The Triumph of Life

The Triumph of Life is written in terza rima, which has three line stanzas (called tercets) and an interlocking rhyme scheme. This form was first used by Dante in his Divine Comedy and used by Petrarch in his Trionfi (Triumphs). Both of these poets influence Shelley, especially in his use of form. Shelley uses terza rima in “Ode to the West Wind,” as well as in The Triumph of Life. The pattern of rhyme in terza rima is ABA BCB CDC, etc., and it connects the tercets. In the first two stanzas, the rhyme words are task/mask, forth/Earth/birth, and the rhyme of snow continues on into the third tercet.

At the end of the first section, there is a four-line stanza with the rhyme scheme ABAB, and the final stanza of two lines was not finished before Shelley died. Some editors do not break up the tercets into stanzas, but the structure remains. The meter of Dante’s work can be contrasted with Shelley’s poem. While Dante’s Italian lines are 11 syllables long, Shelley’s English lines are 10 syllables long. He generally follows iambic pentameter, which has a pattern of unstressed syllables followed by stressed syllables.