“Nuns Fret Not At Their Convent’s Narrow Room” is a Petrarchan sonnet by the English poet William Wordsworth, first published in 1807 in a two-volume edition of Wordsworth's poetry. The poem's speaker argues that constraint—like that of the small room in a convent—can paradoxically offer a feeling of liberation. In the same vein, the speaker continues, the seemingly rigid sonnet form itself, with its strict rhythms and rhymes, can be a place of artistic experimentation and freedom.
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The Full Text of “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room”
1Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow room;
2And hermits are contented with their cells;
3And students with their pensive citadels;
4Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom,
5Sit blithe and happy; bees that soar for bloom,
6High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells,
7Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells:
8In truth the prison, into which we doom
9Ourselves, no prison is: and hence for me,
10In sundry moods, ’twas pastime to be bound
11Within the Sonnet’s scanty plot of ground;
12Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be)
13Who have felt the weight of too much liberty,
14Should find brief solace there, as I have found.
The Full Text of “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room”
1Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow room;
2And hermits are contented with their cells;
3And students with their pensive citadels;
4Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom,
5Sit blithe and happy; bees that soar for bloom,
6High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells,
7Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells:
8In truth the prison, into which we doom
9Ourselves, no prison is: and hence for me,
10In sundry moods, ’twas pastime to be bound
11Within the Sonnet’s scanty plot of ground;
12Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be)
13Who have felt the weight of too much liberty,
14Should find brief solace there, as I have found.
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“Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room” Summary
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“Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room” Themes
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Restriction, Freedom, and Poetry
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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room”
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Lines 1-3
Nuns fret not at their convent’s narrow room;
And hermits are contented with their cells;
And students with their pensive citadels; -
Lines 4-5
Maids at the wheel, the weaver at his loom,
Sit blithe and happy; -
Lines 5-7
bees that soar for bloom,
High as the highest Peak of Furness-fells,
Will murmur by the hour in foxglove bells: -
Lines 8-9
In truth the prison, into which we doom
Ourselves, no prison is: -
Lines 9-11
and hence for me,
In sundry moods, ’twas pastime to be bound
Within the Sonnet’s scanty plot of ground; -
Lines 12-14
Pleased if some Souls (for such there needs must be)
Who have felt the weight of too much liberty,
Should find brief solace there, as I have found.
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“Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language
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Repetition
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Asyndeton
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Alliteration
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Consonance
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Caesura
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Enjambment
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Parallelism
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Metaphor
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“Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room” Vocabulary
Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.
- Fret
- Hermit
- Cells
- Pensive
- Citadel
- Blithe
- Peak of Furness-fells
- Foxglove
- Sundry
- Solace
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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room”
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Form
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Meter
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Rhyme Scheme
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“Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room” Speaker
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“Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room” Setting
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Literary and Historical Context of “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room”
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More “Nuns Fret Not at Their Convent’s Narrow Room” Resources
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External Resources
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More on the Lake District — Learn more about the Lake District, the area where some of Romanticism's biggest names lived and worked.
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More on Wordsworth — Find a treasure trove of Wordsworth resources at the British Library.
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The Poem Aloud — Listen to a reading of the poem.
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A Wordsworth Biography — Read more about Wordsworth's life and work.
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Preface to the Lyrical Ballads — Read the Preface to Wordsworth and Coleridge’s Lyrical Ballads—a groundbreaking work that remains one of the most important treatises on English literature.
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LitCharts on Other Poems by William Wordsworth
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