Book excerpt: Moore (English, Marshall U.) analyzes and contextualizes the Petrarchan love sonnet sequences of Gaspara Stampa, Louise Labe, Lady Mary Wroth, Charlotte Smith, Elizabeth Barrett Browning, and Edna St. Vincent Millay. Close readings of the poems are accompanied by theory and criticism regarding constructs of women, historical events, and biographical material, illuminating the poets, Petrarchism as a convention, ideas about women, and the range and limitations of female roles as erotic subjects and objects. Annotation copyrighted by Book News Inc., Portland, OR