Poetry II

Unit 2: Renaissance poetry

Summary and Analysis
Introduction:
      A Valediction : Forbidding Mourning is a personal poem
showing the pure love and devotion of the poet to his beloved. Some
persons feel that the poem is addressed to his wife Anne More. The poet
is about to leave in the end of 1611 for a short visit to France but this
absence of a few weeks may not be taken as an occasion of separation
and lamentation. The poet's wife was in a bad state of health. The poet
shows the uniqueness of true love and that it can stand separation on
account of mutual confidence and affection. This separation may be
deemed like death, but as good men are not afraid of death, true lovers
are not afraid of separation. This is not a farewell to love, but an
exposition of true and devoted love which can stand the shock of
temporary separation, because it is not based on sex or physical
attraction.
The critics differ about the quality and type of argument used by Donne
to console his partner. Helen Gardner thinks that this is "not an
argument to use to a wife who has no need to hide her grief at her
husband's absence," and therefore the poem may be regarded as an
address of a lover to his lady friend. Coleridge, however, remarked : "It is
admirable poem which none but Donne could have written. Nothing was
ever more admirably made than the figure of the compass". Dr." Johnson
disliked the image of the compass and observed : "To the comparison of
a man that travels and his wife stays at home with a pair of compasses, it
may, be doubted whether absurdity or ingenuity has the better claim".
Grierson, however, admired it as the 'tenderest of Donne's love poems'.
In spite of the differences of opinion there is no doubt that the love
mentioned in the poem is pure and realistic.
Summary:
Stanza 1 : Virtuous people who are not afraid of death pass away quietly.
They tell their souls to leave in silence. Their friends may be sad at their
departure and may want them not to die, even so, the virtuous people
gladly and willingly leave the world.
Stanza 2 : So let us part quietly without making any scene. Let us desist
from shedding tears or heaving sighs. It would be a disgrace to our holy
love if we portray it to the common people (This pure and mystic union
cannot be appreciated by the people and hence it should remain hidden
from them.)
Stanza 3 : Earthquakes cause great damage. People are mortally afraid of
them. They estimate the actual damages caused by it or the threatened
damage, if it were to occur. However, the movement of the heavenly
bodies (larger and subject to greater convulsions) does not cause any
damage or destruction. Similarly, their parting should be peaceful and
harmless.
Stanza 4 : The love of lowly worldly people is based on physical
attraction. To them love means sex and as such they cannot stand
separation or absence. This kind of sexual love is unable to accept
separation because the very elements which go into its composition are
physical (like beautiful cheeks and lips). Our love being holy and pure
can stand physical separation.
Stanza 5 : Our love is so pure and noble that we ourselves do not fully
understand its implications. Being independent of physical attraction, it
rests on mutual confidence and faithfulness. It does not mind physical
separation and consequent absence of eyes, lips and hands.
Stanza 6 : Our souls are one in pure love. If I go away from you, it does
not mean separation or break of love. It is rather an extension of love or
like the expansion of a piece of gold beaten to thinness for the sake of,
production of gold leaf.
Stanza 7 : Supposing our souls are not one but two, even so, they are like
the compass. Like the, compass, we have one central point (love) and two
sides (bodies) which move in a circle. The fixed foot of the compass may
not appear to rotate, when the other foot revolves. How ever, when one
foot moves in a circle, the other foot also moves in a point.
Stanza 8. However, one foot of the compass may remain fixed in the
centre. When the other foot revolves, the first foot also leaves and stands
erect after completing its rotation. Then the two feet get closed at the
central point and stand erect. We are now the two feet of the compass
meeting together at the centre of love.

Stanza 9. (The poet now addresses his beloved and bids her good bye, as
he is going to a foreign country). My beloved will be like the fixed foot of
the compass, because she is staying at home. He will be like the other
foot of the compass which revolves in a circle. Even so, the beloved will
incline towards him and her firmness will only strengthen his love. Just
as the revolving foot of the compass returns to the central point after
completing the circle, in the same way the poet shall return to his
beloved. Thus, they will again be united in pure love.

Development of Thought:
 In 'A Valediction : Forbidding Mourning', the poet addresses his beloved
to offer her consolation for his short absence. Just as virtuous men are
not afraid of death, in the same way true lovers are not afraid of
separation: Separation only tests their loyalty and devotion. Ordinary
lovers who are addicted to sex may not be able to stand separation.
Therefore, his beloved should neither shed tears nor heave sighs. This
absence is a sort of touch-stone to test their mutual love. Men are afraid
of earthquakes and the damage caused by them. However, the movement
of the heavenly bodies, though much greater and more violent, is quiet
and harmless. Similarly, ordinary lovers may lament a separation but
their love is so holy and pure that in spite of separation, they have no
feeling of loneliness. Their love is so chaste and refined that physical
absence does not matter to them at all. Their love is not based on
physical enjoyment.
Pure Love:
      The lovers cannot define the nature and essence of their pure love. It
is a refined love of the mind and has nothing to do with the joys of sex.
Their souls are one. Temporary separation cannot cause a breach of love.
Absence extends the domain and expanse of love. Just as gold is beaten
to thinness and its purity is in no way affected, in the same way their
pure love will expand and in no way lose its essence. The lovers are like a
lump of gold and the quality of their love cannot change. The frontiers of
their love will extend and their mutual confidence and loyalty will in no
way be affected.

A Pair of Compasses:
      Donne employs the conceit of 'twin compasses. Their souls may be
two but they are united at a centre like the two sides of a compass. The
soul of the beloved is like the fixed foot of the compass as she stays at
home. The poet's soul is like the other foot of the compass which moves,
so to say in a circle. The fixed foot leans towards the moving foot, and
afterwards, the moving foot rejoins the fixed foot. The rejoining of the
encircling foot suggests the return of the poet to his beloved and their
union - in spite of their separate identities - is the very consummation
and joy of love. The poet proves that in spite of separation, the lovers are
united in mutual affection and loyalty. James Reeves writes in this
connection: "We are like the two legs of a pair of compasses, you are the
fixed one in the centre. Further my soul goes from yours, the more yours
leans towards mine; and as mine comes home, so yours revives. Your
soul is the centre of my being, and keeps mine constant as it circles
round you."

Critical Appreciation:
      The poem consists of nine quatrains and is quite smooth in its
rhythm. However, its images and conceits enrich its significance. The
comparison of separation to death is obvious. Just as good people face
death patiently and quietly, in the same way, true lovers face separation
willingly. Ordinary lovers may view separation as an earthquake because
their love is based on the physical relationship. True lovers are like the
heavenly bodies, the movement of which is greater and violent but
causes no injury or harm. Holy love is not affected by movement or
change of environment. There is another conceit of the gold beaten to
thinness. The quality of the gold remains unaffected though its area and
its dimensions increase. In the same way, the quality of love remains
constant in spite of the extension of the gambit of love. The best conceit
of the stiff twin compasses is extremely appropriate and fits the theme
like a glove. The individuality of the lover is maintained while their basic
unity is symbolised by the screw which fixes the two sides of the
compass. The fixed foot rotates while the moving foot revolves in a circle
and then gets rejoined to the fixed foot. While moving foot
circumscribes, the fixed foot leaves it, showing the mutuality and
interdependence of the two. In this connection A.J. Smith writes:

"The subject of this poem is a metaphysical problem; that of the union of

the lovers even when they are separated. It is in the very respect in which
they are separated, that he wishes to show his lovers are united. The
souls are one substance, which has the invisibility of air, but also the
obvious unity of a lump of gold. It is to stress this last point that the
compasses are brought in. For gold, though originally solid enough, falls
under suspicion of being likely to vanish away, once it has been
compared to air. Compasses do not vanish ; they have not the remotest
connection either with physical or metaphysical subtlety. Hence, once
the needful subtlety has been expanded, they close the poem and
symbolize it - not, however, by their oddity."

      The strength of the poem lies in its argument and the use of
appropriate conceits and images. Sometimes hyperbole is used to
emphasise a point that 'tears' are floods and 'sighs' are tempests. The
poet has been able to prove his point that his absence is no cause for
mourning for his beloved because their love is pure and constant.
Summary
God, who is Love, welcomed me to His feast, but my soul hesitated and
stepped back because of its sense of its own sinfulness and its
unworthiness. God perceived with His quick eyes my hesitation in going
forward in the direction of the feast. He, therefore, came nearer to me
and sweetly asked me if I lacked anything.
I replied that I was not fit to be his guest at the feast and that what I
lacked was any real worth. God said that I was surely fit to be His guest. I
asked how an unsympathetic and thankless man like me could be fit to
sit at His feast as a guest. I told my dear God that I could not even look at
Him because of my sense of shame. Thereupon God took hold of my
hand and smiling, said to me, “do not feel any hesitation in looking at
me. After all, it was I who gave you those eyes, and therefore I bid you
make use of them.”
I said: “It is right. Lord, that you gave me these eyes, but I have been
misusing them and have therefore rendered them unworthy of looking at
you. Let me, therefore, go where I deserve to be because of my sinful
deeds and my sense of shame.” I certainly do not deserve to stay here
with you. God thereupon said: “You know very well that the blame for
your sins is no longer yours because that blame has already been taken
by my son Christ upon, himself. (Christ took upon himself the sins of all
mankind).” I replied: “In that case, my dear God, I shall stay, but only as
a waiter at the dinner table not as a participant because I do not deserve
that honour.” God, who is Love, said: “No you must sit down to dinner as
my guest and you must taste the food which I have to offer.” Thereupon I
sat down and ate the food at God’ s table.
Analysis
In this poem, God is represented as Love, meaning that God is the source
and fountain of all love and that God‘s love for mankind is infinite. God
forgives man for his sins provided man approaches God in a spirit of
remorse, repentance, and humility. God knows that every human being
commits sins, and therefore what God wants is that human beings
should realize their sinfulness and should feel sorry for their sins. The
act of repentance implies spiritual improvement and spiritual progress.
It is only the unrepentant sinner who incurs the wrath of God. The
repentant sinner can be sure of God‘s mercy and forgiveness.
The poem is written in the form of a dialogue between the poet and God,
thus reminding us of the poem which has the title “Dialogue” and which
begins: “Sweetest Saviour, if my soul….”. In other words, the poet here
also is holding a private conversation with God, thus showing an
intimate relationship with Him. We are to imagine, of course, that the
soul of the poet, after the poet‘s death, stands before God, feeling acutely
conscious of its sinfulness. The feast to which the poet‘s soul has been
invited is the one which sinfulness. The feast to which the poet‘s soul has
been invited is the one which God is to hold in Heaven and at which God
himself will serve the guests. This feast should not be confused with the
sacrament in the church, the ceremony known as the Eucharist where
every member of the congregation is served with bread and wine
symbolizing the body and the blood respectively of Christ. This feast
means the heavenly communion which the souls will attend after
departing from the earth.
The dialogue between the poet and God is intended to emphasize the
poet’s sense of his own unworthiness and God’s unlimited capacity for
forgiveness. When the soul of the poet hesitates to advance toward the
feast God speaks encouraging words to the soul. When the poet admits
that he was unkind ad ungrateful and does not, therefore, have the
courage to look at God. God smiles and, taking the poet by his hand, tells
him that the eyes with which the poet is to look at Him were God’s own
gift to him and that the poet should not hesitate to use them. When the
poet says that he has married his eyes by misusing them, God assures
him that his sins, as also the sins of other people, were taken by Christ
upon himself. Indeed, God’s whole attitude here is one of such profound
benevolence that even the reader is overwhelmed. The poem is, indeed,
charged with intense feeling, and that feeling is effectively
communicated to us.
The poem alternates iambic pentameter (a line of verse with five metrical
feet, each consisting of one short(unstressed) syllable followed by one
long (stressed)syllable)and iambic trimeter(a line of verse with three
metrical feet consisting of one short (unstressed) syllable followed by
one long (stressed)syllable). The poem has four stanzas. The first stanza
of the poem contains one line. The second line contains five lines. The
last two lines contain six lines each.
In Love(III) personification and metaphors are used. Personification is a
figure of speech in which something non human is given human
attributes. Metaphor is another figure of speech which makes a
comparison between two things that are unrelated but share some
common characteristics without using like or as. The comparisons
maybe implied or hidden. Love is personified through out the poem.
Love is like another character. A few quotes are “Love bade me welcome,
yet my soul drew back,” (1), “But quick-ey’d Lover observing me grow
slack” (3), and every time Love talked. The metaphor in the poem is
Love. Love can be viewed as god while the guest in the poem is the
author.
The theme in Love(III) is how god, Love, forgives the sinner, the
narrator, and invites him into his house. The narrator was ashamed to be
there because of what he had done but Love just forgave him and invited
him in.
Paradise Lost
Analysis
In the opening section of Book IV, Satan talks to himself, and for the first
time, the reader is allowed to hear the inner workings of the demon's
mind. This opening passage is very similar to a soliloquy in a
Shakespearean drama, and Milton uses it for the same effect.
Traditionally, the soliloquy was a speech given by a character alone on
the stage in which his innermost thoughts are revealed. Thoughts
expressed in a soliloquy were accepted as true because the speaker has
no motive to lie to himself. The soliloquy then provided the dramatist a
means to explain the precise motivations and mental processes of a
character. Milton uses Satan's opening soliloquy in Book IV for the same
purpose.
In his soliloquy, Satan reveals himself as a complex and conflicted
individual. He literally argues with himself, attempting first to blame his
misery on God but then admitting that his own free will caused him to
rebel. He finally concludes that wherever he is, Hell is there also; in fact,
he himself is Hell. In this conclusion, Satan develops a new definition of
Hell as a spiritual state of estrangement from God. Yet even as he
reaches this conclusion, Satan refuses the idea of reconcilement with
God, instead declaring that evil will become his good and through evil he
will continue to war with God. The self-portrait that Satan creates in this
soliloquy is very close to the modern notion of the anti-hero — a
character estranged and alienated who nonetheless will not alter his own
attitudes or actions to achieve redemption from or reintegration with
society at large.
As Satan debates with himself, he is still in the form of a cherub. The
different guises and shapes that Satan assumes become a revealing
pattern in the work. In Book I, Satan appeared almost as he had in
Heaven — a majestic being. Here at the start of Book IV, he is in the form
of a cherub, a much lesser angel. Next, when he leaps the wall into Eden,
he sits in the Tree of Life as a cormorant, a large ravening sea bird that
symbolizes greed. As he explores Eden and observes Adam and Eve, he
takes the forms of a lion and a tiger. Finally, when he is captured
whispering in Eve's ear, he is described as "squat like a toad." The
devolution or degeneration of Satan in these different shapes is readily
apparent. He moves from archangel to lesser angel, from angel to bird —
a creature that still flies. Next he is a lion and a tiger — dangerous beasts,
feared by Man but nonetheless beautiful and noble in bearing. Finally, he
is described as being like the low and homely frog. The idea that evil
corrupts and diminishes is made graphic in Satan's various guises.
Milton goes even further with images of shape shifting. When Zephron
captures Satan squatting like a toad, Satan immediately assumes his
actual shape. Yet, at this point, his real appearance is so changed that
Zephron does not recognize him. The animal forms that Satan has
assumed symbolize the actual degradation that is taking place in both
Satan's physical appearance and moral character. Milton makes the
point that evil is a destructive and degenerative force almost palpable as
he describes the different physical changes that Satan goes through.
While Satan's soliloquy and shape shifting are important, the most
memorable part of Book IV is Milton's description of Eden and the
introduction of Adam and Eve. Eden is described as a garden on a
plateau-like mountain. It is surrounded by a wall and has only one
entrance, guarded by angels. Milton depicts the Garden itself in lush,
sensuous detail with the two trees — the Tree of Life and the Tree of
Knowledge — singled out. The image of Satan sitting in the Tree of Life
in the shape of a cormorant presages the entrance of Death into
Paradise.
A significant aspect of Milton's description of the Garden is the role that
Adam and Eve have there. Their duty is to tend Eden, to keep nature
from running wild. The implication here is that Man brings order to
nature. Nature is beautiful in itself but also without control. Left alone,
the beauty of nature can be lost in weeds, unchecked growth, and decay.
Eve mentions how difficult it is for the two humans to do all that is
necessary. Some commentators see the struggle between Man and
nature as one of the basic themes in all literature. Nature represents the
Dionysian side of the universe, emotional, unrestrained, without law,
while Man represents the Apollonian side, moral, restrained, lawfully
structured. Nature runs rampant: Man civilizes. Milton's description of
the Garden and Adam's and Eve's duties within it bring this Dionysian /
Apollonian contrast into play. Satan's entrance into the Garden shows
that both the natural and civilized aspects of the world can be corrupted
by evil.
Milton also emphasizes the physical nature of the love between Adam
and Eve. Some Puritans felt that sex was part of the fall of man, but
Milton literally sings the praises of wedded love, offering an
Epithalamion or wedding song at line 743. Milton does emphasize the
bliss of wedded love as opposed to animalistic passion, however.
Milton also provides insight into the characters of Adam and Eve. At line
411, Adam reminds Eve of the one charge God has given them — not to
eat from the Tree of the Knowledge of Good and Evil. While this short
speech reminds the reader of what will happen when Satan gains access
to Adam and Eve, it also hints that Adam may think too much about
God's proscription concerning the Tree, since there is no particular
reason for him to bring the warning concerning the tree up at this point
in the poem.
The introduction of Eve even more obviously reveals her character and
points to the future. Eve describes how she fell in love with her own
image when she first awoke and looked in the water. Only the voice of
God prevented this narcissistic event from happening. God turned Eve
from herself and toward Adam. The suggestion here is that Eve's vanity
can easily get her into trouble. Eve's weakness is further indicated in her
relationship with Adam. Adam is superior in strength and intellect while
Eve is the ideal companion in her perfect femininity. This relationship is
sexist by modern standards but reflects the beliefs of Puritan England as
well as most of the rest of the world at the time. Even so, Eve's
dependence on Adam suggests that she could be in trouble if she has to
make serious decisions without Adam's aid. Eve's vanity and feminine
weakness in conjunction with Adam's warning about the Tree of
Knowledge are a clear foreshadowing that Eve will eventually yield to
temptation.
The final scene of Book IV, as Satan confronts Gabriel and a small
phalanx of angels, has received much criticism from commentators.
Milton's description of Satan as he confronts the angels emphasizes the
devil's power and magnificence even in his corrupted state. The scene
seems to call for a battle, but Milton instead produces a deus ex
machina in the form of a golden scale in the heavens. The suggestion
that Satan has been weighed and found wanting causes the great demon
immediately to fly away. The intense drama of the moment fizzles with
the image of the scale and Satan's inglorious departure. Of course,
Milton's point is that the only power of Satan or the angels comes from
God, and, at this moment, God chooses to exert his own power
symbolically. In terms of drama, the ending of Book IV may be
unsatisfying, but in terms of theology, it reminds the reader of where the
real power in the universe resides.
Kubla Khan: Poem Summary 
The poem Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge is in the form of a
dream or vision about a grand palace of a famous ruler of China and its
magical surroundings. Coleridge has constructed the poem into two
parts. The first part describes Kubla Khan’s pleasure-dome and its
beautiful and mesmerizing setting. While the second part describes the
creative power of a poet and his poetry. 
3.1 The First Part of ‘Kubla Khan’ by Coleridge
Kubla Khan, one of the greatest oriental kings, once ordered a
magnificent luxury palace to be built for him in Xanadu on the bank of
the sacred river, Alph. This sacred river flowed through deep and
immeasurable caves in the hill and then, at last, fell into a dark,
subterranean sea. Xanadu was surrounded up to ten square miles by
walls and towers. It had beautiful gardens, winding streams, and trees
bearing sweet-smelling flowers.
There was also a deep mysterious chasm that ran down the slope of  a
green hill across a wood of cedar trees. It was an awe-inspiring place. In
fact, it was as holy and bewitched as the one haunted by a woman
wailing for her demon-lover in the dim light of a waning moon. From
this chasm, a mighty fountain gushed forth at short intervals producing
an incessant roaring sound. The powerful outburst of water threw up
huge fragments of rocks here and there on the earth. They sounded like
the hailstones striking the earth or the grains spreading when separated
from the chaff by a farmer’s flail. 
The sacred river Alph flowed across a five miles long winding course
through woods and valleys. Then, it entered the immeasurable deep
caves and finally sank in the dead sea producing a loud noise. In this
tumult of the river, Kubla Khan seemed to hear the voices of his
ancestors foretelling him of the impending wars. The palace was built
somewhere midway between mighty spring and the caves measureless to
men. Its shadow seemed floating in the middle of the river. From the
palace could be heard the mixed sounds of the water gushing forth from
the spring and the water noisily flowing through the caves. The palace
had sunny domes and caves of ice and its architecture displayed a rare
skill or a miracle.
3.2 The Second Part of ‘Kubla Khan’ by Coleridge
Once in a vision, the speaker saw an Abyssinian girl who was playing on
a dulcimer and singing a sweet song in praise of Mount Abora. If it were
possible for the speaker to revive the sweet melody and music of her
song, it would fill him with divine inspiration and he would feel
enraptured and poetically inspired. With such divine inspiration, he
would write powerful poetry to give a vivid description of Kubla Khan’s
marvelous palace.
The speaker says that his imaginative palace would be so vivid that all
the people who would listen to his songs would see it clearly before their
eyes. They would then think of him as a mighty magician and would ask
others to be cautious of his flashing eyes and floating hair. They would
weave a circle around him three times and close their eyes with holy
dread. Furthermore, they would say that he had been fed on honey-dew
and the Milk of Paradise and warn one another to keep away from him.
4. Critical Analysis: ‘Kubla Khan’ by Coleridge
Kubla Khan is an edifice of the dream or vision of the poet about a grand
palace of a famous ruler of China and its magical surroundings. It is an
examination from a dream-soaked imagination, and at first sight doesn’t
seem to possess any rational viewpoint and logical consistency. It looks
like a procession of images, images colored in rainbow tints and
expressed in the language of hunting melody. The poem also seems to
have no story, no moral, no allegory, and nor even any logical
consistency of ideas.
However, Kubla Khan is rational as well as logical. Both of its parts are
connected to each other in a logical way. The poem is rich in symbolism,
imagery, pictorial quality, and romantic elements. It is, in fact, a poem of
pure romance, in which all the romantic associations—ancient forests,
hills, measureless caverns, music of dulcimer, Milk of Paradise, demon-
lover—are concentrated within a short compass to create a sense of
mystery and awe. Besides, the poem also stands by the sheer beauty of its
shadowy vision, and by the power of its wonderful music.
Kubla Khan: A Poem About Life and Its Complexities
Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge is a poem about life and its
complexities. The pleasure dome, indeed, dominates the poem. Besides,
the setting of the poem is also carefully and vividly described by the poet.
There is a description of a sacred river Alph that runs through ‘caverns
measureless to man’ down to a sunless sea. The area through which it
flows is, however, full of beautiful gardens, aromatic trees, winding
streams, and ancient forests

Theme, Style and Atmosphere of ‘Kubla Khan’ by Coleridge

The major theme of Kubla Khan is the effects of the dream of the
romantic and mysterious on the poet’s mind or the whole being. Then,
there is the theme of man’s interaction with nature and the power of the
poet’s imagination. The imagery and symbolism of the poem, as
discussed above, strongly bring out these themes. The poem belongs to
the dream territory of art; it is a dream and conforms to the laws of
dream-logic, producing a sense of satisfaction by its delicate
suggestiveness. Its precision and clarity, use of highly emotive and
suggestive words, and musical effect present the conjunction of pleasure
and sacredness. 
The poem possesses a dreamlike atmosphere, with dim light or
brightness. The river flows through caves and enters a ‘sunless sea’, a
‘lifeless ocean.’ Moreover, the ‘shadow’ of Kubla Khan’s palace in the
waves is dim, in outline. The icy caverns are at the center of the poem
with their flashy appearance not allowing the eyes to see anything
clearly. In the poem, we do have the ‘sunny’ spots of greenery’ and the
‘green hill,’ but nowhere does the sun shine brightly. 
In a nutshell, Kubla Khan by Samuel Taylor Coleridge leaves a magical
and mesmerizing effect on the readers which they keep on enjoying for
long in their ideas and feelings.  
Analysis- Ode to a nightingale
The "Ode to a Nightingale" is a regular ode. All eight stanzas have ten
pentameter lines and a uniform rhyme scheme. Although the poem is
regular in form, it leaves the impression of being a kind of rhapsody;
Keats is allowing his thoughts and emotions free expression. One
thought suggests another and, in this way, the poem proceeds to a
somewhat arbitrary conclusion. The poem impresses the reader as being
the result of free inspiration uncontrolled by a preconceived plan. The
poem is Keats in the act of sharing with the reader an experience he is
having rather than recalling an experience. The experience is not entirely
coherent. It is what happens in his mind while he is listening to the song
of a nightingale.
Three main thoughts stand out in the ode. One is Keats' evaluation of
life; life is a vale of tears and frustration. The happiness which Keats
hears in the song of the nightingale has made him happy momentarily
but has been succeeded by a feeling of torpor which in turn is succeeded
by the conviction that life is not only painful but also intolerable. His
taste of happiness in hearing the nightingale has made him all the more
aware of the unhappiness of life. Keats wants to escape from life, not by
means of wine, but by a much more powerful agent, the imagination.
The second main thought and the main theme of the poem is Keats' wish
that he might die and be rid of life altogether, providing he could die as
easily and painlessly as he could fall asleep. The preoccupation with
death does not seem to have been caused by any turn for the worse in
Keats' fortunes at the time he wrote the ode (May 1819). In many
respects Keats' life had been unsatisfactory for some time before he
wrote the poem. His family life was shattered by the departure of one
brother to America and the death from tuberculosis of the other. His
second volume of poetry had been harshly reviewed. He had no gainful
occupation and no prospects, since he had abandoned his medical
studies. His financial condition was insecure. He had not been well in the
fall and winter of 1818-19 and possibly he was already suffering from
tuberculosis. He could not marry Fanny Brawne because he was not in a
position to support her. Thus the death-wish in the ode may be a
reaction to a multitude of troubles and frustrations, all of which were
still with him. The heavy weight of life pressing down on him forced
"Ode to a Nightingale" out of him. Keats more than once expressed a
desire for "easeful Death," yet when he was in the final stages of
tuberculosis he fought against death by going to Italy where he hoped the
climate would cure him. The death-wish in the ode is a passing but
recurrent attitude toward a life that was unsatisfactory in so many ways.
The third main thought in the ode is the power of imagination or fancy.
(Keats does not make any clear-cut distinction between the two.) In the
ode Keats rejects wine for poetry, the product of imagination, as a means
of identifying his existence with that of the happy nightingale. But poetry
does not work the way it is supposed to. He soon finds himself back with
his everyday, trouble-filled self. That "fancy cannot cheat so well / As she
is fam'd to do," he admits in the concluding stanza. The imagination is
not the all-powerful function Keats, at times, thought it was. It cannot
give more than a temporary escape from the cares of life.
Keats' assignment of immortality to the nightingale in stanza VII has
caused readers much trouble. Keats perhaps was thinking of a literal
nightingale; more likely, however, he was thinking of the nightingale as a
symbol of poetry, which has a permanence.
Keats' evocative power is shown especially in stanza II where he
associates a beaker of wine "with beaded bubbles winking at the brim,"
with sunny France and the "sunburnt mirth" of the harvesters, and in his
picture in stanza VII of Ruth suffering from homesickness "amid the
alien corn." The whole ode is a triumph of tonal richness of that adagio
verbal music that is Keats' special contribution to the many voices of
poetry.
Prometheus Unbound
Analysis
Panthea and Ione are sleeping outside Prometheus’s cave. They wake to
hear a chorus of spirits passing by. These are the dead Spirits of the
Hours holding a funeral for the King of the Hours. The spirits of the
elements unite with them in a chorus, which is also joined by the “Spirits
of the human mind.” They rejoice that love is no longer “veiled” and that
they now live in “splendor and harmony.” A new age has dawned on
earth—“a Heaven where yet Heaven never could be”—which is free from
“death, chaos, and night.” This age is “called Promethean.”
The fall of Jupiter has led to the death of time. Humanity is now no
longer bound to the conventional passage of time, and death has been
triumphed over and is no longer a source of grief. Unity between nature
and humanity is symbolized by the “spirits of the human mind” and the
elements dancing together. “A Heaven where Heaven never could be”
suggests the Christian idea of the Kingdom of God being made on Earth
after the final judgement, when evil and death will be ultimately
defeated.
The spirits disappear but their song continues to spread through the
world in “Aeolian modulations.” Panthea and Ione see a small, floating
islet, around which a sleeping infant, the Spirit of the Earth, is being
borne in a basket. They see a vision of all the emblems of power and
tyranny in the world abandoned, sunk to the bottom of the sea and
forgotten, as if they had never existed.
“Aeolian modulations” refers to a musical instrument, known as the
aeolian harp, which was commonly used as a symbol of artistic creation
by the Romantic poets. It relates to classical mythology because Aeolus
was the god of the winds, and the aeolian harp produces sound when the
wind blows through it. The Romantics frequently use this as a metaphor
for the influence of nature on poets. Ione and Panthea see a vision of the
forgotten symbols of worldly power, which are now considered
worthless.
The Earth is frenzied with joy over the change that has come over
her. The Moon, conversing with the Earth, confesses that she feels the
change too and that it “penetrates her frozen frame.” The Moon feels her
frozen surface turned to “living fountains” as a spirit of the Earth bursts
out from her and sets plants and flowers growing on the Moon. The
Moon exclaims that it is “love, all love!” The Earth and the Moon are
joined by this spirit and the Earth rejoices that man is transformed into a
“chain of linked thought” which can no longer “be divided,” and that all
“familiar acts are beautiful through love.”
The Earth’s transformation is so powerful that it extends to the Moon,
bringing the infertile, dead planet, back to life so that water begins to
flow on her surface and plants begin to grow. The Moon recognizes that
this change has taken place through love. This change has also produced
total harmony among mankind so that they no longer think as divided
individuals but as one, harmonious collective that acts with wisdom and
love.
Panthea and Ione rise when they hear the voice of
the Demogorgon addressing the world. The Earth and the Moon, voices
from nature, humanity, and the spirits of the living and the dead all reply
that their “great Republic hears.” The Demogorgon announces that the
spirit of “Love, from its awful throne of power” now rules the world and
“bars Destruction’s strength.” The Demogorgon informs the world that if
“the serpent” of destruction should ever be unleashed on the world
again, compassion, forgiveness, and defiance of power are “the spells by
which to reassume an Empire over the disentangled doom” and to lead
man back to “Life, Joy, Empire, and Victory!”
The use of the word “Republic” reflects Shelley’s hopes that republics
based around individuals who rule themselves will replace absolute
monarchies. The passage gestures to the way that Shelley was influenced
by the formation of the Republic of France during the French
Revolution. Love’s throne is described as “awful” because it is so
powerful that it is all consuming and nothing can withstand its power.
This is different from tyranny, because love allows knowledge and
freedom prosper. The serpent symbolizes destruction, hatred, and
violence, and once again refers to the character of Satan, who appears as
a serpent in the biblical Book of Genesis. Although it is not certain that
the world will maintain its state of harmony, the Demogorgon makes it
clear that love will triumph over hatred, and that love is the path back
from these negative emotions if they ever enter the world again.
The Listeners by Walter de la Mare Analysis
As a poet of the supernatural Walter de la Mare emerges as a
worthy disciple of Coleridge. Like Coleridge he avoids crude methods of
treating the supernatural and presents it as a psychic phenomenon. We
do not find in him the blood-curdling descriptions of ghosts and ghouls,
skulls and skeletons. His treatment is subtle, psychological and
gossamer-like like that of Coleridge.
Like Coleridge De la Mare places great importance on the creation of a
suitable atmosphere. This consists in wrapping round the tale shades of
such emotional feeling and apprehension as would make it alien from
the world of known and normal things.
The opening of The Listeners illustrates De la Mare’s art. The locality
chosen for the scene of the poem is a desolate one. None treads on the
forest to which the traveler comes riding; so the forest path is overgrown
with fern. The house at the door of which the traveler knocks has long
been deserted; so creepers have grown on the window-sill and night-
birds have built their nests in it. An unnatural silence prevails all around.
The desolate forest is bathed in the dim moonlight which is proverbially
associated with supernaturalism.
Thus the desolation of the locality, the silence of the night, and the play
of light and shade in the forest (because of the moonlight falling in places
through the leaves of trees) all these create an unearthly atmosphere
which fills our mind with a feeling of expectancy and thrill. And when the
night-bird, startled by the voice of the traveler flies out of the turret just
above the traveler’s head, we are at once seized with an uncanny feeling
like the wondering traveler himself.
Walter de la Mare does not attach the supernatural to anything
concrete and definite. Like Coleridge he invests the supernatural with an
air of suggestion and indefiniteness, which not only stirs the reader’s
imagination, but also throws him into a state of vague fear and suspense.
In the poem nothing is told definitely-everything is kept vague and
shadowy with the result that we are made to move only in an atmosphere
of conjecture. The poet tells us nothing about the traveller who comes
riding to the forest — who he is, from where he comes, why he knocks at
the door thrice, neither more nor less. The lines,
“Tell them I came, and no one answered,
That I kept my word,”
indicate that there was an engagement but nothing is said about the
nature of the engagement. Again, the poet keeps mum about what
happened to the inmates of the house, and who the phantom listeners
are. Everything in the poem is shrouded in mystery. As Monro finely
says, “we are not at all certain whether the traveler, who does speak, be
not the unreality, and the listeners who fail to speak, the reality in the
episode.”
The poem has none of the usual crude paraphernalia of the
supernatural the fearful description of the physical appearance of
ghosts or goblins or skeletons. The supernatural is presented here as a
phenomenon of the mind. The supernatural fear that the traveler
experiences when none responds to his second call is presented through
his mental flurry and uncertainty perplexity and speechlessness. Again,
the traveler cannot see the phantom listeners. He only feels that they are
thronging on the dark staircase, and listening to his voice.
Like Coleridge, De la Mare believes that the world of the
supernatural is situated on the borders of those of the natural. Nature,
palpable, real and familiar has yet in its extreme a somewhat eerie
appeal to us. In The Listeners the poet brings the natural on the verge
of the supernatural. The forest to which the traveler comes riding is
natural indeed, so are the deserted house, dim moonlight, “the forest’s
ferny floor”, the bird flying out of the turret, “leaf fringed sill” and the
silence prevailing all around.
But when the lumped together, these natural objects are so refined and
rendered so strange that we seem to stand on the borders of
the supernatural world. Walter de la Mare has the wonderful power
of bridging the gulf between the world of living beings and the world of
the dead. In the lines,
“But only a host of phantom listeners
That dwelt in the lone house then
Stood listening in the quiet of the moonlight
To that voice from the world of men.”
and
“Tell them I came, and no one answer’d,
That I kept my word.”
the two worlds meet together and act and react on each other. Scott
James’ observation that “his (Mare’s) poetry is always a wonderland
brought to earth or the earth transfigured by wonder-land” is fully
applicable to The Listeners.
Lastly, the poet’s style does much to intensify the supernatural
atmosphere. Such suggestive phrases as “the forest’s ferny floor,”
“leaf-fringed sill”, “empty hall” serve to build up an atmosphere of
desolation, while the expressions like “moon-lit door” “the starred and
leafy sky”, “plunging hoofs” wrap the whole tale in a veil of mystery.
Summary- IF
The poem is a paean to British stoicism and masculine rectitude; almost
every line in each stanza begins with "If". It is subtitled "'Brother Square-
Toes' – Rewards and Fairies". ‘If—’ was written in 1895 and first
published in 1910 in “Brother Square Toes,” a chapter of Rewards and
Fairies. Today, the poem’s philosophical outlook is considered to be one
of the best examples of Victorian stoicism. It provides traditional advice
about how to live a good life with the understanding that one has to
make the most of every minute they have. It requires self-discipline and
a good moral character. But, no matter when the poem was written, it is
still resonant today.
The poem's speaker says that if you can keep your head while those
around you lose theirs; if you can trust yourself when others doubt you;
if you can be patient and not lose your temper; if you can handle being
lied about but not lie yourself, and being hated but not hating yourself; if
you do not look too good or talk too wise:
If you can dream but not let those dreams cloud your reason; if you can
think but still take action; if you can deal with both triumph and disaster;
if you can handle it when others twist your truths into lies, or take the
things you devoted your life to and turn them from broken into alive
again:
If you can take all of your winnings and bet them in one fell swoop and
lose them all and then keep it a secret; if you can use your heart and
muscles and nerves to hold on even when there is only Will left:
If you can remain virtuous among people and talk with Kings without
becoming pretentious; if you can handle foes and friends with ease; if
you see that men count on you but not too much; if you can fill every
minute with meaning:
Then you have all the Earth and everything upon it, and, as the speaker
exultantly ends, "you'll be a Man, my son!"
Analysis
This is, without a doubt, Kipling's most beloved poem, and, along with
"The White Man's Burden", his most famous. Although T.S. Eliot would
deem it only "great verse" and others "jingoistic nonsense," it is
consistently ranked among the highest, if not the highest itself, of
Britons' favorite poems. It was first published in the "Brother Square-
Toes" chapter of Rewards and Fairies, a 1910 collection of verse and
short stories.
While the poem is addressed to Kipling's son John, it was inspired by a
great friend of his, Leander Starr Jameson, the Scots-born colonial
politician and adventurer responsible for what has been deemed the
Jameson raid that led to the Second Boer War. The raid was intended to
start an uprising among the British expatriate workers in the South
African Republic, but there were complications and it was a failure.
Jameson was arrested and tried, but he was already being hailed a hero
by London, which was filled with anti-Boer sentiment. He served only
fifteen months in prison and later became Prime Minister of Cape
Colony back in South Africa. It appears that Kipling had met Jameson
and befriended him through Cecil Rhodes, the Prime Minister of Cape
Colony at the time of the raid.
In his autobiography Something of Myself, Kipling wrote of Jameson
and "If-": "Among the verses in Rewards was one set called `If-', which
escaped from the book, and for a while ran about the world. They were
drawn from Jameson's character, and contained counsels of perfection
most easy to give. Once started, the mechanization of the age made them
snowball themselves in a way that startled me. Schools, and places where
they teach, took them for the suffering Young - which did me no good
with the Young when I met them later. (`Why did you write that stuff?
I've had to write it out twice as an impot.').They were printed as cards to
hang up in offices and bedrooms; illuminated text-wise and anthologized
to weariness. Twenty-seven of the Nations of the Earth translated them
into their seven-and-twenty tongues, and printed them on every sort of
fabric."
"If-" contains a multitude of characteristics deemed essential to the ideal
man. They almost all express stoicism and reserve – the classic British
"stiff upper lip." In particular, a man must be humble, patient, rational,
truthful, dependable, and persevering. His behavior in response to
deleterious events and cruel men is important; he must continue to have
faith in himself when others doubt him, he must understand that his
words might be twisted and used for evil, he must be able to deal with
the highest and lowest echelons of society, and he must be able to
withstand the lies and hatred emanating from others. This group of ideal
characteristics is similar to those expressed in "The Thousandth Man",
another poem dealing with manhood.
The virtues expressed in "If-" are devoid of showiness or glamour; it is
notable that Kipling says nothing of heroic deeds or great wealth or
fame. For him the true measure of a man is his humility and his stoicism.
Kipling's biographer, Andrew Lycett, considers the poem one of the
writer's finest and notes in 2009 that "If-" is absolutely valuable even in
the complicated postmodern world: "In these straitened times, the old-
fashioned virtues of fortitude, responsibilities and resolution, as
articulated in 'If-', become ever more important.”
Wilfred Owen: Poems Summary and Analysis of "Parable of
the Old Man and the Young"
Summary
As the title suggests, this poem is a parable. It’s meant to teach a lesson
or impart information. In this case, it’s meant to teach readers
something about pride and the choices that led up to World War I and
the immense loss of life. Rather than save his son, Abraham decides to
kill him, a choice that signals the willingness of European nations to
discard what should be their most important concern—their children
Abram rises, chops the wood, taking fire and a knife with him. Father
and son journey together, and Isaac, the first-born, asks, as he has
observed the preparations, where the lamb is for the burnt offering.
Abram binds his son and builds up the earthen walls and trenches. He
holds the knife out to slay his son. Suddenly an angel from heaven calls
out and tells him not to touch his son. There is a ram caught by its horns
in a thicket and Abram should use this "Ram of Pride" instead. The old
man decides not to use the ram and slays his son instead; he then slays
half of Europe's young men, "one by one".
Analysis
"Parable of the Old Man and the Young", one of the poems that appears
in Benjamin Britten's War Requiem, takes the biblical story of Abraham
and Isaac and gives it new vitality and resonance in the context of the
First World War. It was published posthumously by Siegfried Sassoon in
1920 in Owen's collected poems. Owen wrote this poem sometime in
early 1918 and sent it to the poet Osbert Sitwell. Sitwell had written a
poem entitled "The Modern Abraham" where Abraham is a wealthy arms
manufacturer who prides himself on having sent off one of his sons to
fight and die, and says he would gladly send his ten other sons to fight as
well. Owen may have been influenced by this work.
The poem is written in iambic pentameter but uses blank verse rather
than traditional rhyme. This metre gives the poem its solemn, preachy
quality; it is intended to be a parable and surely succeeds as one. Owen's
customary pararhyme pops up here as well ("together, father"). The
poem does a good job of hewing to a narrative flow even though it
possesses an irregular sound pattern. The language is closest to the text
from the King James Version of the Bible.
In the biblical version (Genesis 1-19), Abram takes his son Isaac up into
the mountains and prepares his sacrifice. It is to be Isaac, and Abram is
anguished. He is just about to take his son's life in order to fulfill God's
command when an angel appears and tells him to stay his hand. A ram
caught in a nearby thicket is sacrificed instead. In Owen's poem, there
are a few modern touches that ground it in the context of WWI. Abram
builds "parapets and trenches" and holds Isaac down with "straps and
belts". Where the poem most markedly deviates from the biblical story is
when the angel instructs Abram to sacrifice the "Ram of Pride" instead of
Isaac, but the old man slays his son anyway and then, in one of the most
memorable and disconcerting lines in Owen's oeuvre, also slays "half the
seed of Europe, one by one".
It is commonly assumed that Abram stands for the rulers of Europe and
Isaac is a typical soldier, representative of all the young men slaughtered
so such rulers could play out their games of conquest. Rather than slay
their own pride, the military machine sacrificed the next generation.
Owen's poem may be traditional in its structure, but the seething
commentary is certainly not ambiguous. Scholar Andrew Gates writes,
"Owen’s poem is not one of idealized glory and divine mystery, but an
account of true and bitter reality of his day."
The poem also points to perhaps a different conception of God than
Owen had previously expressed in other poems. The angel, the
mouthpiece of God, orders Abram to stop. It is clear that Abram defies
God and continues his warmongering. God here is much different than
the God of "Soldier's Dream", in which the Archangel Michael repairs
weapons destroyed by Jesus in the quest for peace. Owen's perversion of
a biblical story also serves to contradict the glory and justification of the
nobility of war, cloaked in what Owen called "false creed". (See Analysis
of "Le Christianisme")
Tennyson's Poems Summary and Analysis of "Tithonus"
Tithonus speaks to his beloved, the goddess Eos (or Aurora). The woods
are decaying, men work the land but then die and lie beneath it, and the
swan dies after many years. Tithonus, however, lingers on in “cruel
immortality.” He has become immortal, but he is old, withering in the
arms of his beloved on the eastern edge of the world, and feeling like a
wandering shadow.
He was once a man, he says, feeling “glorious in his beauty” and in being
chosen by this goddess. He asked for immortality, and she got it for him,
yet he still aged and aged. Meanwhile she is eternally young, so their
existence is “immortal age beside immortal youth.” Is her love enough to
overcome this horror? Why should anyone want this kind of special
treatment and avoid the normal death of mortals?
When a soft breeze parts the clouds, Tithonus can see the Earth below.
He sees the glimmer in his beloved’s brow, her cheeks reddening, her
eyes brightening, at the prospect of bringing dawn with her horses and
chariot.
The constant renewal of the dawn brings her to tears when she looks at
Tithonus in contrast. Tithonus is afraid that it will be true that “the Gods
themselves cannot recall their gifts,” that his situation will continue
forever.
He remembers, as if from another life or as another man, when he used
to love the experience of the dawn: the outline forming around her, the
“sunny rings” of hair, his own blood glowing as the day would warm, the
feeling of the dawn kissing him. She would whisper something
otherworldly, like “that strange song I heard Apollo sing / While Ilion
like a mist rose into towers.”
He asks her to release him and restore him to mortality and the grave
because his nature can never truly mix with hers. He experiences the
coolness of her “rosy shadows” while the men below are still warmed by
the day. These men are happy and possess “the power to die,” and are
even happier in death. By letting him go, she would still be able to see his
grave eternally. By returning to the Earth he would forget “these empty
courts,” while she would continue to bring the dawn on her silver wheels.
Analysis
Tennyson first wrote “Tithonus” in 1833 as a pendant (companion) poem
to parallel “Ulysses.” Tithonus achieves immortality, but not the kind
that Ulysses desires. While Ulysses wants to stay alive in order to keep
adventuring, ready to fight his next battle despite his old age, Tithonus is
stuck in the eternal cycle of the dawn and becomes weaker and colder the
longer he lives. While his beloved is happy to go through the same
motions day after day, Tithonus (like Ulysses) understands that mortals
are built for something else—to live and then to die. With no vision of
new adventures ahead, (unlike Ulysses), Tithonus is ready to die.
Like “Ulysses,” “Morte d’Arthur,” and “Tiresias,” “Tithonus”
memorializes and expresses Tennyson’s feelings about the death of his
close friend Arthur Henry Hallam. It is suggested that he comprised this
poem after hearing his fiancée’s comment, “None of the Tennysons ever
die.” The poem was changed slightly and published in 1859 in Cornhill
Magazine, edited by William Makepeace Thackeray.
The poem is a dramatic monologue spoken by Tithonus, primarily to his
beloved, Eos, goddess of the dawn (Aurora in Roman myth). It is seven
stanzas in blank verse, and its meter is iambic pentameter, perhaps
reflecting the unnatural combination of mortal and immortal. There are
no heroic (rhyming) couplets, unless one counts the two lines ending
with the same word,
To dwell in presence of immortal youth, / Immortal age beside immortal
youth,
which emphasizes the contrast between them.
The poem’s tragic situation is based on the Greek myth of Tithonus of
Troy and Eos. Tithonus was not entirely human, being the son of King
Laomedon of Troy by a water nymph. In the myth, Eos kidnapped him
and asked Zeus for Tithonus to receive eternal life, but she neglected to
stipulate eternal youth. Thus, Tithonus grows older and withers away
without ever dying. In later versions he becomes a cicada who begs to
die. Tennyson’s poem is also indebted to The Fall of Hyperion by John
Keats, in which Moneta has a similar fate.
In Tennyson’s poem, Tithonus is the one who requested immortality. He
seems to have wanted it for no other purpose than to keep admiring Eos
and being admired by her. Though he also was proud of his beauty, he
did not think to ask for eternal youth. Thus began the unintended
consequences of missing an essential technicality. He is utterly miserable
that he cannot partake in the death that is the due of every mortal.
People who know they will die will live a different kind of life, perhaps a
happier one, and they are all the happier for achieving their natural end
when they die (without reference to whatever may happen after that).
Thus “Tithonus,” like “Ulysses,” is a crisis lyric, though the crisis is
different. Here death is to be desired, not feared, since it is part of the
natural cycle of mortal species. Tithonus rejects the ever-freshness of the
dawn cycle of a goddess in favor of absorption into the life-and-death
cycle of mortal species. Understanding this point of view clarifies why, in
the first stanza, Tithonus admires the swan who dies; he sees his kind of
immortality, rather than death, as “cruel.”
One critic, William Flesch, writes that “time is the name for the pressure
of eternity, not ephemerality, for a future that will be endless and
endlessly more bleak.” This is Tithonus’s experience with time, unlike
that of Eos, who brightens up to bring the same dawn to the world over
and over again. Her time cycle is truly circular, while his remains linear.
He does not properly participate in her natural rhythm, nor does he
participate in the kind of human aging that leads properly to death
(whether or not one’s existence then opens out into something else).
This problem is understood by Eos: he continually asks her for release
from his imprisonment in his withering body, and she answers with tears
but no help. Arthur D. Ward notes,
Tithonus is trapped, but the reader is not. We are those happy mortals
who can choose the life of Ulysses or, if we lack ambition, the quiet
confines of daily routine. We can enjoy the feeling of the dawn each
morning, at least for the days we have left.
Robert Browning: Poems Summary and Analysis of "My Last
Duchess"
Summary
The poet’s inspiration for this poem came from the Duke and Duchess
Ferarra. The Duchess died under very suspicious circumstances. She was
married at fourteen and dead by seventeen. Browning uses these
suspicious circumstances as inspiration for a poem that dives deep into
the mind of a powerful Duke of Ferarra who wishes to control his wife in
every aspect of her life, including her feelings.
Browning, of the Victorian age, wrote real-life poetry that reflected upon
some of the darkest aspects of Victorian life. One of those aspects, of
course, is the treatment of wives by their husbands. Everyone is familiar
with Henry the VIII and his many wives whom he accused and executed
when he tired of him. Robert Browning reveals that this mentality was
widespread during this time. Wives were viewed as disposable, and their
husbands would often accuse them to do away with them when they
desired to marry someone else. The life of a Victorian wife was a perilous
one.
At the poem's opening, the duke has just pulled back a curtain to reveal
to the envoy a portrait of his previous duchess. The portrait was painted
by Fra Pandolf, a monk and painter whom the duke believes captured
the singularity of the duchess's glance. However, the duke insists to the
envoy that his former wife’s deep, passionate glance was not reserved
solely for her husband. As he puts it, she was "too easily impressed" into
sharing her affable nature.
His tone grows harsh as he recollects how both human and nature could
impress her, which insulted him since she did not give special favor to
the "gift" of his "nine-hundred-years-old" family name and lineage.
Refusing to deign to "lesson" her on her unacceptable love of everything,
he instead "gave commands" to have her killed.
The duke then ends his story and asks the envoy to rise and accompany
him back to the count, the father of the duke's impending bride and the
envoy's employer. He mentions that he expects a high dowry, though he
is happy enough with the daughter herself. He insists that the envoy walk
with him "together" – a lapse of the usual social expectation, where the
higher ranked person would walk separately – and on their descent he
points out a bronze bust of the god Neptune in his collection.
Analysis
"My Last Duchess," published in 1842, is arguably Browning's most
famous dramatic monologue, with good reason. It engages the reader on
a number of levels – historical, psychological, ironic, theatrical, and
more.
The most engaging element of the poem is probably the speaker himself,
the duke. Objectively, it's easy to identify him as a monster, since he had
his wife murdered for what comes across as fairly innocuous crimes. And
yet he is impressively charming, both in his use of language and his
affable address. The ironic disconnect that colors most of Browning's
monologues is particularly strong here. A remarkably amoral man
nevertheless has a lovely sense of beauty and of how to engage his
listener.
In fact, the duke's excessive demand for control ultimately comes across
as his most defining characteristic. The obvious manifestation of this is
the murder of his wife. Her crime is barely presented as sexual; even
though he does admit that other men could draw her "blush," he also
mentions several natural phenomena that inspired her favor. And yet he
was driven to murder by her refusal to save her happy glances solely for
him. This demand for control is also reflected in his relationship with the
envoy. The entire poem has a precisely controlled theatrical flair, from
the unveiling of the curtain that is implied to precede the opening, to the
way he slowly reveals the details of his tale, to his assuming of the
envoy's interest in the tale ("strangers like you….would ask me, if they
durst, How such a glance came there"), to his final shift in subject back
to the issue of the impending marriage. He pretends to denigrate his
speaking ability – "even had you skill in speech – (which I have not),”
later revealing that he believes the opposite to be true, even at one point
explicitly acknowledging how controlled his story is when he admits he
"said 'Fra Pandolf' by design" to peak the envoy's interest. The envoy is
his audience much as we are Browning's, and the duke exerts a similar
control over his story that Browning uses in crafting the ironic
disconnect.
In terms of meter, Browning represents the duke's incessant control of
story by using a regular meter but also enjambment (where the phrases
do not end at the close of a line). The enjambment works against the
otherwise orderly meter to remind us that the duke will control his
world, including the rhyme scheme of his monologue.
To some extent, the duke's amorality can be understood in terms of
aristocracy. The poem was originally published with a companion poem
under the title "Italy and France," and both attempted to explore the
ironies of aristocratic honor. In this poem, loosely inspired by real events
set in Renaissance Italy, the duke reveals himself not only as a model of
culture but also as a monster of morality. His inability to see his moral
ugliness could be attributed to having been ruined by worship of a "nine-
hundred-years-old name.” He is so entitled that when his wife upset him
by too loosely bestowing her favor to others, he refused to speak to her
about it. Such a move is out of the question – "who'd stoop to blame this
kind of trifling?" He will not "stoop" to such ordinary domestic tasks as
compromise or discussion. Instead, when she transgresses his sense of
entitlement, he gives commands and she is dead.
Another element of the aristocratic life that Browning approaches in the
poem is that of repetition. The duke's life seems to be made of repeated
gestures. The most obvious is his marriage – the use of the word "last" in
the title implies that there are several others, perhaps with curtain-
covered paintings along the same hallway where this one stands. In the
same way that the age of his name gives it credence, so does he seem fit
with a life of repeated gestures, one of which he is ready to make again
with the count's daughter.
And indeed, the question of money is revealed at the end in a way that
colors the entire poem. The duke almost employs his own sense of irony
when he brings up a "dowry" to the envoy. This final stanza suggests that
his story of murder is meant to give proactive warning to the woman he
is soon to marry, but to give it through a backdoor channel, through the
envoy who would pass it along to the count who might then pass it to the
girl. After all, the duke has no interest in talking to her himself, as we
have learned! His irony goes even further when he reminds the envoy
that he truly wants only the woman herself, even as he is clearly stressing
the importance of a large dowry tinged with a threat of his vindictive
side.
But the lens of aristocracy undercuts the wonderful psychological nature
of the poem, which is overall more concerned with human contradictions
than with social or economic criticism. The first contradiction to
consider is how charming the duke actually is. It would be tempting to
suggest Browning wants to paint him as a weasel, but knowing the poet's
love of language, it's clear that he wants us to admire a character who
can manipulate language so masterfully. Further, the duke shows an
interesting complication in his attitudes on class when he suggests to the
envoy that they "go Together down," an action not expected in such a
hierarchical society. By no means can we justify the idea that the duke is
willing to transcend class, but at the same time he does allow a
transgression of the very hierarchy that had previously led him to have
his wife murdered rather than discuss his problems with her.
Also at play psychologically is the human ability to rationalize our hang-
ups. The duke seems controlled by certain forces: his own aristocratic
bearing; his relationship to women; and lastly, this particular duchess
who confounded him. One can argue that the duke, who was in love with
his "last duchess,” is himself controlled by his social expectations, and
that his inability to bear perceived insult to his aristocratic name makes
him a victim of the same social forces that he represents. Likewise, what
he expects of his wives, particularly of this woman whose portrait
continues to provide him with fodder for performance, suggests a deeper
psychology than one meant solely for criticism.
The last thing to point out in the duke's language is his use of
euphemism. The way he explains that he had the duchess killed – "I gave
commands; Then all smiles stopped together" – shows a facility for
avoiding the truth through choice of language. What this could suggest is
that the duchess was in fact guilty of greater transgression than he
claims, that instead of flirtation, she might have physically or sexually
betrayed him. There's certainly no explicit evidence of this, but at the
same time, it's plausible that a man as arrogant as the duke, especially
one so equipped with the power of euphemism, would avoid spelling out
his disgrace to a lowly envoy and instead would speak around the issue.
Finally, one can also understand this poem as a commentary on art. The
duke remains enamored with the woman he has had killed, though his
affection now rests on a representation of her. In other words, he has
chosen to love the ideal image of her rather than the reality, similar to
how the narrator of "Porphyria's Lover" chose a static, dead love than
one destined to change in the throes of life. In many ways, this is the
artist's dilemma, which Browning explores in all of his work. As poet, he
attempts to capture contradiction and movement, psychological
complexity that cannot be pinned down into one object, and yet in the
end all he can create is a collection of static lines. The duke attempts to
be an artist in his life, turning a walk down the hallway into a
performance, but he is always hampered by the fact that the ideal that
inspires his performance cannot change.
God's Grandeur by Gerard Manley Hopkins: Summary
and Critical Analysis
The sonnet God's Grandeur by Gerard Manley Hopkins stresses the
immanence of God. The whole universe is an expression of God’s
greatness, but man fails to recognize it. Though the soil is bare and
smeared with man’s toil, there is a constant renewal or natural beauty
because God continues to 'brood' over the world.
In this sonnet, Hopkins praises the magnificence and glory of God in the
world, blending accurate observation with lofty imagination. The world
is filled with the greatness of God. God’s glory expresses itself in two
ways. Sometimes it flames out with sudden brightness when a gold foil is
shaken. At other times, the poet thinks of an olive press, with the oil
oozing (flowing out) from the pressed fruit. It oozes from every part of
the press in a fine film and then the trickles gathers together to form a
jar of oil. In the same way, the grandeur of God is found everywhere,
trickling from every simple thing in a created universe and accumulating
to form greatness. The poet wonders why people do not care about God’s
rod. People pursue their worldly activities without any thought of God’s
will and without the fear of god’s anger.
Generations of human beings have followed the same worldly path and
have become so habituated to it that they don’t know its uselessness. It
has become monotonous due to lack of the divine will. The world has
been degraded and made ugly by commercial activity and by hard work
aimed at worldly gains. The world bears the marks of man’s dirt and
gives out man’s bad smells. The beauty of nature is spoiled by man’s
industrial activity and the sweet smell of nature has been drowned in the
bad smells that come from machines. The earth is now bare, having lost
all living beauty. Man is insensitive to this bareness. Because of the
shoes, he can’t feel whether the earth is soft or hard.
In spite of man’s activities tending to destroy the beauty of Nature, it is
inexhaustible. At the bottom of the world there is freshness. This
freshness never disappears. When spring comes nature renews itself and
thus shows underlying freshness. And although the sun goes down the
western sky and the earth is plunged in darkness, the next day will dawn
and the sun will be rising again in the eastern sky. Just as a dove with its
warm breast broods over its young ones in its nest, so the Holy Ghost
broods protectively over the world which is bent in sleep and
forgetfulness.
The repetition of the words ‘have trod’ captures the mechanical forces in
verse because of their heavy accents. What is sometimes called the ‘daily
grind’ is the repetitive thump in which the feet of generation march on;
and the ‘trod… trod… trod’ sets up the three beat rhythm of the next line:
‘seared… bleared… smeared! ‘Seared’ means ‘dried up’ or it can mean
‘rendered incapable of feeling’. ‘Bleared’ means ‘blurred with
inflammation of the eyes’ and ‘smeared’ means ‘rubbed over with dirt’.
They suggest that there is no delicacy of feeling or perception in the
world. The whole world has been degraded and made ugly by
commercial activity and by toil aimed at monetary gains.
A Critical Analysis of Sailing to Byzantium
“Sailing to Byzantium” is a poem written by 1923 Nobel Laureate
W.B.Yeats in the year 1926. Two years hence it was first published in the
1928 collection ‘The Tower.’ One of Yeat’s most inspired works and one
of the greatest poems of the twentieth century, it tells about the
psychological sufferings of the old aged speaker. Body, art and spirit fuse
in the poem as the old man attempts to find some way to move out and
away from the agony of the ageing body.
Yeats, a pillar of both, the Irish and the British, literary establishments,
was a symbolist poet, influenced by France and an imagist. His works are
laid with allusive imagery and symbolic structures. Being a master of
traditional forms, and with a keen interest in mystic beauty of art and
culture, Yeats uses Byzantium, as a symbol for a place of refuge for the
spiritual escape. The aged speaker wishes to and psychologically does,
land into “the holy city of Byzantium,” the then known Constantinople,
as the present place is “no country for old men.”
Yeats’s picture of old age is expressed beautifully in “Sailing to
Byzanytium.” In the first stanza, Yeats speaks of a place that is “no
country for old men.” In this country, the young, along with “fish, flesh,
or fowl” engage in the procreative, generative energy of summer. Caught
up in “sensual music,” the inhabitants of this country do not consider
intellectual or spiritual concerns. Rather, they are caught up in life itself,
not considering that which is eternal.
Yeats reminds readers, however, that whatever is “begotten” and “born”
ultimately dies. This is the country of fleshly incarnation, the country of
life, but also a place where the joy of life opposes the certainty of death. A
country such as this is no place for an old man moving inexorably toward
death. Yeats continues his exploration of old age in the second stanza,
presenting an image of an old man as a scarecrow, “a tattered coat upon
a stick.” This empty vessel is no more than a “paltry thing” without the
singing of his soul. Through the soul’s singing, Yeats believes, he can
create art, something that will survive physical death. He says, therefore,
that he has sailed to Byzantium, a place where he will be able to learn the
art of singing. Byzantium, now known as Istanbul, serves an important
symbolic function in this poem.
Yeats expresses a growing concern with the problem age and the attitude
appropriate to it. Old age, according to Yeats in the poem "Sailing to
Byzantium", is a time to leave behind e sensual mire of the dying
generations and to contemplate on the “artifice of eternity”. Old age is
useless if at that time one does not respond to spirituality, or the souls
claps and songs.
The opening stanza gives a richly concrete picture of instinctive life with
the images of sensual delight occupying the young of all species that sing
out of excitement. But they express the world of flux and death in
perpetual motion. The old man has no place amidst this "sensual music".
The only justification of old age is the contemplation of those artifacts
which proclaim the glory of the spirit and unageing intellect above the
transitory song of the body. Thus the poet in his old age makes his
voyage to Byzantium-a journey from the sensual to the spiritual world.
There he will choose the form of a golden bird whose song will be totally
different from the "sensual music" of birds in the former country. Sailing
to Byzantium can be interpreted as a journey from the sensual to the
spiritual world. But there is much more involved in this complex poem.
It symbolizes a psychological change from a mentality which values the
pleasure of sexuality and the flesh, to one which values things of the
mind, the spirit and the soul. "The poem can be taken on a number of
levels-at the transition from sensual art to intellectual art: as the poet's
new and brilliant insight into the nature of Byzantine imagination; and
as the poet's coming to terms with age and death", as Cleanth Brooks
observes.
The poem’s major theme is the transformative power of art; the ability of
art to express the ineffable and to step outside the boundaries of self.
Some concrete details of the poem might be read autobiographically,
such as the speaker’s desire to leave his country, references to himself as
an old man, “a tattered coat upon a stick”, and having a heart “sick with
desire”. The speaker feels the desire to sail to Byzantium and
metaphorically to transcend the sensual music of Ireland. He wants to
transform his own consciousness and find mystical union with the
golden mosaics of a medieval empire. “Sailing to Byzantium” explores
many levels of aesthetic, spiritual, and intellectual transformation
through which the poet’s journey starts far beyond his native land.