Poetry Notes©
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Introduction
Irony
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 1
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 2
Shakespeare’s Sonnet 62
Emily Dickinson’s 'I dwell in possibility'
:‫الجزء األول‬
‫ قصيدة‬-‫ قصائد شكسبير‬-‫ السخرية‬-‫(المقدمة‬
)‫إميلي ديكنسون‬
2015
Poetry
By Dr. OSAMA TAHA (PhD)
For courses only, contact:
01115859130
1.Introduction:
Reading poetry is part attitude and part
technique. Curiosity is a useful attitude,
especially when it is free of preconceived ideas
about what poetry is or should be. Effective
technique directs your curiosity into asking
questions, drawing you into conversation with the
poem. Since the form of the poem is part of its
meaning (for example, features such as repetition
and rhyme may amplify or extend the meaning of a
word or idea, adding emphasis, texture or
dimension), we believe that questions about form
and technique provide an effective point of entry
for
interpretation.
To
ask
some
of
these
questions, you will need to develop a good ear
for
the
musical
qualities
of
language,
particularly how sound and rhythm relate to
meaning.
Prior assumptions such as- the readers should
understand the poem from their first reading, the
poem has only one meaning and the poem can mean
anything the readers want it to mean- are wrong.
William Carlos Williams addresses his wife in his
poem "January Morning":
All this—
was for you, old woman.
I wanted to write a poem
that you would understand.
For what good is it to me
if you can't understand it?
But you got to try hard—
Williams admits in these lines that poetry is
often difficult. He also suggests that a poet
depends on the effort of the reader; somehow, the
reader must 'complete' what the poet has begun.
Reading poetry is a challenge, but like so many
other things, it takes practice, and your skills
improve as you progress.
Literature is the sharing of experience, and
successful poems welcome you in, revealing ideas
that you not have been foremost in the writer's
mind in the moment of composition. Poems speak to
us in many ways. Sometimes the poem suggests an
experience, idea, or feeling that you know but
cannot express directly.
Reading the poem usually starts with the
title. The title may give you an image or an
association to start with. Looking at the poem's
shape, you can see whether the lines are
continuous or broken into groups (stanzas). You
can also know whether some words rhyme or not and
whether some lines have a rhythm that is distinct
from the rest of the poem. Lines are often
determined by meaning, sound and rhythm, breath
or typography. Most poems can be interpreted
without the help of historical context. To
understand a poem, you can ask yourself the
following questions:
Who is the speaker?
What circumstances gave rise to the poem?
What situation is presented?
Who is the audience?
What is the tone?
What is the form of the poem?
How is form related to content?
What is the role played by sound in the poem?
Does the poem use imagery to achieve a
particular effect?
If the poem has a question, what is the
answer?/ If the poem has an answer, what is the
question?
What does the title suggest?
Does the poem use unusual words or use words
in an unusual way?
2.Irony:
Irony is a figure of speech in which words
are used in such a way that their intended
meaning is different from the actual meaning of
the words. It may also be a situation that may
end up in quite a different way than what is
generally anticipated. In simple words, it is a
difference
between
the
appearance
and
the
reality.
Types of Irony
On the grounds of the above definition, we
distinguish two basic kinds of irony i.e. verbal
irony and situational irony. A verbal irony
involves what one does not mean. When in response
to a foolish idea, we say, “what a great idea!”
it is a verbal irony. A situational irony occurs
when, for instance, a man is laughing at the
misfortune of the other even when the same
misfortune, in complete unawareness, is befalling
him.
Examples
1. We come across the following lines in
Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet”, Act I,
Scene V.
“Go ask his name: if he be married.
My grave is like to be my wedding bed.”
Juliet commands her nurse to find out who
Romeo was and says if he were married, then her
wedding bed would be her grave. It is a verbal
irony because the audience knows that she is
going to die on her wedding bed.
2. Irony examples are not only found in
stage plays but in poems too. In his poem
“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”,
Coleridge wrote:
“Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.”
In the above stated lines, the ship, blown by
the south wind, is stranded in the uncharted sea.
Ironically, there is water everywhere but they do
not have a single drop of water to drink.
Consider the poem "Dead Boy" by Ransom. The
speaker ironically undercuts any tendency toward
sentimentality, describing a boy not heroic,
talented, or beloved by the community; his
disposition seems more “stormy” than sunny. At
times his mother called him a sword beneath her
heart, but her bitter weeping shows deep love for
him.
Having approached raw emotion in describing
the
mother’s
grief,
however,
the
speaker
immediately retreats to ironic discussion of
changed attitudes toward the child; death has
transformed a squealing, pasty-faced pig into a
“little man,” and in his face, the speaker
professes to see family resemblance.
Sonnet 1
From fairest creatures we desire increase
William Shakespeare
In the first quatrain of Shakespeare's
Sonnet 1, the speaker explains to the young man
that humanity’s wish is that pleasant people will
reproduce children: “From fairest creatures we
desire increase.” The speaker likens the young
man’s beauty to a rose, whose beauty will never
die if he produces little roses or children. He
reminds the young man that he will age and “by
time decease” but if he produces a child, his
memory will be able to live on: “His tender heir
might bear his memory.”
In the second quatrain, the speaker chides
the young man saying he is only interested in his
own beauty; he is conceited and self-indulgent:
“But thou contracted to thine own bright eyes, /
Feed’st thy light’s flame with self-substantial
fuel.” And according to the speaker, the young
conceited
man
is
causing
“a
famine
where
abundance lies”: instead of there being one young
person of such beauty, there could be many, if
only the young adult would marry and produce
others that would be as beautiful as he is. And
in being so selfish, the young man is his own
enemy and ultimately being cruel to himself:
“Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.”
In the third quatrain, the speaker tries to
convince the young man of his selfishness by
reminding again him that as only one person,
“only herald to the gaudy spring,” he is hiding
his value: “Within thine own bud buriest thy
content.” He calls the young man a “tender churl”
and reminds him that he is wasting himself by
continuing to remain so self-important: “And,
tender churl, mak’st waste in niggarding.”
In the couplet, “Pity the world, or else
this glutton be, / To eat the world’s due, by the
grave and thee,” the speaker asks the young man
to take pity on the world, because he is
consuming what the world should have by lavishing
all his attention on himself. And then the
speaker reminds the young man that if he does not
produce heirs he will find himself alone with
grave in the end.
Sonnet 2
William Shakespeare
When forty winters shall beseige thy brow,
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
This
sonnet
belongs
to
the
“marriage
sonnets”; the speaker in each of these sonnets is
trying to persuade a young man to marry. When
forty years have made your brow wrinkled with
age, and you are showing all the other signs of
aging. The pride and greatness of your youth, so
much admired by everyone now will be worth as
little as a tattered weed. Then, when you are
asked 'where is your beauty now?' and, 'where is
the treasure from your days of merriment?' You
must say, within your own eyes, now sunk deep in
their sockets, where lies a shameful confession
of greed and self-obsession. If you would have
only put your beauty to a greater use. If only
you could answer 'This fair child of mine Shall
give an account of my life and prove that I made
no misuse of my time on earth. 'Proving that his
beauty, because he is your son, was once yours!
This child would be new-made when you are
old, and you would see your own blood flow warm
through him when you are cold.
The speaker presents a problem (the young man
is going to get old) and then offers a solution
(having kids). He exaggerates the problem,
wrinkles turn into "trenches" (line 2). Then he
makes his solution sound really great, promising
that having a child will be like being born
again: "This were to be new made when thou art
old" (line13).
We want all beautiful creatures to reproduce
themselves so that beauty’s flower will not die
out; but as an old man dies in time, he leaves a
young heir to carry on his memory. But you,
concerned only with your own beautiful eyes, feed
the bright light of life with self-regarding
fuel, making beauty shallow by your preoccupation
with your looks. In this you are your own enemy,
being cruel to yourself. You who are the world’s
most beautiful ornament and the chief messenger
of
spring,
are
burying
your
gifts
within
yourself. And, dear selfish one, because you
decline to reproduce, you are actually wasting
that beauty. Take pity on the world or else be
the glutton who devours, with the grave, what
belongs to the world.
This sonnet opens with a metaphor that
compares the way time wears away a person's face
to the way an army attacks a castle. The
personification is seen in the
metaphor: "deep
trenches in thy beauty's field" which can be seen
as wrinkles in a beautiful face. This gives
readers a picture of the old age that has yet to
come for some. The man's beauty will be lost and
become like a "tattered weed." "Will be a
tatter'd weed, of small worth held" unless he
reproduces. This is a metaphor. We imagine "alleating shame" being a Monster, just gobbling up
everything around it. There's a little bit of
personification here, since Shakespeare gives
shame a human or animal quality to suggest that
it is powerful and dangerous. For the whole poem
the rhyme scheme would be: ABABCDCDEFEFGG.
William Shakespeare
Sonnet 62
Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
Helen Vendler sees the speaker of the poem as
harshly
criticizing
his
own
weakness
and
foolishness, but for most critics the poem is
lighter in mood. Though it echoes other poems in
the sequence which present the connections
created by love as painful, in this poem, the
presence of the beloved is comforting rather than
terrifying.
Sonnet 62 explores themes of self-love and
seeing the love in yourself– is there really a
difference? The speaker admits he is extremely
vain person, proud both of his outward form and
personality. This sin, furthermore, is so deeply
rooted that he believes it can’t ever be removed.
However, upon seeing his face in the mirror, it
disgusts him. Surely loving such a face would be
a sin. In fact, the thing the speaker truly loves
about himself is his possession of the youth; his
beauty is derived from the part of the young man
he possesses.
The poem depends on wordplay such as
“chopped with tanned antiquity” which describes
the speaker’s face as scarred, wrinkled (like
tanned leather). Another example is “painting my
age” which could also refer either to gilding an
aged countenance with associations to a younger
handsomer man, to verbal descriptions, (word
paintings), or to the use of cosmetics. The
entire couplet may be paraphrased: “I praise
myself, because in doing so I praise you, as if
painting myself in colors borrowed from you”’.
The sin of self-love conditions everything I
see, and my entire soul, and every one of my
faculties. And there’s no remedy for this sin,
it’s so deeply rooted in my heart. I keep
thinking that no-one’s face is as gracious as
mine is; no body as well-proportioned. I regard
myself as surpassing everyone else in everything.
But when my mirror shows me what I’m really like
– beaten and creased by aging and the sun – I
conclude the exact opposite to what my self-love
tells me. To love myself so much would be a
disgrace. It’s you, myself, that I’m really
praising when I praise myself, giving my old age
the beauty of your youth.
The conceit of the poem is derived most
nearly from Petrarch; however, the idea of lovers
who have in some sense exchanged souls is
commonplace and proverbial. The connected theme-the speaker's unworthiness compared to his
beloved--is likewise traditional.
(466)
Emily Dickinson
I dwell in Possibility –
A fairer House than Prose –
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) is the major
American poetess of the 19th century. She was the
daughter of a respectable family of Amherst, a
small town in Western Massachusetts. Death is the
main theme of Emily Dickinson's poetry. She
always personifies death as a king.
The speaker tells us that she lives in a
house with lots of doors and windows, which just
so happens to be a way prettier house than
"Prose." So we assume this house is a metaphor
for poetry. The speaker goes on to describe her
poetry-house with lots of nature imagery. It's
got trees for rooms and the sky for a roof. She
ends by telling us how awesome the visitors to
the house (readers of her poetry) are. Then she
tells us that writing poems—or the life of the
mind—is the best way she knows to reach for the
divine.
This poem is about Dickinson’s vocation as a
poet, which she compares favorably to prose,
largely through the metaphor of the two as
houses. She sees poetry as open and limitless (“I
dwell in Possibility”) and more beautiful (“A
fairer House than Prose”) than the more limited
prose (“More numerous of Windows–/Superior – for
Doors”).
“I dwell in Possibility“is deeply interested
in the power gained by a poet through their
poetry. In the first stanza, the poem seems to
just be about poetry as a vocation as opposed to
prose, and is explicit in comparing the two. The
metaphors and similes used make it so that poetry
is possibility, poetry is more beautiful, poetry
has more doors and windows open for access, for
different perspectives and interpretations, while
prose by default, then, is more closed and
limited and homely.
In the second stanza, the extended metaphor
changes slightly, so that we see that though
poetry is a house, it is also a garden and part
of nature, in the guise of the sky-roof,
completing
it.
This
sky-roof
also
again
emphasizes poetry’s limitlessness, as there is no
upper boundary except the seemingly endless sky.
Poetry’s visitors, that is, the readers, are
the fairest, both in beauty and in judgment, and
they are able to move easily in and out of this
open, welcoming house, with its numerous doors
and windows. The mention of the visitors is
essential. Both the poet and the reader are
equally welcome in this house, and the great
number of possible entrances and exits means that
both poet and reader can choose to interpret it
in different ways.
The final three lines of the poem make the
poet’s power clear. Her “Occupation,” her task is
this wonderful task of “spreading wide [her]
narrow
Hands
/
To
gather
Paradise”.
The
capitalization of “Hands,” here, so close to
“Paradise,” gives the poet’s hands a limitless
quality. This shows how the role of the poet is a
creator.
Robert Frost
“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”
On the surface, this poem is simplicity
itself. The speaker is stopping by some woods on
a snowy evening. He or she takes in the lovely
scene in near-silence, is tempted to stay longer,
but acknowledges the pull of obligations and the
considerable distance yet to be traveled before
he or she can rest for the night. The poem
consists of four (almost) identically constructed
stanzas. Each line is iambic, with four stressed
syllables.
Within the four lines of each stanza, the
first, second, and fourth lines rhyme. The third
line does not, but it sets up the rhymes for the
next stanza. For example, in the third stanza,
queer, near, and year all rhyme, but lake rhymes
with shake, mistake, and flake in the following
stanza. The notable exception to this pattern
comes in the final stanza, where the third line
rhymes with the previous two and is repeated as
the fourth line.
Like the woods it describes, the poem is
lovely but entices us with dark depths—of
interpretation, in this case. It stands alone and
beautiful, the account of a man stopping by woods
on a snowy evening, but gives us a come-hither
look that begs us to load it with a full
inventory of possible meanings. We protest, we
make apologies, we point to the dangers of
reading poetry in this way, but unlike the
speaker of the poem, we cannot resist.
The last two lines a strong claim to be the
most celebrated instance of repetition in English
poetry: “And miles to go before I sleep”. For the
last “miles to go” now seems like life; the last
“sleep” now seems like death.
The basic conflict in the poem, resolved in
the last stanza, is between an attraction toward
the woods and the pull of responsibility outside
of the woods. What do woods represent? Something
good? Something bad? Woods are sometimes a symbol
for wildness and madness. But these woods do not
seem particularly wild. They are someone’s woods,
someone’s in particular—the owner lives in the
village. But that owner is in the village on
this, the darkest evening of the year—so would
any sensible person be. That is where the
division seems to lie, between the village (or
“society,” “civilization,” “duty,” “sensibility,”
“responsibility”) and the woods (that which is
beyond the borders of the village and all it
represents). If the woods are not particularly
wicked, they still possess the seed of the
irrational; and they are, at night, dark—with all
the varied connotations of darkness.
‫ شرح جميع المواد ومن أول الترم‬: ‫الكورس الشامل‬
Poetry Notes©
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The Theme of Time in English Poetry
The Theme of Death in English Poetry
Emily Dickinson’s "I heard a fly buzz"
Emily Dickinson’s "Because I couldn't
stop for death"
 John Crowe Ransom’s "Dead Boy"
 John Crowe Ransom’s "Bells"
‫الجزء الثاني‬
- ‫ فكرة الموت في الشعر االنجليزي‬/ ‫(فكرة الزمن‬
‫قصائد إميلى ديكنسون – قصائد جون‬
)‫كرو رانسوم‬
2015
Poetry Part 2
3.Time
Time is one of the major themes of English
poetry. It is said that it has neither a
beginning nor an end. Yet men are able to measure
it as years, months, days, hours, minutes and
seconds. They have also given meanings to the
words – past, present and future. True, time has
a meaning. The entire creation moves on according
to a time pattern. There is birth, growth and
death. There is time for everything. Plants
flower and give fruits. Seasons come according to
time. A child is born, grows into boyhood,
adolescence, youth, middle age and old age
according to age and time. Two poems that deal
with the concept of time that I actually enjoyed
reading and will compare to each other are "When
forty winters shall besiege thy brow" and "All
the World's a Stage" by Shakespeare.
In the first poem, Shakespeare deals with the
effect of time on his friend. When forty years
have made your brow wrinkled with age, and you
are showing all the other signs of aging. The
pride and greatness of your youth, so much
admired by everyone now will be worth as little
as a tattered weed. Then, when you are asked
'where is your beauty now?' and, 'where is the
treasure from your days of merriment?' You must
say, within your own eyes, now sunk deep in their
sockets, where lies a shameful confession of
greed and self-obsession. If you would have only
put your beauty to a greater use. If only you
could answer 'This fair child of mine Shall give
an account of my life and prove that I made no
misuse of my time on earth. 'Proving that his
beauty, because he is your son, was once yours!
This child would be new-made when you are
old, and you would see your own blood flow warm
through him when you are cold.
In the second poem, "All the World's a
Stage," William Shakespeare deals with the theme
of time and its effect on man. The first stage of
life is that of an infant crying in the nurse's
arms. An infant is helpless and is totally
dependent on others. The second stage is that of
childhood which is also the school going age.
The poem gives the picture of a bright eyed boy
with a shining morning face with his school bag
reluctantly drag himself to school.
The third
stage is that of adolescence, when a man plays
the part of a lover. He is attracted towards
women and composes poems to describe and glorify
his lover. He experiences the emotions of joy,
passion, disappointment and anxiety in this
difficult period of life.
The fourth stage is that of adult or
manhood.
The poem mentions the example of an
arrogant soldier who wears shaggy beard that
makes him look like a fierce leopard.
He is
bold, brave, ambitious and full of energy. He is
eager to establish a status in society. He is
quick to defend his honour and fiercely guards
his reputation.
He is ready to risk
and
sacrifice his life in the battlefield and seeks
glory, fame and recognition. The fifth stage is
the middle age. This is the stage when a man is
more grounded in life. He is no more impulsive
and the experiences in life makes him a mature
and balanced person. He is content with life
which reflects in his attire, behavior and
conversation.
The sixth stage of life is the phase when a
man starts to grow old. He becomes physically
weaker and his mind becomes duller with the
assault of time. He looks silly and funny with
spectacles in his nose and slippers on his
feet. He becomes frail and thin. He wears an illfitting pair of trousers. His manly voice has
become shrill and feeble like a child's voice.
The seventh and the final stage is when a man
grows extremely old and senile. This last stage
depicts the final stage of man on earth.
It
brings an end to his presence on earth and speeds
up his journey towards his death.
4.Death
Death is an aspect of life that everyone
becomes acquainted with sooner or later. It is
one of the major themes of poetry. Poetry is
something that is very difficult for me to
follow, but when it deals with concept that I am
familiar with, then I am able to associate with
the soul of the writer. Two poems that deal with
the concept of death that I actually enjoyed
reading and will compare to each other are "Dead
Boy" by John Crowe Ransom and "Because I couldn't
stop for death" by Emily Dickinson.
“Dead Boy” deals with the intrusion of death
into a rural community. The poem’s form is
conventional: quatrains rhyming abab or cdcd. The
relatively prosaic title, “Dead Boy,” sets the
serious tone. The speaker breaks with the
sentimental tradition, using understatement to
distance both speaker and reader from emotional
involvement in the death of this unnamed child.
No attempt is made to describe the grief of the
boy’s extended family (county kin) and neighbors;
instead, the reader learns that they “do not
like” what has happened. Thus, the reader is led
to examine this death with detachment, and the
full emotional impact is saved for the final
stanza and the speaker’s conclusions about this
“deep dynastic wound.”
The speaker ironically undercuts any tendency
toward sentimentality, describing a boy not
heroic, talented, or beloved by the community;
his disposition seems more “stormy” than sunny.
At times his mother called him a sword beneath
her heart, but her bitter weeping shows deep love
for him.
Having approached raw emotion in describing
the
mother’s
grief,
however,
the
speaker
immediately retreats to ironic discussion of
changed attitudes toward the child; death has
transformed a squealing, pasty-faced pig into a
“little man,” and in his face, the speaker
professes to see family resemblance.
The speaker shifts from this little man to
focus on the “elder men” of the community, who
represent age and its accompanying loss of
vitality. Uncomfortable remaining in the house,
these men congregate outside, exchanging rumors
in an unsuccessful attempt to deal with their
deep dynastic wound, the loss of a male heir to
carry on the family name.
Death is the main theme of Emily Dickinson's
poetry. She always personifies death as a king.
In
this
poem,
Dickinson’s
speaker
is
communicating from beyond the grave, describing
her journey with Death, personified, from life to
afterlife. In the opening stanza, the speaker is
too busy for Death so Death—“kindly”—takes the
time to do what she cannot, and stops for her.
This “civility” that Death shows in taking time
out for her leads her to give up on those things
that had made her so busy so they can just enjoy
this carriage ride.
In the third stanza we see reminders of the
world that the speaker is passing from, with
children playing and fields of grain because she
has stopped being an active agent, and is only
now a part of the landscape. In this stanza,
after the realization of her new place in the
world, her death also becomes suddenly very
physical, as she explains that her dress is only
gossamer, and her “Tippet,” a kind of cape
usually made out of fur, is “only Tulle.”
The carriage pauses at her new “House.” The
description of the house makes it clear that this
is no cottage, but instead a grave.
(591)
By Emily Dickinson
I heard a Fly buzz - when I died The Stillness in the Room
The theme of this poem is death. But Emily
Dickinson deals with theme in a very strange
manner. The very first line strikes us because it
is very strange: “I heard a Fly buzz - when I
died -”. Death is, of course, a very serious
matter; but the poem does not deal with it
seriously. The mention of a fly buzz during one's
death is, of course, funny. The poet says that
she heard a fly buzz when she died. That is why
critics disregarded such poems as too humorous to
be serious.
The poet, then, describes the stillness that
accompanies death. There is stillness in the
room. People are still; they are waiting for her
to die. It is a very special moment—the stillness
of the people is accompanied by the stillness of
the atmosphere. Everybody has shed so many tears
that eyes become dry. They are holding their
breath waiting whether she will give the spirit
or not. It is a moment of great agony. The eyes
of the people around her are waiting for her
death.
The breaths of people are gathered for the
last journey, the journey of immortality. The
word 'Onset' is capitalized because it refers to
immortality. People will witness the King,
meaning death, in the room. This is, of course, a
personification in which death is likened to a
king. Everyone in the room is waiting for the
king of death.
The person dying has written her will and has
signed away on what she can sign. In fact, she is
very poor. She has signed on almost nothing. In
the middle of this very serious situation, a fly
interfered: “and there it was/There interposed a
Fly”. The fly kept on buzzing by fits and starts.
The word 'blue' is very significant because it
shows that the buzz was restless. The fly has
interfered between her and the light—immortality.
This is, of course, a metaphor. The moment of
death disappeared and she could not see to see,
i.e. paradise or immortality. The first see
refers to sight, whereas the second refers to
insight.
The sort of humor in this poem is black
humor. The dashes in the poem refers to emotional
breaks. The fly which is a very insignificant
creature is a symbol of distraction. Many people
are distracted from their aims in life by
insignificant
things.
The
poem
shows
Miss
Dickinson's violation of correct structure as in
“Signed away /What portion of me be Assignable”.
The speaker says that she heard a fly buzz as
she lay on her deathbed. The room was as still as
the air between “the Heaves” of a storm. The eyes
around her had cried themselves out, and the
breaths were firming themselves for “that last
Onset,” the moment when, metaphorically, “the
King / Be witnessed—in the Room—.” The speaker
made a will and “Signed away / What portion of me
be / Assignable—” and at that moment, she heard
the fly. It interposed itself “With blue—
uncertain stumbling Buzz” between the speaker and
the light; “the Windows failed”; and then she
died (“I could not see to see”).
“I heard a Fly buzz” employs all of
Dickinson’s
formal
patterns:
trimeter
and
tetrameter iambic lines (four stresses in the
first and third lines of each stanza, three in
the second and fourth, a pattern Dickinson
follows at her most formal); rhythmic insertion
of the long dash to interrupt the meter; and an
ABCB rhyme scheme. Interestingly, all the rhymes
before
the
final
stanza
are
half-rhymes
(Room/Storm, firm/Room, be/Fly), while only the
rhyme in the final stanza is a full rhyme
(me/see). Dickinson uses this technique to build
tension; a sense of true completion comes only
with the speaker’s death.
Emily Dickinson
"Because I could not stop for Death"
In “Because I could not stop for Death—,” we
see death personified. He is no frightening, or
even intimidating, but rather a courteous and
gentle guide, leading her to eternity. The
speaker feels no fear when Death picks her up in
his carriage, she just sees it as an act of
kindness, as she was too busy to find time for
him.
In
this
poem,
Dickinson’s
speaker
is
communicating from beyond the grave, describing
her journey with Death, personified, from life to
afterlife. In the opening stanza, the speaker is
too busy for Death (“Because I could not stop for
Death—“), so Death—“kindly”—takes the time to do
what she cannot, and stops for her.
This “civility” that Death shows in taking
time out for her leads her to give up on those
things that had made her so busy—“And I had put
away/My labor and my leisure too”—so they can
just enjoy this carriage ride (“We slowly drove –
He knew no haste”).
In the third stanza we see reminders of the
world that the speaker is passing from, with
children playing and fields of grain. Her place
in the world shifts between this stanza and the
next; in the third stanza, “We passed the Setting
Sun—,” but at the opening of the fourth stanza,
she corrects this—“Or rather – He passed Us –“—
because she has stopped being an active agent,
and is only now a part of the landscape.
In this stanza, after the realization of her
new place in the world, her death also becomes
suddenly very physical, as “The Dews drew
quivering and chill—,” and she explains that her
dress is only gossamer, and her “Tippet,” a kind
of cape usually made out of fur, is “only Tulle.”
After this moment of seeing the coldness of
her death, the carriage pauses at her new
“House.” The description of the house—“A Swelling
of the Ground—“—makes it clear that this is no
cottage, but instead a grave. Yet they only
“pause” at this house, because although it is
ostensibly her home, it is really only a resting
place as she travels to eternity.
The final stanza shows a glimpse of this
immortality, made most clear in the first two
lines, where she says that although it has been
centuries since she has died, it feels no longer
than a day. It is not just any day that she
compares it to, however—it is the very day of her
death, when she saw “the Horses’ Heads” that were
pulling her towards this eternity.
John Crowe Ransom
"Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter"
This Ransom poem is, as its title suggests,
a miniature but highly traditional elegy. The
five quatrains follow, as a structure, the threestage progression which is a convention of the
genre: from statement or indication of occasion
of grief to expression of grief and from thence
to reconciliation to or transcendence of grief.
But also its elegiac form underlines what is
impressive about it: how subtly it shows us the
disconnect between the world of children and the
world of adults. "Bells" is about the funeral of
a little girl, but its slow, stately quatrains
put it squarely in the perspective of the adult
funeral-goer.
The middle stanzas are an attempt to enter
the world of the little dead girl, isolated to a
single memory of the girl chasing a troupe of
geese. The vocabulary is Romantic, in the King
Arthur sense: She "took arms" against them; they
"cried in goose, Alas;" her wars were "bruited,"
a word that has a distinctly archaic flavor.
Ransom packs so much in these phrases. There is
the unmistakable sense of adventure that colors
the games of childhood, but to express them in
such terms is to speak as an adult about things
that are, as a child, mostly indescribable. In
other words, the girl may have experienced this
sense of adventure, but she certainly never
connected it to the word "Alas. Whatever our
first impressions, the speaker is decidedly not
admitted into the little girl's consciousness and
is only guessing at things.
In death, she has become a "brown study"
(another phrase severe in its maturity) and lost
those hallmarks of childhood: "such speed," "such
lightness in her footfall," her "tireless heart."
In death, she has more in common with her
onlookers, who like she are "sternly stopped."
The speaker's reaction at this is remarkably
cold, not grief but astonishment, vexation.
"Bells" is an elegy strangely devoid of sadness,
and what of it is there seems to be more over the
loss of childhood than of a child. Grief is only
implied, like a footnote.
The whole poem, in fact, is wholly not about
what it seems. The stronger grief is that the
girl's death foretells our own, which, as we
ourselves are so removed from her fleetness and
mired in our own immobility, is unthinkably near.
"Dead Boy" by John Crowe Ransom
The little cousin is dead, by foul subtraction,
A green bough from Virginia's aged tree
John Crowe Ransom's "Dead Boy" is a poem
about the different opinions in society regarding
a child's death. This child while living, built
himself many reputations among the town's people.
None of the members of society felt it was their
duty to help or inform this child of the path he
was taken. However, when he dies some criticize
his life and feel the need to criticize his
actions in life. While all the time knowing they
did nothing to change his path. Others feel
sorry, but are just as guilty for not helping a
child who might have had a future. Instead he is
lying in a coffin dead. Society is left to wonder
whether his death was necessary?
The first part of the poem discusses the
feelings of his kin. They feel uncomfortable with
his death. Also there are others that do not like
the child's unnecessary death. These are the
people who did not ever meet or see the child but
realize what kind of a tragedy this death was.
Ransom makes a statement at the end of the first
paragraph "Nor some of the world of outer dark,
like me". This is a strong statement for the
simple fact that this shows how much of the town,
city, world is affected by one child's death.
This next part is by far the harshest. The
voices are that of the town's people who say this
child was helpless. His death was felt as the
only alternative to some. He was called "a black
cloud full of storms too hot for keeping". Just
as in Mother Nature the people felt that this
child could not be controlled. The following line
however is one of the most emotional. It talks of
how his mother still weeps for her dead child.
This is a reaction of any mother who cared for
her child. These people have to see her weep, yet
still talk of a horrid child. This is an
unjustifiable act on their part. The part that is
probably the most sincere is that of the elder
men. They speak of the child's death hurting
their hearts.
“Dead Boy” deals with the intrusion of death
into a rural community. The poem’s form is
conventional: quatrains rhyming abab or cdcd. The
relatively prosaic title, “Dead Boy,” sets the
serious tone. The speaker breaks with the
sentimental tradition, using understatement to
distance both speaker and reader from emotional
involvement in the death of this unnamed child.
No attempt is made to describe the grief of the
boy’s extended family (county kin) and neighbors;
instead, the reader learns that they “do not
like” what has happened. Thus, the reader is led
to examine this death with detachment, and the
full emotional impact is saved for the final
stanza and the speaker’s conclusions about this
“deep dynastic wound.”
The speaker ironically undercuts any tendency
toward sentimentality, describing a boy not
heroic, talented, or beloved by the community;
his disposition seems more “stormy” than sunny.
At times his mother called him a sword beneath
her heart, but her bitter weeping shows deep love
for him.
Having approached raw emotion in describing
the
mother’s
grief,
however,
the
speaker
immediately retreats to ironic discussion of
changed attitudes toward the child; death has
transformed a squealing, pasty-faced pig into a
“little man,” and in his face, the speaker
professes to see family resemblance.
The speaker shifts from this little man to
focus on the “elder men” of the community, who
represent age and its accompanying loss of
vitality. Uncomfortable remaining in the house,
these men congregate outside, exchanging rumors
in an unsuccessful attempt to deal with their
deep dynastic wound, the loss of a male heir to
carry on the family name.
‫ شرح جميع المواد ومن أول الترم‬: ‫الكورس الشامل‬
.)‫ ملخصات‬-‫توقعات‬-‫الدكتور أسامة طه (شرح‬
Poetry Notes©
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Introduction
Irony
The Theme of Time in English Poetry
The Theme of Death in English Poetry
Shakespeare's Sonnet 1
Shakespeare's Sonnet 2
Shakespeare's Sonnet 62
Emily Dickinson's I Dwell in Possibility
Emily Dickinson's I heard a Fly buzz
Emily Dickinson's Because I couldn't
stop for death
 John Crowe Ransom's Dead Boy
 John Crowe Ransom's
‫الجزء األول‬
2015
Poetry
By Dr. OSAMA TAHA (PhD)
For courses only contact: 01115859130
1.Introduction:
Reading poetry is part attitude and part
technique. Curiosity is a useful attitude,
especially when it is free of preconceived ideas
about what poetry is or should be. Effective
technique directs your curiosity into asking
questions, drawing you into conversation with the
poem. Since the form of the poem is part of its
meaning (for example, features such as repetition
and rhyme may amplify or extend the meaning of a
word or idea, adding emphasis, texture or
dimension), we believe that questions about form
and technique provide an effective point of entry
for
interpretation.
To
ask
some
of
these
questions, you will need to develop a good ear
for
the
musical
qualities
of
language,
particularly how sound and rhythm relate to
meaning.
Prior assumptions such as the readers should
understand the poem from their first reading, the
poem has only one meaning and the poem can mean
anything the readers want it to mean are wrong.
William Carlos Williams addresses his wife in his
poem "January Morning":
All this—
was for you, old woman.
I wanted to write a poem
that you would understand.
For what good is it to me
if you can't understand it?
But you got to try hard—
Williams admits in these lines that poetry is
often difficult. He also suggests that a poet
depends on the effort of the reader; somehow, the
reader must 'complete' what the poet has begun.
Reading poetry is a challenge, but like so many
other things, it takes practice, and your skills
improve as you progress.
Literature is the sharing of experience, and
successful poems welcome you in, revealing ideas
that you not have been foremost in the writer's
mind in the moment of composition. Poems speak to
us in many ways. Sometimes the poem suggests an
experience, idea, or feeling that you know but
cannot express directly.
Reading the poem usually starts with the
title. The title may give you an image or an
association to start with. Looking at the poem's
shape, you can see whether the lines are
continuous or broken into groups (stanzas). You
can also know whether some words rhyme or not and
whether some lines have a rhythm that is distinct
from the rest of the poem. Lines are often
determined by meaning, sound and rhythm, breath
or typography. Most poems can be interpreted
without the help of historical context. To
understand a poem, you can ask yourself the
following questions:
Who is the speaker?
What circumstances gave rise to the poem?
What situation is presented?
Who is the audience?
What is the tone?
What is the form of the poem?
How is form related to content?
What is the role played by sound in the poem?
Does the poem use imagery to achieve a
particular effect?
If the poem has a question, what is the
answer?
If the poem has an answer, what is the
question?
What does the title suggest?
Does the poem use unusual words or use words
in an unusual way?
2.Irony:
Irony is a figure of speech in which words
are used in such a way that their intended
meaning is different from the actual meaning of
the words. It may also be a situation that may
end up in quite a different way than what is
generally anticipated. In simple words, it is a
difference
between
the
appearance
and
the
reality.
Types of Irony
On the grounds of the above definition, we
distinguish two basic kinds of irony i.e. verbal
irony and situational irony. A verbal irony
involves what one does not mean. When in response
to a foolish idea, we say, “what a great idea!”
it is a verbal irony. A situational irony occurs
when, for instance, a man is laughing at the
misfortune of the other even when the same
misfortune, in complete unawareness, is befalling
him.
Examples
3. We come across the following lines in
Shakespeare’s “Romeo and Juliet”, Act I,
Scene V.
“Go ask his name: if he be married.
My grave is like to be my wedding bed.”
Juliet commands her nurse to find out who
Romeo was and says if he were married, then her
wedding bed would be her grave. It is a verbal
irony because the audience knows that she is
going to die on her wedding bed.
4. Irony examples are not only found in
stage plays but in poems too. In his poem
“The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”,
Coleridge wrote:
“Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.”
In the above stated lines, the ship, blown by
the south wind, is stranded in the uncharted sea.
Ironically, there is water everywhere but they do
not have a single drop of water to drink.
Consider the poem "Dead Boy" by Ransom. The
speaker ironically undercuts any tendency toward
sentimentality, describing a boy not heroic,
talented, or beloved by the community; his
disposition seems more “stormy” than sunny. At
times his mother called him a sword beneath her
heart, but her bitter weeping shows deep love for
him.
Having approached raw emotion in describing
the
mother’s
grief,
however,
the
speaker
immediately retreats to ironic discussion of
changed attitudes toward the child; death has
transformed a squealing, pasty-faced pig into a
“little man,” and in his face, the speaker
professes to see family resemblance.
3.Time
Time is one of the major themes of English
poetry. It is said that it has neither a
beginning nor an end. Yet men are able to measure
it as years, months, days, hours, minutes and
seconds. They have also given meanings to the
words – past, present and future. True, time has
a meaning. The entire creation moves on according
to a time pattern. There is birth, growth and
death. There is time for everything. Plants
flower and give fruits. Seasons come according to
time. A child is born, grows into boyhood,
adolescence, youth, middle age and old age
according to age and time. Two poems that deal
with the concept of time that I actually enjoyed
reading and will compare to each other are "When
forty winters shall besiege thy brow" and "All
the World's a Stage" by Shakespeare.
In the first poem, Shakespeare deals with the
effect of time on his friend. When forty years
have made your brow wrinkled with age, and you
are showing all the other signs of aging. The
pride and greatness of your youth, so much
admired by everyone now will be worth as little
as a tattered weed. Then, when you are asked
'where is your beauty now?' and, 'where is the
treasure from your days of merriment?' You must
say, within your own eyes, now sunk deep in their
sockets, where lies a shameful confession of
greed and self-obsession. If you would have only
put your beauty to a greater use. If only you
could answer 'This fair child of mine Shall give
an account of my life and prove that I made no
misuse of my time on earth. 'Proving that his
beauty, because he is your son, was once yours!
This child would be new-made when you are
old, and you would see your own blood flow warm
through him when you are cold.
In the second poem, "All the World's a
Stage," William Shakespeare deals with the theme
of time and its effect on man. The first stage of
life is that of an infant crying in the nurse's
arms. An infant is helpless and is totally
dependent on others. The second stage is that of
childhood which is also the school going age.
The poem gives the picture of a bright eyed boy
with a shining morning face with his school bag
reluctantly drag himself to school.
The third
stage is that of adolescence, when a man plays
the part of a lover. He is attracted towards
women and composes poems to describe and glorify
his lover. He experiences the emotions of joy,
passion, disappointment and anxiety in this
difficult period of life.
The fourth stage is that of adult or
manhood.
The poem mentions the example of an
arrogant soldier who wears shaggy beard that
makes him look like a fierce leopard.
He is
bold, brave, ambitious and full of energy. He is
eager to establish a status in society. He is
quick to defend his honour and fiercely guards
his reputation.
He is ready to risk
and
sacrifice his life in the battlefield and seeks
glory, fame and recognition. The fifth stage is
the middle age. This is the stage when a man is
more grounded in life. He is no more impulsive
and the experiences in life makes him a mature
and balanced person. He is content with life
which reflects in his attire, behavior and
conversation.
The sixth stage of life is the phase when a
man starts to grow old. He becomes physically
weaker and his mind becomes duller with the
assault of time. He looks silly and funny with
spectacles in his nose and slippers on his
feet. He becomes frail and thin. He wears an illfitting pair of trousers. The breeches which he
had worn in his youth preserved cheerfully for
his old age don't fit him anymore as they are too
big for his thin legs.
His manly voice has
become shrill and feeble like a child's voice.
The seventh and the final stage is when a man
grows extremely old and senile. This last stage
depicts the final stage of man on earth.
It
brings an end to his presence on earth and speeds
up his journey towards his death.
4.Death
Death is an aspect of life that everyone
becomes acquainted with sooner or later. From my
own experiences I am more familiar with death
than I could ever want to be. Poetry is something
that is very difficult for me to follow, but when
it deals with concept that I am familiar with,
then I am able to associate with the soul of the
writer. Two poems that deal with the concept of
death that I actually enjoyed reading and will
compare to each other are "Dead Boy" by John
Crowe Ransom and "Because I couldn't stop for
death" by Emily Dickinson.
“Dead Boy” deals with the intrusion of death
into a rural community. The poem’s form is
conventional: quatrains rhyming abab or cdcd. The
relatively prosaic title, “Dead Boy,” sets the
serious tone. The speaker breaks with the
sentimental tradition, using understatement to
distance both speaker and reader from emotional
involvement in the death of this unnamed child.
No attempt is made to describe the grief of the
boy’s extended family (county kin) and neighbors;
instead, the reader learns that they “do not
like” what has happened. Thus, the reader is led
to examine this death with detachment, and the
full emotional impact is saved for the final
stanza and the speaker’s conclusions about this
“deep dynastic wound.”
The speaker ironically undercuts any tendency
toward sentimentality, describing a boy not
heroic, talented, or beloved by the community;
his disposition seems more “stormy” than sunny.
At times his mother called him a sword beneath
her heart, but her bitter weeping shows deep love
for him.
Having approached raw emotion in describing
the
mother’s
grief,
however,
the
speaker
immediately retreats to ironic discussion of
changed attitudes toward the child; death has
transformed a squealing, pasty-faced pig into a
“little man,” and in his face, the speaker
professes to see family resemblance.
The speaker shifts from this little man to
focus on the “elder men” of the community, who
represent age and its accompanying loss of
vitality. Uncomfortable remaining in the house,
these men congregate outside, exchanging rumors
in an unsuccessful attempt to deal with their
deep dynastic wound, the loss of a male heir to
carry on the family name.
Death is the main theme of Emily Dickinson's
poetry. She always personifies death as a king.
In
this
poem,
Dickinson’s
speaker
is
communicating from beyond the grave, describing
her journey with Death, personified, from life to
afterlife. In the opening stanza, the speaker is
too busy for Death so Death—“kindly”—takes the
time to do what she cannot, and stops for her.
This “civility” that Death shows in taking time
out for her leads her to give up on those things
that had made her so busy so they can just enjoy
this carriage ride.
In the third stanza we see reminders of the
world that the speaker is passing from, with
children playing and fields of grain because she
has stopped being an active agent, and is only
now a part of the landscape. In this stanza,
after the realization of her new place in the
world, her death also becomes suddenly very
physical, as she explains that her dress is only
gossamer, and her “Tippet,” a kind of cape
usually made out of fur, is “only Tulle.”
The carriage pauses at her new “House.” The
description of the house makes it clear that this
is no cottage, but instead a grave.
Sonnet 1
From fairest creatures we desire increase
William Shakespeare
In the first quatrain of Shakespeare's
Sonnet 1, the speaker explains to the young man
that humanity’s wish is that pleasant people will
reproduce children: “From fairest creatures we
desire increase.” The speaker likens the young
man’s beauty to a rose, whose beauty will never
die if he produces little roses or children. He
reminds the young man that he will age and “by
time decease” but if he produces a child, his
memory will be able to live on: “His tender heir
might bear his memory.”
In the second quatrain, the speaker chides
the young man saying he is only interested in his
own beauty; he is conceited and self-indulgent:
“But thou contracted to thine own bright eyes, /
Feed’st thy light’s flame with self-substantial
fuel.” And according to the speaker, the young
conceited
man
is
causing
“a
famine
where
abundance lies”: instead of there being one young
person of such beauty, there could be many, if
only the young adult would marry and produce
others that would be as beautiful as he is. And
in being so selfish, the young man is his own
enemy and ultimately being cruel to himself:
“Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.”
In the third quatrain, the speaker tries
to convince the young man of his selfishness by
reminding again him that as only one person,
“only herald to the gaudy spring,” he is hiding
his value: “Within thine own bud buriest thy
content.” He calls the young man a “tender churl”
and reminds him that he is wasting himself by
continuing to remain so self-important: “And,
tender churl, mak’st waste in niggarding.”
In the couplet, “Pity the world, or else
this glutton be, / To eat the world’s due, by the
grave and thee,” the speaker asks the young man
to take pity on the world, because he is
consuming what the world should have by lavishing
all his attention on himself. And then the
speaker reminds the young man that if he does not
produce heirs he will find himself alone with
grave in the end.
Sonnet 2
William Shakespeare
When forty winters shall beseige thy brow,
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
This
sonnet
belongs
to
the
“marriage
sonnets”; the speaker in each of these sonnets is
trying to persuade a young man to marry. When
forty years have made your brow wrinkled with
age, and you are showing all the other signs of
aging. The pride and greatness of your youth, so
much admired by everyone now will be worth as
little as a tattered weed. Then, when you are
asked 'where is your beauty now?' and, 'where is
the treasure from your days of merriment?' You
must say, within your own eyes, now sunk deep in
their sockets, where lies a shameful confession
of greed and self-obsession. If you would have
only put your beauty to a greater use. If only
you could answer 'This fair child of mine Shall
give an account of my life and prove that I made
no misuse of my time on earth. 'Proving that his
beauty, because he is your son, was once yours!
This child would be new-made when you are
old, and you would see your own blood flow warm
through him when you are cold.
The speaker presents a problem (the young man
is going to get old) and then offers a solution
(having kids). He exaggerates the problem,
wrinkles turn into "trenches" (line 2). Then he
makes his solution sound really great, promising
that having a child will be like being born
again: "This were to be new made when thou art
old" (line13).
We want all beautiful creatures to reproduce
themselves so that beauty’s flower will not die
out; but as an old man dies in time, he leaves a
young heir to carry on his memory. But you,
concerned only with your own beautiful eyes, feed
the bright light of life with self-regarding
fuel, making beauty shallow by your preoccupation
with your looks. In this you are your own enemy,
being cruel to yourself. You who are the world’s
most beautiful ornament and the chief messenger
of
spring,
are
burying
your
gifts
within
yourself. And, dear selfish one, because you
decline to reproduce, you are actually wasting
that beauty. Take pity on the world or else be
the glutton who devours, with the grave, what
belongs to the world.
This sonnet opens with a metaphor that
compares the way time wears away a person's face
to the way an army attacks a castle. The
personification is seen in the
metaphor: "deep
trenches in thy beauty's field" which can be seen
as wrinkles in a beautiful face. This gives
readers a picture of the old age that has yet to
come for some. The man's beauty will be lost and
become like a "tattered weed." "Will be a
tatter'd weed, of small worth held" unless he
reproduces. This is a metaphor. We imagine "alleating shame" being a Monster, just gobbling up
everything around it. There's a little bit of
personification here, since Shakespeare gives
shame a human or animal quality to suggest that
it is powerful and dangerous. For the whole poem
the rhyme scheme would be: ABABCDCDEFEFGG.
William Shakespeare
Sonnet 62
Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
Helen Vendler sees the speaker of the poem as
harshly
criticizing
his
own
weakness
and
foolishness, but for most critics the poem is
lighter in mood. Though it echoes other poems in
the sequence which present the connections
created by love as painful, in this poem, the
presence of the beloved is comforting rather than
terrifying.
Sonnet 62 explores themes of self-love and
seeing the love in yourself– is there really a
difference? The speaker admits he is extremely
vain person, proud both of his outward form and
personality. This sin, furthermore, is so deeply
rooted that he believes it can’t ever be removed.
However, upon seeing his face in the mirror, it
disgusts him. Surely loving such a face would be
a sin. In fact, the thing the speaker truly loves
about himself is his possession of the youth; his
beauty is derived from the part of the young man
he possesses.
The poem depends on wordplay such as
“chopped with tanned antiquity” which describes
the speaker’s face as scarred, wrinkled (like
tanned leather). Another example is “painting my
age” which could also refer either to gilding an
aged countenance with associations to a younger
handsomer man, to verbal descriptions, (word
paintings), or to the use of cosmetics. The
entire couplet may be paraphrased: “I praise
myself, because in doing so I praise you, as if
painting myself in colors borrowed from you”’.
The sin of self-love conditions everything I
see, and my entire soul, and every one of my
faculties. And there’s no remedy for this sin,
it’s so deeply rooted in my heart. I keep
thinking that no-one’s face is as gracious as
mine is; no body as well-proportioned. I regard
myself as surpassing everyone else in everything.
But when my mirror shows me what I’m really like
– beaten and creased by aging and the sun – I
conclude the exact opposite to what my self-love
tells me. To love myself so much would be a
disgrace. It’s you, myself, that I’m really
praising when I praise myself, giving my old age
the beauty of your youth.
The conceit of the poem is derived most
nearly from Petrarch; however, the idea of lovers
who have in some sense exchanged souls is
commonplace and proverbial. The connected theme-the speaker's unworthiness compared to his
beloved--is likewise traditional.
(466)
Emily Dickinson
I dwell in Possibility –
A fairer House than Prose –
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) is the major
American poetess of the 19th century. She was the
daughter of a respectable family of Amherst, a
small town in Western Massachusetts. Death is the
main theme of Emily Dickinson's poetry. She
always personifies death as a king.
The speaker tells us that she lives in a
house with lots of doors and windows, which just
so happens to be a way prettier house than
"Prose." So we assume this house is a metaphor
for poetry. The speaker goes on to describe her
poetry-house with lots of nature imagery. It's
got trees for rooms and the sky for a roof. She
ends by telling us how awesome the visitors to
the house (readers of her poetry) are. Then she
tells us that writing poems—or the life of the
mind—is the best way she knows to reach for the
divine.
This poem is about Dickinson’s vocation as a
poet, which she compares favorably to prose,
largely through the metaphor of the two as
houses. She sees poetry as open and limitless (“I
dwell in Possibility”) and more beautiful (“A
fairer House than Prose”) than the more limited
prose (“More numerous of Windows–/Superior – for
Doors”).
“I dwell in Possibility“is deeply interested
in the power gained by a poet through their
poetry. In the first stanza, the poem seems to
just be about poetry as a vocation as opposed to
prose, and is explicit in comparing the two. The
metaphors and similes used make it so that poetry
is possibility, poetry is more beautiful, poetry
has more doors and windows open for access, for
different perspectives and interpretations, while
prose by default, then, is more closed and
limited and homely.
In the second stanza, the extended metaphor
changes slightly, so that we see that though
poetry is a house, it is also a garden and part
of nature, in the guise of the sky-roof,
completing
it.
This
sky-roof
also
again
emphasizes poetry’s limitlessness, as there is no
upper boundary except the seemingly endless sky.
Poetry’s visitors, that is, the readers, are
the fairest, both in beauty and in judgment, and
they are able to move easily in and out of this
open, welcoming house, with its numerous doors
and windows. The mention of the visitors is
essential. Both the poet and the reader are
equally welcome in this house, and the great
number of possible entrances and exits means that
both poet and reader can choose to interpret it
in different ways.
The final three lines of the poem make the
poet’s power clear. Her “Occupation,” her task is
this wonderful task of “spreading wide [her]
narrow
Hands
/
To
gather
Paradise”.
The
capitalization of “Hands,” here, so close to
“Paradise,” gives the poet’s hands a limitless
quality. This shows how the role of the poet is a
creator.
(591)
By Emily Dickinson
I heard a Fly buzz - when I died The Stillness in the Room
The theme of this poem is death. But Emily
Dickinson deals with theme in a very strange
manner. The very first line strikes us because it
is very strange: “I heard a Fly buzz - when I
died -”. Death is, of course, a very serious
matter; but the poem does not deal with it
seriously. The mention of a fly buzz during one's
death is, of course, funny. The poet says that
she heard a fly buzz when she died. That is why
critics disregarded such poems as too humorous to
be serious.
The poet, then, describes the stillness that
accompanies death. There is stillness in the
room. People are still; they are waiting for her
to die. It is a very special moment—the stillness
of the people is accompanied by the stillness of
the atmosphere. Everybody has shed so many tears
that eyes become dry. They are holding their
breath waiting whether she will give the spirit
or not. It is a moment of great agony. The eyes
of the people around her are waiting for her
death.
The breaths of people are gathered for the
last journey, the journey of immortality. The
word 'Onset' is capitalized because it refers to
immortality. People will witness the King,
meaning death, in the room. This is, of course, a
personification in which death is likened to a
king. Everyone in the room is waiting for the
king of death.
The person dying has written her will and has
signed away on what she can sign. In fact, she is
very poor. She has signed on almost nothing. In
the middle of this very serious situation, a fly
interfered: “and there it was/There interposed a
Fly”. The fly kept on buzzing by fits and starts.
The word 'blue' is very significant because it
shows that the buzz was restless. The fly has
interfered between her and the light—immortality.
This is, of course, a metaphor. The moment of
death disappeared and she could not see to see,
i.e. paradise or immortality. The first see
refers to sight, whereas the second refers to
insight.
The sort of humor in this poem is black
humor. The dashes in the poem refers to emotional
breaks. The fly which is a very insignificant
creature is a symbol of distraction. Many people
are distracted from their aims in life by
insignificant
things.
The
poem
shows
Miss
Dickinson's violation of correct structure as in
“Signed away /What portion of me be Assignable”.
The speaker says that she heard a fly buzz as
she lay on her deathbed. The room was as still as
the air between “the Heaves” of a storm. The eyes
around her had cried themselves out, and the
breaths were firming themselves for “that last
Onset,” the moment when, metaphorically, “the
King / Be witnessed—in the Room—.” The speaker
made a will and “Signed away / What portion of me
be / Assignable—” and at that moment, she heard
the fly. It interposed itself “With blue—
uncertain stumbling Buzz” between the speaker and
the light; “the Windows failed”; and then she
died (“I could not see to see”).
“I heard a Fly buzz” employs all of
Dickinson’s
formal
patterns:
trimeter
and
tetrameter iambic lines (four stresses in the
first and third lines of each stanza, three in
the second and fourth, a pattern Dickinson
follows at her most formal); rhythmic insertion
of the long dash to interrupt the meter; and an
ABCB rhyme scheme. Interestingly, all the rhymes
before
the
final
stanza
are
half-rhymes
(Room/Storm, firm/Room, be/Fly), while only the
rhyme in the final stanza is a full rhyme
(me/see). Dickinson uses this technique to build
tension; a sense of true completion comes only
with the speaker’s death.
Emily Dickinson
"Because I could not stop for Death"
In “Because I could not stop for Death—,” we
see death personified. He is no frightening, or
even intimidating, but rather a courteous and
gentle guide, leading her to eternity. The
speaker feels no fear when Death picks her up in
his carriage, she just sees it as an act of
kindness, as she was too busy to find time for
him.
In
this
poem,
Dickinson’s
speaker
is
communicating from beyond the grave, describing
her journey with Death, personified, from life to
afterlife. In the opening stanza, the speaker is
too busy for Death (“Because I could not stop for
Death—“), so Death—“kindly”—takes the time to do
what she cannot, and stops for her.
This “civility” that Death shows in taking
time out for her leads her to give up on those
things that had made her so busy—“And I had put
away/My labor and my leisure too”—so they can
just enjoy this carriage ride (“We slowly drove –
He knew no haste”).
In the third stanza we see reminders of the
world that the speaker is passing from, with
children playing and fields of grain. Her place
in the world shifts between this stanza and the
next; in the third stanza, “We passed the Setting
Sun—,” but at the opening of the fourth stanza,
she corrects this—“Or rather – He passed Us –“—
because she has stopped being an active agent,
and is only now a part of the landscape.
In this stanza, after the realization of her
new place in the world, her death also becomes
suddenly very physical, as “The Dews drew
quivering and chill—,” and she explains that her
dress is only gossamer, and her “Tippet,” a kind
of cape usually made out of fur, is “only Tulle.”
After this moment of seeing the coldness of
her death, the carriage pauses at her new
“House.” The description of the house—“A Swelling
of the Ground—“—makes it clear that this is no
cottage, but instead a grave. Yet they only
“pause” at this house, because although it is
ostensibly her home, it is really only a resting
place as she travels to eternity.
The final stanza shows a glimpse of this
immortality, made most clear in the first two
lines, where she says that although it has been
centuries since she has died, it feels no longer
than a day. It is not just any day that she
compares it to, however—it is the very day of her
death, when she saw “the Horses’ Heads” that were
pulling her towards this eternity.
John Crowe Ransom
Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter
This Ransom poem is, as its title suggests,
a miniature but highly traditional elegy. The
five quatrains follow, as a structure, the threestage progression which is a convention of the
genre: from statement or indication of occasion
of grief to expression of grief and from thence
to reconciliation to or transcendence of grief.
But also its elegiac form underlines what is
impressive about it: how subtly it shows us the
disconnect between the world of children and the
world of adults. "Bells" is about the funeral of
a little girl, but its slow, stately quatrains
put it squarely in the perspective of the adult
funeral-goer.
The middle stanzas are an attempt to enter
the world of the little dead girl, isolated to a
single memory of the girl chasing a troupe of
geese. The vocabulary is Romantic, in the King
Arthur sense: She "took arms" against them; they
"cried in goose, Alas;" her wars were "bruited,"
a word that has a distinctly archaic flavor.
Ransom packs so much in these phrases. There is
the unmistakable sense of adventure that colors
the games of childhood, but to express them in
such terms is to speak as an adult about things
that are, as a child, mostly indescribable. In
other words, the girl may have experienced this
sense of adventure, but she certainly never
connected it to the word "Alas. Whatever our
first impressions, the speaker is decidedly not
admitted into the little girl's consciousness and
is only guessing at things.
In death, she has become a "brown study"
(another phrase severe in its maturity) and lost
those hallmarks of childhood: "such speed," "such
lightness in her footfall," her "tireless heart."
In death, she has more in common with her
onlookers, who like she are "sternly stopped."
The speaker's reaction at this is remarkably
cold, not grief but astonishment, vexation.
"Bells" is an elegy strangely devoid of sadness,
and what of it is there seems to be more over the
loss of childhood than of a child. Grief is only
implied, like a footnote.
The whole poem, in fact, is wholly not about
what it seems. The stronger grief is that the
girl's death foretells our own, which, as we
ourselves are so removed from her fleetness and
mired in our own immobility, is unthinkably near.
"Dead Boy" by John Crowe Ransom
The little cousin is dead, by foul subtraction,
A green bough from Virginia's aged tree,
John Crowe Ransom's "Dead Boy" is a poem
about the different opinions in society regarding
a child's death. This child while living, built
himself many reputations among the town's people.
None of the members of society felt it was their
duty to help or inform this child of the path he
was taken. However, when he dies some criticize
his life and feel the need to criticize his
actions in life. While all the time knowing they
did nothing to change his path. Others feel
sorry, but are just as guilty for not helping a
child who might have had a future. Instead he is
lying in a coffin dead. Society is left to wonder
whether his death was necessary?
The first part of the poem discusses the
feelings of his kin. They feel uncomfortable with
his death. Also there are others that do not like
the child's unnecessary death. These are the
people who did not ever meet or see the child but
realize what kind of a tragedy this death was.
Ransom makes a statement at the end of the first
paragraph "Nor some of the world of outer dark,
like me". This is a strong statement for the
simple fact that this shows how much of the town,
city, world is affected by one child's death.
This next part is by far the harshest. The
voices are that of the town's people who say this
child was helpless. His death was felt as the
only alternative to some. He was called "a black
cloud full of storms too hot for keeping". Just
as in Mother Nature the people felt that this
child could not be controlled. The following line
however is one of the most emotional. It talks of
how his mother still weeps for her dead child.
This is a reaction of any mother who cared for
her child. These people have to see her weep, yet
still talk of a horrid child. This is an
unjustifiable act on their part. The part that is
probably the most sincere is that of the elder
men. They speak of the child's death hurting
their hearts.
“Dead Boy” deals with the intrusion of death
into a rural community. The poem’s form is
conventional: quatrains rhyming abab or cdcd. The
relatively prosaic title, “Dead Boy,” sets the
serious tone. The speaker breaks with the
sentimental tradition, using understatement to
distance both speaker and reader from emotional
involvement in the death of this unnamed child.
No attempt is made to describe the grief of the
boy’s extended family (county kin) and neighbors;
instead, the reader learns that they “do not
like” what has happened. Thus, the reader is led
to examine this death with detachment, and the
full emotional impact is saved for the final
stanza and the speaker’s conclusions about this
“deep dynastic wound.”
The speaker ironically undercuts any tendency
toward sentimentality, describing a boy not
heroic, talented, or beloved by the community;
his disposition seems more “stormy” than sunny.
At times his mother called him a sword beneath
her heart, but her bitter weeping shows deep love
for him.
Having approached raw emotion in describing
the
mother’s
grief,
however,
the
speaker
immediately retreats to ironic discussion of
changed attitudes toward the child; death has
transformed a squealing, pasty-faced pig into a
“little man,” and in his face, the speaker
professes to see family resemblance.
The speaker shifts from this little man to
focus on the “elder men” of the community, who
represent age and its accompanying loss of
vitality. Uncomfortable remaining in the house,
these men congregate outside, exchanging rumors
in an unsuccessful attempt to deal with their
deep dynastic wound, the loss of a male heir to
carry on the family name.
Robert Frost
“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
On the surface, this poem is simplicity
itself. The speaker is stopping by some woods on
a snowy evening. He or she takes in the lovely
scene in near-silence, is tempted to stay longer,
but acknowledges the pull of obligations and the
considerable distance yet to be traveled before
he or she can rest for the night. The poem
consists of four (almost) identically constructed
stanzas. Each line is iambic, with four stressed
syllables.
Within the four lines of each stanza, the
first, second, and fourth lines rhyme. The third
line does not, but it sets up the rhymes for the
next stanza. For example, in the third stanza,
queer, near, and year all rhyme, but lake rhymes
with shake, mistake, and flake in the following
stanza. The notable exception to this pattern
comes in the final stanza, where the third line
rhymes with the previous two and is repeated as
the fourth line.
Like the woods it describes, the poem is
lovely but entices us with dark depths—of
interpretation, in this case. It stands alone and
beautiful, the account of a man stopping by woods
on a snowy evening, but gives us a come-hither
look that begs us to load it with a full
inventory of possible meanings. We protest, we
make apologies, we point to the dangers of
reading poetry in this way, but unlike the
speaker of the poem, we cannot resist.
The last two lines a strong claim to be the
most celebrated instance of repetition in English
poetry: “And miles to go before I sleep”. For the
last “miles to go” now seems like life; the last
“sleep” now seems like death.
The basic conflict in the poem, resolved in
the last stanza, is between an attraction toward
the woods and the pull of responsibility outside
of the woods. What do woods represent? Something
good? Something bad? Woods are sometimes a symbol
for wildness and madness. But these woods do not
seem particularly wild. They are someone’s woods,
someone’s in particular—the owner lives in the
village. But that owner is in the village on
this, the darkest evening of the year—so would
any sensible person be. That is where the
division seems to lie, between the village (or
“society,” “civilization,” “duty,” “sensibility,”
“responsibility”) and the woods (that which is
beyond the borders of the village and all it
represents). If the woods are not particularly
wicked, they still possess the seed of the
irrational; and they are, at night, dark—with all
the varied connotations of darkness.
Part of what is irrational about the woods is
their attraction. They are restful, seductive,
lovely, dark, and deep—like deep sleep, like
oblivion. Snow falls in downy flakes, like a
blanket to lie under and be covered by. And here
is where many readers hear dark undertones to
this lyric. To rest too long while snow falls
could be to lose one’s way, to lose the path, to
freeze and die. Does this poem express a death
wish, considered and then discarded? Do the woods
sing a siren’s song? Or does the poem merely
describe the temptation to sit and watch beauty
while responsibilities are forgotten?
Criticism
 What is Literature?
 What is Criticism?
 Function of Criticism
 Forms of Literature
 Types of Literature
 Orientations of Critical Theories
 Eliot’s “Tradition and the
Individual Talent”
 Eliot’s “The Function of
Criticism”
2015
Civilization
Study Notes©
 The Concept of Civilization
 The Meaning of European
Civilization
 The Difference between Civilization
and Culture
 Challenges and Complexities of
Human Civilization
2015
Civilization
By Dr. OSAMA TAHA (PhD)
For courses only contact: 01115859130
Chapter One: The Concept of Civilization
Introduction:
Civilization is an outcome of strong culture and religion of
the society. Strong culture and religion play an important role
because they give any society its strong identity leading other
small societies to join it. To know how strong a civilization is,
we consider the quality of life: behavior, art, ritual practices,
language, habits and food.
The Concept of Civilization:
The word civilization comes from the Latin word 'civitatis'
meaning state or city. Civilization refers to a number of
meanings: (1) an advanced state of intellectual, and, material
development in human society marked by use of recordingkeeping (e.g. writing) and the appearance of complex political
and social institution; (2) a particular type of developed society;
(3) modern society; (4) the act of civilizing; (5) cultural or
intellectual refinement.
Various Definitions of Civilization:
 Civilization is a society in an advanced state of social
development (e.g. with complex legal and political and
religious organizations).
 Civilization is a culture of a particular society at a
particular time and place.
 Civilization is refinement: the quality of excellence in
thought, manners and taste.
The Meaning of the Word Civilization:
The word civilization refers to a condition of relative
advancement in human society. A civilized society is usually
marked by progress in the arts and sciences, the extensive use of
writing, and the appearance of complex political and social
institution (American Heritage English Dictionary). Culture
precedes civilization. A human society will have distinct
meaning systems, including language and religious systems,
before these systems become institutionalized politically and
socially.
The Synonyms and Antonyms of Civilization:
The synonyms of civilization include advancement,
civility, cultivation, culture, development, education, elevation,
enlightenment, progress and refinement.
The antonyms of civilization include barbarism, savagery,
wilderness and wildness.
Nineteenth century English anthropologist E.B. Tylor
defined civilization as life in cities that is organized by
government and facilitated by scribes (which means the use of
writing).
Factors of the Success of Civilization:
The factors of the success of human civilization include:
religion, the desire to produce and the joy in production, the
balance between the material and the spiritual and the human
resources. The first factor of success is religion. It is the vital
force which makes our communities. Throughout history
religion was a component of any civilization. Without religion,
there would have never been any civilization.
The second factor is industry. It led to the invention of the
cotton gin, the sewing machine, the printing press, the steam
engine, etc. In fact, it is the desire to produce and the joy in
production which changed the face of the earth. The third factor
is the balance between the material and the spiritual. It is the
human soul upon which any material progress depends. The
greatest resources are the human resources. Prosperity is the
result of righteousness rather than of material things.
Chapter Three:
The Meaning of European Civilization
The Dynamics of Civilization:
Huntington claims that civilizations are dynamic; they rise
and fall. He attaches civilization to an idea of history and
development. Civilizations work in time. Thus, he speaks about
civilization and history and civilization and geography.
Civilizations are formed by their history.
Mirabeau's Definition of Civilization:
There are qualifications such as manners, politeness,
civility or urbanity which are attached to people. We can draw a
line between manners, etc. and people. But this pole is
characterized as a mask by Mirabeau. Behind the mask is the
true meaning of civilization; that is virtue. To be civilized is to
be thus virtuous. The opposite of civilization is corruption,
which means the destruction of social life. So, virtue is the
quality needed to uphold society. This quality is human or
universal. We can therefore draw a line between human and
virtue. We can observe a tension between the universal pole
(virtue-humanity) and the particular cultural pole (peoplemanners).
Mirabeau tries to solve this tension by turning the cultural
pole into a distortion of the true meaning of civilization. The
distortion will lead to corruption while only virtue will carry
civilization with true civilization. Moreover, Mirabeau attaches
an active role to virtue it can do something for society. It is the
driving force in maintaining and developing society. In that
sense, civilization and corruption are at once processes, driving
forces within this processes, and positive or negative results of
this process. Mirabeau has a very abstract idea of the space of
civilization. The reason for this is that he wants to stress the
universal dimension: civilization is an inherent quality.
Civilization and History:
Civilization is an accumulation of common history. It is
also a process of increasing awareness of the final aim of
civilization. History is not mainly events or tradition, but the
awareness of direction. According to religion and history,
Huntington divides the world into seven or eight civilizations.
He locates civilization in a geographical space. Western
Civilization is located between the West coast of the USA and a
line somewhere in the former Eastern Europe. This civilization
is a cultural entity with its history and religion.
Civilization in a Temporal Perspective:
The Stages of Civilization:
The stages of civilization include religion, education,
science and progress. Progress is measured by the level of
commercial and political refinement. Civil society at the end of
the time line is located in the polished and commercial nations.
The driving forces that lead to civil society are knowledge and
virtue.
Levels of Civilization:
Guizot gives us a three-layer definition of civilization: a
universal civilization related to progress in time; a European
civilization related to the common roots of Europe; and finally
national levels. The point for Guizot is not to detect a universal
civilization, but to show Europe's search for universal meaning.
European history becomes such a search. This search goes
through different epochs that are the same for all nations. Each
epoch is at the same time a step towards the final truth where
Europe realizes its potentials. The universal driving forces here
are not arts and virtue, but politics and religion and ideas
(Christianity and political freedom).
Like Huntington, Guizot gives an important role to
Christianity
Guizot locates European civilization directly in history.
For a historian like the German Leopold von Ranke, Europe is
the environment of nations, and there is no talk of a universal
level European civilization comes to play a new and powerful
role in the imperialist discourse of late nineteenth century. But
in this discourse there is no exchange between a universal and a
European level. Rather, it is taken for granted that Europe is the
civilization, or in more racial forms that civilization is white.
Life Cycle of Civilization/Phases of Civilization:
Oswald Spengler's approach to civilization is unique for
many reasons. Firstly, it is a synthesis of different approaches.
He combines an idea of a corrupted civilization with a cultural
paradigm which makes it possible to operate with different
independent civilizations. Secondly, there is a direct link
between Spengler and Huntington with regard to the
civilizational outlook on history. Civilization is only the last
phase in the development of cultures. Culture is the only organic
form within which history is formed. History is not the proper
word. According to Spengler cultures have a life cycle with
different stages of birth, maturity, old age, senility, and death.
Diseases of Civilization:
Spengler suggested a list of the different diseases of
western civilization. This list includes the dominant 19th
century critiques of Marx, Weber and Nietzsche. Spengler
believes that the diseases of civilization are rigidity, mechanical
perceptions, empty abstractions and imperialism. What Spengler
does in his version of civilization is that he eliminates the
universal, Eurocentric approach. For him there are several,
independent civilizations. Spengler believes that a civilization
comes to an end when the dictators manipulate the masses for
their own purpose.
Spengler describes a western culture detached from
classical and Christian roots. He believes in the idea of clashes
of civilizations but he is pessimistic as he believes that this can
lead to catastrophes on the international scale. In fact, he depicts
Western civilization in a very negative way. For Spengler,
civilization has two meanings: the civilization of a particular
people (this leads to the clash between civilizations) and a
universal meaning, which leads to catastrophes on a global
scale.
Chapter 5:
The Difference between Civilization and Culture
Civilization as a Synonym for Culture:
Civilization is often used as a synonym for culture. In our
day-to-day talks and discussions, we often use the terms
‘culture’ and ‘civilization’ interchangeably. Even in the AngloFrench tradition, the concept of culture was often used
synonymously with civilization. But sociologists differentiate
culture and civilization as two different levels of phenomena.
Culture is by definition smaller than a civilization. Culture can
grow and exist without residing in a formal civilization whereas
a civilization will never grow and exist without the element of
culture. Culture can be tangible or intangible whereas
civilization is something that is more tangible because it is what
you see as a whole. Culture can be transmitted through symbols
in the form of language whereas an entire civilization cannot be
transmitted by mere language alone.
Civilization is Bigger than Culture:
Firstly, civilization in theory is bigger than culture in
which an entire civilization can encompass one single unit of
culture. Civilization is a bigger unit than culture because it is a
complex aggregate of the society that dwells within a certain
area, along with its forms of government, norms, and even
culture. Thus, culture is just a spec or a portion of an entire
civilization. For example, the Egyptian civilization has an
Egyptian culture in the same way as the Greek civilization has
their Greek culture.
Culture exists within a civilization:
A culture ordinarily exists within a civilization. In this
regard, each civilization can contain not only one but several
cultures. Comparing culture and civilization is like showing the
difference between language and the country to which it is being
used.
Culture can exist in itself whereas civilization cannot be
called a civilization if it does not possess a certain culture. It’s
just like asking how a nation can exist on its own without the
use of a medium of communication. Hence, a civilization will
become empty if it does not have its culture, no matter how little
it is.
Culture can be something that is tangible and it can also be
something that isn’t. Culture can become a physical material if it
is a product of the beliefs, customs and practices of a certain
people with a definite culture. But a civilization is something
that can be seen as a whole and it is more or less tangible
although its basic components, like culture, can be immaterial.
Culture can be learned and in the same manner it can also
be transmitted from one generation to the next. Using a medium
of speech and communication, it is possible for a certain type of
culture to evolve and even be inherited by another group of
people. On the other hand, civilization cannot be transferred by
mere language alone. Because of its complexity and magnitude,
you need to transfer all of the raw aggregates of a civilization
for it to be entirely passed on. It just grows, degrades and may
eventually end if all its subunits will fail.
The concept of civilization was almost equated with highly
valued things, such as respect of people for one another, the
sanctity of life and high regard for the good, the ethical and the
beautiful. In this sense, those who were lacking in these
attributes were regarded as barbaric or uncivilized.
Primitive people who lived in a state of nature—quite
naked, used to eat unbaked animal flesh—were usually termed
as barbarians. However, many anthropological studies showed
that many preliterate societies had their own values, beliefs,
rules, religions and tools, etc.
They made certain changes in the natural order of things
which are characteristics of culture, in the modern sense of the
term. The use of the term ‘civilization’ as exhibited above is
different from its use in sociological or anthropological sense.
Defining civilization MacIver and Page (1962) said, ‘by
civilization we mean the whole mechanism and organization
which man has designed in his endeavor to control the
conditions of life’.
Similarly, S.M. Fairchild (1908) argued that it is the higher
stage of cultural development characterized by intellectual,
aesthetic, technological and spiritual attainment. On the basis of
this meaning, he made reference of ‘civilized peoples’ in
contrast to ‘uncivilized or non-civilized peoples’.
A few scholars have equated civilization with technology
and progress; e.g., Robert Bierstedt (1974) emphasized on
sophistication, self-criticism and other awareness as the chief
characteristics of civilization. Sociologists do not use the term
‘civilization’ in the sense stated above because all above views
are value-loaded.
Summary of the Difference between Culture and
Civilization:
Thus, making a distinction between
civilization, the following points may be noted:
culture
and
1. Culture is an end (values and goals) in itself while
civilization is a means (tools and techniques) to an end. Cultural
facts like belief, art and literature—prose, poetry or novel, etc.,
gives direct satisfaction to the reader while equipment’s of
civilization such as cars, computers, refrigerators, etc., do not
give direct satisfaction, until and unless they do not satisfy our
wants. Thus, civilization is utilitarian. It just helps in achieving
the end.
2. Culture has no value in itself but it is a measurement by
which we can value other articles of civilization. We cannot
determine the value of culture, i.e., beliefs, norms, ideas, etc.,
but the value of anything can be determined by its measurement
standard. Culture is a measuring rod or weighing balance.
3. Civilization is always advancing but not culture.
Cultural facts like dramatic plays or poems may not be
necessarily better today than the plays or poems of
Shakespeare?
4. Civilization is easily passed without much effort to the
next generation but not culture. Cultural facts, e.g., any art or a
piece of literature, cannot be learned without some intelligence.
It requires a few pains to understand it. Contrary to it, the
equipment’s of civilization (building, TV, etc.) can easily be
inherited without much or any use of energy and intelligence.
5. Civilization may be borrowed without making any
change but not culture. Borrowing any cultural fact like any
political, economic or social belief requires some necessary
alteration to adjust in the new cultural environment while this is
not necessary to make any material change in the civilizational
equipment’s such as TV, computer, etc.
6. Culture relates to the inner qualities of society like
religion, customs, conventions, etc., while civilization relates to
the outer form of society such as TV, radio, fans, etc.
7. Culture is more stable than civilization—cultural change
takes place in years or in centuries but civilization changes very
rapidly.
8. Variability of cultures may not be accompanied by
variability of civilization at different places. Civilization may be
similar in variable cultural areas. For instance, there is a great
difference between American and Indian cultures but there are
many similarities in their civilizational equipment’s.
9. Culture is a social fact, i.e., creation of the whole
society while civilization, i.e., the invention of any equipment
may be by a single individual. Any ordinary person can affect
any change in the civilizational equipment but for any
modification or alteration in any cultural fact requires the power
and imagination of whole society.
10. There are scholars who have designated culture and
civilization as the two sides of the same coin. William F.
Ogburn (1964), in his theory of social change, pointed out two
aspects of culture, viz., material and non-material. For him,
material aspect represents civilization and the non-material
aspect is the culture proper. Gillin and Gillin (1948) designated
the material or tangible part of culture as civilization or culture
equipment which man in his endeavor has modified from
environment.
Chapter 6:
Challenges and Complexities of Human Civilization
The increase in the complexity of human civilization is
directly related to sweeping changes in the structure and
dynamics of human civilization.
Global Connections between Civilizations:
There are unseen connections between human beings.
Today global connections are manifest in the economy, in
transportation and communication systems and in response to
political, social and environmental crises. The conditions of
human life have changed due to technological, medical,
communication, education and governmental changes which
themselves involved global cooperation and collective actions.
Human civilization itself is an organism capable of behaviors
that are of greater complexity than those of an individual
human.
Environmental Challenges to Civilization:
Human civilization continues to face internal and
environmental challenges. Humans are parts of a greater whole.
This complexity is reflected in the diversity of professional and
social environments. On the global scale, human civilization is a
single organism capable of remarkable complex collective
actions in response to environmental challenges.
Challenges of Random, Coherent and Correlated
Behaviors of Human Beings to Civilization:
Random, coherent and correlated behaviors illustrate the
relationship between behavior of parts and the collective
behavior of a system. In both random and coherent behavior, the
collective behavior of the system is simple. Correlated behavior
gives rise to complex collective behavior. For example,
primitive or agrarian cultures involved largely independent
individuals or small groups. Military systems involved large
coherent motions of many individuals performing similar and
simple actions. These coherent actions enabled impact at a scale
much larger than the size of the military force itself.
By contrast, civilization today involves diverse and
specialized behaviors that are nevertheless coordinated. This
specialization and coordination allow for highly complex
collective behaviors capable of influencing the environment on
many scales.
Methods of Control inside Human Organizations:
In human organizations coordination occurs because
individuals influence each others' behavior. The influence is
often called control. Control structures include three types:
hierarchy, hybrid and network. In an idealized hierarchy, all the
communication and coordination of activities is performed
through the hierarchy whereas in the other two there are primary
and lateral connections. A military force is an example of a
coherent behavior since all the individuals repeat the same
action controlled by hierarchy. Factory production is an example
of coordinated behavior. The coordination means that the
behaviors of different individuals, while not the same, are
related to each other.
How is Civilization Complex?
The history of civilization reflects a progressive increase
in the complexity of large scale behaviors. Early civilizations
introduced a few relatively simple large scale behaviors by use
of many individuals (slaves or soldiers) performing the same
repetitive task. Progressive specialization with coordination
increased the complexity of large scale behaviors. The industrial
revolution accelerated this process which continues till today.
The use of new energy sources and automation enabled larger
scale behavior by the use of energy rather than task repetition.
When the complexity of collective behaviors increases beyond
that of an individual human being then hierarchical controls
became ineffective.
History of English
Literature©
 The Elizabethan Age
 Seventeenth Century Literature
 The Restoration
 Eighteenth Century Literature
2015
History of English Literature
By Dr. Osama Taha
For courses only contact 01115859130
Chapter 5:
The Elizabethan Age
The Intellectual Background:
The term 'Renaissance' is derived from a French word
meaning 'the new birth'. It refers to the rebirth of art and
learning in Europe in the sixteenth century under the influence
of models from the classical civilizations of Greece and Rome.
Classical literature is a style of literature and art characterized
by attention to form. Italy was the major centre from which
classical light spread. It reached England quite late, and took
different forms in different countries. In Italy, for example, the
main stress was on painting and sculpture.
The new knowledge of science and of lands greatly stirred
men's imagination. The dominant spirit was that of discovery
and adventure. The Portuguese explorer Vasco Da Gama, for
example, discovered the Cape of Good hope. The revival of
learning had greatly affected men's ways of thought. People in
the Middle Ages looked upon this life as a preparation for the
next, and had blind faith in the church. In the Renaissance,
however, they started to focus on the enjoyment of life and to
question the authority of the church.
Elizabethan Prose:
John Lyly is famous for his book Eupheus which was read
and copied be everyone. So the word 'Euphuism' came to mean
an artificial, flowery way of writing which is based on many
images and classical writings.
Sir Thomas More (1480-1535) was one of the pioneers of
the Renaissance. He was a man of bold imagination and vision.
His most famous book is Utopia meaning "nowhere". It is based
on Plato's Republic. It depicts an imaginary island where
everything is nearly perfect. More's point is contained in the
title: his perfect island does not exist and never can—it is
nowhere.
Elizabethan Poetry:
One of the reasons that made literature flourish is the Queen
herself. Queen Elizabeth encouraged literature and arts. She
could speak Latin and Greek; and writers tried their best to gain
her favor. Another reason is the stability the country enjoyed
after defeating the Spanish Armada. That sense of victory, of
new horizons of learning due to imitation of the classics and by
the native genius made the Elizabethan period the golden age of
English poetry and drama.
Sir Thomas Wyatt was the first poet to introduce the sonnet
in English literature. A sonnet is a fourteen line poem that is
usually in iambic pentameter. Sonnets are either Shakespearean
(three quatrains and a couplet) or patriarchal octave (8 lines) and
(sestet 6 lines). Wyatt in his sonnets used Petrarchan or Italian
form. He built up each poem in two parts: the octave which is a
two rhymed section of eight lines at the beginning of the sonnet.
This is followed by the sestet which is a section having six lines
of three rhymes.
Surry, on the other hand, wrote Blank Verse for the first time
in English. Blank verse is unrhymed lyric in iambic pentameter
(a five feet line of verse). It took from Latin its rhymelessness,
but it kept accent instead of quantity as the basis of its line.
Lyric is a short poem that expresses some basic emotions for
state of mind .it may be rhymed or un rhymed.
Sir Philip Sidney (1552-99) is represents the Elizabethan age
in such a way that Queen Elizabeth herself called him one of the
jewels of her crown. He was the typical English knight. His best
known act of chivalry was when he was mortally wounded in
the Spanish war, he refused a drink of water, asking that it
should be given to another. In prose, he wrote the Arcadia and
Apologie for Poesie. He wrote two groups of sonnets entitled
Astropel and Stella. These sonnets celebrate the history of his
love for the sister of the Earl of Essex, a love brought to a
disaster by the intervention of Queen Elizabeth with whom he
had quarreled. These sonnets are the first direct expression in
English of personal experience. Arcadia is the first example of
the prose pastoral romance.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) is by all accounts the
greatest poet and dramatist in the English language, and one of
the greatest in the world. Shakespeare owes his greatness to two
things: the quality of his poetry and his deep understanding.
That is why he is considered a symbol of English culture. His
contribution in pure poetry consists Venus and Adonais, The
Rape of Lucrece and The Sonnets. The subject of Venus and
Adonais is taken from Ovid's Metamorphoses. It tells the story
of Venus who woos the beautiful boy Adonais who disdains her
love. The sonnets are either addressed to a young man or a dark
lady by whom the poet was betrayed. The language of the
sonnets is smooth and the imagery is clear.
Elizabethan Drama:
The term drama includes two genres: tragedy and comedy.
Tragedy is a literary work often dramatic in form in which the
protagonist falls from grace through an over-alarming
combination of personal faults and circumstances and ends with
a disaster. Comedy is a play written primary to amuse the
audience. In addition to a rousing laugher, comic writing often
appeals to the intellect to teach or to instruct.
The University Wits:
The term University Wits is the title given to a group of
scholarly men, who from 1584 onwards, for about ten years,
took up play writing as their profession. They were graduates of
Oxford or Cambridge. They were men with learning and talent
but with no money. These seven men were Lyly, Greene Peele,
Nashe, Lodge, Kyd and Marlowe. In his comedies, Greene
mixed reality with fantasy-- courtiers meeting fairies, for
example. This, together with his heroines, affected Shakespeare
in his comedies.
Christopher Marlowe (1564-93) is one of the great English
dramatists. Marlowe created the modern English drama. Before
Marlowe there was neither genuine blank verse nor a genuine
tragedy in the English language. His greatest plays include Dr.
Faustus, the Jew of Malta and Edward II. Shakespeare’s works
owe a great debt to Marlowe. Shakespeare’s early blank verse is
fashioned on Marlowe’s. Marlowe's plays convey the spirit of
human freedom, of limitless human power and adventure.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) is considered by all
accounts as the greatest English dramatist. He wrote 37 plays.
Shakespeare followed no rules and had no dramatic theory. He
showed rare genius in creating his characters and expressing his
themes. Naturally, he was affected by the previous writers such
as Kyd, Marlowe and Ben Jonson. He tried to appeal to the
Elizabethan audience though he wrote his plays on universal
themes such as love, ambition and revenge. The portrayal of
characters shows his rare genius. His characters are full of life to
the extent that they seem to be characters we know in real life.
Shakespeare also shows deep insight into the realities of the
world.
Shakespeare probably started by refashioning for stage
production a number of old plays which had been known for
years. There was practically no rule of copyright then. The
earliest period may be said to have lasted till 1595, and includes
such comedies as Love's Labour’s Lost and The Comedy of
Errors. The greatness of Shakespeare is not yet fully visible in
such works, thought they indicate beyond a doubt what is to
come.
The second period lasted from 1595 to 1601 and it was in
this period that As You Like. It was written, as well as the
greatest of the Shakespearean comedies, Twelfth Night. The
third period continued till 1608. and seems to show a marked
change in the spirit and atmosphere of the great dramatist. Now
he appears to have deserted the writing of light – hearted
comedies, and turned to tragedy, dealing with the serious
aspects of life. Such great dramas as Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth,
and King Lear date from this period.
The last period is known as the Romantic Stage of
Shakespeare. It lasts till 1612 and includes: The Tempest,
Cymbeline and The Winter’s Tale. The spirit of these three plays
is not the deep gloomy atmosphere of the tragedies. Although
they are full of many passages of the highest beauty, they show
the decline of the Shakespearean genius.
Chapter 6: Seventeenth Century Literature
Poetry: The Cavalier Poets:
The Cavalier poets are lyrical poets who wrote chiefly about
love and war. They are best represented by Robert Herrick,
Lovelace and Suckling. Their work is simple and graceful in
structure and polished in style. Robert Herrick, for example,
follows Ben Jonson both in form and in pagan philosophy. He is
a lover of pleasure, a singer of the beauty of women and of
flowers and a praiser of wine. Among the best known of his
shorter poems are “To Julia” and “Cherry Ripe”. Richard
Lovelace (1618-58) is so simple and sincere in his poems which
are rather carelessly worked out, and often obscure. His best
known lyrics are “Lucasta Going to the Wars”. As for John
Suckling (1609-42), he was witty, generous and gay. His poems
largely reflected these qualities. His poems such as “The Ballad
upon a Wedding”, “Why so Pall” and “Wan, Fond Lover” show
that elegance was his chief concern.
The Metaphysical Poets:
This term was first used by Dr Johnson to describe a group
of poets who came directly or indirectly under the influence of
Donne. This group of poets include John Donne, George
Herbert, Crashaw, Marvell and Cowley. Their characteristics
include: fantastic wit, or conceit, the argumentative, reasoning,
blending passion and thought and a new verse in reaction to the
Spenserian smoothness and regularity. Their poetry is lyrical;
their subjects are love and religion; their style is startling.
John Donne (1571-1631) is the chief poet of the
metaphysical poetry. Johnson regarded Donne's poetry as
illustrative of a rigorous, philosophical kind of conceit. Donne's
imagery is more scientific than that of the Elizabethans. The
place of the metaphysical gods and goddesses is taken by
images drawn from all sciences. His poetic contribution lies in
the fields of love and religion, two aspects which illustrate the
conflict within him between his worldly ambitions and his
religion. His best known poems include: “The Flee”, “The
Anniversary”, “A Valediction : Forbidding Mourning” and “The
Ecstasy”.
George Herbert (1593-1663) is the second major
metaphysical poet. His poems are honest, sincere and
metaphysical in their unusual conceits and in the blend of
thought and feeling. His expression is precise and simple. His
famous poems include “The Temple”, “The Collar”, “Virtue and
Easter Wings”.
Chapter 7:The Restoration
Dryden's Prose:
The term "Restoration" refers to the restoration of King
Charles II to the throne after the short republican period of
Cromwell. The most famous writer of this period is perhaps
John Dryden. Dryden was a versatile writer. He was a
dramatist, a poet and a critic. Dryden is considered the father of
literary criticism. His most famous critical document is An
Essay for Dramatic Poesy. The essay is in the form of
discussion between four characters, one of whom is Dryden
himself. It deals with the major problems of drama at that time
as the use of rhyme and blank verse in drama; the comparison
between French and English drama. Moreover, the essay is the
first attempt to evaluate the work of Elizabethan dramatists
especially Shakespeare.
Drama: The Heroic Tragedy
After the Elizabethans drama declined due to the Civil War
and the impact of the Puritans who were opposed to drama and
art. With the restoration of Charles II, the theatre was reopened
and the king himself encouraged drama so that it became a thing
of the court. The heroic tragedy depicted the life of the
aristocrats and dealt with themes of love and honor treated in a
grand manner on an unreal scene. There is also a great deal of
fighting, a rhetorical dialogue and almost absurd realism to
appeal to its aristocratic audience. Dryden's first success was in
drama. Dryden was among the famous writers of heroic tragedy
as in his plays: Indian Queen, Indian Emperor and The Earl of
Orrey in his Black Prince.
The Comedy of Manners
The best work of the Restoration period was done by the
writers of the comedy of manners: Shadwell, Etherege,
Wycherley and Congreve. The comedy of manners does not
portray a moral world or include romantic elements but rather
depict elegant people of the day in their amorous intrigues. It
depicts two groups of characters: the wits and the gulls. The wits
win our sympathy and the gulls arouse our laughter. The end of
the comedy is not the victory of the good over the evil but the
witty over the stupid.
Sir George Etherege (1635-1691) first discovered this mode
of writing. William Wycherley (1640-1716) was another
dramatis who evolved the comedy of manners. With four plays
he has a permanent place on the English stage: Love in a Wood,
The Gentleman Dancing-master, The Country Wife and The
Plain Dealer. William Congreve (1670-1729) made his
reputation with four comedies: The Old Bachelor, The Double
Dealer, Love for Love and The Way of The World; and one
tragedy: The Mourning Bride. The Way of The World is
certainly the finest comedy of the period.
Chapter 8: Eighteenth Century Literature
Poetry
Alexander Pope (1688-1744) is famous for his satire. He
determined to achieve perfection as a poet. He imitated the
ancient classical writers. His “Essay on Criticism” made him the
major figure of the age. He expressed the philosophy of the age
in his poem“ Essay on Man”. His best satire, a mock heroic, is
“The Rape of the Lock” which mocks the fashionable London
society in Queen Anne's reign.
The Transition Poets:
The transition poets were a group of poets who appeared
in the second half of the eighteenth century, and their poetry was
transitional stage between the classical school of the 18th
century and the romantic school. This group included James
Thomson, Oliver Goldsmith and Thomas Gray. Instead of the
town atmosphere, common sense and limited themes, the
transition poets depicted nature, humble people and focused on
human feelings. The most famous poems by Thomson include
“The Seasons” and “The Castle of Indolence”. Oliver
Goldsmith wrote “The Traveller” and “The Deserted Village”.
Drama :Ballad Opera The ballad opera was very popular at
that time because the big theatres were very suitable for music
and choruses. The most famous ballad opera was Gray's The
Beggars' Opera.
The Sentimental Comedy:
The sentimental comedy arose as result of the changes that
took place in society. It addressed the commercial middle class
which delighted in moralization, dull preaching and excessive
overflow of feelings. Although sentimentalism is void of free
laughter, it gave the dramatists the chance to reflect on the social
problems of their day.
Prose: The Novel
Daniel Defoe (1660-1731) is the father of the English novel.
Defoe's great book is Robinson Crusoe (1719), which was
written when he was sixty. This novel is based on the true story
of Sir Alexander Silkrik, a British sea-man who was marooned
for several years on a desolate island off the coast of Chili. After
Crusoe there followed in rapid succession: Captain Singleton
(1720), Moll Flanders (1722) and Colonel Jacque (1722).
Samuel Richardson (1689-1761) was a London printer. His
first novel is Pamela or Virtue Rewarded (1740). Pamela is a
poor, virtuous serving maid who resists the dishonorable
approaches of the son of her master. Pamela was followed by
Clarissa, and then Sir Charles Grandison. Henry Fielding
(1707-1754) is another important 18th century novelist. He
wrote The Adventures of Joseph Andrews (1740), which was
meant to ridicule Richardson's Pamela. Instead of the virtuous
serving maid Fielding presents Joseph the chaste servant, whom
Lady Booby tempts from the path of virtue that he has to run
away. Indeed, Fielding had helped much to establish the novel
in one of its notable forms, middle class realism. As a novelist,
Fielding combines the methods of Defoe and Richardson
developing the action and introducing a greater variety of
characters.
Other Prose: Richard Steele and Joseph Addison were the
editors of leading periodicals such as The Tattler and Daily
Spectator in the reign of Queen Anne. Addison and Steele, in
these periodicals, taught their age restraint and good sense. They
encouraged their readers towards self-culture, showing how all
the objects of nature, and literature can be used to cultivate the
mind.
Jonathan Swift is a famous novelist. He was famous for his
satires such as The Tale of Tub and Gulliver's Travels. The Tale
of Tub makes fun of the high and low church parties. Gulliver's
Travels is one of the most successful children's books, and also
the sharpest satire of mankind. In Swift's prose the arguments
are clearly developed, the meaning is never obscure and the
words are carefully chosen.
Introduction to English Poetry
Commentary By Dr. OSAMA TAHA (PhD)
Mobile:01115859130
Reading poetry is part attitude and part technique. Curiosity is a useful
attitude, especially when it is free of preconceived ideas about what poetry is or
should be. Effective technique directs your curiosity into asking questions, drawing
you into conversation with the poem. Since the form of the poem is part of its
meaning (for example, features such as repetition and rhyme may amplify or extend
the meaning of a word or idea, adding emphasis, texture or dimension), we believe
that questions about form and technique provide an effective point of entry for
interpretation. To ask some of these questions, you will need to develop a good ear for
the musical qualities of language, particularly how sound and rhythm relate to
meaning.
Prior assumptions such as the readers should understand the poem from their
first reading, the poem has only one meaning and the poem can mean anything the
readers want it to mean are wrong. William Carlos Williams addresses his wife in his
poem "January Morning":
All this—
was for you, old woman.
I wanted to write a poem
that you would understand.
For what good is it to me
if you can't understand it?
But you got to try hard—
Williams admits in these lines that poetry is often difficult. He also suggests
that a poet depends on the effort of the reader; somehow, the reader must 'complete'
what the poet has begun. Reading poetry is a challenge, but like so many other things,
it takes practice, and your skills improve as you progress.
Literature is the sharing of experience, and successful poems welcome you
in, revealing ideas that you not have been foremost in the writer's mind in the moment
of composition. Poems speak to us in many ways. Sometimes the poem suggests an
experience, idea, or feeling that you know but cannot express directly.
Reading the poem usually starts with the title. The title may give you an
image or an association to start with. Looking at the poem's shape, you can see
whether the lines are continuous or broken into groups (stanzas). You can also know
whether some words rhyme or not and whether some lines have a rhythm that is
distinct from the rest of the poem. Lines are often determined by meaning, sound and
rhythm, breath or typography. Most poems can be interpreted without the help of
historical context. To understand a poem, you can ask yourself the following
questions:
Who is the speaker?
What circumstances gave rise to the poem?
What situation is presented?
Who is the audience?
What is the tone?
What is the form of the poem?
How is form related to content?
What is the role played by sound in the poem?
Does the poem use imagery to achieve a particular effect?
If the poem has a question, what is the answer?
If the poem has an answer, what is the question?
What does the title suggest?
Does the poem use unusual words or use words in an unusual way?
Irony Definition
Irony is a figure of speech in which words are used in such a way that their
intended meaning is different from the actual meaning of the words. It may also be a
situation that may end up in quite a different way than what is generally anticipated.
In simple words, it is a difference between the appearance and the reality.
Types of Irony
On the grounds of the above definition, we distinguish two basic kinds of
irony i.e. verbal irony and situational irony. A verbal irony involves what one does
not mean. When in response to a foolish idea, we say, “what a great idea!” it is a
verbal irony. A situational irony occurs when, for instance, a man is laughing at the
misfortune of the other even when the same misfortune, in complete unawareness, is
befalling him.
Difference between Dramatic Irony and Situational Irony
Dramatic irony is a kind of irony in a situation, which the writers frequently
employ in their works. In situational irony, both the characters and the audience are
fully unaware of the implications of the real situation. In dramatic irony, the
characters are oblivious of the situation but the audience is not. For example, in
“Romeo and Juliet”, we know much before the characters that they are going to die.
Examples
5. We come across the following lines in Shakespeare’s “Romeo and
Juliet”, Act I, Scene V.
“Go ask his name: if he be married.
My grave is like to be my wedding bed.”
Juliet commands her nurse to find out who Romeo was and says if he were
married, then her wedding bed would be her grave. It is a verbal irony because the
audience knows that she is going to die on her wedding bed.
6. Irony examples are not only found in stage plays but in poems too. In
his poem “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”, Coleridge wrote:
“Water, water, everywhere,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, everywhere,
Nor any drop to drink.”
In the above stated lines, the ship, blown by the south wind, is stranded in the
uncharted sea. Ironically, there is water everywhere but they do not have a single drop
of water to drink.
Consider the poem "Dead Boy" by Ransom
Time is one of the major themes of English poetry. It said to be eternal. It is
said that it has neither a beginning nor an end. Yet men are able to measure it as years,
months, days, hours, minutes and seconds. They have also given meanings to the
words – past, present and future. True, time has a meaning. It moves. What was
yesterday is not today. What is today will not be tomorrow. Yesterday is gone. Today
is and tomorrow is yet to come.
The entire creation moves on according to a time pattern. There is birth,
growth and death. There is time for everything. Plants flower and give fruits. Seasons
come according to time. A child is born, grows into boyhood, adolescence, youth,
middle age and old age according to age and time. Every movement of creation is
linked with time. One cannot grow rice in a month nor can a child become an adult in
a year. Everything is fixed to a time-frame. Two poems that deal with the concept of
death that I actually enjoyed reading and will compare to each other are "When forty
winters shall besiege thy brow" and "All the World's a Stage" by William
Shakespeare.
Death is an aspect of life that everyone becomes acquainted with sooner or
later. From my own experiences I am more familiar with death than I could ever want
to be. Poetry is something that is very difficult for me to follow, but when it deals
with concept that I am familiar with, then I am able to associate with the soul of the
writer. Two poems that deal with the concept of death that I actually enjoyed reading
and will compare to each other are "Dead Boy" by John Crowe Ransom and "I heard a
fly buzz when I died" by Emily Dickinson.
Robert Frost
“Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening”
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
On the surface, this poem is simplicity itself. The speaker is stopping by some
woods on a snowy evening. He or she takes in the lovely scene in near-silence, is
tempted to stay longer, but acknowledges the pull of obligations and the considerable
distance yet to be traveled before he or she can rest for the night. The poem consists
of four (almost) identically constructed stanzas. Each line is iambic, with four stressed
syllables.
Within the four lines of each stanza, the first, second, and fourth lines rhyme.
The third line does not, but it sets up the rhymes for the next stanza. For example, in
the third stanza, queer, near, and year all rhyme, but lake rhymes with shake, mistake,
and flake in the following stanza. The notable exception to this pattern comes in the
final stanza, where the third line rhymes with the previous two and is repeated as the
fourth line.
Like the woods it describes, the poem is lovely but entices us with dark
depths—of interpretation, in this case. It stands alone and beautiful, the account of a
man stopping by woods on a snowy evening, but gives us a come-hither look that
begs us to load it with a full inventory of possible meanings. We protest, we make
apologies, we point to the dangers of reading poetry in this way, but unlike the
speaker of the poem, we cannot resist.
The last two lines a strong claim to be the most celebrated instance of
repetition in English poetry: “And miles to go before I sleep”. For the last “miles to
go” now seems like life; the last “sleep” now seems like death.
The basic conflict in the poem, resolved in the last stanza, is between an
attraction toward the woods and the pull of responsibility outside of the woods. What
do woods represent? Something good? Something bad? Woods are sometimes a
symbol for wildness and madness. But these woods do not seem particularly wild.
They are someone’s woods, someone’s in particular—the owner lives in the village.
But that owner is in the village on this, the darkest evening of the year—so would any
sensible person be. That is where the division seems to lie, between the village (or
“society,” “civilization,” “duty,” “sensibility,” “responsibility”) and the woods (that
which is beyond the borders of the village and all it represents). If the woods are not
particularly wicked, they still possess the seed of the irrational; and they are, at night,
dark—with all the varied connotations of darkness.
Part of what is irrational about the woods is their attraction. They are restful,
seductive, lovely, dark, and deep—like deep sleep, like oblivion. Snow falls in downy
flakes, like a blanket to lie under and be covered by. And here is where many readers
hear dark undertones to this lyric. To rest too long while snow falls could be to lose
one’s way, to lose the path, to freeze and die. Does this poem express a death wish,
considered and then discarded? Do the woods sing a siren’s song? Or does the poem
merely describe the temptation to sit and watch beauty while responsibilities are
forgotten?
Sonnet 1
From fairest creatures we desire increase
William Shakespeare
In the first quatrain of Shakespeare's Sonnet 1, the speaker explains to the
young man that humanity’s wish is that pleasant people will reproduce children:
“From fairest creatures we desire increase.” The speaker likens the young man’s
beauty to a rose, whose beauty will never die if he produces little roses or children. He
reminds the young man that he will age and “by time decease” but if he produces a
child, his memory will be able to live on: “His tender heir might bear his memory.”
In the second quatrain, the speaker chides the young man saying he is only
interested in his own beauty; he is conceited and self-indulgent: “But thou contracted
to thine own bright eyes, / Feed’st thy light’s flame with self-substantial fuel.” And
according to the speaker, the young conceited man is causing “a famine where
abundance lies”: instead of there being one young person of such beauty, there could
be many, if only the young adult would marry and produce others that would be as
beautiful as he is. And in being so selfish, the young man is his own enemy and
ultimately being cruel to himself: “Thyself thy foe, to thy sweet self too cruel.”
In the third quatrain, the speaker tries to convince the young man of his
selfishness by reminding again him that as only one person, “only herald to the gaudy
spring,” he is hiding his value: “Within thine own bud buriest thy content.” He calls
the young man a “tender churl” and reminds him that he is wasting himself by
continuing to remain so self-important: “And, tender churl, mak’st waste in
niggarding.”
In the couplet, “Pity the world, or else this glutton be, / To eat the world’s
due, by the grave and thee,” the speaker asks the young man to take pity on the world,
because he is consuming what the world should have by lavishing all his attention on
himself. And then the speaker reminds the young man that if he does not produce
heirs he will find himself alone with grave in the end.
William Shakespeare
Sonnet 62
Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
Helen Vendler sees the speaker of the poem as harshly criticizing his own
weakness and foolishness, but for most critics the poem is lighter in mood. Though it
echoes other poems in the sequence which present the connections created by love as
painful, in this poem, the presence of the beloved is comforting rather than terrifying.
Sonnet 62 explores themes of self-love and seeing the love in yourself– is
there really a difference? The speaker admits he is extremely vain person, proud both
of his outward form and personality. This sin, furthermore, is so deeply rooted that he
believes it can’t ever be removed. However, upon seeing his face in the mirror, it
disgusts him. Surely loving such a face would be a sin. In fact, the thing the speaker
truly loves about himself is his possession of the youth; his beauty is derived from the
part of the young man he possesses.
The poem depends on wordplay such as “chopped with tanned antiquity”
which describes the speaker’s face as scarred, wrinkled (like tanned leather). Another
example is “painting my age” which could also refer either to gilding an aged
countenance with associations to a younger handsomer man, to verbal descriptions,
(word paintings), or to the use of cosmetics. The entire couplet may be paraphrased:
“I praise myself, because in doing so I praise you, as if painting myself in colors
borrowed from you”’.
The sin of self-love conditions everything I see, and my entire soul, and every
one of my faculties. And there’s no remedy for this sin, it’s so deeply rooted in my
heart. I keep thinking that no-one’s face is as gracious as mine is; no body as wellproportioned. I regard myself as surpassing everyone else in everything. But when my
mirror shows me what I’m really like – beaten and creased by aging and the sun – I
conclude the exact opposite to what my self-love tells me. To love myself so much
would be a disgrace. It’s you, myself, that I’m really praising when I praise myself,
giving my old age the beauty of your youth.
The conceit of the poem is derived most nearly from Petrarch; however, the
idea of lovers who have in some sense exchanged souls is commonplace and
proverbial. The connected theme--the speaker's unworthiness compared to his
beloved--is likewise traditional.
Line 7 has posed some problems. Edward Dowden hypothesized that "for
myself" meant "for my own satisfaction," and certain editors suggest that "do" be
amended to "so." Consensus, however, has settled on "do" as an intensifier.
John Crowe Ransom
Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter
This Ransom poem is, as its title suggests, a miniature but highly traditional
elegy. The five quatrains follow, as a structure, the three-stage progression which is a
convention of the genre: from statement or indication of occasion of grief to
expression of grief and from thence to reconciliation to or transcendence of grief. But
also its elegiac form underlines what is impressive about it: how subtly it shows us the
disconnect between the world of children and the world of adults. "Bells" is about the
funeral of a little girl, but its slow, stately quatrains put it squarely in the perspective
of the adult funeral-goer.
The middle stanzas are an attempt to enter the world of the little dead girl,
isolated to a single memory of the girl chasing a troupe of geese. The vocabulary is
Romantic, in the King Arthur sense: She "took arms" against them; they "cried in
goose, Alas;" her wars were "bruited," a word that has a distinctly archaic flavor.
Ransom packs so much in these phrases. There is the unmistakable sense of adventure
that colors the games of childhood, but to express them in such terms is to speak as an
adult about things that are, as a child, mostly indescribable. In other words, the girl
may have experienced this sense of adventure, but she certainly never connected it to
the word "Alas. Whatever our first impressions, the speaker is decidedly not admitted
into the little girl's consciousness and is only guessing at things.
In death, she has become a "brown study" (another phrase severe in its
maturity) and lost those hallmarks of childhood: "such speed," "such lightness in her
footfall," her "tireless heart." In death, she has more in common with her onlookers,
who like she are "sternly stopped." The speaker's reaction at this is remarkably cold,
not grief but astonishment, vexation. "Bells" is an elegy strangely devoid of sadness,
and what of it is there seems to be more over the loss of childhood than of a child.
Grief is only implied, like a footnote.
The whole poem, in fact, is wholly not about what it seems. The stronger grief
is that the girl's death foretells our own, which, as we ourselves are so removed from
her fleetness and mired in our own immobility, is unthinkably near.
Dead Boy
The little cousin is dead, by foul subtraction,
A green bough from Virginia's aged tree,
John Crowe Ransom's "Dead Boy" is a poem about the different opinions in
society regarding a child's death. This child while living, built himself many
reputations among the town's people. None of the members of society felt it was their
duty to help or inform this child of the path he was taken. However, when he dies
some criticize his life and feel the need to criticize his actions in life. While all the
time knowing they did nothing to change his path. Others feel sorry, but are just as
guilty for not helping a child who might have had a future. Instead he is lying in a
coffin dead. Society is left to wonder whether his death was necessary?
The first part of the poem discusses the feelings of his kin. They feel
uncomfortable with his death. Also there are others that do not like the child's
unnecessary death. These are the people who did not ever meet or see the child but
realize what kind of a tragedy this death was. Ransom makes a statement at the end of
the first paragraph "Nor some of the world of outer dark, like me". This is a strong
statement for the simple fact that this shows how much of the town, city, world is
affected by one child's death.
This next part is by far the harshest. The voices are that of the town's people
who say this child was helpless. His death was felt as the only alternative to some. He
was called "a black cloud full of storms too hot for keeping". Just as in Mother Nature
the people felt that this child could not be controlled. The following line however is
one of the most emotional. It talks of how his mother still weeps for her dead child.
This is a reaction of any mother who cared for her child. These people have to see her
weep, yet still talk of a horrid child. This is an unjustifiable act on their part. The part
that is probably the most sincere is that of the elder men. They speak of the child's
death hurting their hearts.
“Dead Boy” deals with the intrusion of death into a rural community. The
poem’s form is conventional: quatrains rhyming abab or cdcd. The relatively prosaic
title, “Dead Boy,” sets the serious tone. The speaker breaks with the sentimental
tradition, using understatement to distance both speaker and reader from emotional
involvement in the death of this unnamed child. No attempt is made to describe the
grief of the boy’s extended family (county kin) and neighbors; instead, the reader
learns that they “do not like” what has happened. Thus, the reader is led to examine
this death with detachment, and the full emotional impact is saved for the final stanza
and the speaker’s conclusions about this “deep dynastic wound.”
The speaker ironically undercuts any tendency toward sentimentality,
describing a boy not heroic, talented, or beloved by the community; his disposition
seems more “stormy” than sunny. At times his mother called him a sword beneath her
heart, but her bitter weeping shows deep love for him.
Having approached raw emotion in describing the mother’s grief, however, the
speaker immediately retreats to ironic discussion of changed attitudes toward the
child; death has transformed a squealing, pasty-faced pig into a “little man,” and in his
face, the speaker professes to see family resemblance.
The speaker shifts from this little man to focus on the “elder men” of the
community, who represent age and its accompanying loss of vitality. Uncomfortable
remaining in the house, these men congregate outside, exchanging rumors in an
unsuccessful attempt to deal with their deep dynastic wound, the loss of a male heir to
carry on the family name.
Emily Dickinson
"Because I could not stop for Death"
Dickinson’s poems deal with death again and again, and it is never quite the
same in any poem. In “Because I could not stop for Death—,” we see death
personified. He is no frightening, or even intimidating, reaper, but rather a courteous
and gentle guide, leading her to eternity. The speaker feels no fear when Death picks
her up in his carriage, she just sees it as an act of kindness, as she was too busy to find
time for him.
In this poem, Dickinson’s speaker is communicating from beyond the grave,
describing her journey with Death, personified, from life to afterlife. In the opening
stanza, the speaker is too busy for Death (“Because I could not stop for Death—“), so
Death—“kindly”—takes the time to do what she cannot, and stops for her.
This “civility” that Death shows in taking time out for her leads her to give up
on those things that had made her so busy—“And I had put away/My labor and my
leisure too”—so they can just enjoy this carriage ride (“We slowly drove – He knew
no haste”).
In the third stanza we see reminders of the world that the speaker is passing
from, with children playing and fields of grain. Her place in the world shifts between
this stanza and the next; in the third stanza, “We passed the Setting Sun—,” but at the
opening of the fourth stanza, she corrects this—“Or rather – He passed Us –“—
because she has stopped being an active agent, and is only now a part of the
landscape.
In this stanza, after the realization of her new place in the world, her death also
becomes suddenly very physical, as “The Dews drew quivering and chill—,” and she
explains that her dress is only gossamer, and her “Tippet,” a kind of cape usually
made out of fur, is “only Tulle.”
After this moment of seeing the coldness of her death, the carriage pauses at
her new “House.” The description of the house—“A Swelling of the Ground—“—
makes it clear that this is no cottage, but instead a grave. Yet they only “pause” at this
house, because although it is ostensibly her home, it is really only a resting place as
she travels to eternity.
The final stanza shows a glimpse of this immortality, made most clear in the
first two lines, where she says that although it has been centuries since she has died, it
feels no longer than a day. It is not just any day that she compares it to, however—it is
the very day of her death, when she saw “the Horses’ Heads” that were pulling her
towards this eternity.
Mirabeau's Definition of Civilization:
There are qualifications such as manners, politeness, civility or urbanity which
are attached to people. We can draw a line between manners, etc. and people. But this
pole is characterized as a mask by Mirabeau. Behind the mask is the true meaning of
civilization; that is virtue. To be civilized is to be thus virtuous. The opposite of
civilization is corruption, which means the destruction of social life. So, virtue is the
quality needed to uphold society. This quality is human or universal. We can therefore
draw a line between human and virtue. We can observe a tension between the
universal pole (virtue-humanity) and the particular cultural pole (people-manners).
Mirabeau tries to solve this tension by turning the cultural pole into a distortion of the
true meaning of civilization. The distortion will lead to corruption while only virtue
will carry civilization with true civilization. Moreover, Mirabeau attaches an active
role to virtue it can do something for society. It is the driving force in maintaining and
developing society. In that sense, civilization and corruption are at once processes,
driving forces within this processes, and positive or negative results of this process.
Mirabeau has a very abstract idea of the space of civilization. The reason for this is
that he wants to stress the universal dimension: civilization is an inherent quality.
Time is said to be eternal. It is said that it has neither a beginning nor an end. Yet men
are able to measure it as years, months, days, hours, minutes and seconds. They have
also given meanings to the words – past, present and future. True, time has a meaning.
It moves. What was yesterday is not today. What is today will not be tomorrow.
Yesterday is gone. Today is and tomorrow is yet to come. Yet time is said to have no
holiday. It exists always.
The entire creation moves on according to a time pattern. There is birth, growth and
death. There is time for everything. Plants flower and give fruits. Seasons come
according to time. A child is born, grows into boyhood, adolescence, youth, middle
age and old age according to age and time. Every movement of creation is linked with
time. One cannot grow paddy in a month nor can a child become an adult in a year.
Everything is fixed to a time-frame.
Time is a free force. It does not wait for any one. It is commonly said that time and
tide waits for no man. Time is money. A minute not usefully spent is an eternal loss.
You can never get back the lost minute. One has to strike the iron when it is hot. The
time flies and never returns. If you waste time it wastes you.
‘Time is the best medicine’, says Ovid. It is said that time heals all wounds and it
even heals what reason cannot. All human beings are emotional. When negative
emotions like fear, anger, envy and jealousy overtake them, they lose reason and act
in haste leading to serious consequences. They may repent later, as emotions cool
down. But the damage done is done and remains forever. Even that damage can heal
with the passage of time. People involved may forget and forgive. That is the
importance of time and its healing touch.
Time is said to be a wise counselor. Passage of time allows an individual to grow.
This growth gives experience. Experience helps decision making. Time reminds you
to act and to act wisely. The wisest make use of the time fruitfully. It is said that the
wisest grieve the most at the loss of time.
Those who do not know the importance of time, waste it or rather they spend it doing
nothing. There is a proverb which says that killing time is not a murder; it is a suicide.
It means, by wasting time one is not harming others. On the other hand one is harming
himself. Ordinary people merely go on thinking how to spend their time. The wise
and talented make use of it fruitfully.
Some people always complain that there is no time fort them to do anything. That is
not correct. If one wisely plans his activities, there will be time for everything
happening according to time. A man who is a part of nature cannot complain against
time. Time is powerful. It conquers all. Men are only to obey it. Man cannot say that
he has nothing of his own. Time which is valuable is all his own.
If you are not on time and miss the train, you miss it fore-ever. So also the time, once
you miss it, it flies off. You can never catch it. Hence it is called fleeting time. Let us
learn to use our time fruitfully. This is the key to success.
Death is an aspect of life that everyone becomes
acquainted with sooner or later. From my own
experiences I am more familiar with death than I
could ever want to be. Poetry is something that
is very difficult for me to follow, but when it
deals with concept that I am familiar with, then
I am able to associate with the soul of the
writer. Two poems that deal with the concept of
death that I actually enjoyed reading and will
compare to each other are "Death be not proud" by
Dylan Thomas and "Do Not Go Gentle Into That Good
Night" by Dylan Thomas. Firstly, in "Death be not
proud,"
Introduction
Reading poetry is part attitude and part technique. Curiosity is a
useful attitude, especially when it is free of preconceived ideas about
what poetry is or should be. Effective technique directs your curiosity
into asking questions, drawing you into conversation with the poem.
Since the form of the poem is part of its meaning (for example, features
such as repetition and rhyme may amplify or extend the meaning of a
word or idea, adding emphasis, texture or dimension), we believe that
questions about form and technique provide an effective point of entry for
interpretation. To ask some of these questions, you will need to develop a
good ear for the musical qualities of language, particularly how sound
and rhythm relate to meaning.
Prior assumptions such as the readers should understand the poem
from their first reading, the poem has only one meaning and the poem can
mean anything the readers want it to mean are wrong. William Carlos
Williams addresses his wife in his poem "January Morning":
All this—
was for you, old woman.
I wanted to write a poem
that you would understand.
For what good is it to me
if you can't understand it?
But you got to try hard—
Williams admits in these lines that poetry is often difficult. He also
suggests that a poet depends on the effort of the reader; somehow, the
reader must 'complete' what the poet has begun. Reading poetry is a
challenge, but like so many other things, it takes practice, and your skills
improve as you progress.
Literature is the sharing of experience, and successful poems
welcome you in, revealing ideas that you not have been foremost in the
writer's mind in the moment of composition. Poems speak to us in many
ways. Sometimes the poem suggests an experience, idea, or feeling that
you know but cannot express directly.
Reading the poem usually starts with the title. The title may give
you an image or an association to start with. Looking at the poem's shape,
you can see whether the lines are continuous or broken into groups
(stanzas). You can also know whether some words rhyme or not and
whether some lines have a rhythm that is distinct from the rest of the
poem. Lines are often determined by meaning, sound and rhythm, breath
or typography. Most poems can be interpreted without the help of
historical context. To understand a poem, you can ask yourself the
following questions:
Who is the speaker?
What circumstances gave rise to the poem?
What situation is presented?
Who is the audience?
What is the tone?
What is the form of the poem?
How is form related to content?
What is the role played by sound in the poem?
Does the poem use imagery to achieve a particular effect?
If the poem has a question, what is the answer?
If the poem has an answer, what is the question?
What does the title suggest?
Does the poem use unusual words or use words in an unusual way?
Sonnet 2
William Shakespeare
When forty winters shall beseige thy brow,
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
William Shakespeare is by all accounts the greatest poet and
dramatist in the English language, and one of the greatest in the world.
Shakespeare owes his greatness to two things: the quality of his poetry
and his deep understanding. That is why he is considered a symbol of
English culture.
This sonnet belongs to the “marriage sonnets”; the speaker in
each of these sonnets is trying to persuade a young man to marry. When
forty years have made your brow wrinkled with age, and you are showing
all the other signs of aging. The pride and greatness of your youth, so
much admired by everyone now will be worth as little as a tattered weed.
Then, when you are asked 'where is your beauty now?' and, 'where is the
treasure from your days of merriment?' You must say, within your own
eyes, now sunk deep in their sockets, where lies a shameful confession of
greed and self-obsession. If you would have only put your beauty to a
greater use. If only you could answer 'This fair child of mine Shall give
an account of my life and prove that I made no misuse of my time on
earth. 'Proving that his beauty, because he is your son, was once yours!
This child would be new-made when you are old, and you would see your
own blood flow warm through him when you are cold.
The speaker presents a problem (the young man is going to get old)
and then offers a solution (having kids). He exaggerates the problem,
wrinkles turn into "trenches" (line 2). Then he makes his solution sound
really great, promising that having a child will be like being born again:
"This were to be new made when thou art old" (line13).
We want all beautiful creatures to reproduce themselves so that
beauty’s flower will not die out; but as an old man dies in time, he leaves
a young heir to carry on his memory. But you, concerned only with your
own beautiful eyes, feed the bright light of life with self-regarding fuel,
making beauty shallow by your preoccupation with your looks. In this
you are your own enemy, being cruel to yourself. You who are the
world’s most beautiful ornament and the chief messenger of spring, are
burying your gifts within yourself. And, dear selfish one, because you
decline to reproduce, you are actually wasting that beauty. Take pity on
the world or else be the glutton who devours, with the grave, what
belongs to the world.
This sonnet opens with a metaphor that compares the way time
wears away a person's face to the way an army attacks a castle. The
personification is seen in the metaphor: "deep trenches in thy beauty's
field" which can be seen as wrinkles in a beautiful face. This gives
readers a picture of the old age that has yet to come for some. The man's
beauty will be lost and become like a "tattered weed." "Will be a tatter'd
weed, of small worth held" unless he reproduces. This is a metaphor. We
imagine "all-eating shame" being a Monster, just gobbling up everything
around it. There's a little bit of personification here, since Shakespeare
gives shame a human or animal quality to suggest that it is powerful and
dangerous. For the whole poem the rhyme scheme would be:
ABABCDCDEFEFGG.
William Shakespeare
Sonnet 62 Sin of self-love possesseth all mine eye
And all my soul, and all my every part;
The sin of self-love controls everything I see, and my entire soul, and every part of
me. There’s no way to get rid of this sin, it’s so deeply rooted in my heart. I think that
no one’s face is as gracious as mine, no body so evenly proportioned, no one’s
integrity of such high worth. I calculate my value such that I surpass everybody else
in everything. But when my mirror shows me how I really look, beaten and cracked
by age and the sun, I come to an opposite conclusion: For myself to love myself so
much would be a sinful error. It’s you I’m praising when I praise myself, ornamenting
my old age with the beauty of your youth.
I am an extremely vain person; I am proud both of my outward form and of my
personality. This sin, furthermore, is so deeply rooted in my soul that I do not believe
it can ever be removed. However, when I look at my own real face in the mirror, I am
disgusted, and I realize that to love such a face would be a sin. In fact, what I love
about myself is my possession of you, and my beauty derives from the part of you that
I possess.
The conceit of the poem is derived most nearly from Petrarch; however, the idea of
lovers who have in some sense exchanged souls is commonplace and proverbial. The
connected theme--the speaker's unworthiness compared to his beloved--is likewise
traditional.
Line 7 has posed some problems. Edward Dowden hypothesized that "for myself"
meant "for my own satisfaction," and certain editors suggest that "do" be amended to
"so." Consensus, however, has settled on some version of the gloss of Nicolaus
Delius: "I define my own worth for myself," with "do" as an intensifier.
For "beated" in line 10, Edmond Malone suggested "bated," and George Steevens
"blasted." Dowden speculated, without accepting, the possibility that "beated"
referred to a process of tanning; John Shakespeare was a glover. Stephen Booth notes
that the use of "bating" in this sense is not attested before the nineteenth century.
Helen Vendler sees the speaker of the poem as harshly criticizing his own weakness
and foolishness, but for most critics the poem is lighter in mood. Though it echoes
other poems in the sequence which present the connections created by love as painful,
in this poem, the presence of the beloved is comforting rather than terrifying.
The sin of self-love conditions everything I see, and my entire soul, and every one of
my faculties. And there’s no remedy for this sin, it’s so deeply rooted in my heart. I
keep thinking that no-one’s face is as gracious as mine is; no body as wellproportioned; no-one’s integrity as sound. I regard myself as surpassing everyone else
in everything. But when my mirror shows me what I’m really like – beaten and
creased by ageing and the sun – I conclude the exact opposite to what my self-love
tells me. To love myself so much would be a disgrace. It’s you, myself, that I’m really
praising when I praise myself, giving my old age the beauty of your youth.
John Crowe Ransom
Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter
Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter"--rhyming, more or less metered--provides us
some respite from the weirdness of Berryman, who teases us with promises of form.
But also its elegiac form underlines what is impressive about it: how subtly it shows
us the disconnect between the world of children and the world of adults. "Bells" is
about the funeral of a little girl, but its slow, stately quatrains put it squarely in the
perspective of the adult funeral-goer.
Not that the speaker doesn't try to enter her perspective, or the perspective she had in
life. The middle stanzas are an attempt to enter the world of the little dead girl,
isolated to a single memory of the girl chasing a troupe of geese. The vocabulary is
Romantic, in the King Arthur sense: She "took arms" against them; they "cried in
goose, Alas;" her wars were "bruited," a word that has a distinctly archaic flavor.
Ransom packs so much in these phrases. There is the unmistakable sense of adventure
that colors the games of childhood, but to express them in such terms is to speak as an
adult about things that are, as a child, mostly ineffable. In other words, the girl may
have experienced this sense of adventure, but she certainly never connected it to the
word "Alas"--and despite what the speaker says, neither do the geese. Whatever our
first impressions, the speaker is decidedly not admitted into the little girl's
consciousness and is only guessing at things.
In death, she has become a "brown study" (another phrase severe in its maturity) and
lost those hallmarks of childhood: "such speed," "such lightness in her footfall," her
"tireless heart." In death, she has more in common with her onlookers, who like she
are "sternly stopped." The speaker's reaction at this is remarkably cold, not grief but
astonishment, vexation. "Bells" is an elegy strangely devoid of sadness, and what of it
is there seems to be more over the loss of childhood than of a child. Grief peeks in at
the edges, or is only implied, like a footnote.
I love "Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter" because it is a classic piece of
misdirection. The goose bits are wonderful in their lightness (I love that they scuttle
"goose-fashion") but they tell you far more about the speaker than the geese. The
whole poem, in fact, is wholly not about what it seems. The stronger grief is that the
girl's death presages our own, which, as we ourselves are so removed from her
fleetness and mired in our own immobility, is unthinkably near. If we didn't know it
were (thankfully) not based on the death any real person, it might conceal a heart of
true selfishness. As it is, we might acquit Ransom of such cruelty by considering the
real gravity of the allusion, which is plucked wholesale from Donne:
Any man's death diminishes me because I am involved in mankind; and therefore
never send to know for whom the bell tolls; it tolls for thee. . .
Robert Penn Warren
Now the peculiar effect of this admirable little poem is largely implied in the words
astonishes and vexed. First, simple grief is not the content of the primary statement.
We are astonished at this event, which, though common to nature, has upset our
human calculation. Second, it is not a poem whose aim is unvarnished pathos of
recollection. Third, the resolution of the grief is not on a compensatory basis, as is
common in the elegy formula. It is something more modest. The word vexed indicates
its nature: the astonishment, the pathos, are absorbed into the total body of the
mourner's experiences and given perspective so that the manly understatement is all
that is to be allowed. We are shaken, but not as a leaf.
From "John Crowe Ransom: A Study in Irony." Virginia Quarterly Review. (1935)
Vivienne Kock
This delicately-turned elegy, suffused with an affectionate humor by the poet's
intrusion into the child's own universe of geese and grass, in the end reckons death as
an incongruous visitor:
There was such speed in her little body,
And such lightness in her footfall,
It is no wonder her brown study
Astonishes us all.
Robert Penn Warren points out that it is the words "astonishes" and "vexed" which are
pivotal to the pathos of the poem. I should add to this the colloquial term "brown
study," which is domestic and yet foreign to the nature of childhood, which is all
"speed" and "lightness." The repetition in the last stanza of "brown study" in
conjunction with the key word "vexed" clinches the unwillingness of the narrator to
accept the "little lady" as departed:
In one house we are sternly stopped
To say we are vexed at her brown study,
Lying so primly proppedFrom "The Achievement of John Crowe Ransom." Sewanee Review (1950)
M. E. Bradford
This Ransom poem is, as its title suggests, a miniature but highly traditional elegy.
The five quatrains follow, as a structure, the three-stage progression which is a
convention of the genre: from statement or indication of occasion of grief to
expression of grief and from thence to reconciliation to or transcendence of grief.
And, again in accordance with the convention, the concluding consolation is
developed directly and organically out of the context established by the reactions to
the girl's death which immediately precede it.
The opening quatrain, because the title of the poem relieves it of the obligation of
stating the occasion of the elegy, the death of Mr. Whiteside's daughter, is free to be
very specific about what there is in her death that "astonishes us all"—about the
singular implications of this particular death which cause it to affront the speaker's
sense of order, justice, and propriety:
There was such speed in her little body,
And such lightness in her footfall,
It is no wonder that her brown study
Astonishes us all.
The recollections of the child's vivacity and grace which make the stillness and
abstracted or vacuous appearance of her dead body disturbing, identified in these
verses as the provocation of grief, are presented fully in the three following quatrains
which make up the second section of the poem. Together, in the language of high
chivalric romance, they validate the explanation of collective sorrow far more
effectively than could any exclamatory lamentation or full-throated Miltonic
remonstrance against harsh fate. For the substance of human grief at the loss of those
beloved is memory; and the most natural thing to remember about a dead child when
in the presence of its mortal remains is the seemingly "tireless heart" with which it
once conducted the petty affairs (in the language of the romances, "wars") of its life.
The image of quest or knightly conflict suggested by the idiom Ransom applies to the
remembered adventures of the little "goose girl" is likewise appropriate to the
function of this section of the poem as the second and lamentory division of a threepart elegiac structure. According to the conventions of the elegy, it is not at all
indecorous to express grief at the death of the subject through a recitation of his
adventures, a recitation which will normally stress those qualities which he revealed
in life that make of his death a loss to those who mourn. Ransom's evocation of "wars
. . . bruited in our high window," of "arms" taken against "shadows" and "lazy geese,"
is gently ironic—his acknowledgement that he has adjusted his form to the necessities
of his poetic situation. The fantasies which children enact in anticipation or imitation
of the business of adult life may amuse us as we observe them; they can but play at
making war. But these fantasies take on a different (and in this case, suitable) coloring
when remembered in so funereal a context as that given them by this poem.
The word "ready" in the first line of stanza five marks it as the climax of an elegiac
sequence: "Now go the bells and we are ready. . . ." In stanza one the speaker declares
that the gathered mourners are "astonished" at the death of John Whiteside's daughter.
In stanzas two, three, and four we are made to understand why. But the placement of
line seventeen of the poem forces us to look at its first four quatrains and to ask how
they explain the "readiness" of the bereaved, who were before "astonished" and
"unready," to ask what has changed their mood and prepared them to complete the
obsequies for which they have gathered; it raises the question of how sorrow at death
may be assuaged by forceful expression of that selfsame sorrow. And, at the same
time, it forces us to recognize in the structure of the entire poem the pattern of the
traditional elegy.
At first glance, the announcement—without prelude or explanation—that those
gathered in bereavement are now prepared for the last rites is surprising. The
movement from section two to section three in the elegiac pattern appears to be, in the
case of "Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter," forced and poetically unearned. But on
re-examination from the perspective afforded us by line seventeen, Ransom's strategy
in embodying consolation in the raw material of grief itself becomes apparent. The
dead girl put the mourners in mind of the girl alive; and the contrast between the two,
which serves first to explain what is astonishing about the child's corpse, comes then
in immemorial fashion to offer what is perhaps the oldest and most natural of all
consolations, that provided by the changed and "uninhabited" appearance of the
corpse. The "brown study" propped before the mourners is not recognizable as the
"tireless . . . little lady with rod." Whatever vitality and grace were earlier "bruited" in
the "high window" of this now diminished household will not answer with its
members the summons of these bells.
Or, to take "ready" another way, and to explain in accordance with pagan or classical
practice the consolation offered by memory to those gathered before a child's body,
special significance may be attached to the "Alas" (line twelve) of the geese harried
by the "little lady," to the "rod" with which she "took arms" and disturbed their "apple
dreams," and to the general description of her activities while yet alive as a conflict
with "her shadow" (lines six and seven).
In the classical elegy the question of an afterlife does not usually arise; reactions to
bereavement are conditioned by emphasis upon the naturalness of death, its part in the
great cycle of life from which all good and fruitfulness are derived. Always nature as
order, as life giving and inevitable, is affirmed.
The geese, after the fashion of animals in the ballads, may have been preternaturally
wise in seeing an ill omen in Miss Whiteside's contention with shadows. No good can
come of "such speed" and "lightness," such an excessive struggle with providentially
imposed limitations. Death is the issue to be expected. No platonic "wand" can
provide mere mortals with the transcendence of their condition which their hearts
desire. Only sorrow can result from its employment. If the rehearsal of the child's life
that makes her still body "astonish" be understood according to the ominous emphasis
here given certain words in the three middle stanzas of "Bells for John Whiteside's
Daughter," the structural placement and the "ready" of that poem's fifth stanza (and
therefore its total design) still give us no problem.
In the interview in Conversations on the Craft of Poetry quoted above, Mr. Ransom
has indicated that his elegy may be read as I have just suggested. And in the same
exchange with Brooks and Warren he implies that even a third reading is possible,
that stanzas two, three, and four of "Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter" may offer
consolation by attributing to the child's passing ''as much magnificence as possible."
To manage the transition from expression of grief to accommodation of grief
according to this formula is more Stoic than naturalistic. But the Stoic formula
combines easily with the classical as do both with the more-or-less religious offered
earlier in this paper. At Vanderbilt University in November, 1961, I discussed all
three (classical/naturalistic, Stoic, and religious) readings of the poem in question
with Mr. Ransom. The poet accepted each as valid "if not pushed too far—to the
exclusion of the others." That the one situation might provoke three distinctive and
yet connected responses in the astonished mourners, and that all three can be rendered
by the one image of the living behavior of the girl they recall we might take to be an
illustration of Ransom's theory that it is poetry's special province to capture and
objectify the complex texture of "the world's body" in what he has described when
speaking of such images as "inconclusive miracles."
Finally, we must acknowledge and remember that, however we take "ready," the
experience implicit in this poem's order is only minimally reassuring. The mourners
remain, at its conclusion, "sternly stopped" and "vexed." Death is still death, the final
deprivation of the living to whom the poem as an elegy is addressed. To see it
otherwise is facile cheeriness—the aforementioned bland pseudo-"Platonism" against
which Mr. Ransom has inveighed at every opportunity. But, as reinforced by the
muted, ceremonious, and archaic language in which it is clothed—a language which is
itself comforting in that it has the effect of holding the loss and attendant pain at arm's
length—the traditional design of "Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter" nevertheless
enables it (in Ransom's Own phrase) to "perform its nature" and identifies it as one of
the finest modern examples of its poetic kind.
from "A Modern Elegy: Ransom's 'Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter.'" Mississippi
Quarterly 21:1 (Winter 1967-1968.) Copyright © Mississippi State University.
Miller Williams
The almost nonconnotative "bruited," the humor of the geese scuttling "goosefashion," lend the distance, the perspective the poem has to have, especially after such
an opening line. We realize slowly that the poem is not a simple elegy, that the grief is
not so great as the consternation and wonder. The "brown study" "astonishes" us; we
are vexed, but we are vexed more at the turning of quickness into stillness than at the
loss of the little girl herself, and we are taken most with the contrast between the
stillness of the girl and the scuttling of the geese. Our understanding is incomplete, we
are taken aback, and because of this--only Ransom's word will do--we are vexed.
From The Poetry of John Crowe Ransom. Copyright  1972 by Miller Williams.
Thornton Parsons
A plausible fiction sustained by an exactly appropriate narrator accounts for the
parallel success of "Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter." "Little body" in the first
line is perilously close to obvious pathos, but this effect is counteracted by the word
"speed," which begins an important motif. The reader's accruing sense of loss in
"Dead Boy" is gleaned through the negative impression of the narrator, and a similar
technique is used in this poem. The narrator, again, is capable of a considerable
emotional distance from the death. He is astonished at the quietness that can come
over, has come over, the little girl whose energetic noisiness had disturbed him so
much.
"Lightness in her footfall' is a delicate suggestion of gracefulness--a quiet way to
make the girl attractive before the parallels to "speed" are brought in. She was
graceful, but she was vigorous and clamorous even when playing by herself. The
conceit of warfare conveys this emphasis: "Her wars were bruited"; "she took arms
against her shadow"; she "harried" the geese. The narrator's annoyance by the rude
disturbance of placidity is projected upon the geese, "Who cried in goose, Alas." The
lovely, gently surrealistic image of serenity--geese presented as a diaphanous snowcloud passively dripping whiteness on the grass, geese that have "noon appledreams"--is abruptly dispersed by the indefatigable girl who converts them into
scuttling, goose-stepping soldiers.
Here is a rich and complex controlling of the tone. The finely attenuated feeling of
harassment in the narrator is achieved by hyperbole--an extravagant figure for
peacefulness followed by an extravagant contrasting figure for clamor. This is the
narrator’s central memory of the dead girl: her enormous ability to shatter placidity. It
justifies the use of the word "Astonishes." It is hard to credit the stillness of the little
girl now in the coffin.
Precisely chosen language is the elusive strength of the concluding stanza. Direct
statements about the dead girl are terse and restrained, and the horror of death is
implicit. "Brown study" is an effective euphemism for death because it has an ironic
relevance to the personality of the girl alive; during her energetic life, the quiet,
pensive mood seemed as unnatural for her as now seems the reality that so much
clamorous liveliness could be permanently stilled. "Vexed" is exquisitely attuned to
the narrator’s emotional perspective. He is not outraged, not overwhelmed. He was
resignedly distressed by her noisiness when alive, and be is resignedly distressed by
her temperamentally unnatural repose in death. The implication is that death itself is
vexatious to human beings. This is close to our usual attitude toward it, our recurring
sense of uneasiness that our lives logically imply deaths some time in the future; and,
though we grow accustomed to the inevitability, it is vaguely annoying.
The motionlessness of the violently active girl has made her survivors motionless, has
"sternly stopped' them, has made them confront death directly and definitely. "Primly
propped" ends the poem with the emphasis upon the unnaturalness, the excessive
formality, of the girl's appearance. This phrase conveys quietly and implicitly more
horror than an indignant outburst would. It is the culmination of a strong and clear
pathos that has been won by deft indirection; it is pathos under control, arrived at by
dramatically working through the data of speed, energy, noise--and the vacuum left by
death.
A little girl's death could readily entail a crude and trite pathos, but Ransom skillfully
avoids it by limiting the reader’s view of the girl to the narrator's version of her. A
vivid picture of her in a characteristic moment of her life is presented in language
formalized enough to keep us detached, to keep us from empathizing her persona
purely: "the tireless heart within the little / Lady with rod." The adult's perspective
upon her is consistent to the end. There are no technical "tricks," as in "Janet Waking"
and "Here Lies a Lady," to damage the fiction and to remind us of Ransom's decorous
vigilance or vigilant decorum. The fiction is superbly integrated with a consistent
perspective. The technique subserves the evocation of an appropriate pathos.
From John Crowe Ransom. Copyright  1969 by Twayne Publishers, Inc.
Thomas Daniel Young
"Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter" (1924), Ransom's best-known poem, is also
one of his best, one that Randal Jarrell has called "perfectly realized . . . and almost
perfect." Like many of Ransom's other poems, this one is on the precariousness of
human life, the fleetingness of feminine beauty. It demonstrates a quality of Ransom's
artistry that Graham Hough has noted: the poet's ability to present important problems
through delicate subject matter. Since it concerns the death of a little girl, the poem
could easily deteriorate into trite and shabby pathos, but Ransom handles his material
admirably. He achieves aesthetic distance by presenting the essentials of the poem
from the "high-window" of an interested but uninvolved bystander. Then, as Robert
Penn Warren has pointed out, the burden of the poem lies in the poet's development of
his attitude to the girl's death. First he is astonished because the news is so unexpected
("There was such speed in her little body, / And such lightness in her footfall"); after a
moment's reflection, however, the astonishment turns to vexation. The speaker has
confronted another of the inexplicable mysteries of the world he must live in. There is
no piteous cry to heaven for justification or solace; the poet uses a usually lamentable
occasion for some of his most effective irony, achieved by contrasting the stock
response to death to the one addressed in the poem.
from The History of Southern Literature. Ed. Louis D. Rubin et al. Copyright © 1985
by Louisiana State UP
Kieran Quinlan
Far from being a simple pessimist, however, Ransom has the positive intention of
making the reader face up to the sobering facts of existence without having recourse
to the kind of consolation traditionally offered by religious belief. It is especially
significant in this regard that his many poems on death have a somewhat different
background than might appear at first. All of them are motivated by a philosophic
purpose that he had entertained certainly when composing Poems About God and
probably long before that. The genesis of "Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter"
illustrates the matter particularly well. Ransom told his biographer that the poem had
been suggested to him while watching a little girl from a neighbor's house at play on a
street nearby: he had imagined what it would be like were she to die. So, in the poem,
the child's "speed" and "lightness" as she scuttles the lazy geese are abruptly brought
to an end:
But now go the bells, and we are ready,
In one house we are sternly stopped
To say we are vexed at her brown study,
Lying so primly propped.
"Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter," then, is not a memorial for a neighbor's child's
actual death but an exploration of man's vexation in the face of the inevitable outcome
of life. Ransom stated his purposes clearly in a letter to Tate in 1927: "My object as a
poet might be something like the following, though I won't promise to stick by my
analysis: (1) I want to find the Experience that is in the common actuals; (2) I want
this experience to carry (by association of course) the dearest possible values to which
we have attached ourselves; (3) I want to face the disintegration or nullification of
these values as calmly and religiously as possible." Crudely stated, the little girl is an
instance of the "common actuals" that have "the dearest possible value" for human
beings; her death, therefore, forces man to confront the cruel facts of life, and he does
so "religiously," not by entertaining vain hopes of future bliss, but rather by remaining
stoically calm in these "vexing" circumstances.
From John Crowe Ransom’s Secular Faith. Copyright  1989 by Louisiana State
University Press.
Alan Shucard, Fred Moramarco, and William Sullivan
This loss of faith and certainty, conveyed paradoxically in decorous and charming
linguistic and poetic forms usually associated with the poetry of chivalry and romance
and treated with a wit that verges on black comedy, becomes the model for other
Ransom poems. In "Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter," he once again dramatizes
the enigmatic and shifting nature of existence. The speaker, a neighbor of the
Whitesides, is reflecting on the totally unexpected death of John Whiteside's daughter.
He remembers how he and others once gazed from their high window at the
daughter's battle with the geese below as she "harried unto the pond / The lazy geese,
like a snow cloud / Dripping their snow on the green grass." Then "There was such
speed in her little body,/And such lightness in her footfall." But now "her brown
study" is still. Although she did not hesitate, unlike Hamlet, to take "arms against her
shadow," her "brown study" is now "Lying so primly propped." At first the speaker is
astonished that death came to such a lively and young creature. The more he reflects,
however, the more he is anguished and vexed by her death:
But now go the bells, and we are ready,
In one house we are sternly stopped
To say we are vexed at her brown study,
Lying so primly propped.
The poem reverberates with a number of striking contrasts that capture the
paradoxical nature of human existence: life-death, past-present, memory-reality,
astonishment-vexation, starkness-artifice (the brown study primly propped). The bells
then, as John Donne exclaims, ring not only for Whiteside's daughter but, more
important, for the speaker, as well as all others still alive, and the readers who are
unable to solve the riddles of human existence. The fact that the "tireless heart" of the
daughter has stopped has, in turn, "sternly stopped" either a comfortable or
comforting vision of existence. To add to the paradoxical tone, Ransom plays his
theme against the basic lightness and even gaiety of the poem's imagery and rhythms.
Thus, we are both charmed and, to use Ransom's word, vexed by the poem. This
resultant irony perhaps is Ransom's finest achievement. It brilliantly captures the
enigmatic nature and complexity of existence; lightness and darkness, comedy and
tragedy become one.
From Modern American Poetry, 1865-1950. Copyright © 1989 by G.K. Hall & Co.
Douglas Fowler
Although John Crowe Ransom's "Bells for John Whiteside's Daughter" has been
widely admired and anthologized since its publication in 1924, commentators seem to
have had difficulty describing, in this instance, the nature of the poet's achievement.
For example, Robert Penn Warren (98) speaks somewhat patronizingly of Ransom's
"admirable little poem," praises what he calls its "manly understatement," and notes
mysteriously that "simple grief is not the content of the primary statement" the poem
makes--although it is precisely as a statement of grief that readers have received the
poem for seventy years.
Vivienne Koch describes the poem simply as a "delicately turned elegy, suffused with
affectionate humor" (382), a statement that is true but superficial. Randall Jarrell
speaks in glowing but indistinct terms of its "real, old-fashioned enchantment" (380).
Graham Hough manages to come only a step closer to exploring (as far as any critic
can explore the heart of any artwork) the emotional mechanism of the poem when he
notes that Ransom's procedure, in this poem as elsewhere in his verse, is a treatment
of "massive and ineluctable facts in small or delicate settings" (5). And the editors of
a recent text for university students single out the poem for extended illustrative
comment but do not seem really to comprehend the quality that sets Ransom's poem
apart: Thus, William M. Chace and Peter Collier claim only that Ransom's language is
understated and that the death of the little girl creates a "sense of loss" not because her
death is unique, but because it "is like most deaths, perhaps our own death to come."
That is, they claim that the poem operates on our emotions by somehow making death
"familiar, natural, ordinary" (427). Nothing could be farther from the truth.
The unique procedure that has assured immortality for Ransom's poem seems to have
been missed again and again. In effect, he has created a bitter coating for a sugar pill
and given to mature readers, by indirection and verbal cunning, an experience of
primal sentimental catharsis. Part of Ransom's success derives from his smuggling
into his poem full-blown, potentially mawkish feelings--the "sugar"--and yet making
them work by disguising those feelings inside a sheath of formality and ironic
distance--the "pill."
Notice that the most vivid image in the poem is that of John Whiteside's daughter
harrying the geese across the lawn. It is a comic image, of course, but the comedy
inheres less in the energetic little girl than in the "sleepy and proud" geese. The geese
themselves are only partially played for comedy, for they give back to the poem a
lovely image of themselves "like a snow cloud / dripping their snow on the green
grass." Further, these vexed, beautiful, comical geese (it would give Ransom's game
away to have imaged swans, too patently a beautiful, fairy-tale creature) cry out, "in
goose, Alas," and thus contribute behind the mask of comedy that shimmering and
almost unforgivable word "Alas," a word that no mature poet could use with a straight
face in our century. An image of great beauty has been injected subcutaneously into
the lines, but it is not applied to the child herself, a nice bit of indirection: we have the
effect without the aftertaste of having been cheaply maneuvered into swallowing it
whole. And although the geese only regret the girl's "tireless heart" because it disturbs
their gooselike "noon apple dreams," the idea of a "tireless heart" is smuggled into the
poem as a statement that we immediately recognize as a pitiful irony: her daughterly
heart was not tireless; her daughterly heart has stopped.
Thus, Ransom's geese give the poem the means by which its emotional effect can be
dilated without its being compromised by obvious sentiment. The quaint, laconic
terms in which the girl's death is described--the "brown study" that is repeated twice
and the prissily inanimate plosives of "primly propped," with which the poem ends-represent strategic withdrawals at those points in the poem where we would expect
elegy or eulogy, or some other sort of frontal assault on our sense of pity.
The real emotional life of the poem lies in the vivid, comical, beautiful "war" between
the geese that scuttle and the "tireless" little girl who makes them scuttle. The poem's
effect is thus specific and intimate, and death is made not to seem "ordinary" at all (as
Chace and Collier suggest), but wasteful and tragic beyond tears--so much so that it is
startling to discover that Ransom's poem had no basis at all in biographical reality.
The idea was suggested to him solely by watching a neighbor's girl playing in some
piles of leaves. The geese were entirely his own invention--or really his own
appropriation, an appropriation of stock icons of fairy tale for use in a fairy tale told
for adults. Thus the provenance of the poem illuminates its creator's procedure.
In discursive prose, Ransom once noted that "to wish to make a thing look pretty or
look smart is to think poorly of it in itself and to want it more conventional, and to try
to improve it is to weaken and perhaps destroy it" (81). As poet, Ransom has profited
from his own advice and created an exquisite poem by smuggling into his lines beauty
disguised as ironic comedy.
Dead Boy Summary
The little cousin is dead, by foul subtraction,
A green bough from Virginia's aged tree,
John Crowe Ransom's "Dead Boy" is a poem about the different opinions in society
regarding a child's death. This child while living, built himself many reputations
among the town's people. None of the members of society felt it was their duty to help
or inform this child of the path he was taken. However, when he dies some criticize
his life and feel the need to criticize his actions in life. While all the time knowing
they did nothing to change his path. Others feel sorry, but are just as guilty for not
helping a child who might have had a future. Instead he is lying in a coffin dead.
Society is left to wonder whether his death was necessary?
The first paragraph of the poem discusses the feelings of his kin. They feel
uncomfortable with his death of "foul subtraction". Also there are others that do not
like the child's unnecessary death. These are the people who did not ever meet or see
the child but realize what kind of a tragedy this death was. Ransom makes a statement
at the end of the first paragraph "Nor some of the world of outer dark, like me". This
is a strong statement for the simple fact that this shows how much of the town, city,
world is affected by one child's death.
This next paragraph is by far the harshest. The voices are that of the town's people
who say this child was helpless. His death was felt as the only alternative to some. He
was called "a black cloud full of storms too hot for keeping". Just as in Mother Nature
the people felt that this child could not be controlled. The following line however is
one of the most emotional. It talks of how his mother still weeps for her dead child.
This is a reaction of any mother who cared for her child. These people have to see her
weep, yet still talk of a horrid child. This is an unjustifiable act on their part.
The paragraph that is probably the most sincere is that of the elder men. They speak
of the child's death hurting their hearts.
“Dead Boy” deals with the intrusion of death into a rural community. The poem’s
form is conventional: quatrains rhyming abab or cdcd. The relatively prosaic title,
“Dead Boy,” sets the no-nonsense tone. The speaker breaks with the sentimental
tradition, using understatement to distance both speaker and reader from emotional
involvement in the death of this unnamed child. No attempt is made to describe the
grief of the boy’s extended family (county kin) and neighbors; instead, the reader
learns that they “do not like” what has happened. Thus, the reader is led to examine
this death with detachment, and the full emotional impact is saved for the final stanza
and the speaker’s conclusions about this “deep dynastic wound.”
The speaker ironically undercuts any tendency toward sentimentality, describing a
boy not heroic, talented, or beloved by the community; his disposition seems more
“stormy” than sunny. At times his mother called him a sword beneath her heart, but
her bitter weeping shows deep love for him.
Having approached raw emotion in describing the mother’s grief, however, the
speaker immediately retreats to ironic discussion of changed attitudes toward the
child; death has transformed a squealing, pasty-faced pig into a “little man,” and in his
face, the speaker professes to see family resemblance.
The speaker shifts from this little man to focus on the “elder men” of the community,
who represent age and its accompanying loss of vitality. Uncomfortable remaining in
the house, these men congregate outside, exchanging rumors in an unsuccessful
attempt to deal with their deep dynastic wound, the loss of a male heir to carry on the
family name.
Emily Dickinson's Collected Poems Summary and
Analysis of "Because I could not stop for Death --"
In this poem, Dickinson’s speaker is communicating from beyond the grave,
describing her journey with Death, personified, from life to afterlife. In the opening
stanza, the speaker is too busy for Death (“Because I could not stop for Death—“), so
Death—“kindly”—takes the time to do what she cannot, and stops for her.
This “civility” that Death exhibits in taking time out for her leads her to give up on
those things that had made her so busy—“And I had put away/My labor and my
leisure too”—so they can just enjoy this carriage ride (“We slowly drove – He knew
no haste”).
In the third stanza we see reminders of the world that the speaker is passing from,
with children playing and fields of grain. Her place in the world shifts between this
stanza and the next; in the third stanza, “We passed the Setting Sun—,” but at the
opening of the fourth stanza, she corrects this—“Or rather – He passed Us –“—
because she has stopped being an active agent, and is only now a part of the
landscape.
In this stanza, after the realization of her new place in the world, her death also
becomes suddenly very physical, as “The Dews drew quivering and chill—,” and she
explains that her dress is only gossamer, and her “Tippet,” a kind of cape usually
made out of fur, is “only Tulle.”
After this moment of seeing the coldness of her death, the carriage pauses at her new
“House.” The description of the house—“A Swelling of the Ground—“—makes it
clear that this is no cottage, but instead a grave. Yet they only “pause” at this house,
because although it is ostensibly her home, it is really only a resting place as she
travels to eternity.
The final stanza shows a glimpse of this immortality, made most clear in the first two
lines, where she says that although it has been centuries since she has died, it feels no
longer than a day. It is not just any day that she compares it to, however—it is the
very day of her death, when she saw “the Horses’ Heads” that were pulling her
towards this eternity.
Analysis
Dickinson’s poems deal with death again and again, and it is never quite the same in
any poem. In “Because I could not stop for Death—,” we see death personified. He is
no frightening, or even intimidating, reaper, but rather a courteous and gentle guide,
leading her to eternity. The speaker feels no fear when Death picks her up in his
carriage, she just sees it as an act of kindness, as she was too busy to find time for
him.
It is this kindness, this individual attention to her—it is emphasized in the first stanza
that the carriage holds just the two of them, doubly so because of the internal rhyme
in “held” and “ourselves”—that leads the speaker to so easily give up on her life and
what it contained. This is explicitly stated, as it is “For His Civility” that she puts
away her “labor” and her “leisure,” which is Dickinson using metonymy to represent
another alliterative word—her life.
Indeed, the next stanza shows the life is not so great, as this quiet, slow carriage ride
is contrasted with what she sees as they go. A school scene of children playing, which
could be emotional, is instead only an example of the difficulty of life—although the
children are playing “At Recess,” the verb she uses is “strove,” emphasizing the
labors of existence. The use of anaphora with “We passed” also emphasizes the tiring
repetitiveness of mundane routine.
The next stanza moves to present a more conventional vision of death—things
become cold and more sinister, the speaker’s dress is not thick enough to warm or
protect her. Yet it quickly becomes clear that though this part of death—the coldness,
and the next stanza’s image of the grave as home—may not be ideal, it is worth it, for
it leads to the final stanza, which ends with immortality. Additionally, the use of
alliteration in this stanza that emphasizes the material trappings—“gossamer” “gown”
and “tippet” “tulle”—makes the stanza as a whole less sinister.
That immorality is the goal is hinted at in the first stanza, where “Immortality” is the
only other occupant of the carriage, yet it is only in the final stanza that we see that
the speaker has obtained it. Time suddenly loses its meaning; hundreds of years feel
no different than a day. Because time is gone, the speaker can still feel with relish that
moment of realization, that death was not just death, but immortality, for she
“surmised the Horses’ Heads/Were toward Eternity –.” By ending with “Eternity –,”
the poem itself enacts this eternity, trailing out into the infinite.
William Shakespeare
All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
“All the World is Stage” is the poem taken from William
Shakespeare’s play entitled As You like It. The character who says those
beautiful words is known as Jacques. Jacques agrees with the Duke
saying that all the world's a stage and compares all men and women to
actors on this stage. Each one of them has their own exits (deaths) and
entrances (births). Men and women play many parts in the drama of life
which Jacques divides into seven acts or stages.
The first stage of life is that of an infant crying and puking in the
nurse's arms. An infant is helpless and is totally dependent on others.
The second stage is that of childhood which is also the school going age.
Jacques gives the picture of a bright eyed boy with a shining morning
face with his school bag reluctantly drag himself to school in a snail
pace. The third stage is that of adolescence, when a man plays the part
of a lover. He is attracted towards women and composes poems to
describe and glorify his lover. He experiences the emotions of joy,
passion, disappointment and anxiety in this difficult period of life.
The fourth stage is that of adult or manhood. Jacques cites the
example of an arrogant soldier who wears shaggy beard that makes him
look like a fierce leopard. He is bold, brave, ambitious and full of
energy. He curses and swears in strange and manly fashion and is eager
to establish a status in society. He is quick to defend his honour and
fiercely guards his reputation. He is ready to risk and sacrifice his life in
the battlefield and seeks glory, fame and recognition. The fifth stage is
the middle age. Jacques depicts this character as the portly judge. This is
the stage when a man is more grounded in life. He is no more impulsive
and the experiences in life makes him a mature and balanced person. He
is content with life which reflects in his attire, behavior and conversation.
Speaking about the judge, Jacques pictures him as a man 'with a fine
round stomach filled with the best meat of the capon' (which he gets as a
bribe), is wealthy, full of wise sayings, possesses a severe look and has a
well trimmed beard to suit his profession of a judge.
The sixth stage of life is the phase when a man starts to grow old.
He becomes physically weaker and his mind becomes duller with the
assault of time. He looks silly and funny with spectacles in his nose,
slippers on his feet and purse slinging on his side. He becomes frail and
thin. He wears an ill-fitting pair of trousers. The breeches which he had
worn in his youth preserved cheerfully for his old age don't fit him
anymore as they are too big for his thin legs. His manly voice has
become shrill and feeble like a child's voice. The seventh and the final
stage is when a man grows extremely old and senile. This last stage
depicts the final stage of man on earth. It brings an end to his presence
on earth and speeds up his journey towards his death. His acts on the
stage of the world slowly comes to a closure. Man loses his rational
power and becomes forgetful and helpless. He again slips back to the
infancy stage heavily dependent on other and Jacques calls this stage as
'second childishness'. He loses his teeth, his eye sight, his taste buds and
reaches a vegetative state. He is on the verge of losing everything-even
himself to the final call of death.
Holy Sonnet X By John Donne
Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for, thou art not so,
John Donne (1573-1631) is the pioneer of metaphysical school
of poetry. He uses paradoxes and fat-fetched similes (conceits) in his
poetry. Throughout his poems, there is a puzzle; he is never looking for
easy answers or final solutions to the mystery of love. His language is
colloquial. It is such wit that makes Donne so much difficult than the
other metaphysical poets.
Donne's Holy Sonnet X is the most famous example of his use of
paradoxical structure. Paradox is the main structural device of this poem.
A paradox is self-contradictory statement, though possibly well-founded
or essentially true. For example, Hamlet's sentence "I must be cruel only
to be kind" is a paradox. The arguments proposed in favor of the
paradoxical statement that death is ultimately harmless are themselves
paradoxical. Sleep is an imitation of death, and is pleasant; therefore
death, the real thing, must be more pleasant. In a brilliant turn of
argument, Donne tells Death that it is not “mighty and dreadful” because
it is merely a functionary, a “slave to fate, chance, kings and desperate
men”. Anything which can be whistled for by so many despicable causes
is hardly to be respected. Its habitat is amongst “poison, war and
sickness”, a realm which no-one would want to rule. Death is brought
about by many agents such as poison, war and sickness. To settle the
argument, the poet says that death itself would face ultimate annihilation.
The opening line, “Death be not proud”, is an apostrophe or
address to an abstract figure. Death should not be boastful, although some
have called him mighty and dreadful, which he is not. Many people
whom death thinks he can overcome- and the poet includes himself- do
not truly die. Much pleasure is to be found in rest and sleep, which are
only images of death, and therefore much more must come from death
itself. Some of the very best men go soonest to death, and finds rest for
their bodies and deliverance for their souls.
Death is the slave of many kinds of weapons, from fate and
chance to war and sickness; opium or charms can produce even better
sleep. Why then should death be so proud? After one short sleep comes
eternal life, when there shall be no more death; death itself shall die.
William Wordsworth
She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,
William Wordsworth (1770-1850) is by all accounts the greatest
romantic poet. He used to sit for hours and hours contemplating the
beauty of nature. To him, nature is great teacher of morals, a main source
of happiness and a fountain of religious feelings. All the visible forms of
nature—birds , trees, lakes etc. are forms of one great spirit, that is God.
Thus, Wordsworth is described as a pantheist : one who believes that God
and nature are one. This poem expresses forcibly the poet's shock that
such a simple person should have died. The poet's own mood is in perfect
harmony with his depiction.
The first stanza introduces the little girl to us. This girl used to live
among the natural surroundings away from people beside the springs of
water. No one saw her to praise her beauty and very few loved her.
In the second stanza the poet depicts the girl as a flower, a violet
and a star shining in the sky. Her beauty is unique because there is only
one star in the sky.
In the third stanza the poet moves on to deal with the grim reality.
The previous romantic surroundings are shattered by the fact that Lucy is
dead. She is in her grave, and the poet is so sad for her death.
The poet has used very beautiful images such as the metaphor in 'a
violet' in which he compares Lucy to a rare flower that grows in
wilderness. He has also used the simile in "Fair as a star when only one is
shining in the sky". Again this simile emphasizes the idea of being rare.
The dominant sound in the poem is the sound /d/ which is repeated
almost in every stanza: dwelt, untrodden, Dove, half-ridden, difference. It
is noticeable that most words expressing sadness are associated with this
sound: death, dumb, disaster etc…
We don't know which river Dove is meant in the second line. This
uncertainty suits the poem, for clearly Wordsworth chose the name for his
rhyme and for its symbol: it suggests that Lucy haunts the very sources of
peace. The plural 'springs', together with 'ways', makes one feel that Lucy
does not live in one place but is part of a landscape. The word untrodden
is associated with innocence. Thus the poet has succeeded in conveying
his feelings to us. He has used the diction that is suitable to the sad tone
of the poem.
(466)
By Emily Dickinson
I dwell in Possibility –
A fairer House than Prose –
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) is the major American poetess of
th
the 19 century. She was the daughter of a respectable family of Amherst,
a small town in Western Massachusetts. Emily Dickinson led a lonely
life. Her experience of life was very limited as she lived her life around
her birthplace. She used to dress in white at the end of her life. Death is
the main theme of Emily Dickinson's poetry. She always personifies
death as a king. Her poetry is different from traditional poetry. Instead of
titles, we have numbers. Her structure and spelling are sometimes wrong.
Miss Dickinson's poetry was not published until after her death because it
was rejected by critics as vulgar.
The speaker tells us that she lives in a house with lots of doors and
windows, which just so happens to be a way prettier house than "Prose."
So we assume this house is a metaphor for poetry. The speaker goes on to
describe her poetry-house with lots of nature imagery. It's got trees for
rooms and the sky for a roof. She ends by telling us how awesome the
visitors to the house (readers of her poetry) are. Then she tells us that
writing poems—or the life of the mind—is the best way she knows to
reach for the divine.
This poem is about Dickinson’s vocation as a poet, which she
compares favorably to prose, largely through the metaphor of the two as
houses. She sees poetry as open and limitless (“I dwell in Possibility”)
and more beautiful (“A fairer House than Prose”) than the more limited
prose (“More numerous of Windows–/Superior – for Doors”).
“I dwell in Possibility –“ is deeply interested in the power gained
by a poet through their poetry. In the first stanza, the poem seems to just
be about poetry as a vocation as opposed to prose, and is explicit in
comparing the two. The metaphors and similes used make it so that
poetry is possibility, poetry is more beautiful, poetry has more doors and
windows open for access, for different perspectives and interpretations,
while prose by default, then, is more closed and limited and homely.
In the second stanza, the extended metaphor changes slightly, so
that we see that though poetry is a house, it is also a garden and part of
nature, in the guise of the sky-roof, completing it. This sky-roof also
again emphasizes poetry’s limitlessness, as there is no upper boundary
except the seemingly endless sky.
Poetry’s visitors, that is, the readers, are the fairest, both in beauty
and in judgment, and they are able to move easily in and out of this open,
welcoming house, with its numerous doors and windows. The mention of
the visitors is essential. Both the poet and the reader are equally welcome
in this house, and the great number of possible entrances and exits means
that both poet and reader can choose to interpret it in different ways.
The final three lines of the poem make the poet’s power clear. Her
“Occupation,” her task is this wonderful task of “spreading wide [her]
narrow Hands / To gather Paradise”. The capitalization of “Hands,” here,
so close to “Paradise,” gives the poet’s hands a limitless quality. This
shows how the role of the poet is a creator.
(591)
By Emily Dickinson
I heard a Fly buzz - when I died The Stillness in the Room
The theme of this poem is death. But Emily Dickinson deals with
theme in a very strange manner. The very first line strikes us because it is
very strange: “I heard a Fly buzz - when I died -”. Death is, of course, a
very serious matter; but the poem does not deal with it seriously. The
mention of a fly buzz during one's death is, of course, funny. The poet
says that she heard a fly buzz when she died. That is why critics
disregarded such poems as too humorous to be serious.
The poet, then, describes the stillness that accompanies death.
There is stillness in the room. People are still; they are waiting for her to
die. It is a very special moment—the stillness of the people is
accompanied by the stillness of the atmosphere. Everybody has shed so
many tears that eyes become dry. They are holding their breath waiting
whether she will give the spirit or not. It is a moment of great agony. The
eyes of the people around her are waiting for her death.
The breaths of people are gathered for the last journey, the journey
of immortality. The word 'Onset' is capitalized because it refers to
immortality. People will witness the King, meaning death, in the room.
This is, of course, a personification in which death is likened to a king.
Everyone in the room is waiting for the king of death.
The person dying has written her will and has signed away on what
she can sign. In fact, she is very poor. She has signed on almost nothing.
In the middle of this very serious situation, a fly interfered: “and there it
was/There interposed a Fly”. The fly kept on buzzing by fits and starts.
The word 'blue' is very significant because it shows that the buzz was
restless. The fly has interfered between her and the light—immortality.
This is, of course, a metaphor. The moment of death disappeared and she
could not see to see, i.e. paradise or immortality. The first see refers to
sight, whereas the second refers to insight.
The sort of humor in this poem is black humor. The dashes in the
poem refers to emotional breaks. The fly which is a very insignificant
creature is a symbol of distraction. Many people are distracted from their
aims in life by insignificant things. The poem shows Miss Dickinson's
violation of correct structure as in “Signed away /What portion of me be
Assignable”.
The speaker says that she heard a fly buzz as she lay on her
deathbed. The room was as still as the air between “the Heaves” of a
storm. The eyes around her had cried themselves out, and the breaths
were firming themselves for “that last Onset,” the moment when,
metaphorically, “the King / Be witnessed—in the Room—.” The speaker
made a will and “Signed away / What portion of me be / Assignable—”
and at that moment, she heard the fly. It interposed itself “With blue—
uncertain stumbling Buzz” between the speaker and the light; “the
Windows failed”; and then she died (“I could not see to see”).
By Dr. Osama Taha
For courses only contact 01115859130
Chapter 5
The Elizabethan Age: The Golden Age
 The Intellectual Background The term 'Renaissance' is derived
from a French word meaning 'the new birth'. It refers to the rebirth
of art and learning in Europe in the sixteenth century under the
influence of models from the classical civilizations of Greece and
Rome. Classical literature is a style of literature and art
characterized by attention to form. Italy was the major centre from
which classical light spread. It reached England quite late, and took
different forms in different countries. In Italy, for example, the
main stress was on painting and sculpture.
 The new knowledge of science and of lands greatly stirred men's
imagination. The dominant spirit was that of discovery and
adventure. The Portuguese explorer Vasco Da Gama, for example,
discovered the Cape of Good hope. The revival of learning had
greatly affected men's ways of thought. People in the Middle Ages
looked upon this life as a preparation for the next, and had blind
faith in the church. In the Renaissance, however, they started to
focus on the enjoyment of life and to question the authority of the
church. This individualism was reflected in the characters of
Christopher Marlowe such as Dr. Faustus. Dr. Faustus is the story
of a learned man, who sells his soul to the devil in return of
magical powers.
 Elizabethan Prose: John Lyly is famous for his book Eupheus
which was read and copied be everyone. So the word 'Euphuism'
came to mean an artificial, flowery way of writing which is based
on many images and classical writings.
 Sir Thomas More (1480-1535) was one of the pioneers of the
Renaissance. He was a man of bold imagination and vision. His
most famous book is Utopia meaning "nowhere". It is based on
Plato's Republic. It depicts an imaginary island where everything is
nearly perfect. More's point is contained in the title: his perfect
island does not exist and never can—it is nowhere.
 Elizabethan Poetry One of the reasons that made literature
flourish is the Queen herself. Queen Elizabeth encouraged
literature and arts. She could speak Latin and Greek; and writers
tried their best to gain her favor. Another reason is the stability the
country enjoyed after defeating the Spanish Armada. That sense of
victory, of new horizons of learning due to imitation of the classics
and by the native genius made the Elizabethan period the golden
age of English poetry and drama.
 Sir Thomas Wyatt was the first poet to introduce the sonnet in
English literature. A sonnet is a fourteen line poem that is usually
in iambic pentameter. Sonnets are either Shakespearean (three
quatrains and a couplet) or patriarchal octave (8 lines) and (sestet 6
lines). Wyatt in his sonnets used Petrarchan or Italian form. He
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built up each poem in two parts: the octave which is a two rhymed
section of eight lines at the beginning of the sonnet. This is
followed by the sestet which is a section having six lines of three
rhymes.
Surry, on the other hand, wrote Blank Verse for the first time in
English. Blank verse is unrhymed lyric in iambic pentameter (a
five feet line of verse). It took from Latin its rhymelessness, but it
kept accent instead of quantity as the basis of its line. Lyric is a
short poem that expresses some basic emotions for state of mind .it
may be rhymed or un rhymed.
Sir Philip Sidney (1552-99) is represents the Elizabethan age in
such a way that Queen Elizabeth herself called him one of the
jewels of her crown. He was the typical English knight. His best
known act of chivalry was when he was mortally wounded in the
Spanish war, he refused a drink of water, asking that it should be
given to another. In prose, he wrote the Arcadia and Apologie for
Poesie. He wrote two groups of sonnets entitled Astropel and
Stella. These sonnets celebrate the history of his love for the sister
of the Earl of Essex, a love brought to a disaster by the intervention
of Queen Elizabeth with whom he had quarreled. These sonnets are
the first direct expression in English of personal experience.
Arcadia is the first example of the prose pastoral romance.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) is by all accounts the greatest
poet and dramatist in the English language, and one of the greatest
in the world. Shakespeare owes his greatness to two things: the
quality of his poetry and his deep understanding. That is why he is
considered a symbol of English culture. His contribution in pure
poetry consists Venus and Adonais, The Rape of Lucrece and The
Sonnets. The subject of Venus and Adonais is taken from Ovid's
Metamorphoses. It tells the story of Venus who woos the beautiful
boy Adonais who disdains her love. The sonnets are either
addressed to a young man or a dark lady by whom the poet was
betrayed. The language of the sonnets is smooth and the imagery is
clear.
Elizabethan Drama The term drama includes two genres: tragedy
and comedy. Tragedy is a literary work often dramatic in form in
which the protagonist falls from grace through an over-alarming
combination of personal faults and circumstances and ends with a
disaster. Comedy is a play written primary to amuse the audience.
In addition to a rousing laugher, comic writing often appeals to the
intellect to teach or to instruct.
The term University Wits is the title given to a group of scholarly
men, who from 1584 onwards, for about ten years, took up play
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writing as their profession. They were graduates of Oxford or
Cambridge. They were men with learning and talent but with no
money. These seven men were Lyly, Greene Peele, Nashe, Lodge,
Kyd and Marlowe.
In his comedies, Greene mixed reality with fantasy-- courtiers
meeting fairies, for example. This, together with his heroines,
affected Shakespeare in his comedies.
Christopher Marlowe (1564-93) is one of the great English
dramatists. Marlowe created the modern English drama. Before
Marlowe there was neither genuine blank verse nor a genuine
tragedy in the English language. His greatest plays include Dr.
Faustus, the Jew of Malta and Edward II. Shakespeare’s works owe
a great debt to Marlowe. Shakespeare’s early blank verse is
fashioned on Marlowe’s. Marlowe's plays convey the spirit of
human freedom, of limitless human power and adventure.
William Shakespeare (1564-1616) is considered by all accounts
as the greatest English dramatist. He wrote 37 plays. Shakespeare
followed no rules and had no dramatic theory. He showed rare
genius in creating his characters and expressing his themes.
Naturally, he was affected by the previous writers such as Kyd,
Marlowe and Ben Jonson. He tried to appeal to the Elizabethan
audience though he wrote his plays on universal themes such as
love, ambition and revenge. The portrayal of characters shows his
rare genius. His characters are full of life to the extent that they
seem to be characters we know in real life. Shakespeare also shows
deep insight into the realities of the world.
Shakespeare probably started by refashioning for stage production
a number of old plays which had been known for years. There was
practically no rule of copyright then. The earliest period may be
said to have lasted till 1595, and includes such comedies as Love's
Labour’s Lost and The Comedy of Errors. The greatness of
Shakespeare is not yet fully visible in such works, thought they
indicate beyond a doubt what is to come.
The second period lasted from 1595 to 1601 and it was in this
period that As You Like. It was written, as well as the greatest of
the Shakespearean comedies, Twelfth Night. The third period
continued till 1608. and seems to show a marked change in the
spirit and atmosphere of the great dramatist. Now he appears to
have deserted the writing of light – hearted comedies, and turned to
tragedy, dealing with the serious aspects of life. Such great dramas
as Hamlet, Othello, Macbeth, and King Lear date from this period.
 The last period is known as the Romantic Stage of Shakespeare. It
lasts till 1612 and includes: The Tempest, Cymbeline and The
Winter’s Tale. The spirit of these three plays is not the deep
gloomy atmosphere of the tragedies. Although they are full of
many passages of the highest beauty, they show the decline of the
Shakespearean genius.
Chapter 6
 Poetry: The Cavalier Poets: The Cavalier poets are lyrical poets
who wrote chiefly about love and war. They are best represented
by Robert Herrick, Lovelace and Suckling. Their work is simple
and graceful in structure and polished in style. Robert Herrick, for
example, follows Ben Jonson both in form and in pagan
philosophy. He is a lover of pleasure, a singer of the beauty of
women and of flowers and a praiser of wine. Among the best
known of his shorter poems are “To Julia” and “Cherry Ripe”.
Richard Lovelace (1618-58) is so simple and sincere in his poems
which are rather carelessly worked out, and often obscure. His best
known lyrics are “Lucasta Going to the Wars”. As for John
Suckling (1609-42), he was witty, generous and gay. His poems
largely reflected these qualities. His poems such as “The Ballad
upon a Wedding”, “Why so Pall” and “Wan, Fond Lover” show
that elegance was his chief concern.
 The Metaphysical Poets This term was first used by Dr Johnson
to describe a group of poets who came directly or indirectly under
the influence of Donne. This group of poets include John Donne,
George Herbert, Crashaw, Marvell and Cowley. Their
characteristics include: fantastic wit, or conceit, the argumentative,
reasoning, blending passion and thought and a new verse in
reaction to the Spenserian smoothness and regularity. Their poetry
is lyrical; their subjects are love and religion; their style is startling.
 John Donne (1571-1631) is the chief poet of the metaphysical
poetry. Johnson regarded Donne's poetry as illustrative of a
rigorous, philosophical kind of conceit. Donne's imagery is more
scientific than that of the Elizabethans. The place of the
metaphysical gods and goddesses is taken by images drawn from
all sciences. His poetic contribution lies in the fields of love and
religion, two aspects which illustrate the conflict within him
between his worldly ambitions and his religion. His best known
poems include: “The Flee”, “The Anniversary”, “A Valediction :
Forbidding Mourning” and “The Ecstasy”.
 George Herbert (1593-1663) is the second major metaphysical
poet. His poems are honest, sincere and metaphysical in their
unusual conceits and in the blend of thought and feeling. His
expression is precise and simple. His famous poems include “The
Temple”, “The Collar”, “Virtue and Easter Wings”.
Chapter 7:The Restoration
 Dryden's Prose: The term "Restoration" refers to the restoration
of King Charles II to the throne after the short republican period of
Cromwell. The most famous writer of this period is perhaps John
Dryden. Dryden was a versatile writer. He was a dramatist, a poet
and a critic. Dryden is considered the father of literary criticism.
His most famous critical document is An Essay for Dramatic
Poesy. The essay is in the form of discussion between four
characters, one of whom is Dryden himself. It deals with the major
problems of drama at that time as the use of rhyme and blank verse
in drama; the comparison between French and English drama.
Moreover, the essay is the first attempt to evaluate the work of
Elizabethan dramatists especially Shakespeare.
 Drama: The Heroic Tragedy After the Elizabethans drama
declined due to the Civil War and the impact of the Puritans who
were opposed to drama and art. With the restoration of Charles II,
the theatre was reopened and the king himself encouraged drama
so that it became a thing of the court. The heroic tragedy depicted
the life of the aristocrats and dealt with themes of love and honour
treated in a grand manner on an unreal scene. There is also a great
deal of fighting, a rhetorical dialogue and almost absurd realism to
appeal to its aristocratic audience. Dryden's first success was in
drama. Dryden was among the famous writers of heroic tragedy as
in his plays: Indian Queen, Indian Emperor and The Earl of Orrey
in his Black Prince.
 The Comedy of Manners The best work of the Restoration period
was done by the writers of the comedy of manners: Shadwell,
Etherege, Wycherley and Congreve. The comedy of manners does
not portray a moral world or include romantic elements but rather
depict elegant people of the day in their amorous intrigues. It
depicts two groups of characters: the wits and the gulls. The wits
win our sympathy and the gulls arouse our laughter. The end of the
comedy is not the victory of the good over the evil but the witty
over the stupid.
 Sir George Etherege (1635-1691) first discovered this mode of
writing. William Wycherley (1640-1716) was another dramatis
who evolved the comedy of manners. With four plays he has a
permanent place on the English stage: Love in a Wood, The
Gentleman Dancing-master, The Country Wife and The Plain
Dealer. William Congreve (1670-1729) made his reputation with
four comedies: The Old Bachelor, The Double Dealer, Love for
Love and The Way of The World; and one tragedy: The Mourning
Bride. The Way of The World is certainly the finest comedy of the
period.
Chapter 8: Eighteenth Century Literature
 Poetry Alexander Pope (1688-1744) is famous for his satire. He
determined to achieve perfection as a poet. He imitated the ancient
classical writers. His “Essay on Criticism” made him the major
figure of the age. He expressed the philosophy of the age in his
poem“ Essay on Man”. His best satire, a mock heroic, is “The Rape
of the Lock” which mocks the fashionable London society in
Queen Anne's reign.
 The Transition Poets The transition poets were a group of poets
who appeared in the second half of the eighteenth century, and
their poetry was transitional stage between the classical school of
the 18th century and the romantic school. This group included
James Thomson, Oliver Goldsmith and Thomas Gray. Instead of
the town atmosphere, common sense and limited themes, the
transition poets depicted nature, humble people and focused on
human feelings. The most famous poems by Thomson include
“The Seasons” and “The Castle of Indolence”. Oliver Goldsmith
wrote “The Traveller” and “The Deserted Village”.
 Drama :Ballad Opera The ballad opera was very popular at that
time because the big theatres were very suitable for music and
choruses. The most famous ballad opera was Gray's The Beggars'
Opera.
 The Sentimental Comedy The sentimental comedy arose as result
of the changes that took place in society. It addressed the
commercial middle class which delighted in moralization, dull
preaching and excessive overflow of feelings. Although
sentimentalism is void of free laughter, it gave the dramatists the
chance to reflect on the social problems of their day.
 Prose: The Novel Daniel Defoe (1660-1731) is the father of the
English novel. Defoe's great book is Robinson Crusoe (1719),
which was written when he was sixty. This novel is based on the
true story of Sir Alexander Silkrik, a British sea-man who was
marooned for several years on a desolate island off the coast of
Chili. After Crusoe there followed in rapid succession: Captain
Singleton (1720), Moll Flanders (1722) and Colonel Jacque
(1722).
 Samuel Richardson (1689-1761) was a London printer. His first
novel is Pamela or Virtue Rewarded (1740). Pamela is a poor,
virtuous serving maid who resists the dishonorable approaches of
the son of her master. Pamela was followed by Clarissa, and then
Sir Charles Grandison. Henry Fielding (1707-1754) is another
important 18th century novelist. He wrote The Adventures of
Joseph Andrews (1740), which was meant to ridicule Richardson's
Pamela. Instead of the virtuous serving maid Fielding presents
Joseph the chaste servant, whom Lady Booby tempts from the path
of virtue that he has to run away. Indeed, Fielding had helped much
to establish the novel in one of its notable forms, middle class
realism. As a novelist, Fielding combines the methods of Defoe
and Richardson developing the action and introducing a greater
variety of characters.
 Other Prose Richard Steele and Joseph Addison were the
editors of leading periodicals such as The Tattler and Daily
Spectator in the reign of Queen Anne. Addison and Steele, in these
periodicals, taught their age restraint and good sense. They
encouraged their readers towards self-culture, showing how all the
objects of nature, and literature can be used to cultivate the mind.
 Jonathan Swift is a famous novelist. He was famous for his satires
such as The Tale of Tub and Gulliver's Travels. The Tale of Tub
makes fun of the high and low church parties. Gulliver's Travels is
one of the most successful children's books, and also the sharpest
satire of mankind. In Swift's prose the arguments are clearly
developed, the meaning is never obscure and the words are
carefully chosen.
Chapter One:
English Drama from Shakespeare to Sheridan
By Dr. OSAMA TAHA
Mobile: 01115859130
Ben Jonson (1573-1637) was considered by some to be England’s
main dramatist. Some critics even said that he is equal to Shakespeare
with whom he was contemporary. In almost every way, Jonson was a
contrast to Shakespeare. He was a classicist, whose masters were the
ancients. His plays generally obey the three unities of time, place and
action: the action takes place in a single day and the play has only a
single scene.
Jonson’s best works are his comedies which are called comedy of
humours. Jonson applied this term to refer to man’s complex nature. He
believes that man consists of a combination of four elements: hot, cold,
moist and dry. These four elements when mixed in various proportions
give different human types. Jonson's most famous comedies are Every
Man in his Humour (1598), Every Man Out of His Humour (1599), and
The Silent Woman, Volpone and The Alchemist.
In Every Man in his Humour (1598), the characters are 'humours'
characters. Jonson displays one element in their moral nature throughout
the play, which is exposed to ridicule. The Silent Woman approaches the
comedy of manners. The central character in this play is Morose who
cannot endure noise. He plots to marry a silent woman but once the knot
is tied she turns out to be a noisy boy!
Jonson wrote also Volpone. Its hero is Volpone who is a rich and
childless man. Aided by Mosca, he pretends to be dying, then sits to
receive expensive gifts from greedy would-be heirs. The play satirizes
avarice and hypocrisy. The Alchemist is the most perfect in structure and
delightful in treatment about swindling. It is also the most realistic
comedy in the whole Elizabethan theatre. Two rogues pretend to have
discovered the magic formula for turning base metals to gold. They
receive dupe after dupe, take money and goods from them and become
involved in a series of comic situations. As a writer of comedies, Jonson's
influence was considerable. The Restoration dramatists leaned strongly
upon him.
In tragedy, Ben Jonson was less successful. His most famous tragedies
are Sejanus and Catiline. In addition, he made a notable contribution in
non-dramatic verse, both in the lyric and the ode. He also wrote criticism.
George Chapman (1559-1634) wrote poems, comedies and tragedies.
He is famous for his translation of Homer than his dramas. He had a long
and varied career both as a dramatist and a non-dramatic poet. The two
translations of the Iliad and the Odyssey were real poems despite their
limitations. Chapman wrote three historical tragedies: Bussy D' Ambois,
The Revenge of Bussy D' Ambois, and The Tragedy of Biron. Chapman
chose French history as his background, though mingling it freely with
his own invention. Chapman was a thinker who used his characters as
mouthpieces of his philosophy.
Thomas Dekker (c.1570-1632) was a writer of comedies. His best
comedy is The Shoemaker's Holiday. It is about a lover who faces
troubles and hides in London as a shoemaker. Dekker also wrote The
Honest Whore. In this play, the whore, falls in love with a man and
attempts to win him. He responds by preaching a long sermon on the evils
of harlotry and she reforms, finally to marry her first lover. Dekker also
wrote The Witch of Endmonton about a man whose generosity then
weakness leads him to commit murder.
Thomas Heywood (c. 1573-1641) wrote domestic tragedy. His plays
include Arden of Feversham, The Rape of Lucrece and A Woman Killed
with Kindness. In A Woman Killed with Kindness, a woman betrays her
husband with his friend and he discovers her adultery and banishes her to
a country house. She repents and dies forgiven in his presence.
John Fletcher (1579-1625) and Francis Beaumont (c.1584-1616)
wrote for some years in collaboration. As dramatists, they have suffered
because critics compare their work with Shakespeare's. Three plays show
them at their best: the tragic-comedy Philaster, and two tragedies, The
Maid's Tragedy and King and No King. The world they depict is
removed from the ordinary world which men know. Upon the
background of an artificial courtly life they portray exaggerated passions,
often corrupt and unnatural. The plots are elaborate but invented with
great skill. The verse, too, has softness and grace. However, they failed to
give tragedy the normality which Shakespeare retained. Fletcher wrote
other plays without Beaumont's collaboration. Among these is The
Faithful Shepherdess, in which a complicated plot of love intrigue is
worked out in a pastoral background.
John Webster (c. 1580-1625) wrote two of the most famous tragedies
of the period: The White Devil and The Duchess of Malfi. These two
plays depend on the 'revenge' theme and show his poetic power. In The
White Devil, the Duke is tired of his wife, Isabella, and loves, the wife of
Camillo. The wife of Camillo is seduced by the Duke through the help of
her brother. Camillo is killed; the Duchess is poisoned (by the Duke) but
her brother avenges her. The Duchess of Malfi shows the merciless
nature of life. The Duchess marries her steward in secret. Her brother
keeps a spy in her service who betrays her. The Duchess and her husband
escape but her brother pursues her. She is finally strangled with her
children.
Cyril Tourneur (1575-1626) wrote two famous plays: The
Revenger's Tragedy and The Atheist's Tragedy. He depicts a world more
abnormal than that of Webster. In The Revenger's Tragedy, he depicts a
Court governed by intrigues and cruelty. The characters are so corrupt
that they seem symbols of vices rather than human figures.
Thomas Middleton (c.1570-1627) was famous for his tragedies. He
was concerned with the personal emotional life of his characters. He
wrote also comedies such as A Chaste Maid in Cheapside. In his tragedy
The Changeling, the heroine Beatrice is betrothed by her father to
Alonzo; but she falls in love with Alsemero. She makes use of De Flores
to murder Alonzo.
In the years before the theatres were officially closed by the Puritans
in 1642, there was little development in the drama. The old themes were
being played again, though with added excesses. When Charles came
back with the Restoration of 1660 the theatres were reopened.
It was in comedy that the Restoration found its peculiar excellence.
Three important writers developed the comedy of manners: Etherege,
Wycherley and Congreve. Sir George Etherege (1635-1691) first
discovered this mode of writing in which the writer does not portray a
moral world or include romantic elements but rather depict elegant people
of the day in their amorous intrigues. The comedy of manners depict two
groups of characters: the wits and the gulls. The wits win our sympathy
and the gulls arouse our laughter. The end of the comedy is not the
victory of the good over the evil but the witty over the stupid.
William Wycherley (1640-1716) was another dramatis who evolved
the comedy of manners. With four plays he has a permanent place on the
English stage: Love in a Wood, The Gentleman Dancing-master, The
Country Wife and The Plain Dealer. The Country Wife is about a man
who is very jealous; his wife begins to love another. His satire is based on
mockery of people who pursue their pleasure to find it so illusory.
William Congreve (1670-1729) made his reputation with four
comedies: The Old Bachelor, The Double Dealer, Love for Love and
The Way of The World; and one tragedy: The Mourning Bride. His
greatness as a dramatist lies in the completeness of his vision. Shallow as
his world is, he depicts its values accurately. The triumph in this world is
of the witty over the dull. Congreve brought perfection to the comedy of
manners. In his plays, men and women are measured according to their
capacity to adjust to the social code of the day. The Way of The World is
certainly the finest comedy of the period. In this play, Mirabell's aim is to
win Lady Wishfort's niece, Millamant, without sacrifice of half of her
inheritance over which Lady Wishfort has control. Mirabell pretends to
love Lady Wishfort in order to cover his love for her niece.
John Dryden (1631-1700) was a versatile writer. He devoted his
talents to heroic drama. This type of drama was an imitation of the style
popular in France and it was written in rhymed couplets. It appealed to
the aristocrats who composed its audience and who wished to see the
themes of love and honour treated in a grand manner, on an unreal scene.
His plays The Indian Emperor, The Conquest of Granada and
Aurengzebe are written in rhyming couplets about the themes of love and
honour. In All for Love, Dryden retells the Shakespeare story of Antony
and Cleopatra in blank verse.
Oliver Goldsmith (1728-74) was an Anglo-Irish novelist, playwright
and poet, who is best known for his plays The Good-Natured Man and
She Stoops to Conquer. The first mocks the excesses of false charity. The
second play is still performed on the stage until the present day. Its plot
depend on the comedy of situation and clear depiction of characters.
Hardcastle and Tony are types and individuals as well as images of their
age.
Richard Brinsley Sheridan (1751-1816) was famous for his three
comedies: The Rivals, The School for Scandal and The Critic. With
Sheridan something of the brilliance of Restoration dialogue returned to
comedy, though without the narrow and immoral Restoration world.
Instead, a more genial and romantic atmosphere is created. There is no
depth in Sheridan's world, no new interpretation of human nature.
A Critical Commentary By Dr. Osama Taha
Mobile: 01115859130
 “The Dogs” By Hanif Kureishi
The Plot:
It had been raining overnight. The mother and her son were
going down stone steps. It was a hard task for them because
branches sometimes blocked their way and they had to climb
over and under them. The steps twisted and turned and were
worn and often broken. It was the only way and the Man would
be waiting for her on the other side.
When they reached the bottom of the steps, her son's mood
improved and he called her "Chase me". This was his favorite
game. The mother lost sight of him in the wooden area ahead
and had to call several times until she heard him reply. Then
they reached the open.
The mother saw a dog coming, but she did not see its
owner. The dog attacked the little boy, "The dog had already
knocked down her son and began not so much to bite him as to
eat him, furiously". The Mother gave the dog a strong blow in
his side with her heavy shoes and pulled the boy to her. It was
impossible to examine his wounds because she had to hold him
as high as she could.
The dog insisted on attacking the child and leaving the
woman alone: "She could not understand why she had no
fascination for the dog". She began to shout, to scream because
she wouldn't be able to carry her son far. She saw numerous
other dogs in various colours and sizes gathering round her and
her son. Then, they pushed her to the ground but she covered her
son with her body: "To get him they would have to tear through
her, but it wouldn't take long".
Symbolism in “The Dogs”
A literary symbol is something that means more than what
it is. It is an object, a person, a situation, an action or some other
item that has a literal meaning in the story but suggests or
represents other meanings as well.
Symbolism is very obvious in the story. First, the
characters are not identified by their names but as character
types, the thing which means that these incidents may happen to
anyone. Second, the dogs insisted on attacking the child and not
the woman. The following sentence is a good clue for
symbolical interpretation: “She could not understand why she
had no fascination for the dogs”. This implies that the story is
about the child abuse and the ‘dogs’ stand for those who abuse
the child.
 “Ahmed” by Ihab Hassan.
The Plot:
“Ahmed” is a short story by Ihab Hassan. It deals with the
concept of home and nostalgia. The narrator's father says to him,
"Home is not where you first see the light, it's where you gather
it into yourself." On the other hand, Ahmed has built up a little
village in one of the rooms of his house to make up for his
homeland.
The narrator tells us how he arrived in New Zealand from
San Francisco and stayed at Auckland Hilton where he meets a
room service man, called Ahmed. Ahmed is happy when the
narrator meets him. He has "long, black eyelashes". The narrator
asks himself, "What was Ahmed doing in the land of the long
white cloud?" "People travel because of hope and affliction", he
thinks.
Tired of the journey, the narrator decides to have breakfast
at his home where he can also watch the ships in the port.
Ahmed enters the room and puts the tray with a cup of coffee.
The narrator asks Ahmed how long he has stayed in New
Zealand and Ahmed says that he has stayed eight years. He is
originally an Egyptian from Damanhur. For the next two days
Ahmed does not show up and the breakfast is brought by a
native. The narrator goes back to the States and returns to
Auckland three months later.
The narrator had always thought of the Orient as a foreign
place with exotic features and faces. His father had never
spoken to him about his home, Lebanon. He once said to him,
"Home is not where you first see the light, it's where you gather
it into yourself." Driving his car, the narrator watches the small
brick cottages of the natives. Ahmed brings the breakfast and
asks the narrator whether he had a good flight. "…we all timetravel now, shuttling between cultures…," he thinks.
Ahmed asks the narrator whether he would like to visit the
Lebanese quarter in Auckland. The narrator agrees to go with
Ahmed on his day off. He meets Ahmed and his wife Audrey in
the lobby and go to a Lebanese restaurant. The narrator asks if
Ahmed visits Egypt and Audrey answers, "Whenever we can
afford". The officials treat the passenger according to the
passport he carries. Ahmed, we learn, has a mother, two sisters
(one married in Jordan) and children from a former wife
They go for a walk in the Lebanese quarter. A few days
later, the narrator returns to the States. His telephone bill
includes more than a thousand dollar calls to Jordan and Egypt,
but he hasn't made these calls. He tries to know who has made
these calls, but in vain. The natives in New Zealand arouse his
suspicions "But Ahmed didn't fit this scheme of mean
suspicions, how could he?"
The Narrator returns to Auckland a year later. He learns
from Audrey's call that Ahmed has suffered from pancreatic
cancer, but he is all right now. He meets Ahmed in his house
and begins to sense something unsaid in the air. It turns out to be
that Ahmed's sister is having some trouble with the Jordanian
government:
Audrey cut in. Egyptians are not as welcome as they used
to be. There's too many of them, they're better educated, and
they tend to fuss.
Ahmed then shows the narrator a room like his Egyptian
village—everything but the fellaheen. Ahmed has taken three
years to build it build it by himself. The narrator moves toward
the door:
Thank you so much. I don't know when I'll be back
in Auckland. From the front steps, I waved and they
waved back. Ahmed gave me his old, sweet smile.
Theme
The basic theme of Ahmed is the concept of home and
nostalgia. The narrator's father says to him "Home is not where
you first see the light, it's where you gather it into yourself." On
the other hand, Ahmed has built up a small little village in one
of the rooms of his house to make up for his homeland. Of
course the hero could see that Ahmed is fatally ill. He cleverly
asks him about his sisters in Egypt and Jordan. Ahmed replies
that his family in Egypt are fine but his sister in Jordan is having
some trouble. They has chatted for a while and Ahmed suddenly
says, "Can I show you my village, sir? It's just outside
Damanhur." Before the protagonist could say anything Ahmed
leads him to a tightly-shut door. To his shock the hero could see
the whole room contains a diminutive Egyptian village
"square mud houses; a small mosque with a single
minaret striped black and white; irrigation canals of blue
glass; fields of green felt in two tones, one for rice, the
other for cotton; a sakia here, a shaduf at the other end, to
water the fields; groves of palm trees; dogs, donkeys,
water buffaloes on the dirt roads; chickens in the yards,
cats crouching on the flat roofs—everything but the
fellaheen".
Devoid of human beings, the scene seemed like a frozen
dream. Audrey has said that Ahmed built it by himself and it
took him three years to build. The hero is amazed and hurries
out of the house saying goodbye to Ahmed and Audrey. Ahmed
gave him his old sweet smile.
The Characters
The Narrator
The hero/narrator is an American of Lebanese origin and
he is on a working journey to New Zealand when the meets
Ahmed. The hero is amazed by Ahmed's mysterious sweetness;
call it sadness, a quality that he shares with many Egyptians. Yet
he has lived in the USA and has never been to Lebanon in his
life. However, Ahmed feels that they share a lot of things. The
narrator is so attracted to Ahmed "as blood is more essential
than water." His father has never spoken him about Lebanon.
However, he is convinced by the false and stereotypical image
that the West have of the east. He admits "I had always thought
of the Orient as a foreign place in the exotic features and faces."
The hero goes back to the USA and returns to New
Zealand after three months. Two days after his return, he meets
with Ahmed again when the latter brings the tray with breakfast.
They soon become friends and Ahmed takes the hero on a tour
of the town and invites him to a Lebanese restaurant where they
have Lebanese food. He also lets him meet with his wife
Audrey. Then the hero returns to the USA. He finds a surprise
waiting for him there. He finds his telephone bill and there are
phone calls amounting to $1239.44 to Egypt and Jordan - which
he has never made. He complains to the phone company saying
that he has no one in Jordan or in Egypt and after four months
the company dropped the charges.
Ahmed
Ahmed works in the Auckland Hilton in New Zealand. He
meets the hero/narrator, who is an American of Lebanese origin
and who is on a working journey to New Zealand. Ahmed is an
Egyptian who immigrated to New Zealand in search for work.
He works as a waiter in the hotel and is married to a white New
Zealander, Audrey. He has been there eight years. The hero is
amazed by Ahmed's mysterious sweetness; call it sadness, a
quality that he shares with many Egyptians. There remains the
question: Why does Ahmed go to New Zealand. Perhaps he is
looking for "hope" or "affliction" which blows people around
the world like sand. It is a part of his fate. Ahmed is attached to
the hero as he shares his looks. Like him, his "people are
Lebanese, from Tripoli." However, Ahmed feels that they share
a lot of things. The narrator is so attracted to Ahmed "as blood is
more essential than water." The hero goes back to the USA and
returns to New Zealand after three months. Two days after his
return, he meets with Ahmed again. They soon become friends
and Ahmed takes the hero on a tour of the town and invites him
to a Lebanese restaurant where they have Lebanese food. He
also lets him meet with Audrey. The hero asks Ahmed about
Egypt and whether he visits his family there. Ahmed replies that
visiting is difficult because he could not afford the money to go
there apart from the visa problems. Then Ahmed tells the hero
about his family back in Egypt. The hero asks Ahmed, "You
have family in Egypt?" Ahmed replies "I've a mother; she's quite
old, and two sisters. One lives in Jordan."
Then the hero returns to the USA. He finds a surprise
waiting for him there. He finds his telephone bill and there are
phone calls amounting to $1239.44 to Egypt and Jordan - which
he has never made. He complains to the phone company saying
that he has no one in Jordan or in Egypt and after four months
the company dropped the charges. It clear that Ahmed is the
main suspect.
Later, the hero returns to Auckland, New Zealand. He has
never forgotten the matter. Who could have used his phone
number to ring Egypt and Jordan during his absence from his
room at the hotel. Could it be his friend, Ahmed?! At the hotel
he decides to ask the manager if the hotel hires any other
Jordanians or Egyptians apart from Ahmed. Yet before doing so
he received a phone call from Audrey, Ahmed's wife. She has
called to let him "know that Ahmed is quite sick. It's pancreatic
cancer." She has also added that Ahmed would like to see him.
Of course the hero could see that Ahmed is fatally ill. He
cleverly asks him about his sisters in Egypt and Jordan. Ahmed
replies that his family in Egypt are fine but his sister in Jordan is
having some trouble.
“The Colour of the Nile”
By Ruth Lillian
The Plot:
“The Colour of the Nile” deals with the disappearance of an
American tourist during her visit to Egypt. The Sun Boat, a cruise ship,
docks near Luxor for the night. Aurora, a young American tourist, dresses
and goes on board. At the stern of the ship, a soldier takes his post,
manning the fifty caliber machine gun. Aurora thinks that the colour of
the water turns green-and violet. She says, "I've become an impressionist.
Without Manet, I would never see the colour of the water properly".
After breakfast there is to be a caravan to a village bazaar. Aurora's
husband, Will, wakes up. "These fine Egyptian cotton sheets, unstained,
have not been initiated by their love making," he thinks. Will hopes that
today can be the beginning of their honeymoon. He addresses and heads
for the dining room.
Aurora goes for a walk; she reaches a small bar and orders a cup of
coffee. As she drinks the coffee, "All the colours of the Nile are floating
silently across her brain". The sky reflects the beautiful colours of the
Nile. Someone is looking at her intently. She feels dizzy and faints. She
falls forward and all the colours become gray. Something must have been
put in her tea.
The Egyptian tour guide tells Will that the carriages are going to
leave. Will searches for his wife in vain. The guide tells him that she must
have gone for a walk, and leaves his cell phone number in case they want
to join the caravan. Will informs the captain who tells him that they must
search the ship first. Unfortunately, Will does not know what his wife is
wearing as he got up later than her: "He can't conjure up a mental image"
for her.
Aurora gets up to find herself lying on a reed matting. She realizes
that she is not on the ship; she is probably in an Egyptian home. Next to
her is a plate of hard boiled eggs and black olives. It's nearly noon.
Meanwhile, Will walks slowly down the long street. He is carrying his
wife's photo and is asking strangers about her. he reaches the café where
his wife sat a few hours ago but the owner denies seeing her.
Aurora tries to search for her purse to give a reward to the man
who brought her to this house when she fainted, but she does not find it.
she goes out and meets a man whom she tells that she must return to the
ship, but he tells her that a massacre happened and the ship left. His
cousin comes and takes her through a shortcut to the ship.
Aurora stumbles on a small stone as they go down the hill. She
thinks, "I'm being abducted". She blames herself for thinking that being
American will protect her. she picks a sharp rock and smashes it on the
back of the man's head, who falls down. She blames herself for she might
be mistaken and tries to seek help. As she reaches, she realizes that he
was not taking her to the ship. She meets a tourist policeman and asks for
help.
The policeman examines the man and says, "He is alive".
Meanwhile, Will goes to the police station to inform the police of his
wife's disappearance. The policeman tells him that "Only terrorists'
attacks are a problem". He makes out a report, as Will gives him her
photo and answers his questions.
The tourist policeman assures Aurora that he will return her to the
ship. Aurora reaches the ship in a state of fatigue and asks about her
husband. When Will returns to the ship and opens the cabin, he finds
Aurora asleep in bed with her hand bandaged. He is extremely happy for
her safe return.
The Characters:
Aurora:
Aurora is an American tourist of around 40 years old. She is very
self-conscious and very proud of herself. She goes on a tour with her
husband in Egypt apparently to solve some problems concerning their
marriage. She has had wrong ideas of the people she met. She rejected the
café owner's suggestions of Cola or a sandwich and chose an Egyptian
coffee drink. As she is lying on the reed matting of the café owner's
home, after her recovering from her fainting, she feels that she is in some
danger.
She is sad and lonely despite being on a tour throughout Egypt
with her husband. Her solitary journey to the Luxor bazaar indicates that
there is some rift between herself and her husband. She stands in
complete contrast to the easy-going, life-loving and courteous civilian
Egyptian characters. She does not try to contact the Egyptian local
women of the house where she slept during her fainting. This seems a bit
strange. She should have tried to make friends with the Egyptian hostess;
yet there is no mention of these women as if they didn't exist.
Aurora thinks that being an American makes her well respected
and feared by others who come from the third world. Her attack on the
young Egyptian student seems unjustifiable as she only ''thinks she is
being abducted." She is not certain of her ideas. Thus she acts out of
sheer guesswork. She is the abuser not the abused; she is the attacker not
the one attacked. Moreover, she has assaulted someone who offered her
help. Thus she tries hard to remedy the situation and save the young man.
This is part of her idealism which is tested by the young Egyptian student.
Her story could be summarized in the fact that she has disappeared and
reappeared.
Will
Mr. Will is Aurora's American husband. He is apparently in his late
thirties or early forties. He took the tour in Egypt as a chance to express
his love to his wife in the presence of the Ancient Egyptian monuments,
in front of Hatchepsut. Yet his plans fail because of the disappearance of
his wife. As he goes to look after her, he comes to know the world much
better. Everyone else assures him that there is nothing wrong in his wife's
going away for some tome. Yet' like her he seems to be suspicious of
other people's intentions. He does not trust the Egyptian policeman who
promised to find his wife. The policeman hit the truth as he told Will that
there must be some quarrel between him and his wife.
Will learns so much through his Journey to find Aurora. He
discovers something about the real Egypt. His meetings with the tour
Guide and the Egyptian policemen tell him something of the official side
of the story. Yet, his doubts are proven wrong when he returns to the boat
at the end of the day to find Aurora sleeping again in their bed. Thus he is
an example of the one who mistrusts others before knowing anything
about them. Like his wife he thinks that being, an American makes her
worthy of respect and feared by others who come from the third world.
Theme:
"The Color of the Nile" is a short story that belongs to the post 9/11
American literature. It is one of the stories that discuss ethnicity,
migration and "abroad" which replaced social class as a source of tension
in American literature. It is about the condition of just being an
American, especially when not in America, vis-à-vis the citizen of the
world. So one could safely say that this is a story about "abroad." It is a
story that deals with the contrasts between first and third world cultures.
The story discusses the tensions governing the relationship of an
American abroad. Aurora feels that being an American, she belongs to a
superior race. After she thinks that she is being abducted we are told:
"She's always assumed being an American would protect her; her
American passport had the power. Now she's aware of her ignorance.
She's as disposable as debris floating down the Nile." This self-esteem
seems to be shared by some people of the third world. Yet there are
people who would not agree with her. As she says she feels endangered
because of being an American. She has had the idea, whether true or false
of being kidnapped. Yet, if she were abducted, she would be chained to
some shackles in the home of the café owner.
It seems that the café owner took her to his home for fear of
reporting the case to the police. So he decided on taking her to his home
till she recovers and let her go. That is clear from his conduct. As for the
student, he is the one who was hurt not Aurora. He offered to go a short
cut through the mountain, perhaps because he knew the roads better, and
because he wants to save Aurora walking a long distance in the heat of
the Luxor noon time. Thus he was a victim rather than a culprit. He was
also a victim of the harsh and brutal treatment of the local police who
took him for a terrorist rather than investigating the matter thoroughly.
The story tends to investigate into the relationship between
peoples and the "Other" as well as the tensions between certain members
of the public and the police force. It is a tragedy of misunderstanding or
lack of connection between people. As an outcome of their journey,
Aurora and Will, as tourists, want to know about Egypt, as well as put
new energy into their personal relationship. At the beginning of the story,
Aurora feels lonely and sad, obviously because of the cold marriage
relationship with her husband. We are told that the husband means to tell
her again that he loves her: "Will hopes today can be the beginning of
their honeymoon. He loves her and he will tell her so, today, in ancient
Egypt, at the Temple of Hatshepsut. And tonight again he will tell her."
This must have colored her idea of other people she came across.
Aurora suspects that the café owner took her purse, yet he saved
her when she fainted and took her to his home to recover. She also
suspected that the student is taking her to a hiding place to ask for a
ransom, or that he may rape her or sell her to terrorists. All this seems to
be sheer speculation.
To sum up, the story represents the new trends of American fiction,
the American abroad and his new perspective of other third world
peoples. It offers an insight into the mentality of the average person who
is afraid, lonely and looks at others as suspicious killers who seek to prey
on him. The title of the story offers a metaphor for such a relationship.
The colours of the Nile change according to the time of day and the
reflection of the beams of the sun. Thus are peoples' emotions; they
change according to circumstances. It is the outcome of the new tensions
that control modern life.
“Growing Pains” by Caryl Phillips (2005)
Theme:
This story is a very good example of the bildungsroman, or the
coming of age story. It traces the stages of one writer’s development from
the beginning to end. It aims at teaching a very clear lesson to the young.
It describes the processes by which maturity is achieved through the
various ups and downs of life. It is also an autobiographical story. It is
an account of a person’s life by himself. It tells of the bad and the good
sides of the protagonist’s life. We should note that the name of the
protagonist is anonymous. The hero of the story is a five-year old black
boy who lives in Leeds. This is a true autobiographical story that has its
background in the early life of its writer. The story traces the life span of
a young writer who grew up in race conscious Britain. His parents have
immigrated to Britain from the Caribbean when he was just four months
old. It is divided into 10 chapters starting when the protagonist is 5 years
old.
Plot:
In Chapter One, he goes to a school where he is the only black
pupil, so he is considered the black sheep. The playground of his school
is divided into two halves. He is supposed to stand on the other side of a
line drawn in the court of the school and all the white pupils standing on
the other side. So at an early age he is to realize that he is the odd one out
and he should know his place. The second chapter, he is a seven-year-old
boy, and he has changed schools. He writes a story and the teacher Miss
Holmes likes it and encourages him to write another one. In chapter three,
he is eight years old and his mother encourages him to go the local
library. He is only allowed to borrow four books every week and he
finishes reading them all by Monday. He borrows books from some white
friends. Yet when he returns the books, their mother puts the books in
front of the fire to kill the germs. His mother forbids him to borrow any
more books from his friends. In chapter four, he is nine years old and he
stays with his father over the weekend. His parents have recently
divorced. He writes a story full of conceits. He wants to win his father’s
attention, but his father does not understand his story. His father liked the
story even though he was confused by it.
In chapter five, he is now 10 years old. His father leaves him for
his work during his night shifts. He reads almost everything. He discovers
a complete novel and reads it all immediately. It was John Howard
Griffin’s Black Like Me about a white American man who has made
himself black in order he might experience what it is like to be a colored
man. He is alone in his father’s double bed and he tries hard not to be
afraid. That night he leaves the lights on, and in the morning he is still
awake as his exhausted father slides into bed next to him.
In chapter six, he is sixteen and he indulges in reading the 19th
century novels one after the other. He reads Tolstoy’s Anna Karenina. He
is so impressed by the novel and Anna's suicide so that he eats nothing
and is surprised no one else sympathizes with her.
In chapter seven, he is 18 years old. He is at university and travels
150 miles to see his mother. They argue a lot and he buries himself in
reading. He is so overwhelmed by reading James Baldwin’s Blues for
Mister Charlie.
His tutor advises him to pursue his studies in literature instead of
psychology in case he wants to learn about people. In chapter 9, he is 20
years old and for the first time leaves England for the Unites States. He
travels the country and in California he buys Richard Wright’s Native
Son. When he finishes reading the book on a beach, it is almost dark and
everyone has left.
In chapter 10, he is 28 years old, and he visits his native Caribbean
Island for the first time. He has written a few novels. He goes to stay with
his great grandmother and asks her about his novels which were sent to
her by his publisher. The old lady has kept the novels in their packaging
paper. Unfortunately, she hasn’t opened them as she could neither read
nor write. She cherishes them like the Bible, her holy book.
“The Factory of Life”
By A. K. Smith
Themes:
"The Factory of Life" satirically and sarcastically deals with the
idea of combating terrorism. The story offers a comment on the wrong
policies followed by the west as regards the so-called war on terror. It
denounces the policies of meddling with the private affairs of sovereign
countries by the only superpower in the world. The stark proof for their
failure is the success of terrorists to bomb and destroy the symbol of
power and government in London that belongs to the biggest ally of the
US administration.
Victor Ashrafian, Britain's PM 30 years ahead from now, is taking
the helicopter and stares down at the ruins of the parliament destroyed by
a terrorist bomb. He says that the terrorist attacks against the West has
begun since the attack on the World Trade Centre, and the American
President's revengeful war against an innocent country (Afghanistan).
The PM looks down at Westminster Bridge and Big Ben that are also
destroyed. The PM tells the pilot that he was only thirty years in 2001 and
so he began to read in order to understand why people killed themselves
to attack America. The pilot argues that this is due to America's policy of
intervention in other peoples' affairs. Religious idiots whispered in his
ears "Armageddon", so he lied to himself and his country but finally
decides to write a speech because "It's time to make few changes".
Plot:
The scene is London, the capital of the UK, and the sad occasion
is the bombing of the House of Parliament, the London Bridge and Big
Ben. Who are the doers of such terrible attack, nobody knows. We are
only told that it is an act of revenge which is only one cycle in the chain
of horrible revenge attacks that followed the bombing of the World Trade
Centre in Washington and the Pentagon on 9/11/2001. Then the following
revenge attacks and destruction of innocent countries like Afghanistan
and Iraq.
The recurrent question of the story which is "When did it begin?" is
very significant. The other question should be, "who started it?" The
pronoun "it" here refers to the war on terror or acts of terrorism that
plagued the modern world. The writer doesn't blame the victims but
seems to lay the blame on the giant and brutal force that terrorizes the
innocent peoples anywhere. He is obviously blaming the American
administration for not waiting and negotiating the outcome of the attacks
on America. The American neoconservatives waged wars on Afghanistan
and Iraq and couldn't end them. The result is an endless war with a vague
enemy. The Factory of Life here is symbolic of the place where all
humans are products like robots.
The story begins as Dr Asrafian flies over the scene of the bombed
British Parliament Building in a helicopter. As he surveys the damage
done to this building, the Westminster Bridge and Big Ben, he indulges in
a conversation with pilot, James Hicks. He tries to find an answer to those
who began these acts of violence. They are obviously acts of revenge,
exactly like the 9/11 attacks. They are a clear proof for the failure of the
so-called war on terror which the American administration started
immediately after 9/11 by the invasion of Afghanistan and Iraq. This
attack is a also a proof of the lack of common sense on the part of the
leaders of the modern world. They should have waited to know more or
they should have negotiated with others whom they call their enemies.
Then there is the vital question that needs an answer: who gave the
orders to start this war? The story takes another turn when the Prime
Minister learns that Hicks is a graduate of the Factory of Life. It is an
institution that produces dumb robots and throws them into the world.
The leaders of this world are also products of this factory. This Factory of
Life that also produces children, puts them in the so-called system such as
schools and graduating them from colleges. Some lucky ones find wellpaid jobs. The unlucky ones either go the police force or the army and are
taught the art of legalized murder and become fuel for fruitless wars. The
war on terror itself is really a disaster and a failure —it has done more to
inspire jihad.
Sometime later the pilot declares that they should go back to
Downing Street, (place of government) as there is a press conference to
be held in half an hour. There are demonstrations let by apprentices from
the opposition. This apprentice (or leader of the opposition) has written
an article attacking the government policy and the Factory of Life. Then
Ashrafian suggests a solution to the war of terror. It seems the only way
out.
The Americans should end interference in other people's affairs.
The story ends on a welcome promising note: "It's time to make a few
changes."
He says:
"we need to talk to these people; find out what they want, offer to
help them under their terms. We have to initiate a global peace process.
We have to withdraw every single soldier from every foreign country on
the planet - unless they want us to stay, wouldn't want to go upsetting
them all over again."
The Americans should end interference in other people's affairs.
The story ends on a welcome promising note: "It's time to make a few
changes."
Chapter One
By Dr. OSAMA TAHA
Mobile: 01115859130
 The Lexical Meaning of Civilization
Both Lisan al-Arab and Taj al-Arus define the term
"civilization" as follows:" settling down, living in an
urban place or region". Ibn Khaldun in his Muqaddima
(Introduction) says "Urbanism is the goal of
nomadism…civilization is the diversity of high living
and excelling at it".
 Civilization: Dictionary Meaning
Civilization means : (1) an advanced state of
intellectual, and, material development in human society
marked by use of recording-keeping (e.g. writing) and
the appearance of complex political and social
institution; (2) a particular type of developed society; (3)
modern society; (4) the act of civilizing; (5) cultural or
intellectual refinement .Thesaurus defines civilization as
(1) the total product of human creativity and intellect;(2)
Enlightenment and excellent taste resulting from
intellectual development.
 The Encyclopedic Meaning
The specific characteristics of civilization are
agriculture, animal domestication, a high degree of
occupational specialization, writing, the growth of cities
and complex political institutions. Such characteristics
originally emerged in many parts of the world:
Mesopotamia, Egypt China India, the central Andes and
Mesoamerica. The development of political system is the
most important characteristic of all civilizations
 The Linguistic and Technical Meaning
of Civilization
Linguistically, "civilization "means "to dwell in an
urban place". Technically, it means "human innovation in
the various fields of human activity leading to man's
progress."According to the Moslem thinker Malik ibn
Nabi, civilization is made up from three elements: man
soil and time. The historian Arnold Toynbee has
criticized this conception which he attributed to the
pressure of their social environment using the term
civilization and use "urban society" instead.
 Early Civilizations
The earliest known civilizations arose in
Mesopotamia between the Tigris and the Euphrates
rivers, the Nile Valley of Egypt, the Huang He (Yellow
River) of China and on the Island of Crete. The
inhabitants of these areas built cities, created writing
systems and created complex social structures with class
systems.
 Factors of the Success of Human
Civilization
The factors of the success of human civilization
include: religion, the desire to produce and the joy in
production, the balance between the material and the
spiritual and the human resources. The first factor of
success is religion. It is the vital force which makes our
communities. Throughout history religion was a
component of any civilization. Without religion, there
would have never been any civilization.
The second factor is industry. It led to the invention
of the cotton gin, the sewing machine, the printing press,
the steam engine, etc. In fact, it is the desire to produce
and the joy in production which changed the face of the
earth. The third factor is the balance between the material
and the spiritual. It is the human soul upon which any
material progress depends. The greatest resources are the
human resources. Prosperity is the result of righteousness
rather than of material things.
 The Concept of Civilization:
The word civilization comes from the Latin word
'civitatis' meaning state or city. Civilization refers to a
number of meanings: (1) an advanced state of
intellectual, and, material development in human society
marked by use of recording-keeping (e.g. writing) and
the appearance of complex political and social
institution; (2) a particular type of developed society; (3)
modern society; (4) the act of civilizing; (5) cultural or
intellectual refinement.
 Anthropological
and
Definitions of Civilization:
Historical
The specific characteristics of civilization include
people live in the cities, the society depends on
agriculture, animal domestication, a high degree of
occupational specialization, writing the society has
rulers, the use of writing, there are large armies,
production is mechanized, large complex institutions
exist to control the behavior of people. Such
characteristics originally appeared in many parts of the
world: Mesopotamia, Egypt, China, India and
Mesoamerica. The development of political system is the
most important characteristic of all civilizations.
Introduction:
Civilization is an outcome of strong culture and
religion of the society. Strong culture and religion play
an important role because they give any society its strong
identity leading other small societies to join it. To know
how strong a civilization is, we consider the quality of
life: behavior, art, ritual practices, language, habits and
food.
The Concept of Civilization:
Civilization is the condition of persons living and
functioning together and cooperatively so that they
produce and experience the benefits of so living. The
word civilization is derived from a Latin word for city. It
implies a society made of cities, and cities involve people
living cooperatively. Civilization involves social
cooperation which is the opposite of individualism based
on survival of the fittest.
Various Definitions of Civilization:
 Civilization is a society in an advanced state of
social development (e.g. with complex legal and
political and religious organizations).
 Civilization is a culture of a particular society at a
particular time and place.
 Civilization is refinement: the quality of excellence
in thought, manners and taste.
The Meaning of the Word Civilization:
The word civilization refers to a condition of
relative advancement in human society. A civilized
society is usually marked by progress in the arts and
sciences, the extensive use of writing, and the appearance
of complex political and social institution (American
Heritage English Dictionary). Culture precedes
civilization. A human society will have distinct meaning
systems, including language and religious systems,
before these systems become institutionalized politically
and socially.
The Synonyms and Antonyms of Civilization:
The synonyms of civilization include advancement,
civility, cultivation, culture, development, education,
elevation, enlightenment, progress and refinement.
The antonyms of civilization include barbarism,
savagery, wilderness and wildness.
Nineteenth century English anthropologist E.B.
Tylor defined civilization as life in cities that is
organized by government and facilitated by scribes
(which means the use of writing).
Civilization as a System of Behavior:
Civilization is system of behavior. There are a lot of
things humans do that are uncivilized. For example,
people use guns and arms for killing others. The
availability of guns in this world is an epidemic, and is
killing innocent people every day. This is, of course, a
barbarian behavior. Civilized humans should be more
tolerant with each other's differences.
Components of Civilization:
Civilization has many social, political, religious,
intellectual, technological, economic, cultural and
environmental components.
 The social components include: class structure, who
the upper class is, the family structure, the role of
men/women or husbands/wives, the education
system that maintains that class structure.
 The political components include: who is in control
and how power is obtained, the type of government,
reasons for its success and the structure of the
military.
 The religious components comprise: the main
beliefs and ethical standards, the role of religious
leaders, the impact of religion on social/gender roles
and the stand of religion from science.
 The intellectual components embrace: the
relationship between religion and science,
description of the new technology and how it affects
civilization, the values of civilization transmitted
and the developments in technology and who is
responsible for them, the type of education needed
to achieve progress.
 The economic components are various: the
economic activity, who does the labor and how they
profit, who owns the means of production and how
they profit.
 Cultural components refer to: what is the most
important component of civilization, who keeps the
culture, the cultural activities of civilization and
how they reflect the values of civilization.
 The environmental components include: the
natural condition of the land, the place people move
to and what plants, animals or diseases transmitted
and the change made by people in the environment.
Elements of Civilization:
There are many elements of human civilization, but
the most important ones include:
 (1) The existence of agricultural system. Early
agriculture is important to world development. It
permitted more humans to live with better health
and to engage in activities other than the basic
survival.
 (2) The presence of irrigation system. It is not an
accident that the cradles of civilization were river
valleys such as the Nile, Tigris, Euphrates and
Indus. The valleys were not useful to the earliest
farmers until they learned to control flooding
through the irrigation system.
 (3) The presence of trade. Trade played a vital role
in human civilization as it greatly encouraged the
specialization of crafts.
 (4) Metalworking which enabled human to make
more refined tools and containers. Things made of
copper and bronze helped man to make many
strides.
 (5) A well-organized central government necessary
to lead the people and help in organizing the city.
City governments were far more powerful than the
council of elders and local chiefs of farming
villages. Governments soon became more complex
as rulers issued laws, collected taxes and organized
systems of defence. Most rulers claimed that their
power came from God or the divine right. These
rulers gained religious power as well.
 (6) The existence of religion. Throughout human
history, God has always sent his Messengers to
mankind to guide them. However, most people have
gone astray worshipping many gods. They appealed
to the natural forces whom they believed to be gods.
They also believed that gods control human
activities such as birth, death and war. Without
religion, human civilization would have never
existed. Man would just lead a nomadic, uncivilized
lifestyle and technologies would never have existed.
 (7) The existence of a system of writing has greatly
enhanced human civilization. It enabled man to
record his history. Writing was first invented to
keep accounts in trade. The invention of writing
took place in Mesopotamia just before the
beginning of the Bronze Age in 3000 B.C. the
earliest writing before the invention of the alphabet
was pictographic—each picture represented an
object. The most famous Egyptian writing was
hieroglyphics.
 (8) The presence of education is required for the
transmission of culture. Through education, human
heritage—its language, knowledge, its morals and
manners, its technology and arts—was handed
down to the new generations, as the very instrument
through which they are turned from animals to men.
Chapter Two:
The Meaning of Human Civilization
 Civilization as a Cultural Identity:
Civilization can be described as the culture of a
complex society. Every society, civilization or not, has a
specific set of ideas and customs, and a certain set of
items and arts, that make it unique. However, some tribes
or peoples remained uncivilized even to this day. These
cultures are called primitive. They do not have
governments, organized religion, writing systems or
money. The civilization in which someone lives is that
person's broadest cultural identity. A female of African
descent living in the United States has many roles that
she identifies with. However, she is above all a member
of "Western Civilization".
Oswald Spengler said that a civilization's coherence
is based around a single primary cultural symbol.
Civilizations experience cycles of birth, life, decline and
death, often replaced by a new civilization with a
powerful new culture, formed around a compelling new
cultural symbol. Civilizations generally declined fell,
according to Toynbee, because of moral or religious
decline. Samuel Huntington similarly defines civilization
as "the highest cultural grouping of people and the
broadest level of cultural identity which distinguishes
humans from other species."
 Civilization as a Complex System:
The history of civilization reflects a progressive
increase in the complexity of large scale behaviors. Early
civilizations introduced a few simple large scale
behaviors by use of many individuals (slaves or soldiers)
performing the same task. More specialization and
coordination increased the complexity of large scale
behaviors. The Industrial Revolution made this process
fast. When the complexity of collective behaviors
increases beyond that of an individual human being, then
hierarchical controls become ineffective. Hierarchically
controlled systems must yield to network systems.
 Civilization as a Cooperative Enterprise:
Cooperation is important to achieve civilization.
Without cooperation anarchy prevails. Cooperation
can be achieved through the interchange of services
and ideas, even more than of goods. Thus, came the
development and exchange of cultural values. The
exchange of goods, services and ideas between
individuals permits of greater specialization and
greater satisfaction.
 Freedom helps cooperation to achieve its desired
results. All members in society should have the
same privileges. Where some members have more
privileges, they deprive others from the fruits of
their labor. Equality of opportunity should be the
highest law.
 Civilization, therefore, is a cooperative enterprise.
The uniformity of purpose or the cooperation for a
common end helps progress. But the purpose of
cooperation is production, and the motor force of
productive effort is thought. As desires become
more numerous and diverse in society, it is found
that the greater satisfactions are obtained by the
diversity of occupations.
Chapter Three:
The Meaning of European Civilization
 The Dynamics of Civilization:
Huntington claims that civilizations are dynamic; they rise and
fall. He attaches civilization to an idea of history and
development. Civilizations work in time. Thus, he speaks about
civilization and history and civilization and geography.
Civilizations are formed by their history.
Mirabeau's Definition of Civilization:
There are qualifications such as manners, politeness, civility or
urbanity which are attached to people. We can draw a line
between manners, etc. and people. But this pole is characterized
as a mask by Mirabeau. Behind the mask is the true meaning of
civilization; that is virtue. To be civilized is to be thus virtuous.
The opposite of civilization is corruption, which means the
destruction of social life. So, virtue is the quality needed to
uphold society. This quality is human or universal. We can
therefore draw a line between human and virtue. We can
observe a tension between the universal pole (virtue-humanity)
and the particular cultural pole (people-manners). Mirabeau tries
to solve this tension by turning the cultural pole into a distortion
of the true meaning of civilization. The distortion will lead to
corruption while only virtue will carry civilization with true
civilization. Moreover, Mirabeau attaches an active role to
virtue it can do something for society. It is the driving force in
maintaining and developing society. In that sense, civilization
and corruption are at once processes, driving forces within this
processes, and positive or negative results of this process.
Mirabeau has a very abstract idea of the space of civilization.
The reason for this is that he wants to stress the universal
dimension: civilization is an inherent quality.
 Civilization is an accumulation of common history.
It is also a process of increasing awareness of the final aim of
civilization. History is not mainly events or tradition, but the
awareness of direction. According to religion and history,
Huntington divides the world into seven or eight civilizations.
He locates civilization in a geographical space. Western
Civilization is located between the West coast of the USA and a
line somewhere in the former Eastern Europe. This civilization
is a cultural entity with its history and religion.
 The Stages of Civilization:
The stages of civilization include religion, education, science
and progress. Progress is measured by the level of commercial
and political refinement. Civil society at the end of the time line
is located in the polished and commercial nations. The driving
forces that lead to civil society are knowledge and virtue.
 Levels of Civilization:
François Guizot gives us a three-layer definition of civilization:
a universal civilization related to progress in time; a European
civilization related to the common roots of Europe; and finally
national levels. The point for Guizot is not to detect a universal
civilization, but to show Europe's search for universal meaning.
European history becomes such a search. This search goes
through different epochs that are the same for all nations. Each
epoch is at the same time a step towards the final truth where
Europe realizes its potentials. The universal driving forces here
are not arts and virtue, but politics and religion and ideas
(Christianity and political freedom).
 Like Huntington, Guizot gives an important role to
Christianity
Guizot locates European civilization directly in history. For a
historian like the German Leopold von Ranke, Europe is the
environment of nations, and there is no talk of a universal level
European civilization comes to play a new and powerful role in
the imperialist discourse of late nineteenth century. But in this
discourse there is no exchange between a universal and a
European level. Rather, it is taken for granted that Europe is the
civilization, or in more racial forms that civilization is white.
 Life Cycle of Civilization/Phases of Civilization:
Oswald Spengler's approach to civilization is unique for many
reasons. Firstly, it is a synthesis of different approaches. He
combines an idea of a corrupted civilization with a cultural
paradigm which makes it possible to operate with different
independent civilizations. Secondly, there is a direct link
between Spengler and Huntington with regard to the
civilizational outlook on history. Civilization is only the last
phase in the development of cultures. Culture is the only organic
form within which history is formed. History is not the proper
word. According to Spengler cultures have a life cycle with
different stages of birth, maturity, old age, senility, and death.
 Diseases of Civilization:
Spengler suggested a list of the different diseases of western
civilization. This list includes the dominant 19th century
critiques of Marx, Weber and Nietzsche. Spengler believes that
the diseases of civilization are rigidity, mechanical perceptions,
empty abstractions and imperialism. What Spengler does in his
version of civilization is that he eliminates the universal,
Eurocentric approach. For him there are several, independent
civilizations. Spengler believes that a civilization comes to an
end when the dictators manipulate the masses for their own
purpose.
 Spengler describes a western culture detached from
classical and Christian roots.
He believes in the idea of clashes of civilizations but he is
pessimistic as he believes that this can lead to catastrophes on
the international scale. In fact, he depicts Western civilization in
a very negative way. For Spengler, civilization has two
meanings: the civilization of a particular people (this leads to the
clash between civilizations) and a universal meaning, which
leads to catastrophes on a global scale.
Chapter 9
Brief Historical Vision of Human and European Civilization
 Prehistoric Times:
The Human race may be related to a pre-human species, or
“hominid” that lived 4 million years ago in east Africa. In addition to
intelligence, a very important difference between hominids and other
apelike creatures was the ability to stand upright on two feet, freeing the
arms and hands for other uses. Modern man, “homo sapiens”, was a
creature with enlarged cranial capacity related to hominidic race that
developed in Africa about 75,000 years ago during the last Ice Age.
 This Neolithic Revolution:
The earliest human societies consisted of families and tribes that
depended on hunting and fishing. During the New Stone (Neolithic) Age,
they used garments made of animal skin and fur. They also used stone
tools and articles made of bones. The first human settlements or villages
appeared in the Bronze Age due to the emergence of agriculture
domestication of animals. This Neolithic Revolution allowed the
development of towns, cities, trade and most components of civilization.
This revolution appeared first in the fertile crescent in Iraq and later in
China and Africa.
 Crete 2500 B.C.
By about 2500 B. C., the Minoan civilization had emerged on the
island of Crete in the Aegean Sea. Minoans probably settled in Crete
before 3000 B.C. They built great cities and palaces. They used a picture
writing system. The Minoan religion seems to have centered on a mother
goddess and on the figures of the bull and the snakes. The end of this
civilization came with the invasions from the mainland Greece.
 Crete and Troy:
As the Neolithic revolution became widespread and larger fixed
settlements began to spring up. The old European civilizations then came
into being, which laid the groundwork for the later development of
classical Greece and Rome. Old European civilizations were created by
the original continental Europeans while the classical civilizations of
Greece and Rome received their impetus from Indo-European of Nordic
invasions. Absorbed into the Indo-European peoples, the old Europeans
largely disappeared.
By the year 3000 B.C., Crete had contact with the budding
Egyptian civilization, and many religious customs and social habits were
taken directly from Egypt. The Cretans were governed by a priest king
who had his residence at Knossos which was destroyed by an earthquake
in 1400 B. C. Ancient Cretans followed the Egyptian artistic convention
of painting males with red skins and females with white skins. Flowers,
plants, sea creatures and dolphins feature prominently in their art forms,
indicating that their society was advanced and wealthy enough to concern
itself beyond just basic survival activities. The oldest forms of European
writing (two baked clay tablets) were discovered in Crete by Sir Arthur
Evans in 1900. Crete knew the first flushing toilets.
 City of Troy: First Built 3999 B.C.
The city of Troy was thought to exist only in Homer's poems: The
Iliad and The Odyssey. However, there were nine cities, all built on top of
one another. These cities were either destroyed by earthquakes, fire or
war. By the time Troy had fallen, the great Indo-European invasions of
the Greek mainland had already started, and it is possible that the city
itself may at one stage have been destroyed during one of these invasions.
 The Etruscans:
The Etruscans became one of the original Mediterranean and
Proto-Nordic peoples living in the Italian peninsula before the IndoEuropean invaders reached that part of the world. They appear to have
penetrated Italy from the north of the Alps. They had close contact with
old European civilization as they adopted Greek characters for writing
their language. They established many towns and cities, one of which was
later to become Rome. However, they were assimilated into the invading
Roman state.
 Middle and Near East:
The Mediterranean and Proto-Nordic groups had by 4000 B.C. also
occupied much of present Middle East, from Egypt to Iraq. These
Mediterraneans were responsible for many of the civilizations in that
region. They were subject to invasions either by Indo-Europeans or
Semites.
 Ancient Harappan Civilization in India C. 2005 B.C.
The old European settlements were also found in northern India, in
Harappa and the Indus Valley. The first old European settlement of the
region was made around 2005 B.C., when the white Mediterraneans
arrived after trekking from Iraq. This civilization lasted until the region
was invaded by the Indo-European Nordics. It was characterized by
advanced sewerage system and baths.
The Difference between Civilization and
Culture
Civilization as a Synonym for Culture:
Civilization is often used as a synonym for culture. Even in the
Anglo-French tradition, the concept of culture was often used
synonymously with civilization. There are scholars who have
designated culture and civilization as the two sides of the same
coin. William Ogburn pointed out two aspects of culture, namely
material and non-material. For him, material aspect represents
civilization and the non-material aspect is the culture proper.
But sociologists differentiate culture and civilization as two
different levels of phenomena. Culture is by definition smaller than
a civilization. Culture can grow and exist without residing in a
formal civilization whereas a civilization will never grow and exist
without the element of culture. Culture can be tangible or intangible
whereas civilization is something that is more tangible because it is
what you see as a whole.
Culture Exists within Civilization
Civilization in theory is bigger than culture. Civilization is a
bigger unit than culture because it is a complex total of the society
that dwells within a certain area, along with its forms of
government, norms, and even culture. Thus, culture is just a part of
an entire civilization. For example, the Egyptian civilization has an
Egyptian culture in the same way as the Greek civilization has their
Greek culture.
A culture ordinarily exists within a civilization. In this regard,
each civilization can contain not only one but several cultures.
Comparing culture and civilization is like showing the difference
between language and the country to which it is being used.
Culture can exist in itself whereas civilization cannot be called
a civilization if it does not possess a certain culture. It’s just like
asking how a nation can exist on its own without the use of a
medium of communication. Hence, a civilization will become empty
if it does not have its culture, no matter how little it is.
Culture can be learned and in the same manner it can also be
transmitted from one generation to the next. Using a medium of
speech and communication, it is possible for a certain type of
culture to evolve and even be inherited by another group of people.
On the other hand, civilization cannot be transferred by mere
language alone.
The concept of civilization was almost equated with highly
valued things, such as respect of people for one another, the
sanctity of life and high regard for the good, the ethical and the
beautiful. In this sense, those who were lacking in these attributes
were regarded as barbaric or uncivilized.
Primitive people who lived in a state of nature—quite naked,
used to eat unbaked animal flesh—were usually termed as
barbarians. However, many anthropological studies showed that
many primitive societies had their own values, beliefs, rules,
religions and tools, etc.
Civilization is Bigger than culture
Civilization is always advancing but not culture. Cultural facts
like dramatic plays or poems may not be necessarily better today
than the plays or poems of Shakespeare.
Civilization is easily passed without much effort to the next
generation but not culture. Cultural facts, e.g., any art or a piece of
literature, cannot be learned without some intelligence. It requires a
few pains to understand it. Contrary to it, the equipment’s of
civilization (building, TV, etc.) can easily be inherited without much
or any use of energy and intelligence.
Civilization may be borrowed without making any change but
not culture. Borrowing any cultural fact like any political, economic
or social belief requires some necessary alteration to adjust in the
new cultural environment while this is not necessary to make any
material change in the civilizational equipment’s such as TV,
computer, etc.
Challenges and complexities of Human
Civilization
The increase in the complexity of human civilization is directly
related to sweeping changes in the structure and dynamics of
human civilization.
Global Connections between Civilizations:
There are unseen connections between human beings. Today
global connections are manifest in the economy, in transportation
and communication systems and in response to political, social and
environmental crises. The conditions of human life have changed
due to technological, medical, communication, education and
governmental
changes
which
themselves
involved
global
cooperation and collective actions. Human civilization itself is an
organism capable of behaviors that are of greater complexity than
those of an individual human.
Environmental Challenges to Civilization:
Human
civilization
continues
to
face
internal
and
environmental challenges. Humans are parts of a greater whole.
This complexity is reflected in the diversity of professional and
social environments. On the global scale, human civilization is a
single organism capable of remarkable complex collective actions in
response to environmental challenges.
Challenges of Random, Coherent and Correlated
Behaviors of Human Beings to Civilization:
Random, coherent and correlated behaviors illustrate the
relationship between behavior of parts and the collective behavior of
a system. In both random and coherent behavior, the collective
behavior of the system is simple. Correlated behavior gives rise to
complex collective behavior. For example, primitive or agrarian
cultures involved largely independent individuals or small groups.
Military systems involved large coherent motions of many
individuals performing similar and simple actions. These coherent
actions enabled impact at a scale much larger than the size of the
military force itself.
By contrast, civilization today involves diverse and specialized
behaviors that are nevertheless coordinated. This specialization and
coordination allow for highly complex collective behaviors capable of
influencing the environment on many scales.
Methods of Control inside Human Organizations:
In human organizations coordination occurs because
individuals influence each others' behavior. The influence is often
called control. Control structures include three types: hierarchy,
hybrid and network. In an idealized hierarchy, all the
communication and coordination of activities is performed through
the hierarchy whereas in the other two there are primary and lateral
connections. A military force is an example of a coherent behavior
since all the individuals repeat the same action controlled by
hierarchy. Factory production is an example of coordinated
behavior. The coordination means that the behaviors of different
individuals, while not the same, are related to each other.
How is Civilization Complex?
The history of civilization reflects a progressive increase in the
complexity of large scale behaviors. Early civilizations introduced a
few relatively simple large scale behaviors by use of many
individuals (slaves or soldiers) performing the same repetitive task.
Progressive specialization with coordination increased the
complexity of large scale behaviors. The industrial revolution
accelerated this process which continues till today. The use of new
energy sources and automation enabled larger scale behavior by
the use of energy rather than task repetition. When the complexity
of collective behaviors increases beyond that of an individual human
being then hierarchical controls became ineffective.
The Difference between Civilization and
Culture
Civilization as a Synonym for Culture:
Civilization is often used as a synonym for culture. In our dayto-day talks and discussions, we often use the terms ‘culture’ and
‘civilization’ interchangeably. Even in the Anglo-French tradition, the
concept of culture was often used synonymously with civilization.
But sociologists differentiate culture and civilization as two different
levels of phenomena. Culture is by definition smaller than a
civilization. Culture can grow and exist without residing in a formal
civilization whereas a civilization will never grow and exist without
the element of culture. Culture can be tangible or intangible
whereas civilization is something that is more tangible because it is
what you see as a whole. Culture can be transmitted through
symbols in the form of language whereas an entire civilization
cannot be transmitted by mere language alone.
Firstly, civilization in theory is bigger than culture in which an
entire civilization can encompass one single unit of culture.
Civilization is a bigger unit than culture because it is a complex
aggregate of the society that dwells within a certain area, along
with its forms of government, norms, and even culture. Thus,
culture is just a spec or a portion of an entire civilization. For
example, the Egyptian civilization has an Egyptian culture in the
same way as the Greek civilization has their Greek culture.
A culture ordinarily exists within a civilization. In this regard,
each civilization can contain not only one but several cultures.
Comparing culture and civilization is like showing the difference
between language and the country to which it is being used.
Culture can exist in itself whereas civilization cannot be called
a civilization if it does not possess a certain culture. It’s just like
asking how a nation can exist on its own without the use of a
medium of communication. Hence, a civilization will become empty
if it does not have its culture, no matter how little it is.
Culture can be something that is tangible and it can also be
something that isn’t. Culture can become a physical material if it is
a product of the beliefs, customs and practices of a certain people
with a definite culture. But a civilization is something that can be
seen as a whole and it is more or less tangible although its basic
components, like culture, can be immaterial.
Culture can be learned and in the same manner it can also be
transmitted from one generation to the next. Using a medium of
speech and communication, it is possible for a certain type of
culture to evolve and even be inherited by another group of people.
On the other hand, civilization cannot be transferred by mere
language alone. Because of its complexity and magnitude, you need
to transfer all of the raw aggregates of a civilization for it to be
entirely passed on. It just grows, degrades and may eventually end
if all its subunits will fail.
The concept of civilization was almost equated with highly
valued things, such as respect of people for one another, the
sanctity of life and high regard for the good, the ethical and the
beautiful. In this sense, those who were lacking in these attributes
were regarded as barbaric or uncivilized.
Preliterate or primitive people who lived in a state of nature—
quite naked, used to eat unbaked animal flesh—were usually
termed as barbarians. However, many anthropological studies
showed that many preliterate societies had their own values,
beliefs, rules, religions and tools, etc.
They made certain changes in the natural order of things
which are characteristics of culture, in the modern sense of the
term. The use of the term ‘civilization’ as exhibited above is
different from its use in sociological or anthropological sense.
Defining civilization MacIver and Page (1962) said, ‘by civilization
we mean the whole mechanism and organization which man has
designed in his endeavor to control the conditions of life’.
Similarly, S.M. Fairchild (1908) argued that it is the higher
stage of cultural development characterized by intellectual,
aesthetic, technological and spiritual attainment. On the basis of
this meaning, he made reference of ‘civilized peoples’ in contrast to
‘uncivilized or non-civilized peoples’.
A few scholars have equated civilization with technology and
progress; e.g., Robert Bierstedt (1974) emphasized on
sophistication, self-criticism and other awareness as the chief
characteristics of civilization. Sociologists do not use the term
‘civilization’ in the sense stated above because all above views are
value-loaded.
Thus, making a distinction between culture and civilization,
the following points may be noted:
1. Culture is an end (values and goals) in itself while
civilization is a means (tools and techniques) to an end. Cultural
facts like belief, art and literature—prose, poetry or novel, etc.,
gives direct satisfaction to the reader while equipment’s of
civilization such as cars, computers, refrigerators, etc., do not give
direct satisfaction, until and unless they do not satisfy our wants.
Thus, civilization is utilitarian. It just helps in achieving the end.
2. Culture has no value in itself but it is a measurement by
which we can value other articles of civilization. We cannot
determine the value of culture, i.e., beliefs, norms, ideas, etc., but
the value of anything can be determined by its measurement
standard. Culture is a measuring rod or weighing balance.
3. Civilization is always advancing but not culture. Cultural
facts like dramatic plays or poems may not be necessarily better
today than the plays or poems of Shakespeare?
4. Civilization is easily passed without much effort to the next
generation but not culture. Cultural facts, e.g., any art or a piece of
literature, cannot be learned without some intelligence. It requires a
few pains to understand it. Contrary to it, the equipment’s of
civilization (building, TV, etc.) can easily be inherited without much
or any use of energy and intelligence.
5. Civilization may be borrowed without making any change
but not culture. Borrowing any cultural fact like any political,
economic or social belief requires some necessary alteration to
adjust in the new cultural environment while this is not necessary to
make any material change in the civilizational equipment’s such as
TV, computer, etc.
6. Culture relates to the inner qualities of society like religion,
customs, conventions, etc., while civilization relates to the outer
form of society such as TV, radio, fans, etc.
7. Culture is more stable than civilization—cultural change
takes place in years or in centuries but civilization changes very
rapidly.
8. Variability of cultures may not be accompanied by
variability of civilization at different places. Civilization may be
similar in variable cultural areas. For instance, there is a great
difference between American and Indian cultures but there are
many similarities in their civilizational equipment’s.
9. Culture is a social fact, i.e., creation of the whole society
while civilization, i.e., the invention of any equipment may be by a
single individual. Any ordinary person can affect any change in the
civilizational equipment but for any modification or alteration in any
cultural fact requires the power and imagination of whole society.
There are scholars who have designated culture and
civilization as the two sides of the same coin. William F. Ogburn
(1964), in his theory of social change, pointed out two aspects of
culture, viz., material and non-material. For him, material aspect
represents civilization and the non-material aspect is the culture
proper. Gillin and Gillin (1948) designated the material or tangible
part of culture as civilization or culture equipment which man in his
endeavor has modified from environment.
First Quatrain
In the first quatrain of Shakespeare's Sonnet 1, the speaker
explains to the young man that humanity’s wish is that pleasant people
will reproduce progeny: “From fairest creatures we desire increase.” The
speaker likens the young man’s beauty to a rose, whose beauty will never
die if he produces little roses or children. He reminds the young man that
he will age and “by time decease” but if he produces a child, his memory
will be able to live on: “His tender heir might bear his memory.”
Second Quatrain
In the second quatrain, the speaker chides the young man saying
he is only interested in his own beauty; he is conceited and self-indulgent:
“But thou contracted to thine own bright eyes, / Feed’st thy light’s flame
with self-substantial fuel.” And according to the speaker, the young
conceited man is causing “a famine where abundance lies”: instead of
there being one young person of such beauty, there could be many, if
only the young adult would marry and produce others that would be as
beautiful as he is. And in being so selfish, the young man is his own
enemy and ultimately being cruel to himself: “Thyself thy foe, to thy
sweet self too cruel.”
Third Quatrain
The speaker tries to convince the young man of his selfishness
by reminding again him that as only one person, “only herald to the
gaudy spring,” he is hiding his value: “Within thine own bud buriest thy
content.” He calls the young man a “tender churl” and reminds him that
he is wasting himself by continuing to remain so self-important: “And,
tender churl, mak’st waste in niggarding.”
The Couplet
In the couplet, “Pity the world, or else this glutton be, / To eat
the world’s due, by the grave and thee,” the speaker asks the young man
to take pity on the world, because he is consuming what the world should
have by lavishing all his attention on himself. And then the speaker
reminds the young man that if he does not produce heirs he will find
himself alone with grave in the end. Sonnet 2 opens with a metaphor that
compares the way time wears away a person's face to the way an army
attacks a castle. The personification is seen in the metaphor: "deep
trenches in thy beauty's field" which can be seen as wrinkles in a
beautiful face. This gives readers a picture of the old age that has yet to
come for some. The man's beauty will be lost and become like a "tattered
weed." "Will be a tatter'd weed, of small worth held" unless he
reproduces. This is a metaphor. A Metaphor is a figure of speech which
includes an implicit comparison. It has only three elements: tenor, vehicle
and aspect of similarity. We imagine "all-eating shame" being like
Cookie Monster, just gobbling up everything around it. There's a little bit
of personification here, since Shakespeare gives shame a human or
animal quality to suggest that it is powerful and dangerous. For the whole
poem the rhyme scheme would be: ABABCDCDEFEFGG.
The difference between poetry and prose should be made clear.
Unlike prose, poetry is characterized by concentration and
intensity. It is also written in syllabics, stanza form and
characterized by deviation from normal language use. A simile
is an explicit comparison between two dissimilar things. Any simile
has four elements: tenor, vehicle, instrument and aspect of
similarity. For example, Shelley says " the dead leaves/Are driven
like ghosts". The tenor is dead leaves, the vehicle is ghosts, the
instrument is like and aspect of similarity is that both of the dead
leaves and ghosts are the remains of living things. A Metaphor is
a figure of speech which includes an implicit comparison. It has
only three elements: tenor, vehicle and aspect of similarity. For
example, when Milton says "When I consider how my light is spent"
he likens his eyesight to light. The eyes is the tenor, the vehicle is
light (a candle or lamp) whose light is out (aspect of similarity).
Metaphors are of three kinds: dead, dying and living. An example
of a dead metaphor is "The situation is in my hand". An example of
dying metaphor is "to fish in troubled waters".
Paraphrase
When forty years have made your brow wrinkled with
age,
And you are showing all the other signs of aging,
The pride and greatness of your youth, so much admired
by everyone now,
Will be worth as little as a tattered weed:
Then, when you are asked 'where is your beauty now?',
And, 'where is the treasure from your days of
merriment?'
You must say, within your own eyes, now sunk deep in
their sockets,
Where lies a shameful confession of greed and selfobsession.
If you would have only put your beauty to a greater use,
If only you could answer 'This fair child of mine
Shall give an account of my life and prove that I made no
misuse of my time on earth.'
Proving that his beauty, because he is your son, was once
yours!
This child would be new-made when you are old,
And you would see your own blood flow warm through
him when you are cold.
William Shakespeare
Sonnet 2 When forty winters shall beseige thy brow
When forty winters shall beseige thy brow,
And dig deep trenches in thy beauty's field,
Thy youth's proud livery, so gazed on now,
Will be a tatter'd weed, of small worth held:
Then being ask'd where all thy beauty lies,
Where all the treasure of thy lusty days,
To say, within thine own deep-sunken eyes,
Were an all-eating shame and thriftless praise.
How much more praise deserved thy beauty's use,
If thou couldst answer 'This fair child of mine
Shall sum my count and make my old excuse,'
Proving his beauty by succession thinner!
This were to be new made when thou art old,
And see thy blood warm when thou feel'st it cold.
William Shakespeare is by all accounts the greatest poet and
dramatist in the English language, and one of the greatest in the world.
Shakespeare owes his greatness to two things: the quality of his poetry
and his deep understanding. That is why he is considered a symbol of
English culture.
Shakespeare's sonnets 1-17 are called the “marriage sonnets”;
the speaker in each of these sonnets is trying to persuade a young man to
marry. When forty years have made your brow wrinkled with age, and
you are showing all the other signs of aging. The pride and greatness of
your youth, so much admired by everyone now will be worth as little as a
tattered weed. Then, when you are asked 'where is your beauty now?' and,
'where is the treasure from your days of merriment?' You must say,
within your own eyes, now sunk deep in their sockets, where lies a
shameful confession of greed and self-obsession. If you would have only
put your beauty to a greater use. If only you could answer 'This fair child
of mine Shall give an account of my life and prove that I made no misuse
of my time on earth. 'Proving that his beauty, because he is your son, was
once yours! This child would be new-made when you are old, and you
would see your own blood flow warm through him when you are cold.
The speaker presents a problem (the young man is going to get
old) and then offers a solution (having kids). He exaggerates the problem,
wrinkles turn into "trenches" (line 2). Then he makes his solution sound
really great, promising that having a child will be like being born again:
"This were to be new made when thou art old" (line13).
We want all beautiful creatures to reproduce themselves so that
beauty’s flower will not die out; but as an old man dies in time, he leaves
a young heir to carry on his memory. But you, concerned only with your
own beautiful eyes, feed the bright light of life with self-regarding fuel,
making beauty shallow by your preoccupation with your looks. In this
you are your own enemy, being cruel to yourself. You who are the
world’s most beautiful ornament and the chief messenger of spring, are
burying your gifts within yourself. And, dear selfish one, because you
decline to reproduce, you are actually wasting that beauty. Take pity on
the world or else be the glutton who devours, with the grave, what
belongs to the world.
Sonnet 2 opens with a metaphor that compares the way time wears
away a person's face to the way an army attacks a castle. The
personification is seen in the metaphor: "deep trenches in thy beauty's
field" which can be seen as wrinkles in a beautiful face. This gives
readers a picture of the old age that has yet to come for some. The man's
beauty will be lost and become like a "tattered weed." "Will be a tatter'd
weed, of small worth held" unless he reproduces. This is a metaphor. We
imagine "all-eating shame" being like Cookie Monster, just gobbling up
everything around it. There's a little bit of personification here, since
Shakespeare gives shame a human or animal quality to suggest that it is
powerful and dangerous. For the whole poem the rhyme scheme would
be: ABABCDCDEFEFGG.
William Shakespeare
All the World is Stage
"All the world's a stage,
And all the men and women merely players;
They have their exits and their entrances;
And one man in his time plays many parts,
His acts being seven ages. At first the infant,
Mewling and puking in the nurse's arms;
And then the whining school-boy, with his satchel
And shining morning face, creeping like snail
Unwillingly to school. And then the lover,
Sighing like furnace, with a woeful ballad
Made to his mistress' eyebrow. Then a soldier,
Full of strange oaths, and bearded like the pard,
Jealous in honor, sudden and quick in quarrel,
Seeking the bubble reputation
Even in the cannon's mouth. And then the justice,
In fair round belly with good capon lin'd,
With eyes severe and beard of formal cut,
Full of wise saws and modern instances;
And so he plays his part. The sixth age shifts
Into the lean and slipper'd pantaloon,
With spectacles on nose and pouch on side;
His youthful hose, well sav'd, a world too wide
For his shrunk shank; and his big manly voice,
Turning again toward childish treble, pipes
And whistles in his sound. Last scene of all,
That ends this strange eventful history,
Is second childishness and mere oblivion;
Sans teeth, sans eyes, sans taste, sans everything."
— Jacques (As You Like It, Act II, Scene VII, lines 139-166)
“All the World is Stage” is the poem taken from William
Shakespeare’s play entitled As You like It. The character who says those
beautiful words is known as Jacques. Jacques agrees with the Duke
saying that all the world's a stage and compares all men and women to
actors on this stage. Each one of them has their own exits (deaths) and
entrances (births). Men and women play many parts in the drama of life
which Jacques divides into seven acts or stages.
The first stage of life is that of an infant crying and puking in the
nurse's arms. An infant is helpless and is totally dependent on others.
The second stage is that of childhood which is also the school going age.
Jacques gives the picture of a bright eyed boy with a shining morning
face with his school bag reluctantly drag himself to school in a snail
pace. The third stage is that of adolescence, when a man plays the part
of a lover. He is attracted towards women and composes poems to
describe and glorify his lover. He experiences the emotions of joy,
passion, disappointment and anxiety in this difficult period of life.
The fourth stage is that of adult or manhood. Jacques cites the
example of an arrogant soldier who wears shaggy beard that makes him
look like a fierce leopard. He is bold, brave, ambitious and full of
energy. He curses and swears in strange and manly fashion and is eager
to establish a status in society. He is quick to defend his honour and
fiercely guards his reputation. He is ready to risk and sacrifice his life in
the battlefield and seeks glory, fame and recognition. The fifth stage is
the middle age. Jacques depicts this character as the portly judge. This is
the stage when a man is more grounded in life. He is no more impulsive
and the experiences in life makes him a mature and balanced person. He
is content with life which reflects in his attire, behaviour and
conversation. Speaking about the judge, Jacques pictures him as a man
'with a fine round stomach filled with the best meat of the capon' (which
he gets as a bribe), is wealthy, full of wise sayings, possesses a severe
look and has a well trimmed beard to suit his profession of a judge.
The sixth stage of life is the phase when a man starts to grow old.
He becomes physically weaker and his mind becomes duller with the
assault of time. He looks silly and funny with spectacles in his nose,
slippers on his feet and purse slinging on his side. He becomes frail and
thin. He wears an ill-fitting pair of trousers. The breeches which he had
worn in his youth preserved cheerfully for his old age don't fit him
anymore as they are too big for his thin legs. His manly voice has
become shrill and feeble like a child's voice. The seventh and the final
stage is when a man grows extremely old and senile. This last stage
depicts the final stage of man on earth. It brings an end to his presence
on earth and speeds up his journey towards his death. His acts on the
stage of the world slowly comes to a closure. Man loses his rational
power and becomes forgetful and helpless. He again slips back to the
infancy stage heavily dependent on other and Jacques calls this stage as
'second childishness'. He loses his teeth, his eye sight, his taste buds and
reaches a vegetative state. He is on the verge of losing everything-even
himself to the final call of death.
John Donne
Holy Sonnet X
Death be not proud, though some have called thee
Mighty and dreadful, for, thou art not so,
For, those, whom thou think'st, thou dost overthrow,
Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me.
From rest and sleep, which but thy pictures bee,
Much pleasure, then from thee, much more must flow,
And soonest our best men with thee doe go,
Rest of their bones, and souls delivery.
Thou art slave to Fate, Chance, kings, and desperate men,
And dost with poison, war, and sickness dwell,
And poppy, or charms can make us sleep as well,
And better then thy stroke; why swell'st thou then?
One short sleep past, wee wake eternally,
And death shall be no more; death, thou shalt die.
John Donne (1573-1631) is the pioneer of metaphysical school
of poetry. He uses paradoxes and fat-fetched similes (conceits) in his
poetry. Throughout his poems, there is a puzzle; he is never looking for
easy answers or final solutions to the mystery of love. His language is
colloquial. It is such wit that makes Donne so much difficult than the
other metaphysical poets.
Donne's Holy Sonnet X is the most famous example of his use of
paradoxical structure. Paradox is the main structural device of this poem.
A paradox is self-contradictory statement, though possibly well-founded
or essentially true. For example, Hamlet's sentence "I must be cruel only
to kind" is a paradox. The arguments proposed in favour of the
paradoxical statement that death is ultimately harmless are themselves
paradoxical. Sleep is an imitation of death, and is pleasant; therefore
death, the real thing, must be more pleasant. In a brilliant turn of
argument, Donne tells Death that it is not “mighty and dreadful” because
it is merely a functionary, a “slave to fate, chance, kings and desperate
men”. Anything which can be whistled for by so many despicable causes
is hardly to be respected. Its habitat is amongst “poison, war and
sickness”, a realm which no-one would want to rule. Death is brought
about by many agents such as poison, war and sickness. To settle the
argument, the poet says that death itself would face ultimate annihilation.
The opening line, “Death be not proud”, is an apostrophe or
address to an abstract figure. Death should not be boastful, although some
have called him mighty and dreadful, which he is not. Many people
whom death thinks he can overcome- and the poet includes himself- do
not truly die. Much pleasure is to be found in rest and sleep, which are
only images of death, and therefore much more must come from death
itself. Some of the very best men go soonest to death, and finds rest for
their bodies and deliverance for their souls.
Death is the slave of many kinds of weapons, from fate and
chance to war and sickness; opium or charms can produce even better
sleep. Why then should death be so proud? After one short sleep comes
eternal life, when there shall be no more death; death itself shall die.
She Dwelt among the Untrodden Ways
By William Wordsworth
She dwelt among the untrodden ways
Beside the springs of Dove,
A Maid whom there were none to praise
And very few to love:
A violet by a mossy stone
Half hidden from the eye!
—Fair as a star, when only one
Is shining in the sky.
She lived unknown, and few could know
When Lucy ceased to be;
But she is in her grave, and, oh,
The difference to me!
William Wordsworth (1770-1850) is by all accounts the greatest
romantic poet. He used to sit for hours and hours contemplating the
beauty of nature. To him, nature is great teacher of morals, a main source
of happiness and a fountain of religious feelings. All the visible forms of
nature—birds , trees, lakes etc. are forms of one great spirit, that is God.
Thus, Wordsworth is described as a pantheist : one who believes that God
and nature are one. This poem expresses forcibly the poet's shock that
such a simple person should have died. The poet's own mood is in perfect
harmony with his depiction.
The first stanza introduces the little girl to us. This girl used to live
among the natural surroundings away from people beside the springs of
water. No one saw her to praise her beauty and very few loved her.
In the second stanza the poet depicts the girl as a flower, a violet
and a star shining in the sky. Her beauty is unique because there is only
one star in the sky.
In the third stanza the poet moves on to deal with the grim reality.
The previous romantic surroundings are shattered by the fact that Lucy is
dead. She is in her grave, and the poet is so sad for her death.
The poet has used very beautiful images such as the metaphor in 'a
violet' in which he compares Lucy to a rare flower that grows in
wilderness. He has also used the simile in "Fair as a star when only one is
shining in the sky". Again this simile emphasizes the idea of being rare.
The dominant sound in the poem is the sound /d/ which is repeated
almost in every stanza: dwelt, untrodden, Dove, half-ridden, difference. It
is noticeable that most words expressing sadness are associated with this
sound: death, dumb, disaster etc…
We don't know which river Dove is meant in the second line. This
uncertainty suits the poem, for clearly Wordsworth chose the name for his
rhyme and for its symbol: it suggests that Lucy haunts the very sources of
peace. The plural 'springs', together with 'ways', makes one feel that Lucy
does not live in one place but is part of a landscape. The word untrodden
is associated with innocence. Thus the poet has succeeded in conveying
his feelings to us. He has used the diction that is suitable to the sad tone
of the poem.
I dwell in Possibility – (466)
By Emily Dickinson
I dwell in Possibility –
A fairer House than Prose –
More numerous of Windows –
Superior – for Doors –
Of Chambers as the Cedars –
Impregnable of eye –
And for an everlasting Roof
The Gambrels of the Sky –
Of Visitors – the fairest –
For Occupation – This –
The spreading wide my narrow Hands
To gather Paradise –
Emily Dickinson (1830-1886) is the major American poetess of
th
the 19 century. She was the daughter of a respectable family of Amherst,
a small town in Western Massachusetts. Emily Dickinson led a lonely
life. Her experience of life was very limited as she lived her life around
her birthplace. She used to dress in white at the end of her life. Death is
the main theme of Emily Dickinson's poetry. She always personifies
death as a king. Her poetry is different from traditional poetry. Instead of
titles, we have numbers. Her structure and spelling are sometimes wrong.
Miss Dickinson's poetry was not published until after her death because it
was rejected by critics as vulgar.
The speaker tells us that she lives in a house with lots of doors and
windows, which just so happens to be a way prettier house than "Prose."
So we assume this house is a metaphor for poetry.
The speaker goes on to describe her poetry-house with lots of
nature imagery. It's got trees for rooms and the sky for a roof. She ends
by telling us how awesome the visitors to the house (readers of her
poetry) are. Then she tells us that writing poems—or the life of the
mind—is the best way she knows to reach for the divine.
This poem is about Dickinson’s vocation as a poet, which she
compares favorably to prose, largely through the metaphor of the two as
houses. A Metaphor is a figure of speech which includes an implicit
comparison. It has only three elements: tenor, vehicle and aspect of
similarity. She sees poetry as open and limitless (“I dwell in Possibility”)
and more beautiful (“A fairer House than Prose”) than the more contained
and limited prose (“More numerous of Windows – / Superior – for
Doors”).
Poetry is also tied to nature, its rooms “as the Cedars,” and its roof
made up by the sky (“And for an Everlasting Roof / The Gambrels of the
Sky”). Those who visit, too—poetry’s readers—are also “the fairest,”
which can be taken to be the more beautiful, but also, the more careful in
their judgments. The final two lines show how poetry enables Dickinson
to grasp so much more than she otherwise could (“The spreading wide
my narrow Hands / To gather Paradise”).
“I dwell in Possibility –“ is deeply interested in the power gained
by a poet through their poetry. In the first stanza, the poem seems to just
be about poetry as a vocation as opposed to prose, and is explicit in
comparing the two. The metaphors and similes used make it so that
poetry is possibility, poetry is more beautiful, poetry has more doors and
windows open for access, for different perspectives and interpretations,
while prose by default, then, is more closed and limited and homely.
In the next two stanzas, however, the comparison between prose
and poetry is no longer mentioned; the poem’s perspective instead shifts
to focus solely on poetry. In the second stanza, the extended metaphor
changes slightly, so that we see that though poetry is a house, it is also a
garden and part of nature, in the guise of the sky-roof, completing it. This
sky-roof also again emphasizes poetry’s limitlessness, as there is no
upper boundary except the seemingly endless sky.
Poetry’s visitors, that is, the readers, are the fairest, both in beauty
and in judgment, and they are able to move easily in and out of this open,
welcoming house, with its numerous doors and windows. The mention of
the visitors is essential—poetry’s limitlessness is not just useful for the
poet for her own sake, for her own exploration, growth, and culture, but
for the sake of those who read the poetry. Both the poet and the reader are
equally welcome in this house, and the great number of possible
entrances and exits means that both poet and reader can choose to
interpret it in different ways.
The structure of the poem also reflects the freedom available in
poetry. Only two lines in the poem do not end with the dashes and thus
emphasize the empty space between lines—the windows of
interpretation. Additionally, although there is a rhyme scheme, Dickinson
only follows it loosely -- and thus helps to give the poem a foundation -but one that is not constrained by its rules.
The final three lines of the poem make the poet’s power clear. Her
“Occupation,” her task and her livelihood, is this wonderful task of
“spreading wide [her] narrow Hands / To gather Paradise –,“ both for
herself and others. Although Dickinson’s capitalization is famously
unpredictable, the capitalization of “Hands,” here, so close to “Paradise,”
gives the poet’s hands a limitless quality. This shows how the role of the
poet is a creator.
Additionally, the explicit imagery of her hands as “narrow,”
juxtaposed with their “wide” spreading under the guise of poetry, shows
that without the magic of poetry, the poet would have very little power or
effect. This is especially true for a female poet, like Dickinson, which is
emphasized in the fact that the whole poem uses house and garden as
metaphor for poetry, the traditional setting of a woman’s vocation -although here it is transformed into poetry.
I heard a Fly buzz - when I died - (591)
By Emily Dickinson
I heard a Fly buzz - when I died The Stillness in the Room
Was like the Stillness in the Air Between the Heaves of Storm The Eyes around - had wrung them dry And Breaths were gathering firm
For that last Onset - when the King
Be witnessed - in the Room I willed my Keepsakes - Signed away
What portion of me be
Assignable - and then it was
There interposed a Fly With Blue - uncertain - stumbling Buzz Between the light - and me And then the Windows failed - and then
I could not see to see –
The theme of this poem is death. But Emily Dickinson deals with
theme in a very strange manner. The very first line strikes us because it is
very strange: “I heard a Fly buzz - when I died -”. Death is, of course, a
very serious matter; but the poem does not deal with it seriously. The
mention of a fly buzz during one's death is, of course, funny. The poet
says that she heard a fly buzz when she died. That is why critics
disregarded such poems as too humorous to be serious.
The poet, then, describes the stillness that accompanies death.
There is stillness in the room. People are still; they are waiting for her to
die. It is a very special moment—the stillness of the people is
accompanied by the stillness of the atmosphere. Everybody has shed so
many tears that eyes become dry. They are holding their breath waiting
whether she will give the spirit or not. It is a moment of great agony. The
eyes of the people around her are waiting for her death.
The breaths of people are gathered for the last journey, the journey
of immortality. The word 'Onset' is capitalized because it refers to
immortality. People will witness the King, meaning death, in the room.
This is, of course, a personification in which death is likened to a king.
Everyone in the room is waiting for the king of death.
The person dying has written her will and has signed away on what
she can sign. In fact, she is very poor. She has signed on almost nothing.
In the middle of this very serious situation, a fly interfered: “and there it
was/There interposed a Fly”. The fly kept on buzzing by fits and starts.
The word 'blue' is very significant because it shows that the buzz was
restless. The fly has interfered between her and the light—immortality.
This is, of course, a metaphor. The moment of death disappeared and she
could not see to see, i.e. paradise or immortality. The first see refers to
sight, whereas the second refers to insight.
The sort of humor in this poem is black humor. The dashes in the
poem refers to emotional breaks. The fly which is a very insignificant
creature is a symbol of distraction. Many people are distracted from their
aims in life by insignificant things. The poem shows Miss Dickinson's
violation of correct structure as in “Signed away /What portion of me be
Assignable”.
The speaker says that she heard a fly buzz as she lay on her
deathbed. The room was as still as the air between “the Heaves” of a
storm. The eyes around her had cried themselves out, and the breaths
were firming themselves for “that last Onset,” the moment when,
metaphorically, “the King / Be witnessed—in the Room—.” The speaker
made a will and “Signed away / What portion of me be / Assignable—”
and at that moment, she heard the fly. It interposed itself “With blue—
uncertain stumbling Buzz—” between the speaker and the light; “the
Windows failed”; and then she died (“I could not see to see—”).
Form
“I heard a Fly buzz” employs all of Dickinson’s formal patterns:
trimeter and tetrameter iambic lines (four stresses in the first and third
lines of each stanza, three in the second and fourth, a pattern Dickinson
follows at her most formal); rhythmic insertion of the long dash to
interrupt the meter; and an ABCB rhyme scheme. Interestingly, all the
rhymes before the final stanza are half-rhymes (Room/Storm, firm/Room,
be/Fly), while only the rhyme in the final stanza is a full rhyme (me/see).
Dickinson uses this technique to build tension; a sense of true completion
comes only with the speaker’s death.
Commentary
One of Dickinson’s most famous poems, “I heard a Fly buzz”
strikingly describes the mental distraction posed by irrelevant details at
even the most crucial moments—even at the moment of death. The poem
then becomes even weirder and more macabre by transforming the tiny,
normally disregarded fly into the figure of death itself, as the fly’s wing
cuts the speaker off from the light until she cannot “see to see.” But the
fly does not grow in power or stature; its final severing act is performed
“With Blue—uncertain stumbling Buzz—.” This poem is also remarkable
for its detailed evocation of a deathbed scene—the dying person’s loved
ones steeling themselves for the end, the dying woman signing away in
her will “What portion of me be / Assignable” (a turn of phrase that
seems more Shakespearean than it does Dickinsonian).
his poem is another where the speaker is writing from beyond the
grave, and like “Because I could not stop for Death,” it is describing the
scene of the speaker’s death, although in a very different way. The poem
opens with a fly interrupting “The Stillness in the Room,” which,
however, is not a permanent peace, since it is “like the Stillness in the Air
--/Between the Heaves of Storm –.”
In the next stanza, we see that although the room is so quiet that the
speaker can hear a fly buzz, there are in fact many people there, waiting
for her death. They have all finished crying (“The Eyes around – had
wrung them dry –“) and are preparing for her final moments (“And
Breaths were gathering firm/For that last Onset”), when it is presumed
she will see God, who will lead her to the afterlife (“when the King/Be
witnessed – in the Room –“).
The speaker, as per the Victorian tradition of death bed scenes,
then wills away all of her material possessions (“I willed my Keepsakes –
Signed away/What portion of me be/Assignable”). A fly then interrupts
the scene, and its “uncertain stumbling buzz” distracts the speaker, gets
between her and “the light” of death, or more probably, what the speaker
hopes will follow death. The speaker then loses consciousness—“And
then the Windows failed – and then/I could not see to see –,” which ends
the poem, as we can imagine, with her death.
Analysis
Like many of her poems, “I heard a Fly buzz – when I died –“ has
a speaker who communicates to the reader from beyond the grave. This
poem, however, unlike “Because I could not stop for Death,“ is focused
not on what comes after death—eternity and the afterlife—but instead is
focused on the actual rites of dying, of having one’s last moments.
Indeed, this poem’s only dealings with the question of afterlife and
eternity come in the fact that the speaker is speaking from beyond the
grave, and in order to speak must have some kind of existence after death.
The clues that the death scene itself is the most important element
of the poem is clear for several reasons. First, the poem is entirely located
in a room—even in its metaphors, the perspective does not leave the
room, with the only exception being the imagined still air between “the
Heaves of Storm,” which is a generic enough image not to pull the reader
out of the bedroom. In addition, Dickinson repeats the phrase “in the
Room,” in the first and second stanzas, making sure the reader has not
wandered away from this setting.
Finally, the fly’s importance also emphasizes this focus on the
process of death. Were it the afterlife, faith, or the journey to eternity that
proved most important, the fly would be a minor character; but it is,
instead, the only significant character besides the speaker in the poem and
the character that best represents the poem’s climactic moment. Its
significance is so apparent that it comes between the speaker and “the
light" -- this small, very earthly bug thus supplants spirituality and the
afterlife.
This bug and its consequences ultimately represents the speaker’s
inability to hold on to spirituality, faith, or hope, in the face of death. The
speaker is participating in a common deathbed ritual of the time—people
would, as the end came near, will away their possessions, followed by a
kind of climax where they would announce the presence of God or of
some spirit ready to take them to the next life, before they died, and all of
this before an audience of their close friends and family.
Dickinson’s speaker succeeds in willing away her objects, but she
is distracted by the idea that not all of her is “assignable”—presumably,
this unassignable part being her spirit or soul. Just as she has this thought,
and thus is likely close to seeing “the light” and announcing that “the
King/Be witnessed – in the Room –,“ she is interrupted by the fly. This
fly, which reminds us of the most physical aspects of death, the rotting
and decomposition of the corpse, stands between the speaker and the
spiritual “light.” While physicality distracts the speaker from a final
revelation, however, the poem does not say that all hope should be lost,
for the speaker’s very ability to write this poem means that there is an
afterlife, after all.
I heard a Fly buzz- when I died (591)
By Emily Dickinson
The theme of this poem is death. But Emily Dickinson deals with
theme in a very strange manner. The very first line strikes us because it
is very strange: “I heard a Fly buzz - when I died -”. Death is, of course,
a very serious matter; but the poem does not deal with it seriously.
The poem strikingly describes the mental distraction posed by
irrelevant details at even the most crucial moments—even at the
moment of death. The poem then becomes even stranger and more
macabre by transforming the tiny, normally disregarded fly into the
figure of death itself, as the fly’s wing cuts the speaker off from the
light until she cannot “see to see.”
“I heard a Fly buzz” employs all of Dickinson’s formal patterns:
trimeter and tetrameter iambic lines (four stresses in the first and third
lines of each stanza, three in the second and fourth, a pattern
Dickinson follows at her most formal); rhythmic insertion of the long
dash to interrupt the meter; and an ABCB rhyme scheme. Interestingly,
all the rhymes before the final stanza are half-rhymes (Room/Storm,
firm/Room, be/Fly), while only the rhyme in the final stanza is a full
rhyme (me/see). Dickinson uses this technique to build tension; a
sense of true completion comes only with the speaker’s death.
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