POET
Henry Howard
1517 - 1547
Robert Southwell
1561 - 1595
William Shakespeare
1564 - 1616
John Donne
1572 - 1631
Robert Herrick
1591 – 1674
John Milton
1608 - 1674
Anne Bradstreet
1612 – 1672
Andrew Marvell
1621 – 1678
Jonathan Swift
1667 – 1745
William Blake
1757 – 1827
William Wordsworth
1770 – 1850
Samuel Coleridge
1772 – 1834
Thomas Love Peacock
1785 – 1866
Lord Byron
1788 – 1824
Percy Shelley
1792 – 1822
John Clare
1793 – 1864
John Keats
1795 – 1821
Elizabeth B Browning
1806 – 1861
Alfred Lord Tennyson
1809 – 1892
Emily Bronte
1818 – 1848
Arthur Hugh Clough
1819 – 1861
Emily Dickinson
1830 – 1886
Christina Rossetti
1830 – 1894
Thomas Hardy
1840 – 1928
Gerald Manley
Hopkins
1844 - 1889
Literary Period or
Movement
Renaissance
FORM
Renaissance
Ballad
Renaissance
(Elizabethan/Jacobean)
Renaissance
Metaphysical
Renaissance (Jacobean)
Cavalier
Renaissance
(Jacobean)
Colonial/Puritan (US)
Sonnet
Metaphysical
Quatrains/
couplets
Neoclassical
Elegy
Romantic
Ballad –
couplets
Romantic
Quatrains/
couplets
Romantic
Iambic
Tetrameter
Romantic
Ballad
Romantic
Lyric Poem
Romantic
Sonnet
Sonnet
Sonnet
Lyric Poem
“Carpe Diem”
Sonnet
Epistle
Romantic
Romantic
Iambic
Pentameter
Victorian
Rhyming
Stanzas
Victorian
Lyric Poem
Victorian
Victorian
Quatrains
Modernism (US)
Pre-Raphaelite
Victorian
Victorian
Sprung
rhythm
THEMES/
LINKS
PEERS
WJEC AS Language and Literature Anthology 2012 Summary
Renaissance
Tudor/Elizabethan/Jacobean
 Sonnet brought to this country by Wyatt and Surrey [octet/sestet/volta]
 Life revolved around the court of Henry VIII and later Elizabeth.
 Called the Renaissance – characterised by a rebirth of interest in the Classics
Sonnet Form
 fourteen-line lyric poem, traditionally written in iambic pentameter
 Two kinds of sonnets have been most common in English poetry – PETRACHAN and
SHAKESPEARIAN
 Petrarchan sonnet is divided into two main parts, called the octave and the sestet.
 The octave and the sestet are usually contrasted in some key way: for example, the
octave may ask a question to which the sestet offers an answer.
 Petrachan octet typically follows a rhyme scheme of ABBAABBA, or ABBACDDC and the
sestet (the remaining six lines) typically follow a rhyme scheme of CDCDCD, or CDECDE.
 Shakespearean sonnet is divided into four parts
 The first three parts are each four lines long, and are known as quatrains, rhymed ABAB;
the fourth part is called the couplet, and is rhymed CC.
 The Shakespearean sonnet is often used to develop a sequence of metaphors or ideas,
one in each quatrain, while the couplet offers either a summary or a new take on the
preceding images.
1. “Love that doth Reign and Live Within My Thought” - Henry Howard, Earl of
Surrey
Context – Son of Duke of Norfolk, career cut short – executed for treason aged 30yrs,
Content – Deals with themes -of love, death, confusion of love. It examines how love
chooses you, you can’t choose it. He talks about being in love with a woman who does not
return his feelings. Shows that LOVE and PAIN go together, it is 'sweet' to die for love.
Audience - Tudor/ Elizabethan, court, those unrequited in love
Purpose - to show his cleverness in translating the sonnet from Italian and to complain
about unrequited love.
Form - Shakespearean sonnet (14 lines, 10 syllable in each), Iambic pentameter,abab cdcd
efef gg rhyme scheme. Clear use of enjambement
Lexis/imagery –
 abstract nouns show juxtaposition (love/pain),
 Latinate words and lexis of battle [arms, captive coward],
 personification {Love},
 image of dress as in putting on armour for a fight,
 archaisms [eke, taketh,]
 paradox ‘Sweet is the death’ –pun on ‘death’.
Grammar - 4 declarative sentences. Discourse markers show logic and, but, and, for, yet.
Older forms of verbs - doth, taketh.
Phonology – alliteration [look for t, b, c, p]
2. “New Prince, New Pomp” – Robert Southwell
Context - Catholic martyr
Content - The poem is about the birth of Jesus and how one should worship him even
though he is just a normal baby born in a stable and does not appear powerful. (Use of
rhyme suggests it may be a carol)
Audience - It would be written to spread the Biblical story through song. They would also
have been Christian as this was the predominant religion of the times.
Purpose - To praise Jesus, to entertain, to educate others about the stories of the Bible
Form - ballad – actually a carol still sung at Christmas. Instruction[uses imperatives to tell
us what to do until we approach the baby in the last verse.
Lexis/imagery –
 archaisms[seely, wight],
 juxtaposes humble imagery of poverty with images of riches [pearl, court],
 Biblical imagery and references,
Grammar - imperative voice giving instruction, exclamatory at times for emphasis, Each
verse is a complete sentence and a complete thought.
Phonology - uses rhyme abcb – uses plosives [p] in v. 5 for emphasis and in last verse open
vowels of assonance for acceptance.
3. "Sonnet CXXX – Shakespeare
Context – Part of a series of sonnets dedicated to “The Dark Lady”. This goes against
traditional ideas of Courtly Love prevalent at the time and instead describes the woman in
question in terms of what she isn’t. Shakespeare rejects the usual exaggerations of love
poetry (false compare) in order to describe her in a more truthful and modest description.
Content – Shakespeare opens with a bold statement that the eyes of his beloved lady are
not like the sun and continues in this way to understate her attractions or present them
honestly. Having acknowledged all of her imperfections or limitations, the poet swears that
his beloved is, nonetheless, as special as any woman "belied" (misrepresented) by "false
compare" (untrue or lying comparisons).
Audience – An audience interested in Literature, Elizabethan court, middle classes who
would have been able to read.
Purpose - To entertain, to engage audience to think about love and the honesty of
relationships compared to the falsity of courtly descriptions.
Form – Shakespearean sonnet – 3 quatrains plus a rhyming couplet to end.
Lexis/imagery: Poem uses metaphors of winter and the twilight, archaic language evident
(doth, thou), lexical sets of fire (glowing, ashes, fire) and death (sunset, cold,ashes,
expire).Personification of death.
Grammar: three declarative sentences – complex as he points out his insight. Discourse
markers show the argument [That, When, upon. As ]etc. Use of list as in L.2 for emphasis.
Phonology: use of alliteration
4. Sonnet “Batter My Heart” – John Donne
Context – one of the most famous metaphysical poets, a group of writers who wrote in the
early 17th Century and whose work was characterised in style as being highly intellectual
and philosophical with intensive use of ingenious conceits and turns of wit. Their poetry was
concerned with abstract thoughts and subjects such as existence, truth and the role of
God.
Content –‘Batter My Heart’ was written after Donne was asked to be an Anglican priest,
the poem expresses his inner desperation and mental turmoil, Donne wants to let God into
his life yet feels he is too weak, he is asking God to push himself in and the poem contains
many violent images. The poem was shocking for its time and still has the power to shock as
the four stanzas chart the struggle Donne undergoes.
Audience – Plausible that he could have read them to an audience of friends hence the
shocking quality, not likely to have been read in a sermon due to controversial nature of
ideas.
Purpose – This poem is an appeal to God, pleading with Him not for mercy or clemency or
benevolent aid but for a violent, almost brutal overmastering.
Form – This simple sonnet follows an ABBAABBACDDCEE rhyme scheme and is written in a
loose iambic pentameter. In its structural division, it is a Petrarchan sonnet rather than a
Shakespearean one, with an octet followed by a sestet.
Lexis/imagery – A lexical set of violence is prevalent throughout the poem. The poem’s
metaphors (the speaker’s heart as a captured town, the speaker as a maiden betrothed to
God’s enemy) work with its extraordinary series of violent and powerful verbs (batter,
o’erthrow, bend, break, blow, burn, divorce, untie, break, take, imprison, enthrall, ravish)
create the image of God as an overwhelming, violent conqueror. The bizarre nature of the
speaker’s plea reaches a climax in the paradoxical final couplet, in which the speaker claims
that only if God takes him prisoner can he be free, and only if God ravishes him can he be
chaste.
Grammar – Imperative voice used to order God to punish him, the use of the first person
possessive pronoun ‘my’ centres the poem on Donne making it a personal appeal and a
personal struggle with the issue of his faith, the enjambement used makes the opening
sentence complex which is indicative of the complex nature of the argument. Syndetic and
asyndetic listing show the strength of his feelings, here he is referring to god as a
carpenter as he entreats him to ‘mend’ him.
Phonology – the alliterative plosives and tripling used in ‘breake, blowe, burn’ show the
harshness of Donne’s feelings.
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Cavalier Poets
Cavalier poets is a broad description of a school of English poets of the 17th century,
who came from the classes that supported King Charles I during the English Civil War.
Much of their poetry is light in style, and generally secular in subject.
Most of the Cavalier poets were courtiers, with notable exceptions. For example,
Robert Herrick was not a courtier, but his style marks him as a Cavalier poet.
The Cavaliers preferred more straightforward expression than the Metaphysical Poets.
They valued elegance, and were part of a refined, courtly culture, but their poetry is
often frankly erotic. Their strength was the short lyric poem, and a favourite theme
was carpe diem, "seize the day."
5. “To Virgins to Make Much of Time” - Robert Herrick
Context – The Roman poet Horace (65-8 BC) popularized the term carpe diem, it gained
widespread currency as a term for categorizing any literary work whose primary purpose
was to persuade readers to make the most of the here and now. Herrick’s poem was
published in 1648. Herrick is generally considered the greatest of the Cavalier poets. He
was ordained into the church sometime before 1627.
Content – a lyric poem ( a genre of poetry that expresses personal and emotional feelings)
that promotes carpe diem, the idea of living life to the fullest
Audience – educated middle classes – clearly aimed at a female audience trying to
encourage them to make the most of their lives.
Purpose – urges young unmarried woman to hurry up and get married before they become
old hags.
Form – Lyric poem - and most of the line are in iambic tetrameter and in iambic trimeter,
four stanzas, ABAB rhyme scheme.
Lexis/imagery – personifies the sun, time and flowers, uses metaphors such as calling the
sun a lamp, lexis of religion, lexical set of nature to reflect fragility of life and the passing
of time.
Grammar – imperative voice to start – ordering women to gather rosebuds, direct address
“ye” talking to his readers.
Phonology – masculine and feminine rhymes, alliteration,



Epic Poetry and the mock heroic
John MILTON’s (1608 – 1674) Paradise Lost is considered an epic poem and is
influenced by writing in the Bible as well as Greek writers such as Homer. As a younger
poet
Anne BRADSTREET (1612 – 1672) wrote five quaternions,epic poems of four parts each
which explore the diverse yet complementary natures of their subject.
Andrew MARVELL (1621 – 1678) Mower against Gardens, first appeared in the
Miscellaneous Poems of Marvell, which were published posthumously. .
6. “Sonnet XIX: On His Blindness” - John Milton
Context – son of a prosperous Puritan family, involved in many of the religious and political
controversies of his day, most known for “Paradise Lost” which set out to “justify the ways
of God to man.”
Content –a deeply personal poem, which gently guides himself and the reader from an
intense loss through to understanding and gain. The main themes of this poem are Milton's
exploration of his feeling, fears and doubts regarding his failed sight, his rationalisation of
this fear by seeking solutions in his faith.
Audience - This was written at a time when the Church was very influential and everyone
had to attend Church services. The society at the time was God-fearing. The audience of
Milton’s epic is therefore almost universal - it appeals to all humanity to understand and
learn from the mistakes of the first man and woman.
Purpose - Milton believed that God had singled him out for the task of writing Paradise
Lost (his epic poem) and spreading the word of God was his motivation.
Form – a Petrarchan sonnet (see notes above), with iambic pentameter
Lexis/imagery - contrasting darkness and light, `my light is spent' and spending half of his
life `in this dark world and wide', using alliteration and contrast to give understanding to
his affliction, a biblical reference to the parable of the `Talents', personifies Patience to
give guidance and encouragement.
Grammar – paste tense to reflect his contemplation, pre-modifiers to emphasise his
turmoil, compound sentences to show complexity of his argument, lots of enjambment to
reflect continuing thoughts.
Phonology – alliteration to create a sense of emphasis on certain phrases “Patience to
prevent”, best Bear”, “day-labour, light denied”
7. To My Dear And Loving Husband - Anne Bradstreet
Context - Anne Bradstreet was a devoted wife and mother (She had eight children!). In
1647, Anne Bradstreet's brother- in- law, took some of her poetry to England where he
had it published (possibly without her knowledge/permission). She is considered a great
poet because readers enjoy her subjects and how they are treated. Another reason why
she is considered a great poet is because women poets in the 1600's are rare. Her poems
are written primarily for herself, her family, and her friends, many of whom were very well
educated.
Content – one of two Bradstreet poems on this subject, she addresses her husband by a
series of metaphors, the main one being the sun.
Audience – Women, the general public, her brother in law
Purpose – to explore the strength of her feelings for her husband, to show how love works
in a close, loving relationship.
Form – She must have been familiar with the classical epistle, or verse letter, which
English poets had begun imitating in the sixteenth century. Uses rhyming couplets in
iambic pentameter throughout.
Lexis/imagery – series of metaphors, use of paradox – “if ever two were one then surely
we.” Similes and hyperbole is also used – “all the riches the East could hold”. The archaic
verb "persever" imports the idea of abiding continuity transcending death. In addition it
repeats the key term "ever," used in each of the poem's thee opening lines as well as the
concluding line. Lexical set of religion.
Grammar – declarative mood, first person narrative voice talking directly to her husband,
caesuras in the lines to allow for consideration of the ideas.
Phonology – some alliteration and assonance.
8. The Mower Against Gardens - Andrew Marvell
Content - "The Mower Against Gardens" is the first of the "Mower" sequence, an attack on
the sophistications of human invention and a praise of Nature. The poem's disgust with the
freaks produced by science is balanced with the praise of Nature's "wild and fragrant
innocence". A supporter of Cromwell. "The Mower Against Gardens" is one of several poems
that Marvell wrote using the persona of Damon the Mower, a rural type even more rustic
than the conventional shepherds of the pastoral mode. The mower is one with nature; he
doesn't use fertilizers or plows, he doesn't graft plants to make hybrids, he doesn't use
the arts of horticulture or agricultural husbandry. Instead, he's like the gatherer half of a
hunter/gatherer tribe: he mows, with his scythe, the green grasses which nature provides;
he makes his living taking what Nature in its pure form has to offer. Here, he describes
other ways of life in very disapproving terms.
Audience - General public at the time but was written as an attack on science. Follows
traditional style of the metaphysical period.
Purpose – To make audience aware of the power and beauty of nature and wary of changing
things through science.
Structure - The poem is written in rhyming couplets where the first line sets up a
statement and the second undercuts or extends the thought. Uses discourse markers [and
yet, that, but]
Lexis/imagery - Lexis of nature/plants (fields, plants, roses, tulip, onion). Pre-modifiers
(Luxurious, luscious) to mock mankind for not appreciating Earth's natural beauty. Classical
and exotic imagery. Sexual imagery [seraglio[harem] eunuch, sex] Personification of
Nature.
Grammar - Complex declaratives. Use of iconic Proper nouns [Marvel of Peru] . syntax =
‘Man the sovereign thing and proud’ for emphasis and rhyme.Elision ‘tis for rhthm and
naturalness.
Phonology - fricatives {f} ‘and from the fields the flowers’

The Augustans and the Age of Reason
So-called because it was said to mirror the reign of Augustus in ancient times. As a
writing form it is centred mostly around London and urban life but drawing upon
classical Literature as inspiration and model.
9. A Satirical Elegy On The Death Of A Late Famous General - Jonathan Swift
Context –wrote satires in verse and prose. He is best-known for the extended prose work
‘Gulliver's Travels’, in which a fantastic account of a series of travels is the vehicle for
satirising familiar English institutions, such as religion, politics and law.
Content – written in 1722 upon the death of the English general John Churchill, the Duke
of Marlborough. The poem was first published formally in 1765. Churchill, the duke
disparaged in the poem, had a checkered diplomatic and military career. Thus, he became
the object of an unsympathetic satirical elegy by Swift, who was one of his leading political
enemies.
Audience - The poem is written as a satirical verse. This suggests it is aimed at higher
classes as satires are often politically based, sarcastic and contain disguised humour.
Newspaper ‘The Tatler’ published it – read in coffee houses.
Purpose - One of the purposes of this poem is to entertain. Satire is a form of humour
but this humour is often disguised and highlighting a bigger issue. Therefore another
purpose of satires is to provoke change.
Form – Satire. Rhyming couplets throughout to add to feeling of mockery – masculine
rhyme. Iambic tetrameter – rigid structure.
Lexis/imagery – Lexical set of religion – “the last trump” Use of metaphor to compare
candle to his life – burnt out and extinguished.
Grammar – Use of exclamatives to show the tone – sarcastic! Uses caesuras to emphasis
the disbelief and lack of emotion “well, since he’s gone…” Connectives “and” to show how
terrible his actions were. Rhetorical questions to indicate surprise and to make the reader
consider how much the General has done.
Phonology – iambic tetrameter and rhyme.
AGE OF ROMANTICISM
From Blake – Keats.
Romanticism was a movement in the nineteenth century characterised by;
 An interest in emotions particularly love
 Interest in form particularly traditional ones such as ballads
 Love of nature particularly wild scenes
 Political radicalism
 Interest in dream, nightmare, gothic, ruins
 Concern with transience
Language of Romanticism
Romantics wanted to ‘bring poetry back to the language of ordinary men’ as Wordsworth
said. However, they are also keen to be as descriptive and sensual as possible especially
when expressing emotion or developing gothic landscapes. Romantic art is:
 Rich in vocabulary using archaisms, coinages, compound words, much premodification
 Rich in figures of speech – similes, metaphor, personification etc
 Thought is complex and expressed through language of argument and logic as well
as expressing extremes of emotion through symbolism, pathetic fallacy, and natural
imagery.
10. The Tyger –William Blake (1757 – 1827)
Context - Blake did not attend school as a young child. He was allowed to wander freely in
the city and the surrounding countryside. As a child, he began to have the visions that he
would later use in his illustrations. His parents discouraged him from speaking about his
visions of angels in trees or God's face at the window, believing he was lying. In his
lifetime, Blake was primarily known as an artist rather than as a poet. His illuminated texts
were self-published and only had a very limited range of readership.
Content - Blake was a forerunner of Romanticism, an engraver and painter. This poem
comes from his book ‘Songs of Innocence and Experience’. This is from ‘Experience’ the
parallel poem is ‘The Lamb’ Tigers were exotic creatures for the time and the tiger is a
polysemic image.
Audience - intellectuals, middle classes, children, followers of his work.
Purpose - to entertain but mainly to inform people (especially his supporters) of his views
against the establishment which he believes corrupts people.
Form - ballad written in rhyming couplets. First and last verses almost the same – key
words changed to show development of the poem.
Lexis/imagery - Tiger as a symbol of God's power in creation. The tiger as seen by Blake's
poetic imagination: "fearful symmetry"; "burning …bright...fire" contrasted with "hammer,
chain. .furnace...anvil". Repeated (rhetorical) questions; contrast with meekness of The
Lamb; Tyger is addressed directly; lexical set of fire and industrial process. semantic field
of the forge, artist/god as maker/creator. Use of archaisms ‘thee’ and ‘thy’. symbolism of
tiger, extended metaphor of the forge, use of fire image, darkness/light binary opposition.
Grammar – use of interrogatives, premodifiers ‘burning’ use of exclamation and questions.
Questions rhetorical to express wonder and to include the reader in thinking.
Interrogative style challenges the reader to think. Use of capitals shows links with God
.Use of adjectives to show frightening nature of the tiger ‘dread’, ‘deadly’ etc. elision
‘water’d’ in order to fit rhythm.
Phonology - Alliteration (burning bright, frame thy fearful, distant deeps). Uses 'Lamb' as
a symbol of God/innocence.
11.I Wandered Lonely As A Cloud - William Wordsworth
Context – Wordsworth grew up in a rustic society, and spent a great deal of his time
playing outdoors, in what he would later remember as a pure communion with nature. In the
early 1790s William lived for a time in France, then in the grip of the violent Revolution;
Wordsworth’s philosophical sympathies lay with the revolutionaries, but his loyalties lay
with England. Wordsworth’s poems initiated the Romantic era by emphasizing feeling,
instinct, and pleasure above formality and mannerism.
Content – This simple poem revisits the familiar subjects of nature and memory, with a
particularly (simple) spare, musical eloquence. The plot is extremely simple, depicting the
poet’s wandering and his discovery of a field of daffodils by a lake, the memory of which
pleases him and comforts him when he is lonely, bored, or restless.
Audience – anyone who wanted to read his works. He set out to welcome all forms of
readership and chose to write in very plain English. His writing was a movement away from
those of his peers, who wrote specifically for educated aristocrats and the intellectual
elites who were, at this time, the major consumers of poetry. Instead he wrote for the
average Englishman.
Purpose – perfectly actualises the emotional virtue of Romantic poetry itself - implies an
inherent unity between man and nature, making it one of Wordsworth’s most basic and
effective methods for instilling in the reader the feeling the poet so often describes
himself as experiencing.
Form – The four six-line stanzas of this poem follow a quatrain-couplet rhyme scheme:
ABABCC. Each line is metered in iambic tetrameter.
Lexis/imagery – metaphorically compares the speaker to a cloud and personifies the
daffodils as graceful dancers,
Grammar – declarative sentences to share the details that he sees,
Phonology – sibilance used throughout to create a sense of peace – doesn’t jar when read
aloud.
12. Kubla Khan - Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Context – Coleridge was a friend of Wordsworth’s. Kubla Khan remained unfinished
because of the man from Porlock – a visitor who interrupted the moment of inspiration.
Coleridge is associated with drug taking, specifically opium but he had a great mind
influenced by German philosophy.
Content – The title is exotic, mysterious, designed to create a feeling of unknown, the
poet tries to create a mythical landscape of the imagination
Audience – Coleridge’s poetry is more complicated and complex than Wordsworth’s
although he was published in the same book “Lyrical Ballads” so they would have had a
similar readership.
Purpose - In a way it’s a metaphor for the way that Man tries to control Nature. A manmade paradise is annihilated and replaced with a “true” form of Nature in the form of a
“pleasure-dome with caves of ice!”
Form - Narrative prose using iambic tetrameter with staggered irregular rhyming couplets
– perhaps representing the way that Nature itself is irregular and ever-changing. When
read aloud there’s a chant-like rhythm with complex grammar and fluent trains of thought
enhanced with a complex rhyme scheme of abaab. etc. a sensuous evocation of a mythical,
dreamlike place. A description.
Grammar - use of prepositions for location. Complex sentences packed with description
and pre-modification and qualification. Use of colon and semicolon in order to make
sentences. Use of exclamation. Inversion of syntax e.g. ‘ceaseless turmoil seething’
Lexis/imagery - : use of compound words. Dark/light binaries, archaisms e.g. athwart.
Elision - ‘mid, natural imagery. Paradox as in last line. Gothic imagery e.g. ‘demon-lover’
alliteration ‘meandering with mazy motions. Mazy sounds like a coinage. Personification
suggested by simile ‘as if…breathing.’
Phonology – alliteration to emphasise enormity of Nature – “measureless to man” and
“sunless sea.”
13. The War Song of Dinas Vawr – Thomas Love Peacock (1785 – 1866)
Context - Poem appears within the comic novel 'The Misfortune of Elphin'. Thomas Love
Peacock (1785-1866) was a friend of Shelley the poet. Married a welsh woman who Shelley
called ‘the milk-white antelope of Snowden’.
Content –The title with anglicised spelling of a fortress of bogus history invented by the
poet in the comic novel The Misfortunes of Elphin (1829). A poem within the novel, ‘The
War-Song of Dinas Vawr’, portrays the delight of Welshmen in stealing sheep; later set to
music it has almost the status of a folksong. Although Peacock does not posit a Welsh
original, it should be dinas fawr (mawr) [big fort].
Audience - Welsh community[on Nationalist web-site], male audience as it is a war chant.
Purpose - It is a Welsh Gothic war chant about stealing cattle and land – meant to
entertain – not a serious poem.
Form - Written in ballad form with abab rhyme scheme
Lexis/imagery - violent lexis (quell'd, kill'd, fierce, struggle, conquer] Feudal landscape.
Welsh iconography.
Grammar - Welsh place name 'Dyfed' (proper noun) used, superlative 'richest'
Phonology – pounding rhythm like a chant
14.SHE Walks in Beauty – Lord Byron (1788 – 1824)
Context - Written in 1814, when Byron was twenty-six years old, was inspired by his young
cousin by marriage, Anne Wilmot. ‘mad, bad and dangerous to know’. This lyrical poem
captures a portrait of purity
Content - description of a lady who is shown as being of central importance by capitalizing
the pronoun ‘SHE’. The poem deals with duality and aims to explore both sides of her
character. Being a Romantic description it is also a profound and realistic one.
Audience – typical of Romantic era, audiences at the time would like the dualism. Still
enjoyed by audiences today as it provides an account of love.
Purpose – to entertain, to show the qualities of women and duality of human nature.
Lexis/imagery - Uses dualism to enrich the poem (dark\bright, mellow’d/innocent,
mind/heart ) gives us the idea that the lady is a mixture of qualities such as light and
darkness, good and evil. This is not an archetypical description that gives only a positive
and idealized point of view. The poet describes a beauty of “shade” and “ray”, giving us
again the impression that she is not only positive. Lexical sets – Physical description (face,
cheek, brow, smiles, eyes) and internal description: (thought, grace, tender, peace, love,
calm) This shows the contrast between two realities, mind and heart, experience and
innocence, the physical and the psychological worlds. Themes = passing time (transience)
and aquisition of experience.
Form - Serious tone shown through strict structure : 8 syllables, ababab rhyme scheme of
lyrical poem.
Grammar – Declarative mood, complex sentences using enjambment to create the
description of his “love”.
Phonology – alliteration occurs frequently to enhance the appeal of the poem to the ear.
The most obvious examples of this figure of speech include the line “cloudless climes;
starry skies”.
15.Ozymandias - Percy Bysshe Shelley
Context - Shelley.born into aristocracy but rejected title. Husband of Mary – author of
“Frankenstein” and friend of Lord Byron.
Content – the title is another name for Ramses 11, who is mentioned in Exodus, Exotic
name. The poem is a traveller’s tale re-told by Shelley which shows man’s need to leave a
mark – it is the artist not the king who does so but eternity sweeps all before it.
Audience – Probably the most famous of Shelley’s poems and therefore widely read and
studied.
Purpose - Ozymandias is first and foremost a metaphor for the ephemeral nature of
political power, and in that sense the poem is Shelley’s most outstanding political sonnet,
Form - sonnet. Petrarchan. Form of a story about a journey with a message from the past
ending the poem.
Grammar - personal address. Inverted syntax ‘’sculptor well those passions read’ Use of
speech marks to denote inscription. Exclamation used or words of the pedestal. Imperative
coming from beyond the grave. Three sentences, the first extremely complex followed by a
simple dramatic, ‘Nothing beside remains’ and ending with a much pre-modified sentence.
Lexis/imagery - Latinate ‘trunkless.’ antique,’ pedestal’ rather abstract vocabulary. Premodification piles up details e.g. lone and level, half-sunk, shattered. Sands of time image,
imagery of ruins and wild places. Contrast between anonymous artist and sneering king
Phonology – alliteration – “cold command” to highlight the emotions of the king.
16.First Love - John Clare
Context – Clare is ranked with the foremost English nature poets. While some
commentators define Clare's importance with reference to the tradition of eighteenthcentury descriptive verse, others emphasize the Romantic qualities of his poetry. His
mental health was unstable and he spent the last years of his life in an asylum.
Content – Explores the experience of “first love” which Clare describes as changing the
way he saw the world.
Audience – Had some publishing success during his lifetime.
Purpose – To try and explore how it feels to be in love and to capture the experience.
Form – Quatrains and rhyming couplets throughout
Lexis/imagery – Lexical set of Nature to show how love is a natural experience. Narrative
poem with enjambed lines to create a sense of sharing details. Possessive pronouns used to
show that it is a personal experience.
Grammar - First person narrative voice. Juxtaposes ideas to show how contradictory love
can be.
Phonology – Sibilant sounds to create a lyrical, gentle sound.
17. To Autumn - John Keats
Context - Keats wrote some of the most beautiful and enduring poems in the English
language. Among his greatest achievements is his sequence of six lyric odes, written
between March and September 1819—astonishingly, when Keats was only twenty-four years
old. Keats’s poetic achievement is made all the more miraculous by the age at which it
ended: He died barely a year after finishing the ode “To Autumn,” in February 1821.
Keats wrote a series of Odes. He died young.
Content - Title: the season is used as symbolic of time passing to show transience. It is
part of a series of poems in which Keats philosophised about life and explored the senses.
‘O for a life of sensation rather than of thought.’
Audience –
Purpose – To explore the different aspects of the season. 1st Verse deals with the
plentiful harvest. 2nd Verse gives vivid iconic pictures of autumn and the 3rd verse, sees
autumn as a threshold time between seasons and symbolic of the coming of death.
Form – Ode - a three-stanza structure with a variable rhyme scheme. Each stanza is eleven
lines long and each is metered in a relatively precise iambic pentameter.
Grammar - Starts with exclamation. Second sentence complex using semi-colons to build
detail. Uses rhetorical questions to involve the audience. Use of elision. Much qualification,
pre and post-modification as details are piled on details. Piling of verbs in v1. Adjectives in
all verses.
Lexis - semantic field of nature and harvest, assonance of v1. onomatopoeia of v.3.
Circumlocution of full-grown lambs for sheep. Compound words. use of puns e.g. maturing
[adjective/verb] symbols e.g. swallows\twitter, indexical signs of autumn.
Phonology Victorians
Victorian poetry
 Often deals with mythology and narrative as a retreat from industrialisation
 Challenged in the latter years by Darwinism


Growth of atheism
Rise of women writers
18. A Musical Instrument – Elizabeth Barrett Browning
Context - An invalid through her childhood who turned to books and eloped with the poet
Robert Browning. Extremely popular – nearly became Poet laureate [no woman has before or
since until Duffy] but Tennyson given the role.
Content - Her poem deals with the business of being a poet. Pan stands for the ‘id’ –
creative urges bringing chaos and order in equal measure. She uses the story of Pan to
show the dual nature of art. She shows that while art is beautiful it also is destructive.
Audience – Wide audience. Showing the male establishment that a woman can write a
learned and intricate verse. Female role model. First published in ‘The Cornhill Magazine’.
Purpose – to examine the power and sometimes destructiveness of art and the artist. The
power of the ‘id’ – the instinctive part of us in which creativity is born.
Form - This poem is made up of five stanzas, with six lines each. The first line of each
stanza has nine syllables and ends with the word "pan". The second and last line of each
stanza ends with the word "river". The third line of each stanza ends with a word that
rhymes with "pan". The fourth and fifth lines rhyme with each other, but the rhymes are
different in each stanza
Lexis/imagery -classical imagery using Pan making a reed pipe as symbolic of art.
Browning uses lexical set of water “deep” and “cool” to emphasize that the place the reed
was coming from was safe and calm. In line nine Browning uses an oxymoron “the limpid
waters turbidly” to reinforce that the art has a beautiful part and a destructive part,
which are also contradictory. Active verbs like “hacked” and “hewed” to emphasize the
destruction.
Grammar - Syntax of lines changed to make them end with river and Pan. The repetition in
the poem puts emphasis on "the great god pan" and on "the river", creating an image that
builds through the poem. Uses declarative mood with interrogatives.
Phonology - alliteration, rhyme, use of sound effects.
19.Break,Break, Break - Alfred Lord Tennyson
Context – many critics consider Tennyson to be the greatest poet of the Victorian Age;
and he stands as one of the major innovators of lyric and metrical form. In 1884, the
Royals granted Tennyson a baronetcy; he was now known as Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
Content – a lyric poem that was believed to have been completed in 1834. It centres on
Tennyson's grief over the death of his best friend, Arthur Hallam, a fellow poet.
Audience –
Purpose – To explore the depths of grief and to commemorate the loss of a friend.
Form – Lyrical poetry presents the deep feelings and emotions of the poet as opposed to
poetry that tells a story or presents a witty observation. A lyric poem often has a pleasing
musical quality. The word lyric derives from the Greek word for lyre, a stringed instrument
in use since ancient times.
Lexis/imagery - Tennyson's friend, Arthur Hallam, was only 22 when he died. The shock of
Hallam's death impressed upon Tennyson how priceless youth is. To underscore this idea,
and to express the agony he suffers at the loss of young Hallam, Tennyson presents images
of youthful joy: the fisherman's son playing with his sister and the "sailor lad" singing in
the bay. Personification and metaphor also occur in Lines 1 and 2, for the poet regards the
sea as a human being. Paradox used in the “touch of a vanished hand” and “sound of a voice
that is still” to emphasise the sense of loss.
Grammar Phonology - Alliteration (Line 8): boat on the bay
20.Spellbound - Emily Brontë
Context – Livied most of her brief life in the morally circumspect atmosphere of her
father’s parsonage in Haworth, Yorkshire. Wrote “Wuthering Heights” and created a world
rife with tempestuous, passionate, vengeful characters. Although she has generally been
depicted as a recluse, she was, in fact, exposed to a cross-section of society through her
father’s congregation and their very diverse life experiences.
Content – The setting of Emily Bronte's poem “Spellbound” is the Yorkshire Moors in
England, the same setting as for her novel “Wuthering Heights.” The speaker is there on a
cold winter's night, and the atmosphere is very bleak. Emily Bronte wrote the poem in
1837, at the age of nineteen. She and her sisters, Charlotte and Ann, had imagined a world
that they called Gondal. In Gondal, the heroes and heroines they wrote about found
themselves in romantic and sometimes tragic circumstances.
Purpose – To explore a feeling of entrapment. Possibly linked to her feelings about being
trapped in her life and not being able to escape.
Form – 3 stanzas with rhyming couplets. Parallel last lines which change slightly
throughout.
Lexis/imagery – Lexical sets of Nature and the power of Nature to destroy or bend you to
it’s shape – is she weighed down like the trees?? Is it metaphorical? Binary oppositions of
heaven and hell “clouds above…wastes below…” – cannot make up her mind what she thinks
and believes. Lots of negative pre-modification which creates a negative and trapped feel.
Grammar – Modal verb – will not – shows the change in her decision making – she has
decided at the end – it is her choice. Lots of repetition and parallelism to show the
monotony of the life.
Phonology – Alliteration – bare boughs – assonance – coldly blows – “o” sounds to represent
the wind?
21. There Is No God, The Wicked Sayeth - Arthur Hugh Clough
Context - He shows the religious crisis experienced by many people living in England in the
mid-Victorian period. epitomized in his life and poetry the religious crisis experienced by
many Englishmen of the mid-Victorian period. Often humorous, light verse. "And almost
everyone when age, disease, or sorrows strike him, inclines to think there is a God, or
something very like him."
Content - This poem is about the fact that many Englishmen of his time were going
through a religious crisis, even Clough had trouble keeping his beliefs.
Audience - General public at the time (those who were literate!). Strong message to the
establishment that they were lving in uncertain times. Gives a list of those who still believe
in religion in a scornful manner.
Purpose - He seems to be showing us the crisis on religion for the people of England in his
era, also showing his hidden doubts on his views on religion. Ironic and superior tone.
Form - Composed of eight quatrains and is quite formal. Overall the tone of the poem is
melancholic as the poem is shadowed with doubt. Alternate rhyme.
Lexis/imagery- Archaic lexis (saith, t'were). 'There is no God' is repeated to emphasise
and clarify his point. Sound and rhythmn adds to the mocking tone. Lists sections of the
community (youngster, baby, tradesman, rich man, country folks, parson) to show that the
message is for everyone – everyone is affected.
Grammar - use of speech marks, declarative voice, discourse markers. Ellipsis ‘‘twere’ still
uses capital for Him.
Phonology - Alliterations is used (mean-man, mostly-married, sorrows-strike perhaps to
show his verhment opinion.
22.Dying – Emily Dickinson
Context - Wrote at a time when women often disguised their gender to be taken seriously
e.g. Bronte’s’ and sometimes refers to herself as a boy. Restricted world of 19th Century
Puritan America was her world however, she is wider read than most women because of her
father’s role and influence.
Content - Talks about death (referencing flies as a symbol of death. One of Dickinson's
most famous poems - had no title only a number.Describes the mental distraction posed by
irrelevant details at even the most crucial moments--even at the moment of death.
Audience - Formal language, probably for more educated; those with a perception of their
own mortality? Never published in lifetime.
Purpose - Show her perception of death, allows reader to question the event – how could
she hear the fly if she is dead?
Form - 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).
Lexis/imagery - Image of death it presents is horrifying, even gruesome. Central image is
the fly. It makes a literal appearance in three of the four stanzas and is what the speaker
experiences in dying. The speaker's tone is calm, even flat; her narrative is concise and
factual. The window image = death?. ‘I could not see to see’ like a riddle. Oxymoron in
“last onset” - the end of the beginning – Christians believe that your life begins in Heaven.
Grammar - each verse a complete complex declarative.
Phonology - onomatopoeia of ‘buzz’, half-rhymes
23. Song – Christina Rossetti
Context - ’the high priestess of Pre-Raphaelitism’ Song is a poem in two verses about not
wanting to be mourned and the uncertainty of death and memory.
Content – A person’s message to their lover for when they die, saying how they want their
partner to live/act once they have died. Unusual as she reverses the traditional; male
message to a female lover.
Audience – Her lover who she will be leaving, anyone who has suffered a loss.
Purpose – To possibly advise others of how to act in such times, support them and express
feelings.
Form – Poem splits into two halves – the first half imploring her lover not to mourn her loss
however the second half goes even further against traditional views as she shows that
actually the female is distanced anyway from her lover.
Lexis/imagery - images of nature, imagery of grave yards.
Grammar - gives instructions, syntax ‘Plant thou no roses’.
Phonology - Parallelism, called a song because written in a lyrical style.
24. Nature’s Questioning – Thomas Hardy
Context - started as a novelist. A pessimist and agnostic. His poem traces his thoughts
about a godless universe.
Content – Hardy questions why we are here. What is the meaning of life? He asks in the
light of Darwinism. He comes up with various philosophical theories – made by an uncaring
deity, part of a dying godhead etc. Philosophical poem reflecting challenges to religion at
the end of the Victorian era.
Audience - thinking people of the end of the Victorian era.
Purpose – to explore the situation the zeitgeist[spirit of the age]
Form - ballad – liked this old form - traditional
Grammar - syntax reversals for emphasis, Declaratives with interrogatives.
Lexis/imagery - natural and cosmic, educational lexis, personification, philosophical lexis.
‘lippings’ = words colloquial Dorset.
Phonology - alliteration, rhyme
25.God’s Grandeur Gerard Manley Hopkins
Context – one of the greatest 19th-century poets of religion, of nature, and of inner
anguish. In his view of nature, the world is like a book written by God. Hopkins therefore
sees the environmental crisis of the Victorian period as vitally linked to that era’s spiritual
crisis, and many of his poems bemoan man’s indifference to the destruction of sacred
natural and religious order.
Content –The poem begins with the surprising metaphor of God’s grandeur as an electric
force. The figure suggests an undercurrent that is not always seen, but which builds up a
tension or pressure that occasionally flashes out in ways that can be both brilliant and
dangerous
Audience – Aimed at the Victorian audience feeling the crisis in their faith to restore their
beliefs.
Purpose – To restore faith and to highlight the power of God to a doubting nation.
Form – Petrachan sonnet – divided into an octave and a sestet with the volta showing the
change in the argument.
Lexis/imagery – extended metaphor to show God’s power. Lexical set of destruction to
show how man has damaged God’s earth. Simple similes with a complex image within them.
Grammar – rhetorical questions to engage interest. Complex sentences.
Phonology - The meter here is not the “sprung rhythm” for which Hopkins is so famous, but
it does vary somewhat from the iambic pentameter lines of the conventional sonnet. For
example, Hopkins follows stressed syllable with stressed syllable in the fourth line of the
poem, bolstering the urgency of his question: “Why do men then now not reck his rod?”
Similarly, in the next line, the heavy, falling rhythm of “have trod, have trod, have trod,”
coming after the quick lilt of “generations,” recreates the sound of plodding footsteps in
striking onomatopoeia