A March Day in London
Jewish not accepted in English society
Sexuality
One sided loce
Sufferings disease suicide
Written in the victorian but the qualities of a wordsworthian poem
Amy Levy
The east wind blows in the street to-day;(shelley’w ww)
The sky is blue, yet the town looks grey.(romanticism)
'Tis the wind of ice, the wind of fire,(paradox)
Of cold despair and of hot desire,
(paradox)
Which chills the flesh to aches and pains,
And sends a fever through all the veins.
From end to end, with aimless feet,
All day long have I paced the street.
My limbs are weary, but in my breast
Stirs the goad of a mad unrest.
I would give anything to stay
The little wheel that turns in my brain;(mental anguish)
The little wheel that turns all day, (anaphora)
That turns all night with might and main.(alliteration)
What is the thing I fear, and why? (Rhetorical)
Nay, but the world is all awry-The wind's in the east, the sun's in the sky.
The gas-lamps gleam in a golden line;(alliteration)
The ruby lights of the hansoms shine, (chariot)(light imagery)
Glance, and flicker like fire-flies bright;
The wind has fallen with the night,
(beginning of
peace. When the town is asleep)
And once again the town seems fair
Thwart the mist that hangs i' the air.
And o'er, at last, my spirit steals
A weary peace ; peace that conceals(oxymoron or
epithet)
Within its inner depths the grain (enjambment)
Of hopes that yet shall flower again.
transferred
Ends with hope like te romantics. Beautiful visual imagery.
Amy Levy was born on November 10, 1861 into a bourgeois
Jewish family. She grew up in Clampham, London with her seven
siblings. Amy’s Father, Lewis Levy, was a export merchant while
her mother, Isabelle Levy, stayed home to raise the children. When
Amy was fourteen years old she attended Brighton High School
Girls’ Public Day School Trust. In her high school years Amy
showed a great amount of literary talent. In 1889 Amy was the first
Jewish woman to attend Newnham College, Cambridge. While at
college Amy was involved in some personal drama that some say
was a one-sided love affair. When Amy graduated from college
she explored the continent of Europe. After exploring she wrote
two of her best works, Reuben Sachs and Xantippe. Soon the
popularity of the books and people always wanting her around
didn’t help with Amy’s depression. The problems that led to her
depression were the controversy over one of the books she had
written. She became seriously depressed after her brother, Alfred,
died from syphilis. Also she was depressed from being diagnosed
with increasing deafness. On September 10, 1889, two months
before turning 28, Amy took her own life by inhalation of carbonic
gasses. Throughout her short lived life Amy had her ups and her
downs, her depression and great moments, heartbreak and love
struck, but she always found a way to express the feelings on
paper.
All throughout life some people look for their soul mate or
one true love. In most cases people do find their one true love, but
Amy Levy never found her true love. “…The little wheel that turns
in my brain; the little wheel turns all day…” (Whittington). Amy is
referring to how she was always wondering about how she cannot
find true love. Amy was not like other women, Amy loved women,
she did not care what people had to say about her sexuality. At first
Amy thought she could not fall in love because she was Jewish and
she was not accepted in society. Later in life Amy finally figured
out that the women she fell in love with were not physically
attracted to her. After her final heartbreak Amy accepted herself
for being Jewish. She used her search for true love as a muse for
her poetry. Amy was never able to find her one true love for life,
but going through much heartbreak inspired her to write out her
feelings.
In life usually when a person loves someone the feeling is
mutual. Amy Levy had trouble finding the one person that loved
her back. When Amy was 25 she was exploring her sexuality and
suddenly fell head over heels in love with a woman named Violet
Page. Soon after meeting Violet, Amy would often write letters to
her mother stating how much she loved Violet and wanted to be
with her forever. However Violet did not feel the same, written in a
letter to her brother Violet stated “I have asked Miss Levy. I don’t
love her, but she is a poor little person and clever.” It took Amy
time to recover from Violet breaking her heart. Then in 1887 Amy
Levy crossed paths with another woman whom Amy was
immediately attracted to. Dorothy Blomfield was also a poet and a
fiction writer. Amy was personally and physically attracted to Miss
Blomfield. After meeting Dorothy, Amy traveled through Europe
for a couple of years and when she returned she hope for a
romantic reuniting with Dorothy. Also like Violet, Dorothy had no
physical attraction to Amy. In the end Amy learned to accept
herself and soon gave up on love. Even though she gave up trying
to find love, she still showed her love for writing.
People are usually born with the talent to be a great athlete or
intellectual. Also, people often either love math or literature. Amy
was the person that was intellectual and loved literature. She
showed a love for literary work when she was just in high school.
In 1881 when Amy was in college she wrote a small pamphlet of
poems called Xantippe and Other Verse. This pamphlet was
written from the point of view of Socrates; the Greek philosophers
wife. Xantippe was strong in the rhetoric, dialectic, and pathos.
Then in 1888 Amy’s first novel Romance of a Shop was published.
In the novel Amy took aim at a certain audience and absolutely
nailed it. Another important novel written by Amy in 1889 was
Reuben Sachs. In the story Reuben Sachs, Amy writes about the
women in the Anglo-Jewish community. After writing Reuben
Sachs, Amy was thrown into a hectic schedule and lifestyle. Amy
was always attending parties and meeting new literary
acquaintances. Then Amy found out she had illnesses such as a eye
infection and increasing deafness. To Amy that made her feel as if
she would have a lonely future and go completely mad. On
September 10, 1889 Amy committed suicide by inhaling carbon
monoxide from a charcoal fire. Amy was only 27 and was well on
her way to become a well known poet due to her love and talent in
literature.
Even though Amy had a tragic death she really showed her
literary talent throughout her books and poems. Living only to be
27, Amy accomplished a great deal. She wrote two well-known
novels and over 30 poems. Going through heartbreak made Amy
realize she had to accept herself for who she was. Amy levy was a
Jewish poet who used her hope to find true love, turmoil in her
love life, and her passion for writing to create poetry that was
tragic yet inspiring.