Sonnets of Four Centuries

from an academic standpoint obviously most of the sonnets are ‘good', they have been hand picked by an expert in the field (who offers super useful and insightful introduction/notes/footnotes, imo you should read introduction>general notes for the section ur on>intro notes for the particular poet>then go through the sonnets one by one, reading as hale advises and going through the notes for the particular sonnet after you have enjoyed it yourself. or just read it however you like, it doesn't affect me.) from a personal standpoint my favourites were: “That time of year” + “My love is as a fever” (Shakespeare), “Batter my heart” (!!!) (John Donne), ‘On First Looking into Chapman's Homer' (Keats), “School parted us” (George Eliot, maybe my number 1?), and all of Hopkins (particularly ‘God's Grandeur', ‘The Windhover: To Christ our Lord', and ‘That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of the comfort of the Resurrection'), because they make me smile :)).