Also 7 sonnettier, 8– sonnetteer. [ad. It. sonettiere (f. sonetto sonnet), or f. SONNET sb. + -EER.] A composer of sonnets; freq. in disparaging sense, a minor or indifferent poet.
α. 1665. Dryden, Indian Emp., Epil. He first thinks fit no Sonnettier advance His censure, farther than the Song or Dance. Ibid. (1678), All for Love, Pref. B ij b. Our little Sonnettiers who follow them, have too narrow Souls to judge of Poetry.
1753. Gray’s Inn Jrnl. (1756), I. 307. I … was a Witness to the Mischief which was occasioned by the polite Sonnetteers.
1791. W. Gifford, Baviad, 45. And laugh to scorn th’ eternal sonnetteer.
1839. Hallam, Hist. Lit., II. v. § 76. The English sonnetteers deal less in customary epithets.
1872. Blackie, Lays Highl., Introd. 42. In this matter I am neither a speculative reasoner, nor a sentimental sonnetteer.
β. 1677. Wycherley, Pl. Dealer, I. i. The Noble Sonneteer wou’d trouble thee no more with his Madrigals.
1711. Addison, Spect., No. 160, ¶ 1. I have heard many a little Sonneteer called a fine Genius.
a. 1763. Shenstone, Economy, III. 109. How shall I sing the various ill that waits The careful sonneteer?
1835. Edin. Rev., LX. 359. She is one of the best of the Italian sonneteers.
1877. Mrs. Oliphant, Makers Flor., i. 14. The elaborate sonnet put forth avowedly to a little quaint, old-world company of answering sonneteers.
transf. 1824. Miss Mitford, Village, Ser. I. (1863), 63. No cuckoos (that ever I should miss that rascally sonneteer!).
Hence Sonneteeress. nonce-word.
1822. Blackw. Mag., XII. 657/1. Our songstresses,… sonneteeresses, or other ‘buildresses of the lofty rhyme.’
