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POETRY
M.A. English (Previous)
Directorate of Distance Education
Maharshi Dayanand University
ROHTAK 124 001
Paper-V
Option-I
Section A & B
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Contents
Unit 1 Spenser 5
Faerie Queene
Unit 2 Alexander Pope 43
The Rape of the Lock
Unit 3 Samuel Taylor Coleridge 80
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Kubla Khan
Unit 4 Matthew Arnold 115
The Forsaken Merman
Dover Beach
Scholar Gypsy
Memorial Verses to Wordsworth
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M.A. (Previous)
POETRY
PAPER-V (Option-I) Max. Marks : 100
Time : 3 Hours
Note: Students will be required to attempt five questions in all. Question 1 will be compulsory. This question shall
be framed to test students comprehension of the texts prescribed for Close Study. There will be one question
on each of the Units in all the four Sections. The students will be required to attempt four questions (in
about 200 words each) one from each section.
The other four questions will be based on the texts for Close Study with internal choice i.e. one question
with internal choice on each of the four units. The students will be required to attempt One question from
each of the Four unit.
Section A
Unit 1 Spenser
Faerie Queene
Unit 2 Pope
The Rape of the Lock
Section B
Unit 3 Coleridge
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner
Kubla Khan
Unit 4 Arnold
The Forsaken Merman
Dover Beach
Scholar Gypsy
Memorial Verses to Wordsworth
Course: M. A. (Previous) English
Paper V (option I) Poetry
Section A; Unit I: Spensers The Faerie Queene Book I

SPENSERS LIFE AND WORK
Although considerable information about Spensers life is available from
official records and from the writings of his contemporaries, the more valuable
information can be obtained from his poetry itself. For instance, from a sonnet
Spenser wrote in 1593, the year of his courtship, we can know when he was
born. The year (1593), says Spenser, seems longer then all those fourty that my
life outwent. We can easily infer from the sonnet that Spenser was born in or
abut 1542. We can also know from Prothalamion, where he speaks of
mery London, my most kindly nurse,
That to me gave this lifes first native sourse;
Though from another place I take my name,
An house of ancient fame,
that he was born and brought up in London, but that his parents were not
Londoners. The reference to the house of ancient fame is to the Spencers of
Althorpe, Northampton. Spenser received his school education at the Merchant
Taylors, where Mulcaster was its first head master, who was a keen scholar with
a generous conception of the aims of education. It is not a mind, he wrote,
not a body, that we have to educate, but a man; and we can not divide him.
This conception derives from the Humanist ideal of education; from, broadly,
the culture of the Renaissance. The ideal of the perfect courtier, which Spenser
later emulates and portrays, must have found its source in this early education.
Mulcaster grounded his students in Hebrew, Greek and Latin. He also trained
them daily in music both vocal and instrumental.
It was also at school that Spenser picked up French, and made his first
attempts as a poet. Spenser translated certain sonnets of Petrarch and Du Bellay.
Of his years at Pembroke college, Cambridge (1569-76) there is not much on
record. But certain vital informations are available. The entry books of the
college do make a reference to him as the recipient of allowances, aegrotanti.
It is considered possible that Spensers chronic ill-health tended to develop in
him the tendency to reflect and dream. He is considered among the most learned
of the English poets. Even if some of his contemporaries have been better
scholars, none has been as well read as Spenser. Of his contemporaries, Ben
Jonson and, perhaps, Chapman alone could rival his knowledge of the classics.
As Drummond has informed, Ben Jonson did neither understand French nor
Italiannes, whereas Spenser knew both quite well. Spenser was a known Greek
scholar in his time. He was an enthusiastic student of both Plato and Aristotle.
He was more profoundly influenced by the mystical element in Platos thought,
as revealed in the latters Symposium and Republic. The Roman poetry also
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attracted Spenser both by its wealth of material which he could use for his own
purpose, and by virtue of its style. It is also significant to note that while most
Elizabethans turned chiefly to Ovid, Spenser was highly influenced by the art of
Virgil.
At Cambridge Spenser formed a deep and lasting friendship with Gabriel
Harvey, who was among the most notable figures at the university. There can be
no doubt that Harvey was both a loyal and a valued friend of Spensers, that he
took keen interest in Spensers career, and introduced him to those who were in
the best position to further it. If he gave Spenser bad advice on literary matters,
obviously Spenser seldom followed it. Years later, he delighted to refer to
Harvey as his entire friend. In 1576 Spenser earned the degree of M. A. and
left Cambridge for the society of his Lancashire kinsfolk. Of his occupation at
this place, we only know that he fell in love with a lady whose identity he veils
under the name of Rosalind in the Shepheardes Calender. She was both a
conventional love figure of Elizabethan poetry as well as a sincere object of
love. This love experience remained an integral part of Spensers imagination
for a long time in his life. Rosalind is again alluded to with chivalrous devotion
in Spensers poem Colin Clouts Come Home Againe. However, whatever the
depth of emotion for Rosalind, it did not save Spenser from the dangers and the
delights of falling under other spells. The cautious Harvey had soon reason to
warn his friend of the seductions of another Rosalindula, perhaps some lady
of the court.
Spenser returned to London in 1578, where Harvey introduced him to
Sidney and Leicester. Spenser looked up to Leicester as the acknowledged
political leader of the Puritan faction, the most favourite of Elizabeth, who had
not yet lost the hope that a marriage with the Queen might turn his fortunes. He
got bound more closely to Sidney than to Leicester and their relation was not
that of patron and protg. Although yet a young man, Sidney was regarded the
most brilliant figure at the court of Elizabeth. Sidney, recognized for his
abilities all over Europe, was considered by his own countrymen as the ideal
courtier. An earnest Protestant, Sidney saw in Roman Catholicism the greatest
threat to his countrys liberty. He remained persistent in persuading Elizabeth
for a strong action against Spain. Spenser accepted Sidneys political ideals
without any reservation. In other matters, too, he felt closer to Sidney than to
any one else around him. The Puritanism of both Sidney and Spenser was
deeply tinged with Platonic mysticism. Both made an attempt to adopt to
modern life the ideals of mediaeval chivalry. They saw in the romance of
medieval times an inspiring symbol for the battles they were to fight in their
times. The soul of Sidney that was stirred by a rude ballad of Chary Chase and
later found an intimate expression in Arcadia found kinship with the poet of the
Faerie Queene. In their judgements upon art, however, the two friends were not
in complete agreement. Sidney was more committed to fashion and precedent.
He did not endorse Spensers bolder linguistic experiments because he dare not
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allow, since neither Theocritus in Greek, Virgil in Latin, nor Sanazar in Italian,
did affect it. Sidney, in fact, went a step further to lead the scholars movement
for establishing classical metres in English verse. And yet, Sidney did not fail to
encourage Spenser in his ambitious project of the Faerie Queene, whereas
Harvey only condemned it. Spensers dedication of his poem The Ruins of Time
to Sidneys sister, the countess of Pembroke, claims no equal friendship with
that most brave knight your noble brother deceased. Sidney had also inspired
Spenser in his youth and given him a model for the brave courtier in Mother
Hubberds Tale. This noble friend continued in Spensers memory to vitalize
some of his most beautiful conceptions in the Faerie Queene. Spensers elegy
on the death of Sidney, Astrophel, although in pastoral form, underlines the
poets deep sentiment for Sidney.
In Spenser as a poet, there is nothing of the realist. His genius expresses
his emotion far more in verbal cadence, in melody of phrasing, than in the
logical expressions of words. Even in his Astrophel, it is only through elaborate
use of his characteristic effects of alliteration and repetition that he is able to
give to his lay of lingering and tender pathos an effective expression of personal
regard. It is not because Astrophel is an elegy that he uses the pastoral idiom.
Pastorial idiom, for Spenser, was the most useful metaphor which could give an
effective expression to his most intimate personal experience. It is not for
nothing that the poet of the Faerie Queene was known as Colin Clout among
his friends. Finally, when Spensers own Faerie land itself becomes pastoral,
with Colin Clout straying into it, its hero, Sir Calidore, represents an ideal
portrait of Sidney. Spensers first bid for poetic fame, in 1579, was also marked
by his dedication of the book, the Shepheardes Calender, to the president of
noblesse and of chevalrie, Sir Philip Sidney.

THE SHEPHEARDES CALENDER:
Spensers the Shepheardes Calender, with its clear relations with the past,
came to be recognized as a pioneering piece of a new movement. It appeared
with explanatory and apologetic notes by an editor mentioned merely as E. K.
Various scholarly views on the identity of the editor notwithstanding, the
current critical opinion accepts the editor as Edward Kirk, a fellow student of
Spenser at Cambridge and an enthusiastic disciple of Harvey. The poem has
been accepted as a veiled autobiography of the poet, as a work of historic
interest, and as a work of high intrinsic value. Spensers choice of the pastoral
form was a happy one, for Virgilian eclogue was already popular. Its traditions
in classical and Renaissance literature allowed Spenser a precedence for the
allegorical use he made of it. The Shepherds cloak, in Spensers time, was an
accepted disguise of the lover, the poet, the courtier, the pastor, and even the
critic of contemporary life. Thus, the poem could be made the repository of the
poets personal emotions, his religious and political beliefs, his hopes and fears
for art. Spenser represents, in the dramatic personae, under a disguise
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sometimes dark, sometimes transparent, himself as well as his friends. Spenser
appears disguised as Colin Clout, Gabriel Harvey as Hobbinol, and Rosalind,
the object of his unhappy love. Several more personalities are represented under
different names.
The poems editor, E. K., has divided the Eclogues into Plaintive
(1,6,11,12); Recreative, such as certain matter of love, or commendation of
special personages (3,4,8); Moral, which for the most part be mixed with
some satirical bitternesse (2,5,7,9,10). The various motives of the work are so
interwoven that no division can, in fact, be entirely satisfactory. There is an
Eclogue written for every month of the calendar. For instance, love is the main
theme of January and December alone. The April Eclogue is in praise of the
fayre queene of sheperds all. The February Eclogue brilliantly narrates the
fable of the oak and the brier, contrasts old age with arrogant youth. Spensers
purpose in May, July and September, is clear enough:
To teach the ruder shepherd how to feed his sheepe,
And from the falsers fraud his folded flocke to keepe,
The most deeply interesting of all the Eclogues is, in fact, the October one. It
takes the form of a dialogue between two shepherds, Cuddie and Piers. The
subject of dialogue is the state of poetry in Spensers time, the dialogue actually
being between the two internal voices within the poet himself. Even more
important than the contents of the Shepheardes Calender is, however, the style
in which it is composed. The poets own attitude to his predecessors is equally
important. The poet shows full knowledge of the pastorals of Greece, Italy, and
France. He also adapts and translates from Mantuan and Marot. But he
acknowledges his debt to Chaucer alone. At a time when his contemporaries
were running after foreign models, it was Spensers ambition to be English. His
reversion to Chaucer is the boldest sign of his independence.
In the June Eclogue Spenser represents Harvey as calling Colin to the
study of the classics, to which Colin modestly replies:
Of Muses Hobbinol, I conne no skill,
For they bene daughters of the hyghest Jove,
I never lyst presume to Parnasse hyll,
But pyping low in shade of lowly grove
I play to plese myself, al be it ill.
Colins reply in the above lines barely conceals his deliberate conviction that his
native poetry can benefit little from the rhetoric of classical and Italian
imitation. Here, the poet asserts that his master is Tityrus alone, by which he
means Chaucer. The reason why he is drawn to Chaucer most is that he
considers Chaucer one of those who have right well employed themselves to
the beautifying and bettering of the English tongue.
The Shepheardes Calender is no less experimental in its use of metre.
Having no precedent in pastoral tradition for such metrical variety, Spenser was
inspired solely by his own enthusiasm to explore the capabilities of his native
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language. Although he does owe something to his immediate predecessors both
in England and France, he reaches back for his models to an earlier age. He
makes attempt at forms suggested by the ballad, at the irregular four-stressed
lines, at the regular line of five feet, all being traditional in English poetry. But
in this, too, he finds the fullest and most natural expression in the metre of
Chaucer. In the exquisite and varied melody of Spensers poem lies, for sure, its
greatest charm. But it also makes a further appeal to the admirer of Spensers
poetry. That appeal comes from the strange pastoral country that the poet
creates in the poem. With its ideal atmosphere that imparts to intimate personal
allusion the remoteness of romance; with its unique mixing of artifice and
naturalness; of nature and convention, of deep moral earnestness and tender
delicacy of feeling, Spensers poem, despite all its borrowings, creates a world
of its own. It lies along the high-road that leads him to Faery land.
The status of the Shepheardes Calender (1579) is the same as that of the
The Lyrical Ballads (1798); both are literary events of the same kind. Like
Wordsworth, Spenser appeared like heavens benediction with the demand for
homelier things and truer poetic language. He also aimed at fresher cadences,
ballad simplicity, and a new social philosophy. Like Wordsworth, he did not
stand alone, though for several years readers called him the new poet, or
Colin Clout, or Immerito. The poem, consisting of twelve eclogues, is
addressed to Philip Sidney in the most charming of all Spensers dedications:
Go, little book: thyself present,
As child whose parent is unkent,
To him that is the president
Of noblesse and of chivalry.
The Shepheardes Calender marks the turning point in the Elizabethan poetry. It
also forms the first landmark in Spensers career as a poet. He was only twenty-
seven years old. The breadth and immediacy of the poems intellectual basis and
the variety of effects and rhythms obtained are what most call attention to the
work.

THE IRELAND EXPERIENCE:
Only six months had passed after the publication of the Shepheardes
Calender when Spenser was appointed as secretary to the new governor of
Ireland, Lord Grey of Wilton. Although the post in itself was highly honourable,
the life of an administrator in Ireland was rather arduous. It checked for ten
years the output of Spensers poetry. He had started the composition of the
Faerie Queene before he left England in August 1580, and it was not till late in
1589 that he was able to return and find a printer for the first three books, which
appeared in 1590. This was the earliest publication to bear Spensers name. He
boldly dedicated the books, as later the entire poem, to Queen Elizabeth, who
rewarded him by the grant of a pension of fifty pounds a year. In 1591, Spenser
was able to issue two volumes of his minor poems. One of these volumes,
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Daphnaida, is a long ceremonious elegy on the recent death of a lady of rank.
The poem is notable for its beautiful metrical structure and delicate balancing of
parts. It remains reminiscent of Chaucers Book of the Duchess, and has been
considered Spensers most consummate tribute to medieval art and to his great
predecessor. The second volume entitled Complaints, containing Sundry Small
Poems of the Worlds Vanity, consists of poems of mixed character, consisting
of four parts, each carrying a signed dedication by Spenser to a lady of the
court, namely, the Countess of Pambroke, and the three titled sisters of the
Althorpe Spencer family with whom the poet claimed relationship. The four
parts of the volume carry separate titles as The Vision of Belley, Visions of
Petrarch, Visions of The Worlds Vanity, and Ruins of Rome. All the poems in
the volume are in sonnet form, showing the growth of Spensers style from its
early beginnings to full maturity.
The greatest poem, and the longest, in Complaints is Mother Hubbards
Tale. The significance of this poem is that it is Spensers only ambitious effort
in heroic couplets. There is no doubt about the poets satiric intention. The tale
actually consists of four tales of the malefactions of a fox and an ape, who in the
first three live disguised in the world of men, but in the last inhabit a beast
world. The satire moves on four levels, in which the poet successively attacks
agricultural, clerical, social, and finally imperial mores. The poem, especially
the picture of the brave courtier (Philip Sidney) in the third part, portrays
conditions of the Elizabethan court, in the strongest couplet verse written by any
poet before Dryden:
So pitiful a thing is suitors state
Full little knowest thou that hast not tried,
What hell it is in suing long to bide:
To lose good days that might be better spent,
To waste long nights in pensive discontent;
To speed today, to be put back to-morrow;
To feed on hope, to pine with fear and sorrow;
To have thy princes grace, yet want her peers;
To have thy asking, yet wait many years;
To fret thy soul with crosses and with cares,
To eat thy heart through comfortless despairs:
To fawn, to crouch, to wait, to ride, to run,
To spend, to give, to want, to be undone.
In the last tale, the fox becomes an apparent symbol of Burghleys
imperiousness, avarice, and nepotism. It is not surprising that for this and other
impudences, the Complaints volume was called in or suppressed, and that
Spenser did not adventure further along this congenial but most dangerous path.
Spensers next poem, Colin Clouts Come Home Again, is, therefore, in a
different tone altogether. It is also considered, in its attractiveness, only next to
the Epithalamion. Although not printed until 1595, the poem is prefaced by a
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letter to Raleigh, dated from Spensers Irish home, Kilcolman Castle, December
27, 1589 90, which made possible the publication of the first three books of
the Faerie Queene. In Colin Clouts Come Home Again, Spenser lays off his
singing robes and reverts to the humble character of Colin Clout. He is shown
safe in Ireland again among his shepherd mates, to whom he describes the great
things and persons he has seen. The poem is written in pentameter quatrain of
rustic type and language in keeping with the poems character. Primarily, his
purpose is to pay complements to Raleigh, the Shepherd of the Ocean, whose
meeting with Spenser in Munster, companionship on the voyage, and patronage
at court are delightfully narrated. The pastoral note is admirably sustained. The
poem is equally important as poetic autobiography, though far less sublime than
Miltons Lycidas. The poem gives the impression that Spenser was now happily
reconciled to his life in Ireland, and had sincerely abjured the enticements of
courtly ambition. The poem ends in philosophic mood, with a Platonic praise of
true love and a reassertion of Colins loyalty to the loved and lost Rosalind.

ASTROPHEL AND AMORETTI:
Spensers Astrophel, his elegy on the death of Philip Sydney, was printed
in the same volume as Colin Clouts Come Home Again. The poem is the first
of a group of poems by various poets on Sidneys death. Although published a
little later, it was in all probability composed earlier than Shakespeares Venus
and Adonis. Spensers elegy is written in the same stanza as Shakespeares. It
figuratively represents Sidneys wound as caused, like Adoniss, by a tusked
beast. An year later Spenser found himself enamoured of an English girl, named
Elizabeth Boyle, who had come to Ireland with her brother and settled near
Kilcolman. The account of the wooing and marriage in Spensers Amoretti
sequence of sonnets and Epithalamion, published together in 1595, is expressed
in the same autobiographical frankness as in Colin Clouts Come Home Againe.
But in these later volumes we come across much greater depth of feeling. The
courtship was, of course, not easy. The girl was proud and much his junior, with
her family having greater ambitions for her. The fourth sonnet of the Amoretti
sequence is dated, by internal evidence, January 1, 1593. In the nineteenth, the
merry cuckoo, messenger of spring has commenced to sing. In the twenty-
second Lent has begun. The sixtieth sonnet notes that the poet has been in love
for one year. The sixty-second sonnet speaks of New Year, 1594. The sixty-
eighth speaks of Easter. The seventieth sonnet speaks of May Day. Their
marriage took place on St. Barnabys Day, June 11, which by the Old Style
calendar was the longest day of the year.
In the Amoretti sonnets, except the eighth, which is of usual
Shakespearean kind, Spenser employs his special form of linked quatrains, a
b a b bc bc cd cd ee, which he had already used in the Vision of the Worlds
Vanity and the Dedication to Virgils Gnat. In terms of the content of these
sonnets, they divide into three unequal parts. While sonnets 1-62 deal with
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unrequited love, sonnets 63-84 deal with the lovers happiness, sonnets 85-88
deal with the four little lyrics on Cupid. It is naturally the second group which
matters most. One of the notable features of these sonnets is Spensers dabbling
with the metaphysical conceit, commonly defined as a phase of the reaction
against him. Although a less outstanding instance is sonnet no. 67, it merits
mention because not many poets have written so like a gentleman:
Like as a huntsman after weary chase,
Seeing the game from him escape away,
Sits down to rest him in some shady place,
With panting hounds beguiled of their prey.
So, after long pursuit and vain assay,
When I all weary had the chase forsook,
The gentle deer returnd the selfsame way,
Thinking to quench her thirst at the next brook.
There she, beholding me with milder look,
Sought not to fly, but fearless still did bide,
Till I in hand her yet half-trembling took,
And with her own good will her firmly tied,
Strange thing, me seemd, to see a beast so wild
So goodly won, with her own will beguild.

EPITHALAMION ANA PROTHALAMION:
Spensers marriage, when finally arranged, was performed rather in a
hurry. The Epithalamion is his gift to his bride and to himself. As he puts it, I
unto myself alone will sing. But the song has actually been his most universal
passport to posterity. The Faerie Queene may not always, or in all respects, be
admired, but the superiority of Epithalamion to everything else in its class has
seldom been disputed. For one thing, it differs from the other marriage hymns in
its larger range of melody. It is said that Spenser has used in this poem the total
resources of his musical power. For another, it differs in its broader humanity;
for in its twenty-three strophes some twenty hours of an Irish day are registered
with a vividness that never seems to fade. And the poem differs most of all in
striking the nearly unattainable line between too hot and too cold.
Spensers Prothalamion is one of the casual results of his visit to London
in 1596 to see Books IVVI of the Faerie Queene through the press.
Epithalamion had been printed the year before. On this visit to London, Spenser
was made to concede to a request by the Earl of Worcester, who had to provide
a state wedding for his two daughters, the Ladies Elizabeth and Katherine
Somerset. Taking advantage of Spensers presence in London at the time, the
Earl commissioned him to write a marriage poem similar to the one he had done
for the occasion of his own marriage. Although less than half the length of the
other poem, Prothalamion is not much inferior in quality. In fact, the Earl got an
extraordinary value for his money. The poem, some critics believe, is even more
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proportioned than the other one. However, the emotion of the earlier work could
not be reproduced, nor did perhaps the poet make any attempt to do so. The
brides and the bridegrooms remain lay-figures, but the poets emotion on being
in London once again, walking beside the Thames, comes out in fascinating
verses. The spousal interest is delicately dismissed in the opening lines, in
which Spenser expresses his old grievance against courts:
Calm was the day
When I, whom sullen care,
Through discontent of my long fruitless stay
In princes court, and expectation vain
Of idle hopes, which still do fly away
Like empty shadows, did afflict my brain,
Walkd forth to ease my pain
Along the shores of silver-streaming Thames.
At the end of the poem, Spenser brings over his associations with merry
London, my most kindly nurse, expressing in lines that everyone remembers
best. The marriage occasion actually gets pushed into the background as a
decorative backcloth.

THE FOUR HYMNS
Preferred by an interesting letters to the Countesses of Cumberland and
Warwick, date September 1, 1596, Spensers The Four Hymns were published
the same year. They are perhaps the latest publications of his life-time. It is
perhaps the only time that Spenser so directly attempts a formal statement on
the idealistic philosophy of Pagan-Christian blend and neo-Platonic brand. The
philosophy, no doubt, is suffused over the whole of The Faerie Queene. Of
course, The Four Hymns are more poetic than systematic. As the poets letter
explains, the first two poems, on the pagan theory of love and beauty, had been
composed in the greener times of my youth when one of the sister countesses
had urged Spenser to suppress them, he had been unable to do so by reason of
the number of manuscript copies in circulation. Therefore, he resolved at least
to amend and by way of retraction to reform them, making instead of those two
hymns of earthly or natural love and beauty two others of heavenly and
celestial. These Hymns are written in delicate and accomplished rime royal,
making it lend itself to abstruse exposition. The first two start from the notion
that love is born of beauty as Cupid was of Venus. They develop the conception
of love as the prime creative force (as is done in Platos Symposium). They
further demonstrate how mans moral progress takes place through the love of
beauty at its successive levels. In the Hymn of Heavenly Love, Christ replaces
Cupid as creative love. The poem becomes a rationalization of the Fall and
Redemption, a sort of Paradise Lost in miniature.
Spenser retracted nothing in the later Hymns, which essentially remain as
Greek as the earlier ones. They are also not much hampered by the new medium
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into which the doctrine has been translated. For all that is good is beautiful and
fair is the core of Spensers thought. The grand summary at the end of
Heavenly Beauty is as frank neo-Platonism, or pure Platonism, as anything in
the earlier two. The conception of love and beauty as a gradual infusion is one
of the points that make Spenser stand apart from that other Hellenist, Marlowe,
who stressed intuitive genius. In the second Hymn he categorically denies the
Dead Shepherds yet unpublished clich:
For all that like the beauty which they see
Straight do not love; for love is not so light
As straight to burn at first beholders sight.
One of the controversial pieces of Spensers appeared in prose, namely, A
view of the present State of Ireland. Although written in 1596, when Spenser
was in England, it got into print much later in 1633. This treatise runs into
60,000 words, and is a well-planned dialogue on Irish laws, customs, and
military government. Spensers own opinions are expressed through a character
named Irenius, who has recently arrived from Ireland. Another character,
Eudoxus, interprets the opinion of Irenius. The prose style is beautiful, simple in
diction and syntax, but with a periodic roll that marks it for the poets prose, as
in Ireniuss condemnation of the social influence of the Irish bards. Large part
of the essay shows sympathetic understanding of the antiquities, art, and
customs of the island. But the poets view in the treatise has been described as
brutal by most critics. An example of the Views brutality is cited in the poets
blatant defence of the British policy of imposing reforms by the sword.
Unlike a poet, Spenser suggests group removal of disloyal population to
another part of the country and systematic starvation to check outlaws. He
advocates mercy for the mean and submissive, but none for the great rebels like
Tyrone. No wonder that barely four months after Spensers book was
ineffectively registered in London, Tyrone struck again. All Munster rose in
unexpected tumult. Spensers Kilcolman residence was destroyed, with also
probably an important portion of The Faerie Queene. Spenser, now Sheriff of
Cork, was sent to London in December 1598 with official dispatches about the
revolt. Spenser died at Westminster, January 13, 1599, owing to the tensions he
had been under. He was about 47 years of age, and at the peak of his career both
as poet and civil servant.

THE FAERIE QUEENE
Mature critical opinion insists that Spensers own life provides the key to
much that is there in The Faerie Queene, which was his crowning achievement.
Written for the most part during his long stay in Ireland, in the wild and solitary
part of the island, the poem is reminiscent of the world from which the poet, so
to say, remained exiled for the better part of his life. It expresses his yearning
for a fuller life, for an abundance of all the good things that his spirit and senses
felt deprived of in the hostile country. The poem is also fully charged with his
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experience of those years in Ireland. The beauties of the countryside, the
desolation of forest and hillside, the difficulties and dangers he was made to
face living amidst rebellious people, the heroes and villains he actually
encountered, the friends he made, and the women he loved, all find their places
in the intricate structure of The Faerie Queene. The poems idealism,
heightened by the poets desire to escape from sordid reality, is thus combined
with a realism that bespeaks his sure sense of the imaginative value of all
experience that is intensely lived.
Thus, in a sense, all the earlier poetry of Spenser has been a preparation
and exercise for his unfinished epic, The Faerie Queene. It has been viewed as a
great inclusive attempt by the poet to bring together in one rich pattern all the
various strands of civilization with which he was acquainted. Spenser drew
upon the medieval allegorical tradition in both its secular and religious form, on
medieval romance, classical epic, Aristotelian ethics, Plato and Italian neo-
Platonism, Renaissance Humanism, geography and folklore, Elizabethan
patriotism and political thought, and almost every current of European thought
and expression and convention which were the rich heritage of the Elizabethan
age. He constructed his comprehensive poetic vision of la condition humaine as
it was, in a context of ideal suggestion, what it should be. Spensers immediate
model for The Faerie Queene was Ariostos Orlando Furioso. As Spenser told
his friend Gabriel Harvey, he hoped to overgo the Italian epic. It provided
Spenser the mould into which he could put his serious and complex vision. He
might have used the older traditions and moulds, the vision that informs his
poem was decidedly his.
Spenser prefixed to the 1590 edition of The Faerie Queene a letter
addressed to Sir Walter Raleigh expounding his whole intention in the course
of his work. He declared in this letter that the general end of all the book is
to fashion a gentleman or noble person in virtuous and gentle discipline. He
further pointed out that he had learned from Homer, Virgil, Ariosto, and Tasso,
by example of which excellent Poets I labour to portray in Arthur, before he
was king, the image of a brave Knight, perhaps in the twelve private moral
virtues, as Aristotle hath devised, which is the purpose of these first twelve
books, which if I find to be well accepted, I may be perhaps encouraged to
frame the other part of politic virtues in his person, after that he came to be
king. The letter goes on as under:
In that Faerie Queen I mean glory in my general intention, but in my
particular I conceive the most excellent and glorious person of our
soveraine the Queen, and her kingdom in Faery land. And yet in some
places else I do otherwise shadow her, for considering she beareth two
persons, the one of a most royal Queen or Empress, the other of a most
virtuous and beautiful Lady, this latter part in some places I do express in
Belphoebe, So in the person of Prince Arthur I set forth magnificence
[the Aristotelian megalopsychia, magnanimitas, greatness of soul] in
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particular, which virtue for that (according to Aristotle and the rest) it is
the perfection of all the rest, and containeth in it them all, therefore in the
whole course I mention the deeds of Arthur applicable to that virtue
which I write of in that book. But of the XII other virtues I make XII
other Knights the patrons, for the more variety of the history. Of which
these books [i.e. the first three books, published in 1590] contain three,
the first of the Knight of the Redcross, in whom I express Holiness; the
second of Sir Guyon, in whom I set forth Temperance; the third of
Britomartis, a lady Knight, in whom I picture Chastity.
Spenser further goes on to explain that he starts in medias res in proper epic
fashion. But since only the three books are here presented, he had better explain
what has happened before the events narrated there. The beginning of my
history, he says, if it were to be told by an Historiographer, should be the
twelfth book, which is the last, where I devise that the Faery Queen kept her
annual feast xii days, upon which xii several days the occasions of the xii
several adventures happened, which being undertaken by xii several knights are
in these xii books severally handled and discussed. Spenser does not stop here.
He goes on to give a brief account of how the adventure of the Redcross Knight,
of Sir Guyon, and of Britomart first started. And many other adventures are
intermeddled, but rather as accidents than intendments.
Like Chaucers The Canterbury Tales, Spensers The Faerie Queene also
remained incomplete. Chaucer had planned 120 tales, but could complete only
twenty. Similarly, Spenser planned a total of 24 books, but completed only 6.
While the first three books were published in 1590, the next three books were
published in 1596. In 1609, almost ten years after Spensers death, a folio
edition of the poem was published containing the first six books and a fragment
of book VII entitled Two Cantos of Mutability. Thus, Spensers epic poem is
far from complete, being only a fragment of the whole. Decidedly, in a work of
such a complex design incompleteness is bound to present difficulties of
comprehension and interpretation. Nevertheless, the work as it exists today is
noble and impressive. It is long enough to enable us to assess its merit and
excellence. It still remains one of the greatest poems in the English language;
but its greatness is of a rather special kind.

BOOK I
The Book I of The Faerie Queene relates to the story of the Redcross
Knight, who represents Holiness. He sets forth as the champion of Una, who
represents truth, to slay the old Dragon that is devastating her fathers country.
The very opening stanza of the poem (as well as of Book I) strikes the note of
observed adventure:
A Gentle Knight was pricking on the plain,
Y-clad in mighty arms and silver shield,
Wherein old dints of deep wounds did remain,
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The cruel marks of many a bloody field;
Yet arms till that time never did he wield.
As much disdaining to the curb to yield.
Full jolly knight he seemed, and fair did sit,
As one for knightly jousts and fierce encounters fit.
The Redcross knight becomes involved in a series of adventures which suggest
(at a variety of levels) how mans pursuit of holiness can be hindered by error,
hypocrisy, false devotion, etc. At the same time, the Redcross knight is also
Everyman, facing the ordinary temptations of this world. As such, he needs the
help of Grace, represented by Prince Arthur. He also needs the help of Truth in
order to attain the good life and achieve holiness. Thus, the Redcross knight
both represents a quality (holiness) and represents man in search of that quality.
Spenser also introduces in his narrative another level of meaning. He is also
talking about the religious conditions in England, putting the Protestant against
the Catholic view of the good life, thereby inducing many contemporary
references.
In the multilayered complex of meanings that Spenser has woven into the
narrative of The Faerie Queene, the adventures as well as the various levels
they represent carry in them both the story and significance, adventure and
allegory. The reader is carried through a structure subjected to reflections and
refractions of various colours. While the major characters and adventures arouse
both the story interest as well as the significance interest, the incidental minor
characters may or may not have human qualities, which enrich the narrative
psychologically and ethically. The allegorical significance of characters and
incidents varies at different times and at different places. In the company of
Una. the knight fights a successful battle against the monster Error. The
Redcross Knight slays the monster Error, who is described as most loathsome,
filthy, foul and full of vile disdain. The monster is prolific of her poisonous
young, and, in the midst of the fight, vomits forth books and papers together
with lumps of local flesh and loathly frogs and toads. Spensers description
here is vigorous, skillful, and thoroughly Spenserian in the popular sense. The
allegory, too, is highly simple, to the point of childishness. The description goes
on showing how the knight is harassed by the monsters cursed spawn:
The same so sore annoyed has the Knight,
That wellnigh choked with the deadly stink
His forces fail, he can no longer fight.
Whose courage when the fiend perceived to shrink
She poured forth out of her hellish sink
Her fruitful cursed spawn of serpents small,
Deformed monsters, foul and black as ink,
Which swarming all about his legs and crawl,
And him encumbered sore, but could not hurt at all.
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This, for sure, is quite vigorous and effective. Both layers of meaning, literal as
well as allegorical, are quite clear. But when we move to the next stanza, the
tone changes altogether:
As gentle Shepherd in sweet eventide
When ruddy Phoebus gins to welk in west,
High on an hill, his flock to viewen wide,
Marks which do bite their hasty supper best,
A cloud of cumbrous gnats do him molest,
All striving to infix their feeble stings,
That from their noyance he nowhere can rest,
But with his clownish hands their tender wings
He brusbeth oft, and oft doth mar their murmurings.
The background of postoral life introduced here reminds one of Miltons similar
comparisons in Paradise Lost. The sudden though brief metamorphosis of the
Redcross knight here from a hero battling with a cursed spawn of serpents into a
shepherd brushing off the innocent but annoying bring in a more human world.
It establishes, as it were, a middle term between the world of heroic action on
the one hand and the world of ethical ideals on the other. The transformation
does not in any way spoil the force of the original incidents, because the change
is introduced only as a simile. At the same time, it humanizes the heroic world,
reminding us of the everyday world in which our ethical problems are to be
faced and resolved.
Spenser moves in Book I, as he does in the others, through a much wider
range of tones. There is, for instance, the note of pure and simple romantic
adventure:
At length they chanced to meet upon their way
An aged Sire, in long black weeds clad.
Next, there is the pastoral:
A little lowly Hermitage it was,
Down in a dale, hard by a forests side.
And then, there is the popular satirical:
He told of Saints and Popes, and evermore
He strewed an Ave Mary after and before.
Thus, he keeps shifting the tone further from the mythological, to the homely
proverbial, to the moralizing and religions, and then to the lofty heroic. The
astounding variety of verse, the richness of imagery and music, the wealth of
adventure and significance, all combine to make the slow but steady colourful
but complex movement of the narrative.
After slaying the monster Error, the Redcross knight has to soon
encounter next the arch deceiver Archimago. This misleader of the knight is
actually impersonating Guile and Fraud. He succeeds in deceiving the hero,
making him distrust the integrity of his lady (Una) and take in her place Duessa.
Since the hero is now enamoured of false Religion, he succeeds in defeating the
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pagan knights named Sans Foy and Sans Joy. But since he is committed now to
false Religion, he falls an easy prey to Orgoglio, the Giant of Pride. Now, Una
brings to his aid the divine strength of Arthur. However, even though rescued
from the sin of Pride, he is weakened by suffering and remorse, narrowly
escaping the toils of Despayre. It is only after dwelling in the House of Holiness
thereby learning the full meaning of the Christian faith that the Redcross knight
gains strength to overcome the Dragon. Thus, he finally becomes worthy of
winning the hand of Una, who represents Truth. Thus goes the surface or literal
story of Book I. But each character and incident here, as well as elsewhere, is
loaded with multiple meanings through allegorical suggestions. We need to
know these allegorical meanings and significances of incidents and characters in
Book I to fully appreciate the poems richness and complexity.

THEME OF BOOK I
C.S. Lewis, in his Allegory of Love, insists that the subject of the first
book is sanctification the restoring of the soul to her lost paradisal nature by
holiness. This is presented in two interlocked allegories. Unas parents, who
represent homo, or even, if you like, Adam and Eve, after long exclusion from
their native land (which of course is Eden) by the Devil, are restored to it by
Holiness whom Truth brings to their aid. That, says Lewis, is the first allegory.
In the second, we are told, we trace the genesis of Holiness; that is, the human
soul, guided by truth, contends with various powers of darkness and finally
attains sanctification and beats down Satan under her feet. Spenser chooses
Truth as the heroine of both actions. The reason for this, in all probability, is
owing to the age of Spenser being a time of religious doubt and controversy. At
such a time, avoidance of error is as pressing a problem as, and in a sense prior
to, the conquest of sin. It is for this very reason that the forces of illusion and
deception, such as Archimago and Duessa, play such a part in the story of the
Redcross knight. And it is for this very reason that St. George and Una get
separated so easily. Moral instability and intellectual error, however, are
inextricably mixed with each other. The knights desertion of his lady
symbolizes the souls desertion of truth, and has an element of willful rebellion
as well as of illusion.
Will was his guide and griefe led him astray.
The various temptations which the knight has to encounter can, for the
most part, be easily recognized. The only difficulty he faces is to make
distinction between Pride and Orgoglio. In the historical or political allegory,
undoubtedly, Orgoglio is the dungeons of the Inquisition. But what is not
obvious is his moral signification. However, if we do not forget that he is a
blood relation to Disdain, and view, with imagination than intellect, the
character of both giants, it is not difficult to get the inkling. Although Pride and
Orgoglio are both pride, the one is pride within us, the other pride attacks us
from outside. The outside attack of pride can be in the form of persecution,
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oppression, or ridicule. In other words, while the one (the internal) seduces us,
the other (the external) browbeats us. There has been noticed some
inconsistency in the utter hopelessness with which St. George, who is unarmed
and newly roused from the fountain of sloth, staggers forward to meet Orgoglio;
for it cannot be easily reconciled with this view. It is quite possible that the
giant is a survival from some earlier version of the poem.
This can be called the allegorical core of the first book. Unas adventure
carry much less load of allegory. Only in a very general sense, the lion, the
satyrs, and Satyrane represent the world of unspoiled nature, which cannot hold
Una: she blesses it and passes on her way. But to go beyond this and read more
in it would be a mistake. We need not expect that Truth separated from soul
could, or should, be allegorized as fully as the soul separated from Truth.
Certain characters in the poem are only types; they are not personifications.
Satyrane is very first of these characters. He is truly a child of nature. Although
he is a knight, we are told that in vaine glorious frays he little did delight.
Decidedly, it is a deliberate rejection of that essential element of chivalry, which
had survived, as the duello, into the courtly code of Spensers time. Spenser,
very clearly, emphasizes this anti-courtly character in Satyrane. When this
character is introduced again some twenty-four contos later, we are reminded
that he
In vain sheows, that wont young knights bewitch
And courtly services, tooke no delight.
One of the problems posed by the incompleteness of the poem is that we
cannot say with certainty that Prince Arthur is the hero of the whole poem. We
can only talk of the respective heroes of the six books that are complete. There
we are very certain about the status of different characters. But the same
certainty cannot be available about the hero of the entire poem. We do know
from the preface that he personifies Magnificence and is seeking Gloriana, or
Glory. But if it is considered how little one should know of Britomart from the
mere statement that she is Chastity, it will be seen that this tells us little about
Arthur. As C. S. Lewis observes, And if we consider how little we should
know of Spensers chastity if we had never been to the Garden of Adonis, and
how little of his justice if we had never been to the temple of Isis, or of his
courtesy if we had never seen its connexion with the Graces on Mount
Acidale, then we must conclude that we do not know what Glory would have
come to mean in the completed poem. I have very little doubt that Glory
would have been spiritualized and Platonized into something very like the Form
of the Good, or even the glory of God. It seems reasonable to argue that
Spensers whole method is such that we come to have a rather dim perception of
his characters until we are met by them or their archetypes at the great
allegorical centre of each book. For example, Amoret would reveal nothing of
her real nature unless the Garden of Adonis and the Temple of Venus are
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known. Suppose they are lost, then the character would not carry the presently
accepted connotations.

THE HERO OF BOOK I:
Very much like Virgils Aeneid, Spensers The Faerie Queene, echoing
the former, begins on a note where we see the pastoral poet turning to become
the epic poet:
Lo I the man, whose Muse whilome did maske,
As time her taught in lowly Shepheards weeds,
Am now enforst a far unfitter taske,
For trumpets sterne to chaunge mine Oaten reeds,
And sing of knights and Ladies gentle deeds;
Whose prayers having slept in silence long,
Me, all too meane, the sacred Muse areeds
To blazon broad emongst her learned throng:
Fierce warres and faithful loves shall moralize my song.
Thus, the poet of the Shepheardes Calender, like Virgil before him, sees himself
as reaching poetic maturity only when he faces the realities of his own world
and ceases to linger in an imagined paradise of rural simplicity. In fact, it is not
merely the poet who is shown leaving the pastoral mode, it is the hero as well.
There is a clear juxtaposition of the pastoral marks of the early Spenser and the
native rusticity of the youthful St. George. The anonymous new poete of the
Shepheardes Calender, Immerito becomes the narrator of a poem whose hero
had himself first appeared at Glorianas court in the guise of a tall clownishe
younge man and had rested him on the floore, unfitted through his rusticity
for a better place. We are told all this in Spensers letter to Sir Walter Raleigh
prefixed to The Faerie Queene. As we see in Book I of the poem, it is only after
Una has seen him dressed in the armour of a Christian Knight, which she has
brought with her to Fairyland, that he seems the goodliest man in all that
company and wins her approval as the champion of her cause.
The hero of Book I is known only in terms of his armour until the tenth
canto, when at the House of Holiness he learns that he is English and bears his
name of George attributed to his childhood upbringing in ploughmans state.
Spensers treatment of Redcross is rather periphrastic. It is an extreme instance
of the poets habit of repeatedly giving his characters names symbolic of their
roles but announcing those names only after showing them in action, so that the
names themselves become capsule summaries or mottoes. Spensers rather
extended emphasis on the anonymity of Redcross is directly related to the plot
of Book I. As an unproved knight, Redcross is therefore only potentially St.
George. Book I traces the steps by which the hero gains his identity. The
poems opening incidents present the ambiguous position of the Redcross. His
armour, at first, is a mere protection, or even a disguise. But there is a promise
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that it may become an image of his inner nature. The natural settings of the
poem, too, stress the same ambiguity.
The first challenge to the hero, Redcross, comes as a consequence of a
sudden shower which drives the knight and lady into the Wood of Error. In
fleeing the shower, they have abandoned one kind of nature for another.
Redcross and Una do not hesitate to take shelter. They find themselves in a
wood with which they seem very familiar. They deliberately shroud themselves
from the light, and praise the trees in a catalogue which reflects mans confident
moral dissection of his universe. We are shown here that humans seem to share
with the animals and birds a false sense of security which ignores the changing
moods of nature, of which seasons are a reflection. It is only when they come
upon the hollow cave of Error that they realize their position of being lost. Una
belatedly recognizes this position. Until then, they seem content to identify the
trees and append the appropriate moral or emblematic tags to each:
The sayling Pine, the cedar proud and tall,
The vine-prop Elme.
When Una urges caution at the mouth of Errors den, an accumulation of
proverbs is nicely suggestive of perplexity:
Be well aware, quoth then that Ladie milde,
Least suddaine mischiefe ye too rash prouoke:
The danger hid, the place unknowne and wilde,
Breeds dreadfull doubts: Oft fire is without smoke
And perill without show: therefore your stroke
Sir knight with-hold, till further trial made.
Ah Ladie (said he) shame were to revoke
The forward footing for an hidden shade:
Vertue gives her selfe light, through darkenesse for to wade.
The rapid exchange of comments reaches its climax when the Dwarfe is moved
to interject his own comment:
Fly fly (quoth then
The fearful Dwarfe:) this is no place for living men
The Error is to be overcome. But that can be done only when faith reinforces the
knights human powers. As Una urges,
Add faith unto your force and be not faint
Strangle her, else she sure will strangle thee.
The heros next encounter on the journey to Holiness is with Archimago.
Redcross and Una are drowned in deadly sleepe when Archimago begins his
enchantment. They go to their sleep suspecting nothing, lulled as they are by
easy platitudes and the appearance of a cloistered virtue. The temptations
offered by Archimago bring into clear focus the present spiritual health of the
hero, Redcross. In the heros active conscience and his dependence on reason
and the evidence of his senses there is implicit the combination of his strength
and weakness. It is very much appropriate that Archimagos assault should be
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directed toward sexuality. The very sobriety and solemnity of the heros pursuit
of his quest becomes at once his strength as well as weakness. Here is a
challenge to his nave idealism in an area where his faith in a reality contrary to
appearance is most difficult. He has overcome Error by following Unas advice,
thereby adding faith to force. But when Archimago presents him, in his third
and final phase of his temptation, with the apparent evidence of Una embracing
a young squire, such a faith becomes impossible. Thus, the final stage comes
in his fall when he yields to Duessa and presents to Orgoglio the compromising
spectacle which is prepared for his sight by Archimago. As is common in The
Faerie Queene here lust is presented as primarily a dereliction of chivalric
duties. It amounts to a loosness, which is opposed to the sternness of the
pursuit.
Although the hero, at this stage, is running away from the imagined lust
of his chaste lady, he himself becomes a victim of lust by falling for Duessa.
Thus, the parallel stories of Una and Redcross complement each other. Put
together, these stories define the divided personality produced by the
separation of the two. This shows the movement of Book I towards a
meaningful return symbolized by the climactic killing of the Dragon, by the
formal blazoning of the Knights armour, and by the betrothal scene - the
solemnization of the union of Knight and Una. The pattern of Book I seems to
stress the repetition of scenes in which he overcomes a clear and present threat
only to fall prey to a hidden danger. In the first canto he overcomes Error only
to be fooled by Archimagos deceptive appeal to the evidence of his senses. In
the second, he vanquishes the clearly labeled Sans Foy but at the same time
accepting uncritically Duessa when she calls herself Fidessa. The heros
apparent aimlessness in the central cantos is also in keeping with his picture as
nave Knight.
At this point of the narrative, Una is shown as a helpless maiden
wandering in wilderness, susceptible to both menace and assistance represented
by the savage figures she is made to encounter. Thus, in the third canto, we see
one such cycle completed when the friendly lion is killed by Sans Loy. The end
of the canto falls as she is carried off by this new, inimical figure of bestial lust.
The next two cantos, the fourth and the fifth, in which her adventures are
described, where Redcross visits the House of Pride and encounters Sans Joy.
The gentle maidens experiences in an uncivilized setting thus provide a
backdrop for her youthful knights equally passive role in a sophisticated world.
Luciferas relationship to the norm of chivalry is quite clear: her house is built
on the sands, and her diabolic ancestry is seen in her name and retinue. In the
dubious battle that ensues, it is only befitting that Redcross should win his
limited victory after misinterpreting Duessas shout of encouragement, and that
his descent into the underworld to cure Sans Joy should present elements of
considerable relevance to the heros own situation.
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The motifs gathered, in the infernal setting in the later part of Book I, of
the daytime quests of the poem acquire ironic overtones. However, the descent
to the underworld in general seems to be designed to dramatize the challenge of
mortality to the heros quest for identity. The story of Hippolytuss fall seems to
have a special relevance for the hero whose nave literalism has limited him to
purely nominal victories over his foes. It has also blinded him to Unas
pertinence to his quest. It is also a function of this same literal imagination that
Redcross should be deprived of the vision of hell provided to the reader. His
own vision is sufficient to rescue him from the House of Pride. But it also
leaves him vulnerable to a new figure of pride who is more natural and
monstrous. Reason, presented as Dwarf, is able to protect Redcross from the
civilized world of Lucifera. The panorama of victims in his dungeons is
precisely the kind of underworld vision that the Dwarf can unfold to his master.
There, the Old Testament names flow into a list of Romans:
The antique ruins of the Romaines fall.
It suggests through the epithets used for the Romans (stout, stubborn, sterne,
highminded) that the stoic virtues on which the Redcross is currently depending
are no better than synonyms of pride.
In Spensers poem, nemesis seems to take the form of a balancing force
that reasserts the validity of the natural cycles of time. Redcross leaves the
House of Pride only to fall in weariness before the enervating fountain, which
ironically commemorates the weary nymph of Dianna, where all his energetic
resistance will be mocked as he falls prey to Orgoglio. As we have seen, the
hero of Spensers Book I of The Faerie Queene is very different from the
Greeko-Roman and Italian or French models. No doubt, Spenser used those
models for pattern or design of his epic. He used them for their mythologies and
legends. He also used Platonic, Aristotalian and other ancient philosophic ideas.
But he did not accept in full any of those. He evolved an outlook on life of his
own. And to illustrate that outlook he shaped his hero of the poem, and the
subsidiary heroes of different books representing a virtue each. The ideal that
his hero represents seems a combination of values derived from the Renaissance
humanism, Platonism, and Christian theology. Hence the values he embodies
and represents are both secular as well as theological.

AS AN ALLEGORICAL POEM:
Following the wandering progress of Spensers poem, The Faerie
Queene, to the point where the poet left it, one may feel confused at its
construction. As originally conceived, the poems plot was rather loose, and in
the course of its development, it became looser still. In the eighteenth century,
Upton had the audacity to claim for Spensers poem the unity of a classical epic.
In view of the fact that The Faerie Queene is an incomplete poem, having only
six out of twenty four books, it is not possible to pass any judgement on the
poems plot or structure with any measure of finality. In fact, even if the poem
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had been completed, one thing is certain that its plot could not have come any
closer to that of the classical epic. If a comparison must be sought for The
Faerie Queene, one would find it in the Italian and French romances of the
medieval period. Chaucers The Canterbury Tales sounds much closer to
Spensers The Faerie Queene than Homers Iliad or Virgils Aeneid.
The adventures intermeddled, but rather as accidents and intendments,
throw far more light upon the moral conception than is commonly
acknowledged. But they tend to complicate the narrative. In fact, by their very
interest and importance they obscure the development of an already inchoate
plot. Spenser was aware of this, and towards the end of the sixth book he
offered a defence of his rambling method:
Like as a ship, that through the Ocean wyde
Directs her course unto one certain cost,
Is met of many a counter winde and tyde,
With which her winged speed is let and crost,
And she her selfe in stormie surges tost;
Still winneth way, ne hath her compasse lost:
Right so it fares with me in this long way,
Whose course is often stayed, yet never is astray.
As Smith and Selincourt have observed, Such a defence will make no converts.
Those who are imbued with the classical horror of voyaging upon strange seas
will travel uneasily in this Elizabethan privateer, which sails at the mercy of
every wind and tide, and is always ready to tack or to follow any course that
seems to promise a costly prize. They will rudely question the poets
seamanship, and accuse him of having lost his way, perhaps of having no way
to lose.
Apart from the announced, and pronounced, moral allegory, The Faerie
Queene has often a special and even topical significance. This significance is
not coincident throughout with the main plot. It is generally fitful and allusive,
appearing and disappearing as and when the characters and situations suggest a
parallel to the real world. As Spenser himself has stated, In that Faerie Queene
I mean glory in my general intention, but in particular I conceive the most
excellent and glorious person of our sovereign the Queen, and her kingdom in
Faerie Land. Here, Drydens observation seems pertinent: The original of
every one of his knights was then living at the court of Queen Elizabeth, and he
attributed to each of them that virtue which he thought most conspicuous in
them. This should not, of course, imply that Spenser intended to draw portraits
of Elizabeth, or of Leicester, even of Grey or Sidney. But he did see a
possibility. And the beings who filled his visionary world took on, in the
fashion of a dream, a likeness to those familiar to his waking life. It was very
natural for a person like Spenser, who was a part of the political apparatus of his
time, and remained a part until his last, to turn his mind continually to that vast
stage of public life on which the players were the men he knew and loved. So,
22
as he developed his moral allegory, it kept acquiring at the same time political
overtones. No doubt, quite often, the political allegory was almost a replica of
the moral. This phenomenon is quite clear in the conduct of Book I, just as it is
obvious in the conduct of Book V.
If Una is Truth who must be freed from Falsehood, Deceit and Hypocrisy,
if she must be united to Holiness, Spenser would not fail to associate her with
his own faith, and Duessa with Roman Catholicism. He would also not fail to
identify them with those two great queens, Elizabeth and Mary. Also, in tracing
the development of the Redcross knight in his efforts to achieve holiness,
Spenser would naturally follow, episode by episode, the history of the English
church in its fight with Rome. But such analogies are not always complete and
consistent. Quite often, they are only suggestive as well as momentary. The two
worlds of romance and politics converge for the moment only to part company.
Different aspects of one and the same character appear under different guises.
One of Spensers ideal creations can shadow forth different historical figures.
For example, Elizabeth is found in Gloria, in Belphoebe, in Una, in Britomart,
in Mercilla. Similarly, Arthur is now Sidney, now Leicester. Again, Sir Calidore
is at one time Sidney, at another Essex. Spenser generally idealized these
characters, but he could also hint a fault as well as extol a virtue. For example,
Greys involvement in an intrigue with Mary Queen of Scots, which Elizabeth
never forgave him, is glanced at in the subjugation of Archegal to Redegund.
Similarly, in the vivid portrait of Timias the failings of Raleigh are as clearly
shown as his splendid virtues. Such reflections of his own time enhanced the
delight with which Spensers readers would follow the adventures of the faery
knights. At the same time, it also saved the poet from the possible dangers of an
allegory that could become too abstract and remote to interest his readers.
Of course, allegory is not to every readers taste. Some tend to believe
that Spenser was led to adopt the allegorical mode, partly by the force of
medieval tradition, and partly under the influence of contemporary ideas which
recommended didactic function of poetry. As a matter of fact, Spenser was so
influenced because he was of that idealistic temper which made possible the rise
of allegorical poetry. Another reason probably was that Spenser could most
readily express in that medium the rich and varied interests of a mind which
continually traveled between the worlds of fact and fiction. As an idealist,
Spenser would start form the actual world of his experience, distil from it what
seems to be its essence, and create another world of moral and spiritual
conception which would become as real for him as that from which he has
created it. For sure, ideas depend for their reality upon the vividness with which
they kindle his imagination. Thus, the poets imaginative vision, which imparts
to the world of fact higher reality by expressing the soul that informs it, imparts
to the world of ideas a sensuous incarnation which utters its voice in song.
We can convincingly assert that in the allegory of The Faerie Queene
these two worlds meet and fuse. It cannot, of course, be asserted with certainty
23
that the fusion is complete or perfect. The creatures of each world carry upon
their forms traces of their origin. We may normally distinguish two types of
allegory. In one type, the poet starts from the idea, and then initiates the process
of incarnation. The poet abstracts human qualities into the rarefied atmosphere
of thought, which are then presented to the imagination for conscious artistic
treatment. The result is somewhat formal personification, cast in the traditional
mould of medieval allegory. The manner of execution in this case is that of a
pageant or a Morality. Much of the incidental allegory in The Faerie Queene is
of this type. The other type of allegory is when the poets mind is turned upon
the warm realities of life. Human qualities, justice, temprance are still realized
in their essence, but they are seen to be present in living human beings. Hence
the poet does not present an abstract conception by a human symbol. He accepts
under his idealizing vision of human being as the symbol of his conception. For
instance, Britomart is not the abstract conception of chastity. She is a real
woman who expresses through her person the essential quality of chastity, but
not without some human weaknesses. Una may be Truth, but is much more. She
is a woman with sufficient individuality. And such in the main is the structural
allegory of The Faerie Queene. For sure, the characters are seldom presented
with the subtle and complex detail of a realist.
Spensers whole artistic method is that of idealization, and of emphasis
on the essential. But for all that he bases it on real life. Also, it cannot always be
decided whether the ideal conception or the character representing that ideal
formed his initial inspiration. Who can say for certain whether in Sir Calidore
he thought first of Courtesy or Sir Philip Sidney. Who can say whether he drew
from Timias or from Raleigh or found himself in his delineation of reckless
honouring, falling back unwittingly upon his knowledge of his daring and
impetuous friend. Allegory of this kind is easily distinguishable from the more
obvious personification, however vivid. It is marked by all the character of
myth. It has complete artistic life apart from all its symbolism.
Thus, in The Faerie Queene real persons are idealized. The poet breathes
life into his abstractions. For instance, Spenser sees his Hope not merely as a
symbolic figure leaning upon anchor, but as a real woman with a face bearing
signs of the anguish hidden in her heart. Similarly, Spenser sees Lord Grey not
simply as sagacious and fair-minded person, but as the faery knight of Justice.
The poet sets by the side of Grey a character named Talus, the iron man, that
most powerful embodiment of Justice in the abstract. Then, we see in Sir
Artegal and his remorseless squire two very different types of allegory, which
are at once in their boldest contrast and yet in perfect harmony. The most
interesting case of a mixture of different allegories is that of Graces, who dance
before Colin upon the mount of Acidale. They are actually four, not three, in
number. We see that in the midst of the three ancient handmaids of Venus,
daughters of delight, who symbolized for the Greeks the grace and charm of
womanhood, is placed paravaunt the woman that Colin loved, the heroine of
24
Amoretti and the Epithalamion. And yet there is nothing incongruous between
the ideal and the real; the two meet and their kinship is acknowledged.
In Spensers poem, The Faerie Queene, even where the allegory is least
spontaneous and quite dead, the poet is able to breathe life into what seems
doomed to be mechanic and merely formal. One such case is the ingenious
symbolism of the Castle of Alma. In all probability, it is borrowed from the
driest scholasticism. Here, in the description of its lower regions, Spensers art
seems to sink to its lowest. We see here the mechanical figures of the maister
cooke Decoction officiating with the Kitchen clerke Digestion. And yet even
within these antiquated walls we meet with vividly real people. Like Sir Guyon,
we find ourselves drawn to that strangely shy maiden, dressed in her thickly
folded robe of blue. As Guyon addresses her, the flashing blood inflames her
lovely face. The scene has a human appeal, which is not diminished when Alma
reveals its ideal significance:
Why wonder yee
Faire Sir at that, which ye so much embrace?
She is the fountaine of your modestee;
You shamefast are, but Shamefastness it selfe is shee.
Thus, the ideal conception of modesty is bodied forth in the lady. The human
quality of modesty is the very essence of Guyons personality. The two are
shown meeting for one brief but vivid moment in the spacious halls of Alma,
the Soul. Here, the wide world in which they meet is the ideal world of
Spensers imagination. We may sum up our discussion of allegory in The Faerie
Queene with a cogent citation from Smith and Selincourt:
This world of faery land is wide enough to embrace all that was
most precious to Spenser in his own experience. With its
chivalrous combats and its graceful leisure, its tangle of incident
and character, its dense forest and glades, and pleasant sunny
interspaces, where the smoke rises from the homely cottage or the
stream tickles down with a low murmur inviting repose and
meditation, it could mirror both the world of his philosophic
vision and the real world of Irish countryside, of court intrigues,
of European politics, of his own loves and friendships. The
romantic setting of the faery forest and the idealizing form of
allegory are more than a picturesque convention. They are the
fitting artistic expression of that mood in which he looked out on
the strangeness and the beauty of life, and brooded over its inner
meaning.

AS ROMANCE-EPIC:
Before we discuss, and can decide, the status of The Faerie Queene as an
epic, we need to know the definition and descendance of the epic. Epic being the
earliest and loftiest form of poetry also has the longest tradition in world
25
literature. The epic, or heroic poem, or simply long poem, is generally defined as
a long narrative poem on a serious subject, related in an elevated style, and
centred about an heroic figure on whose actions depends to some degree the fate
of a nation or a race. Epics have been divided into two categories the folk or
primary epic and the literary or secondary epic. The folk or primary epics were
shaped from the legends that developed in the heroic age. In that age, the nation
was on the move, engaged in military conquest and expansion. In this group
belong the Greek Iliad and Odyssey, both written by the blind poet Homer, as
well as Ramayana and Mahabharta, both Indian, and Beowulf, an Anglo-Saxon
epic whose author is not known. The literary or secondary epics were written by
sophisticated craftsmen in deliberate imitation of the folk or primary epic. Of
this kind is Virgils Roman poem, the Aeneid, and Miltons Paradise Lost.
Although influenced by Aeneid, Dantes Divine Comedy and Spensers The
Faerie Queene are only loosely called epics, since they radically depart from the
formal qualities of the original.
The epic as poetry was ranked by Aristotle (in his Poetics) as second only
to tragedy in the hierarchy of genres. The Renaissance critics, however,
considered epic superior to tragedy, and the highest form of all. The controversy
of hierarchy apart, epic is decidedly the most ambitious and most exacting of
poetic forms. It makes immense demands on the poets knowledge, invention,
and skill to sustain the scope, grandeur, and variety of a form which aspires to
encompass the known world and its learning. Despite countless attempts over
three thousand years, we possess only half a dozen or so epics of undisputed
status. Literary epics commonly have the following features, derived from the
folk epics of Homer in the west, and the Indian epics in the East. In the first
place, the hero of an epic is of great national or international importance.
Achilles in Iliad, Odysseus in Odyssey, Aeneis in Aeneid, Adam in Paradise
Lost, Rama in Ramayana, and Arjuna in Mahabharta, are all great warriors or
great men, who represent the ideals and aspirations of their respective societies
that produced them. The second quality of an epic is the large canvas of its
setting. The setting in an epic is always ample in scale, sometimes world-wide,
or even larger. For example, Odysseus wanders over the Mediterranean basin
(the whole of the world known to its author). In fact, in Book VI he descends
even into the underworld. The scope of Miltons epic is all the more enormous;
it is cosmic, including heaven, hell, and earth. The third quality of an epic is the
grand action, involving heroic deeds in battle, such as the Trojan war, or a long
and arduous journey bravely accomplished, such as the wanderings of Odysseus.
Paradise Lost includes the war in Heaven, the journey of Satan to discover the
newly created world, and his audacious attempt to outwit God by corrupting
mankind. The fourth aspect of an epic is the participation of gods and other
supernatural beings. For instance, the gods of Olympus in Homers epics,
Jehova, Christ, and the angels in Paradise Lost. This aspect of the epic is called
machinery. The fifth aspect of an epic is its elevated style, befitting to the grand
26
subject and lofty hero. The poem is almost a ceremonial performance in a
deliberately ceremonial style. Hence Miltons Latinate diction and stylized
syntax, his resounding list of strange and sonorous names, and, above all, his
epic simile help elevate the poems style. The epic similes is an elaborate and
sustained comparison, developed far beyond the specific points of parallel to the
subject. The objective is to enlarge, elevate and exaggerate the subject in order
to make it look larger than life size.
The debate about the poems status notwithstanding, the use of epic
similes by Spenser is deliberate and beyond dispute. Note, for instance, the
following from Book I of The Faerie Queene:
His huge long tayle wound up in hundred foldes,
Does ourspred his long bras-scaly backe,
Whose wreathed boughts when ever he unfolds,
And thicke entangled knots adown does slacke,
Bespotted as with shields of red and blacke,
It sweepeth all the land behing him farre,
And of three furlongs does but little lacke;
And at the point two stings in-fixed are,
Both deadly sharpe, that sharpest steele exceeden farre.
There is, in fact, an abundance of such similes in Spenser. In fact, at times, the
abundance starts sounding a little overdone. See, for instance, the following,
which follows just a stanza after the above:
His blazing eyes, like two bright shining shields,
Did burne with wrath, and sparkled living lyre;
As two broad Beacons, set in open fields.
Send forth their flames farr off to evry shyre.
And warning give, that enemies conspyre,
With fire and sword the region to invade;
So flamd his eyne with rage and rancorous yre:
But farre within, as in a hollow glade,
Those glaring lampes were set, that made a dreadfull shade.
There are several other conventions that the epic poets have been following,
taking cue from the earliest practitioners of the genre. One such convention has
been to open the poem by stating its theme, followed by an invocation to the
muse to help accomplish the gigantic task of completing the long poem.
Here again Spenser consciously follows the epic convention. The poem
opens with a set of four stanzas in which the poet makes an announcement of the
poems subject and invokes the muses to help him accomplish his heroic task of
completing the ambitious narrative. The first stanza reads as under:
Lo I the man, whose Muse whilome did maske,
As time her taught, in lowly Shepheards weeds,
Am now enforst a far unfitter taske,
For trumpets stern to chaunge mine Oaten reeds,
2?
And sing of Knights and Ladies gentle deeds;
Whose praises having slept in silence long,
Me, all too meane, the sacred Muse areeds
To blazen broad emongst her learned throng:
Fierce warres and faithful loves shall moralize my song.
Thus, Spenser shows his conscious connection with the epic poets. He departs
with the classical tradition on the point of structure largely, and on the point of
subject partly. Spenser chose the Italian poets, closer to him in time than the
ancient classics of Greek and Roman poetry, and followed their model for the
structuring of his most ambitious poem.
This more recent tradition of poetry dates back to the thirteenth century,
wherefrom literary or secondary epic becomes the main form. Also, the poets in
this tradition adopted Virgil as the source of inspiration. Virgils influence is
particularly apparent in the works of two great Italian poets Dante and Petrarch.
Early in the fourteenth century Dante wrote his Divine Commedia (1310). Later
in the century Petrarch wrote his epic Africa in Latin. The Divine Commedia is a
personal epic, a kind of autobiographical and spiritual Aeneid. Africa records
the struggle between Rome and Carthage. Neither Langlands Piers Plowman
nor Chaucers Canterbury Tales, though both are long poems, have any claims
as conventional epics. But by virtue of their range, diversity, and scale they are
of epic proportions. The same can be said of Ovids Metamorphoses. Their
imaginative depth and scope, too, rival the aspirations of their great epic
predecessors. More than a hundred years later, two Italian poets created what
can be called a new form of epic. This new form comprised of a long narrative
written about romantic adventures and in comic spirit. Before these poets, the
epic world had been overwhelmingly masculine. Boiardos unfinished Orlando
Innamorato (late 15
th
century) and Ariostos Orlando Furioso (1532), which
was a sequel to the former, established this new tradition. Orlando is driven mad
by love for Angelica. But the heroine of the poem is Bradamante whose love
affair with Ruggiero is the main subject of the work. The poem also contains a
certain amount of mockery of chivalric ideals and knightly prowess.
Two other outstanding epics in the new tradition or form of Europe
belong to the sixteenth century, namely Camoenss Os Lusiadas (1572) and
Tassos Gerusalemme Liberata (1575). Of these, while the first is classical and
Virgilian in spirit and structure, the second is Christian rather than classical or
nationalistic. Camoens does for Portugal what Virgil had done for Rome. It has
for its theme Vasco Da Gamas discovery of the sea-route to India. In the course
of the narrative, Camoens covers the whole history of Portugal. In doing so, he
creates a nationalistic epic in which the Portuguese wage a holy war against
paganism. Tassos subject is the recovery of Jerusalem in the First Crusade. It
has many heroes and heroines and owes a good deal to the tradition of the
medieval romance. It also contains a strong element of the chivalric and
supernatural. It is also a didactic and allegorical poem.
28
Spensers The Faerie Queene (1589, 1596) is an acknowledged greatest
long poem in English of the Elizabethan age. Like the preceding Italian poems,
it is a mixture of epic and romance. It is written in the specially designed stanza
form now called the Spenserian stanza. He professedly planned the poem in
twenty-four books, but only six could be completed, left unfinished in the
middle of the seventh. That Spenser was conscious of writing the poem in the
great epic tradition is evident in all aspects of his epic, including the opening
announcement. In the prefatory letter to Sir Walter Raleigh, he also mentioned,
as his four greatest predecessors, Homer, Virgil, Ariosto and Tasso. Spenser
designed the poem as an elaborate allegory or, as he calls it, darke conceit. He
uses in the poem the material of the Arthurian legends and the Charlemagne
romances. The hero of each book represents a virtue, making the poem
throughout a didactic narrative. The structure of the poem is astonishingly
complex, rich, and allusive. Also, it needs to be noted that The Faerie Queene is
a courtesy book, the most elaborate and courtly of all books of etiquette of the
Elizabethan age. As Spenser explains in his letter to Raleigh, the generall end
therefore of all the booke is to fashion a gentleman or noble person in virtuous
and gentle discipline. With The Faerie Queene comes to an end the tradition of
the epic of chivalry, in fact, the whole cult of chivalry. But that did not affect its
great influence on the subsequent narrative poets.
Although, as we have seen, The Faerie Queene combines within its fold
both the traditions of the classical epic as well as the medieval romance, in its
spirit it is neither classical nor medieval. Spenser gives his poem, through its
allegorical structure, the spirit of the Renaissance ideal which combines
Christian, Platonic and humanist codes. In that sense, it is the most complex epic
poem of all the classical as well as medieval lot. The radical change in the spirit
of The Faerie Queene from that of the classical epics need to be understood;
else, we misjudge the merit of Spensers work. To get at the nature of that spirit
we shall have to go back to the end of the eleventh century poetry. It was during
this period that the idea of the holy crusade, and hence of the Christian epic, was
born. We are right and these miscreants are wrong (as Roland utters in the
French epic) conveys the spirit that dominated the European epics after Le
Chauson de Roland. This was something altogether new for epic poetry. The
epic had always lived by conflict. Until this time, it was simply a conflict
between two sides, with both sides almost equally protected by gods. Also, both
sides were noble, one destined to prevail only with the help of superior power,
or the accidental support of an immortal conceived in essentially human terms.
Homer writes from the Greek point of view, but he does not suggest that the
Greeks were right, and the Trojans were wrong. Virgil has moved perceptibly
nearer to the idea of a hero with a divine mission. But he also does not suggest
that the Trojans have any sacred or pre-ordained superiority over the Latins. In
these epics one does not perceive any attempt to portray one side representing
faith and the other faithlessness, one side as good and the other as evil.
29
The notion of the conflict having supernatural sanction is original with the
Christian epic. This idea, in various forms and with varying degrees of intensity,
runs all through the European epics after the French Roland. It is not quite
absent in the more frivolous Italian epics. And it runs with all the weight in the
operation of Redcross Knight and Sir Artegall in Spensers The Faerie Queene,
Book I. To the readers of Ariosto, struck only by the fantasy and irony, the idea
of the Christian crusade may look an absurdity. But there is a case to be made of
it all the same. As for Tasso, the case needs no arguing. Writing in the full tide
of the Counter-Reformation and completely expressing its spirit, he takes the
holy war as his theme as well as his inspiration. It must, however, be added that
neither in Ariosto nor in Tasso do the exigencies of the faith exclude chivalry
and courtesy to those outside its bounds.
The Italian romance-epic benefitted the most from the Arthurian
literature, from its vast and many-sided appeal. Like Charlemagne, Arthur was
Christian prince, fighting against pagan enemies. With the disappearance of the
great theme of national and Christian war against a pagan foe, the exploits of the
individual knights of the Round-Table became deeds of individual prowess,
undertaken for love or personal renown. True, the knights of the Round-Table
sometimes fight against pagan or Saracen knights; but these are in no other way
distinguished from the Christians. They are equally likely to be noble and brave.
The code of chivalry embraces pagan and Christian alike. Also, the
disappearance of the holy war affects the supernatural no less than the natural
events. They are no longer parts of a providential scheme. They become
individual enchantments, infinitely various, and mysterious in means and
motive. Above all, it was the love theme that distinguished the Arthurian
romances from the older epic. In Italy, it was above all the love stories, of
Lancelot and Guinevere, of Tristan and Iseult, that represent the Arthurian cycle.
Hence a new motive enters Italian romance literature love and the fatal power
of the heroine. We are already in sight of Spensers Angelica and Bradamante. It
is this grafting of the new Arthurian romance on to the old Carolingian stock
that brings the romantic epic into being. It also accounts for the pervasive
atmosphere of Arthurian romance in Spensers The Faerie Queene; of course,
with the absence of specific Arthurian tales or specific debts to Malory. The
Arthurian element is too obvious in Spenser to be denied or overlooked. But it
came to him, not form Malory, but from his Italian sources. Whenever a
different and distinctly British Arthurian element enters in The Faerie Queene
the ordinary reader quite often fails to notice it.
Spensers epic begins in the same manner in which does Boiardos,
though Spenser, affected by later notions of epic correctness, plunged in medias
res, left what was chronologically the beginning to the end, and so never got to it
at all. The two fountains of Cupid and Merlin, the one inspiring love and the
other hate, which play a large part in the story, are similarly removed from the
Carolingian and Akin to the Arthurian spirit. Above all, there is the central
30
importance of the heroine, the delectable Angelica, whose caprices and
enchantments control the entire intricate web. Spenser had read Boiardo as much
as he had read Ariosto and Virgil. Boiardos style is straightforward, easy and a
little rustic. He tells his tale with a rather grand carelessness and an undertone of
irony that is nearer to simple humour than to the finesse of Ariosto. His
admiration for the virtues of chivalry is whole-hearted and perfectly genuine.
There are many parallels between Boiardo and Spenser. A certain old-fashioned
simplicity of mind brings him in some way closer to Spenser. But ever more
important than that is the fact that he created Ariostos world, and therefore, at
one remove, form Spensers world. He laid down the lines both of its adventures
and its characters. All the principal characters in Ariosto are taken over from
Boiardo. The principal heroes, Orlando, Rinaldo, Astolfo, Ferran, all subject to
the whims of Angelica. The faithful lovers Ruggiero and Bradamante,
Brandimarte and Fiordilige, etc., with their beguiling gardens; the magic lance,
the shield, the lions, the dragons, the hermits, the salvage men; all these that
make Boiardos world are taken over bodily by Ariosto. Further, without these
characters of Ariosto and Boiardo, there could not have been Spensers Arthur,
Guyon, Calidore, Artegall and Britomart, Scudamour and Amoret, Archimago,
Duessa and Acrasia. Intricate adventures proliferating into many episodes, feats
of arms inspired by love, and a background, however treated, of religions
conflict these are the materials that Spenser inherited from these Italian writers
of romance-epic. It is also possible to find, besides one or two explicitly
allegorical episodes, a general allegorical undertone to Boiardos romance. And
it is quite likely that Spenser read him in this way. It is, therefore, in these
respects that Spensers The Faerie Queene is different from the classic epics of
Homer and Virgil, and is similar to the romance-epics of Boiardo and Ariosto.

LITERARY ALLUSIONS:
It was quite inevitable that Spensers faery land should be enriched with
the spoils of literary reminiscence. A student from his youth, Spenser had lived a
full and eager life in books. His imagination was kindled as much in the study as
in the outside world. To know the sources of his art is to get familiar with the
library to which the Elizabethan scholar had access. Spenser also drew with
equal freedom from the Bible, from the Greek and Latin poets, from the writings
of the Italian and French Renaissance, and from that medieval literature which
the learned held up to contempt. La Morte DArthur, and kindred romances, Sir
Bevis, Guy of Warwick, and the rest those feigned books of chivalry
wherein, says Ascham, a man by reading them should be led to none other end
but only to manslaughter and bawdry suggested to Spenser much incident and
inspired many a noble reflection. His art was a compound of many simple
elements extracted from many sources. Although he borrowed from his
predecessors more than any other poet did, no one left as distinct a mark of his
own personality on the borrowed material as he did. There is hardly an incident
3l
or character in The Faerie Queene which cannot be traced in the writings of one
or another writer that came before him. All that only proves the extent of his
readings in earlier literature. However, more surprising than the extent and
diversity of his reading is his power to combine in one composite picture
materials drawn from very different sources. He is able to harmonize these
borrowed materials because he leaves nothing as he found; his imagination
colours all that passes through his mind. Thus, every particle included in the
formation of the rich compound shows the distinctive imprint of the poets
personality. The routine distinctions between classical and romantic, ancient and
modern, sacred and profane do not come in his way of assimilating and
amalgamating them into his multi-coloured texture he designs for each of his
poems. Spenser pursued such an eclectic method alike in the weaving of his plot,
in its incidental embellishment, in the similes and allusions that enrich his style
and drive home his imaginative conception.
The story of Una and Redcross knight in Book I of The Faerie Queene
opens with suggestions of Malorys Gareth and Lynette. Here, the enchanter,
who is their chief enemy, is not a distant relative of Ariostos hermit, who
deceives Angelica. Further, on their travels, Una and her knight meet with
classical satyrs and Elizabethan courtiers. Their adventures at this time are
reminiscent now of Virgil, now of Sir Bevis and The Seven Champions of
Christendom, now of the Apocalypse. When their betrothal is described, its
celebration marks a confusion of pagan and Christian rituals. However, despite
all these echoes of earlier sources, the harmony of the imaginative atmosphere
created with all these allusions is not disturbed by any individual element.
Similarly, when we come upon the description of the ante-room in the house of
Busirane, which is hung with goodly arras whereon, as in the castles of several
medieval poets, are woven legends of classical mythology. Presumably, their
source is Ovid, but nothing could be different form Ovid than the music and the
feeling with which Spenser delineates them. Further, we see that over the portals
of the room are inscribed the words Be bold, which are said to have come from
the old wives tale of Mr. Fox. Also, among the lovers whose spotless
pleasures make glad the garden of Venus, David and Jonathan, Pylades and
Orestes walk side by side. Then, in the dark river of Cocytus, Pilate stands next
to Tamtalus.
Spensers style does not undergo any change when it comes to giving
utterance to his religious thoughts. For instance, the well of life into which the
Redcross knight falls and sinks in his conflict with the Dragon, is likened, not
merely to Silo or to Jordon, but to Cephise and to Hebrus, to the English Bath,
and to the German Spau. The guardian angel, who watches over the prostate Sir
Guyon after his fierce struggle with the temptations of Mammon, and evokes
that superb expression of Christian humility and gratitude, O why should
heavenly God to men have such regard?, appears to Spenser as a fair young
man of wondrous beautie, and of freshest years, like to Phoebus, or to
32
Cupido on Idaean hill. A pedant may find this comparison rather ludicrous, and
the more prosaic pietist may find it profane. But to Spenser it seemed quite
natural, even inevitable. As Truth appealed to the poet in terms of beauty, so all
beauty, whatever its source, could be brought to serve and to illuminate the
highest truth.

Spenser brings this wealth of literary allusions in touch with his own
observation of nature and of human character. The Irish scenery with which he
was most familiar, and which resembled the traditional landscape of medieval
romance, provided background for his poem, which is also often treated in a
traditional manner. Also, as the fruit of intimate observation, it gave him
pictures of vivid reality.

STRUCTURE OF THE FAERIE QUEENE:
It is a little odd that a poem, which is incomplete, should be subjected to
the consideration of its plot and structure. And yet, there has been a running
debate on the subject of the poems structure. One way of looking at the
structure of The Faerie Queene is to see how far the proposed design of the 24
books has been followed in the six that are complete. Another is to forget about
the proposed pattern and look for the structure of the existing poem in six books
and a small fragment of the seventh. The difficulty that one experiences in
considering the poems structure is, however, posed not by its incompleteness so
much as the mixing of modes that the poet has deliberately effected. The poem
consciously follows the epic model, the romance model, the allegorical mode,
etc.; all within the framework of a single poem. As C. S. Lewis has observed,
Formally considered, The Faerie Queene is the fusion of two kinds, the
medieval allegory and the more recent romantic epic of the Italians. Because it is
allegory, and allegory neither strictly religious nor strictly erotic but universal,
every part of the poets experience can be brought in: because it is romantic
epic, a certain unity is immediately imposed on all that enters it, for all is
embodied in romantic adventures. Faerie land itself provides the unity a
unity not of plot but of milieu. A priori the ways of Faerie Land might seem so
exceeding spatious and wide that such a unity amounted to nothing, but this is
not found to be so. Few poems have a greater harmony of atmosphere. The
multiplicity of the stories, far from impairing the unity, supports it; for just that
multiplicity, that packed fullness of vehement adventure, is the quality of
Faerie Land; as tragedy is the quality of Hardys Wessex.
Here, then, is one way of looking at the unity of the poems structure. The
way is not to look at its unity in terms of Aristotalian beginning, middle and end,
not in terms of a chain of incidents linked with each other on the principle of
causality, nor in terms of the story of a single, or a set of characters. The unity of
the poems structure, we are told, has to be seen in terms of its atmosphere. And
the atmosphere of the Faerie Land, it is argued, is that of romance or romantic
33
adventure, just as in Hardys Wessex, the atmosphere is that of tragedy. So we
study the poems structure in terms of its mood and atmosphere, not in
traditional terms of incident and character. In Lewiss view, there is in The
Faerie Queene the originality and fruitfulness of its structural invention. In his
view, whatever incidental faults the poem may have, it decidedly has a healthy
constitution. The matter and the form fit each other like hand and glove.
The primary structural idea (of atmospheral unity) is reinforced by two
others, the first internal to each book, and the second striding across from book
to book through the whole poem. Thus, Spenser seems to have decided that in
each book there should be, what Lewis calls, an allegorical core (or shrine or
inner stage) where the theme of the book would appear disentangled from the
complex adventures and reveal its unity. The core of each book can be described
as follows: in Book I, the House of Holiness; in Book II, the House of Alma; in
Book III, the Garden of Adonis; in Book IV, the Temple of Venus; in Book V,
the Church of Isis; and in Book VI, Mount Acidale. Since the position of the
core in each book is not stable, no conclusion can be drawn based on the
numbering of the two cantos of Book VII. Next in dignity to the core in each
book comes the main allegorical story of the book. It may be Guyons or
Calidores quest. Beyond that is a loose fringe of stories which may be fully
allegorical (like Sendamores visit to the cottage of Care) or merely typical (like
Paridells seduction of Hellenore) or not allegorical at all (like the story told by
the Squire of Dames to Satyrane). So, the appearance of pathless wandering,
which is very necessary to the poems quality, is largely a work of deliberate and
successful illusion. It is quite possible, although a little improbable, that the poet
does not always know where he is going with regard to particular stories. But he
is always very much in command with regard to the symphony of mood, the
careful arrangement of different degrees of allegory and different degrees of
seriousness. And it is in this symphony and symmetry that the poems unity lies.
The unity of The Faerie Queenes structure is also to be seen in the
symphony or symmetry of its imagery. As Northrop Frye has remarked, To
demonstrate a unity in The Faerie Queene, we have to examine the imagery of
the poem rather than its allegory. It is Spensers habitual technique, developing
as it did out of emblematic visions he wrote in his nonage, to start with the
image, not the allegorical translation of it, and when he says at the beginning of
the final canto of Book II:
Now givs this goodly frame of Temperance
Fairely to rise
one feels that the frame is built out of the characters and places that are clearly
announced to be what they are, not out of their moral or historical shadows. It
is significant to note that Spenser prefaces his poem with sonnets to several
patrons. And it is quite clear from those pieces that the poet meant to indicate to
them that they are there somewhere in the poem. Of course, he does not specify
where precisely anyone of them appears. However, the implication is that for
34
such readers the allegory is to be read more or less ad libitum. The expressions
that Spenser chooses to use for allegory darke conceit, clowdily enwrapped
emphasize that allegorys deliberate vagueness. One example to this effect will
suffice. It is quite clear in the poem that Belphoebe refers to Elizabeth, or so we
believe. But, when Timias speaks of her, to whom the heavens doe serve and
sew, can we really say, as someone does, that it is a reference to the storm that
wrecked the Armada? Obviously, such a reading is only an example of a
subjective allegorical meaning. In the work of Spenser, the greatest allegorical
poet in English, the allegory can not merely be uncertain but even be muddled.
Of course, Fryes argument is not that we let the allegory go, but that it is
evident in Spenser that the imagery is prior in importance to it.
We must, therefore, while looking for unity in the poem, also look for the
structure of imagery. Centring around the quest and journey motives each book
of The Faerie Queene moves through a pattern of conflict between the forces of
good and those of evil. Since the world of The Faerie Queene is that of romance,
the presence of good and evil is shown in the simplified terms of separate
existence of the two. Hence, Spensers method is to make every virtue and vice
visual, which makes the moral of every conflict clear, besides making the
presentation interesting in terms of fable. Thus, fable follows fable, image
follows image, character follows character, incident follows incident, and all
moving in a simultaneous visual show of moral and spiritual journey through
light and sound apparatus. The structure thus of imagery that emerges in the
poem is multi-dimensional. Romance may simplify the complex reality of life
into static characters and symbolic incidents, but it complicates the matter in the
presentation of the equations between different characters and incidents. Hence
in such a work as Spensers while philosophy may get simplified, in almost
adolescent vision of life, the structure gets complicated by the very wealth of
details. But one can always notice the repetitive tracks which one finds in the
web of visual imagery. Thus, both allegory as well as imagery help notice the
principles or patterns which contrive unity in the poem.
Still another way of finding an entry into the structure of The Faerie
Queene to see where the unity of the poem lies is, as Rosemond Tuve has
suggested: By far the most striking element of structure which Spenser has
caught from much attention to romances is the principle of entrelacement. No
doubt it is this characteristically interrupted and interwoven structure which is
referred to when Wilfred Owen distinguishes the typical Ariostan structure of
Books III and IV of The Faerie Queene from the contrasted repetitive structure
of Books I and II; Spenser is thought to have failed to accommodate these
structures to each other when he conceived the idea of a super-epic, in which
each Book should be a little epic or miniature Aeneid, with its separate hero, as
in Books I and II. However, typical romance entrelacement, a thoroughly
medieval development though altered by Ariosto for more suspense and variety,
seems to me to characterize all Spensers designs. The well organized Books I
35
and II are not little epics with separate heroes, but parts of a whole, connected as
the parts of cyclical romances are ordinarily connected, and in fact showing
extreme likeness to the way the different quests of the Queste are connected.
The separate Books exhibit, as units and as parts of the unfinished whole, a
romances kind of coherence. It is unlike, even opposed to, that epic coherence
which was most palatable to the eighteenth and nineteenth centuries, and which
was all the more attractive to the nineteenth century if the piece got its unity
from an epic hero more visibly than from an epic action. These remarks sum up
the substance of the debate about the structure of Spensers poem. The critic is
right in discouraging us from seeing the poems unity in terms of the traditional
epic form. He rightly puts us on the path of romance, which the poem obviously
is, suggesting how romance form holds the key to the poems unity. Of course,
corroborating that unity in terms of the pattern of allegory or that of imagery
does not, in any sense, contradict the romance structure. After all, romance quest
is also to be about something and it would require some method and technique
to make the quest or journey humanly interesting. The method and technique
bring in allegory and imagery which, undisputedly, are the chief devices of
Spenser as poet.
Although we see Spensers poem closer to romance than epic, no one
intends to deny the simple fact that Spenser deliberately tried to emulate epic
structure and epic conventions. The problem arises only when we try to see epic
in romance or romance in epic, and call it defective the moment we see any
departure or deviation from the traditional form of an epic or romance. As
Rosemand Tuve argues, This web-structure has special possibilities of
gradually discernible meaning as the woven pattern shows it is a pattern and
takes shape. Hence it was a superbly invented instrument for conveying not only
what we called the polyphonic nature of what is happening, but that which
interested Spenser supremely, the fact to human minds what happens means
something is significant. Hence the real principle of unity, in this view, lies in
meanings of happenings, which inform what happened and are not separable
from the story. In a romance, the story can be advanced by conventions, such as
customs of castles, quarrelsome knights provoking battles, stops for lodging,
knights-errant who merely meet adventure, etc. It is such a use of significances
as the cohering factor, not the fancifulness of romance, which makes it possible
for the reader to move in and out of symbols like the real places they are.
Although this mode of making different incidents cohere in a unity is used
all over the poem, it is easier to observe in Books where a single hero achieves
some objective or learns some great lesson. Unlike the epic, Spensers poem
does not depend on the sequential series of happenings, which is natural to a
biography-of-hero principle of organization. In Spenser, we encounter a
conception of structure very different from that which would give us an epic
action towards which every events builds, or an epic hero whom every action
ultimately exalts. In The Faerie Queene, structure is an interweaving of
36
unrelated parts which unobstrusively take shape as a pattern. In this poem, unity
is not imparted by the series of a heros exploits, nor by the development of a
mind, nor even by a conflict. The virtue, which is sought by the hero of each
book, acts as the unifying factor in every Book. This is quite a common thing in
romance, but not so common in epic. Spenser inherited this structure from the
Italian poets who preceded him, those who wrote romances. Through the
inheritance of this structure, which was neither episodic nor articulated like an
epic action, Spenser found it convenient to heighten the presentation of reigning
themes to produce real allegory, and yet evade the problem which teases the
modern writer, where and when the story is subordinate to allegory.
Thus, in Spensers The Faerie Queene the unifying principle of structure
is not the history of a particular or an individual; the action is not a biography, a
life, but an action. Allegory may have many definitions, all seen to agree to
Sidneys remark on poetry, that it deals with things in their universal
consideration, so that we view abstractions themselves interacting. It seems
Spenser acted brilliantly in realizing that a structure which weaves a tapestry
before us is particularly well-suited to allegory, where pattern must overwhelm
us. He also came out supremely successful at this secret conveying of
unparaphrasable meaning. We need not obscure the poets success by re-writing
his stories into their allegories. Instead, we should take the whole images with
all their depicted feelings as the true statements of his allegorical meanings.

SPENSER'S POETIC STYLE:
Spensers art can be said to vary from homeliness to splendour, from the
remoteness of romance to the closeness of common life. We can be sure that the
greatness of his art lies, not in the one sphere or in the other, but in the fusion of
both the spheres. And in this very fusion lies the secret of his style. It easily
adapts itself to the matter or mood in hand. It is also the fitting expression of the
poets unique and graceful personality. His personality as poet may not be as
forceful as that of Milton, but his character is no less indelibly stamped on all
the different poems he wrote. Wordsworth and Keats have produced lines which
could be mistaken for those of Milton, but no one has produced a stanza which
could be mistaken for Spensers. the distinctive qualities of his style can be
found in its diction and its melody. Spenser was drawn to an archaism, which is
inimitable because it is purely capricious. He was drawn to it because of its
reminiscent picturesqueness as well as by its musical potentialities.

In his very first, and greatly successful, poem, the Shepheardes Calender,
Spenser had experimented in the use of archaic language. The diction of The
Faerie Queene is a more mature product of his peculiar poetic talent. Undeterred
by the criticism of his contemporaries, he took complete advantage of the fluid
state of English in his day, not only to recover the obsolete, but to construct new
words on the analogies of the old, and to adapt both his spelling and
3?
pronounciation to the desired effects of cadence and melody. One of the aims of
Spenser as poet was to perfect for himself an instrument from which he could
extract a music as subtle as Chaucers and by means of which he could create
around his subject the atmosphere of an ideal antique world. The Chaucerian
element in Spensers language is like a distinct but not often perceived flavour.
It can be tasted in occasional words, such as warry, encheason, or solas. It
can also be felt in the use of abstract nouns with romance terminations. Finally,
it can be seen in the cadence or verbal reminiscence of such a line as there
many minstrales maken melodye. It clearly shows how from Chaucer he learnt
the metrical value of the short syllable.
Spensers poetic style is also marked by a special touch of the old
romance. Malory and others had transplanted it from France. It gets expressed in
such words as prow, persaunt, belgardes, heavperes, paravaunt. We
also need to remember that many of Spensers supposed archaisms are those of
his age. He did, of course, cherish words which though still in use were rapidly
going out of fashion. The sustained colouring and atmosphere of Spensers style,
we find, is given by a constant use of words which are not so frequently found in
Marlowe, Shakespeare, or Sidney. Thus, Spenser made the fullest use of the
richly compounded language by freely adapting spelling, punctuation, and word-
formation, to his needs. In order to lighten the movement and smooth the flow of
his metre he could use old forms, as whilom was the antique worldes guize.
To suit the play of his melody or rhyme he could vary his forms, using
dreriment, or drerihed, or dreariness, jollihed or jollitee. Spenser also
created his own forms such as the adjective daint, or the verb to cherry.
Spenser has invited criticism about his diction, which has been labelled arbitrary
and illogical. Yet Spenser has grafted his so-called idiosyncrasies on to a firm
and healthy stock of pure and simple English. His style is decidedly free from
the involved and pedantic mannerisms which were very common in his day.
Therefore, it can be said that Spenser was the first conscious inventor of a
distinct poetic diction. His diction provoked Daniel, his contemporary, to
comment that Spenser used aged accents and untimely words; and Ben Jonson
to say that in affecting the ancients he writ no language. However, while his
contemporaries disparaged him, the romantics admired him. Note, how
Coleridge comments: there was no poet whose writings would safelier stand the
test of Mr. Wordsworths theory than Spenser.
It has been unanimously acclaimed that the distinctive quality of
Spenserian melody found perfect expression in the verse form of The Faerie
Queene. Throughout the huge length of the poem he heightens the effect proper
to his interlacing rhyme-system by an unbroken assonance and alliteration, as
also by the haunting repetition of word, phrase and cadence. His supreme tour
de force in this method can be seen in his often cited stanzas from the Bower of
Bliss in Book II. Of course, this method is habitual to him. Also, it is capable of
infinite variation according to his needs. Puttenham, another contemporary of
38
Spenser, noted some of those rhetorical figures, such as both auricular and
sensible, by which all the words and clauses are made as well tunable to the ear
as stirring to the mind, that find perfect illustration in The Faerie Queene. At
times, Spenser repeats a word in such a manner that it gives the line a metrical
balance. Another time it enforces an obvious antithesis. At times, the iteration is
little more than a play upon the meaning of the word. But more often, the word
suggests a subtlety in the poets thought or feeling by the peculiar quality which
it imparts to the music of the stanza:
Withal she laughed, and she blusht withal,
That blushing to her laughter gave more grace,
And laughter to her blushing, as did fall.
Spensers skill in playing with the recurrent word and phrase and cadence
throughout a whole stanza is very much like that of an expert juggler who
weaves in the air intricate patterns with various balls of different colours, and
yet never allows any ball to go out of his control. Note, for example, the
following:
Amongst those knights there were three brethren bold,
Three bolder brethren never were yborne,
Borne of one mother in one happie mold,
Borne at one burden in one happie morne,
That bore three such, three such not to be fond;
Her name was Agape whose children werne
All three as one, the first hight Priamond,
The second Dymond, and youngest Triamond.
Puttenham gave this device the name of translacer, which is when you turn and
translace a word with many sundry shapes as the Tailor doth his garment, and
after that sort to play with him in your dittie. Some say that Spenser was
attracted to this device in the prose of Sidney; others, that he caught its true
poetic use from his study of the Latin poets. Dryden called it the turn upon the
word or the thought. He rightly recognized that the English master of this device
was Spenser, who had studied Virgil, and among his other excellences had
copied that.
One of the prominent aspects of Spensers poetic style is the music. He
has been considered most musical among the English poets. His studied use of
assonance and alliteration springs from his musical instinct. He employs
assonance usually to give greater value to the vowel of the rhyme word, by
anticipating it in some strong place within the line:
Weening some heavenly goddesse he did see,
Or else unweeting, what it else might be;
This use can be especially noticed in the Alexandrine, where the assonance will
often be found to emphasize the caesura (a break or pause in a line of poetry,
dictated by the natural rhythm of the language and/or enforced by punctuation):
Or A work of wondrous grace, and able soules to save.
39
That like a rose her silken leaves did fair unfold.
At times Spenser continues his assonance through a stanza, as in the following,
where he emphasizes the rhyme vowels ai and e by contrasting them with the
harder sound of i:
So there that right Sir Calidore did dwell,
And long while after, whilest him list remaine,
Dayly beholding the faire Pastorell,
And feeding on the bayt of his owne bane.
During which time he did her entertaine,
With all kind courtesies, he could invent;
And every day, her companie to gaine,
When to the field she went, he with her went:
So for to quench her fire, he did it more augment.
Spensers most persistent stylistic device is alliteration, which he uses as
much to mark his rhythm as to knit his verse together; as much to enforce his
meaning as to enrich his melody. His source for this device was, decidedly, that
earlier poetry of the Anglo-Saxon period which is alliterative by structure. Its
artistic value was enhanced by his study of Chaucer, in whose poetry it is
accidental rather than structural. He developed its musical possibilities to their
utmost, so much so that it became for him an integral part of his melody, capable
of sustaining his verse even when his poetic inspiration was at its lowest. Many
of Spensers favourite phrases, such as loving lord, girlonds gay, silver
sleepe, lovely layes, wide wildernesse, are born of his love of alliteration.
It becomes such a natural element of his music that at times it even influences,
almost unconsciously, his choice of words. Note, for instance, the following:
I knockt, but no man aunswered me by name;
I cald, but no man answerd to my clame.
Spenser knew the power of alliteration upon w to give the sense of vastness and
desolation:
In all his wayes through this wide worldes wave.
It seems that in Spensers mind certain combinations of consonants were
associated with particular feelings or conceptions. He would always carry their
use through several lines, sometimes even through an entire stanza. His
alliteration upon s and l for conveying a sense of peace are particularly effective.
The sense of peace is conveyed through the senses lulled are in slumber of
delight. One of the best examples of this type is the Despairs argument, which
is rendered irrisitible by the music in which it is phrased:
Is not short paine well borne, that brings long ease,
And layes the soule to sleepe in quiet grave?
Sleepe after toyle, port after stormie seas,
Ease after warre, death after life does greatly please.
Very similar is Arthurs dream of the faerie queene; the alliteration does the
trick here also:
40
Whiles every sence the humour sweet embayd,
And slombring soft my hart did steale away,
Me seemed, by my side a royal Mayd
Her daintie limbes full softly down did lay.
We need to note here that in all these citations the effect of the alliteration is
strengthened by the use of the alliterative letter in the middle and end as well as
at the beginning of the words.
All these are, of course, special uses. Apart from these uses, assonance as
well as alliteration runs through Spensers entire verse as an integral part of its
melody. It sounds as a kind of sweet undertone. It blends with the regular rise
and fall of the verse. It enhances the rhythmical appeal. Finally, it forms a total
effect of indefinable grace and beauty.
A style like that of Spenser is always fraught with dangers as well as
temptations. No wonder that Spenser did not escape them. No doubt, his finest
music is strongly linked with his noblest imaginings, he could still convey, in
music of a kind, any idea, however trivial, even though it was not always worth
the carriage. In such cases, he ends up producing parodies of his own poetic self.
He loses his imagination. His favourite and powerful devices become just
threadbare artifice of a cunning metrical trickster. He fills out, then, the
rhythmical structure of his stanza with words and phrases that add nothing to his
picture. He gives then whole lines of comment. That is trite and commonplace.
He never learnt the art of pruning, nor was he overcareful to weed. Although his
verse has a vigour of its own, it is seldom rapid. His verse can be said to be the
counterpart of that brooding habit in which he usually looked at life. Its
sustaining principle was a slow circling movement that continually returned
upon itself. The essential quality of Spensers style is better summed up by the
inspired lines of Wordsworth than by any prose criticism can do:
Sweet Spenser moving through his clouded heaven
With the moons beauty and the moons soft pace.
To Spenser the significance of the situations that he chooses to describe as well
as his attitude to them were more than situations themselves. The music in
which his imagination phrased them was very much a part of their significance.
To say this is, of course, to deny him supreme place among narrative poets, even
among the writers of romance. Also, even those readers who like a story for its
own sake often find him tedious. They turn with relief to Ariosto, Byron, or
Scott. But the charm of his romantic world is not only conveyed through an
appropriate poetic style, it is also enhanced by the sound and colour of his verse.
The charm assumes the nature of enchantment. It carries us along, far away from
the real world, and into the faerie land of people and places better or worse than
the real. Style is the man. The statement is more true in the case of Spenser
than anyone else.

THE SPENSERIAN STANZA:
4l
The unique and distinctive quality of Spenserian melody found perfect
expression in the verse form of The Faerie Queene. The stanza form was his
own invention. That is why it has come to be known as the Spenserian stanza. It
is considered Spensers greatest contribution to the development of English
prosody. Perhaps it was Chaucers rhyme royal (a b a b b c c ) which called his
attention to the effectiveness of a stanza with an uneven number of lines. The
effects achieved in these two measures might well be said to represent the
difference between the metrical genius of Chaucer and that of Spenser. He is
also said to owe something to the ottava rima (a b a b a b c c). In all probability,
Spenser relied more on rhyme royal than on ottava rima for forging his new
stanza form. An evidence to this probability is the interlacing of his rhymes that
brings his measure nearer to the stanza that he had borrowed from Chaucer for
the opening of his April and November Eclogues (a b a b b c b c). But to admit
this should not in any way detract from the absolute originality of the Spenserian
stanza.
Spenser added ninth line to the ottava rima and made it longer by adding
two more syllables. He made it decasyllabic. This line provides magnificent
conclusion to the linked sweetness of the preceding eight. In the last line, the
music of the whole stanza spreads and settles to a triumphant or a quiet close.
Note, for instance, the following:
Nought is there under heavens wide hollownesse,
That moves more dear compassion of mind,
Then beautie brought tunworthy wretchednesse
Through envies snares or fortunes freakes
I, whether lately through her brightnesse blind,
Or through alleageance and fast fealtie,
Which I do owe unto all woman kind,
Feele my heart perst with so great agonie,
When such I see, that all for pittie I could die.
It logical value to the metrical scheme lies in the fact that, standing separate
from the rest by reason of its length, it constitutes a distinct climax. Thus, in a
manner, it remains detached. And yet, because it is linked in rhyme with the
foregoing quatrain, it never suffers the sharp isolation that often marks the final
couplet of the ottava rima or the rhyme royal .
The ninth line, which is longer than the rest, and is the last line, is
apparently fitted for sentitious (a short, pithy statement which expresses an
opinion) and reflective comment upon the situation. Note, for example, the
following:
Ill wears he armes, that nill them use for Ladies sake
Thus, it is admirable for rounding off an episode, or concluding a canto. It is
quite often the most beautiful line of a stanza, which gathers strength as it moves
on, giving the last beautiful touch to a detailed description. Note, for instance,
the following:
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Loe where the dreadfull Death behind thy backe doth stond,
At times, it distils into one perfect sentence the emotion that the other eight lines
of the stanza have evoked, such as the following:
Ah Love, lay downe thy bow, the whiles I may respire.
This ninth long line, called Alexandrine, as a rule, has an almost regular iambic
beat, and a caesura which splits the line into two equal parts. Even with such a
construction, it can be put to various uses, as Spenser does in The Faerie
Queene. One of its uses is that it can express a tender beauty, such as the
following:
So faire a creature yet saw never sunny day.
It can also roll magnificently as when it tells
Of old Assaracus, and Inacbus divine
Or when it tells of
A sacrament prophane in mistery of wine.
At times, it can also be utterly simple, such as the following:
For all we have is this: what he list do, he may.
Spenser quite often gives it a slight variation from the normal type to give
expression to the subtlest grades of feeling. The addition of a syllable to the fifth
foot of the line makes it dance with the grace and easy movement of a bride:
When forth from virgin bowre she comes in th early morne.
At times Spenser makes it avoid a marked caesura to gain an added length and a
more sustained and sinuous flow like that of a snake. Note, for instance, the
following:
Through the greene gras his long bright burnisht backe declares.
Also, when the line is split by the caesura into three equal parts instead of two, it
acquires a slow and halting movement, as of pain and weariness in the
following:
Their hearts were sicke, their sides were sore, their feete were lame.
As we have seen, Spenser attains in all these lines an effect which seems beyond
the scope of a decasyllabic verse. But to quote individual, isolated Alexandrine,
as we have done here, does not give a fair idea of their true value. For their
effect, these lines are dependent upon their vital relation with the metrical
scheme of the entire stanza of nine lines. No poet has the distinction of ever
weaving a web of verse as subtly intricate as Spensers. Throughout the vast
length of The Faerie Queene Spenser heightens the effect proper to his
interlacing rhyme-system by a continuous assonance and alliteration, and by the
haunting repetition of word, phrase, and cadence. As the concluding quotation of
the beauty that Spenser created in his wonder of nine lines, here is a piece which
is so visual, so musical, and so stately:
As when two rams stird with ambitious pride,
Fight for the rule of the rich fleeced flocke,
Their horned fronts so fierce on either side
Do meete, with the terrour of the shocke
43
Astonied both, stand sencelesse as a blocke,
Forgetful of the hanging victory:
So stood these twaine, unmoved as a rocke,
Both staring fierce, and holding idely
The broken reliques of their former cruelty.

SPENSER AS POETS POET:
Spenser has been known for over four hundred years now as the author of
The Faerie Queene. More than any other poem in English, Canterbury Tales and
Paradise Lost included, this has been a sort of source book for the subsequent
poets. In this long poem, Spenser seems to have taken all poetic impressionism
as his province. The poem is full of folklore, myth, and legend of all sorts. It is
also crammed with influences Italian, medieval and classical. It is a peculiarly
rich poem in pagan lore. Spensers metaphysic of fertility and creation is, in fact,
often nearer to the pagan and the naturalistic than to the Christian. As G. Wilson
Knight has observed, The Faerie Queene is more a storehouse for poets of the
future than itself a poem. In this, if in no other sense, he is the poets poet.
Behind all our poetry there is unconsciously possessed legendary material:
Spenser seems to have possessed it consciously.
Spenser has exercised the greatest influence on the subsequent
generations of English poets. From Milton to Wordsworth, Shelly and Keats, to
Tennyson, Swinburn and Bridges, his influence has been continuously felt.
Descriptive or narrative, symbolic or allegorical, historical or mythological, for
all kinds of poetry he has provided inspiration to the English poets. His stamp
has been apparent and indelible on a large number of major English poets. When
Milton described him as our sage and serious poet Spenser, he not only
praised his predecessor, but also acknowledged his debt to him. Miltons
Paradise Lost shows that influence throughout its long narrative. Note, for
instance, the following:
Another side, umbrageous Grots and Caves
Of cool recess, oer which the mantling Vine
Lays forth her purple Grape, and gently creeps
Luxuriant.
Milton is not merely or simply influenced here. The sudden dropping of the
word luxuriant, and isolating it, shows direct use of the rhetorical technique
that Spenser made his own in describing the Bower of Bliss. The technique
involves pleasing or alluring the reader and then suddenly revealing moral
danger, often by making us realize the dangerous moral meanings in words that,
in other contexts, could be innocent or merely descriptive. Of course, Milton
stands the technique on its head. He makes use of it only to remind us, in present
case with a genuine shock of recognition, that this garden (Garden of Eden),
unlike Spensers, is the true Eden. The point for us to note here is that the
present use of Spenser involves on the part of Milton an active and critical
44
awareness of his poetic achievement. Like any great poet-critic Milton shows
appreciation of Spensers rhetorical device both for its verbal craftsmanship as
well as for the way it renders and evaluates mans visions of and longing for a
paradise on earth. It need to be remembered that among the poets who accept the
reality of poetic genres and poetic styles and poetic conventions, writing a poem
is often an act also of literary criticism. Much implicit commentary on Spenser
is therefore to be found in the poems of his contemporaries and successors,
which we the readers have to rediscover. It was not the rhetorical technique of
Spensers poetry which influenced him, but also his moral teaching. As Milton
remarks in his famous tract on the freedom of press, Areopagitica, Spenser I
dare be known to think a better teacher than Scotus or Aquinas, describing true
temprance under the person of Guyon, brings him in with his palmer through the
cave of Mammon and the bower of earthly bliss, that he might see and know,
and yet abstain.
That Spenser would become the poets poet got recognition in the early
seventeenth century itself. Sir Kenelm Digby, a contemporary of Milton, had
said as much, even more, as early as 1638:
I hope that what he hath written will be a means that the English
tongue will now receive no more alterations and changes but will
remain and continue settled in that form it now hath. For
excellent authors do draw unto them the study of posterity, and
whoever is delighted with what he readth in another feeleth in
himself a desire to express like things in a like manner. Which
maketh me confident that no fate nor length of time will bury
Spensers work and memory nor indeed alter that language that
out of his school we now use.
Very much in the same vein comes an acknowledgement of his debt to Spenser
form Dryden, I must acknowledge that Virgil in Latin and Spenser in English
have been my masters. Spenser has also given me the boldness to make use
sometimes of his Alexandrine line, which we call, though improperly, the
Pindaric, because Mr. Cowley has often employed it in his Odes. The
influence of Spenser on the eighteenth century has been no less. As John
Hughes, talking of Spenser being an oak of the English poetic tradition,
having serious, exalted and elegant mind, a warm and boundless fancy and was
an admirable imager of virtues and vices, proclaims: the embellishments of
description are rich and lavish in him beyond comparison; and as this is the most
striking part of poetry, especially to young readers, I take it to be the reason that
he has been the father of more poets among us than any other of our writers.
It will not seem strange, therefore, that Cowley, as he himself tells us, first
caught his flame by reading Spenser; that our great Milton owed him for his
original, as Mr. Dryden assures us; and that Dryden studied him and has
bestowed more frequent commendations on him than on any other English
poet.
45
In the nineteenth century, Spenser received greater and warmer reception
and admiration than ever before. The Romantics found in him a kindred soul,
Keats in particular, and sought confirmation in him of their own views on
poetry. Note how fondly Wordsworth recalls his reading of Spenser:
In trellised shed with clustering roses gay,
And, Mary! Oft beside our blazing fire,
When years of wedded life were as a day
Whose current answers to the hearts desire,
Did we together read in Spensers Lay
How Una, sad of soul, in sad attire,
The gentle Una, of celestial birth,
To seek her knight went wandering oer the earth.
Here is an instance, not merely of a tribute to a predecessor, but also an imitation
of his verses. The underlined phrases, the alliteration, consonance and
assonance, all show a close copying of the earlier poet. Imitating an old master
is in itself the greatest tribute to him. Among the Romantics Keats shows much
greater affinity with Spenser than Wordsworth or any other poet of that age.
Others who imitated Spenser include Walter Scott, who wrote his The Vision of
Don Roderick in Spenserian stanza form. Byrons Childe Harold and Shelleys
The Revolt of Islam and Adonais are also composed in the same stanza form.
Keats The Eve of St. Agnes and an Inimitation of Spenser closely follow the
poetic technique of Spenser, including his stanza form.
In a way, Spenser is inimitable. His voice is, no doubt, highly distinctive
and recognizable. As Dryden said of Jonson, Fletcher and Shakespeare as
dramatists, there are no bays to be expected in their walks. Later, Tennyson, in
the Victorian age, and then Swinburne, followed him as closely as did Keats.
His influence continues, and will always continue, just as the influence of
Homer and Virgil continues even today.

SUMMARY OF BOOK I:
The plot-structure of Book I of The Faerie Queene is perhaps the clearest
of all Books, its message no less. It closely follows the structure of a romance
narrative. It presents a quest or journey full of adventures as well as dangers.
The Book I consist of 12 cantos. The events in each canto follow in the
chronological order as under:

Canto I:
Una, a lady, who represents Truth, accompanies a knight named Redcross.
The knight is on a mission to overthrow a dragon that has occupied the land of
Unas parents. While going they lose their way in the Wandering Wood, where
they encounter the monster Error. The Redcross knight, aided by Una,
overcomes Error. Soon after, they come across Archimago, the enchanter.
Unsuspecting, they go to his hermitage to spend the night. He calls up infernal
46
spirits, sends one of them to Morpheus for fetching idle dreams of lust for the
knight. He converts another spirit into someone resembling Una. This creacture
goes to the knights bed. Although perplexed by the apparent change in virtuous
Una (the false one in reality), he treats her gently and sends her away.

Canto 2:
Angered at the failure of his trick, Archimago converts one of the evil
spirits into the like of the knight and sends him to Unas bed. At the same time,
he calls Redcross knight to witness Unas wanton lust and lewd embracement.
Tormented by the sight, Redcross leaves the hermitage at dawn, leaving Una
behind. When Una wakes up, she feels grieved finding herself alone. She starts
in search of the knight. Now Archimago disguises as Redcross knight to create
further misunderstanding in her mind. Meanwhile, Redcross knight encounters
Sansfoy, a Saracen knight, whose companion is the wantonly beautiful woman
Duessa. As Sans foy attacks him, the Redcross knight kills the attacker. Now
Duessa changes side, denigrates the dead, gets closer to the Redcross knight, and
tells him that her name is Fidessa. She craves the knights mercy, which he
extends. He falls for her charms and lies in dalliance under the shade of two
mossy trees. When the knight plucks a bough from one of the trees to make
garland for her, the tree speaks, revealing his name as knight Fradubio, who had
abandoned his beloved Frelissa for Duessa. But, one day, when he had seen her
in her true person as filthy foule old woman, he had tried to escape her, she
perceived his thoughts and imprisoned him and his beloved in these two trees.
Even after receiving the trees warning, the Redcross knight remains enchanted
by Duessa.

Canto 3:
Searching for her knight, Una encounters a fierce Lion, who accompanies
her as her guard and companion. When night falls, they stop at the cottage of
blind Corceca and her daughter Abessa. When the Lion finds a robber,
Kirkirapine, returning to the cottage with his loot stolen from the churches, the
Lion kills the robber. Next morning, they resume their search for the knight and
encounter on the way Archimago disguised as Redcross knight. Deceived by his
disguise they feel overjoyed. As they are going along together, Sansloy, a
Saracen knight, attacks Archimago (thinking he is Redcross knight). He does so
in order to take revenge on Redcross knight who had killed his brother Sansjoy.
In the encounter, Archimago gets injured, and then revealed as his helmet falls.
Now Una feels perplexed and is in great distress. Attracted by her beauty,
Sansloy tries to take her away, but the Lion resists and attacks Sansloy and gets
killed. Sansloy succeeds in taking her away.

Canto 4:
4?
Meanwhile the Redcross knight is led by Duessa to the House of Pride,
where he meets Lucifera (Pride) and the other deadly sins, Idleness, Gluttony,
Lechery, Avarice, Envy, and Wrath, and also Satan with them. Now, the third
Saracen brother, Sanjoy, attacks the Redcross knight as a measure of revenge for
the death of his brother Sansfoy, but Lucifera stops the fight and decrees a
proper duet for the next day. At night, Duessa goes to Sansjoys chamber, tells
him of her love for his slain brother (Sansfoy) and also how she was captured by
Redcross knight after her lovers slaughter. She puts herself under Sansjoys
protection.

Canto 5:
The next day takes place the fight between Redcross knight and Sansjoy.
While about to fall, Sansjoy is saved from death by a darksome cloud,
presumably summoned on Duessas behest, by the infernal powers. Under the
cover of this cloud Sansjoy escapes. Duessa straight rushes to Redcross knight
and acclaims him. At night she travels to the secret chamber in which Sensjoy is
hiding in woeful plight. Then she goes to the abode of Night to incite her to
avenge the deaths of her descendant Saracen brothers. Night accompanies
Duesa, and both come to Sansjoy, bandage his wounds, and take him
underworld to Aesculapines for treatment. When Duessa returns to the House of
Pride, she finds the Redcross knight gone.

Canto 6:
While being harassed by the lustful Sansloy, Una is rescued by a troop of
fauns and satyrs, who then worship her. She stays with them for a while and
teaches them Truth. Now arrives Sir Satyrane (born of a satyr father and a
human female), who helps her leave the fauns and satyrs, and travels with her.
They meet Archimago on the way, this time disguised as a pilgrim. He
misinforms them that the Redcross knight was dead, killed by Sansloy. Satyrane
rides off to trace Sansloy, finds him, and fights with him.

Canto 7:
The Redcross knight, enfeebled by drink from an enchanted spring, is
found by Duessa, who rebukes him for having deserted her. On getting
reconciled the knight again makes love to her. In his unguarded position, the
knight is seized by the giant Orgoglio, and is imprisoned in the dungeon of the
latters castle. As for Duessa, Orgoglio takes her for his leman (lover). The news
of the capture of Redcross knight reaches Una, even possible death. At this point
appears before Una Prince Arthur (the hero of the whole Faerie Queene),
accompanied by his Squire Timias, and they proceed to liberate the Redcross
Knight.

Canto 8:
48
Prince Arthur, Timias and Una reach Orgoglios castle. A fight follows
between Arthur and Orgoglio. Arthur slays the giant, captures Duessa, and at
last finds the Redcross knight terribly wasted in the dungeon. Now Duessa is
stripped of her rich garments, and is shown in her true person as filthy and ugly.
Finding herself exposed she flees.

Canto 9:
Now Arthur reveals himself to Una as of unknown parentage, and tells her
of his dream about the Faerie Queene, who is the object of his quest in this
world. After being united, the Redcross knight and Una leave Arthur and
Timias. On the way they encounter a knight named Sir Trevisan, who is fleeing
from Despair. Moving further, they come upon the cave of Despair, where
Redcross knight is tempted to suicide by Despair who helps him with a dagger.
But since Una is with the knight and is not tempted by any such weakness, she
snatches the dagger from him.

Canto 10:
Rescuing him from the cave of Despair Una brings the knight to the
House of Holiness, where they are met by Dame Caelia, Faith, Hope and
Charity. Here, Fidelia teaches him; Speranaza gives him comfort; Amendment,
Penance, and Remorse discipline him; and Charissa show him the path to
heaven, sending Mercy to accompany him to the hermitage of Contemplation.
Now, Contemplation shows him the new Jerusalem, and tells him of his origin
and his future. He reveals that he is destined to be a Saint, in fact St. George, the
patron saint of England. Having received all these instructions, Redcross knight
returns to Una, who is waiting for him, and they proceed on their journey.

Canto 11:
The duo of Una and knight finally arrives at the kingdom of Unas
parents, which lies ravaged by the Dragon. They make to the castle in which
Unas parents are imprisoned. A fight ensues between the knight and the
Dragon, in which Redcross gets sorely wounded, and on the fall of evening, is
hurled on to the ground. However, the knight falls into the well of life, which
restores him to life again. The next day, the knight is again ready for the fight. In
the terrible fight that ensues, the Redcross knight slips as he is recoiling from the
Dragons fiery breath, this time near the tree of life growing near the stream of
life. Once again the knight is revived. The third days battle begins, with the
knight fully recovered at night, which ends in the death of the Dragon.

Canto 12:
With the Dragon now dead, all the inhabitants of the castle come out
joyfully to have a look at the conquerer and the beast. Unas parents, the King
and Queen of Eden, thank the Redcross knight and shower gifts on him. They
49
carry Una and the knight into the castle. The job done, the knight wishes to
return to the court of the Faerie Queene. He tells them that he still has six more
years of service before his avowed marriage to Una can take place. Una unveils.
Meanwhile, a messenger arrives with a letter from Fidessa saying that the
Redcross knight is affianced to her and that he has deserted her. The messenger
is none else than Archimago. On being discovered, he is thrown into the
dungeon. The king then performs the sacred betrothal rites for the duo of Una
and the knight. It is followed by grand feast and celebration. The Book I ends
with the Redcross knights return to the court of the Faerie Queene.

The Faerie Queene As A Gothic Poem:
In Letter 8 of his Letters on Chivalry and Romance, Richard Hurd said, in
1762, the following:
When an architect examines a Gothic structure by Grecian
rules, he finds nothing but deformity. But the Gothic
architecture has its own rules, by which when it comes to
be examined, it is seen to have its merit as well as the
Grecian. The question is not which of the two is conducted
in the simplest or truest taste, when scrutinized by the laws
on which each is projected.
The same observation holds of the two sorts of poetry.
Judge of The Faerie Queene by the classic models and you
are shocked with its disorder; consider it with an eye to its
Gothic original and you find it regular. The unity and
simplicity of the former are more complete, but the latter
has that sort of unity and simplicity which results from its
nature.
The Faerie Queene then, as a Gothic poem, derives its
method, as well as the other characters of its composition,
from the established modes and ideas of chivalry.
To understand the nature of Spensers poem we need to know the world it
pictures, its men and their manners, its hierarchy and occupations, its customs
and conventions, its beliefs and beauties, etc.; for the poems structure is derived
from the life style of that very world. Let us have a look at the outline and the
essential nature of the faerie land.
Spensers world is the world of knight errantry. It was usual at the holding
of any royal feast or festival for the knights to appear before the presiding
Prince, and claim the privilege of being sent on any adventure to which the
solemnity might give occasion. At such an occasion, the distressed will also
flock in from all sides knowing that they can get their grievances redressed
there. Now, making this practice as a foundation for the poets design, we can
see how properly The Faerie Queene is conducted. Spenser speaks of this
foundation in his letter to Sir Walter Raleigh which he added to the poem as a
50
preface: I devise that the Fairy Queen kept her annual feast twelve days: upon
which twelve several days, the occasions of the twelve several adventures
happened; which being undertaken by twelve several knights, are in the twelve
books severally handled. Thus, we have here the poems design explained and
the reason of it. The design arose out of the order of the subject. It was, thus, as
requisite for The Faerie Queene to consist of the adventures of twelve knights as
for the Odyssey to be confined to the adventures of one hero. Otherwise justice
would not have been done to the poets subject. It is also pertinent to note here
that the classic ideas of unity, for the same reason, have no place here and are in
every view foreign to the purpose.
Therefore, just as we seek the unity of Odyssey in the relation of its
several adventures of its hero, so do we seek the unity of The Faerie Queene in
the relation of the adventures of several knights to its central figure, the Fairy
Queen. In other words, here the unity is to be seen, not in terms of action, but in
terms of design. The gothic method of design, which Spensers poem follows,
can be understood from what is called the gothic method of design in gardening.
We are told that a wood or grove cut out into many separate avenues was
amongst the most favourite of the works of art which they attempted in this
species of cultivation. These walks used to be distinct from each other. They had
each their several destination, and terminated on their own proper objects. Yet
the whole was brought together and considered under one view by the relation
which these various openings had, not to each other, but to their common and
concurrent center. On this pattern, drawn from the gothic ideas, Spenser seems
to have designed his poem. But, as he knew also what belonged to classic
composition, he was tempted to tie his subjects still closer together by one
expedient of his own and by another taken from his classic models.
Spensers own was to interrupt the proper story of each Book by
dispersing it into several. By this means he involved and intertwined the several
actions together so that he could give something like the appearance of one
action to his twelve adventures. For the conduct of this he had several examples
before him in Italian poets. The other expedient that Spenser borrowed from the
classics was by adopting one superior character who should be seen throughout.
Prince Arthur, who has separate adventure of his own, is to have his part in each
of the other. Thus, several actions are embodied by the interest which one
principal hero has in them all. Now, considering The Faerie Queene as an epic
or narrative poem constructed on gothic ideas, the unity of the poem can be
easily seen in its design. But Spensers poem is not a simple narrative. It is also
allegorical throughout. Spenser clearly subordinates the narration to his moral.
As he himself announces in the very opening of the poem, Fierce warres and
faithful loves shall moralize my song. That is, adventures of love and war shall
serve as vehicle or instrument to convey the moral.
Now, under this idea the unity of The Faerie Queene becomes more
apparent. His twelve knights have to exemplify as many virtues, out of which
5l
one illustrious character is to be shaped. In this design, then, the role of Prince
Arthur in each book becomes essential, and yet not principal, exactly as the poet
has contrived it. This management of the poem has come under heavy criticism
over the years. They say that it necessarily breaks the unity of design. Their
argument is that either Arthur should have had no part in the different
adventures, or he should have had the chief part. He should have done either
nothing or more. Conventional criticism apart, there are such designs in the East.
Mahabharta is one example, where Lord Krishna plays a similar part. He
appears only when others are not able to cope with the events on the good side.
He is to salvage every situation. The same is the case with Arthur. Both the
characters are conceived with powers deemed superior to all others. There seems
nothing wrong with this design so long as it offers an understandable pattern on
that count. The Faerie Queene has a flawless design, offering a unity of its own,
having no adventure for its own sake, and having all the very many for the sake
of the grand purpose that governs the design.
Thus, howsoever faulty the conduct of the poem may seem in the literal
narrative, it is very much appropriate in the allegorical, which is moral.
Spensers principal hero was not to have the twelve virtues in the same
proportion in which they exist in the various persons of the knights each of
them his own. Such a character would not have been humanly probable. But he
was to have so much of each as was requisite to form this superior character.
The superiority of the human or superhuman character lies not in having any one
superior virtue or having virtues in number more than the others. Having one or
more virtues does not make a character superior to others. What makes him
superior is the harmony or balance of all the virtues humans are capable of
having. It is this proportion or harmony of all, not the excess of any one, which
makes Arthur superior. The Greeks knew it. Spenser, who read them, knew it.
We may have gone out of touch with this ancient concept of superiority or
perfection. Aristotles concept of unity or beauty is based on this harmony or
proportion of parts. Spenser is therefore doing nothing unusual or unheard of in
the creation of Arthur or designing of The Faerie Queene.
Obviously, this was the moral purpose of Spensers poem. And what way
of expressing this moral in the history but by making Prince Arthur appear in
each adventure and in a manner subsidiary to each Books proper hero? He may
look inferior to each in his own specific virtue, he is superior to all by uniting in
proportion the whole circle of their virtues in himself. And thus he arrives, at
length, at the possession of that bright form of Glory, whose ravishing beauty, as
he saw in a dream or vision, has led him out into these miraculous adventures in
the land of the Fairy. The reasonable conclusion to the discussion is that, as an
allegorical poem, the method of The Faerie Queene is governed by the justness
of the moral. As a narrative poem, it is, obviously, conducted on the ideas and
usage of chivalry. In either view, if taken by itself, the plan is defensible, quite
comprehensible. Some say that the problem arises from the union of the two. To
52
us, there seems to be no such problem arising out of the poems design. It is very
clearly explained in the poets letter to Raleigh, and as clearly conducted in the
design of the poem. The romance and the allegory do not conflict with each
other. They make only the two levels of the single narrative. The surface level,
as is the case in any allegory, only illustrates in terms of humanly probable
incidents and characters the abstract moral purpose of the poem. As such The
Faerie Queene has, though incomplete, one of the most complex but cohesive
design ever attempted in the long narrative, call it epic, if you so like. Spenser
has fully succeeded in the execution of his moral plan of the poem. The poem,
even as it is, in its incomplete form, makes a wonderful reading, so rich and
varied in adventures, so solemn and single-minded in its moral purpose.

BOOKS FOR FURTHER READING
1. C. S. Lewis. English Literature in the Sixteenth Century. Oxford
University Press, 1954.
2. C. S. Lewis. The Allegory of Love. Oxford University Press, 1936.
3. Hallett Smith. Elizabethan Poetry: A Study in Conventions, Meanings,
and Expression. Harvard University Press, 1952.
4. Paul J. Alpers (ed.). Edmund Spenser, in Penguin Critical Anthologies.
Penguin Books, 1969.
5. William Nelson. The Poetry of Edmund Spenser. Columbia University
Press, 1963.
6. William Nelson(ed.). Form and Convention in the Poetry of Edmund
Spenser. Columbia University Press, 1961.
7. Graham Hough. A Preface to the Faerie Queene. Duckworth and Norton,
1962.
8. A. C. Hamilton. The Structure of Allegory in The Faerie Queene. Oxford
University Press, 1961.

QUESTION BANK
1. Discuss Spenser as the poets poet.
2. Examine the case of Spenser as a Renaissance poet.
3. Write a note on the poetic style of Edmund Spenser.
4. Discuss The Faerie Queene as an epic.
5. Examine the structure of The Faerie Queene.
6. Write a critical note on the narrative of Book I of The Faerie Queene.
7. Discuss the character of the Redcross knight as the hero of Book I of The
Faerie Queene.
8. Write a note on the Spenserian stanza, considering its origin and
significance.
9. Bring out the allegorical meaning of Book I of The Faerie Queene.
10. Discuss Ben Jonsons statement that Spenser writ no language.

43 Alexander Pope
ALEXANDER POPE
The Rape of the Lock
Poetry 44
Unit-2: Alexander Pope
Chronology of Pope's Life
1688 (May 21 Pope born, Lombard St. London.
1700 Popes family moves to Binfield in Windsor
Forest.
1702
1705 Becomes acquainted with Wycherley, Walsh,
and other literary persons.
1709 Pastorals.
1710 Beginning of friendship with Caryll.
1711 Essay on Criticism.
1712 The Rape of the Lock (2 Canto version). First
meets Swift, Gay, Arbuthnot, Parnell and
Oxford. Beginning of Scriblerus Club.
1713 Windsor-Forest. Proposals issued for
translation of the Iliad. Painting lessons from
Jervas.
1714 Enlarged version of The Rape of the Lock.
Scriblerus Club breaks up on death of Anne.
1715 The Temple of Fame. Iliad, Books I-IV.
Friendship with Lady Mary Wortley Montagu
begins.
1716 Iliad, Books V-VIII. Family move to
Chiswick.
1717 Iliad, Books IX-XII. Popes Works including
Eloisa to Abelard and Elegy to the Memory
of an Unfortunate Lady . (October) Popes
father dies.
1718 Iliad, Books XIII-XVI.
1719 Pope and his mother move to Twickenham.
1720 Iliad, Books XVII-XXIV.
1721 Popes edition of Parnells Poems with Epistle
to Oxford as Preface. Begins work on
edition of Shakespeare.
1722 Begins work on translation of the Odyssey
with Fenton and Broome.
Related Historical & Literary Events
The Glorious Revolution William of Orange becomes
King of England. James II flees to France.
Death of Dryden.
Death of William III. Accession of Queen Anne.
Declaration of war on France.
Peace negotiations.
Fall of Whigs. Tory ministry formed under Robert
Harley, later Lord Oxford.
Swifts Conduct of the Allies.
Peace of Utrecht. Harley and Bolingbroke struggle
for power within Tory party.
Death of Queen Anne. Accession of George I. Tories
fall from power.
Impeachment of Oxford and Bolingbroke. Oxford put
in Tower, Bolingbroke flees to France. Jacobite
rebellion.
Septennial Act.
Death of Parnell.
Death of Addison. Defoes Robinson Crusoe.
South Sea Bubble.
Robert Walpole becomes Lord Treasurer.
Atterbury charged with complicity in a plot to reinstate
the Pretender.
45 Alexander Pope
1723 Popes edition of Buckingham s Works,
seized by Government on suspicion of
Jacobite passages. Pope appears before
House of Lords as witness at Atterburys
trial.
1725 Popes edition of Shakespeare in 6 volumes.
Odyssey, Vols I-III.
1726 Odyssey IV-V. Swift visits Pope. Friendship
with Spence begins.
1727 Pope-Swift Miscellanies I-II. Swifts second
visit to Pope.
1728 Pope-Swift Miscellanies, III, inci. Peri
Bathous. The Dunciad, in 3 Books, with
Theobald as hero.
1729 The Dunciad Variorum.
1731 Epistle to Burlington. Pope-Swift
Miscellanies, IV.
1732 Epistle to Bathurst. Imitation of Horace,
Satire II, i.
1733 An Essay on Man, Epistles I-III. (June)
Death of Popes mother. Pope becomes more
committed to the Patriot opposition.
1734 Epistle to Cobham. Essay on Man, Epistle
IV. Imitation of Horace, Satire II, ii.
1735 An Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot. Epistle to a
Lady. Popes Works, vol. II. Curlls edition
of Popes letters. Prince of Wales visits Pope
at Twickenham
1737 Imitation of Horace, Epistle II, ii. Authorized
edition of Popes letters. Imitation of
Horace, Epistle II, i.
1738 Imitation of Horace, Epistle I, vi. Imitation
of Horace, Epistle I, i. Epilogue to the Satires.
1739 Spends winter with Ralph Allen at Prior Park
near Bath.
1740 First meets Warburton. Refurbishes his
grotto.
1741 Publisher Memoirs of Martinus Scriblerus.
Works closely with Warburton on revised
edition of his poems.
1742 The New Dunciad (i.e. Book IV).
1743 The Dunciad in Four Books, with Cibber
replacing Theobald as hero. Popes health
deteriorates.
Atterbury found guilty of Jacobitism and exiled.
Bolingbroke pardoned and returns for brief stay.
Bolingbroke returns from exile and settles near Pope
at Dawlay Farm.
Bokingbroke begins. The Craftsman. Theobalds
Shakespeare Restored. Swifts Gullivers Travels.
Death of George I. Accession of George II.
Gays Beggars Opera. The War with the Dunces
reaches a peak.
Swifts Modest Proposal.
Death of Gay. Hogarths prints of The Harlots
Progress.
Walpoles Excise Scheme defeated. Bolingbrokes
Dissertation upon Parties appeared in The
Craftman.
Death of Arbuthnot and Lord Peterborough.
Bolingbroke returns to France.
Hogarths Rakes Progress.
Death of Queen Caroline. Prince of Wales heads
Patriot opposition. Crousaz attacks An Essay on
Man.
Bolingbroke returns from France and stays with Pope
at Twickenham. Dr. Johnsons London.
Warburtons Vindication of the Essay on Man
defends Pope against Crousaz.
Handels Messiah receives its first performance, in
Dublin.
Walpole resigns.
Poetry 46
The Age of Pope
The revolution of 1688, which banished the last Stuart kings and called William of Orange to the throne,
marks the end of the long drawn struggle of England for the political freedom. Once the goal of the political
freedom was attained, thereafter the English people spent their energies in efforts to improve their political
systems through discussions in order to bring about reforms in their socio-political life for which the votes
were necessary. And to get the votes the people of England were to be approached with ideas, facts,
arguments and information. So the newspaper was born and the first newspaper, The Daily Courant, appeared
in London in 1702. Literature in the widest sense of the term, including books, newspapers, magazines and
other forms of writing, focuses on the complete society that played an instrumental role in the progress of the
nation. It makes some sense if one takes into account the political scenario of the age, but it attains a greater
significance if one considers on the whole the circumstances, which were very largely favourable to all round
development of the nation. In his comprehensive book, A History of English Literature, Louis Cazamian
describes the literary scene and summaries its history thus:
The Revolution 1688 does not constitute a break from the past; it inaugurates an organic and regular
progress. The upper middle classes associate themselves with the nobility in the exercise of power a more
extensive section of the nation participates in political influence and directs culture. . The classical ideal of
art, elaborated under the Restoration in an atmosphere of aristocratic elegance, finds full realization during
the reign of Queen Anne and George 1in a broadened society, whose members are growing more numerous
and so diverse, but where the spirit of literature is undergoing no essential change.
By the modern standards, the nation was parochial and sharply stratified. This kind of society could express
itself most adequately in its high art because it has the potential to convey the whole truth.
(A) Social Development of the Age
The first half of the eighteenth century brought remarkable and rapid changes in the English society. Uptill
now the society was governed by the narrow and obsolete standards of the Middle Ages and there was no
freedom to question them or even to differ from them. The society was cultivating the art of living together,
while still holding different opinions on various urgent issues. The social historians cite the example of the
mushroom growth of the coffeehouses as the centers of sociability. In a single generation nearly two thousand
public coffeehouses sprang up in London alone, and the number of private clubs is equally astonishing. The
new social life and culture had its effect on the language and manners of the people. Though the typical
Londoner of Queen Annes days was rude and even a little vulgar in his tastes; the city itself was filthy, the
streets unlighted and infested with the rowdies and bands of petty thieves, but outwardly men sought to refine
themselves as per the prevailing standards. To have a good form and elegant manners was the first priority
and duty if one wished to be a part of a refined society or wrote literature. Briefly, this superficial elegance
fully registers itself in every book or poem of the age.
On the political scene, the Government still had its opposing parties Tory and Whig and the Church was
divided into Catholics, Anglicans and Dissenters, but the growing social life subsided many antagonisms, and
gave the impression of peace and unity. The writers of the age participated in the religious and political
debates through their writings. The scientists like Newton and philosophical thinkers like Locke and the
religious men like Wesley, all recommended the virtues of moderation in their respective fields of thought.
They argued from reason and Scripture, and used mild satire to deal with their opponents, instead denouncing
them vehemently. W.J.Long has beautifully summed up the tendencies of the period stating:
the general tendency of the age was toward toleration. Man had found himself in the
long struggle for personal liberty; now he turned to the task of discovering his neighbour,
of finding in Whig and Tory, in Catholic and Protestant, in Anglican and Dissenter, the
same general human characteristics, that he found in himself. This good work was helped,
moreover by the spread of education and by the growth of the national spirit. Under their
many differences they were all alike Englishmen.
47 Alexander Pope
In the latter half of the eighteenth century the political and social progress is almost bewildering. The modern
form of cabinet government responsible to Parliament and the people had been established under George 1;
in 1757, the cynical and corrupt practices of Walpole, Premier of the first Tory cabinet, were replaced by the
more enlightened policies of Pitt. Schools and colleges were established; coffeehouses and clubs increased in
number, books and magazines multiplied and the press became the greatest visible power in England. The
preachers like Wesley and Whitefield brought a tremendous spiritual revival known as Methodism that was
felt by all the churches of England. Outside her own borders three great men Clive in India, Wolfe on the
plains of Abraham, Cook in Australia and the islands of Pacific discovered the hidden wealth of the new
lands and spread the world wide empire of the Anglo-Saxons
(B) Some Social Practices of the Age And their Projection In Literature
The writers of the age were greatly influenced by the social condition of the age and their range was
restricted to the town. They wrote for the critics of the Coffeehouses, for the noblemen from whom they
expected patronage, and for the political party they were pledged to support. At the level of the political life
in which most of the eminent writers participated with two important things in mind: (i) There was the custom
of patronage and the writers wished to attach themselves to a patron and (ii) they were keen to take part
active part in the political strife and even a writer like Swift was obliged to do so. Politicians divided
themselves into two hostile camps, Whigs and Tories. The patriotic sentiment was more of a matter to be
demonstrated than a thing to be felt. The poets and the writers wrote satires and lampoons on their patrons
political enemies. Compton Rickett observes:
At first, the poet or the pamphleteer attaches himself to some influential Minister using his
pen on behalf of this gentlemans cause. Afterwards when the minister found he could get
his work done more cheaply than by hiring man of taste, the literary man was thrown upon
the suffrages of the public then rising into existence.
Patronage existed even in the days of Dr. Johnson. The story how Dr. Johnson sought Lord Chesterfields
help for preparing his Dictionary and what happened in the end is well known. In due course of time, the
reading public increased and it put the custom of the authors dependence on a patron to an end. The most
significant change in the eighteenth century society was the induction of the coffeehouse and club culture in
the cities. It was at these places that the politicians and clergymen, lawyers and literary men discussed the
problems of the age. Not only that they came in direct contact with the public and the readers also. At these
coffeehouses the wits assembled to exchange repartees and the moralists to deliver their sermons; the
satirists gathered to attack vices and vicious men and the literary artists to discuss their proposals of their
forthcoming works. As it is commonly acknowledged, The well-known writers of the day congregated at
these places and talked to their friends and criticized their rivals. It was at the coffeehouse that Pope met
Dryden. It was from here that Addison discoursed to his selected circles and Dr. Johnson delivered many of
his talks. These writers found their subject matters from these surroundings besides meeting their friends and
foes. It is worthwhile to note that there came into existence separate coffeehouses of Whigs and Tories and
they would not go to the coffeehouses of another party. It was so, may be, to avoid confrontation or to retain
their privacy. The periodicals were published for the pleasure and profit of these visitors of the coffeehouses
and books were judged not on their merit, but according to the political beliefs of the authors. Impartial
criticism hardly existed. There was violence and hostility, which affected the literary criticism. His enemies
even threatened Pope in that way and he took care to carry pistol with him for the personal safety while going
out of Twickenham.
One of the common social practices was that of snuff-taking which started towards the end of the eighteenth
century, and it grew extremely popular. Both men and women used snuff and they seldom went out without
a snuff-box with them. If Addison and Steele recommended to their readers of Tatler to take three dishes of
bohea and two pinches of snuff, Pope showed in The Rape of the Lock, its place in the fashionable society
and mildly criticized its use.
Poetry 48
The age of Pope suffered from certain vices, which are projected in its literature especially in the novel.
Prominent among them were dueling, drunkenness and gambling. Fielding, the father of modern English
novel and Goldsmith mentioned dueling in their novels; even Dr. Johnson defended it and Sir Walter Scott
was willing to accept a challenge in his old age for a comment he made about Napoleon. Drunkenness was
a wide spread weakness among all the ranks and level of people. Similarly, all the classes of people practised
gambling. John Dennis mentions in his book, The Age of Pope, that
This evil was exhibited on a national scale by the establishment of the South Sea Company,
which exploded in 1720. At Bath, which was then the center of English fashion, it reigned
supreme; and the physicians even recommended it to their patients as a form of distraction.
In the greenrooms of the theatres, as Mrs Bellany assures us, thousands were often lost and
won in a single night. Among fashionable ladies the passion was quite as strong as among
men
Pope highlighted this fashion in The Rape of the Lock by showing Belinda playing a game of Ombre and
losing it which seems to be the cause of the whole problem. Similarly, the ladies of the fashionable society
adopted the custom of receiving visitors in their bedroom. The following couplet of The Rape of the Lock
refers to it directly:
The fair ones feel such maladies as these.
When each new nightdress gives a new disease.
Wits, who formed a significant group in the eighteenth century society, displayed their flair for intelligent and
cleverness in interacting with people specially ladies. Their tone of gallantry was often carried to the point of
absurdity; for instance, take the character of Sir Plume from The Rape of the Lock. Even Pope himself in
his letter to Judith Cowper professed to worship her as much as any female saint in heaven, and used still
stronger protestations of love and admiration for Lady Montagu. The irony is that women in that age were
treated as pretty triflers, who were meant more to amuse men than elevate them. For their plight they
themselves were responsible to a great extent. Lord Chesterfield made a very candid remark about it that,
No flattery is either too high or too low for them. They will greedily swallow the highest and gratefully
accept the lowest.
The Augustan Age had other drawbacks like political corruption, dirty party strife and low morals. These
problems started with King Charles, who along with his courtiers and statesmen, ignored these practices and
the situation could not improve even during the reign of William and Mary. Queen Anne had an instinctive
respect for moral law but being a meekly stupid person could not do much. However, the corruption was
not limited to the domain of politics only, but infiltrated to almost every aspect of social life. Even religion was
not spared from such degeneration and was used to serve personal ends.
These common flaws in the age should not make us underrate certain very high qualities, which make it a
great age, the silver age as Ian Jack called it. It was a great age of high political philosophy and oratory;
it was an age when England won the continental wars and built up a mighty empire in India. The progress in
the literature, art and music too was rapid. The novel attained an unprecedented robust life at the hands of
Richardson, Fielding, Smollett and Sterne. Reynolds and Gainsborough, Romney and Wilson established
schools of portrait and landscape painting. Under the inspiring leadership of Handel, the power of music was
felt, as it was never experienced before. Sciences and inventions made rapid progress. Poets and writers
enjoyed a status and position in society and were given important posts in government. If Addison could
gain a pension and subsequently a high official position because of his powerful pen, Pope was the first poet
to live comfortably by the sale of his works and could cherish friendships with the highest statesman and
aristocrats of England. Briefly, the Age of Pope honoured its creative artists and promoted the talents of the
nation.
Major Literary Characteristics
The term Augustan as Sainsbury points out, is sometimes applied to the whole period during which Pope
wrote, sometimes limited to the reign of Queen Anne, and sometimes extended backwards so as to include
49 Alexander Pope
the age of Dryden. If the last use of the term is considered to be the best, the Augustan Age in English
literature begins with the accession of Charles 11 in 1660. It covers the whole of Restoration period of which
Dryden is the greatest writer and extends to the classical school, which develops approximately with Pope.
Its traditions continue till 1798 when Wordsworth published the Lyrical Ballads. From this point of view, the
Augustan age includes the age of Dryden (1660-1700), and the Age of Pope (1700-1744). Briefly the term
Augustan Age includes the period of both the great writers, Dryden and Pope, and it originated in Dr.
Johnsons famous comparison of Dryden with the Augustans when the former dealt with the English language
and Literature and the latter with the city of Rome. He says:
To Dryden we owe the refinement of our language, and much to the correctness of our
sentiments. By him we were taught to think naturally and express forcibly What was
said of Rome, adorned by Augustus, may be applied an easy metaphor to English poetry
embellished by Dryden he found it brick and he left it marble.
However, the Augustanism in English Literature implies veneration for the Roman classics, their thought and
way of life. In the British history this period is of great significance and marks a beginning of a new society
and a new literature. These changes were the outcome of the complex socio- political events, which had
been occurring since the dawn of the seventh century. If the Elizabethan literature presents deep and intense
emotions and boundless flights of imagination, which forms the texture of its plays and other literary genres,
there is a gradual change in the tone and literary temperament of the writers ,for example ,in the last plays
of Shakespeare. A clear touch of intellectuality and even philosophy as in the Metaphysical School of Poetry
directly indicates the changes. During the early decades of the seventeenth century English literature was
striving for regularity, restraint, reason, order and balance. During the reign of Charles-II, which began in
1660, the King and aristocracy both helped to create an environment for this sort of literature. During the
Restoration period the court with its elegance and an ordered balance becomes the center of fashion both in
life and literature. The London society prided itself in exerting the deterministic influence on the literature of
the time, which became the literature of the town , of London society.
The contemporary France also influenced the literature of the Restoration Age. King Charles-II and his
courtiers, including a number of writers who were with them, had spent many years of their exile in France,
where they imbibed the French culture, and many new tendencies of French Literature. When they returned
to England, they tried their best to enforce the French ideals in the realm of literature. Neo-classicism
developed earlier in France than in England. Therefore the variety of influences which mark the new literature
bear the impact of France as well as of the classics which were prevalent in the contemporary France. It
was specially so in the case of poetry. The character and rhythm of the English classical lines are fixed, so
to speak, by the authority of inner choice, which in its turn is prompted, accentuated and even controlled by
the cadence of French verse. There also began a search for the authority of rules, and in this matter the
authority of Latin poet, Horace, and of the French poet Boileau came to be accepted. As the characteristics
of the new literature are restraint, rationality, a desire for order, balance and a composed tone, to attain these
qualities, the classical writers like Ben Jonson were adored, though they did not lose sight of the Renaissance
writers like Beaumont and Fletcher and in certain aspects Shakespeare also. The main themes of the new
literature of the Restoration period were parody, comedy, satire, analytical reasoning and criticism.
In 1700 begins the Neo-Classical Age, which continues with full force during the lifetime of Pope. Though its
traditions prevail till the end of the eighteenth century, Pope is undoubtedly the greatest representative of the
Neo-Classical Age as he accentuates and modifies the general traits of the new literature of the Restoration
period. It is amazing that the literature of the Age of Pope, which is termed Classical, is not so either in its
inspiration or in form It does not come very near to the literature of antiquity or the French model. The poets
of the Neo-Classical school look for their model in Latin literature and all Latin poets, including Augustans
like Horace and Ovid, have the Italian love for the beauty of nature. For illustration, consider Wordsworth,
who has more in common with Virgil than Pope. Therefore the eighteenth century classicism is termed
Poetry 50
pseudo classicism. The poets and writers of this period, no doubt, cherished deeply the desire to observe
the aesthetic rules of the ancients but to achieve their end they imitated the French writers, who also observed
the classical rules. Hence their actual achievement, that is, their writings, instead of being termed classical,
are called Neo-Classical .The literary historians like A. N. Whitehead call it the silver age of the
European Renaissance, which is a period between the civil wars and the middle of the eighteenth century.
Briefly, the ideals produced by the interaction of medievalism and the vigorous classical and Continental
influences of the new age provided the background which supported poets in their endeavours to match the
literary standards of the literatures of Greece and Rome.
These Neo-Classical writers have a marked distrust of originality and inspiration. They have a two-fold idea
before them which they strictly follow: (i) Simple orderliness in idea and (ii) Smooth balance in form. They
care more for form than for the spirit of literature; more for the expression than for the thing expressed. Pope
suggests his idea for poetry in the famous following couplet:
True wit is Nature to advantage dressed
What oft was thought but never so well expressed.
Pope was not uttering a barren half-truth characteristic of an age lacking in originality but repeating a
simple, commonplace idea, which constantly guided them. In other words, the general tendency of the literature
of the age was to look at life critically, to emphasize intellect rather than imagination, the form rather than the
content of a sentence. Writers tried hard to repress all emotion and enthusiasm and to use only precise and
elegant methods of expression. This is what is often meant by the classicism of the ages of Pope and
Johnson. Actually, the classical movement in this age had become pseudo-classical which means partly or
false classical.
The poets of the Neo-Classical school aim at the perfection of form, for which they labour hard. To achieve
two most significant characteristics The scrupulous searching for a perfection and the sovereignty of
Form the writers of the Age strove persistently. Dr. Johnson made very perceptive remarks about Popes
efforts to achieve the desired effect in the art of versification when he observed:
By perpetual practice, language had in his mind a systematical arrangement; having
always the same use of words, he had words so selected and combined as to be ready at his
call.
Such a laboured work of art will, no doubt, possess exquisite glitter and polish but it would lack spontaneity
and novelty, which occurs only when the creative imagination is allowed a free play. Dr. Johnson again
defends the approach of the Neo-Classical poets and says about Pope:
New sentiments and new images others may produce; but to attempt any further improvement of versification
will be dangerous. Art and diligence have now done their best and what shall be added will be the effort of
tedious toil and needless curiosity If Pope be not a poet, where is poetry to be found?
The Neo-Classical school of poetry is dominated by reason and correctness. As Geoffrey Tillotson puts it
asserting the value of correctness and Intellectual quality in Popes poetry that
Pope satisfies the expectation in a thousand ways. ....To make his kind of poetry he relied partly on the
intellectual quality of what he was saying. And his poetry served to demonstrate the proximity,
interpenetrableness, of the intellect and the emotions
In his book, On the Poetry of Pope he makes it specifically clear that For Pope and his contemporaries
the word correctness had full colour of novelty. He elaborates the idea in relation to Nature, Design,
Language and Versification of Pope showing how through the common and teachable element in literature he
follows the principle of correctness. As the Augustan age broadens and intensifies the practice of free
rational inquiry, which the Restoration could apply only in an incomplete way, the literature of the period finds
therein its true inspiration whether in its poetry or prose. It earns the age another name by which it designates
51 Alexander Pope
itself, that is, The Age of Prose and Reason . If in its poetry Pope is the center, and so to say its symbol, in
prose it is Addison who carries the rational as the scruple of his style and Swift becomes one of the greatest
masters of English prose. Pat Rogers rightly comments in his book, Introduction to Pope, that
Pope was a representative writer of his time, to a far greater degree than Swift, Richardson
and even Defoe. An outsider in the social sense, he was nonetheless able to infuse his best
work with a sharp contemporary tang. Furthermore he did not disdain the superficial polish
of Augustan vers de societe.
Popes life and works
Pope was born on 21 May 1688. He was the only child of the second marriage of a prosperous London
linen-merchant. Popes father, who was the son of clergyman, could rank as a gentleman. Pope was born
when his mother was already forty-six and his father forty-two. His lifelong devotion to his elderly parents,
whom he cared for till the time of their respective deaths, is one of the most moving and significant aspects
of his life. He loved them tenderly through out their lives and they loved him and were his refuge against the
cruelty of the world. The household was a most happy and contented one. What an irony it is that if he was
tiny, tall people crowded around him; though he was deformed, people with beautiful shapes surrounded him
and were proud of knowing him. Popes father, who was a successful businessman and was perhaps influenced
by commercial trips to Portugal, had become converted to Roman Catholicism. The family lived over his
warehouse in Lombard Street. But when James II led and William and Mary succeeded, it became the law
that Roman Catholics must live at least ten miles away from the Cities of London and Westminster. Several
laws were passed forbidding Catholics preventing their children from being taught by Catholic priests, compelling
them to forfeit two-thirds of their estates or the value thereof. And, of course, they were prevented from
serving in Parliament or holding any office of profit under the Crown. His parents thought it was best to live
out of London and he himself found it inadvisable to come up to town for medical attention during his illness.
As a result the elder Alexander Pope finally settled in a small farm in Windsor Forest at Binfield in Berkshire,
taking his savings with him in large wooden boxes, perhaps he distrusted Williams new Bank of England.
Pope was about twelve years old then. Soon, the Old Mr. Pope made friends not only among the Romanist
country gentry but also, because of his sons precious poetic talent and lively ways, with a staunch protestant
Whig like Sir William Trumbull, who held a high office under William. However, the anti-Catholic laws
became a major factor in determining the course of Popes life. Though the literary historians have disagreed
with the account of Popes ancestry and its endless mystifications, but none can question that Pope had
terribly poor health caused by the curvature in his backbone, which left him almost invalid. As the biographical
details of Popes early childhood are not fully known, nothing could be definitely said about its causes.
However, Edith Sitwell states in her book, Alexander Pope that
It is probable that Pope inherited at least some tendency to deformity from his father, who suffered from a
slight curvature of the spine. It is quite undoubted that he inherited from his mother those terrible headaches
that made his later life martyrdom. But, his half-sister Mrs. Rackett told Spence that he was a pretty little boy,
with happy laughter, clear eyes and round rosy cheeks that healthy children have. He had too gentle and
affectionate disposition, and it was as a small child that the sweetness of his voice earned him the loving
name of the little nightingale.
George Fraser mentions with considerable certainty in his book, Alexander Pope, that as a child Pope
suffered two accidents: one, probably at Lombard Street or possibly in Binfield he had been trampled on by
a large cow; second, later on from drinking bad milk from one of the Binfield cows. He developed that
disease of curvature of the spine, which made it necessary, in his later years, for him to be sewn every
morning into a tight pair of corsets and to have his withered legs warmed and disguised by three thick pairs
of woolen stockings. He was almost a dwarf, well under five feet high (four feet six, in fact). What is
particularly sad is that his earlier portrait, painted before these accidents, shows a chubby, cheerful little boy
Poetry 52
with every promise of healthy growth .A renowned scholar like Geoffrey Tillotson in Pope and Human
Nature gives an entirely different reason for his being a permanent invalid. He says: As a result of too much
of study (so he thought), he acquired a curvature of the spine and some tubercular infection which limited his
growth .
In A Preface to Pope, I.R.F.Godon points out that Popes health was seriously impaired by some kind of
tubercular disease of bones, which was known as Potts disease and it was inevitable that his deformity and
poor health should interfere with his activities throughout what he pathetically calls This long Disease, my
Life in An Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot. He actually was so weak that he was not able to dress and undress
himself, and neither went to bed nor rose without help. Sympathy with Popes character and for his sufferings
shines through every page of Doctor Johnsons essay, though the poets faults are not glossed over. None,
who knew his sufferings, would fail to be saddened by the tragedy of this man whose body was too frail for
the terrible burden of his genius, and whose life was one long torture of pain and weakness and humiliation
caused by the knowledge of his deformity, as Edith Sitwell put it. Pope, who had perhaps the most subtle and
sensitive feeling for beauty of form, realized painfully how his own outward form raised feelings of mockery
or coarse pity in the beholders.
Pope had been to two schools for Catholics in London, learning little or nothing, but the move to Binfield
brought Popes formal education to a close. Henceforth, he largely educated himself. In June 1739 he told
Spence that:
When I had done with my priests I took to reading by myself, for which I had a very great
eagerness and enthusiasm, especially for poetry. In a few years I had dipped into a great
number of the English, French, Italian, Latin and Greek poets. This I did without any design
but that of pleasing myself, and got the languages by hunting after the stories in several
poets I read, rather than read the books to get the languages. I followed everywhere as my
fancy led me, and was like a boy gathering flowers in the woods and fields just as they fall
in his way. I still look upon these five or six years as the happiest part of my life.
At Binfield his father set him to writing rhymes and some of his early efforts survive, mainly neat imitations
of the earlier court poets of his own century. Though there is a patchy imitation of Chaucer also. Pope grew
interested in poetry at a very early age as he himself told Spence in March 1743 I began writing verses of
my own invention farther back than I can remember . There is some slight exaggeration in the claim which
he lateron made in An Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot that,
As yet a Child, nor yet a Fool to Fame,
I lisp d in Numbers, for the Numbers came.
His mother gave Spence similar testimony:
Mr. Popes father was no poet, but he used to set him to make English verses when very
young. He was pretty difficult in being pleased and used often to send him back to new turn
them. These are not good rhymes he would say, for that was my husbands word for verses.
He was also busy with translations from Latin and even Greek though he was never in any profound sense
a scholar. Self-taught, like many poetic translators, he learned the syntax of his original from the sense rather
than the sense from the syntax. Pope too had ambitions towards original verse. A projected epic on Alcander,
Prince of Rhodes, of which he wrote four books of about one thousand verses each, in the end came to
nothing; besides, he had roughed out and shown to his friends his first pastorals before 1705. Earlier at the
age of twelve Pope was not only extending his reading and writing he was also developing his literary
acquaintance. He got to know the literary wits at Wills Coffee House, and was taken to see Dryden, a great
writer then. The boy could immediately see that Dryden belonged to the world of books and serious writers
but not to a polished society, as he himself was to belong. The particular members of the Wills group that
Pope got to know apart from Trumbull were the critic William Walsh; the poet Samuel Garth; the dramatists
53 Alexander Pope
William Wycherley and William Congreve; and the actor Thomas Betterton. These were all older and
distinguished literary men by the time Pope knew them and it was obviously not mere coincidence that they
should all share an enthusiasm for the young mans ability and company. He wrote to these worldly men of
letters regularly but with Wycherly and Walsh Pope struck up particularly close friendship. He helped the old
playwright prepare his verse for publication and maintained a long correspondence with him. It was from
Walsh that he received the famous advice to make correctness his study and aim: Pope stated:
When about fifteen, I got acquainted with Mr. Walsh. He encouraged me much, and used
to tell me that there was one way left of excelling, for though we had had several great
poets, we never had any one great poet that was correctand he desired me to make that
my study and aim.
Pope really had a surprising range of social circle for two specific reasons: (i) In Popes age an enormous
importance was attached to poetic talent by well-bred and educated people. Hence could say that Natures
chief Masterpiece is writing well, and (ii) Windsor Forest, where the family had settled, was a favourite
haunt of Catholic recusant families, like Blounts. They clung together with a certain disregard for social
distinctions that were important for the Protestants. As it was, he was mainly self-educated and a precocious
boy. He was a reader in several languages, which he managed to teach himself. Being an incessant scribbler,
he turned out verse upon verse in imitation of the poets he read. The best of his early writings are the famous
Ode On Solitude and a paraphrase of St.Thomas a Kempis, which he did at the age of twelve. He became
more precocious as he grew in age. It in no way means that he was aiming at a slow laborious correctness.
Pope was, in fact, brilliant and he wrote best when he wrote most rapidly. Though his home was in Windsor
Forest, he frequently visited London and made friends with many of the well-known men of letters, such as
Wycherley, Congreve, Garth and Walsh. Pope interacted and corresponded with them on the serious subjects
like the art of versification. He showed them the manuscript of the Pastorals which a few years later
became his first published work in 1709.
From 1708 to 1717 were the years of experimental writings as well as of great expansion in his personal and
social life. They mark a period during which Pope spent more time in London than at any other stage of his
life, and at the same time he continued to visit his Catholic acquaintances in Binfield. They include making of
the lasting and major friendships with Gay, Swift, Arbuthnot, Bolingbroke and Oxford among his literary and
political friends, and with Carylls, Englefields and Blounts among the Catholic friends. It also includes his first
meeting with Martha Blount for whom he developed a love that, despite all the barriers, endured till his death.
It is notable that throughout his life, Pope has been dearly admired by women who were ready to make
friends of him and confide in him. His true and life long friend among women was Martha or Patty Blount.
Though she was not brilliant and had lost her charms and sweetness of expression, which had attracted Pope
to her first, but she cared for him with the tenderness of a nurse. Even Warburton, who strongly disliked her,
admitted that when Pope was on his last sick-bed her entrance would stir him into new cheerfulness and life.
In 1716, Popes family moved from Binfield to Chiswick but the sudden death of his father on 23
rd
October
1717 brought this period of carefree gaiety to a close. After the death of his father, he became solely
responsible for his seventy-five year old mother.
The eight years from the time of Popes first published work, the Pastorals (May 1709) to the time of the
first edition of his collected Works (June 1717) form a fairly cohesive unit in his life. This period was of
extraordinary poetic activity, which he later described as wandering in Fancys maze. Pope tried his hand at
half a dozen different kinds of poetry ranging from pastoral and georgic as (Windsor Forest), to didactic
(Essay on Criticism) to elegiac (The Elegy to the Memory of an Unfortunate Lady), to heroic (Eloisa to
Abelard) to mock epic (The Rape of the Lock), to actual epic (the translation of the Iliad). When he
attempted a variety of poetical works it was as if he was trying to judge where his strength lay. The period
begins with the publication of the Pastorals. They were greatly admired by Popes Tory friends at Wills but
they immediately brought him into conflict with Londons rival literary group, Addisons little Senate of
Poetry 54
Whig writers who met at Buttons Coffee-House. The quarrel ensued because of the great admiration of
Addisons friend Ambrose Philipss Pastorals, which were undoubtedly inferior to the young Popes Pastorals
and for totally ignoring Pope. Nearly every publication of Pope was attended with this sort of critical and
personal dispute. It is indeed ironical that age that had set literary
standards like decorum and wit and other rules indulged in this kind of conflicts for literary standing and
made it the part and parcel of the literary scene in the early decades of the eighteenth century. Following the
model of Boileau and Horace, he tried his hand at a poem about writing of poetry and produced the Essay on
Criticism in 1711.
It was an ambitious attempt for a young man as in it Pope wished to compress and chisel out the wisdom of
all past ages regarding criticism and poetry. The poem is fundamentally a staring point to establish quintessentially
neoclassical assumptions about literature in the eighteenth century. Its reception was quiet at first but then
John Denniss furious attack in his Reflections upon an Essay upon Criticism made Pope retire sensibly in
the country to his Catholic friends like John Caryll who lived in Ladyholt, near West Harting in Sussex It was
during this period that Caryll suggested to Pope the subject matter of the most delightful of his poems The
Rape of the Lock .The poem was written as Pope told Spence later on to make a jest of the estrangement
between two Catholic families , the Fermors and the Peters , and to laugh them together again. It was Le
Lutrin (1674) by Boileau Dispensary by Garth that gave him the brilliant idea of writing in a mock -epic form
which he fulfilled in The Rape of Lock; it consisted of two Cantos and was published in 1712.Addison
praised it as a delicious little thing but advised the poet not to attempt at its improvement. Pope attributed
that advice to jealousy. It is Popes masterpiece, which comes nearer to being a creation than anything
Pope has written. Its instant success caused Pope to lengthen the poem by three more Cantos; in order to
make it a more effective burlesque of an epic poem, he introduces gnomes, sprites, sylphs and salamanders,
instead of the gods of the epics. The poem is well worth reading as an expression of the artificial life of the
age of its cards, parties, toilettes, lapdogs, tea-drinking, snuff-taking, and many more idle vanities. It was
brought out in 1714 in its present form.
Pope moved back to London in 1713, where he joined the group of the writers who strongly supported the
Tory Government. His landscape poem called Windsor Forest , published in the same year, was meant to
celebrate the Treaty of Utrecht. It was taken to be a statement of his party commitment despite his own
attempts to maintain neutrality:
In Moderation placing all my Glory,
While Tories call me Whigs, and Whigs a Tory.
However, during this year he lived mostly with his painter friend Jervas, who has been a pupil of the famous
portrait painter Sir Godfrey Kneller, and studied painting seriously.
The following spring Pope became involved with the Scriblerus Club with Swift, Parnell, Gay, Arbuthnot,
Robert Harley, Lord Oxford and Pope himself as its members. They shared a common philosophical belief in
conserving the best from the past not as a dead unit but as a living thing and had a scorn for false and
superfluous taste in learning. They also planned to produce the Memoirs of Marinus Scriblerus to burlesque
over the works of the pedantic scholars but there was an abrupt end of the activities of the Club because of
the death of Queen Anne on 1
st
August 1714. The members of the club dispersed to attend to their own
literary pursuits. During these days Pope got an opportunity to pay back to Dennis what he did to Pope after
the publication of his Pastorals Pope published The Narrative of Dr. Robert Norris in which he invented a
fictive episode in Dennis life and D. Norris was called to cure him of his lunacy. The piece is full of farcical
jinks that completely destroy Dennis. In October 1713, Pope published his proposals to translate the Iliad and
turned his attention almost entirely to Homer. It was his major literary occupation for next six years. It was
a difficult task as he told Spence years later: In the beginning of my translating the Iliad I wished anybody
would hang me a hundred times. It sat so heavily on my mind at first that I often used to dream of it and so
do sometimes still. By June 1715 the first four books were published in one volume. From this time onwards
55 Alexander Pope
he proceeded with the task at the rate of four books a year until the poem was completed in May 1720.The
fame of Popes Iliad, which was financially the most successful book, was due to the fact that he interpreted
Homer in an elegant, artificial language of his own age. Even the Homeric characters lose their original
strength and become the fashionable men of the court.
One of the most important aspects of Popes personal life these years was his increasing intimacy with the
Blount sisters whom he met in 1711. Within one month after meeting them Pope wrote to his friend Cromwell
praising them as two of the finest faces in the Universe. Theresa Blount, whom Pope admired, first, was
the same age as Pope and Martha, for whom his affection grew stronger, was two years younger. In times
of trouble and pain, Pope turned to them for comfort and solace. When his father suddenly died on 23
rd
Oct.
1717, it was to Martha that he wrote: My poor Father dyed last night. Believe, since I dont forget you this
moment, I never shall. For the next sixteen years the responsibility of his life was to look after his aged
mother who was so affected by the death of his father.
Two of many more experiments made at this stage deserve a mention, they are: Eloisa to
Abelard and Elegy to the Memory of an Unfortunate lady.
The former shows Popes high-flown devotion for the great Whig beauty, lady Mary Wortley Montagu, but
later on when she managed to hurt Popes vanity, he made rather venomous and obscene references to her
while the latter poem is a striking original poem. The year 1717 was the triumphant year of Popes life as he
brought out his beautifully printed book which contained his best works including his perfectly revised version
of The Rape of the Lock, the famous proverbs of Essay on Criticism and exquisitely musical versification
of the Pastorals, but none the less it is a volume of experiments. Pope knew now where his strength lay.
Looking back on these experiments in his later years, he was accustomed to make a distinction between
earlier Fanciful poems and his mature work in which he wrote of Truth and the Heart. This was a
deliberate change, conscious canalizing of his poetical power. From henceforth, with the exception of his
translation of Homer, Social Comment and Social Philosophy were to be his theme, but this theme is already
fount in parts of 1717 volume, for instance take the grave Clarissas speech of the 5
th
Canto of The Rape
of the Lock.
Various changes took place in Popes life after his fathers death. He had already moved from Binfield to
Chiswick in his lifetime itself, in March 1719 he moved with his mother to a new house at Twickenham,
which was to be his last residence. He amused himself there with constructing a grotto, a kind of gnomes
cave full of glittering crystals. This grotto, it appeared, housed his dreams of romance. On the whole, the
improvement that he wrought on his house, garden and grotto became the chief source of relaxation in life as
well as an integral part of his art. He set out to establish his small estate at Twickenham, which he affectionately
called Twitnam, as a symbol of those cultural and civilized values- literacy, honesty, generosity and hospitality-
, which seemed to be crumbling all about him in Hanoverian England.
No doubt, Pope was recognized as the foremost poet of his day. He made a wide circle of several friends and
several enemies as well because he had certain strong likes and dislikes, for instance, he did not like being
patronized as much as Addison liked patronizing. It led to Addisons role in supporting a rival translation of
Homer. However, his domestic life was much quieter and the translation of Homer was now absorbing all his
time and energies. It was completed in 1720 and was well received but some of his contemporaries had not
approved it. The great scholar, Bentley said: It is a pretty poem, Mr. Pope, but you must not call it Homer.
Pope, however, did not go back to writing poetry. He turned instead to editing. He wrote to Caryll in October
1722 saying:
I must again sincerely protest to you that I have wholly given over scribbling, at least
anything of my own, but am become by due gradation of dullness, from a poet a translator,
and from a translator a mere editor.
His main editorial project was an edition of Shakespeare that would supersede Rowes which appeared in six
Volumes finally in March 1725. Though the preface was a perceptively written piece but the text itself was
Poetry 56
hastily collated and emended. A disapproval was expressed of the edition of Shakespeare, particularly, the
scholar named Theobald exposed its deficiencies in his book called Shakespeare Restored Pope also edited
the posthumous edition of his friend Parnells Poems, which was published in 1721 and Duke of Buckinghams
Works which appeared in 1723. As his own comment indicates, Pope was not a particularly good and
successful editor, but the indiscreet attacks on his works and his character during the fifteen years had made
him peculiarly sensitive about them. He was smarting under these attacks and was determined to repay
them. Of that there is no doubt. He comforted himself by reflecting that he was maintaining the highest
literary standards and that his enemies were pedants and other ordinary persons who were devoid of spirit,
taste and good sense. However, the other major work belonging to these years was the translation of
Odyssey. Pope was led into this venture by an extraordinary success of his translation of the Iliad. But his
heart was no longer in translation. Therefore he engaged two Cambridge scholars as his collaborators,
William Broome and Elijah Fenton to help him. The initial idea was that they would translate and Pope would
revise and polish it, but the collaboration got him into all sorts of problems; as a result, in the end Broome
translated eight books, Fenton four and Pope the remaining twelve. Pope made over 5000/= Pounds, and
Broome and Fenton got under 1000/= between them. Popes financial independence as an author was now
completely secured. He by his own hard work became the first English author to be able to live off his
writings and needed no patron. His description of himself as Un-plac d, unpensioned, no Mans Heir, or
Slave , in his Imitation of Horace, Satire 11,written in1733, best sums up his justifiable pride. Four years
later still he put the same thought slightly differently in his Imitation of Horace, Epistle 11,ii (68-69):
But (thanks to Homer) since I live and thrive,
Indebted to no Prince or Peer alive.
Popes labour was great, but the reward was great too. Pope paid a heavy cost of his health and gaiety of
temperament by long labours of translations and comparative solitude stooping over the table for long daily
hours, which made him a man older than his years. It was now that Popes powers of verse showed a gift for
lighter and gayer conversational satire on the minor follies in a Horatian tone. Not only that, satire, a mode in
which he had as yet given glimpses of his genius as in The Rape of the Lock and The Narrative of Dr.
Norris, was to become for the rest of his life the vehicle for its fulfillment.
Pope had been facing attacks by many envious cotemporaries and he bore them bravely and said, These
things are my diversions ; though his face
contorted with agony, he had the sense to feel that even silence shows contempt. His fury in his great satire,
The Dunciad, was aroused by Theobalds comments on Popes edition of Shakespeare. The Dunciad,
published first 1728, is a mock-epic like The Rape of the Lock but with a difference. The former is dark,
furious but more somber, often more magnificent and less easily appreciated while the latter is sparking,
bright, delightful, and renowned poem. The Dunciad has always been a controversial poem. It was of course
written as such: Pope meant to annihilate his enemies. There is undoubtedly a strong element of personal
revenge about The Dunciad, but it is important to recognize that the poem grew out of the most profound and
deep-rooted of all Popes feelings about literature. At its base is the firmly held belief that bad literature,
indeed bad art generally, is immoral, and if allowed to spread unchecked will corrupt and eventually destroy
civilization. The artists duty therefore is a moral duty as I.R.F. Gordon remarked. The first version of
Dunciad consists of three books that centered on the crowning of King Tibbard (Lewis Theo- bald) as King
of the Dunes, and came to the climax with a vision of the future in which the Goddess of Dulness held full
dominion. In 1728 version, it is still a vision but by the time of the revised Dunciad, in four books, of 1743, the
vision has become an actuality. George Fraser writes in his book, Alexander Pope, that,
He is writing in The Dunciad not light Horatian but Juvenalian tragical satire, which at
moments...is not a mockery of the sublime but true sublime. the end of the fourth book of the
revised Dunciad has a Miltonic grandeur.
57 Alexander Pope
All this time Popes health had been deteriorating. In 1728 his ailment had become so bad that in August he
agreed to go to Bath to see if the waters would help him. He stayed there for ten weeks but there was no
appreciable improvement. Partly because of his own health and partly because of his mothers failing condition,
the five years from 1728 to 1733 were the most painful days of his life.
In the winter of 1730 pope told his friend Spence of a new work which he was contemplating. It was to write
a series of verse epistles, of which first four or five would be on The Nature of Man and the rest would be
on Moderation or the Use of Things . This work was not completed but Pope never gave up the intention
till the end of his life. In June 1730 itself he wrote to Swift: Yet am I just now writing, (or rather planning) a
book, to make mankind look upon this life with comfort and pleasure, and put morality in good humour. The
first poem actually to be published was the Epistle to Burlington, the famous amateur architect. The poem,
which is one of the most characteristic works of Popes maturity, presents an entertaining
selection of examples of taste in architect and landscape gardening, and concludes with some suggestions for
a worthier use of money. Within the next four years three more Moral Essays were published as well as a
group of four epistles entitled An Essay on Man, which was intended to serve as the introduction to a larger
work Pope had in mind. The former, with their brilliant observation of human nature, provide better reading
than the latter, in which Pope is concerned to vindicate the ways of God to man based on the doctrine that
whatever is, is right. But, the Essay on Man, in which there is much proverbial, and philosophical wisdom
that springs eternal in the human breast is the best known and most quoted of all Popes work. Except in
form it is not poetry, and when one considers it as an essay one finds that there are innumerable literary
ornaments and for its thought structure it has a deistic basis as there are no unanswered questions or problems
in Popes philosophy. To be precise, Pope, who had no philosophy of his own borrowed it from his friend
Boilingbroke and the notion of vindication is perfectly accomplished in four poetical epistles: Epistle 1 discusses
the nature and state of man concerning his relations to the universe; Epistle 11 shows man with respect to
himself as an individual; Epistle 111 considers man with respect to society, and Epistle 1V man in his relationship
to happiness. The essence of the poem is summed up in a few lines:
All nature is but art, unknown to thee;
All chance, direction that thou canst see;
All discord, harmony not understood;
All partial evil, universal good:
And, spite of pride, in erring reasons spite,
One truth is clear, whatever is, is right.
Though Pope, a true Christian humanist, is speaking in the spirit, though not in the language of Fenelon and
the Gospel to use the words of Fraser, his An Essay on Man was received with a lot of noise and recrimination
as if to indicate to Pope that his Dunciad, far from destroying his enemies, had multiplied them. Pope was
deeply distressed by these attacks, which coaxed him to think out his position as a satirist. , and to ponder the
ethics of writing satire. The form his defence took was to imitate the first satire of the second book of
Horace, itself a defence of satire,; That is to say, he loosely translated this satire, substituting modern parallels
for contemporary allusions in the original. In this poem, the Epistle to Dr. Arbuthnot (1735), a further
defence of himself and his writings, and in the Epilogue to the Satires(1738), his last word on the subject,
Pope contended that the satirists duty is to uphold a standard of moral rectitude and to point out deviations
from that standard by chastising the most notorious and powerful offender to use the words of Geoffrey
Tillotson.
Popes standards are expounded and defended not only in the Moral Essays but in his miscellaneous satires.
Imitations of Horace (1733-8), entitled Satire 1, which is a paraphrase of the first satire of the second book
of Horace, in form of a dialogue between the poet and William Forrescue the lawyer. Pope defends himself
against the charge of malignity and professes to be inspired only by the love of virtue. However, he inserts in
it a gross attack on his former friend, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu. He was prompted by the success of
Poetry 58
Satire1 which was followed by Imitations of Horaces Satire 11,ii, and 1,ii (Sober Advice from Horace)
in 1734, and Epistle 1,iv; 11,ii, 11,i, and 1,I, in 1737. In these Satires he recommends the standards,
which were the old Horatian standards of Temperance, of Contentment with a modest Competence. Above
all, he recommends that one must cultivate an honest, open-hearted, and serene disposition. Though Pope
himself was not completely successful in living up to these standards, but there is no doubt that these standards
were real to him.
Sick as he was, he was facing continual encounter with pain, and was actively preoccupied with writing till
the end. During the last two years his condition became critical. He died of an asthmatical dropsy on 30
th
May 1744, on the ninth day of his fifty-seventh year and was buried in Twickenham church. In his last illness
he was watched over by many friends like Bolingbroke, Marchmont, Martha Blount and Spence. They
appreciated his tenderness and love and thought themselves to be honoured by his friendship. From 1709
to 1744 he dominated English poetry and remained the representative poet of the century who dared to speak
out as boldly through his writings as he did in his life.
Popes The Rape of the Lock: An Introduction
Popes The Rape of the Lock is an authentic and living picture of the actual happening in the eighteenth
century society. Some time during the summer of 1711 the circle of prominent Catholic families in home
counties was deeply disturbed by the rash act of Robert, 7
th
Lord Peter, in removing a lock from the head of
the famous beauty, Arabella Fermor. Pope himself told his first biographer, Joseph Spence:
The stealing of Miss Belle Fermors hair was taken too seriously, and caused an
estrangement between the two families, though they have lived long in great friendship
before. A common acquaintance and well-wisher to both desired me to write a poem to
make a jest of it, and laugh them together again. It was in this view that I wrote my Rape of
the Lock, which was well received and had its effect in the two families.
The first version of the poem in two cantos was written in less than a fortnight sometime in August /
September 1711The well-wisher was Popes friend John Caryll, to whom the poems invocation refers. It is
not sure that Pope personally knew any of the families concerned but when the manuscript was circulated
among them, the lady vouchsafed to view and Lord peter approved . And apparently it succeeded in
healing the breach between them. Here two things form the kernel of the poem: first, a small matter led to a
serious quarrel between two Catholic families and secondly, it is Popes handling of the incident in a light and
playful manner, which put the discord to an end. He treated the subject on the model of Boileaus Le Lutrin,
which makes it a mock-heroic poem.
The first version appeared with Miss Fermors permission anonymously in 1712. It received the praise of
Addison who called it a delicate little thing, but he advised Pope not to enlarge it or improve it. Pope
distrusted his advice. In 1714 appeared the second and revised version of the poem in five cantos by adding
the machinery of sylphs, gnomes etc., which Pope adopted from the mysteries of the Rosicrucians. In
other words, he introduced the domesticated supernatural agents, including the Cave of Spleen, the scene at
Belindas toilet and the game of Ombre. He told Spence that
the machinery was added afterwards to make it look a little more considerable; and the
scheme of adding it was much liked and approved of by several of my friends, and particularly
by Dr. Garth, who, as he was one of the best-natured men in the world, was very fond of it.
It was Dr. Garths The Dispensary (1699) which served as a model for his mock-epic, The Rape of the
Lock.
Popes satire did displease and disturb all the parties concerned for its indelicate innuendoes and some odd
resemblances with the living characters around. It gave offence to Miss Fermor as the scandal had gone too
far. He not only failed to please her but also earned the hostility of Sir George Brown about which he reported
59 Alexander Pope
to Spence later: Nobody but Sir George Brown was angry, and he was so a good deal and for a long time.
He could not bear that Sir Plume should talk nothing but nonsense Similarly Baron , who might be
interested in marrying her as per the internal literary evidence, chose another bride just two months before
the poem was issued. In A Key to the Lock, Pope tried to placate Sir George Brown showing two men as
possible candidates for the role of Sir Plume; as for Arabella, Popes dedication to the second and enlarged
version of 1714 was contrived especially to give her favour and even to help her to get out of a rather silly and
embarrassing position. Pope wrote to John Caryll on 9
th
January, 1714:
The dedication to Arabella and the enlarged poem of 1714 take us from the complicated and ultimately
unimportant tangle of social trivia into sublet and permanent fabric of the poems creation. For the original
events, which led to the poem, the dedication stresses only the central one.
As to the following Cantos, all the passages of them are as Fabulous, as the Vision at the
Beginning, or the Transformation at the End; (Except the loss of your Hair, which I always
name with Reverence). The Human persons are as Fictitious as the Airy ones; and the
Character of Belinda, as it is now manag d, resembles you in nothing but in Beauty.
Popes concern, beneath these courtesies, is now for his art. As the last lines of the fifth canto confirm this.
They celebrate the lasting fame which poetry has granted to the ephemeral lock. Thus, Pope transforms the
passing social event into permanent relevance.
If the first version of 1712 sold poorly,while the revised version of 1714 was very well received, which sold
3000 copies within four days. The only other addition or alterations came in 1717, when Pope decided to
open more clearly the MORAL of the poem by adding Clarissas speech in canto five. Her role so far has
been to hand over the fatal scissors to the Baron in the third Canto. Ever since the publication of the poem in
its final version The Rape of the Lock has almost always enjoyed an enthusiastic and delighted reception.
R.K. Root has quoted a letter of George Berkley to Pope in his book, The Poetical Career Of Alexander
Pope in which he writes:
I have accidentally met with your Rape of the Lock here (in Leghorn!), having never seen
before. Style, painting, judgement, spirit, I had already admired in other of your writings;
but in this I am charmed with the magic of your invention, with all those images, allusions,
and inexplicable beauties, which you raise so surprisingly, and at the same time so naturally
out of a trifle.
Pope did suffer for such charges against him as plagiarism of Garth and Boileau, which stemmed from the
personal animosity and professional rivalries, literary in-fighting and personality conflicts in the first half of
the eighteenth century. The first real adjustments in the critical reaction to Pope begin in the second half of
the century and are due mainly to new movements in taste and aesthetics created by the writers like Edmund
Burke and Joseph Warton who displays some of the eighteenth century notions about poetry and is confident
at the same time of the new criteria which led him to observe that Pope is more a Man of Wit, and a Man
of Sense than a True Poet. Radically new responses in the later part of the century made the critics
highlight different aspects of his poetry though the preconceptions hampered the fair judgements. The Romantic
critics like Hazlitt, Byron and others admired Pope, and Campbell goes to the extent of saying about The
Rape of the Lock: There is no finer gem than this poem in all the lighter treasures of English fancy.
In the nineteenth century, the criticism of Popes work has really more historical interest than intrinsic value.
It was read and appreciated with a limited delight. Actually a little has changed since Wartons claim that
it was the best Satire Extant. The responsibility of saving Pope from utter neglect and to present him in the
true perspective has fallen on the twentieth century scholars. Modern readings of Pope and The Rape of the
Lock have revised most of the ideas propounded by the Romantics and have asserted that he is a serious
writer who is justified in using satire as the vehicle of real imagination. They have focused on the following
themes of Pope:
Poetry 60
(a) The moral seriousness and imaginative intelligence with its full richness and complexity.
(b) The social realities and Popes witty manipulation of them.
(c) Popes powerful rejection of the superficialities and the artificialities of social mores in contemporary
contexts.
(d) The serious relevance of human passion especially about sex and religion.
(e) Technical innovations like the density of allusions, metaphors and mimicking to maintain what
J.S.Cunningham calls a continuous doubleness of apprehension by which the poet combined the flirtation
with sublime, bathetic with poignant and trivial with significant.
This sort of serious study has accorded to Popes works a proportionate praise.
The Rape of the Lock as a Burlesque
According to Pope that first principle of criticism is to consider the nature of the piece, and the intension of
the author as he put it in the postscript of his translation of the Odyssey. In this poem neither is in doubt. The
title and the opening lines of the poem contain a kernel of the whole. The incident on which the poem is
founded had caused a breach between the two Catholic families and it was suggested to Pope that he should
write a poem to make a jest of it and laugh them together again. The writing of a narrative poem was the
most obvious method and no variety of narrative was more suitable than the mock-heroic. Pope himself
called The Rape of the Lock a heroi-comical poem, a form so highly praised by Dryden, but the literary
affiliations of the poem are of a complicated kind. On the one hand, it belongs to a class of literature called
burlesque, which is also a parody and at the same time it has some of the features of a Farce as well. To
call it a mock-epic is to add another dimension as the term mocking implies laughing at something critically
and the term epic adds a highly serious motif to the narrative. A brief analysis would make it absolutely clear
that the poem may fit into a variety of comic and satirical writings. .
Some critics assess that it is essentially a burlesque because A burlesque is a parody on a large scale, in
which not a single poem but a whole type or style of literature is travestied, the language and thought proper
to a serious theme being reproduced in setting forth something ridiculous and trivial. There are many famous
literary burlesques, for instance take Batrachomyomachia a poem in which the battle of Frog and Mice
is described in the language of Homer, or Don Quixote the burlesque of chivalry, or Hudibras the
burlesque of Puritanism. The Rape of the Lock is a burlesque of epic poetry at large and contains parodies
of Homer, Virgil, Statius, Ariosto, Spenser and Milton .
The writers of burlesque should be thoroughly acquainted with the manner he intends to parody, and he
should have no genuine reverence, admiration or sympathy for it. Pope knew very well the phraseology of
the ancient epics. At the same time he was capable of a real appreciation of Homer and Virgil. Therefore, he
was fit for the task of parodying the ancient epic.
The burlesque is partly a matter of treatment and partly a matter of language. By treating an insignificant
subject in the manner of an epic the poem parodies that form of poetry. Instead of grand passions and great
fights between heroes in which the immortals take part; we have as the theme of The Rape of the Lock a
petty amorous quarrel assisted by the spirit of the air. The epic portrays an age around the personality of a
god or a demi-god, and its characters are heroes, The Rape of the Lock, on the other hand, gives us the
picture of a fashionable society. The central figure in that picture is a pretty young girl, and other characters
are a rash youth, a foolish dandy and a few frivolous women. The place of deep and genuine passions found
in the ancient epics is given to a succession of mock passions. Ariels fears associated with an impending
danger are travesty of genuine fears.
This day, black omens threat the brightest Fair,
That e ver deserved a watchful spirits Care;
Some dire disaster, or by Force, or Slight;
61 Alexander Pope
But what, or where, the fates have wrapt in Night.
Whether the nymph shall break Dianas laws,
Or some frail China Jar receive a flaw.
Likewise, Belindas anger, when the lock of hair is removed from her head is sheer exaggeration of true
passion:
Then flashed the living Lightning from her Eyes,
And Screams of Horror rend the affrighted Skies.
Nor louder Shrieks to pitying Heaven are cast,
When Husbands, or when Lap- dogs breathe their last;
Or when rich China Vessels fallen from high,
In glittering Dust and painted Fragments lie,
Thus, by its trivial theme, puny characters and false and exaggerated sentiments, the poem becomes a
parody of an epic.
Besides, there are other incidents and features, which also suggest that the poem is a burlesque. As Addison
wrote in Spectator No249 defining the varieties of burlesque:
Burlesque is of two kinds, the first represents mean persons in the accoutrements of heroes,
the other describes great persons acting and speaking like basest among the people.
Pope exercised his talent in both the kinds, that is, in diminution and in aggrandizement. Agamemnons
sceptre dwindles to become Belindas bodkin. Lord Peter builds an alter to the god of love but what kind of
alter is it?
Of twelve vast French Romances, neatly gilt.
There lay three Garters, half a pair of Gloves;
And all the Trophies of his former Loves.
With tender Billet-doux he lights the Pyre,
And breathes three amorous sighs to raise the Fire.
Likewise, a battle is drawn forth to combat on a velvet plain like the Greeks; but it turns out to be a game of
cards on the fashionable card-table. Geoffrey Tillotson has summed up some other characteristics of this
poem stating:
We find a supernatural being threatening his inferior with torture; but it is sylph, not Jove
and the tortures are neither thunder-bolts nor pains of Hades, but cruelties devised
ingeniously from the requisites of the toilet table. The epic is a long poem; The Rape of
the Lock is short. The story of the epic covers years; that of The Rape of the Lock hours.
The gods of the epic are stupendous creatures; Popes sylph tiny.
These are some of the examples of the epic grandeur presented on a diminutive scale. But, its reverse is also
present in The Rape of the Lock
As Hazlitt points out:
The most glittering appearance is given to every thing, to paste, pomatum, billet-doux,
and patches. A toilet is described with the solemnity of an alter raised to the goddess of
vanity, and the history of a silver bodkin is given with all the pomp of heraldry.
Pope is a master of the type of humour, which emerges from presenting small things in a grand form. A
remarkable instance of this type of aggrandisement is the speech of Clarissa in The Rape of the Lock She
begins thus:
Say, why are Beauties prais d and honour d most
The wise Mans Passion, and the vain mans Toast?
Why deck d with all that Land and Sea afford,
Why Angels call d and Angel-like ador d?
Poetry 62
Clarissa swells and talks like a Homeric sage and effectively moves in the well-devised direction of the text.
It has been rightly assessed that ,
The burlesque is both- a matter of treatment and a matter of language. There are number
of lines and passages which are the parodies of Virgil.
For instance, consider the following lines as examples:
1. Slight is the Subject, but not so the Praise
If She inspires and He approved my Lays.
(Canto 1.11. 5-6)
This couplet parodies the following lines of Virgil from Georgies1V:
Slight is the subject but the praise not small,
If heaven assist and Phoebus hear my call
Heaven and Phoebus in Virgil are replaced by she (Belinda) and he (Caryll) in Pope.
2. The following couplet of Pope, again, is a parody of Virgil:
Her joy in gilded chariots, when alive,
And love of Ombre, after death survive,
(Canto1,11, 55-56)
Similarly Virgil says:
The love of horses which they had alive
And care of chariot after death survive
3. The seven folds in the petticoat of Belinda refer to the shields of Ajax, which was made of seven bulls
hides:
Oft have we known that seven-fold fence to fail,
Though stiff with hoops; and armed with ribs of whale,
(Canto11,11,267-268)
Thus, there are many proofs to surmise that Pope in The Rape of the Lock was seriously attempting to write
a burlesque with two purposes in mind, (a) to laugh away the conflict and (b) to expose playfully the follies
of the fair sex and the artificialities of his age.
Popes The Rape of the Lock as a Mock- Heroic Poem
Despite its literary affiliation to other kinds of witty narratives, Popes The Rape of the Lock is most obviously
a mock-heroic poem. It had been evolved for the very purpose of diminishing a quarrel and combines in it
two kinds of writing in which the age of Pope was really interested: Epic and Satire. Popes handling of this
genre has been so unique that it ceases to be an imitation of either of these forms and acquires an unprecedented
novelty. Pope had two instances of this kind of writing in mind Boileaus Le Lutrin and Garths The
Dispensary which Pope followed with keen interest. They were suitable models but none of them was so
brilliant as Popes poem. It appears that Pope might have aspired to write a consummate example of the
mock-heroic genre before Lord Peter gave him the occasion by stealing the lock. In other words, the quarrel
of the Peters and the Fermors family gave him the subject matter and opportunity for realizing that idea as an
actual poem.
Some of the modern critics think that mock heroic poem is primarily a satire on the epic, but the writers of
the Augustan Age took it differently. The technical brilliance of The Rape of the Lock is largely due to the
fact that Pope had studied Shakespearean drama and Miltons epic and builds from both his poem . Preserving
the essence of the heroic poetry, he gives it a humorous treatment and it was not a less worthy ambition in an
age which had different requirements and a changed mental horizon.
The writers who ridiculed the epic in Augustan age were the authors of burlesques and travesties and their
object was, as Dennis put it a very scurvy one . In a mock-epic a dignified genre is turned to witty use
63 Alexander Pope
without being cheapened in anyway. The poet has an opportunity of ridiculing through incongruity and
offering his reader the sophisticated pleasure of recognizing ironical parallels to familiar passages of Homer
and Virgil. If a mock- heroic poem is a parody of the epic, it is so in the Augustan sense, not in the modern.
The new purpose of the frequent allusions throughout The Rape of the Lock is not to ridicule a literary
form but to organize a chaos into an order by setting a lovers tiff in true perspective with their help.
The fact that the 1712 version of The Rape of the Lock consists of no more than 334 lines and takes over
only a few characteristics of the epic, makes it clear that Popes concern was less with Homer and Virgil
than with Miss Fermor and Lord Peter. In its 1714 form it becomes the masterpiece of the mock- heroic
because it imbibes the maximum amount of the epic qualities. Here, the mockery takes different forms and
employs different devices. The proposition of using an epic form for the purpose of diminishing the affair
of the lock of hair, is in itself the general mockery of the epic form and substance the epic manner with its
invocations, the descriptions, the moralizing asides, the speeches opening with He said, its battles, its machinery,
its journeys on water and down to the underworld and its harangues are some of the structural features
modeled on the epic. Clearly, the purpose of the poet at this stage was neither to ridicule the heroic genre nor
to provide a humorous parallel to all the principal ingredients of epic, but to serve the occasion for which
poem was written. This remains true of the 1714 version, in which Pope increased the length of the poem
from two cantos to five, totalling 794 lines in all, and added such further allusions to the epic as the visit to
the Cave of Spleen like the epic heros visit to the underworld, the game of Ombre resembling other heroic
games, the adoring of Belinda which parallels the arming of Achilles, and above all the extensive machinery
of Ariel and sylphs. Pope was fully conversant with the formidable mass of criticism in which the function
and nature of epic machinery is discussed as he himself had planned for writing an epic. Le Bossu had said
that the Machinery crowns the whole work while Dryden concluded, no heroic poem can be writ on the
Epicurean (i.e. atheistical) principles.
In the first version of the poem, the supernatural agents play practically no part Pope realized that if a more
extended mock epic was to be attempted, machinery of a more striking sort had to be invented. Pope could
either revive the classical deities or would have taken personified moral qualities but he preferred to choose
a machinery based on the Rosicrucian spirit, which proved to be fanciful and thus suitable for a mock-epic.
For the action of the poem it was the most suitable invention. Geoffrey Tillotson aptly observes:
Pope, like any epic poet, had already made the action of the poem take place on the knees
of the gods: it was Heaven and the powers which, granting half the barons prayer, wrested
from the fingers the lock they had allowed him to cut. But from the start it must have been
obvious to Pope that the epics usually allotted their celestials more room and colour than
his own poem did, and his literary mockery accordingly gained in quality as the supernatural
machinery gained in quantity.
Ian Jack says in Augustan Satire: Intention and Idiom In English Poetry, 1660-1750: The epic poets
task of arousing admiration was particularly associated with the supernatural machinery of his poem. In the
description of the sylphs and their actions Pope made his own bid to arouse admiration . Besides, It is rightly
pointed out that,
Each epic poem has some peculiar passion, which distinguishes it in particular from other
epic poems, and constitutes a kind of singular and individual difference between these
poems of the same species. These singular passions correspond to the character of the
hero.
The peculiar passion of each epic is surprisingly different. If in Iliad it is Anger and Terror, the softer and
tender passions reign in the Aeneid. So coquetry and pride are the reigning passions in Popes mock epic
about Belindas stolen lock.
A mock heroic poem has been thought of primarily as a satire on the epic, but the vast difference made by
the nature of Popes subject has often been overlooked. Le Lutrin, The Dispensary and The Rape of the
Poetry 64
Lock are all mock heroic poems describing a quarrel; but while the first two describe the quarrels between
the lazy priests and grubby physicians, the third is concerned with a quarrel in the beau monde. The nature
of Popes subject and his intention creates an immense difference between his mock-epic and those of
Boileau and Garth.
Another quality lies in the descriptions in The Rape of the Lock, which are mock-heroic in a very different
sense from other poems of the same genre. While others, like Dryden and Garth, had described ugly things
with ironical elevation of style, Pope had objects of great beauty to describe. Ian Jack says that Popes
poem is shot through with strands of silk from the fashionable world.
Joseph Warton in his Essay on Pope says, If Virgil has merited such perpetual commendation for exalting
his bees, by the majesty and magnificence of his diction, does not Pope deserve equal praises for the pomp
and luster of his language on so trivial a subject ? His style is heroic and it is evident from the opening lines
onwards:
What dire Offence from am rous Causes springs,
What mighty Contests rise from trivial things,
I sing.
The inversion of the order of words and the use of the relatively pompous diction adds dignity to the verse. A
similar elevation is particularly noticeable at the end of Canto III:
What Time wou d spare, from Steel receives its date,
And Monuments, like Men, submit to fate!
Steel cou d the Labour of the Gods destroy,
And strike to Dust th Imperial Towers of Troy;
Steel cou d the Works of mortal pride confound,
And hew Triumphal Arches to the Ground,
What wonder then, fair Nymph!thy Hairs shou d feel
The conq ring Force of unresisted Steel?
Pope makes the serious use of what is basically Homers style. The similarity of idiom between The Rape of
the Lock and Homer is nowhere more striking than in the descriptions of the battles between the beaux and
belles and between the opposing cards in the game of Ombre:
Now move to War her Sable Matadores,
In Show like Leaders of swarthy Moors
It is because of the idiom that Popes mock-epic differs from that of epic itself only in being more brilliant
and more laboured that he was able to work into the texture of his verse such numerous and such parodies of
the classical epics. Of several passages in The Rape of the Lock, where the style is deliberately lowered,
the most obvious is the description of Sir Plume, With his earnest eyes, and round unthinking face he says,
Give her the Hair. Gildon called this style as something New; Heroic Doggrel . There are many speeches
through out The Rape of the Lock which add the dignified colours of rhetoric associated with the heroic
poem. They fulfill two important functions: (i) They wittily emphasize the poets high seriousness and (ii)
They provide remarkably effective transitions. Pope was right when he said in the Postscript to the Odyssey
that the use of pompous expression for low actions is the perfection of Mock Epick.
Periphrasis is one of the common manifestations of the eighteenth century poetic diction. Pope uses many
periphrases as uncommon appellations For instances, for the scissors with which Lord Peter performs the
rape two-edg d Weapon, little Engine, glittering Forfex, fatal Engine, Sheers, and meeting
Points. The epic methods of heightening the effects are used not for ridiculing them but to produce the
desired ends. Through them he emphasizes the artificiality of the milieu, which he presents. Similarly by
yoking together the ideas which belong to very different levels Pope produces strongly satirical effect and
also shows topsy turvy values in Belindas world.
65 Alexander Pope
It is relevant to note that Popes poem contains a very few directly diminishing images as they are used in
a satire but it has a large number of mock-heroic images which intensify the effect of the fundamental irony.
For illustration consider the following lines:
Not fierce Othello in so loud a Strain
Roar d for the hankerchief that caus d his pain.
The apotheosis of the lock is drawn from the Roman myth:
So Romes great Founder to the Heav ns withdrew,
To Proculus alone confess d in view.
There are some images which are particularly found in a mock-heroic poem, for example consider the
comparison of Belinda to the sun at the beginning of Canto II:
Not with more Glories, in the Etherial plain,
The sun first rises over the purpled Main,
Than issuing forth, the Rival of his beams
Launch d on the Bosom of the silver Themes.
There is a paradox about this image, which is the paradox about the whole poem. In a mock-heroic poem the
subject of the poem is compared to something great and made ridiculous by comparison. It is as Pope pointed
out in the Postscript to the Odyssey a deliberate transgression against the rules of proportion and mechanics.
It is using a vast force to lift a feather. The image is an exaggreration of the same imaginative truth as is in
the line: Belinda smild, and all the World was gay. There is an element of incongruity and the heroic idiom
of the poem has its measure of appropriateness as well as inappropriateness, which establishes its claim as a
mock-heroic masterpiece.
Briefly, The Rape of the Lock is not a poem against anybody. Pope only wished to laugh the quarrel out of
the court and does not want to give serious offence to anybody. In short his purpose is to conciliate everybody
by means of mirth to use the expression of Ian jack.
Themes of Love & Marriage And the Character of Belinda
Love is such an obvious theme in The Rape of the Lock that it plays a title part in the poem. Whenever the
critics attempted to analyze the themes they invariably commented on the love affair, which is the main force
motivating the action of the narrative. Dr. Johnson observed that the subject of the poem..(is) an event
below the common incidents of the common life , Geoffery Tillotson thought that the rejection of the hero by
the heroine was unaccountable. Though many Twentieth century critics felt that the theme of love in the
poem was too weak to invite analysis, but Cleanth Brooks stated that the poem is about war of the sexes
over the rites of possession. It appears that Belinda and Baron might have gone there, like many young
people, to find a suitable match to get married- he to another woman and she to another man. The poem does
not show that they were concerned with finding a mate; rather it confirms that in true neo-classical tradition
they feigned death and believed in sophisticated love and shunning marriage. Both of them, however, wage
a mock war in a mock-heroic poem. Hugo. M. Reichard has summed up the idea thus: The plot of the poem
(is) a contest of wiles between commanding personalities- an uninhibited philanderer and an invincible flirt.
Pope himself seems to be sharing this opinion as he puts it in his own words in The Rape of the Lock and in
other poems. Addison & Steele who also projected in their papers many members of Belindas and Barons
species but they certainly do not contain Belinda and the Baron and Popes world of things.
The axis of the story of The Rape of the Lock is the character of Belinda who, Brooks thinks, is out to
catch a husband. As per the norms of the day the girl would be well advised to become somebodys wife
before the heyday of her reigning beauty passes away. Belinda is not one of those girls who plan for
marriage. In other words, there is not the slightest sign that she is thinking of marriage. The only characteristic
feature of her personality, that catches the attention of the readers first, is Belindas self-sufficiency as a
Poetry 66
reigning beauty. Clarissa pointedly reminds her that since locks will turn to grey she who scorns a man,
must die a maid (Canto V, 26-28) but Belinda persistently disdains wedlock. Reichard assertively says Her
quest is plainly, not for a man in her life, but for men at her feet. Pope makes it clear that Belinda is keen to
be wanted; she devotes herself to the destruction of mankind and even rejects a man. She no doubt likes
with youthful lords to roam and chooses to reject a lord as her lover or husband. She not only declines the
improper advances of the Baron, but she oft rejects other offers also.
If one judges Belinda on the evidences of the text and the opinions of the critics like Murry, Addison and
Steele one would simply agree with Reichard that, Popes heroine is not a bride-to-be but a coquette par
excellence. The Oxford English Dictionary defines this word coquette thus:
a woman ( more or less young) who uses arts to gain the admiration and affection of men,
merely for the gratification of vanity or from a desire of conquest, and without any intention
of responding to the feelings aroused; a woman who habitually trifles with the affections
of men.
On the whole the word coquette stands for a self-loving woman who indulges in winning the hearts and
throwing them away. Belinda fits reasonably well into such descriptions. Her patience before her dressing
table and her fondness for the barges and courts, her delight in love letters, the bounds she puts on her
blandishments and the assault she inflicts on the Baron support the idea that she is extremely self- admiring
and self- loving dame. As Addison had concluded in Tatler, No. 107, They are the most charming, but the
most unworthy sort of women.
It is interesting to note that Ariel, who is an expert witness, himself like other sylphs, is a deceased and
metamorphosed coquette. He is associated with live coquettes by the way of duty because they protect the
fair and chaste girls like Belinda. They guide them through flirtations and keep them fancy- free. It is the
chosen few women who are under the care of the sylphs but the services of all the sylphs are exclusively for
such women. On the one hand, they distract them from the seductive treats of one man, and on the other,
they draw them to the advances of another man.
Belindas behaviour fully matches her retinue though everything she says or does is a plain coquetry. When
the Baron approaches her with the scissors, for instance, to cut the lock, Thrice she looked back, and thrice
the foe drew near. This sort of turning back may be enchanting allurement, or it may be only an innocent
response to the twitches of warning of the sylph. Pope has made her perform on the Thames barge, in the
most natural and fascinating manner. She executes a tour de force of flirtation to borrow an expression
from Reichards article entitled: The Love Affair in Popes Rape of the Lock. Pope presents her thus:
Fair Nymphs, and well-drest Youths around her shone,
But every Eye was fixed on her alone
Favours to none, to all she Smiles extends,
Oft she rejects, but never once offends,
Bright as the sun, her Eyes the Gazers strikes,
And, like the Sun, they shine on all alike.
Belinda skillfully maintains the style that suits her charms without losing her grace. She keeps her chastity in
tact even when she offers temptations and she rejects the advances of some young men. Belindas motive is
just not easily traceable and her conduct is stultifying. As the poem grows, the purpose of Belinda also
becomes clear, that is, living in the present and enjoying her status as a maiden of infinite beauty. She shuns
the dull glories of a virtuous housewife. Her motives are three fold: Vanity, the desire of conquest and self-
love. After her defeat she herself protests that she does not know what movd my mind with youthful lords
to roam. With a characteristic inconsistency in her behaviour she says: Oh had I rather un-admired remaind
/in some lone isle. Belinda has taken all pains with her charms and has got her tresses curled to seize and
enslave the hearts of men before she comes to the Hampton Court. She plays her cards against the two
67 Alexander Pope
dashing, adventurous Knights for the fame in the game of Ombre. Here Pope renders that Belindas ruling
passion is unmistakably pride, which asserts in her personality in the dual sense of self-conceit and self-
assertion. Pope uses the sylphs to expose it for many purposes because they are as solicitous as the girl
herself not only in the matter of dress and coiffure, but also in the inner, instinctive gratification. Ariel addresses
Belinda: Fairest of mortals, Hear and believe! Thy own importance know. Ariel merely says what Belinda
believes; His words are only the echo of Belindas own sense of values. His message on honour is the most
impressive. It begins and ends thus:
What guards the Purity of melting Maids?
Tis but their Sylph, the wise Celestials know,
Tho Honour is the Word with Men below.
The sylph that keeps the young maiden chaste represents something different from honour that preserves
her in the worldly sense of the term.
The term honour means a sense of self-respect , or nobleness of mind as
Dr. Johnson would take it or a concern for good taste as Brooks signifies it but Pope plays on the shades of
meaning in the spectrum of honour. Consider Thalestris outburst:
Honor forbid! At whose unrival d Shrine
Ease, Pleasure, Virtue, All, our sex resign.
If at the first glance, honour seems to mean chastity, the word slowly fades into the meaning as reputation.
Any discussion about the significance of true love must take into consideration the essential meaning of the
term honour. Like all the classical poets, Pope brings out the relevance of love only if it is genuinely associated
with honour. However, in the eighteenth century interpretation of the word has been brought to the forefront
by Ariel when he tells Belinda: Tis but their Sylph, the wise Celestials know, / Tho Honour is the Word with
Men below. He means thatit is pride rather than nobility that keeps the young girl like her pure. It is
interesting to note that sylph behind Belindas purity is symbolically her alter ego.
Belinda displays her real self most vividly at her dressing table. The scene is set in religious metaphor .Her
vanity table is taken as an altar where she plays the double role. She is in person the chief priestess and in
the mirror the goddess. Brooks resolves the mystery with a paradox when he says: Such is the paradox of
beauty worship, she can be both the sincere devotee and the divinity herself. He feels that Pope himself
was amused by the vanity of Belindas performance. Hazlitt comes very close to the first principle of Belindas
soul as well as Popes text when he says:
A toilette is described with the solemnity of an alter raised to the Goddess of vanity. .. In
keeping with her honour, Belindas religion is primarily not beauty worship, but self-
worship.
Belinda is her own goddess, which according to Oxford Dictionary means woman whom one worships or
devotedly admires. The line like puffs, powders, patches, Bibles, billet-doux, builds the meaning through
contrast between heaven and self, piety and vanity and ultimately shows the chaos of values which create
the environment in which even love loses its substance and significance. Not only that, when she bends to
her own image in the mirror, she is enamored by her own image. She worships the deity and decks her to
evoke the worship of mankind. These are in earnest the sacred rites of pride.
Belindas antagonist, the Baron, is also unconventional. She fails to maneuvers the male into matrimony and
assaults the well bred lord and he too attacks the gentle belle. Since Belindas lock is an amatory symbol,
the pursuit of it involves the Baron in a lovers toil. His aims are to kiss and tell- on his foe to die. Baron
burns the previous trophies of love because he believes that Belindas pretty lock of hair will make the
grandest trophies. Hence:
Poetry 68
Resolved to win, he meditates the way,
By Force to ravish, or by Fraud betray.
Barons preference for fraud or force shows that Barons adventurism has no place for persuasion and
matrimony.
In the game of Ombre which is a parlour version of the epic battle, the Baron and Belinda encounter each
other by name for the first time. Ariel, who has strict rules of heart, would not like Belinda to lose her heart
to any young man. Momentary success of the diamonds in the game makes the whole environment a kind of
challenge to Belindas virtue. When the queen of heart is taken Belindas cheeks turn pale because Belinda
holds the king that can take the Barons ace of heart, she averts the catastrophe and emerges out of the crisis
with new honours as a heart- breaker. Within moments the tables are turned. On the way she falls in love
and the earthly lover is probably the Baron. It does not directly affect her status or her adventures. Belinda
tactfully keeps her new ideas about love to herself but betrays no sign of languishing into a wife. On the
contrary, she flaunts Clarissas suggestions about housewifery and marriage. When she tries to retrieve the
lock she symbolically seeks to spike the Barons claims. Never the less, after falling in love, Belinda is not
all what she used to be. Ariel and other sylphs leave her because she does not meet the desired standards of
purity and honour. Hazlitt comments that on this occasion You hardly know whether to laugh or weep.
Ariels painful departure is an indication that the worst is yet to come. The theft of Belindas lock is degrading
because the lock like the hankerchief in Othello would cause the possibility of a greater scandal as Thalestris
prophesies:
Gods! Shall the Ravisher display your Hair,
While the Fops envy, and the Ladies stare!
...
Methinks already I your tears survey,
Already hear horrid things they say,
Already see you a degraded Toast,
And all your Honour in a Whisper lost!
Belinda is also anxious and somehow wants to get rid of such publicity, which is worst than intimacy. She tries
to recover it by words in the fourth canto and by force in the fifth Canto. The battle is fierce and the young
men prefer dying at the hands of these beautiful ladies than withdraw: dying here is physically as well as
metaphorically. While other men dwindle and faint, only one man, Sir Plume, is bold and eccentric enough to
draw Clarissa down. Even this unthinking fellow awakes to the unreality of the warfare and allows himself to
be slain by the frowns of Chloe. On the whole, it is the belles and not the beaux who enjoy the initiative in
Belindas war. Reichard has very aptly observed:
When the girls rush bravely forward, they are flirting, not with death or dishonour, but
with men.. and they limit themselves to lighthearted artillery.
The double point of her bodkin -lovely hair ornament flourished as a dagger is utterly disarming. Even
more breath-taking is her charge of snuff. Like a nerve gas this dust is an absolute weapon; its atoms
completely explode his pretensions to manhood. This fraternizing suits not only the mock-heroics and manners
of drawing rooms, but also the envy felt by fops for another beaus conquest and the joy felt by belles for
another beautys shame. However, it adds new pleasure even to death,and turns on Belinda favourably.
Single-handedly she wins the war. For Joves scale the singular ladys hair outweighs the multiple mens
wits. The Baron suffers humiliation as he is thrown out by a snip of her fingers. The lock, obtained with
guilt has been kept with pain. Belinda threatens the Baron who exposed her honour to unfair whispers, to
put him to an everlasting shame with a hairpin. To restore to the prewar equilibrium it is necessary that none
is the gainer or the loser. After they have fought this game of love and honour with cards, scissors and snuff,
their ambitious aims are thwarted and the contest is drawn. The disappearance of the lock has left the baron
without a trophy of conquest and Belinda without a trophy of reprisal.
69 Alexander Pope
In the end, the star, which is born from the lost lock of Belinda, shines to her advantage but it is hers only by
the special providence of Popes poetry. He has graced her career with sense and good humour:
This Lock, the Muse shall consecrate to Fame,
And midst the Stars inscribes Belindas Name.
The poet invests her with a finer glory than she could ever achieve by her own art of beauty or love.
Supernatural Element in The Rape of the Lock
Pope introduced the supernatural agents in the second edition of the poem when he enlarged two cantos to
five cantos. His choice of the supernatural shows how alive he was to the literature, which even could not be
counted on to help him to be a poet. Pope found in the Rosicrucian doctrine many hints about the Sylphs
specially in Le Comte de Gabalis, a roman written forty years ago in France by Abbe de Monfaucon de
Villars, and which has been twice translated into English. The short novel is itself a skit on the sylphs of the
system, the Rosicrucian philosophy, which had been inaugurated in Germany a hundred years earlier. Since
the machinery of a serious epic is derived from established mythology, Popes adoption of the machinery
from the Rosicrucians was well known to be counted as established. Pope, then, owed to Gabalis the right
to assume the existence of this particular system of elemental sprites who could change their sex at will, but
the main attraction through out the novel is laid on their attractions for men as elementary mistresses. In
Popes poem, on the other hand, they figure primarily as the allies of women in their unceasing war with men.
Pope took from this novel what he could conveniently develop as per the design of his poem; for instance, in
Gabalis all the sylphs are good but Pope following the traditional categories of spirits, makes gnomes bad
wickedly contriving vexations for the ladies. He makes them more like the factious celestials of the epics.
According to the Rosicrucians,
the four elements are inhabited by spirits, which they call sylphs, gnomes, nymphs and
salamanders. The gnomes or demons of earth delight in mischiefs; but the sylphs, whose
habitation is in the air, are the best conditioned creatures imaginable. For they say, any
mortals may enjoy the most intimate familiarities with these gentle spirits, upon a condition
very easy to all true adepts, an inviolate preservation of chastity.
Pope also borrows the opinion that transmigrated souls protect their friends on earth, and conspire against
their enemies; he makes the sylphs guardians of maidens and this again carries its epic reference since the
epic heroes are provided with their divine guardians. He is, however, more interested than de Villars in the
living conditions of the sylphs and goes for help to another French book, that is Fontenelles Pluralite de
Mondes .It is on this basis of the scientific whims of Fontenelle that Popes fancy scrupulously build up its
universe ,for example, take 77-86 line from Canto II.
Like Miltons angels again, Popes sylphs are invulnerable, i.e., if their bodies are divided they can come
together again. Pope borrows the idea of their regimentation and names them,for instance, The light Militia
of the lower sky. Ian Jack made an insightful observation that,
The main thing that he took over was merely the licence to invent a fantastic race whose
presence would make every trivial incident in his poem appear of utmost importance . The
sylphs are mirrors added to his scene. By them the central action is reflected and multiplied
a hundredfold, gaining in subtlety and mystery as well as in ironical importance.
The creation of the sylphs allowed Popes imagination a much wider scope than before. The whole of English
poetry contains no passage of description more exquisite than that of the sylphs in Canto II of The Rape of
the Lock Of the four Elementary Nations Pope concentrates on the sylphs, whose region is the air; and air
is the element which marks every line of this description:
He summons strait his Denizen of Air;
The lucid Squadrons round the Sails repair:
Poetry 70
Soft o ver the Shrouds Ariel Whispers breathe.
That seem d but Zephyrs to the Train beneath.
Some to the Sun their Insect-Wings unfold,
Waft on the breeze, or sink in the Cloud of Gold.
Transparent Forms, too fine for mortal Sight,
Loose to the Wind their airy Garments flew,
Thin glittering textures of the filmy Dew.
Fully immersed in the ethereal beauty of the sylphs, Pope describes some of the colours, which these sprites
display:
Dipt in the richest Tincture of the Skies,
Where Light disports in ever-mingling Dies,
While ev ry Beam new transient Colours flings,
Colours that change whene er they wave their Wings.
Amid the Circle, on the gilded Mast,
Superior by the Head was Ariel plac d;
His Purple Pinions opening to the Sun,
He raised his Azure Wand, and thus begun.
Pope borrowed the idea of Ariel from Shakespeares The Tempest, and got so fascinated by the beauty of
the sprites, which are essentially the product of his own imagination, that he went much ahead of the given
idea. Ian Jack has remarked in this context: Through out the poem the senses are flattered as delicately as
they are in Belindas world itself.
In his letter to Arabella Fermor Pope explains the term machinery and its use in the epic. He says:
the machinery, madam, is a term invented by the critics, to signify that part which the
deities, angels, or demons are made to act in a poem: For the ancient poets are in one
respect like many modern ladies; let an action be never so trivial in itself, they always make
it appear of the utmost importance. These machines I determined to raise on a new and odd
foundation, the Rosicrucian doctrine of Spirits.
The machinery gives Pope an unrivalled opportunity of indulging in his descriptive powers and to follow the
epic design more effectively as the machinery of sylphs is a parody on gods and goddesses in classical
epics. In an epic the immortals intervene in action. They control the destiny of men and determine their
success or failure. In The Rape of the Lock sylphs intervene in the small stratagems of love. Ariel tells
Belinda that hundreds of sylphs attend the fair ones and zealously guard their chastity:
What guards the purity of melting maids,
In courtly balls, and midnight masquerades
..
Tis their sylph, the wise celestials know,
Though honour is the word with men below.
The sylphs contrive what is known as the levity of women. If a woman rejects a lover or prefers one suitor
to another, it is because of the secret contrivance of sylphs. This is how the sylphs control the course of
womens love on this earth, and guides them through its mystic mazes. It is because of their secret influence
that
With varying vanities, from every part,
They shift the moving toyshop of their heart.
As in the epic gods govern the human destiny; in Popes The Rape of the Lock the sylphs influence the
course of human affairs, especially love. Exactly like the gods, they intervene in the events as they develop.
A thousand sprites try to prevent Lord Peter from cutting Belindas lock:
71 Alexander Pope
Swift to the Lock a thousand sprites repair,
A thousand wings, by turn, blow back the hair:
And thrice they twitched the diamond in her ear
Thrice she looked back and thrice the foe drew near.
Against the brilliant background of the eighteenth century society, Popes gorgeous descriptions about the
sylphs make the poem an exceptionally fascinating piece of poetic creation.
As the gods have their favourites among mortals, so sylphs have their favourites among beauties. Belinda is
the favourite of Ariel who acts like the guardian angel. He could not, however, protect her hair because he
viewed an earthly lover lurking in her heart. Thus, the gods in the classical epics are travestied in The Rape
of the Lock through the machinery of the sylphs. Geoffrey Tillotson says that the scale in The Rape of the
Lock is that of diminution. The mock-epic poem presents the methods of the epic on a diminutive scale. The
sylphs are like the gods of epic on a diminutive scale. In a world of trivialities they take recourse to petty
stratagems. They are quite suited to the world of The Rape of the Lock. Precisely, the machinery in the
poem is a splendid and superb invention and achievement of Popes imagination.
Pope as a Satirist
Of the entire genre that makes up the Western literary tradition, satire is the only form invented by the
Romans rather than the Greeks. The Latin noun from which the word satire is taken is satura which
means a medley, a variety of things or topics. The main aim of the comic satire developed by Horace is to
castigate and thus to correct the prevailing follies and vices of the age. The Augustan age is the golden period
of English satire because the finest and the most powerful satires were written in this age. It is not Pope but
his friend Swift who was the great natural satirist and prior to him was Dryden. Pope uses this skill differently
because he shows a sneaking liking for the society or the things he attacked through his satire. If Pope makes
conventional attacks on pride, he had a dangerous kind of pride himself. He says:
Yes, I am proud; I must be proud to see
Men not afraid of god, afraid of me
Pope could not be a satirist like Swift because he had taken a sanguine and cheerful view of London society.
He loved London as the great centre of all pleasures and amenities of life and became, as Lowel aptly points
out, the delineator of manners and the poet of society whose follies and frivolities also he knew well. Pope
was temperamentally respectful to great lords, powerful statesmen, learned lawyers, courtly manners and
loved his neighbour and he made these factors known publicly Pope was almost an invalid depending very
much on the expensive life-style, glitter and gold of the society and close friendships. He could not take grim
and limited view of the possibilities of life as a great satirist is bound to do. In his Essay on Man and Moral
Essays Pope had taken a positive view of the power of reason to regulate passion and the tendency, implanted
by God himself, of our self-love, the spring of all our energies, to grow into social love. He loved his age and
his society, and if he criticized them, it had only one purpose, that is, to purge them of their limitations. Some
of Popes best writing in his satires is invective against his enemies or compliments to his friends-, which have
all the eloquence of true feeling. Other pieces of excellent writing in Popes satires are in the nature of an
emotional autobiography; a kind of apology, as in the Arbothnot poem, for a life shut up in literature because
it could have no other outlet, an apology that moves effectively between the self-mocking, the proud and the
sad. In his satirical skill Pope comes next to Dryden, his later poems are more satirical in nature than his
earlier ones and the note of satire is present in almost everything he wrote. He has a moral tendency, which
naturally expresses itself in terms of satire.
Popes important satirical works are, The Dunciad, The Moral Essay and the Imitation of Horace and
similar epistles and satires. In The Dunciad, his moral excuse was that he was defending a high civilization
against forces of stupidity and corruption that were threatening to destroy it. No doubt, he ridicules dullness
in literary works, but he also attacks his enemies who had given him real or imaginary offence. He attacks
Poetry 72
Theobald, because he found fault with his edition of Shakespeare. Mark Jacobs says that it is a poem that
holds ones attention by being at once broadly comic and strikingly nasty. It is probably the most powerful
and original of all Popes poems, but also the least charming; whereas elsewhere he always seems to write
with ease, here one is conscious of recurrent triumph but also of continual effort. However, it displays
Popes majestic power which raised satirical poetry to a grandeur to use George Frasers expression.
Likewise, he attacks Colly Cibber for he ridiculed a play in which Pope had some share. Besides, Pope
ridiculed his old enemy Dennis, who harassed him all his life and remained an enemy. He bitterly satirized
Lintot who accused him of unfair dealings with his collaborators in his translation of Odyssey. In his Imitations
of Horace Pope attacks grossly his former friend, Lady Mary Wortley Montagu and in his Epistles to Dr.
Arbothnot he caricatures Addison who was once his friend.
There are two aspects of Popes satire- impersonal and personal. His satires are basically directed against
the follies of polite society, against corruption in politics, and against false values in art, particularly the art of
poetry. But, this is also not the whole truth about Popes satires because it is not as impersonal as stated by
a critic. Pope did not succeed in emancipating himself from personal spite and in generalizing his dislikes.
Talking about The Dunciad John Dennis says:
The theme is a mean one. Pope from his social eminence at Twickenham, looks with scorn
on the authors who write for bread, and with malignity on the authors whom he regarded as
his enemies. There is, for the most part, little elevation in his method of treatment, and we
can almost fancy that we see a cruel joy in the poets face as he impales his victims of his
wrathThere is no part of it which can be read with unmixed pleasure, if we except the
noble lines which conclude the satire.
This estimate may sound bitter but is true to some extent. Pope attacked in his satires not only man but also
men and his attack on men is really conspicuous and ruthless. Pope could not forgive even his friends if they
annoyed him or gave him offence real or imaginary.
When an attempt is made to assess the ethical values of Popes satire, it leads to certain controversies. What
concern us most are its wit, vigour, brilliance and beauty of form. Saintsbury sums up Popes contribution as
a writer of satires thus:
It is in his later Essay, his Epistles, his Satires and his Dunciad that Popes genius shows at
its very greatest. They are no doubt mosaicsthe Atticus passage was pretty in Epistle to
Arbuthnot- but this is no defect in them. Here he reigns triumphant. His philosophy may
be always shallow and sometimes mere nonsense; his satire may lack the large Olympian
sweep of Dryden, but he looked on society, and on humanity, as that society happened
for the time to express it, with an unclouded eye, and he expressed views with a pen that
never stumbled, never made slips of form, and always said the right thing in the right
way
Even in The Rape of the Lock, Pope has carried the responsibility of a satirist in the most dignified manner.
He knew the social circle whose follies and frivolities are exposed in the poem. Besides, it presents the
attitude of the age towards women. We have already seen that wits addressed ladies in a tone of gallantry,
but in reality they were treated like pretty triflers. Addison also deplored the treatment given to them and
added that the toilet is the great scene of business, and the right adjustment of their hair, the principal
employment of their lives. Belinda, like the ladies of her age, seems to be devoted to the similar pursuits
related to toilet and tea, Ombre and armour. Her mornings are spent in the adoration of the cosmetic
powers , Puffs, powders, patches and bibles which make up her beauty. After her make up which repaired
her smiles, she sallies forth to conquer the hearts of the young men. Her main occupations are balls, games
and masquerades. This sort of life, deprived of any work or serious engagement obviously, results in petty act
of removing the lock of a woman. Pope exposes the hollowness of the class, which is pompous only from
without but is shallow within. It is a poem in which the coxcomb and dandies on the one hand and frivolous
73 Alexander Pope
and pretentious woman on the other display their vanities. When invested in a grand attire of epic, their
frivolities become all the more glaring and interesting. Pope does portray the life of the age from the point of
view of a moralist. His purpose is to present their weaknesses with a view to improving them. When Pope
presents their smallness, he is not condemning them rather he is amused by their follies, which he
believes, must be corrected. Humour does not arise from a great and serious purpose. It emerges from a
situation in which a lady loses a lock of her hair, or from a conflict in which a man is slain with a womans
bodkin.
Thus, the satire in The Rape of the Lock exposes the life of the age in playful manner and the picture is
saturated with a gentle irony. The instructive hours are passed by exchanging the scandals, and by singing,
laughing and ogling. The trivialities are drawn with exquisite skill; they are meant to amuse and should not be
taken more seriously than Pope meant them to be. Joseph Warton has summed up the whole issue stating
that,
The Rape of the Lock is the Best satire extant; that it contains the truest and the liveliest
picture of modern life; that the subject is of a more elegant nature, as well as more artfully
conducted, than that of any other heroi-comic poem. Pope here appears in the light of a
man of gallantry, and of a thorough knowledge of the world; and indeed he had nothing, in
his carriage and deportment, of that affected singularity, which induced some men of genius
to despise, and depart from, the established rules of politeness and civil life.
In fact, Popes satire was mostly leveled against folly. He says, Fools rush to my head, and I write .
Popes Language, Art of Versification and The Heroic Couplet
Popes verbal workmanship is unparalleled. He is the master of clean-cut and incisive phraseology and
ornamental extravagances of the eighteenth century diction which has been attacked by the later critics
principally on three grounds: (a) that it was a new borrowing from Latin, for example, take the word dehorting,
or its use in the original Latin sense; or the word obvious; these words were already borrowed and developed
in meaning, for example obvious;(b) that it adapted a Latin method of phrasing, for example, fleecy care;
and (c) that it was used too much. Against the first objection the only reply is that the poets of the age were
experimenters; for the second the only justification can be that it was Latin and therefore it provided cultivated
pleasure. Fleecy care is good as sound. It is also subtle and complex as meaning. This kind of phrase
provided an excellent method of compression, especially since it is often an abstract and a concrete, which
are clashed together. This method of compression by periphrasis, of comprehensive description and designation
acting simultaneously, becomes one of the most prominent items in the poetic diction of the eighteenth century.
Another favourite phrase is Adjective + a group of words: for example, the featherd kind. The poets of the
eighteenth century attained the stateliness befitting the Classical poets especially Virgil, his conception of
poetry and his gracefulness by adopting their metre. They achieved it by avoiding low words like fish and
sheep. There is another reason for this poetic diction. It is notable that it is principally used in reference to
external nature. The eighteenth century inherited the Renaissance creed that man is the monarch in his
world. Dryden and Pope looked at the external nature for what it could show them of splendour or beauty or
even of mystery they superimposed on nature by allotting it a due and fit place in the human scheme. In other
words, they made a selection from nature of elements that suited their interests, and superimposed on nature
some of their own civilized humanity. Briefly the writers justified the use of Latin diction, phrases and expression
used excessively. Pope, being an extremely laborious craftsman, learnt through constant labour and practice
the art of expressing his ideas in the best words and phrases. To achieve the perfection of form, his one great
concern was to express the best thought within his compass in the best words. Pope corrected his lines
with meticulous care, polished and repolished them. Dr. Johnson speaks of Popes incessant and unwearied
diligence and adds that Pope was not content to satisfy; he desired to excel, therefore always endeavoured
to do his best He examined lines and words with minute and punctilious observation, and retouched
every part with indefatigable diligence, till he had left nothing to be forgiven.
Poetry 74
Pope believes that there should be correctness of diction. Certain poems require to draw from a fund of
acknowledged poetic diction, others require original diction. As Geoffrey Tillotson observes: He requires
that language should be appropriate. There should be no incongruity between the length in space (or time)
and the length in meaning, between decoration and substance, between obsolete and modern. Appropriateness
is the cardinal virtue for Pope in life as well as literature. In Essay on Criticism Pope says:
Expression is the dress of thought, and still
Appears more decent, as more suitable
For diff rent styles with diff rent subjects sort,
As several garbs with country, town and court.
Pope firmly believed that the style should be adapted to the subject. He had rules for a variety of styles even
for the appropriate placing of the preposition:
What is your opinion (asks the Boswellian Spence)of placing preposition at the end of a
sentence? It is certainly wrong: but I have made a rule to myself about them some time
ago, and I think verily tis the right one. We use them so in common conversation: and that
use will authorize one, I think, for doing the same in slighter pieces, but not in formal
ones.
Pope cannot endure stiffness, which is created with high words and metaphors. He wanted his language to
be appropriate and hence there is no diction in satires to borrow the expression of Tillotson. In the
moral poetry Pope uses the words almost with freedom and fearlessness of Shakespeare. This freedom
can be seen nowhere more readily than in Popes verbs of the poetic diction which were predominantly
of Latin origin. He is free but at the same time he is not free to use any word that comes to his head,
because like all, his poems, the satires are addressed to the cultured society of his time. As Tillotson
says:
Poeticisms are barred. These must be no merely ornamental epithets, and no compound
ones. The epithet must therefore fall into its prose order, that is, it must precede the noun
Such rules apply unless appropriateness demands their temporary suspension. Coleridge, in Biographia
Literaria, considered that in satires, Pope was a poet of almost faultless position and choice of words.
Pope inherited the Elizabethan dread that English language had a limited future. Hence his occupation with
correctness in language is aimed partly at keeping English afloat. In his book On the Poetry of Pope
Tillotson reflects on Popes fancy for Latinizing English:
His envy of the adamant of Latin led him to respect and extend the seventeenth century
practice of latinizing English. In his early works his respect was shown mainly in vocabulary
and methods of phrasing, in the later work mainly in the close Latin-like packing of line,
and the precise correctness of each word used. Correctness was a likely preservative.
Pope wished to be concise in the meaning and the use of words. That perhaps was the first requirement for
writing in the heroic couplet. He enunciated the rules which he felt were valuable for the writing of couplets.
Though Dryden did not invent the couplet but he improved upon his predecessors and turned it into a powerful
medium of expression. Besides, he broke the monotony of the couplet by frequent use of triplets and
Alexandrines. In the Epistle to Augustus, Pope summarizes the history of seventeenth century versification,
pays his tribute to Dryden though he thinks of him an incorrect versifier .
The bulk of Popes poetry is written in the heroic couplets because, as Pope believed,it attracts attention to
itself as a metre and carries an unpretentious elegance . He learned his merical devices from Dryden but
he narrowed down its metrical scope considerably. He discarded the triplet and Alexandrine by which Dryden
introduced variety in his verse and brought more subtle variations of rhythm within the closed couplet. Tillotson
rightly points out that
75 Alexander Pope
Heroic couplets had not always been written in the way Pope wrote them. He may be said
to have regarded them as if they were stanzas, self-contained; or, if not quite that, as having
a beginning , middle and end even though at the end stood a gate and a gate which on some
occasions he opened to allow the sense to drive through. That is, the couplet may belong to
the paragraph, even more than to itself: but if so, it is only because Pope deliberately chose
to open the gate.
Pope enunciated in letters to Cromwell and Walsh some of the principles upon which he worked in the heroic
couplets such as of the feet, the quantities and the pauses . In the collected Works of 1717 he writes:
There are indeed certain Niceties, which, tho not much observed even by correct versifiers, I cannot
but think, deserve to be better regarded. Briefly they are:
1. It is not enough that nothing offends the ear, but a good poet will adapt the very Sounds, as well as Words,
to the things he treats of.
2. In any smooth English verse of ten syllables, there is naturally a Pause at the forth, fifth, or sixth
syllables
3. Another nicety is in relation to Expletives, whether words or syllables Do before verbs plural is
absolutely such which are almost always used for the sake of rhime
4. I would also object to the irruption of Alexandrine verses, of twelve syllables I am of the same opinion
as to Triple Rhimes.
5. I could equally object to the Repetition of the same Rhimes within four or six of each other, as tiresome
to the ear throtheir Monotony.
6. Monosyllabic Lines, unless very artfully managed, are stiff, or languishing: but may be beautiful to express
Melancholy, slowness, or Labour.
7. To come to Hiatus, or Gap between two words, which is caused by two vowels opening on each other .
I think the rule in this case is either to use Caesura (by which Pope meant the elision of one of the vowels
or admit Hiatus, for Caesura sometimes offends the ear more than the Hiatus .
As these rules confirm, Popes first need is onomatopoeia. There are thousands of examples of Popes
beautiful use of onomatopoetic effects through so many varieties of patterns. For instance, consider how
Pope provides an antithesis as well as an echo in the following line:
So sweetly warble, or so smoothly flow
Or take an instance of unbalance between two parts:
More bright than moon, yet fresh as early day.
Or the line:
Fresh as the moon, and as the season fair.
in which there is an inversion of music but not an inversion of meaning. Tillotsons observation is
remarkable when he says: Popes regard for versification which, to speak approximately, began
in the cause of music and continued in the cause of meaning, was the major element in his effect and his
effectiveness.
Popes greatest triumph in the couplet lies in his making it dramatic with the help of the mechanics of his art
which make them satisfying as complete stanzas and there is no doubt that Pope looked on the couplet as
capable of attaining a temporary unity in itself. There are three significant qualities which make them
astonishingly unpredictable: (a) He introduces in them a subtler variety of rhythm, and adds to it an incomparable
lightness and polish. One of the critics of Pope has summed up the beauty of his couplet thus: Light, bright,
glittering, varied in a manner almost impossible to account for, tipped over with the nearest, sharpest rhyme,
volleying on the dazzled, though at times at any rate satiated reader, a sort of salvo of feud artifice, skipping,
Poetry 76
crackling, scattering colour and sound all round and about him. (b) There is a quality of the verbal colouring
and metre on the large scale. Popes meaning is achieved through his metre as much as through his words.
Pope, seeing the value of conciseness, saw also that the heroic couplet- that of all metres- could be patterned
and rhythmd so as to save words, so as to complete the subtlety of a meaning which otherwise would have
taken up more space. The metre whispers to the reader the sense, the tone, the nuance which those words
have not needed to be used for. (c) Popes couplet are self-sufficient so that they are curiously
detachable even when lacking grammatical independence. From the stand-point of sense each couplet of
Pope is complete in itself. He introduces in them sense pause and grammatical pause. to present a
complete thought
To sum up Popes art of poetry it can be said that Pope with his concepts of correctness about human nature
and society, art and values has risen above the old myth of being a satirical poet and has become a
conscious Augustan prophet whose greatness is to voice the ideas and ideals of his age to use the expression
of S.L. Goldburg who futher adds:
He has created for his age, and in another sense for ours as well, But that life and that
artistic intelligence of it gleams most brightly as they also reflect the chaos and darkness
that paradoxically sustain them.
Being a great writer, Pope did not deliver exactly what his audience had ordered. There are codes and secret
messages in his work; there is a constant thread of myth, irrationality and fancy but he was sufficiently a man
of his time who used the poetic idiom then in fashion, who used the inherited idiom with absolute mastery. He
is a social poet who knew his people; he is a poet of correctness, he is a creative poet who is conscious
of his responsibility and uses his art effectively. In the Preface to his volume of 1717 Pope observed that the
life of a Wit is a warfare upon earth; and the epigram makes an apt comment on his work, though in a more
complex sense than he could have meant when he made it. The highest life of his Wit is certainly a warfare,
not only directed at the earth he inhabited, but also an inextricable part of it. At his greatest, he does not
simply oppose clear-cut doctrines or principles against an imperfect word, but participates in the endless
conflicts that make it imperfect . As a poet Pope carries more inclusive, more subtle, more relaxed and more
mature sense of life around him.
Assignments
Note: Answer the following questions.
1. What are the characteristic features of the Augustan age , which is also known as the Age of Pope?
2. Write an essay on Pope as a Neo-classical poet and a true representative of the eighteenth century.
3. Discuss Pope as a Satirist with special reference to The Rape of the Lock.
4. Consider Pope as a writer of Heroic couplets.
5. Discuss The Rape of the Lock as a mock-epic poem.
6. Write an essay on the supernatural machinery in The Rape of the Lock
7. What are the qualities of Belindas character? Illustrate your answer.
8. Geoffrey Tillotson calls Pope as a poet of correctness? Elucidate the statement.
9. Discuss Popes art of versification. Give illustrations to support your answer.
10. What are the structural qualities of The Rape of the Lock?
11. Discuss the theme of love in The Rape of the Lock.
12. In The Rape of the Lock Pope himself is fascinated by the glitter of his own age. Discuss the
remark.
13. What is the significant moral message of The Rape of the Lock?
77 Alexander Pope
14. Discuss Pope as a poet. Give a reasoned answer.
15. What are the limitations or demerits of Pope as a poet?
Note: Answer the following questions in about two hundred words.
1. What is a heroic couplet?
2. Discuss the opening lines of the first Canto of The Rape of the Lock
3. What are the epic qualities in The Rape of the Lock? Give two examples to support your
answer.
4. Pope has recommended certain niceties for poetry. Discuss any three of them briefly.
5. Write a note on Sylphs.
6. What is the difference between the first and the second version of The Rape of the Lock?
7. What happens to Belindas lock at the end of the poem?
8. What was the purpose of writing the poem, The Rape of the Lock?
9. Discuss the role of Clarissa.
10. What is the significance of the title of The Rape of the Lock?
11. What is a Satire?
12. Discuss the significance of the metre in Popes poetry.
13. Write a note on Popes classicism.
14. Point out any two qualities of Popes craftsmanship.
15. What are the features that make Popes poetry autobiographical?
Books Useful for the Students
Poems
Complete Editions
The Poems of Alexander Pope: the Twickenham Edition. General Editor, John Butt, 6 vols. Its 7, London,
1939-6I. This is the definitive edition.
The poems of Alexander Pope, ed. John Butt, London, 1963, new ed. 1965. A one-volume edition of the
Twickenham Text with selected annotations.
The Poetical Works of Alexander Pope, ed. Herbert Davis, London, 1966. Oxford Standard Authors Edition.
Letters
The correspondence of Alexander Pope, ed. G. Sherburn, 5 vols. Oxford, 1956.
Letters of Alexander Pope, A selection edited by J. Butt, London, 1960.
George Sherburn, The Early Career of Alexander Pope, Oxford, 1934. The standard biography up to 1727.
Edith Sitwell, Alexander Pope, London, 1930. In spite of its sentimentality this book still has some value for its
sympathetic account of Pope.
Joseph Spence, Anecdotes, Observations, and Characters of Books and Men, Collected form the Conversation
of Mr. Pope and other Eminent Persons of His Time.
(I) ed. S.W. Singer, 1820. Newly introduced by Bonamy Dobree, London, 1964.
(II) Ed. J.M. Osborn, 2 vols. Oxford, 1966. An essential source for Popes life.
W.K. Wimsatt, The Portraits of Alexander Pope, New Haven and London, 1965. An interesting and beautifully
produced book.
Poetry 78
Criticism
A.L. Williams, Popes Dunciad: A Study of its Meaning, London, 1955.
Arden, John M., Something Like Horace: Studies in the Art and Allusion of Popes Horatian Satires. Nashville,
Tennessee, 1969.
Arthur O. love joy, The Great Chain of Being, Cambridge, Mass., 1936, Repr. 1950. See Chaps. VI-IX for an
illuminating study of some key ideas in the 18
th
century.
Bateson, F.W. and Joukovsky, N.A (eds), Alexander Pope: Acritical Anthology, Harmondsworth,
1971.
Cleanth Brooks, The Case of Miss Arabella Fermor, in Sewanee Review, vol. LI, no. 4, 1943, pp. 505-24;
also in The Well-Wrought Urn, New York, 1947.
Dixon, Peter, The World of Popes Satires: An Introduction to the Epistles and Imitations of Horace ,
London, 1968.
Dobree, Bonamy, Alexander Pope, London, 1951.
Douglas Knight, Pope and the Heroic Tradition, A Critical Study of His Iliad, New Haven and London, 1951.
Edith Sitwell, Alexander pope, London, 1930.
Evan Jones, Verse, Prose and Pope: A From of Sensibility, in The Melbourne Critical Review, No. 4, 1961,
pp. 30-40.
Geoffrey Tillotson, On the Poetry of Pope, London, 1938, rev. ed. 1950. The best book by a distinguished
Pope scholar.
Geoffery Tillotson, Pope and Human Nature, Oxford, 1958.
Geoffery Tillotson, Alexander Pope, I and II, Two essays in Essays in Criticism and Research, Cambridge,
1942.
George Sherburn, Pope at Work, in Essays on the Eighteenth Century Prese4nted to David Nichol Smith,
Oxford, 1945, pp. 49-64.
G.Wilson Knight, The Poetry of Alexander Pope: Laureate of Peace, London, 1955, Paperback 1965. See
Chapter The Vital Flame, originally published in The Burning Oracle, London, 1939. The rest of the book is
not as helpful as this chapter.
Ian Jack Augustan Satire: intention and Idiom in English Poetry 1660-1750. Oxford, 1952. Chaps. V-VII.
John Butt, The Augustan Age, London, 1950. Has a useful chapter on Pope.
J. Sutherland, A preface to Eighteenth Century Poetry, London, 1948. a sound introduction to the period.
J.S. Cunningham, Pope: The Rope of the Lock, London, 1961. A detailed analysis of the poem.
Maynard Mack, Ed., Essential Articles for the Study of Alexander Pope, London, U.S.A. Printing, 1965. A
valuable collection although of uneven quality. See in particular the essays by Auden, Brooks, Cameron,
Empson, Griffith, Jack, Knight, Sutherland, Williams, and Wimsatt.
Maynard Mack, Wit and Poetry and Pope : Some observations on his Imagery , in Pope and his
Contemporaries: Essays presented to George Sherburn, ed J. L. Clifford and L. Landa, Oxford, 1949, pp.
320-40. The other essays in this book are also worth reading.
M. Price. To the Places of Wisdom, New York, 1964. Includes a good essay on Pope.
Norman Ault, New Light on Pope, London, 1949.
Owen Ruffhead, The Life of Alexander Pope, London, 1769.
79 Alexander Pope
R.A. Brower, Alexander Pope: The Poetry of Allusion, Oxford, 1959. On the richness and meaning of
classical allusion in Pope.
Rebecca Price Parkin, the Poetic Workmanship of Alexander Pope, Minneapolis, 1955.
R.W. Rogers, The Major Satires of Alexander Pope, Urbana, Ill., 1955.
T.R. Edwards, This Dark Estate: A Reading of Pope, Berkeley, 1963.
Warren, Austin, Alexander Pope as Critic and Humanist, Princeton 1929.
William Empson, Wit in the Essay on Criticism, in The Hudson Review, vol II, No. 4, 1950, pp. 559-77; also
in The Structure of Complex Words, London, 1951. Difficult but interesting.
M.A.ENGLISH
LITERATURE IN ENGLISH FROM: 1772-1834
SAMUEL TAYLOR COLERIDGE`S: THE RIME OF THE ANCIENT
MARINER AND KUBLA KHAN.
A BRIEF BIOGRAPHICAL SKETCH OF THE POET
Samuel Taylor Coleridge was born at Ottery, St. Mary in Devon- shire,
England in the year 1772. He was a great poet, a critic, a philosopher and
dramatist. He was the youngest of the nine brothers and one sister. His
father was the Vicar of the village; he was visionary and unworldly. As a
boy Coleridge himself was very imaginative, and a solitary loving person.
Coleridge was educated at Christ's Hospital, London (1781). Matriculated
at Jesus College, Cambridge (1791). Coleridges marvelous gift of
eloquence was already evident and his schoolfellows would listen to him
with great interest, as the young poet poured out poetry with all his
melody.
Coleridge took little interest in games as a boy. He spent most of his time
reading books. Once he ran away from home, fearing a whipping of his
father and spent the night by the banks of the village stream. He caught
cold and suffered from rheumatism, which embittered his future life, and
so we lost a great poet at a young age.
At the age of sixteen he fell in love with Mary Evans, the sister of a school
friend, but was married to Sarah Flicker, the sister of Southey's fiance.
Sarah was neither emotionally nor intellectually a suitable partner for
Coleridge. His marriage was a failure because of temperamental and
practical difficulties from both sides.
Coleridge was idealistic, sensitive, generous and openhearted. Southey
was conservative and highly materialistic in his attitude. In 1795, the two
spent enough time to realize their mutual incompatibility and bitterly
quarreled with each other.
MEETING WITH WORDSWORTH
Coleridge met Wordsworth in 1795 and the two had felt attracted to each
other by a common interest in political idealism and poetry. In 1797,
Wordsworth and his sister Dorothy moved to Alfoxdon to be near the
Coleridges. The two poets were temperamentally different but they had
great regards for each others talent and each stimulated the other.
Coleridge was brilliant and commanded a vast range of ideas while
Wordsworth possessed great emotional stability. Coleridge said that when
compared to Wordsworth, he felt himself "a little man". Wordsworth felt
that he was no match for Coleridge's profundity. Dorothy has given a very
vivid impression of the personality of Coleridge during these days.
"He is a wonderful man. His conversation themes with soul mind and
spirit. Then he is so benevolent, so good-tempered and cheerful, and like
William, interests himself so much about every trifle. At first I thought
him thin, has a wide mouth thick lips, and not very good teeth, longish,
loose-growing, half curling rough black hair. But, if you hear him speak
for 5 minutes, you think no more of them. His eye is large and full, and
not very dark, but grey- such an eye as would receive from a heavy soul
the dullest _expression; but it speaks every motion of his animated mind;
In the short time from June 1797 to September 1798 Coleridge wrote
almost all of his best poetry- "The Ancient Mariner", "The Nightingale",
"The first part of Christabel", "Love", "Fears in Solitude", "Frost at
Midnight", "Kubla Khan" etc
Some change in Coleridges writing is noticed due to Wordsworths
influence upon him. Coleridge was by nature unsteady, and also rambling
in his speculation; it was Wordsworth who checked his rambling tendency
and helped and encouraged him to concentrate his poetic energy along a
definite channel. And again Wordsworth's philosophy of nature influenced
him and coloured to some extent his nature poetry. The later groups of
nature poems show a deeper sense. But Coleridge did not fully and
unreservedly accept Wordsworth's philosophy of nature. According to
Wordsworth, nature lives her own life and heals and soothes man in his
sorrows and suffering. But Coleridge opposes this view where he says in
"Ode to DEJECTION":
O Lady we receive but what we give
And in our life alone does nature live.
Nature to him is cold and inanimate, and if any glory or joy is to be found
in her, it is due to the reflective mind of man and not any quality present in
her:
Ah, from the soul itself must issue forth
A light, a glory, a fair luminous cloud
Enveloping the Earth...
Both Coleridge and Wordsworth revolted against the artificial poetic
diction of the eighteenth century. But Coleridge did not wholly subscribe
to Wordsworth theory. He would not give any importance to rustic speech,
nor would he accept the dictum that "there is no essential difference
between the language of prose and metrical composition".
In September 1798, a few months after the birth of his second son
Berkely, Coleridge accompanied Wordsworths to Germany. In their
absence Cottle published the first edition of the Lyrical Ballads, a joint
venture of Wordsworth and Coleridge, at Bristol. The book sold very bad
and earned a lot of criticism.
Coleridge returned to London to engage himself in political journalism for
the "Morning Post" but gave it up in 1800. Since Wordsworth and
Coleridge were now not living together, this adversely affected the quality
of their poetry. Coleridge resumed "Christabel" and wrote its second part,
but it is very much inferior to the first part.
COLERIDGE'S HEALTH
Coleridge was persistently scourged with rheumatism and spasms in the
stomach. He started taking opium as a relief giver and soon got addicted to
it. To distract himself from his health and domestic problems he took
recourse to metaphysics and abstract philosophy. He soon became a
nationalist, and in philosophy he began to believe in the supreme
importance of mind and spirit. His sorrow and frustration is bewailed in
his last green poem "Dejection: An Ode"' this was actually written as a
verse letter to Sara Hutchinson. The Ode was written in April 1802.
Coleridge spent the next three years of his life in Italy and Malta; His
health was becoming very poor day by day. In 1819, he received a severe
blow of his life when he got news of his son, Hartley's expulsion from an
Oxford fellowship. His health became worse, and he took more of opium.
From this day to 25th July 1834 {till his death} he never regained his
health.
Coleridge's life was full of vicissitudes and from many points of view, he
was a singularly an unfortunate man. He left many of his works
incomplete; but whatever he wrote is just brilliant. His talk was always
fascinating and persuasive. He was the most wonderful man ever known
to me" -said Wordsworth about S.T. Coleridge. Charles Lamb has rightly
described him as "an Archangel-slightly damaged. His likeness, nor
probably the world can see again" A very recent critic, Allan Grant praises
him for his modernity as a poet and thinker.
Coleridge's life may be viewed as a composite of several careers (poet,
preacher, lecturer, playwright, journalist, reviewer and a writer). He has
been given more numerous and various reputations than perhaps any other
English poet. Hazlitt called him an "Eagle dallying with the wind, Shelley
referred him as a "Hooded eagle among blinking owls".
Coleridge's works may be categorized under three heads:
1. His poetry
2. His dramas
3. His literary criticism.
1. His Poetical Works: The early poems of Coleridge were published
in the spring of 1796 in the volume entitled Poems on various
subjects. The manner is artificial and stiff, under the strong
influence of 18
th
century poetic diction, modified by
sentimentalism and melancholy. His political sonnets betray the
influence of Godwin but are pompous in style. More promising,
however, are the poems dominated by the young poets love and
minute observation of natural scenery-The Song of the Pixies
(1793); The Lines on Autumnal Evening; Lewti (1794) and
Religious Musings (1794-96).
Then came his golden period of intimacy with Wordsworth and Dorothy,
which led to the planning of The Lyrical Ballads and the flowering of
Coleridges best poetry- the true Wordsworthian pieces like The Lime Tree
Bower, Frost at Midnight, Fears in Solitude (1797-98), followed by the
master pieces stamped with his own original sensibility- The Ancient
Mariner, Christabel and Kubla Khan. Then the poetic fount began to
dwindle in energy and after a few spurts in Dejection: An Ode and Love
and Hope it became exhausted and the vacuum thus created had to be
filled by critical and philosophical activities which yielded richer and
more voluminous works, though quite fragmentary and discursive. The
creative life of Coleridge is at once a miracle and a melancholy spectacle
of waste and sudden collapse of divine imagination.
2) His Dramas: His first drama, written in collaboration with Southey was
The Fall of Robes Pierre (1794). It shows influence of Shakespeare but is
marred by rhetorical declamation and poor characterization. His other
dramas were Remorse (1798), which is a tragedy in blank verse and
Zapolya (1817) a romantic tragedy.
3) His Literary Criticism: Coleridges chief critical work was Biographia
Literaria (1817). It is a sort of loose autobiography embracing a variety
of subjects like religion, politics, literature and criticism. It contains a
valuable criticism of Wordsworths theory of poetic diction.
Coleridge as a Critic
There are many for whom he is the most important critic, chiefly because
he raised central questions about criticism itself, its methods and
philosophical basis incorporating rites and materials pertaining to any area
of life. The function of criticism itself he conceived to be the lifting of all
these elements into awareness, not the prescribing or even describing of
rule that can neither be adequately formulated by the critic, nor adhered by
the writer, but rather the elucidation of what he called "the principles of
grammar, logic and psychology. It is, however, in literary criticism that
Coleridge's achievement is the most lasting. No one before him in England
had brought such mental breadth to the discussion of aesthetic values. His
judgments are all great doctrinal preconceptions. The well- known
differentiation between imagination and fancy is a way of laying stress
upon the creative activity of the mind, as opposed to the passive
association of mental pictures, but for Coleridge, it has a mystical
significance.
COLERIDGE AS A ROMANTIC POET
The movement of romantic revival had started much before Coleridge, in
the age of Johnson. Poets like Gray, Goldsmith and Blake initiated it. But
the official date for the beginning of the romantic age is 1798, the year in
which Wordsworth and Coleridge together brought out The Lyrical
Ballads. Thus in the first generation of romantic poets, Coleridge is as
important as Wordsworth himself. In certain respects, his poetry illustrates
the romantic temper even better than that of Wordsworth. According to an
eminent critic, his poetry is the most finished, supreme embodiment of all
that is purest and most ethereal in the romantic spirit.
Coleridge may be called the most romantic of the poets of the Romantic
Revival. . His early poems are more or less experimental, but they show
his ardent delight in natural beauty and his self-consciousness as an artist.
His emotional response to the beauties and glories of nature is poetically
expressed in all his poems. Coleridge possessed the most vigorous mind
among the English Romantic Poets. Whereas in the other poets of this
period, romanticism tends to take a single dominant hue which colors the
objects of experience; in Coleridge it attains a fullness of complexity. In
his poetry, there is room for the spirit of bold adventure, the joy of
discovery and the romance of action. There is nature in a variety of
moods, familiar and comforting, weird and horrifying, tender and
soothing, tumultuous and perturbing, gay and jubant, desolate and
mournful. There are intensely human emotions, which flow out of
supernatural incidents and are lifted into the upper heights of romance. All
these elements are linked into a vital unity with a psychological bond that
gives them the harmony of a perfect moral impression. Many of his poems
may be fragments, but reading them is a wholesome experience. And
while the other romantic poets weave the web of wonders of the external
world and links them to the subtleties of human psychology. And unlike
most of the others writers, he possesses the gift of telling a story rich in
dramatic situations with a close grip over psychological truths and a
delicate sense of moral fitness.
Coleridge has been called the "high priest of romantism", and as C.M.
Bowra remarks, his three great poems, The Ancient Mariner", "Kubla
Khan" and "Christabel", are his supreme contribution to poetry and "of all
English romantic masterpieces, they are the most unusual and the most
romantic". This is so because in his poetry all the chief characteristics of
romanticism find a rich _expression.
To sum up, Coleridges whole career was romantic in the sense that his
life was full of brilliant promises and broken aims. He found _expression
for many an unheard-of mood of his mind in poems like Dejection: An
Ode. He was a melancholy man given to brooding over the failure of his
life- in fact he had the romantic melancholy to the full.
Coleridges poetry represents the culmination of romanticism in its purest
form. The Ancient Mariner and the Christabel mark the triumph of
romanticism as fully as Wordsworths narrative poems mark the triumph
of naturalism. It is by virtue of these poems that Saintsbury has called him
the high-priest of romanticism.
There is a certain romantic note present in the best works of Coleridge. In
pictorial power writes Buchan, ``felicity of phrase and word music he is
one of the greatest masters. In his subtly suggestive treatment of the
supernatural he stands almost alone. It is not only that he eliminates from
his supernaturalism the crude material horror, then popular with the
writers of the romantic school; he also gives it a psychological foundation.
This is particularly apparent in The Ancient Mariner, the backbone of
which is provided, not only by the marvels of the narrative, but also by the
spiritual history of the hero. By the power of his imagination Coleridge
perceived the unseen forces at work behind the visible world, and through
his poetry he tried to convey his perception of the mystery of things to
others. He felt that there are more things under heaven and earth than the
world of dreams, and it is this feeling, which Coleridge expresses in his
poetry. This is the reason why Coleridge's poems are more mysterious and
strange than that of any other romantic poet. He creates a sense of
strangeness and wonder, and thus makes the words of Pater more truthful
about the definition of romanticism as "the addition of strangeness to
beauty, or that of Watts Dutton as`` the renaissance of wonder".
Coleridge said that while writing about supernatural characters and events,
his main problem was to transfer from our inward nature a human interest
and a semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of
imagination that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which
constitutes poetic faith'. How he succeeds in his purpose is indeed
admirable. He gives his supernatural the solid base of the dramatic truth of
human emotions so that howsoever improbable the events might appear,
the authenticity of human experience is never violated. Besides, his
treatment is very subtle. He does not cumulate horrors; he does not give
gruesome details, any blood curdling and spine chilling incidents for him.
He just suggests giving his readers a free hand to use their imagination and
fill in the necessary details. His descriptions are never a strain on our
credulity. Instead of abruptly stepping into the realm of the supernatural,
he first wins the faith of his readers with an accurate rendering of the
familiar landscape and then slowly proceeds to exploit this faith and
introduce the supernatural elements. The presence of the moral principle
as a unifying link saves his poems from being a "Phantasmagoria of
unconnected events".
The essence of Coleridges romanticism lies in his artistic treatment of the
supernatural. All of his three important poems Kubla Khan, Christabel and
The Ancient Mariner are poems of pure supernaturalism. Kubla Khan is
less directly concerned with the Supernatural, still the supernatural touch
in the "Woman wailing for her demon-lover, in the ancestral voices
prophesying war and in the demoniac energy with which the mighty
fountain is momently forced from the deep romantic chasm is quite
unmistakable. Towards the end of the poem, the poet caught in a spell of
creative inspiration, transcends his mundane existence and is transformed
into a purely supernatural being. In Christabel, the evil spirit that haunts
the body of Geraldine and blasts the innocent happiness of the lovely
Christabel is in the true tradition of vampires, the Coleridge infuses a
mysterious dread into her. But it is "The Ancient Mariner" that deals with
the supernatural machinery on a large and in a generous sense. There is a
phantom ship with its ghastly crew "Death and Life-in-Death, the polar
spirit seeking vengeance for the murder of the Albatross, two supernatural
voices representing justice and mercy, and a troop of celestial spirits
animating the dead crew. The evec of "Kubla Khan is haunting and
weird.
CRITICAL ESTIMATE OF COLERIDGES POETRY
There are certain limitations of Coleridge's poetry. First, his poetic output
is extremely limited. Secondly, the period during which his creative genius
was at his best was brief, and, therefore, much that he has written is flat,
gross and dull. Thirdly, his poetry is dream-poetry and as such it does not
deal with the realities of life. Human passions do not find an adequate
_expression in it. Fourthly, even the little that he could compose is
fragmentary. His Kubla Khan and Christabel are mere fragments.
In spite of all its limitations, Coleridge's poetry ranks among the rarest
treasures of English literature. Romanticism reaches its acme in his poetry.
All the characteristics, for which romanticism stands, are found in
Coleridge's poetry. Love of liberty, interest in the supernatural and the
mysterious world, the revolutionary zeal, the medieval imaginative
faculty, new experiments in verse, simplicity of diction, humanism, love
for Nature, and _expression of melancholy and similar other traits of
romantic poetry are found in Coleridge's poems. Coleridge belonged to the
Romantic School. He held a higher deal of poetry and fought bravely
against the artificial style of the previous age. Thus, the variety of meter,
simplicity of language, originality of thought, flight of imagination, love
of nature, sympathy with all human beings, and democratic and
humanitarian outlook are the characteristics possessed by Coleridge
Coleridges status as a romantic poet is supreme. His poetry in certain
respects illustrates the romantic temper even better than that of
Wordsworth. According to a critic, Coleridges poetry is "The most
finished, supreme embodiment of all that is purest and most ethereal in the
romantic spirit".
Most of his work in poetry again was of a fragmentary nature. His last
pieces Christabel and Kubla Khan, are brilliant fragments. This small and
fragmentary amount of Coleridges poetry is however, of exquisite
quality. Stopford Brooke says: All that he did excellently might be bound
in twenty pages but it should be bound in pure gold.
His earlier poetry was like the poet himself, very turgid, rhetorical,
diffused and harsh in diction and rhythm. Later, however, he outgrew all
his deficiencies. Coleridge shares with other romantic poets a deep love
for music; he is one of the most melodious poets in English poetry. The
second part of Kubla Khan describing a damsel playing on a dulcimer is
itself a piece of exquisite music. It supports Coleridges claim that with
music loud and long he could build Kubla Khans pleasure dome in the
air, for the fact is that the kind of skill claimed by the poet is actually
displayed in it. A number of lines in The Ancient Mariner have a
haunting and lilting melody about them. The alliteration and the simplicity
of the words employed add to the melodious effect of the poem. The
following four lines, almost picked at random from The Ancient
Mariner aptly illustrate the witchery of Coleridges music:
The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew,
The furrow followed free;
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.
And Christabel is even more musical than these two. The movement of
verse in this poem is so free that, bewitched by its fluency, one just reads
it on and on. Its musical quality just defies analysis.
Thus, all the features of the Romantic Revival are fully manifested in the
poetry of Coleridge. In his poetry, there is bold adventure, joy of
discovery, and romance of action. There is the glamour of unraveled
regions, elements of mystery and marvel. There is Nature in a variety of
moods: familiar, weird, tender, tumultuous, gay, desolate, soothing or
horrifying. All these features are linked into a vital unity with a
psychological insight. Truly, in Coleridges poetry, romanticism attained a
fullness of complexity.
POET OF THE UNIQUE SUPERNATURAL
As a poet of the supernatural, Coleridge's place is supreme and unique
"Coleridge made an epoch in the poetry of the supernatural", remarks a
critic. In the words of H.D. Trail, "Coleridge's imagination seems to
acquire poetic distinction in the region of the fantastic and the
supernatural, Coleridge made his poetry not only convincing and exciting
but also a positive criticism of life. Coleridge succeeded where the others
had failed because he treated the supernatural as subordinate element in
the wider scheme of human experience and secondly, unlike the other
writers who had cultivated this creed as a fashion but had no belief in it,
Coleridge wrote in full conviction. It can be said without any hesitation
that he eminently succeeded in his field. In fact, he is known to be the
greatest poet of the supernatural in the entire range of English poetry.
The three important poems in which Coleridge has made use of the
supernatural are "The Ancient Mariner", "Christabel" and "Kubla Khan".
It is significant that in all the three poems, Coleridge takes us to distant
times and remote places. "The Ancient Mariner narrates the experience of
an ancient mariner voyaging around polar regions in unknown
seas."Christabel" takes us back to the Middle Ages, to the old moated
castles with barons and bards. In "Kubla Khan, the scene is laid in the
oriental city of Xanadu, in forests as "Ancient as the Hills, where Alph,
the sacred river, ran through caverns measureless to man down to a
sunless sea.
for a willing suspension of disbelief, Coleridge makes the supernatural
look natural and convincing. The dream like nature of the supernatural in
Coleridge makes the suspension of disbelief easily possible. Besides these
devices, he also uses occult forces.
In order to make his supernaturalism realistic and convincing, Coleridge
humanizes it. It appears in his work, not in a traditional blood-curdling and
hair raising form, but assumes the ordinary human personality The
supernatural incidents convey a moral useful for normal everyday life of
humans. The air of reality is also imparted to the supernatural by carefully
blending it with the natural. Coleridge's settings are perfectly natural
The main characteristics of Coleridge's supernaturalism are summarised as
follows:
a) Refined and Subjective: The supernaturalism in coleridge is refined
and subjective. It does not have the objective palpability and crudeness of
the marvelous, which is found in almost all pre-Coleridgean ghost
literature.
b) Its Suggestiveness: Coleridge's supernaturalism is highly suggestive,
subtle, intuitive and subjective. It is the reader who has to infer himself
what he understands by a supernatural agency or element. It is not sudden
but slowly distilled into the air.
c) Its Vagueness: Mystery shrouds and surrounds the supernatural of
Coleridge. Everything is dim and vague; nothing is made very apparent
and clear.. The poet excites curiosity, but does not gratify it. Mystery
surrounds everything; the readers are left guessing.
d) Its Indefiniteness: The supernatural in Coleridge does not have any
definite or fixed character. It is difficult to say how much of it is real and
how much of it is merely a subjective illusion
Coleridge is careful not to show any abruptness in introducing
supernatural elements. He first takes his reader around familiar places and
wins his faith in the narrative through vividly portrayed minute details.
Then minor hints of the supernatural are gradually dropped. Finally, the
entire scene puts on a supernatural look
Another very important feature of Coleridge's treatment of the
supernatural is a very clever and subtle blending of the natural and
supernatural. Indeed the two are so indistinguishably fused with each other
that it becomes difficult to locate where the one ends and the other begins.
THE ANCIENT MARINER
A brief Introduction: -
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner was actually planned by Wordsworth
and Coleridge together. It was planned on the afternoon of the 20
th
of
November 1797,while having a walk in the Quantocks. Among all the
great works of Coleridge it is the only complete one. It is based on a
dream of a friend of Coleridge, Cruikshank, who fancied he saw a skeleton
ship, with figures on it Wordworth kill one albatross while entering the
South sea and that the tutelary spirit of those regions might take upon
them to avenge the crime. He also suggested the idea of navigation of the
ship by the dead men. As the poem grew, both Coleridge and Wordsworth
thought of creating a volume which would consist of all poems dealing
with supernatural elements, and also on subjects taken from common life
but which were looked at through an imaginative medium from its
composition. Colridge continued his work on it alone and finally finished
it on 23
rd
March, 1798.
The Origin of the poem: -
Quite a deal is known about the literary sources of The Ancient Mariner.
A detailed study has revealed that Coleridge was a voracious reader and
the books he read and the men he met left a profound influence on him. He
was like a honeybee, roaming from garden to garden to collect the best
nectar. He gathered the materials for his great works from strange and
little known places. It is enough for the reader to know that an exquisite
work of art in presented to him. He need not be bothered about the sources
from where the poet has brought the material. It is undesirable that
Coleridge draws upon a variety of sources, but it has also to be admitted
that he fuses and reshapes them in a unique unity. Colridge himself claims
that The Ancient Mariner is a poem of Pure imagination , and says
keeping in view the way he dissolved, diffused and dissipated his objects
of contemplation.
The purpose of writing The Ancient Mariner was to be fulfiling his plan
of writing a series of supernatural poems, in which the incidents and
characters are to be at least in part supernatural and yet to present them as
would impress the readers with a sense of their reality.
In The Ancient Masiver, Coleridge with consummate skill he welded the
story into an artistic skill. For vividness of imagery and descriptive power
the poem is unsurpassed. We move in a world of unearthly weirdness
whose mystery and charm is unbroken by an inconsistency. Coleridge sees
the invisible and almost touches the intangible in this realm, where the
things that are too seldom dreamt of in our philosophy loom within our
ken. The poem is absolutely simple, both in, metre and language.
Coleridge himself stated it as inimitable.
In chapter XIV of his Biographia Literaria, Coleridge tells us that in
order to emancipate English poetry from the eighteenth-century
artificiality and drabness, he and Wordsworth had agreed to write two
different kinds poems. He was to write about persons and characters
supernatural, or least romantic, but he was to give them a semblance of
truth sufficient to procure that willing suspension of disbelief for the
moment, which constitutes poetic faith. Wordsworth was to give the
charm of novelty to things of everyday, and to excite a feeling analogous
to the supernatural, by awaking the minds attention to the lethargies of
custom, and correcting it to the loveliness and the wonders of the world
before us. It was according to this mutual decision that Coleridge wrote
The Ancient Mariner.
Wordsworth Account: -
Wordsworth says that The Gloss with which it was subsequently
accompanied was not thought of by either of us at the time, at least not a
hint of it was given to me, and I have no doubt it was a gratuitous
afterthought. We began the composition together on that to me,
memorable evening: I furnished two or three lines at the beginning of the
poem, in particular-
And listened like a three years child:
The Mariner had his will.
These small contributions, may have slipped out of Wordsworths mind
but are scrupulosesly recorded by Coleridge .As we endeavoures to
proceed conjointly on that evening, our respective manners proved so
widely different that anything but separate from an undertaking upon by
Dulverton to Alfoxender. The Ancient Mariner grew and grew till it
became too important for our first object, which was limited to our
expectation, which was to consist, as Mr. Coleridge has told the world, of
poems chiefly on supernatural subjects, taken from common life, but
looked at, as much as might be, through an imaginative medium. With a
lot of skill Coleridge has welded the story into an artistic whole. Coleridge
has tried to touch the intangible in writing this piece of art. The poem may
be simple in metre and language, but still it is inimitable,as said by
Coleridge himself.
The book Voyages written by shelvocke has a reference of a black
Albatross, which was taken to be some ill omen. Coleridge has perhaps
taken the idea of the Albatross from it. The bird was hovering around the
mariners and was ultimately shot dead by the Mariner,. It seems obvious
that Coleridge has taken the killing of the Albatross incident from the
voyages. But Wordsworth reports that Coleridge had never read the
book, so most probably it was merely on Wordsworths suggestion that
Coleridge incorporated the incident in The Ancient Mariner.
CRITICAL SUMMARY OF THE POEM

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is perhaps the most read poem of
Coleridge. The poem Kubla Khan is read merely for pleasure but the poem
The Ancient Mariner is read with an eye on criticism. The poem is divided
into seven parts. It is the story of crime and punishment.
In the first part the old Mariner stops the wedding guest to listen to his
tale. He tells the guest how his ship leaves the harbour and, sails towards
the southern horizon. The guest is impatient in the beginning but latter on
is hypnotized and
Listens merely like a three years child:
The sun was shinning bright at the beginning of the voyage. As the ship
sailed the people on the shore gave them a hearty send off.
The ship was cheered, the harbour cleared,
Merrily did we drop
Below the Kirk, below the hill,
Below the lighthouse top.
It is like the ending of The Midsummer Nights Dream, as daybreaks and
the lovers wonder whether the adventures of the night were a dream.
Dreaming without awaking is not dreaming. In the figurative sense of the
word perspective, to be sure, the Wedding-Guest, in his momentary,
palpitating interruptions of the narrativeWhy lookthou so, -- I fear
the Ancient Marinerrepresents the middle distance, and the marginal
comment is the nearer distance, though still from us remote.
They sailed leaving the church, the hill and the lighthouse behind.
Everyday the sun went higher and higher till at noon it stood right over the
mast. Then came the furious storm. The Mariners can see no life on the
sea when suddenly they come across an Albatross flying to the ship and it
followed the ship. Thus it also brought good weather along with it. The
first section tells of the actual crime. To us the shooting of the bird may
seem a matter of little moment, but Coleridge makes it significant in two
ways: Firstly, he does not say why the Mariner kills the albatross. We may
infer that it is in a mood of annoyance or anger or mere frivolity; but these
are mere guesses. What matters is precisely the uncertainty of the
Mariners motives, for this illustrates the essential irrationality of the
Mariners crime, due to a simple perversity of the will. Secondly, the
crime is against nature, against the sanctified relations of guest and host.
The bird, which has been hailed in Gods name as if it had been a
Christian soul, and is entirely friendly and helpful is wantonly and
recklessly killed. What matters is that the Mariner breaks a sacred law of
life. In this action we see the essential frivolity of many crimes against
humanity and the ordered system of the world, and we must accept the
killing of the albatross symbolical of them.
God save thee, ancient mariner!
From the fiends, that plague thee thus!-
Why lookst thou so?-With my cross-bow
I shot the Albatross.
The mariner is horror-stricken. The wedding guest also pities him and
prays for mercy for the mariner. It is uncertain why the mariner kills the
bird. The bird had always been friendly to the sailors, the mariner felt that
because of the bird the ice had started to spilt and so he killed the bird.
The superstitious belief is perfectly keeping the balance of the
supernatural atmosphere of the poem.
The second part of the poem supports the superstitious belief for a little
while. The sailors also believed that the mariner had not done a rightful
thing to kill the bird, which had brought them problems.
And I had done a hellish thing,
And it would workem woe:
For all averred, I had killed the bird
That made the breeze to blow.
Ah wretch! Said they, the bird to slay,
That made the breeze to blow!

The sailors condemned him for his act. Suddenly the wind stops and the
ship cannot move anymore.
All in a hot copper sky,
The bloody Sun, at noon,
Right up above the mast did stand,
No bigger than the Moon.
Day after day, day after day,
We stuck, nor breath nor motion;
As idle as a painted ship
Upon a painted ocean.


The sun burned fiercely. The silent sea looked like it had rotted; the slimy
creatures crawled all around: the sailors did not get water also. It was like;
Water, water, every where,
And all the boards did shrink;
Water, water, every where
Nor any drop to drink.
Death fires shone all about them at night. The sea-waters burnt like the
oils burnt by a witch emitting multi-colored lights. Some of the sailors
also dreamt that a spirit that had been following them from the land of
mist and snow was avenging them. The thirst of the sailors was so much
that their tongues were dried to their very roots
We could not speak, no more than if
We had been choked with soot.
The sailors looked at the mariner reproachfully. They could not speak but
their looks revealed the contempt they felt for him. They removed the
cross from his neck and hung the dead Albatross round the mariners neck.
This was sign to show the sailors hatred for the mariner and also it served
as a punishment for him.
The third part shows the sailors plight. The sailors have a very awful time,
and are almost dead with thirst. Their eyes were had a glossy appearance.
Just then the mariner saw a small speck on the water, and thought it to be a
ship. The mariner bit his own arm and moistened his lips with the blood so
that he could tell the sailors about it. When the ship neared it was a
surprise to see that it was a skeleton ship. The next moment he also sees
Death and Life-in-Death playing at dice.
Are those her ribs through which the Sun
Did peer, as through a grate?
And is that Woman all her crew?
Is that Death? And are there two?
Is death that womans mate?
The woman has been described with great accuracy. She was like a
nightmare personified and was capable of curdling any mans blood.
Her lips were red, her looks were free,
Her skin was as white as leprosy,
The Nightmare Life-in-Death was she,
Who thicks mans blood with cold.
The naked hulk alongside came,
And the twain were casting dice;
The game is done! Ive won! Ive won!
Quoth she, and whistles thrice.
The sun sank down below the horizon. The stars appeared, immediately it
became very dark. The spectre ship also disappeared. The mariner felt
very afraid .He felt like a man without life. The moon came out and under
its light the Mariner saw his fellow sailors drop one by one dead. They
died so quickly that they did not get time to even utter a groan. However,
just as they fell dead they cast a painful glance at the mariner and cursed
him with their eyes.
The souls did from their bodies fly, -
They fled to bliss or woe!
And every soul, it passed me by,
Like the whiz of my cross-bow!
The mariner saw their souls passing by him, but he was very helpless. The
mariner is left alone on the ship to expiate by life long suffering and
penance.
The fourth part of the poem shows the pity of the wedding guest for the
mariner. He felt that he was not speaking to the mariner but to his ghost.
He was afraid of the mariners skinny hand and his tall and thin figure.
The mariner goes on to say that how he was all-alone on the ship with all
his crew dead and a thousand of slimy creatures crawling all around him.
He says that:
I looked upon the rotting sea,
And drew my eyes away;
I looked upon the rotting deck,
And there the dead men lay.
He was unable to say his prayers also because even before he could pray,
some wicked whisper influenced his heart and made it as dry as dust. The
dead crew lay with their eyes open and full of curse. But they did not rot
or smell foul. He faced them and lived with their curse for seven days and
seven nights, yet he could not die.
The mariner saw some water snakes in the water, they were of many
bright colours and unknowingly the mariner blessed those living creatures.
O happy living things! No tongue
Their beauty might declare:
A spring of love gushed from my heart,
And I blessed them unaware:
Sure my kind saint took pity on me,
And I blessed them unaware.
The self- same moment I could pray;
And from my neck so free
The Albatross fell off, and sank
Like lead into the sea.
He had been able to pray because he blessed the water creatures.
The fifth part continues the process of the souls revival. The mariner is
blessed with sleep for it soothes and refreshes man. The mariner praises
Virgin Mary for having sent sleep for him. When he wakes that rain has
moistened his parched lips. He felt very light and felt;
I thought that I had died in sleep,
And was a blessed ghost.
And soon I heard a roaring wind:
It did not come anear;
But with its sound it shock the sails,
That were so thin and sere.
Soon after that he, heard the wind roaring at a distance. The air in the
upper regions showed sudden signs of life. Hundreds of fire-flags, shining
and moving to and fro could also be seen. In-between them the pale stars
seemed to be dancing. All of a sudden the rain came and made the dead
men to groan.
They groaned, they stirred, they all uprose.
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes;
It had been strange, even in a dream,
To have seen those dead men rise.
The helmsmen steered, the ship moved on;
Yet never a breeze up-blew;
The mariners all gan work the ropes,
Where they were wont to do;
They raised their limbs like lifeless tools-
We were a ghastly crew.
The body of the Mariners nephew stood by his side, knee to knee. They
were working at the same rope. Yet he did not speak even a single word to
the mariner. The wedding guest shows signs of fear. But the mariner
consoles him by saying that they were not the souls of the dead men, but
they were a group of blessed souls, which had entered the dead bodies.
The mariner falls down into a swoon and hears two voices maybe of the
spirits talking to themselves. One of the voice says about the crime done
by the mariner in killing the Albatross that had loved the mariner. The
second voice, which was softer says:
The man hath penance done,
And penance more will do.
The first voice was that of the spirit, which lived on the land of mist and
snow, it loved the bird and also the man, but he had very cruelly killed the
bird and so was suffering so hard.
In the sixth section, the process of healing seems to be impeded. The
Mariner is haunted by the presence of his dead comrades and feels that it
has been planned by some fearful power of vengeance. In this figure of the
Mariner, haunted by memories and fears, Coleridge gives his special
symbol of remorse. But because remorse brings repentance and humility,
the section closes with the vision of angels standing by the dead sailors.
The forgiveness of God awaits even the most hardhearted sinner, if he
only wants to receive it. The mariner wakes to find the moon shining
calmly and the dead bodies still gazing at him. The _expression of agony
had not left them and the curse with which they had died had not left them.
The mariner felt helpless. He could neither take his eyes of them nor could
he raise them to pray. And all of a sudden he feels that the spell has been
broken.
I viewed the ocean green,
And looked far forth, yet little saw
Of what had else been seen-
It is like the ending of The Midsummer Nights Dream, as daybreaks and
the lovers wonder whether the adventures of the night were a dream.
Dreaming without awaking is not dreaming. In the figurative sense of the
word perspective, to be sure, the Wedding-Guest, in his momentary,
palpitating interruptions of the narrativeWhy lookthou so, -- I fear
the Ancient Mariner
He was like a person who was walking all alone on the road but was afraid
to turn, for he feared that some fiend was following him. Soon there is a
sudden change in the scene, when the reader is lost into this frightful
world the poet lessens the burden of fright. Soon there was a cold breeze
blowing. It did not seem to be blowing on the sea, for it did not create any
changes or ripples in the water. The ship moved on:
Swiftly, swiftly flew the ship
Yet she sailed softly too;
Sweetly, sweetly blew the breeze-
On me alone it blew.
The mariner is all of a sudden filled with joy when he sees the lighthouse,
the hill and the church; it was all very familiar to him. He could not
believe his eyes; he felt it all to be a dream. The current drew the ship to
the harbour. The bay was bright and silent and he saw some crimson
shapes at some distance. On turning on the deck he was surprised to see
that the dead crew was no longer standing, but each body lay on its back
with an Angel bathed with light standing beside each body. The Angels
did not make any sound; the silence sank into the mariners soul like
music.
Humphrey House has interpreted the poem and while speaking about the
poem up to this point that is Part I to IV and the opening stanzas of Part V,
he says- taken together it is relatively easy to interpret it as a tale of crime,
punishment and reconciliation, with the recovery of love in the blessing of
the water snakes as its climax. But the remainder of Part V and the whole
of Part VI do not seem at first sight to have quite the same coherence and
point. It is here that readers may still find unmeaning marvels and
elaborated supernatural machinery, which dissipates concentration. There
are wonderful details in the verse, some of the finest descriptions of all;
but they still fall apart and have too little bearing on each other and on the
whole. Many published accounts of the poem do not adequately face the
implications of the detail in these parts. Then as the ghost says: The
Angelic spirits leave the dead bodies. And appear in their own forms of
light. This acts as the signal, which brings out the boat from land.
Soon he hears the strokes of oars and he sees the Pilot and the Pilots boy
coming towards him. He was so happy that he even for a while forgot the
dead crew. The mariner also saw the Hermit and the mariner wished that
the Hermit would listen to his confession. He feels that now he could wash
the sin on his soul.
In part VII a dreadful rumbling sound comes under the water and the ship
sinks.
A quite normally accepted and simple interpretation of Parts V and VI
treats them as a further necessary extension of the expiation theme. In the
blessing of the water-snakes the Mariner has reconciled himself to the
creatures, but it remains for him to reconcile himself also with the Creator:
therefore, he has to suffer once more (this time from the curse of the dead
mens eyes) and to win the power of recognizing the beauty of the angelic
music.
But as the boat approaches, there is heared a loud thundering noise below
it and the ship goes down like lead into the ship
Under the water it rumbled on,
Still louder and more dread:
It reached the ship, it spilt the bay;
The ship went down like lead.
The mariner was stupefied by this loud sound and when he recovered he
found himself on the Pilots boat. The mariner requested the Hermit to
remove the guilt from him. The Hermit made a cross on his forehead,
immediately the mariners body was filled with a painful agony and it
subsided after he had told the story of his crime. According to the mariner
he always felt this way and so he always was in search of a patient
listener.

I pass, like night, from land to land;
I have strange power of speech;
That moment that his face I see,
I know the man that must hear me:
To him my tale I teach.
The mariner told the wedding guest that he had been all-alone on the vast
sea. He said that he liked to pray in the church more than anything else.
The mariner, while bidding the wedding guest farewell said that the best
way to pray to God was to love all Gods creation. He walked away like
one dazed and deprived of his senses.
He went like one that hath been stunned,
And is of sense forlorn:
A sadder and a wiser man,
He rose the morrow morn.
These lines mark the powerful impact produced by the Mariners tale on
the wedding guest.
THE WEDDING GUEST IN THE ANCIENT MARINER
The wedding- guest has a very important character to play in the dramatic
framework of The Ancient Mariner Structurally, he reinforces
interpenetration of two different kinds of realities, that of the everyday
common existence with the world of uncanny and preternatural
experience. The introduction of the wedding-Guest promotes our
understanding of the significance of the Mariners experience.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner begins abruptly when the Ancient
Mariner stops one of the three Wedding guests and begins to tell his story:
It is an ancient Mariner,
And he stoppeth one of three.
The Wedding-guest at first is reluctant to hear the story, as he is in a hurry
to go and attend the wedding. He even recoils in horror from the ghastly
Mariner But the Ancient Mariner holds him by his arresting glittering eye.

He holds him with his skinny hand,
The helpless Wedding Guest collapses on a stone nearby and listens to the
story like a three-year child.
The Wedding-Guest stood still,
And listens like a three years child:
On occasions he protests but cannot move away. In the end, he becomes
so dazed with what he has heard that he does not have the heart or the
mind to attend the wedding. He is a sadder and a wiser man. He is sadder
for the realization of the human predicament which the Ancient Mariner
has so vividly impressed upon him through his story .He is wiser for the
profound moral truth that he has learnt, namely the love of all things, great
or small.
The Wedding-Guest he beat his breast
Yet he cannot choose but hear;
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.
The Mariner and the Wedding-Guest satisfy their mutual needs. Towards
the end of the poem, the Mariner says:
I pass like night, from land to land;
I have strange power of speech;
That moment that his face I see;
I know the man that must have me:
To him my tale I teach.
The Mariner thus, has an instinctive recognition of the person who must
hear him and to whom he may teach his tale. Narrating the tale, it
should be obvious, is a mutually beneficial deed. It relieves the mariner of
his periodic spell of agony; at the same time, it teaches the wedding-Guest
the much-needed lesson of consideration and compassion. If we recall for
a moment how petulantly he reacts to the marines tale in the beginning,
we would immediately feel that he is so pre-occupied with the ordinary
convivial pleasures that he is not inclined to show commiseration to the
old mariner, though the latters mental agony must be writ large on his
face. We may even venture to suggest that there is in the composition of
the wedding-guest something of the mariner who so wantonly and
thoughtlessly shot the Albatross. The mariners experience has a salutary
effect on the wedding-guest and teaches him the Christian concept of love
and kindness. His sympathies are enlarged when he comes in contact with
the mariners profound experience.
When the Wedding-Guest is initially accosted by the Mariner, he
reacts with sharp impatience:
Hold off! Unhand me, greybeard loon!
The Mariner drops his hand but holds him with his glittering eyes:
The Wedding-Guest sat on a stone:
He cannot choose but hear;
And thus spake on that ancient man,
The bright-eyed Mariner.
It is clear that if the Wedding-Guest meekly takes his seat on a stone and
submits to the Mariners tale, it is only under a hypnotic effect created on
him by the abnormal gleam in the Mariners eyes. His heart is in the bridal
feast and he would fain escape and join; but he cannot choose but hear.
The opening of the narrative is rather ordinary and the Guest finds it
difficult to conceal his annoyance. As soon as he hears the merry sounds
issuing from the brides place, he immediately gives vent to his
fretfulness:
The Wedding-Guest here beat his breast,
For he heard the loud bassoon.
There is a slight change in the attitude of the Wedding-Guest when at the
end of Part I, the Mariner comes to the most crucial moment of his tale-the
murder of the Albatross. Even the recollection of that heinous crime is so
painful to the Mariner that he shudders to mention it and defers its
announcement. The Wedding-Guest perceives the acute pain on his face,
his initial indifference and hostility melt away in a moment and he
exclaims:
God save thee, ancient Mariner!
From the fiends, that plagues thee thus!
Why lookst thou so?
At this moment, the Mariner no longer remains an insolent, eccentric old
seafarer undesirably imposing himself on a stranger. He becomes one of
the millions of unfortunate people suffering untold miseries and deserving
everyones unqualified sympathy. After this, the Weeding-Guest does not
interrupt the narrative because of impatience. He vicariously suffers what
the Mariner has suffered and interrupts only when the pain generated by
the Mariners excruciating experience becomes a little too unbearable for
him .He suffers with the Mariner and learns what the Mariner has learnt at
such a terrible cost. The hypnotic spell initially cast on soon ceases to
exert, but he is totally absorbed in the experience .The wedding-bells keep
ringing in the background to remind him that he is the next of kin and
that the feast is set. But he is utterly oblivious of what goes on around
him. It is the Mariner who tries to awaken him from his spiritual reverie:
What loud uproar bursts from that door!
The wedding-guests are there:
But in the garden-bower the bride
And hark the little vesper bell,
Which biddeth me to prayer!
The Mariners experience proves so overwhelming for the Wedding
Guest that he becomes just insensitive to such calls.
At this point, the Mariner and the Wedding-Guest exhibit a strange
reversal of roles. Earlier, the Mariner has been undergoing an experience
of alienation while the Wedding-Guest was going to attend a social
gathering: but now the Mariner is able to enjoy company. He died with the
death of the Albatross, but the gush of love he showed for the water-
snakes led to his resurrection into a much larger brotherhood extending to
the whole human race.
This brotherhood embraces all living creatures and admits of no
distinctions whatsoever between the great and the small, the young and the
old, the gay and the serious. The Mariner has attained a complete
reconciliation with god and all his creation. He likes going to the church
in goodly company to pray to his great father. On the other hand, the
Wedding-Guest, who was earlier fond of gay company, now withdraws
into the loneliness of his inner self to ponder over the mystery of human
existence and its real significance .He responds neither to the wedding-
bells nor to the little vesper bell. The profundity of his experience just
stuns him. For a while, he is forlorn of his senses. But when he rises the
morrow, morn, he is a sadder and a wiser man.



THE STRUCTURAL IMPORTANCE OF THE WEDDING-GUEST
The structural importance of the Wedding-Guest is easier to comprehend
than his thematic relevance. Structurally, he helps to bring out more
clearly and emphatically the spiritual crises undergone by the Mariner
after he kills the Albatross. His interruptions pointed by draw the readers
attention to the important stages of the Mariners fateful voyage and the
accompanying emotional states. When the Mariner comes to the first
important point in his narrative- the point when he shoots the Albatross
the Wedding-Guest makes a loud exclamation, which helps to elicit from
the Mariner the much-evaded reply:
With my cross-bow
I shot the Albatross.
Towards the end of Part III, the Mariner describes how his companions
drop down dead one by one with their souls passing by his ear like the
whiz of his cross-bow. It is such a ghastly episode that the Wedding-Guest
is seized with terror. He suspects the Mariner himself to be a ghost:
And the Mariner reassures him:
Fear not, fear not, thou the Wedding-Guest!
This body dropt not down.
Another horrible situation occurs in the Part V when the dead bodies of
the sailors are reanimated and they begin to work on the ropes:
The body of my brothers soon
Stood by me, knee to knee:
The body and I pulled at one rope,
But he said nought to me.
The Wedding-Guest again ejaculates: I fear thee, Ancient Mariner. And
the Mariner promptly replies:
Be calm, thou Wedding-Guest!
T was not those souls that fled in pain,
Which to their corses came again,
But a troop of spirits blest:
After this the Wedding-Guest is completely fascinated and he does not
find any occasion to interrupt the narrative.
It has been pointed out that the Wedding-Guest is an ideal for the reader,
responsive, apprehensive and completely involved in what he hears. He
is used to articulate the readers own emotional reactions to the narrative.
He has a refined and sharpened sensibility. He keenly feels and expresses,
what an ordinary reader might overlook. The reader who instinctively
identifies himself with the Wedding-Guest takes a cue from him to define
his own emotional responses to the Mariners tale. The Wedding-Guests
suspension of disbelief and the trust with which he accepts the tale helps
the reader to suspend his disbelief as well. Besides, he helps to relieve the
monotony of what otherwise would have been a monologue.
It is clear from the above discussion that the introduction of the Wedding-
Guest has a great significance. The Wedding-Guest is neither unimportant
nor redundant. The contrast between the spiritual worlds of the Mariner
with its rich moral values with the world of actuality with its mistaken
values cannot be effective and perfect without the Wedding-Guest figuring
as a link between the two worlds. The Wedding-Guests suspension of
disbelief and trust assists to create suspension of disbelief in the reader.
THE DREAMLIKE QUALITY OF THE ANCIENT MARINER
Coleridge was a great dreamer and he had greater admiration for dreams
than any of the other romantics. He once even declared that he would like
to sleep on the lotus in the sea of milk like the Indian Vishnu. The hours
that he spent in dreaming were more important than his waking hours.
When he was lost in sleep and it was thought he was lost in his dreams
that were the time when actually a new work of art was being created in
his mind. Infact, he fed on his dreams and vitalized them in his poetry. His
entire poems have a dreamlike quality.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner also has dream like qualities. Prof.
Bowra observes in this connection:
On the surface it shows many qualities of dream. It moves in abrupt
stages each of which has its own single, dominating character. It visual
impressions are remarkably brilliant and absorbing. Their emotional
impacts changes rapidly, but always come with an unusual force as if the
poet were haunted and obsessed by them. When it is all over, it is difficult
at first to disentangle ordinary experience from influences which still
survive from sleep.
To begin with the dream like qualities of The Rime of the Ancient
Mariner, even the inspiration to write it came from a dream. A friend of
Coleridge, Mr. Cruikshank, had dreamt about a skeleton ship with figures
in it. This dream caught Coleridges fancy and later he and Wordsworth
got together to plan it. Thus Coleridge decided to make it on the basis of
the poem.
Wordsworth has criticized the poem in Lyrical Ballads published in
1800, the events, having no necessary connection, do not produce each
other. But this is wrong of Wordsworth. He is not being fair to Coleridge.
It is quite certain that no one expects the events of dream to have any kind
of necessary connection, which we find in our waking conditions. The
subject is very supernatural, and one of the basic problems confronting
him was to relate it to something, which his readers knew and understood,
of the readers. Exploiting some of the characterstics of a dream did this.
C.M. Bowra, in his book The Romantic Imagination, observes;
Dreams can have a curiously vivid quality which is often lacking in
waking impressions. In them we have one experience at a time in a very
concentrated form, and since the critical self is not at work, the effect is
more powerful and more haunting than most effects when we are awake.
If we remarkable dreams at all, we remember them very clearly; even
though by rational standards they are quite absurd and have no direct
relation to our waking life.
When we analyse The Ancient Mariner in the light of the characteristics
of a dream described above, we find unmistakable signs of a dreamlike
quality in it. C.M. Bowra says again, it moves in abrupt stages, each if
which has its own single, dominating character. Its visual impressions are
remarkably brilliant and absorbing. Their emotional impact change
rapidly, but always comes with an unusual force, as if the poet were
haunted and obsessed by them. When it is all over, it clings to the memory
with a peculiar tenacity, just as on waking it is difficult at first to
disentangle ordinary experience from influences which still survive from
sleep.
Things move in a mysterious way in The Ancient Mariner but not
without some connection, this may also be termed as casual. The Mariner
commits crime when out of irritation and anger he shoots an innocent
Albatross. He commits a crime and is punished by the doom of Life-in-
Death. This means that he was haunted by the presence of his dead
comrades. His shipmates are also victims to the curse because they
supported the Mariner by killing the bird. The Mariners curse starts to
become lesser when love gushes from his heart at the sight of Water
snakes. The first horror of his spell is removed and we see the Albatross
falls from his neck. It is wrong to kill the Albatross, once this act is
accepted; the rest of the action follows with an inexorable fatality.
The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a frightful dream. The Mariner is
tormented through quite a nightmarish experience. In part II, we have a
picture of the unmoving ship, and slimy creatures crawl through with legs
upon the slimy sea. Death-fires dance and water burns like a witchs oils,
at night and we also see the picture of the Albatross hanging around the
Mariners neck. All this is very terrifying. In part III of the poem, freezing
chills are sent down the Mariners and also the readers spines; by the
appearances of Life-in-Death with her red lips, yellow locks and skin as
white as leprosy. The reader is left stunned to see the sight of two
hundreds sailors cursing the Ancient Mariner, with their eyes and
dropping dead one by one.
In part IV we see the utter desolation and helplessness of the Mariner:
Alone, alone, all, all alone,
Alone on a wide wide sea!
And never a saint took pity on
My soul in agony.
This imaginary world may have some rules, which are not same as ours,
but still they touch the familiar chords in us. The events are more
convincing and the reader somehow admits that in the world created by
Coleridge it is right that things should happen as they are made in his
world. Once the reader starts believing that spirits watch over human
actions, and then it becomes more convincing to feel that the spirits have
the right to interface with men and do all the extraordinary things. The
spirits guiding the mariner towards his northward voyage have sufficient
reality for the reader to feel that their actions are appropriate. It is also not
absurd to see the ship sinking when it reaches home. This so happens
because it has undergone so many unearthly adventures that now there is
no place for it in the world of common things. Coleridge makes his events
so coherent and so close that the reader accepts the things as valid and
feels that they are not different from their own world.
Coleridge knows that he must make the supernatural convincing and
humane. In the Biographia Literaria, after saying that such poetry
interest the emotions and has dramatic truth, Coleridge adds that his aim is
to transfer from the readers inward nature a human interest and a
semblance of truth sufficient to procure for these shadows of imagination
that willing suspension of disbelief for the moment, which constitutes
poetic faith:
The Ancient Mariner has a beautiful moral also. Its entire movement is
directed towards teaching love and reverence for all things made and
loved by God. If it terrifies, it guides and educates as well. And it brings a
sense of assurance to sinners that through earnest penance they can atone
for their sins and gains regeneration. Hence it is quite justified to say that
Coleridge is a dreamer and The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a
beautiful but frightful dream. A critic has edgily observed:
The Ancient Mariner lives in its own worlds as events in dreams do, and,
when we read it, we do not normally ask if its subjects is real or unreal.
But this is due to a consummate art. Each action and each situation is
presented in a concrete form in which the details are selected for their
appeal to common experience. Coleridge exercises an imaginative realism.
However unnatural his events may be they are formed from natural
elements, and for this reason their constituents are familiar and make a
direct, natural appeal. Once we have entered this imaginary world we do
not feel that it is beyond our comprehension, but respond to it as we would
to actual life.
The Ancient Mariner as a myth of guilt and redemption.
The Ancient Mariner is a myth of guilt and redemption but of course it is
also much more. Its symbolical purpose is but one element in a complex
design. Though Coleridge has his own poetry of a guilty soul, it is not
comparable in depth or in insight with the poetry of some other men who
have given the full powers of their genius to writing about crime and the
misery it engenders. Nonetheless Coleridges introduction of this theme
into The Ancient Mariner gives to it a new dimension. What might
otherwise be no more then an irresponsible fairy-tale is brought closer to
life and to its fundamental issues. The myth of crime and punishment
provides a structure for the supernatural events, which rise from it but
often make their appeal irrespective of it. Much of the magic of The
Ancient Mariner comes from its blend of dark and serious issues with the
delighted play of creative energy. Coleridge had good reasons for
fashioning his poem in this way. In the first place, the combination of
different themes responded to his own complex vision of existence. For
him life had both dark and its bright sides; its haunting responsibilities
and ravishing moments of unsullied delight. He saw that the two were
closely interwoven and that, if he were to speak with the full force of his
genius, he must introduce both into his poem. In the second place, he saw
life not analytically but creatively, and he knew that any work of creation
must itself be an extension and the enchantment which he knew in his
finest poems, and for him these came alike from the beauty for the visible
world and the uncharted corners of the human soul. The shadow cast by
the Mariners crime adds by contrast to the brilliance of the unearthly
world in which it is committed, and the degree of his guilt and his remorse
serve to stress the power of the angelic beings, which watch over human
kind. The result is a poem shot with iridescent lights. It appeals to us now
is this way, now in that, and there is no final or single approach to it.
In creating The Ancient Mariner in this way, Coleridge obeyed the
peculiar and paradoxical were uneasily blended, and the creative spirit,
witch was capable of such rapturous flights, worked most freely when it
was free from metaphysical speculations.
The poem is more than an allegory of guilt and regeneration. In any
ordinary sense the Mariner is very little guilty. But he has broken the bond
between himself and the life of Nature, and in consequence becomes
spiritually dead. What happens to him when he blesses the water-snakes in
the Tropical calm is a psychic rebirth a rebirth that must at times happen
to all men and all cultures unless they are to dry up in living death. The
whole poem is indeed a vivid presentation of the rebirth myth as it is
conceived by Jung-the psychologist who has done most to explain these
recurrent forms of imaginative
Literature. But such explanations of poetry are not convincing to everyone
and are not easily demonstrable. What we must explain is that universal
psychic experience that gives the poem its lasting power. It is as though
Coleridge tapped a deeper level of consciousness here than he was ever to
reach again. And none of the literary figures concerned with The Ancient
Mariner, in its composition or in its appearance seems to have detected
allegory or symbolism in it. The retribution is greater, simpler, less
regardful of natural movement: punishment, repentance, a gush of love for
other living things, prayer and relief, yet further penance for, as in ancient
legend and somewhat as in life, the train of cause and consequence knows
no end. For The Ancient Mariner is a structure, a perfectly ordered, a
finely complex design wrought out through the exquisite adjustment of
innumerable details. It is not an opium dream like Kubla Khan; and that
is the answer to the symbolists of psychoanalytic and biographic bent.
The gentle spirit who decrees that he shall win his way back to partial
release through loving all things ultimately saves the Mariner from his fate
worse than death. And so through a role of gentleness and sentimentality
does Coleridge pursue his way through life. He plays the role and reaches
the gospel of being in love and shooting the Albatross is, significantly an
utterly unjustified act and.it is followed by a remorse out of all
proportion to the deed. It is clearly a fantasy symbolizing guilt. The
Mariner has killed the source of kindness, safety and guidancethe odd
omission of any justification, provocation or motivation is best explained
as a symbolic device suggesting their sub rational, neurotic source. In
view of the birds mission and pattern of emotional disturbance in
Coleridges childhood, it would seem that this fantasy of killing the
Albatross is associated with some deeply buried guilt, cither incestuous or
Oedipal.
With Coleridge a week or waning moon is pretty clearly a powerful
symbol for loss of mother love. The figure appears in Christabel:
The moon is behind, and at the full;
And yet she looks both small and dull.
But the most astonishing moon symbolism occurs in The Ancient mariner.
At the most awful moment in that poem, when the nightmare Life-in-
Death has won the Mariners soul, and the night is thick and dark, then
comes the Moon. The passage describing her coming has forever
astonished and puzzled with its mystifying error in astronomy:
Till climb above the eastern bar
The horned Moon, with one bright star
Within the nether tip.
The figure comes at the end of a long stanza that reaches a climax of
feeling in these lines. Can this impossible bit off astronomy be a Freudian
slip? It seems inexplicable, yet if the moon holds reference here to
motherhood, how wonderful that Coleridge should put the star within the
nether tip, enfolded so to speak. Is it possible that we have here the
unconscious yearning of the narcissist in a magnificent bit of pure
expressionism altering the very face of the heavens? Like a mother, the
moon holds the little star within her arm. It is not so strange an idea in the
mind of a poet dominated by the need of a universe essentially benevolent,
essentially loving. Soft, gentle and benevolent presence in the sky,
serenely she floats among the stars quietly shedding her light on all
belowthe lovely complement and partner of the strong mail Sun.
The Ancient Mariner and his ship represent the small but persisting class
of mental adventurers who are not content with the appearances
surrounding them but who attempt to get behind Granted that the Mariner
and his voyage signify the mental adventure of an unusually inquiring
spirit, the outline of that adventure becomes tolerably clear, while it would
be senseless of to seek more than an outline. From the social point of view
these spiritual adventurers are criminals: they disturb the existing order
and they imply a criticism of the accepted round of life: they are self-
appointed outcasts. The shooting of the Albatross in the present context
was an anti-social act: something that by everyday rules would not be
done. And the avenging spirit takes the Mariner into a region and a
situation the utter loneliness of which is both the logical consequence and
the avengement of his revolt against society. This same region is one more
version of that aridity that besets all isolated mental voyagers at one stage
of their voyage. Other versions are Donnes conceit of himself in A
Nocturnal upon St. Lucys Day as the quintessence of the primeval
nothingness out of which God created the world; the emptiness
experienced by the poet in Shelleys Albatross, who, when he awakes
from his dreams sees the garish hills and vacant woods while his wan
eyes
Gaze on the empty scene as vacantly
As oceans moon looks on the moon in heaven
And the landscape in Brownings Child Roland. The Mariner escapes
from his isolation by the enlargement of his sympathies in the manner
least expected and he is allowed to return to common life. And he does so
as a changed man. He has repented of his isolation; his greatest
satisfaction is to worship in company with his fellows of all ages. But he is
still the marked man, the outcast, the Wandering Jew, the victim of his
own thoughts. Further, although he has been judged by society, he has the
reward of the courage that propels the mental adventurer: that of arresting
and disturbing and teaching those who have had no such experiences. And
this ambivalent criterion enriches the poem incalculably.
The Treatment of the Supernatural in the Ancient Mariner
In The Ancient Mariner the series of supernatural events begins with the
appearance of the spectre ship with its crew, Death and Lifein-Death, and
ends with the leaving of the corpses by the troop of the angelic spirits.
Death and Life-in-Death play at dice. The sailors fall-dead one by one.
The Mariner himself, won over by Life-in-Death, begins a lifelong process
of penance. At first, he despises the sea creatures and finds that his heart
being as dry as dust, he is unable to pray. But he partly atones his crime by
appreciating their beauty, acknowledging their worth, and blessing them.
The spell is broken and he is able to pray, and no sooner dose he pray than
the body of the Albatross that the sailors had hung round his beck instead
of the cross drops into the sea. The Mariner, partly absolved, falls into a
blessed sleep and is refreshed with rain. The bodies of the crew are
animated by a troop of angelic beings and the ship moves on without any
apparent wine. It is the Polar Spirit, desiring further vengeance that makes
the ship move and carries it as far as the equator. The Mariner falls into a
swoon and hears two voices, one telling the other that the Mariner has
done enough penance but will domore. When the angelic spirits quit the
bodies, the Ancient Mariner nears his home country. His ship is wrecked
and it sinks into the sea but the hermit to continue his penance rescues
him.
On the surface, The Ancients Mariner belonged to a class of poetry,
which provoked adverse comment. Even Hazlitt, who regards it as
Coleridges Most remarkable performance, adds less kindly that It is
high German, however, and in it he seems to conceive of poetry but as a
drunken dream reckless, careless and needless, of past, present, and to
come. Charles Lamb responded with greater sympathy but he too had his
doubts about the use of the supernatural and said: I dislike all the
miraculous part of it, but the feelings of the man under the operation of
such scenery dragged me along like Tom pipers Magic Whistle.
Coleridge set for himself a difficult task. To succeed in it he must do a
great deal more than reproduce the familiar thrills of horrific literature; he
must produce poetry of the supernatural, which should in its own way; be
as human and as compelling as Wordsworths poetry of everyday things.
Coleridge saw these difficulties and faced them much more than a thrill of
horror. He lives up to his own programmed and interests the affections by
the dramatic truth of what he tells.
The Scene set in distant times and remote places
First of all, Coleridge transports us to distant times and remote places with
vast weird possibilities. It is an Ancient Mariner, he tells us in the very
first line of the poem. The word ancient immediately suggests Middle
Ages when an atmosphere of magic and mystery was ripe all around and
when supernatural occurrences were not dismissed as the figments of a
feverish imagination but were believed to be really true. And the Mariner
is not moving about in any familiar place but is voyaging around Polar
Regions in unknown seas where anything might happen. Before any
supernatural element is introduced, the Mariner does not forget to tell us:
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.
Thus cut off from the everyday life, the Ancient Mariners story gets free
from the rigorous logic governing the world of reality and can follow its
own laws without unduly straining our credulity.
In the beginning, the poet gives a very realistic description of the
background:
The ship was cheered, the harbour cleared,
Merrily did we drop
Below the Kirk, below the hill,
Below the lighthouse top.
We notice that the church, the hill, the lighthouse top are mentioned
exactly in the order in which they would disappear from the mariners
sight. It might be a minor detail but it deepens ones faith in the truth of
the narrative. The next few lines give another similar detail contributing to
the total effect of reality.
The sun came up upon the left,
Out of the sea came he!
And he shone bright, and on the right
Went down into the sea.
Higher and higher everyday,
Till over the mast at noon-
Notice how accurate and how vivid the description is. It does not allow
any possibility of disbelief. So the reader just pins his faith in the poet.
Such realistic descriptions of nature scattered through out help to sustain
this faith. The ice mast high, as green as emerald, sending out fitfully a
dismal sheen, and occasionally cracking and growing; the fair breeze
blowing, the white foam flowing and the furrow following free; the bloody
sun, looking no bigger than the moon, standing right above the mast in a
hot and copper sky; the ship standing still as a painted ship upon a painted
ocean; the pale moonshine glimmering all night; the horn moon with one
bright star dogging its heels; all these are examples of vivid imaginative
apprehension of the exact details of nature. Here the very essence of
nature is distilled and with great vividness and imaginative energy at once
stamped on ones memory. These descriptions of nature surely help in the
acceptance of the supernatural elements.
Fear at my heart, as at a cup,
My life-blood seemed to sip.
The poet wants us to grasp the dreadfulness of Life-in-Death through this
effect on the Mariners mind. This method has been repeatedly used in the
poem to avoid horrible details. At the end of part III, two hundred sailors
drop down dead one by one, cursing the Mariner with their eyes:
One after one, by the star-dogged Moon,
Too quick for groan or sigh,
Each turned his face with a ghastly pang,
And cursed me with his eye.
Here again the poet does not provide any ugly details and leaves the entire
scene to our imagination. It is for us to imagine how the Mariner must
have felt when
Four times fifty living men,
(And I heard nor sigh nor groan)
With heavy thump, a lifeless lump,
They dropped down one by one.
And not only can we imagine the scene fully but even share the Wedding-
Guests fears that the Mariner himself is perhaps a ghost. Again, towards
the end of the poem, the poet wants to tell us how horrible the Mariners
face appears at the end of his face; instead, he describes the effect
produced by the sight of it upon the minds of the Pilot, the Hermit and the
Pilots boy.
I moved my lips-the Pilot shrieked
And fell down in a fit;
The holy Hermit raised his eyes,
And prayed where he did sit.
I took the oars: the Pilots boy,
Who now doth crazy go,
Laughed loud and long, and all the while
His eyes went to and fro.
This method of suggesting supernatural horrors is very different indeed
from the practice of the novelists of the school of terror like Horace
Walpole and Monk Lewis. It is also worth noting that even when
Coleridge has to introduce supernatural beings, he does not introduce
ghosts, he animates the bodies of the dead crew with a troop of spirits
blest and avoids all gruesome details:
They groaned, they stirred, they all up rose,
Nor spake, nor moved their eyes,
It had been strange even in a dream
To have seen those dead men rise.
The use of imaginative realism
As suggested earlier, in The Ancient Mariner, Coleridge makes use of
imaginative realism. He gives natural touches to supernatural beings and
weaves a web of mystery and vagueness about simple incidents and
common objects. Thus the two aspects get thoroughly fused together. The
Mariner himself, with his glittering eye, grey beard and skinny hand seems
to have descended from a world haunted by phantoms and specters, where
as supernatural happenings, because of the psychological truth inherent in
them, look to be quite natural. Moreover the relation between the
supernatural happenings and the mind of the Mariner is firmly established.
One who does not believe in the supernatural phenomena can easily accept
them as taking place on the inner stage of the Mariners mind. The
psychological truth of the incidents will only support such a reading. At
the end of the poem, when the ship approaches the harbour, the sight of
the familiar landmarks greeting our eyes also assures us of the truth of the
whole experience. The horrified shrieks of the Wedding-guest
occasionally appearing in the narrative tend to reassert the presence of the
world of humanity in a supernatural environment.
The [Rime Of The Ancient Mariner is a superb narrative, terse,
vigorous and inimitable. The perfectly ordered story moves on
unchecked through a world of mystery and wonder. The form
adapted by Coleridge is an old traditional one- the ballad. By the
time of Coleridge the medieval influence was considerably
established and it was natural enough for a tale strange adventures
to be told in ballad style.
As the narrative proceeds, its dramatic quality is intensified and its hold on
the reader's imagination becomes stronger. The total absence of wind
causing complete suspension of the ship's movement reflects a state of
Mariner's sinfulness, which is also objectified by the hanging of the Dead
Albatross round his neck. These events combine in themselves the
strangeness of the supernatural with the psychological truth of human
experience. They are not allowed to come down to the level of the drab
commonness, nor are they made so fantastic that they start straining our
belief. The poet also employs some clever devices to make the story more
interesting. The Wedding - Guest's interruptions are used to highlight the
climatic moments. The dramatic endings given to each part of the poem
make the readers move on to the next without even a moments pause. The
pronunciation of the moral at the conclusion gives the poem an air of
finality, as if there were nothing more to be said. The various aspects of
Nature, still and stagnant, tender and soothing, violent and furious, are
presented in harmony with the events. They are used, as music is used in
movies and stage representation, to enhance the dramatic effect of the
incidents. The metrical organization of the verse that follows the pattern of
a ballad adds to the poem's narrative charm.
The Romantic Elements of the Ancient Mariner
Supernaturalism: The Ancient Mariner is a romantic poem, impressing us
by bold invention, and appealing to that taste for the supernatural, the
longing for a shudder, to which the romantic school in Germany, and its
derivations in England and France, directly ministered. Fancies of the
strange things which may very well happen, even in broad daylight, to
men shut up alone in ships far off on the sea, seem to have occurred to the
human mind in all ages with a peculiar readiness, and often have about
them, the fascination of a certain dreamy grace, which distinguishes them
from other kinds of marvelous inventions. This sort of fascination The
Ancient Mariner brings to its highest degree: it is the delicacy, the
dreamy grace, in his presentation of the marvelous, which makes
Coleridges work so remarkable.
The sudden and mysterious appearance of the skeleton ship, Death and
Life-in-Death who are on board that ship, the coming back to life of the
dead crew, the angels of light standing on the corpses, the popular spirits
driving the ship- these are all supernatural elements in the poem. This
supernaturalism lends to the poem an atmosphere of wonder, enchantment,
and mystery, which are romantic qualities.
Medievalism: The poem has a medieval background. Interest in the middle
Ages too, is a romantic characteristic. The Middle Ages were a period of
superstition, piety, and love and chivalry. In this poem the first two
elements of the Middle Ages have been emphasized. The superstition of
the period is seen in the supernatural incidents. Its piety is seen in the
religious basis of the poem and in the reference to the hermit. The poem
thus carries us back to a remote period of time. Nature: There are many
pictures in the poem showing Coleridges interest in nature. Love for
nature is one of the outstanding qualities of romantic poetry. Every phase
of seascape, landscape and cloudscape is touched upon in the poem. The
sun shining brightly at the outset, the mist and iceberg surrounding the
ship, the moving moon going up the sky, the water burning green, blue
and white, the snakes moving in water and leaving tracks of golden fire-
these are some of the beautiful and richly-coloured nature-pictures, giving
the poem a romantic interest.
Melodious Movement: The poem is also romantic because of its melody
and music. Coleridge here appears as a keen lover of sweet and musical
sounds. Alliteration, medieval rhymes, onomatopoeia, etc are all employed
to produce musical effects. As an example of melody the following stanza
may be taken:
The fair breeze blew, the white foam flew
The furrow followed free;
We were the first that ever burst
Into that silent sea.
The simplicity and freshness of diction further enhance the romantic
effect.
Conclusion: The Romantic Movement of the nineteenth century was
characterized by an upsurge of Imagination. Much of the magic of The
Ancient Mariner comes from the blend of dark and serious issues with the
delighted play of creative energy. The imaginative power of The Ancient
Mariner gives to it its complex appeal-there is no final or single approach
to it.
The Significance of Life-in-Death
The two instruments in the hands of God are Death and Life-in-Death.
God punishes the people who go against the law of pity. They are not
allowed to pray nor can they bless any creature in the world. God loves
them best who love others and show kindness:
He prayth well, which loveth well
Both men and bird and beast.
Since the Mariner has gone against the rules of God, he has sinned. He is
admitted from both God and his creation. He is not pited by the saints. The
Mariner regrets that so many beautiful men lie dead on the deck while a
thousand thousand slimy things live on. This suggests that he still refuses
to acknowledge the worth of his fellow creatures. He tries to pray but he
fails.
A wicked whisper came, and made
My heart as dry as dust.
The bird was hailed with joy when it first came through the fog. With it
came the south wing, the ice split and the helmsman began to steer the
ship. The Albatross followed the ship for nine days and played with the
sailors. Suddenly, it was shot dead by the Mariner. It was a very
irresponsible at committed.
The guardian spirit of the Albatross began to avenge. It sent Death and
Life-in-Death to punish the sailors. A skeleton ship approached them
carrying two figures. One was a grim, looking ghastly skeleton. It was like
a Nightmare, the personification of Death. The other was Life-in-Death. It
had red lips, golden locks, and leprous skin. She represents the life-long
torture that a sinful man endures on account of the- pricks of his
conscience. Life-in-Death curdles ones blood by striking terror into the
heart of man. The two ghastly crew were playing at dice to determine who
would win the Mariner. Life-in- Death won whereas Death fell upon the
sailors. It can be said here that life is not always a blessing and Death is
not always a curse. The sailors were infact blessed with death because
they were saved from seeing the horrors faced by the Mariner. The
Mariner had to penance and repent all his life for the sin he committed.
As the souls of his sailors departed, they passed by the mariner with the
whizzing sound of his cross-bow. This was so, to remind him of the crime
he had committed. He was left all alone. No saint pitied his soul. The sight
of the sea was dreadful and ugly. The timbers of the ship were rotting and
heaps of dead men lay sinful on them. The Mariner wanted to pray but his
sinful heart would not allow him to do so. Even God accepts the prayers
said by hearts that are full of love and kindness. The eyes of the dead
sailors seemed to curse the mariner. For seven days he had to go through
this torture. He himself confused that he wished to die but could not die.
After seven days of constant torture did his fate take pity on the mariner?
In the moonlight he saw the water-snakes and slimy creatures, a fountain
of sympathy and tenderness flowed from his heart and he blessed those
creatures unswervingly. This love for the snakes was the best of prayers.
This illuminated his heart and he became calm. He was then able to pray
to God; who ultimately took pity on the mariner.
This recovery does not help to end the mariners suffering. It however
opens the door to the future. The mariner is haunted by the presence of his
dead sailors. The mariner becomes a symbol of remorse and he often feels
the necessity of repeating his confession.
Thus, we learn that nature has two tools of punishment Death and Life-in-
Death. Life-in-Death is much more horrible than Death. Death heals us of
pain instantly but Life-in-Death kills by degree
KUBLA KHAN AN INTRODUCTION
Coleridge himself stated that this poem was part of a gorgeous dream,
which he once dreamt while asleep. It was the year 1797. One night at his
farmhouse on the border of Somerset with Devon shire, he fell asleep
while reading Purchases Pilgrimage written by Samuel Purchas. It was
an anthology of travels. In it Coleridge was reading about Kubla Khan and
his palace when sleep overcame him. The author continued for about
three hours in a profound sleep, at least of the external senses, during
which time he has the most vivid confidence, that he could not have
composed less than from two or three hundred lines; if that indeed can be
called composition in which all the images rose up before him as things,
with a parallel production of the correspondent expressions, without any
sensation or consciousness of effort. On awakening he appeared to himself
to have a distinct recollection of the whole dream, and taking his pen, ink
and paper, instantly wrote down the lines which he saw in his dream. At
this moment he was unfortunately called out by a person on business from
Porlock, and thus he had to stop writing .He was detained by him for
above an hour, and on returning to his room, he found, to his small
surprise and mortification, that though he still retained some vague and
dim recollection of the general purport of the vision, yet, with the
exception of some eight or ten scattered lines and images on the surface of
a stream into which a stone had been cast, but, alas! Without the after
restoration of the matter!
According to the poet himself, Kubla Khan is now no more than a
psychological curiosity. Humphry House, however, observes that if
Coleridge had not told us that the poem is a fragment, it would not have
occurred to anyone to regard it as such. He believes it to be a complete
poem dealing with the theme of poetic creativity. Wilson Knight regards it
as a poem about life. Raymond Wilson feels that just because the poem
was A Vision in a Dream and not at all the product of conscious
composition, it came to be regarded as an example of indisputably
authentic inspiration. Its prestige rose when, in the second half of the
nineteenth century, a cult of Arts for Arts sake prevailed, and twentieth
century theories of psychology have also tended to promote attitudes
favourable to the poem, which can be dubiously honored as an early
example of Secularism. According to this critic, ``To this day, it is for the
most readers a fragment of inspired incoherence, a piece of verbal magic,
to ask the meaning of which would be impertinent.
CRITICAL SUMMARY
KUBLA KHAN
Kubla Khan, the great oriental king, once ordered that a magnificent
pleasure palace be built for him in Xanadu where the sacred river Alph
winding its course through immeasurably deep caves ultimately sank into
a dark, subterranean sea. So a fertile tract of land, about ten square miles
in area was enclosed with walls and towers. This piece of land, with
streams meandering their way through bright gardens and ancient forests
enclosing the bright gardens and ancient forests enclosing bright green
spots presented a spectacle of rich profusion
From this valley, a fountain of water gushed out of the ground every
moment. This burst of water threw up stones, which looked like hail or
chaff being scattered around.
Next the poet describes the source of river Alph. There was a deep,
mysterious- looking, awe-insuring chasm that slanted down a green hill
across a screen made by cedar trees. It was a savage, holy and enchanted
place, the kind of place frequented by a woman desperately wandering
about, in the light of a waning moon, in search of her demon-lover, who,
after making love to her deserts her. A mighty fountain issued from this
chasm intermittently. As the water gushed out, it flung about huge pieces
of rock in the same way in which the hailstones rebound from the earth or
the chaffy grain flings about under the threshers flail. The river Alph,
issuing from this fountain, flowed meanderingly for five miles through
woods and valleys, entered the deep caves and finally sank into the sunless
sea with a loud, tumultuous sound. In the midst of this tumult, Kubla Khan
could hear from far the voices of his ancestors predicting a war in the near
future and exhorting him to be prepared for it. The dome presented a great
marvel of human skill. It was a sunny pleasure-dome with caves of ice
and its shadow fell midway on the river. While standing here one could
hear the mingled noises from the fountain and the caves.
In the second part of the poem, Coleridge gives us a vivid picture of a poet
caught in a spell of poetic inspiration. Once, in a vision, he saw an
Abyssinian maid playing on her dulcimer and singing of the wild splendor
of Mount Abora. It was a beautiful indeed. The poet says that if he could
recreate in his imagination the sweet music of the Abyssinian maid, it
would give him such an ecstatic joy and he would feel so inspired that
with the music of his poetry he would build Kubla Khans pleasure dome
in the air. In other words, he would give such a vivid description of the
pleasure dome that his listeners would actually begin to see his
imagination. They would then regard him as a mighty magician, a
superhuman being who has fed on honeydew and drunk the milk of
paradise. They would mark his flashing eyes and floating hair, weave a
circle around him thrice and close their eyes in holy dread. The idea is that
a poet caught in a spell of poetic inspiration transcends his mundane
existence and becomes a superhuman being.
The Use of the Supernatural in Kubla Khan
Coleridge is pre-eminentally a poet of the supernatural. But he does not
belong to the School of the late eighteenth century writers of the Gothic
romance, whose works are marred by indiscreet accumulation of crude
horrors. Today they do not appeal to us because they violate our sense of
probability. The incidents described by them do not strike us as true, as
capable of having happened. Coleridge also makes use of supernatural
agencies and situations but he makes sure that they appear to us as natural.
When he started writing, he said that he was aware that his major problem
was how to make his presentation of the supernatural elements acceptable,
how to get from his readers that willing suspension of disbelief for the
moment, which constitutes poetic faith, and it must be acknowledged that
he solved this problem in the most convincing manner.
To begin with, the scene of this poem is never laid in a familiar place. He
takes us to remote, unknown regions and to distant times-mostly middle
ages- where the very unfamiliarity of the scene prompts us to suspend our
reasoning faculties. We do not argue, do not dispute, because we do not
know. In Kubla Khan, the scene is laid in the oriental city of Xanadu, in
forests as ancient as the hills.
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
This is something we have not seen. It seems to be improbable, but not
utterly impossible. So we accept it for a while. In the meantime the poet
cleverly makes use of some other devices to strengthen our sense of belief.
Another very important feature of Coleridges treatment of the
supernatural is a very subtle blending of the natural and the supernatural.
The two are so indistinguishly fused with each other that it is very difficult
to locate where the one ends and the other begins. The mighty fountain
being momently forced from the deep romantic chasm is definitely
invested with supernatural energy but the similes employed to describe it
are so familiar that we accept the fountain as quite natural.

Amidst whose swift half-intermitted burst
Huge fragments vaulted like rebounding hail,
Or chaffy grain beneath the threshers flail:
And mid these dancing rocks at once and ever
It flung up momently the sacred river.
Suggestiveness is the keynote of Coleridges treatment of the supernatural.
Coleridge does not describe the supernatural; he simply suggests it.
Suggestions stir ones imagination; descriptions make it inert. Suggestions
evoke our sense of mystery and make us more keenly interested;
descriptions arouse our sense of improbability and make us protest. In
Kubla Khan, Coleridge makes use of subtle suggestions in the description
of the deep romantic chasm slanting down the green hill across a cedarn
cover:
A savage place! As holy and enchanted
As eer beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover!
It has been remarked that these three lines contain the seeds of a complete
love story comparable to Keatss La Belle Dame Sans Merci.
The supernatural in Kubla Khan does not strain our sense of probability
because the dramatic truth of human experience projected in it is nowhere
falsified. Kubla Khans hearing the ancestral voices in the midst of the
tumultuous noises heard from the chasm and the measureless caves may
be slightly unusual, but once we accept that he can hear these voices (or if
we so like, we can say that he interprets the noises as ancestral voices),
how appropriate it is that he should hear a war prophecy since he is
himself a warrior of great renown! Toward the end of the poem, the poet is
presented as a supernatural being:
And all should cry, Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And close your eyes with holy dread,
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of paradise.
A note of supernatural mystery runs through these lines and yet the whole
descriptions is psychologically accurate because when a poet is caught in a
spell of poetic inspiration, he transcends his ordinary existence and rises to
the level of a supernatural being. Thus we find that Coleridge makes his
supernatural acceptable mainly through a faithful adherence to the
dramatic truth of human experience. Today we have come a long way
from the days of supernatural belief. Supernatural agencies and situations
no longer capture our imagination. Still we are able to enjoy the poem
because it is relevant to us. Whether we read it as a poem about poetic
creativity or a poem about life, it is intensely human and that is why we
accept it as a convincing presentation.
The Mystery and the Touch of the Supernatural
The vagueness, however, is the greatest strength of the description. It
leaves so much to suggestion that every reader with a little imagination
will build a vast scene of his own. The mystery becomes very effective
because of the vast vision of imagination, which surrounds the vivid
picture of the poem. The poem is raised from the region of everyday
realities to that of a supernatural world. The details though may be
realistic but however each detail has an actual counterpart somewhere.
The total impression however is of an unearthly rather than earthly scene.
The deft touches scattered in the poem help to achieve the creation of a
masterpiece. The very mention of Xanadu, Kubla Khan, Alph,
Abora and The Abyssinian maid evoke associations of remoteness,
mystery and strangeness. The woman wailing for the demon-lover, the
chasm seething with ceaseless turmoil, the earth breathing in thick
pants, the huge fragments thrown up by the waves, the caverns
measureless to man, the sunless sea, the caves of ice etc are all
nothing but touches which make the poem a supernatural one.




NATURE OF POETIC VISION IN KUBLA KHAN
Coleridges preface to Kubla Khan reveals that it was composed during a
dream. He adds that it was not really a composition in the ordinary sense.
For, the entire images rose up before him as things with a parallel
production of the corresponding expressions without any sensation or
consciousness of effort.
It has been pointed out by Humphrey House that by writing this preface
the poet played out of modesty right into the hands of critics. Humphry
House refers to other critics who talk of the vivid incoherence and
patchwork brilliance of the poem and like to read it only as a
psychological curiosity. He himself believes the poem to be complete
and intensely meaningful. According to him Kubla Khan is a poem about
the act of poetic creation, about the ecstasy in imaginative fulfillment. It
is triumphant positive statement of the potentialities of poetry.
Kubla Khan not merely attracts the readers by giving good poetry; it is
also often studied and esteemed for reasons other than poetic. It has been
regarded as a forerunner of both symbolism surrealism. The claim is
sometimes made that Kubla Khan is an immediate and undistorted
_expression of poetic inspiration, as it has been written without a poets
mind functioning at the conscious level.
Humphry House writes, The precision and clarity of the opening part are
the first things to mark even in the order of the landscape. In the centre is
the pleasure-dome with its gardens on the river bank; to one side is the
rivers source in the chasm, to the other are the Caverns measureless to
man and the sunless sea into which the river falls: Kubla in the centre
can hear the mingled measure of the fountain of the source from one
side, and of the dark caves from the other. The river winds across the
whole landscape. Nobody need keep this mere geographical consistency of
the description prominently in the mind as he reads. Humphry House
suggests that if this factual-visual consistency had been absent, and there
had been a mere random sequence or collection of items, such as a dream
might well have provided items which needed a symbol-system to
establish relations at all- then the absence would be observed: The Poem
would have been quite different, and a new kind of effort would have been
needed to apprehend what unity it might have had. The fertility of the
plain is only made possible by the mysterious energy of the source. The
dome has come into being by Kubla Khans decree: the dome is stately;
the gardens are girdled round with wall and towers.


Even so, even if the poem is the outcome of an opium dream, it has to be
studied as poetry by the critics. In seeking the significance of the poem,
there is often a tendency to discover some kind of allegory or symbolic
meaning. If we have to read an allegory into the poem, it must be
consistent throughout. Most of the details, if not all of them, must have
significance in the allegory. Now it will be difficult to find the hidden
meaning behind such features of the landscape as the deep romantic
chasm, the forest full of cedar trees, the walls, the towers, and the sinuous
rills.
Attempts have been made to link the poem with the poets own life.
Graham Hough supposes that Kubla is the inspired poet-magician who,
towards the close of the poem, becomes the inspired poet-prophet. The
Alph may stand for poetic inspiration. It rises up under awe-inspiring
circumstances. For a while, it flows smoothly in sunlight. Then it falls into
deep caverns and reaches the sunless sea.
Where Alph, the sacred river, ran
Through caverns measureless to man
Down to a sunless sea.
So twice five miles of fertile ground
With walls and towers were girded round:
And there were gardens bright with sinuous rills,
Where blossomed many an incense-bearing tree.
To Hough, this suggests the story of the rise and fall of creative
imagination in a poet.
It is so often said that kubla khan achieves its effects mainly by far
reaching suggestiveness, or by incantation or by much connotation, with
little denotation, that it is worth emphasizing this element of plain clear
statement at the outset, statement which does particularize a series of
details inter-related to each other, and deriving their relevance from the
inter relation and their order. Further more, the use of highly emotive and
suggestive proper names is proportionately no large source of the poems
effect; it is only necessary to watch the incidence of them. Xanadu, Kubla
Khan and Alph occur once in that form within the poems opening two-
and-a-half lines: and none of them occur again except for the single
repetition of kubla in line 29 And mid this tumult kubla heard from far
ancestral voices prophesying war!Abyssian and Mount Abora occur once
each, in the three lines 39-41
It was an Abyssinian maid,
And on her dulcimer she played,
Singing of Mount Abora.
Could I revive within me
Her symphony and song .
There are no other proper names in the poem at all, unless we should
count the final word Paradise.
For he on honey-dew hath fed,
And drunk the milk of paradise.
An even more personal view of the poem is taken by Robert Graves. He
finds it dealing in a roundabout way with Coleridges relation with his
wife. According to Graves, the poet identifies himself with the serene and
powerful Kubla Khan. The pleasure dome is the state of joy brought by
opium. The caves of ice should be taken to mean that passion did not
disturb his retreat from the difficulties of life. Graves suns up: We
understand from the poem that Coleridge has determined to shun the mazy
complications of life by retreating to a bower of poetry, solitude and
opium. Its far-fetched symbolism is admitted; every kind of fanciful
meaning can be read into the poem. It may be taken to refer to the poets
own experience or desires, whether expressed or hidden. Such
interpretations can neither be proved nor disapproved.
It is best therefore, to understand the poem without burdening it with any
deep symbolic or allegorical purpose. After the entire poem is felt to be a
lovely lyric. It is full of evocative phrases and images. The poem shows
the distilled essence of all the romance and adventure of travel and
discovery. As Prof. Lowes put it: And over it is cast the glamour
enhanced beyond all reckoning in the dream, of the remote in time and
space-that visionary presence of vague and gorgeous and mysterious past
which brooded, as Coleridge read, above the inscrutable Nile and domed
pavilions in Kashmir, and the vanished stateliness of Xanadu. Kubla Khan
makes us feel the magic of distance called romance.
ROMANTIC ELEMENS IN KUBLA KHAN
The main theme of Coleridges romanticism lies in his artistic rendering of
the supernatural phenomenon. A major part of his poems are engrossed
deep in supernatural mystery. Kubla Khan, it is true, is less directly
connected with the supernatural, but still the supernatural elements in the
poem appear quite prominent. The woman wailing for her demon lover
and the ancestral voices prophesying war are actually supernatural
occurrences. The poetic frenzy of an inspired poet is based on the
supernatural. The tumultuous rise of the river Alph from a deep romantic
chasm is also given an unmistakable supernatural touch. But what is
remarkable about Kubla Khan is the convincing presentation of the
supernatural elements. The description of the landscape is so vivid and
precise, the similes used for the mighty fountain so homely and familiar
that it just does not occur to the reader that anything impossible is
described. The psychological truths hidden behind Kubla Khans hearing
ancestral voices prophesying war or the presentation of the poet as a
superhuman being make these facts acceptable.
Kubla Khan is full of dream imagery. Now the essence of a dream is its
inconsequence and illogicality which we realize only after we wake up
from it. While experiencing the dream we are entirely lost in it and find no
objections to its details. That is the first thing to remember in estimating
the significance or effect of the poem. There is also the disconnected
nature of the thing seen or the impressions evoked in our minds by them.
We are told of a palace and fortress, but there is no description of the inner
decoration except for the mention of a sunny dome and caves of ice. A
river tuned to flow in many clever or romantic ways is possible, but this
river is said to be a sacred river. This idea is particularly Hindu or Eastern,
for only in the East do people Treat Rivers as holy. Where there are rivers
and subterranean springs, there are bound to be caverns as well. Rivers do
often go underground and then come up again. This is given a supernatural
or magical turn, and the associations with magic, wizardry and mystery
are emphasized. In fact, and nearly half of the entire poem is taken up with
the course of the sacred river.
Reference to distant times and places with a view to evoke a sense of awe
and mystery is another romantic characteristic used by Coleridge in Kubla
Khan. The very first line transports us to the distant city of Xanadu, the
summer capital of the great oriental king Kubla Khan, and the son of the
great Chenghiz Khan. These names, unfamiliar and wrought with the spirit
of mystery, lend to the poem an enchantment of their own. The same
purpose is served by the allusion to the Abyssinian girl singing of Mount
Abora in the second part of the poem.
The third feature of the poem is the mixing and blending of the vision of
the palace of Kubla Khan with another dream, which the poet is said to
have dreamt on another occasion. In that dream, he saw a maiden playing
on a dulcimer and singing to the accompaniment of the instrument. The
effect of it on the poet was to intoxicate him with the purest fervour of
poetic imagination. For, he becomes transfigured with hair disheveled,
eyes flashing forth fire, being completely transported from the world of
ordinary humdrum existence. He is sustained by the food of the gods and
drinks the milk of paradise, such as are earmarked for the children of
poetry.
Kubla Khan abounds in suggestive phrases and lines capable of evoking
mystery. The description of the romantic chasm, the source of the river
Alph in the second part of the poem is romantic in spirit. Perhaps the most
appropriate lines in the poem refer to the woman wailing for her demon-
lover.
A savage place! As holy and enchanted
As eer beneath a waning moon was haunted
By woman wailing for her demon-lover.
But almost equally suggestive in Kubla Khans hearing the war prophecy
made by the ancestral voices.
The disjoined entities are each pictures, but together they have no
connection with one another. The whole poem is like a series of snatches
of music remembered in bits and on different occasions. Such unity as
they may possess will derive its meaning or significance from the
personality or subjective bias of the reader acting on the suggestions given
by the poet.
Sensuous phrases and pictures so generously used in the poem contribute a
good deal to its romantic spirit. The bright gardens and sinuous rills, the
incense-bearing trees laden with sweet blossoms, the sunny sports of
greenery, the half-intermittent burst of the mighty fountain the rocks
vaulting like rebounding hail-all these vivid pictures give the poem a
sensuous touch so characteristic of romantic poetry.
The very idea of poetic creativity taking place under divine inspiration and
of the poet transcending his prosaic existence and rising o the level of
superhuman being when caught in his poetic frenzy is based on the
romantic concept of poetry and of a poets identity.
Above all, the dream-like atmosphere of Kubla Khan makes it an exquisite
romantic poem. It was not only composed in a dream but even exhibits a
dream-like movement.
DEVELOPMENT OF THOUGHT IN KUBLA KHAN
Kubla Khan is one of the three great poems of Coleridge. It is the shortest
but in some ways the most remarkable of the three. In the first part of the
poem the poet describes a mighty river and a rare pleasure dome
constructed on it by the mighty Kubla Khan. In the later part the poet has
described the power of poetry and inspiration as well as a poet in the
frenzy world of creation. The poem is not related to a story in any way; it
is but a masterpiece of description. The critics also feel that the poem
Kubla Khan is Airy and Unsubstantial. At the first reading there comes
the impression that the poem is airy and unsubstantial. There is a feeling
that there is no coherence and that the two parts of the poem do not hang
together. In the first part the river Alph and its beauty are depicted where
as the second part describes a vision and the poet in frenzy. The first part
also does not follow an even Course. There is no connection between the
Abyssinian maid and the river Alph. However a close study reveals that
the poem does have Coherence and substance. It cannot be explained in
a rational terms, but when we follow the course of association and
suggestions that run through the poem, it does yield a coherent meaning.
The imagination of the poet is aroused by the river Alph and its
subterranean Course. The measureless caverns, the panting earth, the
dancing rocks, sunless and lifeless sea, and the tumult of the mighty waves
as they rush into the silent ocean, the scene where a woman wails for the
demon-lover, all these excite his imagination. A feeling of awe and
mystery is upon the poet, and he is lifted into a mood of poetic creation.
The poet glides into this new theme through suggestion; the power of
creation in man is suggested through the damsel; who is the symbol of
creative power. The poet is aroused by the desire to capture the weird
beauty of the entire scene, and reminds him that this can be built in
colours, strains and words. The symbol of this creative power is the
maiden whom he saw in a vision. Both the parts of the poem are
connected by the poets desire to build a pleasure dome with the help of
his imagination.
The whole poem follows the course of a dream. It can be interpreted as a
complete poem; but the coherence and the completeness is of a dream seen
by the poet and not of waking life. The description of river Alph has
dream like qualities. It is not easy to follow the course of the river. It is not
clearly suggested whether the entire course of the river is of ten miles or
whether this was a part of its entire course. It is difficult to also associate
the wild and the fertile parts of the course of the river. The transition from
the description of the river to the description of the vision is abrupt, and
the second part tenuous. The poem feels to be a dream due to its vividness
and lack of smooth transitions
The poem is a master-piece of descriptive art. It is nothing but a series of
pictures which following quick succession. First the poet describes the
pleasure-dome and immediately after he describes the course of the river
Alph. He builds up the picture of romantic chasm-by a scene of vast
desolation in the dim light of the moon. The picture of the mighty fountain
follows this. The vision of the river is repeated again and is followed by
the pictures of the pleasure dome; after this there is the description of the
vision and finally we get the picture of the poet in frenzy.
There is a clear combination of vagueness and vividness. The pictures of
the dome, the river, the damsel, are at once vivid and get vague. It is
just like being in a dream. The details are left vague. The impressions of
the dream have clear outline, yet they concentrate only on a few details.
The details are imaginative and leave the reader also in a state of
imagination. The details are suggestive and not explicit.
The entire description of the poem has the indefiniteness of a dream;
because we dont know exactly about the pleasure dome or the river Alph.
There are many questions which haunt our minds like-How far was the
sunless sea from the pleasure domes? How far was the fountain from the
river? We have a vague picture of the pleasure dome-that it was situated
on the banks of the river Alph, it had a sunny dome and caves of ice, its
shadow floats on the waves and the pleasure dome is haunted by the
tumult of the mighty river.
KUBLA KHAN AS THE POEM OF DESCRIPTION
In view of the absence from the poem of any story or plot or episode
intended to be narrated, we have to look out for the significance of it in
terms of the descriptions it contains. Major described are the sacred river
Alph and its romantic course, the chasm bubbling up with violent
upheaval of rocks and boulders alternating with gushing and foaming
waters. Next to these we have a damsel with a dulcimer, who though not
otherwise described, at once suggests the whole world of romance and
mystery. Lastly, we have the picture of the poet roused to creative
utterance. The poet is inspired, his hair is loosened and he looks scarcely
mortal. All the details mentioned are enough to deepen the sense of either
mystery or charm of delight. The reference to the waning moon at once
starts a train of associations which end in magic and sorcery; from the
ancient times the moon has been associated with all occult manifestations
and powers.
The figures of speech employed also promote the same elements of
mystery and magic. The demon-lover has a mortal woman in love with
him, and this at once thrills us with a creepy feeling. Romance of the
exciting and pleasurable type is provided by gods and mortals marrying, as
they often do in classical mythology. But men and the demoniac spirits
having similar love- bonds are neither so common nor so natural. But such
superstitious beliefs are common among ordinary people especially in out-
of-the-way rustic areas. The underground commotion made by the river or
by some panting force strikes us as fearful, for it suggests earthquakes.
Some idea of the tremendous violence felt by the earth may be formed
from the poets description of rocks and boulders being scattered about
like the chaff by the winnower of newly harvested grain.
These are all unforgettable details. And the very fact that they do not fit in
with one another in any prosaic or logical manner is a characteristic of the
poem underlying the poem.
The element of magic in the poem.
Magic is generally associated with the ability to invoke powers or exploit
Nature in defiance of what we consider to be natural and universal laws. It
appeals to the irrational or mysterious element in all of us, since, there is
nothing wonderful in what is known. It is the human tendency to always
try to know more about the other world. But when suggestions or details
are calculated to stir our feelings and inspire in us vague dread or terror,
and then we say that some sort of magic is at work. It is the supreme virtue
of Coleridges poetry that he creates this elusive but powerful feeling
more often and more intensely than many others great poets.
In the poem Kubla Khan, Coleridge speaks of a place being holy, savage
and haunted at once; the readers cannot imagine the combination easily
but we accept it since the poet says so with a matter-of-fact certainty. Only
magic can account for the combination of a sunny dome with icy caves.
Lest we should disbelieve it, the poet himself says that it was a miracle of
rare device.
In order that people may be exempt from being bewitched by the poet
when he is under the influence of his poetic inspiration, the poets represent
the beholders as crying to themselves:
Beware! Beware!
His flashing eyes, his floating hair!
Weave a circle round him thrice,
And in these ways let us protect ourselves from his dreaded influence. The
reference to the number- three, is wholly magical, for mystic powers are
ascribed to numbers in all systems of magic. The most striking indication
of this magical influence is found in the last two lines. Honey-dew
suggests something sweet as honey, and fresh, cool and sparking as dew.
It is the blend of these qualities that is entrancing to the mind. To drink the
milk of paradise is to be one of the best creatures already enjoying the
privileges of blessed spirits. Such is the power conferred by the spirit of
poetry on the poet.
Coleridges style and diction in the poem
The wonderful effect of the poem is to be found compressed for the most
part in single words or pregnant epithets, which carry a whole world of
meaning and association. The language of the poem is simple and sublime:
not a word can be changed for the better and not an image or sentiment
jars on the mind or offends the sensibilities. The poem is, as we may say,
word perfect. Phrases like pleasure-dome, demon-lover, incense bearing,
holy-dread and honey-dew, are compounded of the most ordinary words,
but they sound different and convey intensified meanings. The sentence,
Ancestral voices prophesying war, defies analysis. But it conveys some
idea of part played by oracles in foretelling the future, of the interpretation
of natural phenomena by soothsayers and augers and of the practice
among primitive tribes of inspired priests indicating when a war should be
begun. The two words damsel and dulcimer are themselves romantic
and help us to visualize a beautiful maiden highly gifted with all artistic
accomplishments.
The element of music in the choice of the diction is no less worthy of
notice. The word Xanadu at once strikes the note of the remote and
mysterious; for few have heard of such a place. Kubla Khan is sonorous
and dignified and also suggestive of an eastern emperor and of the pomp
and luxury associated with one. A sunless sea sounds smooth and strange
and a rarity. By describing the shadow of the dome of pleasure as moving
the poet conveys to us the idea of how the waters are disturbed and so the
images formed on the surface of the stream are also disturbed. Prosaically
we reproduce a song we have heard well or ill. But, poetically, he would
rebuild that dome in air, that is, describe it in the musical language of
inspired poetry.
By making these analyses, however, we come no nearer to the heart of
mystery of how great poetry is produced. We recognize the quality of it
when we read it, and by the persistence with which these impressions
linger our consciousness without our realizing it always or fully.
Kubla Khan is steeped in the wonder of all of Coleridges enchanted
voyaging, a critic rightly observes.
Kubla Khan fragment or a complete poem
A very important question asked by critics is Is the poem a fragment?
All critics however dont hold this opinion. George Saints bury disbelieves
Coleridges statement. He remarks the prose as rigmarole in which
Coleridge tells the story of the coming and going of the vision called
Kubla Khan. It is A Characteristic piece of self-description.
Humphrey House, a modern critic also holds that the poem is complete.
He regards the poem Kubla Khan as poem about the process of poetic
creation, about the ecstasy of imaginative fulfilment.
Coleridge himself feels that the poem Kubla Khan is not complete but a
fragment. According to him it is only a part of the poem of two or three
hundred lines, which he saw in his dream. He not only saw the picture but
he painted the whole scene in the poem as a portrait. He says that the lines
and words written are as they came to him in the dream. The poem could
not be completed. Coleridge says because a visitor interrupted him and the
vision faded.
Kubla Khan when read as a story or even as a piece of connected
description, it seems but a fragment. The unwritten parts of the poem are
needed to give us a clear idea of the story of the places and things
described. But it will be wrong to treat the poem in this way. Actually,
when read, it somehow does not make us feel that it is incomplete or
inadequate. It creates a vivid and full impression of a mood or an
atmosphere. It seems to bring before us the very essence of romance.
Coleridge steeps his poem in romance of distant in space or time.
Coleridge says that the poem was composed in a dream after he fell
asleep, reading a volume of travels edited by the Elizabethan writer,
Purchas.
Professor J.L. Lowes had traced most of the features of the landscape and
the persons mentioned or described in the poem to the accounts of travels
in Africa and Asia. It is a piece of remarkable detective work in the field
of literary origins. The identification of the sources of Coleridges words
and images does not in any way make the poem less original or exciting.
For even his opium induced dream, the imagination of the poet was
selecting combining and transforming the materials from travellers
descriptions. So well has this been done that George Sampson has
declared: So far from being the opium dream, Kubla khan is the product of
one expected lucid interval before the fumes closed up once more the
_expression of the spirit: moreover, it is complete.
The poem starts with a reference to a city called Xanadu. The name is
exotic. To an English reader, it suggests the distant and mysterious East.
One to Kubla Khan follows the reference to Xanadu. This is another
exotic name. Anyone with some knowledge of world history can
recognize in him a notable emperor of China, who was the patron of
Marco Polo. Kubla Khan and Xanadu determine the setting of the poem. It
is laid in the Far East in the Middle Ages. The impression is strengthened
by the mention of a sacred river called Alph.
Africa too is brought into the poem. To do this, the poet has to describe
something seen in a vision by him. It WAS AN Abyssinian maid playing
on a dulcimer. Her song was about Mount Abora. The poet connects her
song with the pleasure-dome of Kubla Khan in a curious way. The song at
the time of the vision filled him with joy. If that joy could be revived in
him, he could build from mere music the wonderful dome of Kubla Khan.
The pleasure-dome is in the midst of a fertile valley. It is girdled round
with walls and towers. Near it are gardens with winding streams. Incense-
bearing trees grow there. There are also forests and sunny glades. The
most remarkable thing there is a deep romantic chasm. From it a mighty
fountain flings up the sacred river, which after meandering for five miles,
reaches underground caverns and meets the sea somewhere under the
earth.
These features of the landscape suggest some kind of paradise. Prof.
Lowes has pointed out that we have here a mixture of Miltons Garden of
Eden and Mohammeds paradise as described in an account of one
Aladdin in Purchases Pilgrims. The fragment trees and sacred river may
owe their origin to Eden. But the Abyssinian is partly suggested by one of
the inferior paradises described by Milton as a foil to Eden and partly from
the story of Aladdin.
Prof. Lane Cooper suggested that Coleridges Mount Abora was really
Miltons Mount Amara. The latter is described as the place where
Abyssinian kings kept their sons under guard. The poet adds that it is near
the origin of the Nile. Now Coleridge is known to have read Bruces
popular book, dealing with travels to discover the source of the Nile.
There we find the concept of a sacred river to which the pagan prays
everyday as if it were God. We have also the description of two fountains
forcing themselves out with great violence at the foot of the mountain.
Then the stream meanders five miles through green meadows. All this
seems to have got into Kubla Khan. Lowes goes further to suggest that
Coleridge must have read in Bruce about Abola, a tributary of the Nile.
Moreover, Bruce also mentions another river called Astaboras. So it is
possible that between Abola and Astaboras, Agora may have been coined
in the dream.
Coleridge probably takes the sunny dome with caves of ice from an
account of the Cave of Amarnath in Kashmir. The image formed there of
ice which attracts pilgrims was known to the poet through the accounts of
travellers. The incense bearing trees may be a reminiscence of the groves
in Eden whose rich trees wept odorous gums and balm.
In this way, we find the poem full of fascinating images, suggesting the
scene of strange adventures in Africa, India and China. It is pervaded by
the magic of travel and exploration. In his imagination, Coleridge traveled
with the explorers and is thrilled with their discoveries. His poem allows
us to capture the spirit of romance. In this sense, the poem, even though a
fragment is complete. The poet presents a mood in all its fullness.
115 Matthew Arnold
MATTHEW ARNOLD
The Forsaken Merman
Dover Beach
Scholar Gypsy
Memorial Verses to Wordsworth
Poetry 116
Unit-4: Matthew Arnold
Life Sketch
Matthew Arnold, writer, critic, poet, thinker, publicist and educationist was born at Leleham, England on
December 24, 1882. His father, Thomas Arnold, was the famous Headmaster of Rugby. Matthew was his
eldest son but second lchild. His childhood was spent at the place of his birth, Laleham which is full of natural
beauty. Poet Wordsworth who lived nearby was a family friend of the Arnolds. The influence of Nature las
well as that of Wordsworth the poet can be traced in Matthew Arnolds work, specially, in his poetry. But the
most dominant was the influence of his own father who was a scholar and a disciplinarian. Thomas Arnold
taught him Latin when Matthew was still a boy of thirteen years. The Boy Matthew was sent to Winchester
School but he could not adjust to the atmosphere prevailing in that school and came back to the care of his
father at the Rugby School development as a serious poet and thinker. As a boy he used to be have flippantly.
His childhood passion for fishing remained with him through his career at Oxford university with which he
had long and lasting association.
At Oxford University, he got admitted to Balliol College, Where he pursued the study
of the classics, that is, Latin and Greek. He was not a serious student and during
holidays and vacation, he roamed over the Oxford countryside in the company of
friends and his brother Tom. Predictably, he got a second class and was disappointed.
But he more than made up his handicap by obtaining a fellowship at Oriel College.
l For a while, he worked at the Rugby school. he has developed literary tastes and creative inclination. He
met George Sands, the novelist which he had developed a liking. Arnold writer who made a lasting
impression on his mind at this time was Etienne Pivert de Senacour who is famous for his work
OBERMANN. mattew Arnold had also developed zest for the theatre during this period of his life.
l In 1847, Matthew Arnold got appointed as Private secretary to Lord Lansdown. He, thus hot an opportunity
to intermingle with the aristocracy but was not impressed by their aristocratic ways. Those were the
times of new ideas and of reforms and many a social and political movement . Those were also the days
when England had emerged as the most dominant Imperial Power of the world. Matthew Arnold, somehow,
kept his balance. He did not turn a radical, though he had sympathies with the masses who were prone
to be exploited and led dismal lives, deprived of their basic human rights. he listened to thinkers and
speakers of the Chartist Movement and hoped that men would eventually look toward possibilities of
developing a better civilization and develop a humanistic culture. he, apparently, did not like the aristocratic
class whom he later on called barbarians
l In 1849, Matthew Arnold published his first volume of verse entitled : THE STRAYED REVELLER
AND OTHER POEMS which established his reputation as a literary figure. Three years late, he published
EMPEDOCLES ON ETNA AND OTHER POEMS.
l Arnold this time a fruitless love affair with Marguerite, whom he had met in Switzerland, left him darkly
despaired. The influence of this despairing experience can be found in several of his poems he wrote
later by many critics are regarded his best poems. But he recovered from the shock of failed love and
returned to England where he married France Lucy Wightman, daughter of a Judge, in 1851. He was
also appointed an Inspector of Schools. he led a happily married life and his wife bore him six children.
Only two daughter and one son survived. Arnold, much influenced by Greek survived. Arnold, much
influenced by Greek classics, faced his grief stoically.
l Arnold found it hard to adjust to the routine demands of his job but slogged on and two years before his
retirement he became the Chief Inspector of schools. he however, gained very high reputation as a man
117 Matthew Arnold
of ideas, a writer, critic and poet. He made his contribution to the cause of Education in England. he in
may ways, was ahead of his times and promoted the ideas that Education ought to be the sole responsibility
of the State. He made official tours of Europe thrice and studied the school and university educational
system in Switzerland, Germany, France, Italy and Austria.
l In 1853, he got published yet another volume of poetry with a preface which became famous like
Wordworths preface to his Lyrical Ballads, With this Preface he emerged as literary critic of immense
influence.
l In 1857, Matthew Arnold was appointed Professor of Poetry at Oxford and remained in that position for
ten years. He was the first Professor of Poetry to use English for academic communication instead of
Latin. During his Professorship the published ON TRANSLATING HOMER, ESSAYS IN CRITICISM,
ON THE STUDY OFCELTIC LITERATURE AND WHICH WAS TO BECOME IN LATER YEARS
AND AFTER HIS DEATH , HIS MOST FAMOUS CONTRIBUTION TO HUMANISM, Culture
and Anarchy, Later Years saw more publications, such as Friendships Garland, Mixed Essays and other
prose writings and social criticism. He was then much occupied with the problems of Culture and Religion
and devoted much thought to the controversies and debated of his time . St Paul and Protestantism,
Literature and Dogma, God and the Bible, Last essays on Church and Religion reflect his concerns for
mans development as a civilized and culture being and disnction between fake and real values that
sustain the human element in man.
l Arnold became an institutional his life time. He is counted among the wise men of Victorian Age and
enjoys the sobriquet : THE VICTORIAN SAGE, even as Thomas Carlyle, a more formidable and
prophetic writer-thinker too is remembered by the same title. Arnold carried a relentless campaign
against hypocrisy and cant as also against boorish behavior. He coined the word Philistinism for this type
of behavior. Some of his phrases have lingered on beyond his age to wit, Sweetness and light high
seriousness , to see life steady and see it whole , to see an object as it in itself is . While conferring an
honorary degree on him, the Chancellor of Oxford University cited him as the most sweet and most
enlighterned man. That was in 1870.
l In 1883, Matthew Arnold visited the United States on a lecture tour and his daughter Lucy who
accompanied him got married to an American and he vsted Amerca agan when a child was born to hs
daughter. Arnolds influence s still felt in American universities and the best book on him is written by
Lionel Trilling, an American. He is taught in American universities as a major literary and social critic as
much a poet. He was granted a liftime pension by Gladstone, the then Prime Minister of England.
l Arnold retired from ative life in 1886 and died in 1888 inL verpool where he had gone to receive his grand
daughter who was to avvompany her mother Lucy from America. He had jumped a fence to catch a
tram car but drpped dead on April 15, 1888 leaving behind a formidable reputation and profound influence
on the succeeding generations, far beyond the borders of his own country and is immortalized in his
highly valued literary works.
Poetry 118
Important Dates in Arnolds Life
1822 Born 24 December, Laleham on the Thames. Second child and eldest son of Dr. Thomas Arnold
and Mary Penrose Arnold.
1828 Dr. Thomas Arnold appointed Headmaster at Rugby school.
1833 Dr. Thomas Arnold bought a house in the English Lake District, known as Fox How.
1836 Arnold admitted to Winchester School, his father had studied there.
1837-41 Arnold could not adjust at Winchester and joined Rugby school. Arthur Hugh Clough, senior to
him by three years, whom he immortalised in an elegy entitled thyrsis, also studied there.
1840 Arnold won the Rugby poetry Prize for Alaric at Rome, elected to and open classical Scholar-
ship at Balliol Collage, Oxford under the tutorship of R. Lingen.
1841 Arnold went to Oxford in the Michaelrnas term. Dr. Thomas Arnold appointed Regius Professor
of Modern History at Oxford.
1842 Dr. Thomas Arnold died at forty-seven of angina pectorisa on 12 June.
1843 Arnold won the Newdigate Prize for his Cromwell.
1844 Arnold got Second class in Literae Humaniores, i.e., Humanities.
1845 Arnold taught at Rugby, elected to a Fellowship at Oriel College, Oxford.
1846 Arnold travelled in France and Switzerland. In Paris he met George Sand , the female novelist
and Rachel, the famous actress.
1847 Arnold appointed Private Secretary to Lord Landowne, President of Lord John Russells Cabi-
net.
1848-49 Arnold travelled in Switzerland , when he met Marguerite.
1849 Arnolds first volume of poetry, The Strayed Reveller and other Poems published anonymously
as by A .
1851 Arnold appointed Her Majestys Inspector of Schools on 14 April; married Frances Lucy
Wightman, daughter of Judge Wightman on 10 June.
1852 Arnolds Empedocles on Etna and Other Poems published anonymously as by A .
1853 Arnolds volume of Poems appeared, with a long preface; he expounded his poetic thery and
vindicated Classicism in an age of Romanticism.
1855 Arnolds Poems, Second Series appeared.
1857 Arnold appointed Professor of Poetry at Oxford, delivered Inaugural Lecture on The Modern
Element in Literature re-elected to the Professorship for the Second term after five years.
1858 Arnolds classical drama, Merope published.
119 Matthew Arnold
1859 Arnold appointed Foreign Assistant Commissioner to the Newcastle Commission. In that capac-
ity visited Schools in France, Switzerland and Holland, appeared his England and the Italian
Question.
1861 Published The Popular Education in France and On Translating Homer. His friend Arthur Hugh
Clough died at Florence of 13 November.
1861 Arnolds eldest son, Thomas, and infant son, Basil died. His Schools and Universities on the
Continent published.
1862 Arnolds Culture and Anarchy and New Poems published.
1862 Arnolds Twice-Revised Code and On Translating Homer: Last words were published.
1865 Arnold visited France, Italy, Germany and Switzerland as a member of the Taunton Commission.
His Essays in Criticism, First Series published.
1866 Arnolds elegy Thyrsis appeared in Macmillans Magazine.
1867 New Poems and On the Study of Celtic Literature published Arnolds Professorship at Oxford
ended.
1870 The degree of Doctor of Civil Law (D.C.L) conferred of him at Oxford University. His St. Paul
and Protestantism, published appointed Senior Inspector ot Schools.
1872 His son William died. A Bible Reading for Schools: The Great Prophecy of Israels Restoration
Published.
1873 Arnolds Literature and Dogma published.
1875 Arnolds God and the Bible appeared.
1877 Arnold declined Rectorship of St. Andrews university. His Last Essays on Church and Religion
published.
1879 Arnolds Mixed Essays published.
1882 Arnolds Irish Essays published.
1883 Arnolds granted a Civil of 250 a year by Gladstone, Prime Minister Of England, published
visited America on a Lecture tour. His Isaiah of Jerusalem appeared.
1884 Arnold appointed Chief Inspector of Schools.
1885 Arnold did not accept re-nomination Oxford Professorship. His Discourses in America pub-
lished.
1886 Arnold resigned the Inspectorship of Schools. His Report on certain points connected with El-
ementary Education in Germany, Switzerland, and France, released, visited America for the
second time.
1888 Died of angina Pectoris, A hereditary curse on 15 April, buried at Laleham. His Essays in
Criticism, Second Series appeared posthumously.
Poetry 120
The Victorian Age
Times of Arnold
(A) Life of the Novelist
Was Victorian Age an extension of the Romantic Era? The question is interesting for viewing the Literature
as well as the history of Arnolds times. keats and Shelley, who epitomised the spirit of the romantic age died
young but Carlyle who also wrote with fire and a searing vision lived long and continued to stride the Victorian
times though he was also a contemporary of Shelly and Keats. It also needs to be noted that Wordsworth,
prophet and leader of the Romantic Age lived into the Victorian era though when he died he had lost the zeal
and vision of his early romantic poetry. In fact, the romantics regarded him as a lost leaders and, though he
gained Laureateship and respectability of the Establishment, he was reduced to be a hollow ghost of his early
poetic achievements; voice the living man of the victorian times was hardly a shadow of the prophetic voice
of the 1798 Lyrical Ballads: He survived only:
To hear the world applaud the hollow ghost
which blamed the living man.
But we tend to impose division on the continuity of time, especially for academic purposes, so that we are
able to perceive patterns of social or literary trends and tendencies of a certain length of period of time for
easier and more logical understanding of literary and social history than a formless, chaotic flow of time
would allow. Yet, it is difficult to impose a sharp division between the end of the Romantic era and the
beginning of the Victorian age. The high tide of Romantic inspiration disintegrated and got scattered into
different channels whose flow was not swift but somewhat dull and limited in comparison. The new
developments in the literature of the Victorian Age are represented by Tennyson, Browning, Arnold, the pre-
Raphaelites and Meredith. All these writers, in someway or the other, are related to the Romantic Age.
Rossetti looks back to Keats; Arnold to Goethe and, surprisingly, to Byron; Browning looks back to Shelley;
and Tennyson imbibed the romantic inspiration and made it dulcet and oversweet but with disappearing
freshness and fading colours.
New Directions in Victorian Writers: Mair and Ward, in their history, note a distinctive departure from the
Romantic tendency of treating men and women as projections of Nature itself. The Victorians started looking
at man and women in terms k of world life if not entirely existentially. Wordsworthian Characters such as
Michael, or The Brothers appear to be natural objects while Brownings Last Duchess or even Pippa
belong to life. Mair calls it an advance but we beg to differ. It is not very helpful to pass judgements in such
matters. It is a question of perceptions. The universe of man has many world and they exist all at once rather
than being advanced or backward. The romantic cared more for the spirit that soars and looks beyond. The
Victorians were more occupied with the milleu in which they lived. With the development of industrialism,
life was becoming more complex and the Victorians felt the impact of the forces of science and industry
more powerfully than the Romantic in whose times life was comparatively simpler. In this context it will be
meaningful to understand the rise of the novel in the Victorian age. Even Browning the poet has been
described as a novelist in verse. Fiction as a form lends itself more comprehensively to analysing and depicting
the world of men and women as individuals interactiong with one and another in relationship of changing
equations.
The Victorian Age, then, added, humanity to nature and art, as the subject-matter of Literature . Arnolds
own poems such as The Forsaken Merman, Scholar Gypsy Rostum and Sohrab are kind of novels. While
121 Matthew Arnold
the Romantics were overly conscious of the forces of Nature and Destinty and other larger than life forces,
the Victorrians were conscious of themselves, increasingly so of their social environment and social fate.The
scientific spirit of doubt and discovery too was in the ascendant in this period and Darwins Theory of Species
profoudly affected Mans view of God and Universe. At the same time, the invention of steam engine
changed,nay, revolutionised and exploitation of man by man for industrial and commercial work and profit.
Doubt started being celebrated as much as faith as Tennyson, the Poet Laureate of the Victorian Age wrote:
There lives more faith in honest doubt
Believe me, than in half creeds.
The harsh reality about the evolution of man is his animal existence; and, survival of the fittest is the
prevailing rule. It was now a time of factories and fact, the immediate Fate of men was no longer metaphysical
but in the hands of other men and in the hands of distant gods.
The Span of Victorian Age: In terms of time, the Victorian Age has been assigned a period of sixty-four
years: From 1837 to 1901. This period of time is marked with scientific advance, political unrest and dissensions,
material progress. The methods and means of increasing prosperity and wealth also underwent revolutionary
These changes brought increased comfort to some and increased struggle for existence for many. England,
a small island nation, became an Empire where the Sun never set. The Great Exhibition of 1851 signified both
commercial expansion and national pride. But all was not power and glory. The slums increased with the
same rapidity as the brand new urban habitat all over England. The disease and decrepitude and deprivation
of humanity in England was as glaring as the rising class of the newly rich or nouous riche. And this social
phenomenon attracted the attention of the writers and poets of the times.
Carlyle, Matthew Arnold, Charles Kingsley, Mrs Gaskall, Dickens, Galswaorthy and so many other writers
responded with anger and protest in varying degrees. Starved child-workers, sweating seamstresses, hungry
ill-paid men of labour wrenched the consciousness and conscience of sensitive minds. Millowners and capitalists
were heartless toward their servants and workers. The middle-class gained the right to vote and the Whig
and Tory parties got transformed into Liberals and Conservatives respectively. Liberals supported and promoted
relentless and limitless individualism. The British Empire was expanding in all directions and the plight of
colonies in far flung areas of the world across the seven seas was throwing up new political and economic
forces. The British Government, full of imperial arrogance, was also full of complacency. Democracy at
home and despotism in colonies of alien soil was the Janus-faced policy of the British Ruling Classes. India
too became a part of the British Empire after the 1857 political upheavil and sepoy revolt. This was around
this time that Arnold had already published the second volume of his poems.
Other important national and international developments ware in the offing. In 1832, slavery was abolished.
Anti-corn Law League was formed in 1838. Penny Postage Act was passed in 1840. Ashleys Factory Act
got passed in 1844. Free trade was declared to be the national policy in 1846, as Corn Law was repealed.
The Jews in England ware allowed to hold public offices, marching a step ahead in an atmosphere marked by
racial discrimination and hatred. Chartism and the Chartist Movement Launched in 1836 need special
mention and are signnificant developments in the early part of the Victorian Era. This Movement of the
common people is a part of the history of democracy. Chartism was a response to unbridled exploitation
under capitalist dispensation and the policy of laissez-faire which favoured the factory owners and moneyed
upper crust of British society. The severity of the capitalist system had become unbearable and working class
and conscious elements within the society gave went to their discontentment through collective agitational
methods. The masses and the mainstream of society lent moral support to the Chartist activists. A Peoples
Charter demands continued until 1918. Some of the Chartist demands ware: (i) universal manhood franchise,
(ii) annual elections to Parliament (iii) fixed salaries/emoluments for Members of Parliament (iv) voting by
secret ballot (v) qualification for seeking membership of Parliament (vi) equal electoral constituencies or
districts. The government yielded to these demands not all at once by degrees over a period of time but by
Poetry 122
1918 (almost two decades after the ending of the Victorian era in 1901) most of them had been met. The
Chart is Movement was a working class movement and on the public mind and it proved to be a historical
force that had to be reckoned with. Strikes, protests, demonstrations and riots ware reduced to ten; women
and children were not forced to work in the mines in the wake of this movement. Robert Owen, a leader and
man of vision proposed checks and controls over indiscriminate use of machine for ensuring humane treatment
toward who operated or worked on them. In the beginning workers were neither united nor organised but
bargaining. By the end of the Victorian era, labour leaders from the United Kingdom of Great Britain were
visiting other countries, including India, to organize factory and other workers for agitational action.
Though the Victorian Age was a time of scientific and intellectual development, it was also a time of doubt,
self-deception and disillusionment. Matthew Arnold, a foremost thinker and critic of his own times shared
with other scholars and scribes, poets and thinkers an ironic view of the material progress and mental
advancement recorded by the Victorian era. Lytton Strachey, G.K.Chesterton, Ruskin and Carlyle debunked
the claims of wealth and riches and were horrified by the dishonesty and degradation of human beings under
the impact of the new forces unleashed by capitalism and greedy pursuit of getting and possessing more and
more resulting in the loss of godly values and drying up of the human conscience. G.M. Young wrote THE
PORTRAIT OF AN AGE which has his assessment of the Victorian era. On re-reading, it does not appear to
be an encomium. Anthony Trollope, a novelist and realistic observer in his Autobiography has this to say
about his times: Whether the world does or does not become more wicked as years go on is a question which
probably has disturbed the minds of thinkers since the world began to think. That men have become less
cruel, less violent, less selfish, less brutal, there can be no doubt; but have they become less honest ? If so,
can a world retrograding from day today in honesty, be considered to be in a state of progress? We know the
opinion on this subject of our philosopher Mr. Carlyle. If he be right, we are all going straight away to
darkness and the dogs. But then we do not put much faith in Mr. Carlyle nor in Mr. Ruskin and his followers.
The loudness and extravagance of their lamentations, the wailing and gnashing of teeth which comes from
them, over a world which is supposed to have gone all together shoddy-wards, are so contrary to the convictions
of men who cannot but see how comfort has been increased, how health has been improved, and education
extended- that the general effect of their teaching is the opposite of what they have intended. It is regarded
simply as Carlylism to say the English-speaking world is growing worse from day to day. And it is Carlylism
to opine that the general grand result of increased intelligence is a tendency of deterioration
Macaulay, who laid the foundation of the English system of education in India, and a historian in the service
of the British Raj was excessive in his praise of the Victorian age. More balanced critics while conceding
advancement of science and material progress to Victorianism castigated the deteriorating ethos of the
times. Arnold, a votary of culture, regarded the achievements of materialism as detrimental to human culture.
L.M.Myers was scathing in his observation of the deep-seated spiritual vulgarity that lie at he heart of our
civilization. The rising trends of promotion of self-interest shocked most of the eminent writers and publicists.
The scramble for power and pelf which we are witnessing in India today had its beginnings in the Victorian
England who ruled over us then. Just as India is seeing and experiencing the phenomenon of expansion of
education and intellectual capacities so did England in the Victorian era when Industrial development was
creating the new middle-classes who, gaining economically and losing contact with the rural population, were
no longer dependent on agriculture for their livelihood, The British society was undergoing structural changes
disrupting the old order which was yielding place to the new order as celebrated by Tennyson in his famous
poem with the refrain: Ring in the New .
Revolution in scientific thought and transformation to scientific temper cannot be denied and England shared
this change with the rest of Europe. In the medical research Pasteur, Koch, Lister, Paget made truly spectacular
contributions that have had a long term impact on the conditions of living. Their discoveries and successful
experiments and the spirit on inquiry generated by their practical application to daily life have helped reduce
physical pain and suffering. Charles Darwin, T.H. Huxley, Herbert Spencer, John Stuart Mill, A.R. Wallace
123 Matthew Arnold
and John Tyndall are some of the several eminent men of science who through their theories and writing are
writings pushed the frontiers of scientific thought with a sudden and final blow of intellectual force. Just as in
our own day, computer and internet and electronic media are revolutionizing communication and speedier
aeroplanes and trains are restructuring human society everywhere, so also, the beginnings made in the
Victorian era in these spheres had a deep and lasting impact on European society. Telephone, Telegraph.
wireless, electricity changed the world. Human beings changed not only their ways of thinking but, more
significantly, their ways of relating to one another. The institutions of family, marriage, friendship all underwent
fundamental changes dramatically and visibly. These changes were grist to the novelists mill and fiction
emerged as a dominant and major form and genre in imaginative writing.
Political and social transformation went hand in hand. From the slums and poor segments of society emerged
DEMOCRACY as the triumphing form of Government in Europe and England. The English people, the
common people, had more freedom than ever enjoyed by them in their history. They now had personal liberty
and certain fundamental rights. They also could feel a sense of equality more palpably. The Queen was now
merely a symbol of glory bereft of her power, almost totally stripped of political awe and authority. The
Divine Rights of Kings was a mythical proposition, or rather, supposition. The kings, queens, princes no
longer enjoyed too many privileges at the cost of the public at large. Both the practice and theory of democracy
were making revolutionary advance. The solid gainers of these advancements were, however, the middle
classes. The lower and poorer classes and sections of society now looked up to the middle classes for
shaping their own lives because the aristocracy was disappearing. The new middle-class was the model for
the lower classes for promotion and socio-economic status. But there were writers and thinkers who in the
rise of middle-classes saw a decline in the social value system and of western culture. The most ardent
contemner of Democracy and Industrialism was Thomas Carlyle who searingly wrote about the evils brought
about by these twin forces in his famous books and treatises such as LATTER-DAY PAMPHLETS, CHARTISM,
SHOOTING NIAGRA.
# A Special feature of the Victorian era is an unprecedented expansion of colonialism. The British Empire
had colonies and subject people on all continents. The whole of Australia, Canada, Newzealand, the English-
speaking countries came under the British rule. Britain made colonial inraods into the Muslim; world also,
Egypt and Sudan came under the British sway. E.M. Forster, a novelist and don at Cambridge University
who served in India and made India as the setting and subject-matter of his novel, A PASSAGE TO INDIA,
records a telling account of the expansion of British colonialismin in the last quarter of the nineteenth century
in his book THE COMMON PEOPLE: The closing quarter of the nineteenth century opened symbolically
with the proclamation of Queen Victoria as Empress of India and ended with the South African War. Between
1875 and 1990 the total area of the British Empire was increased by not far short of 5,000,000 square miles,
containing a population of at least 90,000,000. In other words in space five years the British governing class
added to the Empire territories forty times as large as Great Britain, and with a population more than twice as
large. In all, by 1900 Great Britain was the centre of an Empire ruling over 1300,000,000 persons of whom
nearly 300,000,000 were to be found in India alone . India, of course, has been called the Jewel of the British
Crown and a popular TV serial has been made on this theme. Henry James, an American novelist of those
times called it the great grabbed-up British Empire .
We often find distinction between culture and civilization difficult as both terms are in certain contexts used
interchangeably. But the imperial Victorian era helps us understand the distinction and even contrast between
the two clearly. The Victorian Age, as earlier remarked, saw the advance of civilization and decline of
culture. Matthew Arnold in this context wrote: I am a Liberal . yet I an a liberal tempered by experience,
reflection, and renouncement. And, I am, above all a believer in culture. There were other voices who
joined this chorus: The peculiar evil of silencing the expression of an opinion is that it is robbing the human
race , said john Stuart Mill in his famous essay On Liberty. He was a zealous supporter and advocate of
democracy and freedom for all as he observed: The only freedom which deserves the name is that of
Poetry 124
pursuing our own good in our own way, so long as we do not attempt to deprive others of theirs or impede
their effort to obtain it .
The Victorian era was also the era of philosophers and philosophies, of social and political thinkers. Democracy
had brought in new waves of thought. How best the benefits of this new form of politics and government
could be made to reach the common people in largest possible numbers was a challenge that remains to this
day as creation of wealth does not necessarily implies equal or equitable distribution of wealth. The instinct of
greed is over powering and man is reluctant to give others their due. These challenges were more prominently
and distinctly felt and experienced by the Victorians because the thought and fact of multiplication of wealth
of the society and people were new and lent confidence to theorists to propose philosophic approaches to not
only remove inequality but also to ensure greater economic benefits, amenities of life and higher standards of
living for the maximum number of people, if not for all. There emerged a school of thought which has been
called UTALITARIANISM and the propounders of the utalitarian theories or philosophies have been called
the UTILITARIANS, the more famous among them being Jermy Bentham, James Stuart Mill and John Stuart
Mill. They were radical thinkers who suggested basic changes and approaches to social, political and economic
problems. Their basic creed was THE GREATEST GOOD OF THE GREATEST NUMBER. Bentham is
regarded as the foremost among Utilitarians . Bentham was a jurist first and economist after. There are
contradictory strains of thought in Bentham. As a jurist he was very conscious of the importance of restraint.
As a philosopher of Law, he had reservations on the possibility of Liberty as a universal principal. Liberty, as
a concept, is a generalization without scientific precision. Social science is the science of restraints as it is the
science of laws. The Liberalist Economic Philosopher on the other hand overemphasizes liberty and suppresses
restraint. Bentham, as a Jurist and Liberal Economist both at the same time, has the dexterous task of
promoting and advancing the cause of Liberty and Restraint simultaneously.
What about Religion in the Victorian Age?. Religion was facing challenge and revolt in the wake of new
scientific discoveries and social philosophies which questioned the existence of God. Ritualistic aspects of
religions got jolted. Politics and Religion too had to re-define their relationship. The British church is Anglo-
Catholic, a kind of cross between Catholicism and Pretest antism, with the Archbishop of Canterbury as the
State-appointed Head of the Church of England. Catholics, like the Jews, had historical disabilities in England
and they did not enjoy certain basic rights. Though the denominational discrimination was not completely
overcome yet The Catholic Emanicption Act of 1829 did aim at removing the disabilities of the practioners of
Roman Catholicism in Great Britain. The Catholics, however, still remained debarred from some Universities.
They could not be appointed as Regents, Keepers of Great Seal, Lord Chancellor. In the context, it will be
relevant to remind us of the OXFORD MOVE MENT.
The OXFORD MOVEMENT IS also known as the TRACTARIAN MOVEMENT. This was surely a religious
movement. The aim of this movement was to revive the religious beliefs and practices of the Middle Ages
when the Roman Catholic Church was supreme. The promoters of this movement perceived that religion
was in danger because of the new forces of politics and society. The society and culture, to these revivalists,
were exposed to evil influences and could and should be protected by re-introducing the sacramental form of
piety that was once advocated and sponsored by Lancelot Andrews and William Laud. Symbolism and
ritualism to the Oxford Movement appeared essential. John Keble is regarded as the initiator of the Oxford
Movement and his TRACTS OF THE TIMES (1833-41), a set of ninety pamphlets, may be regarded this
movements manifesto. Cardinal Newman emerged as a charismatic leader of this movement. Principal
Shairp assesses Cardinal Newmans role and personality A mysterious veneration had by degrees gathered
round him, till now it was almost as though some Ambrose or Augustine or older ages had reappeared . As
irony of Fate would have it, this charismatic leader later lost fame, got embroiled in religious and theological
controversies and had to face ignominy. But, irrespective of the merits and demerits of Oxford Movement
and its impact, the fact remains that religion held its own and was not and could not be dethroned by Science
and Reforms of the times.
125 Matthew Arnold
Though Victorian age has earned the disparagment, revulsion and even contempt of the twentieth century
and succeeding generations have been pejorative about the Victorians and their morality or lack of it, there
are writers who have thought otherwise. G.M. Young thought that 1850s were exciting times and the right
time for men "to be young in". Raymond William, writing in the riper part of the twentieth century described
it as the age of the long revolution . There is no doubt the reign of Victoria Queen after whom the era takes
its name was full of activity and extending horizons. The Britishers were recognised as the ruling and imperial
race. The skeptics like Carlyle, Matthew Arnold, John Ruskin were heard but not much cared for their
discounting view of the Victorian norms. These prophets have found greater acceptance in other climes such
as America and India. Gandhi venerated John Ruskin and Arnold continues to have audience in America.
Traditional religion did not yield entirely its ground to science or utilitarianism. Gladstone, four-times Prime
Minister of England wrote in THE CHURCH IN ITS RELATION WITH THE STATE : I cast over that
party a prophetic mantle and assigned to it a mission distinctly religious .
The preceding commentary on the Victorian Age will indicate that it was an age of increasing complexity and
several new and varied streams of thought and action/reaction, beliefs, theories and ideas had entered the
mainstream of the English society. Arnold, the prophet of culture saw anarchy and disorder taking over the
life of his nation and society. He was unhappy and morose about the new development in politics and economy
of the country. In a letter to his friend Arthur High Clough, he said : These are damned times- everything is
against one-the height to which knowledge is come, the spread of luxury our physical enervation, the absence
of great natures, the unavoidable contact with millions of small ones, newspapers, cities, light profligate
friends, moral desperadoes like Carlyle our own selves, and the sickening consciousness of our difficulties".
Arnold remained at odds with his times, he never could compromise with the changing mores of his age and
increasing coarseness and vulgarity of taste and loss of refinement in social behaviour. He continues in the
same letter Reflect too, as I cannot but do here more and more, in spite of all the nonsense some people talk,
how deeply unpoetical the age and all ones surroundings are. Not unprofound, not ungrand, not unmoving-
,but unpoetical.
Arnold, in his famous essay Culture And Anarchy pronounces his preference for Hellenism which for him
stands for enrichment and flowering of the mind; and its opposite is Herbraism, the dominant tendency of his
own age, which stands for hectic, thoughtless activity. Arnold was a modernist and was not averse to new
ideas but it was the degradation of his times that annoyed him. He was not an orthodox christian. In the Bible
he saw imaginative poetry as he wrote: Its real superiority is in its charm for the imagination - its poetry. I
persist in thinking that catholicism has, from this superiority, a great future before it; that it will endure while
the Protestant sect(in which I do not included the Church of England) dissolve and perish. I persist in thinking
that the prevailing form for the Christianity of future will be in the form of catholic Catholicism; but a
Catholicism purged, opening it self to the light and air having the consciousness of its own poetry, freed from
its sacerdotal despotism and freed from its pseudo-scientific apparatus of supernatural dogma. its forms will
be retained as symbolising with the force and charm of poetry: a few cardinal facts and ideas, simple indeed,
but indispensable and inexhaustible, and on which our race could lay hold only by materialising them.
The preceding account and analysis of the Victorian Age might leave one with the impression that it was a
period of intense conflict and confusion, But in fact, it was not so. The Victorian Era is known for its
reconciliation of diverse strands and opposing pulls. The continental model of the French Revolution had
made the people of England wary of bloody revolution which degenerates into inhumanity of man to man .
Therefore, in spite of the rising class conflict and discontent among the poorer sections, the respect for
authority was maintained. There was both the assertion of liberty and restraint. Doubt and Faith found equal
pedestals. Wealth of the few and want of the many only glared at each other and did not come to each
others throats. The imperial supremacy made the English people proud and patriotic. There were divisions
but people were not divided in their common goal of achieving Englands good which, according to the
prevailing wisdom of the times lay in the golden mean and that was the Grand Victorian Compromise.
Poetry 126
The golden mean worked in all the spheres of human activity in religion, politics, industry and even in
Literature.
The influence of the continental Europe on the British Isle to was visible. Matthew Arnold himself was much
influenced by Europe. He had a failed love affair in the Swiss Alps and retained the memory of this deep
experience in his literary inputs. He was also influenced by two French critics, namely, Trine and Sainte
Beuve. Taine believed that literature was the product of social forces-race, the moment and the milieu
contributed to the shaping of literary forms. These factors are essential to be studied before arriving at an
assessment of the literature emerging from their interaction. Sainte-Beuve had similar views and emphasised
the study of a poets personality for a proper understanding of his poetry and other literary creations. But the
critic has to be objective in studying the work of a poet keeping his own likes and dislikes at
bay. Disinterestedness , thus became an Arnold criterion in life and literature.
127 Matthew Arnold
Major Themes in Arnolds Works (Poetry)
Matthew Arnold is regarded highly both as a poet and critic. he is a major writer of the Victorian Age. Here
we are mostly concerned with the major themes in his poetry. As already pointed out in previous chapters,
Arnold published poetry between 1849 and 1867. His earlier poems written in his youth such as Cromwell
though won the Newdigate prize, are considered as juvenilia. In the same category is placed his Rugby prize
poem Alaric at Rome.
What are the major themes in his poetry between 1849 and 1867? LOVE, NATURE, LOSS OF LIFE,
DEATH, STOICISM, UNREST OF THE VICORIAN TIMES, FAITH AND DOUBT are recurrently
expressed themes in his poems, including in those poems that have been prescribed for reading.
Arnold was a self-conscious poet. He was conscious of the inevitable comparison the reading public was
prone to make with his contemporary poets who were held in higher esteem and were writing on similar
themes with attitudes and approaches to life that differed from his own. He also had made disinterestedness
as a basic criterion to judge poets. That he was capable of an objective appraisal of his own poetry can be
gauged from a letter he wrote to his mother: "It might be fairly urged that I have less poetical sentiment than
Tennyson, and less intellectual vigour than Browning yet, because I have perhaps more of fusion of the two
than either of them and have more regularly applied that fusion to the main line of modern development, I am
likely enough to have my turn.
Yes, Matthew Arnold did get his turn, perhaps not in his own times but in the twentieth century when much
greater attention began to be paid both to his poetry and criticism. The trends in the twentieth century
favoured the intellectual type of poetry that reflected the conflicts, confusion and tensions within and without
the human mind and its environment. Therefore, in some ways, Arnold did surpass in his acceptance by the
reading public, especially, among the academic world, the poet Laureate Tennyson though it is doubtful if he
has surpassed Robert Browning. This is because of Brownings capacity for inovation and understanding of
the complex psychology of the human mind which Arnold lacked. Arnolds poetry has a bitter-sweet taste
compared to that of Tennysons which is over sweet. Tennyson, too much taken up with line-alignment
aspect of his poems is now seen as a superior type of versifier rather a post. Arnold had the penetrative
quality to his poetry and he deeper depend in the human dilemmas and projected the conflicts and complexities
that have continued to linger beyond his time. Large social, political, religious conflicts of his age find verbal
equivalence in his poems and engage the modern mind. Like Goethe, the great German poet, whom he
admired, Arnold too put his finger on the painfully tingling nerve. What he said about Goethe could also be
said about himself.
He took the suffering human race
He read each wound, each weakness clear,
And struck his finger on the place,
And said: Thou ailest here, and here!
Arnold, thus, has survived the general demotion and devaluation of the many eminent Victorians , to borrow
the title from Lytton Stracheys famous book. Carleton Stanley, a literary commentator opines: "In his poetry
there is a mature wisdom appealing to the elemental and universal in man; austerely expressed without pomp,
ornament, or tinkling music; and sometimes falling into lines as perfect and flawless as anything we know .
Love As Theme in Arnolds Poems
Autobiographical element is sought to be foisted on Arnolds love poems. he had a love affair with Marguerite
Poetry 128
in Switzerland which could not mature in marriage. Critics have traced the memory of this failed love in
several of his poems. These poems are not his greatest or even more striking. They do not compare well with
the love poems of Browning, his own contemporary and with those of Shelley, a romatic lover and poet from
the preceding age. He later married Frances Lucy who also is part of a pattern in some of his love-poems,
also classed as lyrics. Love, however, is, by no means, a very prominent or persistent theme in his poetry as
death and loss of life are. He is today remembered as a poet who wrote elegies rather than love poems.
Some critics have traced his lack of strong expression of love in his poems to his Puritanism and his revulsion
toward the so-called French lubricity . Among the most conspicuous example of his love poems are those
entitled: SWITZERLAND which, according to Smith and Grierson, hint at a love for one between whom and
him lay the gulf of a different ethics, temperament and experience .
He kept revising the titles of some of these poems which were mostly written in 1853. For example the poem
entitled THEY ARE TO MY FRIENDS WHO RIDICULED A TENDER LEAVE TAKING later on was
called A MEMORY PICTURE. Other love-poems are The Like, A Dream, Parting, To Marguerite and
Absence. In 1854, he added A Farewll. In 1857, he changed the title of To Marguerite to Isolation and
another poem that he called To Marguerite. In 1869, some more changes were incorporated. We WERE
Apart now he called as Isolation and most liked of the Switzerland series poems Yes ! in the Sea of Life
was given the title To Marguerite. This obsession with the title changes may have something to do with the
psychological disturbance the memory of his long-receding love -affair may have been causing as he tried to
forget it in his apparently very happy marriage with Frances. But these are speculations that do not either
enhance or detract from the value of his love poems but such academic speculations are a part of our studies
and need not be ignored in the present context. It is believed that there are about 29(twenty-nine) love poems
that can be ascribed to the memory of Arnolds failed love and inspiration from Marguerite.
There is another bunch of love-poems or love-lyrics which form part of the anthology called Faded Leaves.
The second series of love-lyrics includes: The River, Too Late, Separation, On the Rhine and Longing.
Was Marguerite an idealized woman like Wordsworths Lucy ? Or a real person. Though such enigmas are
hard to resolve the fact is that Marguerite did exist. Also, Frances Lucy also is an inspiration though married
love is often discounted as a source of inspiration. Arnold confided in his friends about the secret of blue eyes
in a letter from Switzerland: Tomorrow I repass the Gemmi and get to Thum : linger one day at Hotel
Bellevue for the sake of the blue eyes of one of its own/inmates. Marguerite was the one with blue eyes
speculators believe.
The quality of Arnolds love poetry is peculiar to him. It does not have the element of ecstasy as found in
Browning and Shelley. There is deep despair in them. Even in such poems as Dover Beach he calls on love
for help from pain; love to him is a soothing balm for the aches and sorrows of fate and times:
Ah love, let us be true
To one another.
Echoed in The Buried Life is the same strain :
When a beloved hand is laid in ours
....................................................
Abolt is shot back somewhere in our breast,
And a lost pulse of feeling stirs again.
The love poems of Matthew Arnold are full of elegiac tones and content. They are a kind of mourning for the
death of love. The only exceptions Dover Beach which places love at the centre of an aching heart for
succur and solace. It is married love which is a constant companion and fulfilment amidst the failures and
despairs of life. Arnold, unlike Keats, was not a passions slave . He had no faith or obsession with romatic
love. Love was not his ideal either. Peace, calm and resignation of life were his pursuit. Duffins remarks
about his love poetry are apropos here : There is no lurid passion like that in the Sonnets (of Shakespeares) .
129 Matthew Arnold
According to Duffin, Arnold also lacks any touch of the fine abandon of Burns, the romantic etherealism of
Shelley, the angel worship of Browning and Patmore.
In longer poems of Arnold also the theme of love streaks through. In The Forsaken Merman, The Youth of
Nature, A Modern Sappho, The New Sirens and Tristram and Iseult are such examples. In The Forsaken
Merman, the Marguerite figure makes its presence felt more than incidentally. This aspect will be taken up
in the discussion of the text of this poem later on. A modern Sapho bears comparison with Browning and has
the appearance of imitation of Browings dramatic-lyrics. In Tristram and Iseult, Arnold projects two types
of women: those who satisfy their lovers and another type of women are those who can be identified with
Bernard Shaws Life Force itself, full of passion, almost abstract in their cravings for creation and creativity
who care not for men but for their own passions and pursuits, lovers for them are only encounters not very
purposeful or for materializing dreams. Finally, it can be said that Love for Arnold the poet was a territory he
feared to tread and in his poems pure love as a passion appears only timorously.
Stoicism
Arnold was a scholar of Greek and Latin. He borrowed heavily from these classical resources. He has a
very strong streak of stoicism in his poetry. Stoics is the name given to the Greek philosophers such as
Zeno of Tarsus, Diogenese, Zeno, Cleanthes, Chrysioppus. Later on, Roman scholars and philosophers also
donned airs of Stoicism and their works have left a deep imprint of stoicism on the western tradition. The
Latin or Roman stoic philosophers include Cato, Cicero, Seneca, Epictetus, Marcus Aurelius and Brutus who
were part of the Roman ruling elites and of the Roman establishment.
Stoicism and Cynicism pertain to a certain view of life which is pessimistic and negative. It takes note of
human failing to cope with reality as it is. It has at the same time a piercing gaze on men and their activities.
As a philosophy, Stoicism, has a higher purpose of teaching virtue as the Art of Right Action and of Right
Living. Stoicism stands for capacity to absorb shocks, bear the burden of fate and darkness of despair,
fortitude in the face of calamity. It is an ethical posture. Arnolds stoicism dervies from Epictetus and Marcus
Aurelius, the former a Greek slave and the latter, an Emperor of Rome. Aurelius wrote Meditations, a set of
private reflections that show his peculiarities as a public figure. According to Bertrand Russell, Aurelius felt
his public duties burdensome, and the he suffered from a great weariness.
Epictetus philosophised that human beings are nothing but prisoners in an earthly or physical body. Marcus
Aurelius echoed the same sentiment when he wrote: Thou art a little soul bearing about a corpse . These
two philosophers loved their enemies. They abhored pleasure, luxuries and material manifestations of mans
wealth. Death being an over present reality, one must organise and arrange ones life and actions keeping this
harsh fact in mind. Arnold was excessive in his praise of Epictetus. In his poem TO A FRIEND:
Who prop, thou askst in these bad days, my mind? .................
That halting slave, who Nicopolis
Taught Arrianm when Vespesians brutal son
Clear d Rome of what most sham d him.
In the Scholar Gipsy, Arnolds stoicism comes through most strikingly :
Still nursing the unconquerable hope,
Still clutching the inviolable shade
With a free onword impulse brushing through.
In personal life as well as in his writings and poems, Arnold sought inspiration from the Stoics. He tried to be
objective and disinterested in his views and ways of life, in the manner of the Stoics.
Nature As A Theme in Arnolds Poetry
Arnold lived near where Wordsworth lived. They were also friends, though Wordsworth was much senior. In
his Memorial Verses, Arnold wrote about his proximity to Wordsworth and the tenderness of feeling be-
tween the two.
Poetry 130
In the Memorial Verses, he says about Wordsworth:
He found us when the age had bound
Our souls in its benumbing round;
He spoke, and loosed our hearts in tears.
He laid us as we lay at birth
On the cool flowery lap of earth.
Wordsworth was a lover and worshipper of Nature. But Arnold is not a pantheist as was Wordworth.
According to Stopford Brooke: Nature to Arnold is frequently the nature the modern science has revealed
to us, matter is motion, always acting rigidly, according to certain ways of Nature, which, for want of a wiser
term, we call laws. For the first time this view of Nature enters into English poetry with Arnold. He sees the
loveliness of her doings but he also sees their terrors and dreadfulness and their relentlessness. But in his
poetry he chiefly sees in the peace of Natures obedience to law, and the ever lasting youth of her unchanging
life.
Arnolds Nature, then, is not a divine and benign agency as was perceived by Wordsworth. Nor does his
nature import for the poet Dryads and Naiads on the wings of poesy! Smith and Grierson say that Arnold
knew Wordsworths healing power; his visionary power he did not understand . For Arnold the secret gift
of Nature was peace rather than joy. In Quiet Work and other similar poems, Nature imparts tranquillity .
Toil is the fate of man but Nature can provide relief of toil, usever d from tranquillity . Nature too is
ceaselessly working but with no weariness or boredom or tension on its face. This is the quiet work which
men could emulate or imbibe by their travelling in lifes common way in cheerful godliness. Arnolds
accuracy as observerof Nature too is a notable feature of his poetry. This quality of his poetry comes through
very impressively in poems such as Resignation and The Merman :
Sand-strewn caverons cool and deep,
......................................................
Where great whales come sailing by
Sail and sail, with unshut eye. -The Scholar Gipsy
The entire poem is full of such accurate description.Dover Beach and the Scholar Gipsy too have accurate
descriptions of Nature: Tall grassesand white flowering nettles wave, under a dark-red fruited yew-heeshads.
The Scholar Gipsy.
And the famous lines from Dooer Beach:
The sea is calm tonight,
The tide is full, the moon lies fair
Upon the straits.....the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay
Arnolds Nature exudes serenity. Lewis correctly points out that he loved Nature in her quieter and more
subdued moods, he preferred her silences to her many voices . The sea, the moon and water are recurring
symbols and images in his poetry. In Southern Night, serenity is the gift of shore-locked lakes that melt
into open, moonlit sea; as The soft Mediterranean breaks/At my feet free . And in A Farewell, Sweet
the unbroken moon beams lay. In The River, glides the stream, slow drops the boat . Oxford countryside
was dear to Matthew Arnold and it was a quiet country. In The Scholar Gipsy, The oxford countryside
has been described with loving tenderness. Nature is serene and contrasted with the hectic human activity
full of sick hurry and cross-purpose. Nature, of course, is superior to Man. At some places, we find Arnold
congnizant of Natures indifference to Man and his activity and perceptions. He was after all a product his
age. And, a humanist who believed in the perfecting and perfection of man. he wanted Man to live in
harmony with Nature which was yet an impossibility. He appears to shift his view-point while regarding
Nature:.
131 Matthew Arnold
We, O Nature, depart
Thou survivest us! this,
This I know, is the Law - The Youth of Man
Victorian Unrest as a Major Theme in Arnolds Poetry
Arnold is not regarded as a representative poet of the Victorian Age. That appellation is more appropriately
reserved for the Poet Laureate Lord Tennyson of the Victorian Times who wrote for more than sixty years
and epitomised the entire era in his poetry; hepresented art, phiosophy, movements, society, religion in his
poems and, in his own day was fondly accepted as their poet by all classes of Englishman. Browning and
Arnold, in later times achieved greater recognition for their contribution to poetry Poetry (Arnolds reputation
is also due to his criticism, literary as well social) but they were not identified with the age in which they
wrote. In the beginning of this note on major themes in his poetry, we referred to Arnolds letter to his mother
in which he conceded having less poetical sentiment than Tennyson but at the same time he asserted that
he had a fusion of these two elements or gifts possessed by Tennyson and Browing and has more regularly
applied that fusion to the main line of modern development, I am likely enough to have my turn .
Arnold wrote and thought like a crusader with a mission. Because, he thought that this age was unpoetical
and that he lived in damned times. He was scared of being rendered arid by the dismal surroundings or
social milieu which was full of philistines and barbarians . Only let us pray the time- God keep us both
from aridity Arid that is what the times are. he wrote to Clough, his friend. He also wrote to Clough about
his poems: As for my poems they have weight, I think, but little or no charm...... But woe was upon me if I
analysed not my situation and Werter (sic) Rene, and such like, none of them analyse the modern situation in
its true blankness, and unpoetrylessness(sic) . Arnold was not satisfied with his times; hailed and extolled by
many of his contemporaries as exciting and prosperous . He found the Victorian Age joyless and heading
toward spiritual darkness as he sadly reflects in his oft-quoted poem:
Hath really neither joy nor love nor light
Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;
And we are here as on darkling plain
Swept with confused alarms of struggle and flights
Where ignorant armies clash by night
Dover Beach
To Arnold, the so-called progress of contemporary life was without significance or direction, Religion, Christian
religion, had also lost its lustre and shine and had little to offer by way of consolation. He was a poet of doubt
and scepticism. He lacked Tennysonian geniality and gentle faith even in the face of scientific fact and doubt,
he also lacked the buoyancy and sturdy optimism of Brownings poetry. he could not absorb the shock of
conflicts between science and religion, matter and spirit and in his hopelessness harked back to the surer
times of antiquity:
The Sea of faith
Was once, too, at the full, and round earths shore
Lay like the folds of a bright girdle fur d.
But now I only hear
Its long, mealncholy, withdrawing roar.
Dover Beach
He was sliding into a hostile, godless, confused world. In his poem To A Fried, he says: Who prop, thou
askst, in these bad days, my mind? .
It is the old maters, Homer, Sophocles and Epictetus who beam light to him to let him see through the
encircling gloom of his times. In The Buried Life he remonst-rated I feel a nameless ovr me roll . At times,
his dramatic personal are so deep in the abyss of misery that willingly they go to death as in Empedocles on
Poetry 132
Etna who escapes from the confusing, despairing world and jumps into the crater of Etna. Arnold felt lonely
in the existentialist sense of alienation; he felt alientated from his own milieu and social setting. Lionel Trilling
observes:... The loneliness which Arnold represent in the person of Empedocles is no small part of the
burden of own age . He was disturbed, restless; and his spiritual tension represents the spirit of Victorian
unrest . In his Scholar Gipsy, he gives vent to his melancholy and tiredness brought about by the sick
hurry and divided aims of the Victorian Era. In The Memorial Verses, the Victorian age is called the iron
age that symbolized: Europes dying hour,/Of fitful dream and feverish power and frightening was The
lurid flow/Of terror, and insane distress, Arnolds spiritual depression is vividly projected in The Stanzas from
the Grande Chartreuse. He continued Wandering between two worlds, one dead,/The other powerless to
be born.
133 Matthew Arnold
Arnold And Literary Traditions
Classicism And Romanticism
CLASSISM: has become a part of Western Literary Tradition after the Rennaissance or re-birth of
European Culture after its scholars and learned men rediscovered Greek and Latin Books of Knowledge and
traced their origin to the Greek and Roman fountains of knowledge. Classicism is a term now used in wider
sense to connote qualities of clarity, proportion, balance of form and content, lucidity in expression or presentation
and light of reason that should brighten a work of art, including Literature. In one sense, any later work that
looks back, seeks inspiration from the Greek and Roman masters in art and literature and other branches of
knowledge is also ternmed as a Classic. An important trait of classical poetry is its restrained expression; the
emotion and feeling which are the basic elements in a poem are never allowed to overflow but need to be
subordinated to the requirements of forms (stanza, metre, sonnet, couplet, quartrain etc). Often, the original
inspiration and spontaneity and freshness gets lost in the hands of lesser poets or versifiers and the result is
insipidity and tastelessness. Therefore, to fit emotion into an arrangement of words has to be more than a
decorative art. Long sustained inspiration to support the diligent effort required is a necessary condition for
achieving classical perfection in poetry or else it would appear either fake imitation of some other creation or
a failed experiment or exercise. At its highest, classical poetry achieves universality of perceived truth and
simplicity of expression which repetition cannot weary. Economy of expression and the guiding principal of
brevity is the soul of wit lend not only excellence but abiding permanence to a classsical work of art
which retains its shine and never ages through the passage of time, rather gains the status of everlasting truth
and beauty.
Parthenon (epithet applied to Greek goddesses, especially Athena; a Doric temple of Athena, built in 5th
century B.C) of ancient Greece is regarded as the ideal of CLASSICISM because it is an example of a
perfect proportion between the parts and their whole. Classicism, laid emphasis on Reason and the Knowledge
and the Known. Mystery is not denied but it is put in the brackets. The Greeks knew that no creativity was
possible without inspiration and imagination whose sources are mysterious yet a work of art has to be seen
and placed in the context of a world lived in by mortals and, therefore, should not be beyond their comprer
hension or grasp. They also knew that Reason cannot explain or capture Reality which imagination can
embody mysteriously but still they insisted on Reason because, perhaps it clarified the significance of the
imaginatively created wonders. They had the belief that an artist can create only under inspiration of the
Muses but these creations had to become a part of the common and ordinary world of men/women and
created works have to be timeless within time. Limitations are a necessary fact for the Greek Masters and
their later followers.
Romanticism, which shall be discussed separately, on the other harld, spurned the very idea of limitation and
for The Romantics imagination has to be unbounded and unrestrained in its expression and impose its won
form on thought and feeling without outward rules, regulation and control. They believed that Imagination has
and knows its own order and harmonizes better, if it is left to itself, and if it is true, it will find its own form. For
Wordworth, the high priest of Ramantic poetry, poetry is an overflow of spontaneous feelings .
The two categoties of Classicism and Romanticism are not hidebound classificiations of art and literature
and often are present together in the works of the same creator/poet. In English literature, Milton is a most
astouding example of Classicism and Romanticism running like an intertwining stream of thought and expression.
Matthew Arnold too, in his poetry, combines the two strains of romanticism and classicism. Lewis, in his The
poetic Image warns the students of Literature to resist the temptation, as strong now as ever it was, of
dividing poets into teams and making them play against each other.
Poetry 134
Arnold was not a believer and practitioner of unbridled imagination . He was endowed with too much of a
critical spirit for doing so. He relied more on intellect than on powerful feelings or strong emotions. He was
critical of Shelley and Keats and said: Keats and Shelley were on false track when they set themselves to
reproduce the exuberance of expression, the charm, the richness of images, and felicity of the Elizabethan
poets. He also often protested against subjectivism and Individualism. In his preface to 1853 Poems he
recorded the necessity and importance of owning up the legacy and heritage of the Greeks; Watson regards
1853 preface as a manifesto of classicism of the Victorian times. Arnold favoured poems that are particular,
precise and firm , that deal with primary emotions and affection and elementary feelings which subsist
permanently in the race . The virute of the Greeks was that They regarded the whole; we regard the parts .
Matthew Arnold possessed a Greek temperament. In Advertisement to the second edition of his poems, in
the Oxford lecture entitled The Modern Element in Literature and in the many letters he wrote to friends
and relatives, he pays homage to the Greek Masters; Homer, Sophocles, Epictetus; and his drama Merope
follows Sophocles. He wanted the example of the Greeks for precision and spartanism to prevail against the
excesses of expression and imprecision of observation of his own times. Hugh Walkers comment is relevant
here: As regards his poetical methods, Arnold is essentially classical not romantic. Not since Milton has
there been any English poet more deeply imbued with classical spirit. Arnold was so by native predilection;
but his innate tendency was strengthened by the operation of a principle he was never tired of insisting upon
the principle that what we ought to attempt should be determind for us by a consideration of what is
needful.....Arnolds own design was to tone down what was exessive and to supply what was deficity.It was
this, which made him turn to France and insist so much on the value of French Literature to England. It was
this priniple which made him seek to Hallenise, to emphasise the importance of seeing the whole instead of
seeing only the beauty of parts and cultivate the qualities of lucidity, restraint and proportion. He only
occasionally opted for an antique theme, nor was he very successful in the implementation of such ancient
designs as Merope which is frigid or Empedocles who is none else but himself, the nineteenth century
mordern man . Empedocles does not speak like the Greek original but he speaks like Matthew Arnold, the
man despaired of his own Victorian times. Yet, Arnold was a classicist and not a new-classicist. If he
reprimanded Keats and Shelley for excessive overflow of expression, he equally admonsihed Dryden and
pope for their slavish imitation and superficial glitter of their Greek and Latin original models. In his Study of
Peotry he remarks about these pseudo classicists (Pope and Dryden) their poetry was conceived and
composed in their wits; genuine poetry is conceived and composed in the soul.
Grand action and grand subject were the main consideration for the Greeks, Arnold said: This is the Greek
understood....With them, the poetical character of the action in itself..... was the first consideration; with us,
attention is fixed mainly on the value of the separate thoughts and images; which occur in the treatment of
and action. They regarded the whole, we regard the parts.... the unapproached masters of the Grand Style .
The Greek expression, he says, is excellent because it is simple and so well subordinated because it draws
its force directly from the pregnancy of the matter which it conveys. He always avoided the grotesqueness
- conceit and irrationality which in others distressed him. He craved and tried, irrespective of his total
successs in this respect what he called architectonice . Sophocles was his favourite model from the Greek
example because whose even balanced soul/From first youth tested up to extreme old age/ Business could
not make dull, not passion wild/Who saw life steadily, and saw it whole. It was his persistent quest for
classical values in his poetry that perhaps failed him to win popularity. The Romanticism had not yet exhausted
its stream and the Victorians fall for it and fell for the poetry of Tennson which, though has not the tide of
Shelleyan passion, or Keatsian numbness of sense under the influence of hemlock, nor has it the gurgling
/sound of Wordsworthian cataracts but still it had the dozes of sensation, degrees of somnolence and hypnotic
sounds that could and did haunt the Victroians in their bourgeois bowers.
Arnold could not fully over come the influence, tendency and demands of his times and romaticism does
creep in his avowedly classical poems and poetic drama such as Sohrab and Rustum, Merope, Balder
135 Matthew Arnold
Dead, The Scholar Gipsy, Thysris, The Grand Chartreuse, which are otherwise examples of highly
restrained expression. He practised in these poems the lessons learnt from the Greek masters. Sohrab and
Rustum display resignation to Fate and diction remains highly retrained throughout. The theme is noble, the
legend is noble and grand and rouses the basic and primary human emotions which are freed from the
limitation of temporality. The story is about sublime acquiescence in the course of fate . Similes are very
classical, e.g.; Like some rich hyacinth which by the scythes/Or and unskilful gardener has been cut/Moving
the garden grass-pots near its bed/ and lies, a fragrant tower of purple bloom.......Merope is a tragedy in the
classical mould and in Arnolds own words the most complete reproduction in English of the forms and
conventions of Sophoclean tragedy. in which Aristotelian rules were consciously followed. But as a play, it
failed. Balder Dead is not as epical in its objectvity as Sohrab... but its ending is poignant. The Scholar
Gipsy is a pastoral elegy modelled on the Creskipal model but it also has a heavy doze of modernism in which
he wanted not only to animate but also to ennoble The complaining millinons of men who Darken in
labour and pain . The same is true of Thyrsis which too is an Elegy, quietly undertoned, for which Arnold
looked to The ocritus and Virgil. Empedocles On Etna, classical in theme yet is romantic in treatment.
According to Arnold himself suffering finds no vent in action.... a continuous state of mental distress is
prolonged, unrelieved by incident, hope, or resistance in which there is everything to be endured, nothing to be
done . He was so convinced of its imperfection that he withdrew it from public circulation. Thus, Arnold
remained a committed classicist but poetry has a way of violating norms set by its own creator, the poet and
Arnolds poetry crosses over to Romanticism because poetry is a force of verbal freedom.
ARNOLDS ROMANTICISM. If classicism prescribes restrained expression, Romanticism calls for supremacy
of Imagination to prevail against all odds. In English Literature, Coleridge and Wordsworth are its greatest
propagators and practioners. For Wodsworth, it is inner light that was never on sea or land . It is there to
embody the poets visions and dreams. Romanticsm has many and differing definitions. For some it is a
curious mix of beauty and wonder or strangeness added to beauty or renaissance of wonder to others
it is the awkening of the imaginative sensibility . Romanticism has been called liberalism in literature ,
liberation often ego , revival of medievalism , escape from life , withdrawal from the actualities of life,
passion flower born out of the blood of Christ , Romanticism is spirit, classicism is form , if you like. It is
clear that Romanticism does not like any fixed definition. It is a pulsating impulse and always on the wings.
Imagination is its essential and highest quality or characteristic.
Gothic cathedrals and grotesque medieval castles have been presented or projected as its symbols.
Disproportionate parts of building that just out in lonely majesty declaring its independence from the whole of
the building may be eited as good an example of the Romantic style and Imagination as any other far fetched
example. No predetermined scale or design, no unity, no symmetrical arrangement are necessary for the
Romantic imagination to prevail. Yet, at the same time, a work of imagination may have all the attributes of
a classical work of art but it has to be spontaneous and not based upon a priori dictates of composition or
creation. The medieval mind worked and lived in the very midst of the Supernatural , the unknown and
unknowable, mysterious and bewitching and stretching to infinity and nothingness alike. Almost like God the
unknowable. And Romantics draw their inspiration from this kind of medieval mind away from the rational
mind of the ancient Greeks or modern scientific inquiring mind.
Classicists believe Truth is manifested in outer reality; Romanticism believes Truth remains essentially inner .
A Romantic is an explorer of the unknown and is satisfied returning from his/her explorations without any
objective gain but a transformed imagination, a transformed self. For classicists, Truth cannot be individual
and it has to appear as common to all and experienced by all. According to Wordsworth the poet is with
more lively sensibility, more enthusiasm and tenderness than are supposed to be common among mankind .
The Greeks proposed Golden Mean, the Romantics are for emotions and passions with no holds barred.
Subjectivity and Individualism are also important features of Romanticism. Rousseau, an important figure
and thinker of the Romantic era highlighted the perfectibiltity of man which is also a humanist belief.
Poetry 136
Shelley and Swineburne and many other romantic poets sang glories of man. Individuality, which is now a
basic factor is the concept of human rights is an essential item of faith with the Romantics. Classicists did
not rely on feelings because they cloud judgement but the Romantics believed without feeling no human
development is possible. The classicists made objectivity and reason as the soundest criteria for deciding the
issues of life and art but the romantics said it was personal reflection or subjective response and inner voice
that ought to be the deciding principles. It is perhaps for this reason that most romantic poets are lyrical and
lyricists. The source of Supreme Truth for the Romantics lies within the human personality and, therefore,
expression of that truth has to be unpremeditated and profusely abundant. In spite of commonality and
universality of human experience, each human being is also distinctive and even unique and the right subject
for artisitc and poetic celebration, howsoever paltry and small his status in the world of human affairs, say the
Romantics. For the Classicist, there are the heroes and heroines who, when they suffer or feel elevation of
thought and feeling, because of their high status in society, affect all the common and lesser beings, especially
the heros or the Great Mans fall holds both example and lesson for the viewer of Tragedy in a theatre. But,
the Romantics ideas such debunk of greatness and the poorest and most anonymous among human beings
is capable of soaring into heights of passion and suffering and of achieving greatness both in life and drama
and poetry, and are fit subjects for imaginative art or poetry and drama and fiction.
Romantic poets find formalism obstrucive for their expression which has to be very spontaneous and without
controls. Poetic expression has to be full of power and flow, gusty, intense like the Shelleyan whirlwind or
West Wind. Wordsworth asserted that the Poet is a man who has more lively sensibility, more enthusiasm
and tenderness . The Romantics are full of wonder, supernatural, unfamiliar and Utopion in their thought and
imagination and project them freely in their works of art and literature.
Arnold as a Romanticist: Arnold practised and professed classicism yet there is a visible strain of romanticist:
Arnold practised and professed classics yet there is a visible strain of romanticism in his poetry. All the
Romantic poets exercised great influence on him and he wrote deeply and extensively on Keats, Shelley,
Byron and Wordsworth who was almost a neighbour and friend, besides being an influence on him. There
are four people, in especial, from whom I am conscious of having learnt - a very different thing from merely
receiving a strong impression... and the four are... Goethe, Wordsworth, Sainte Beuve, and yourself , Arnold,
wrote to Henry Newman. Wordsworth has been called Arnolds spiritual father. In Memorial Verses,
Arnold pays a glowing tribute to the departed poet. Laid us as we lay at birth/On the cool flowery lap of
earth . In The Youth, he reminds Wordsworth as a priest to us all/of the wonder and bloom of the world .
In his essay on Wordsworth, Arnold reminds us of the romantic poets extra-ordinary power in feeling the
joy offered to us in the simple primary affections and duties. But, more amazing is Arnolds fascination for
Byron, the sensualist considering Arnolds strict sense of morality and almost puritanic approach to life.
And Byron! let us dare admire
If not thy fierce and turbid song
yet that, in anguish doubt, desire
The fiery courage still was strong.
But Byron had no direct influence as did Keats. He appears to have fallen for Keats diction in Sohrab and
Rustum and To a Gipsy Child by the Seashore. Tristram and Iseult have descriptive similarity to The Eve
of St. Agnes, and important poem by eats. For Arnold Coleridge and Shelley were no major poets but critics
have traced the influence of these poets on him. Coleridges Christable and The Rime of the Ancient
Mariner cast their shadow on Arnolds Saint Brandon, Tristram and Isuelt and The Forsaken Merman.
Even among the continental writers he turned to those who had distinctly romantic imagination: Joubert,
Maurice de Guerin, Senancourt and George Sand.
Which Tradition Matthew Arnold belongs to - Romantic or Classic? The answer is not and cannot be straight
and absolute. Arnold, in fact, interestingly belongs to both the traditions. And, in equal measure. This duality
of tradition ought to be clear from the preceding discussion on Arnolds classicism and romaticism.
137 Matthew Arnold
Detailed Critical Summary of the Text
The Poems :
1. The Forsaken Marman
2. Memorial Verses
3. Dover Beach
4. The Scholar Gipsy
1. The Forsaken Marman is one of the six narrative poems written by Matthew Arnold. It is based upon
The Story of My Life by Hans Christian Anderson and George Borrows Romantic Ballads. The Story
is rather simple though somewhat strange. A Merman (Merman is a Fabled Creature of the waters
having a mans body and a fishs tail. Mere means a sheet of standing waters or a lake, sea or pool.
Mermen and Mermaids figure in Romantic fables, stories and poems) marries an ordinary human woman
whose name is Margret (reminds of Marguerite, the French woman with whom Arnold fell in love but
could not marry). Merman and Margret have five children. One day, Margret feels a longing to go back
to her own village for saying prayers in her former Church. Merman, her husband, allows her to go back.
Margret never returns. The Merman and the children keep wailing but they and their father, the Merman,
have been deserted by Margret. Arnold has recreated the story with pathos and effective imagery. This
is one of the early poems of Arnold but it has been hailed as a better poem than Tennysons Mermaid
and Merman, though Tennyson is an acknowledged craftsman of verse. Elizabeth Barret Browining,
wife of Browning the poet had liked this poem and wrote about it to her friend Mary Mitford. Arnolds
poetry, as already discussed, is a mixture of romantic and classical styles and traditions. Merman, however,
is predominatly romantic; it has both strangeness and beauty, two cardinal qualities of romantic poetry.
Though it is a narrative poem, poetic flow is sustained over a long sequence making it a long lyrical poem.
The poems atmosphere has haunting music, brooding melancholy and sincerity of feeling which all
together and in unison heighten its beauty. The classical elements in the poem too are not lacking. It has
lucidity of style which is a special feature and requirement of classicism. It is in fact a curious mixture of
diverse strains. For example, the lyrical element harmoniously mixes with the dramatic in this poem.
Duffin, a discerning critic points out that The Forsaken Merman has three dramatic characters; The
Merman, Margret and the Sea. The children too are there but they not serve as the main characters.
They only enhance the pathos and melancholy of the drama. But, the Sea is the most interesting character
as it is the Seas kingdom, the watery home of the Merman which has been painted by the poet with an
intimate and tender touch of art. The great winds, salt tides, the white horses, the cool and deep caverns
with the snakes and great whales, and the Marmans retreat, are wonderfully depicted.
Detailed Analysis/ Critical Comments
Come, dear children, let us away,
Down and away below!
.....................................
Lines 1-29
The poem opens with the above lines and sets the mood of desperation for the deserted husband and his
children. The anguish and agony caused by the unexpected disappearance of Marget, the wife of the
Merman and mother to his five children is heart-rending. The Marman appears to have lost all hope; he
is on the edge of dispair and social shame as is suggested by now my brother call from bay . The
Poetry 138
gathering storm Now the great winds shoreward blow enhances the feeling of forsakenness, helplessness
and helplessness. The accurate imagery of the sea acquaint us with the consummate skill of the young
poet and his controlled manipulation of the action of the story set against the sea and storm. The inner
disturbance finds a verbal equivalence in the lines:
Now the salt tides seaward flow;
Now the wild white horses play,
champ and chafe and toss in the spray,
And appear to be the enlarged and elemental version of Mermans anguished implorations to his innocent
and deprived children to Call her once before you go- / Call once yet ! , as he prepares to go back to the
bottom of the sea, his habit at and face his brothers as deprived man forsaken by his woman.
In a last hopeless bid, he calls upon his children to call their mother by her first name Margret! Marget!
because dear is the voice of her children to a mothers ear and if their voices are wild with pain
that should wrench her back to her crying children/ Mother dear, we cannot stay! as wild white
horses foam and fret .
Margrea! Margret!. and they hope Surely she will come again but it was all in vain. And, now there
is no hope, no more calling, no more harking, they have lost her forever; Call no more! . With a master-
stroke of human psychology, the poet lets the last whimper of hope and the last look on the white walld
town and And the little grey church on the windy shore /, Then come down to the bed of the sea
where a motherless home awaits the children. And, in the very next moment all hope is lost: She will not
come though you call all day / Come away, come away ! There is a kind of tour de force, psychological
and poetic finality of forsakenness in these lines.
Lines 30-63
It seems some time has elapsed. It, is a time to remember the happy past. How soon the time passes! It
looks as if it was only yesterday that all this happened on the seashore: the parting and desertion on the
part of her wife, Margret. And how all this came about? He speaks to his children, perhaps lost in his
own thoughts and memories, sweet memories of yesterday , of a sweet home, tender time and loving
nature of his wife. The memory of yesterday dramatizes the incident on the seashore, the going away
forever of his lifes companion; Children, dear, was it yesterday/ We heard the sweet bell s over the
bay? These are questions of lifes pain. Perhaps the memory will serve and the articulation of the
memory of the last scene between him/his children and his wife/their mother will serve to relieve the pain
and regain strength to come to terms with the reality of separation and desertion. Next few lines from In
the caverns where lay... .. to Where great whales come sailing by/sail and sail, with unshut eye , have
been singled out by critics for the accuracy of observation of the sea-imagery. Arnold seems to have a
botanists and zoologists knowledge of the activities of the sea animals and the setting of the sea. They
poetically establish the Robitat of the Merman with any convining sea scenery by the poet and, what is
even more impressive, by the bond that the Merman feels with his sea- environment in the same way
perhaps as the bold of Margrets human environment, her natural habitat before she decided to live with
The Marman as his wife and where she went back forever, never to return to sea-home.
It was the sweet sounds of the bell emanating from the gray church that did the trick. It was Easter
time when good Christians celebrate the suffering, sacrifice and rising again of the Holy Christ. It is the
time of good Friday. It is time to repent and rejoice. It is a time of sacrifice and rejuvescence , it is the
time of the Spring. The tolling of the church bell reminds Margret of her Christian soul which she has
lost ( I lose my poor soul Marman ) by marrying, the Marman. Now is the occasion to reclaim the lost
soul. If she could go to the gray church where her own kinsfolk pray as it is Easter-time in the
world . She is full of Christian pangs! Ah me ! . Merman loves his wife and perhaps cares for her
soul and let us her go/ go up, dear heart, Through the waves/ Say thy prayer, and come back to the
139 Matthew Arnold
sea-caves but she never returns and is no more heard of. There is only the memory of the cosy times
the Merman and children spent with her, as if it was only Yesterday the She combed the hair of her
youngest child who sate on her knee as she herself sate On the red gold throne in the heart of the
sea. Painful and sweet are the memories of those days!
Lines 64-84. Clear and deeply carved is the memory of that fateful day when Mermans wife and his
childrens mother Margret left them forever to go to the gray church to say prayers . His children had
started to moan as they were long alone and Margret was taking too much time at the prayers with
her kinsfolk in the white-walled town. The Marman had said to Himself Long prayers.. in the world they
say as the moments of waiting started stretching beyond endurance and the children continued to
moan He recalls how in her search, he along with his children went through the surf .. up the beach,
by the sandy down where the sea-stocks bloom and on to the white walled town . They walked
through the narrow paved street and where the gray church stood on they windy hill . They did hear
the murmur of the town folks prayers as they stood at some distance in the cold blowing air . They
even had a little glimps of Margret by the pillar then they saw her clear and called Margret, hist!
come quick, we are here and he recalls having been long alone . They reminded her about the gathering
strom at the sea and he pointed out The sea grows stromy/ the little ones moan but she had her eyes
glued only to the holy book , the priest was saying prayers loudly. And, the door of the church was
shut . So he had said, Come away, chikdren/call no more because it was all in vain.
Line 85-107. The Merman. from his abode in the depths of the sea lets his mind and imagination
wander into the human world, The world where his wife Margret now lives, leaving him and her children
behind. She is no longer a mermaid now. On the country, she now is a part of the humming town and
perhaps, he imagines, is plying her weaving wheel doing it as a part of the household chores. Perhaps,
she is singing Joyfully and listen, what she is singing. she is singing joyfully about the child with a toy
she had seen in the busy humming street . Or is she singing about her found again life of a woman of the
human world, of her town, of the priest, of the bell in the church that had enticed her back to her town,
of the holy well , in the church where shep rayed to rescue her soul , of her being back in the world
of familiar faces , of her return to the world of sunshine from the dark deaths of the sea . And so she
is singing to her fullest satisfaction on the turn her fate had now taken and on finding herself back in the
blessed light of the sun ! But, then, maybe she also remembers her life in the deep sea, her days with her
Merman husband, her children and may be, suddenly the spindle drops from her hand as a thought of
those times in the sea passes her mind, may be the spinning wheel stops suddenly and she comes to the
window to throw a backward glance at the sand and beyond over the sand at the sea and perhaps
she fixes a stare seaward and as in her minds eye she sees her past sea-life and she lets out a sigh at
remembrance of things past ! And perhaps, here and there drops tears from her eyes for her children and
for her husband, a strange being, half-human, half-fish !And sorrow brims into her saddened eyes for
having lost that world of intimacy, love and affection, a very different life in the deep sea than the life now
on earth, sunny earth !Merman, has memories, sweet and sad memories of her golden hair and strange
eyes which now are perhaps cold with looking too much fixedly to the sea that was once her home.
Lines 108-123. The Merman, consoling his children and himself, lets his fancy roam into the imaginary
world where the faithless woman now lives. May be she will some day reawaken to the realization of
what suffering she has caused to her husband and children, may be when the gusts shake the door , or
a storm hits her town and the suns shine is gone, she would be reminded of the sea and of those she left
behind in the sea. She will hear the winds howling and waves roar from her life of yesterday and it
will also be an occasion for us to see and say, as we see pearls of the sea strewn above us and in the
roaring and whining of the waves we shall also have an occasion to say, say that Here camea mortal/
But faithless was she . Faithless woman is a recurring theme in romatic poetry. In fact, these lines
remind us of Keats lines O Knight, what can ail thee when the flowers and leaves are withered from
Poetry 140
the Lake/And no birds sing , from The Lady Without Mercy. The faithless woman from the world of
men has forsaken the kings of the sea . The Merman too would be singing because from a sad, painful
heart flow the feelings into poetic strains. And, now he imagines his lonely future with his lonely children,
who will learn to live without Margret, wife and mother of yesterdays, and yet shall not be able to forget
her. Winds would go on doing their usual work, moonlight shall come and go at midnight, spring tides
will be low, sweet airs come seaward and the (Lines 124-143) moon will light the gloomy, blanched
sand and glistening beach , Up the creeks and there will be a time in the future, to remember the
Faithless Woman and go up to the sleeping town or gaze it from the sand hills and look at the hill-
side church and then come back, after perhaps throwing a wistful glance on the scene which was once
a witness to the forsaking act of the faithless wife and mother and a time to sing: There dwells a loved
one
Lines 128-143
But cruel is she!
She left lonely for ever
The kings of the sea.
The Forsaken Merman has been called a romantic poem of a classicist. Not only that, it is an example
of Arnolds peculiar genius, not often expressed with such consummate skill where the lyrical and
dramatic elements are so well mixed as romaticism and classicism. It has modernity, it has the intellectual
element, it has the elegiac note, it has tranquillity and disturbance of the mind and, in other words, it has
all the elements Arnolds distinctive style was capable of manifesting. It sings of the death of love, of the
incompatibility of the natural and the human. The Merman represents Nature and Margret the human
and never the twain shall meet. It was a part of Victorianism to think this way. Nature is incomplete while
man is perfectible. This is also the humanist creed. Just as the dramatic is expressed in the lyrical, so also
the narrative has been lent charm and poetry through the lyrical flow of the Arnoldian lines. And, then,
there is also a touch of the autobiographical in this poems. Arnolds own failed love with Marguerite, a
French woman, is a variation on this theme. Perhaps, as his letters indicate, the element of personal and
cultural incompatibility was responsible for Arnolds not being able to seek marriage to Marguerite. The
religious element, a major concern in the Victorian age among writers and thinkers also find expression
in this poem. Mermans willingness to let Margret go to the gray church to save her soul by kneeling in
prayer at the Easter-time and the resulting faithlesseness in return for this very human gesture is a
comment on the rigidity of religion and its interference with personal life of the practioners of an organised
religion. Arnolds poem is also acclaimed as an example of accurate observations and remarkable
descriptions that reach our hearts as much as entice our eye. The magical quality of Colerigde, Keatsian
melancholy, both imagery and metrical felicity make this poem stand out among the finest of the Victorian
age.
2. Memorial Verses (Elegy to William Wordsworth) This poem was composed by Matthew Arnold on
the occasion of Wordswoths death. Wordsworth died on April 23, 1850 and was buried on April 27,
1850. Arnold was a family friend of William Wordsworths and the latters son-in-law Edward Quilinan
requested Arnold to write an elegy on his father-in-law, a poet respected by other poets including Arnold.
Wordsworth was, in fact, the usherer of a new era of Romanticism in the history of English Literature.
He inspired many other poets. Arnold, as a poet and thinker and critic was also much influenced by
Wordsworth. And, he was glad to respond to this request as he states in a letter to his dearest friend
Arthur Clough... I have at Quilinans solicitation dirged W.W. in the grand style .
An elegy is a conventional poem written in the memory of a departed figure. There are hundreds of
examples where a poet of later times celebrates a dead, departed poet and eulogizes him and pays his
homage to him, enumerating his contributions and qualities. It is also usual for an elegist to highlight the
impact the departed poet has left on the times and life of others, his contemporaries and later generations.
141 Matthew Arnold
In Memorial Verses, Arnold has sung praises of Wordsworth. As the elegiac convention demanded, he
has spoken glowingly about the departed elder poet but his tribute pierces through the cover of convention
and reveals the sincerity of feeling and genuine respect in which Arnold held Wordsworth.
In order to assign Wordsworth a high place among other great poets and writers of his time, Arnold
brings in two other poets who died earlier but had put up a strife against the unwholesome trends of their
times.
Lines 1-14
Byron had died in 1824 and Goethe in 1832. Goethe, though a German, had influenced the whole of
Europe and the impact of his writings continues to be felt. Though very different personalities who wrote
in very different styles, yet all the three had their struggle and strife and their influence travelled
beyond the countries of their birth. Goethe was buried in Weimar, Germany and Byron died in Greece
though he belonged to England and Wordsworth wrote about the French revolution Bliss was it in that
dawn to be alive but to be young was very heaven ; but now gone are these revolutionary voices of truth
and beauty; and, Arnold and his friends have come to bury Wordsworth The last poetic voice is dumb/
We stand by Wordsworths tomb . Byron was not a teacher or a priest like Goethe or Wordsworth
and He taught us little but he did move our hearts and we felt him like the thunders roll and strove
with passion against eternal law . That was the daring life of Byron, enfant terrible of his age, the
fount of fiery life which was like that of the Titans, larger than lifes dimensions and Byron took art in
the big battles of his times for his beliefs in liberty and human rights. It is interesting to note that Arnolds
own sense of uritanic morality is in sharp contrast to Byrons unbridled pasion for life but perhpas it is the
earlier poets courage and daring to fight against hypocrisy and cant that has impressed Arnold.
Lines 15-33
As compared to Byron, Goethe was a true teacher, who was Europes sagest head .In fact, he was a
physician of the ailing age in whose soul iron had entered, which had become hardened and cold and this
physician of the iron age was so accomplished a practitioner of his art that he could minutely diagnose
the disease of his time and like a doctor would objectively put his finger on the place/And said Thou
ailest here and here ! .The hectic activity, power and pelf, the tensions of mindless actions and conflicts,
weltering strife and turmoil of expiring life , he knew what would be the end of all this meaningless
overreaching of the human self. He knew the cure for the ailments of his ambitious and furious age and
revealed the secret: The end is everywhere./Art still has truth, take refuge there! .Materialism and
scepticism were leading to cultural death in Europe when Goethe was creating his art and inviting the
maddened and maddening crowd to take refuge in the tranquil beauty of art, stop for a while and stay
and stare , to borrow Wordsworths words from his poem The World Is Too Much With Us . Goethe
knew the causes of things and he watched and observed the lurid flow/of terror, and inssane distress/
And headling fate .This is a sarcastic and scathing comment upon Arnolds own times. It may be relevant
here to remind ourselves that Goethe was writing when the French Revolution has lost its earlier promise
and Napolean had come on the scene and was demolishing the ideals of justice, equality, liberty and
fraternity. Europe had to go through a period of extreme suffering because of the Napoleanic was.
Goethe was appalled by the barbarity and terror of these developments and proposed to the troubled
mind of Europe to embrace the ideals of art and beauty so that order and harmony is restored and
tranquillity and peace prevail in the world of human affairs.
Lines 34-57
With Byron and Geothe in the background, Arnold now prepares to pay his homage to William Wordsworth,
regarded by critics and historians, as the greatest among the romantic poets of his times. He was also a
friend of Arnold and a great influence on him. In the next fioe lines (34-39), Arnold addresses himself to
the denizens of the under world, pale ghosts , the spirits of the world of death and asks them to be glad
Poetry 142
and full of joy because amidst them has just arrived a musical being, with a soothing voice which they
have never heard since the days of Orpheus, the great Greek musician of antiquity, of myth and son of
Apollo. Orphells ha lost his wife Eurydice the Orpheus followed her to Hades, the underworld of the
dead where he met Pluto, the god of death. Orpheus so pleased the god of death, Pluto, with his dulcet,
sweet and moving tunes that emanated from his lyre (a musical instrument) that he agreed to Orpheuss
prayer and released his wife Eurydice on the condition that while returning to the world of the living
Orpheus would not look back. But in this context, the reference to Orpheus is confined to his music and
its soothing, pleasing effect which could even move the heart of the god of death, known for his hardest
of all hearts. So, now Wordsworth, who once sang and soothed the world of the living shall be singing to
and soothing the world of the dead.
Now the sweet and soothing voice of the great Romantic poet Wordsworth belongs to the dead and they
can also hear the same Wordsworth who has gone from us and feel his voice as we! did once in our
world ( clime ) or region which had been experiencing doubts, disputes, distractions, fears which had
turned our age into iron time , cold and souless. He found us when the age had bound/our souls in
benumbing round . The World which Wordsworth saw was a world that was becoming senseless and
insensitive, too much going round in circles of foolish and maddening pursuit of wealth and materialism,
having lost all faith and full of doubts and scepticism but he created that kind of poetry which had a
restoring effect and soothed our ruffled feelings and loosed our heart and moved us to tears of sympathy
and pity for fellow beings and the fate of man; through his poems he made us feel like innocent children,
even like the babies who can never sin as they are the closest to the divine spirit and made us return to
Nature to seek our original innocence back. He laid us as we lay at birth/on the flowery lap of earth , he
removed our tensions and we had ease and smiles by responding to his poetry. This was a veritable
Return to Nature as was felt once again proximity and closeness to The hills...round us and felt the
fresh breeze/..ovr the sun lit fields again . We could once again enjoy the fresh touches of Nature and
our mids were balmed as Our foreheads felt the wind and rain . A new life was breathed into us by
Wordsworths poetry and Our youth returnd as his poetry showered on us The freshness of the early
world , the serenity and peace and harmony of Nature as was received by the earliest man when he was
innocent and free from ugly cravings of greed and vemality for insatiable lust for wealth and material
possessions; our long...dead , dried up and closed and closely furld spirtits were re-awakened to a
new life and a new world, joyful add heavenly and not worldly and ugly.
Lines 58-70
In these last lines, Arnold keeps to the conventions of Elegy in which the immediate subject or, for whom
the Elegy has been written, has to be placed on the highest pedestal. It has to be an eulogy, praise in
purest forms. Therefore, Arnold, though he introduced comparisons with Byron and Goethe, must now
find ways to elevate Wordsworth the poet to his most distinctive place and pay tribute to his unique
qualities and contributions to the world in general. In classicism, individual good and benefits, rendered to
friends are not so consequential and meaningful. It is the general and common good done by the doer that
is of the highest significance. So, how Wordsworth is greater than Byron and Goethe who too set high
examples in their respective public life? Goethes sage mind , his wisdom and counsel and Byrons
force did a lot to warm and fight against the ignoble tendencies of their times. But, then, out of dark
days emerges light . Out of ignorance is born consciousness and courage; Therefore, it is possible that
other Goethes and Byrons shall come back ( restored ) to the world sunk in gloom and darkness of
ignorance as examples of prudence and fiery might like Goethes sagacity and Byrons daring but
never in Europe, in later times of tensions and ruffled feelings and frayed nerves would Wordsworth with
his unique healing power be found. Arnold attached gret importance to his special quality of wordswords
poetry on distribution also. In his essay on wordworth, he observed that polty is great of Wordsworths
poetry is great because of the extraordinary power with which Wordsworth feels the joy offered to us in
143 Matthew Arnold
nature, the joy offered to us in the simple primary affections and duties; and because of the extraordinary
power with which, in case after case, he shows us this joy, and renders it so as to make us share it . Like
Goethe, we shall possibly find other teachers who will teach us how to fend against the fears and terrors
of our times and how to summon up courage for doing so. Like Byron we will likely receive lessons in
daring to meet the challenge of times and have the strength to bear the onslaught of the bad times. But
hard would it be to find a poet and philosopher and friends like Wordswoth who would be able to impart
feelings to us. But who, ah! who, will make us feel? Others shall come and yet again face the
troubling clouds of doubt and weaknesses which is the destiny and condition of human living and fearlessly
shall they confront the odds. But who, like Wordsworth shall keep our feelings alive? Who will give us the
gift of feeling? Who will save and store human feelings even in the midst of clutter and corrosion of the
hectic, thoughtless and insensitive world of profit and loss and greed to have more, more and yet more.
Therefore, O Rotha (the river along whose bank Wordsworth was buried), keep fresh and green the
grass on Wordworths grave, as a symbol of nautre O: River Rotha, you do this small favour to us who
seek to preserve the Greazt Poets mmeory, the source and fountain of human feelings, And you sing to
him the soo thing songs the best you have because only he was capable of hearing the Voice of Nature
and he will surely, hear your sweet voice as none are left now to gain feelings from rivers and mountains
and springs and cataracts and brooks and vernal woods and the one who could and did it is gone forever
and lies with you here, O Rotha along your side.
Arnold difined poetry as the criticism of life . Memorial Verses fulfil this criterion. He found in Goethe
a physician of iron age and Byron a poet of daring spirit. The verse, according to Swin burne at
once praise and judge the great poet and place him at a high pedestal in the context of his and later
Victorian time (of Arnold). Eliot, somewhat antagonistic to Arnold in his views of the latters poetry and
thinking called this poem a testimonial of what Wordsworth had done for him , though Arnold himself
would say it was Wordsworths general gift to people, the gift of feeling as healing power that he had
celebrated in this poem. His epithets sagesthead and poet of titanic power and healing power for
Goethe, Byron and Wordsworth respectively are just and appropriate, more so in the context of Meomorial
Verses being an international elegy.
3. Dover Beach: This is at once religious and sceptical, philosophical and emotional says Herbert Paul,
(a critic who has made a special study of Arnolds works) about Dover Beach. This poem was written
in the early part of his poetic career but, for some reason, got published only in 1867 in the first edition of
his New Poems. It is said that Arnold after his marriage to Frances Lucky Wightman visited Dover
Beach in her company. This otherwise romantic occasion resulted into this very melancholy (one of the
most melancholy of Arnols poems) poem. The sight of Dvoer Beach, inspite of its enchanting and quiet
beauty, does not rouse in him any romantic feelings; on the other hand, his mind gets invaded by thoughts
about what humanity has lost in his own times, the Victorian times. This feeling of general loss is
overwhelming and sets the mood of the poem which is full of lament and sad reflection. The poet
observes the sea intimately which he finds on that night calm and The tide is full as the moon scatters
its light on the waters of the Brtish Channel. A slow game of hide and seek between the waters of the
sea and gleaming light from the moon is going on as the steep rock on the English side of the Channel
watch and witness the scene all bathed in the moonlight and the glimmering shine makes them look
bigger or vast as reflected in the tranquil bay .
Lines 1 to 20
He seems to address his wife: Come to the window and tells her sweet is the nightair . There is no
noise here excepting the sound of the sea originating from the shore Where the sea meets the moon-
blanched land . There you will hear a peculiar sound of the sea like a grating roar/of pebbles which the
waves draw back, and fling and this sound is generated with a poetic cadence or rhythm of soft music,
slow and sad, slow and sad, with a repetition that appear to produce The eternal note of sadness in .
Poetry 144
The poet in other words, instead of finding the sea encouraging the married couple to have a fling of
delight and happiness forces upon them a note of sadness carrying memories of a never-ending ( eternal )
Time, of times gone by and of distant lands where the sea meets likewise the land as it does at Dover
Beach. Memory from antiquity, from the cultural past, invades Arnolds mind. This is the memory of
Sophocles, a writer of Greek tragedies, who perhaps also stood on a seashore as does Arnold now and
heard the same note of sadness along the Greek Aegean sea which brought to his mind the still
and sad music of humanity , to borrow a phrase from Wordsworth and saw in that Aegean Sea on that
moonlit night the rise and fall of men and their being in the clutches of time and fate - the turbid ebb and
flow/of human misery . Sophocles, Arnolds favourite poet and tragedian lived in 495-? -406 B.C.) and
wrote highly moving tragedies like Antigone, Oedipus, Elebra, in which heroes and heroines of high
stature. Stature fall victims to Fate and undergo misery and suffering, at times for no deliberate fault on
their part. In these lines some passages of Sophocles dramas are incorporated with appropriate modification.
For example Answer to the roar is from Antigone. Just as Sophocles gathered from the notes of the
sea sad thoughts about life and human misery so also now standing by this northern sea , the English
channel, we (Arnold and his wife in the immediate context) can hear and gather the same sounds and sad
thoughts from the moonlit waters spread before us.
Lines 21-27
In the lines starting with The Sea of Faith/Was once, too, at the full there is a poetic transition, from the
immediate scene and physical setting of the scene to the distant past, to antiquity, to times when people
had Faith and certitude, which with the passage of time has given way to doubt and despair. The faith in
the past was a universal phenomenon, shared by men and beings of all climes, in all parts of the world,
round earths shore and it hung like a bright girdle hangs around the figure of a lovely woman (women
and men also used to wear girdle around their waists as a piece of ornament. In indian villages too, not
long back this customary wearing of a girdle was common). But the hugging faith is now gone. Now, just
as the sea is producing its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar so also Faith has withdrawn itself from
the lives of human beings and from their world. It is Retreating and leaving behind, only the night-
wind and dreary edges and naked shingles of the world.
And, now the aweful thought of a faithless world, brings the Poet back to the quest for a refuge from
such a harsh world. This the poet finds in individual love, the strength and comfort of the body and soul,
both Ah, love, let us be true/To one another! for the world, which seems/To lie before us like a land of
dreams/So various, so beautiful, so new/Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light/Nor certitude, nor
peace, nor help for pain . Left abandoned in this sea of confusion and illusion, our fate is no better than
of those armies perhaps of the Peloponnesian war, who get caught in battles on a darkling plain , in the
dusk hurriedly embracing night, raise noisy alarms and helter-skelter run around and try to escape onslaught
of one another, knowing not a friend form foe. In the world, ments fate is like that of these ignorant
armies that clash by night and perhaps injure and kill their own sides.
The quality of lyrical poetry is not often associated with Arnold but Dover Beach, is lyrical, musical,
albeit, it is sad, and full of the usually Arnoldian melanchioly. He is philosophical and intellectual as is his
poetic wont, but in this poem he is also subjective and personal, if you like. This is a short poem but has
a ranging thought and depth of meaning. His statements are not bare thoughts, concrete imagery loads
his thought with solid ore. The moon-blanched land and sea provide a very convincing setting for his
peculiar handling of the usual Arnoldian themes of loss of faith, of hopelessness of modern or victorian
life, of looking back to antiquity for succur and solace but what he achieves in this poem is somewhat
modern goal of establishing personal, individual love between man and woman as an abiding source of
shielding against the inflictions of the mileu and the times. In a single, short lyric poem, Arnold has
succeded in expressing not only the main movement of mind of the last quarter of a century but
answered a larger riddle of the lifes question: where to seek strength and comfort against the pains and
145 Matthew Arnold
agony of times? There is comfort in the strength of love said Wordsworth in his Michaal and a
similar sentiment has been expressed and offered here by Arnold, though in a different context. Dover
Beach has also been called the greatest elegy by Arnold or one of the greatest, at least. Though it does
not mourn and pine for a personal loss or grief expressed here is not for the death of a human being. It
mourns the death of Faith, an essential source and sustainer of meaningfulness in life.
Says Herbert Paul about Dover Beach: ..it expresses the peculiar turn of Arnolds mind at once religious
and sceptical, philosophical and emotional, better than his formal treatises on philosophy and religion and
it is full of Arnoldian melancholy . The literary allusion according to J.D. Jump serves not only to
suggest that we have here to do with an archetype image but also to introduce Arnolds own commentary .
These remarks of Jump are in reference to Sophocles already discussed in the above detailed analysis of
the poem. The following five lines have been especially cited by Jump for Arnolds success here with
balancing and harmonising his didacticism with feeling. This has been achieved though a falling syntactical
rhythm and a series of open vowels which invest his verse with an eerie resonance that echo and
re-echo for line to line, especially in the following five lines:
But now I only hear
Its melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,
Retreating, to the breath
of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear
And naked shingles of the world.
While most Victorians hailed the rise of material prosperity and democracy in the Victorian age, Arnold
was worried about the decline and degradation of cultural taste of his times. These concerns find a
subdued but effective expression in Dover Beach as discussed above in the detailed analysis of the
poem. The theme of the loss of Faith symbolized by the Retreating Sea and its withdrawing roar and
naked shingles act as nearly perfect objective correlative of the poetic feeling or subjective ingredient
of the poem. This most famous of his poems contains, in a way, his most representative and central
statement about mans fate and human condition as perceived by him: we are here as on a darkling
plain . This perception he shares with the modern poets of the twentieth century and speaks of the
modern element in his poetry, conscious and critical, descriptive and not merely judgemental about Man
who remains alienated and alone amidt crowds. He, as pointed by A.D. Culler, anticipates the Existentialists
and Absurdists like Sartre, Camus and Karl Jaspers. For Arnold, Christian Church and Dogma have lost
their capacity to offer consolation to modern man who is alone and separated from his community.
Imagery used in Dover Beach has also attracted notice of the critics. The prevailing mode of imaging in
the poem is meta phoric. (The intention behind the device of the image is to convey meaning or significance
directly to the imagination through one or more or all of the five senses). The ear and the eye, auditory
and visual imagination are the dominant modes in Dover Beach. For instance the Sea is calm , the
moon shines fair , the light on, the French coast are examples of Visual Imagination; grating roar of
pebbles , ignorant armies clash , Its melancholy long withdrawing roar are examples of Auditory
Imagination at work.
Dover Beach has also been studied as a part of Arnolds poetry of Nature. Nature here provides a very
impactful setting for his philosophic reflection. It is not the Nature of Byron or Shelley, swift and shaking,
forceful westwind but a Nature full of peace and tranquillity. (Read critical comments in the line-by-line
descriptive analysis of the poem given above). This poem is full of choral cadence and, according to
Lord Morely an exquisite piece of pensive music that brings the eternal note of sadness to our minds
with tremulous cadence slow and a land of dreams as also of its disillusionment. Themes of love,
nature, faith and its loss, doubt and disillusionment, aloneness and mans antique archetypal patterns, are
intertwined in this short poem which is also a sober hymn of praise to married love.
Poetry 146
4. The Scholar Gipsy: This poem appeared in the 1853 edition of Arnolds volume of poetry entitled
Poems for the first time. Arnold had toyed with the idea of entitling The Scholar Gipsy as The First
Mesmerist. The theme and conceptualization of this poem, now considered as one of the most
representative of his poems, have their origin in Glanvils Vanity of Dogmatizing which Arnold had read
in 1845. The Scholar Gipsy has remained a popluar poem since its first appearance, though Arnold
himself did not rate it very highly as is evident from his letter to Arthur Clough : I am glad you like the
Gipsy Scholar - but what does it do; for you? Homer animates - in its poor way I think Sohrab and
Rustum animates - the Gipsy Scholar at best awakens a pleasing melancholy. But this is not what we
want. The complaning millions of men/Darken in labour and pain . What they want is something to
animate or ennoble them not merely to add zest to their melancholy or grace to their dreams .
In the above self-assesment of his creation, Matthew Arnold betrays his inclination toward his notion of
Greek Classical tagedies or serious literature/poetry, especially as we find practised by Sophocles in his
drama. Arnold as a critic assigned a high mission to poetry which ought to embody action and not merely
ideas; which ought to offer healing power to suffering humanity and not mere stories. But there are
other theories of poetry according to which a poem need not do anything except communicating a state
of mind or just making the reader a little more aware, that poetry can be expected to perform no social
function, that its commitment is to words and not to action. Therefore, we cannot regard Arnolds own
comment that poem is deficient in action as the final word. The poem is sustained by its own beauty and
its significance has to be found within its own discourse. Definitely, there are other ways of looking at this
poem.
In a letter to his brother Tom, Matthew Arnold gives hints about the circumstances that form a backdrop
to the creation of this poem, his days at Oxford and his flippant ways of youth ! Writes he to his brother:
You alone of my brothers are associated with that life at Oxford, the freeest and most delightful past,
perhaps of my life. When with you and Clough and Walrond I shook off all the bonds and formalities of
the place, and enjoyed the spring of life and that unforgotten Oxfordshire and Berkshire country. Do you
remember a poem of mine called The Gipsy - Scholar? It wasmeant to fix the remembrance of those
delightful wonderings of ours in the Cummer Hills? .
Though Arnold borrowed the story and basic materials of The Scholar Gipsy from Joseph Glanvill, this
poem does not centre upon the mesmeric powers of the scholar gipsy which was a central theme of
Glanvills Vanity of Dogmatizing. The obvious theme of Arnolds The Scholar Gipsy is his debunking
of Victorian materialism and sceptism, an age he found of sick hurry , divided aims and full of doubts ,
distractions and confused and of confusing issues and curiousity. Arnold imparts a veritable character
to the Scholar Gipsy he borrowed from Glamnvill. His wandering scholar is a symbol of idealism and
quest for truth , not mere seeker of the curious art of hypnotism and mesmerism like Glanvills Oxford
scholar who confides to his two friends, former class-mates from Oxford, that he would give up the
company of the wild brotherhood soon after learning these skills.
Arnolds scholar - gipsy, on other hand, is alone in the existentialist sense, and spiritually transformed
having no home, no bonds, no job or employment. This gipsy does not behave like a gipsy. In his imagination
he is more akin to Empedocles, Obermann and self-conscious characters from eistentiolist and absurdist
plays of modern times. Arnolds scholar - gipsy appears again for a brief moment in this Thyrsis, perhaps
continuing his spiritual pilgrimage and transformation into another being; in the later poem, he is no more
an escapist from the harsh world no is he full of dark despair. He rather symbolizes new hope and faith,
a far, cry from Glanvills scholar - gipsy. Arnold was not being a teller of tales and in his The Scholar -
Gipsy he offers a criticism of life as lived and perceived by him in the Victorian times whose materialism
and doubt had told upon his nerves. His transformation of Glanvills scholar - gipsy allows him to make
moral statement based upon deep reflection on his times. His gipsy- scholar if tired of knocking at
preferments door and he roamed the world with the wild brotherhood and to an extent he sticks to
147 Matthew Arnold
the content of Glanvills story as he read it. But he is very original in its treatment. His quest for the
scholar - Gipsy is a tour de force of invention, very much his own. Glanvills gipsy - scholar from the
seventeenth century is changed into a dream apparition, beyond the clutches of time, a vision of faith and
high principles: No, no, thou not felt the lapse of hours ; Thou has not lived, why should thou perish
so?
Lines 1-10
The Scholar Gipsy is a pastoral elegy, that is, a poem written in remberance of things past, recalling
and celebrating the memory of a person or some event or some precious thing now lost and which has a
rural or natural setting. If the setting in a pastoral elegy is rural, with shepherds, farmers and other simple
folks playing significant role, the mood is of pervasive sadness. This elegy, written in the grand style and
manner recalling that of the Greek classicist, also dwells on serious general themes, impersonal and
objective in their scope, treatment and dimension conveying elevatings thoughts on issues of general
rather than of personal import.
The first ten lines of the opening stanza set the pastoral scene, with images of shepherd life in the lap of
nature profusely projected : from the hill , wattled cotes , wistful flock , cropped herbage , moon-
blanched green a recurring image in Arnolds other poems-give us a close-up of the rural life as the poet
tells a shephered to do his chores, feed his flock of sheep as his fellow companions are calling him back
now and come back after freeing himself from his daily tasks, in the evening when the fields are still
and tired men and dogs are all gone to rest and may be only one or two sheep are straying from the
flock. It is a very convincing portrayal of leisurely life of men and animals together interacting with one
another, helping one another as a community (to be contrasted with urban, city life) that Arnold presents
here as he sets the mood and the scene of the poem. It is important to note right at the beginning that
Arnold, the poet does not identify himself with shepherds and the rural folk. He only makes friends with
one of the shepherds who he requests to come backin the evening after he is at leisure and all others are
gone from the scene. For, the poet seems to have come hither for a purpose. That purpose is to quest for
something or some one will be revealed in later lines. For now, Come, shepherd, and again begin the
quest , Some critics say, this shepherd a companion the poet has made in these lines is no other than
Arnolds own friend, Arthur Hugh Clough as they were engaged in the same pursuit of ennobling human
life and in Thyrsis, Arthur is presented as a shepherd by Arnold, as the subject of another pastoral elegy.
Lines 11-20
In the next lines upto the twentieth, the rural scene is further brought to our larger view as Arnolds poet
i.e. eye pans to a spot in a camera-like motion. Here, where the reaper was at work of late , this high
fields dark corner where he has left His coat, basket and other personal effects and where he shall
return at noon It is here the poet will sit and wait for his shepherd companion of the opening stanza;
from here he will be hearing The bleating of the folded flocks of sheep, and distant cries of reapers in
the corn and other sounds and murmurs of a summers day .
Lines 21-30
The poet continues to build the rural scene with green roots , thick corn , scarlet poppies , perfumed
showers Of bloom on the bent grass and sits himself in a bower to find shade from the August
sun What is important is that here a contrast to the serentity and other worldliness of the pastoral scene
has been introduced as the eye travels down to oxfords towers .
Lines 31-40
In these lines there is a transition; the scene is now wrapped up into a memory of the past and gone by
times. The poet has brought Glanvills book with him which has a tale that is often told and let me read
the of tread tale again . Thus a character is revealed; the character is the scholar gipsy from oxford
university, a promising scholar Of pregnant parts and quick inventive brain but who was tired of
Poetry 148
knocking at preferments door as his creative talents did not meet the medi are requirements of these
who study in universitieis for a uniform and competitive world of success and money rather than to use
their education for self-discovery and creative exploration. Unable to cope with the worldy demands, and
response of the world, this oxford scholar One summer morn forsook his friends and went to learn the
gipsy-lore , the tribal learning, esoteric and mysterious and started roaming the world of that wild
brotherhood and got lost forever as to Oxford and his friends he came back no more. Desertion
and forsaking are also recurring themes in Arnolds poetry (read Forsaken Merman). This scholar
turned gipsy, naturally spoiled his career.
Lines 41-50
But, as the story goes, two of his class-fellows from the college whom he knew him chanced to meet him
in a village street and questioned him about his gipsy ways and life of wandering. Wherat he answerd,
that the gipsy-crew knew skills of such powers that they could control the minds of men, or in other
words, could hypnotize other people and through this mesmerism they could make ordinary men do
anything they wanted. The Scholar Gipsy disclosed to these companions, class-fellows from his college
that he wanted to learn the secret of their art of reading others thoughts and workings of mens
brains and When fully lean d, will to the world impart but this art is not learnt the way students/
scholars learn in colleges and universities by putting in so many hours of study and books and writing
exams and getting marks from teachers/examiners. It needs heavens blessings, god-sent moments of
illumination, some heaven sent moments for grasping and gaining this skill .
Lines 51-60
After this exchange, the Scholar-Gipsy once again departed from his mates and never came back.
Stories keep doing the rounds that the scholar-Gipsy was seen here or thre, silent and sad wearing an odd
type of hat that used to be worn by people of long gone times; great outer garment of the kind gipsies
wear; and he was seen they say over Hurst Hillock under forest cover, in Berkshire fields near
Oxford; he was some times spotted by country people; peasants and boorish clowns or vagabonds saw
him sitting some warm-ingle bench or in loan ale houses .
Lines 61-70
It is in these lines 61-70, that the poet makes his quest clear to the reader and gives out an imaginative
vision of the Scholar Gipsy whom he is searching with the help of shepherds in this Oxford country side.
the scholar - gipsy shunned noisy places, and disappeared mid their drink and clatter and the poet
imagines and recalls scholar gipsys face or looks and have been describing his features to the shepherds
so they recognised him when hey find him. These shepherds and boys who scare the birds from eating
the crops in the fields too fields too the poet sets on a search for the scholar gipsy and the poet at times
asks them if the scholar gipsy had passed by the silent places or when the poet lies in a floating boat on
the cool banks in summer heats , amid grass meadows nestling in the sunshine or when he watches
the warm, green-muffled Cumner hills , the poet wonders if the Scholar Gipsy has been to these quiet
retreats rarely visited by others. So the poets quest for scholar gipsy continues.
Lines 71-90
Scholar Gipsy is fond of secluded places; he was once met by the joyful riders of Oxford in a ferry who
crossed the narrow river Thames near Bablock-hithe (about eleven miles from Oxford); seen by these
Oxford ferry joy-riders when the Scholar Gipsy was dipping his fingers in the cool stream as the punt
(a small boat plied by a single person) had just passed him by. They saw him in somewhat sadly dreaming
with a single person) had just passed him by. They saw him in some what sadly dreaming with a heap
of flowers perhaps gathered from the nearby Wychwood bowers and his eyes gazing the moonlit
steam . And lo! now you are gone! As they landed on the banks, they could see you no more. Then,
there were the young married girls, who had come from distant homes to dance in the Fyfield elm in
149 Matthew Arnold
May , the spring time; they too had seen the scholar gipsy as the dusk desceneded on the fields. He was
roaming and crossing over a stile into a public way.
Lines 91-100
But none of the maidens could tell if he had spoken and said anything! And during when men are busy
cutting breezy grass in the hot sun with a scythe that flashes in the sunshine like flames , when the
summer swallows black-win-ged hover over the river Thames. You have been seen there when the
labouring men had come to bathe in the abandond lasher pass . They passed by you when they came
over Godstow Bridge . They have seen you sitting by the river bank recognizing you by your outlandish
garb , that is, strange dress; by your lean and weakened body; and they have seen you dark vague
eyes and withdrawn looks. But when they came back from bathing , lo! you were gone . Thus, the
Scholar Gipsy, roams and haunts the lines 101-130 count tryside near Oxfordshire, has been seen by
housewives busy with their chores in their households, hanging on a gate ; seen by children in The
springing pastures and even when the stars come out and shine in the dewy grass or in the autumn,
on the outskirts of Bagley Wood where other gipsies visiting the area pitch their tents. Even the birds who
are not frightened of the Gipsy Scholar have seen him in all weathers and in all places in this countryside.
The poet imagines the at one time Gipsy Scholar was seen with a twig clutch in his hand and waiting for
a heavenly divine light to fall for self-fulfilment and self-realization, perhaps his aim of learning hypnotism
by Heavenly Grace still unrealized. Even in the snowy winter the Scholar Gipsy has been roaming over
the Oxford countryside; sometimes on he highway or the causeway that is used by travelers to reach
their homes through flooded fields on foot. The poet is not sure if he too has seen the Scholar Gipsy or
perhaps only imagined that he has seen him Wrapt in thy cloak and thudding through the snow going
toward Hinksey , a village near Oxford along its wintry ridge and climbing the hill there reaching the
snow-covered top of Cumner range , once the Gipsy Scholar was seen moving towards the Christ-
Church hall, walking in the thick snowflakes to observe the lights on the occasion of feast and
festival and, then looking for a bed to straw in the nearby secluded farmhouse- some sequestered
grange .
Lines 131-160
The next thirty lines (131-160) mark a very definite and significant transition. Till now, the poet was
narrating and largely describing the scene of Oxford Scholar Gipsys haunts and wanderings in the
Oxford-Berkshire countryside. Now he turns to the theme of life and death, of mortality and immortality,
of ambitions of this world and quest for self-realization and spiritual discovery of the self and countrasts
the Scholar Gipsy with the ordinary mortals of his times, the Victorian times.
Back to the world of reality, the poet suddenly realizes that he was only dreaming. As it was two hundred
years ago that Glanvill wrote the story of Scholar Gipsy and a legend was born in Oxfords halls of
Learning, that you , the Gipsy Scholar had left the university premises ( studious walls ) and had
chosen to learn strange arts , instead of the classics and liberal arts at the university, and joined a
gipsy-tribe and, in fact, not only you , (the Gipsy Scholar) has left university but has left the world
altogether and are dead and gone, and may be buried in some churchyard, in Some country-nook or
unknown corner grave where now tall grass grows and thorny wild flower plants and dark, red-
fruited yew tree , a tree associated with human death.
But, then, the Scholar Gipsy was no ordinary mortal or human being. He was not bound by the limitations
of time. He did not experience the passage of time and the lapse of hours like other men who are born,
live and act in life for a certain span and then die for ver. Mortal men go from one change to another
change because, everything and everyone in this time-world changes excepting the law of change .
Time wears the life of mortals, under repeated shocks and even the sturdiest among human beings
finally give way to decline, lose their energy and powers after exhausting them on our thousand
Poetry 150
schemes that one thinks up and pursues. And, at the end of it all, we have to submit remit - to the
directives of the Angel of Life, the passing Genius who watches our performance only briefly and
nothing remains but our past or what we have been which does not amount to much, actually.
But the Gipsy Scholar has not lived like an ordinary mortal, therefore, he will not have the fate of an
ordinary mortal. He will not die: Thou has not lived, why shouldst thou perish . Now the poet explains
how Gipsy Scholars life was different and why he will not be destroyed by time. And, here, in fact, the
poet Arnold finds scope for his favorite and oft-indulged moral comment on his own times, the Victorian
times. Compared to ordinary men who go from one scheme of life to another, who keep changing their
norms and values and even give up theior aims and ideals to lead a cosy and comfortable life of compromise
with the worldly reality, the Scholar Gipsy hadst one aim, one business, one desire . Had this not been
so, thou long since numberd with the dead or counted among the dead like the contemporaries of the
Scholar Gipsy, and even like us who will also pass into oblivion. But, you are indestructible, immortal
always living in our imagination, never growing or declining, exempt from age as thou livst on Glanvills
page , or immortalized in Glanvills book and because you had what we do not have. It is interesting to
remind here about the meaning of word in Sanskrit, AKSHARA, that is beyond destruction. Thus, the
immortality of the word has been bestowed upon the Scholar Gipsy, by the writer Glanvill and the Scholar
Gipsy shall live as long as Times shall last.
Lines 161-200
In these lines, the poet continues with themes stated in lines 131-160, delving deeper in the causes of
increasing preponderance of divided aims , doubts divisions and general sceptism and materialism
prevailing in Arnolds own Victorian times and why he considers Scholar Gipsy as freed from these
worldly ills. The first reason why he considers Scholar Gipsy has escaped the fate of the ordinary people
who live in Victorian times of doubt and faithlessness is that early did leave the world , that is, early
in terms of the time of history as well as time of individual being. The Scholar Gipsy, in the first lace lived
in times when the world still was not devoid of Faith, and then, because he gave up the world in early
youth when his powers , energy, and idealism had not been wasted upon or diverted to the world of
dulling routine and not spent on other things , when he was still free from the sick fatigue and
languid doubt that baffle and confuse us all. So, it was a life unlike to ours , who vacillate aimlessly
and strive without knowing the object of our striving, and live piecemeal lives, a hundred different
lives , who also wait like you but without hope. (Hope, Faith and Charity are regarded three guiding
directives of Christian life, and hope here has to be understood as an ally of Faith, or the other Face of
Faith).
You waitest for heavenly bliss, godly illumination, the spark from heaven ! , because of your unshakable
faith but we are only half-believers and have casual creeds , and our consciousness has not been
translated into actions, or we say one thing and act quite the opposite or differently, our vague resolutions
have remained unfulfilled because we are not clear in our resolves; on every step we falter, in every
triumph there is disappointment, full of hesitations as we are, and lose our ground after every gain. So,
this is our waiting; so different from yours who is continuing your quest without dithering from steady,
single-minded course and direction once chosen and decided. Even the wisest amongst us who have
been recognized for their intellectual achievements (reference is perhaps to Tennyson who was made
the Poet Laureate, though the reference could also be made to Wordsworth who late in life was made
the Poet Laureate of England), and seated upon the intellectual throne this wise man is still full of
dejection and is pour his heart laying bare his sad and unhappy experience with and of the world, of his
wretched days of life. From his works all we can gather is the tale of his misery, his loss of inspiration
or the dying spark of hope and how he blamed and overcame his aches and pains of his life and how
and what different medicines or painkillers he had swallow to relieves his pains and stresses of life.
(Reference could be to Goethe, Wordsworth and Tennyson).
151 Matthew Arnold
If this is the story of our wisest man of the times, then what about us, ordinary people? We only ply our
lives in sorrow and pain, nourishing unhappy dreams, and forfeit our claim to bliss and seek Sad
patience which is only next to being in the grip of despair . But none of us, the wisest and, the most
simple-minded among us, has hope like thine , because real hope is to go on struggling on the strength
of faith that striving is its own reward, Faith should be the other name of Hope. So you are still roaming,
retaining your youth and you still are the same truant boy who ran away from the Oxford studies still
Nursing thy project in clarity of mind or unclouded joy and if you had any doubt it has been long
blown by time away . (Compare Keats Ode to Nightingale Thou was not born for death and Ode
to Grecian Urn : A thing of beauty is joy forever )
Lines 201-250
In these final verse paragraphs, Arnold or the poet of the poem, warns the Scholar Gipsy to keep away
and come not in contact with the contaminated world and time of the Victorian age, lest he should get
polluted and lose his Hope or Faith and Immortality and timelessness. Addressing the Scholar Gipsy, the
poet reminds us that the Scholar Gipsy was born in happier times, when mind was free from bloated
REASON and IRRATIONAL MATERIALISM and life was clean like the Thames whose waters then
were also crystal clear, before this strange disease of modern life sick with hurry and its divided
aims , mental tensions, paralysis of hearts had prevailed. Go, go, go, away, come not near us, the infected
denizens of this sick world ! Escape to some natural abode, to some jungle or wild and plunge deeper in
the bowering wood , and take to a safer refuge there ! Shun us, avoid this our world in the same
disdainful manner as did Dido, the betrayed beloved of Aeneas who even when Aeneas chanced to meet
her in the Hades, the underworld of the Dead, avoided him, ran away from him. So also you, run away
from us. We are like Aeneas, False Friends ! Indeed, not worthy of your contact. Just tell us to keep off
and keep thy solitude , your solitary life of quest.
The poet wishes the Scholar Gipsy keep to his solitude which will help him keep his hope unextinguished
- nursing the unconquerable hope in the company of nature, he will be able to cling to his hope just as
he has been seen clutching the invoilable ohade with energy flowing through his being as he negotiates
the wild spaces of the forest, on 1the outer ring of the forest in the open area (glade) where no one
follows him. May be, if need be, the poet ask the Gipsy Scholar to come to a sloping fields, on the moonlit
fence, just to freshen up his flowrish the dew as did in the former times (when he was alive and roamed
in the company of the gipsy) just to freshen up his flowers in the company of the gipsies) or perhaps listen
to the nightingale sing in the valleys.
But never cross your path with ours, and never come in contact with our hectic feverish world.
Because, pollution of our minds is overwhelming; it gives no bliss or joy but it will spoil your peace of mind
and serenity and rendery our being and life like ours, full of tension, distraction , devoid of joy overflowing
with consciousness or bliss and you will lose your rejoicing self. Your faith and hope will become timid
and weak and our powers will be lost and our clear and fixed aim will falter and our eternal joyful youth
glad perennial youth would decline and you will then also like us grow old and finally, like us, die.
The poet continues his good counsel to the Scholar Gipsy warning him against coming in contact with the
poets world, or the Victorians who will ruin his peace of mind and deprive him of his joyful bliss and
immortality. Dont accept our greetings even; dont be taken in by our speech and smiles . Here, in the
last stanza, the poet introduces a long simile in the Homeric style. It somewhat distracts the reader from
the themes and the mood till now built by the poet but, then, Arnold is too much a classicist. He wraps up
the poem with a classical simile of the trading sailors. Once the Tyrian or phooenician traders saw from
some distance a Greek ships, loaded with luxury goods, emerging from the high waters as the sun was
rising. That was in the Aegaean sea and the merry Grecian coaster was carrying amber grapes, and
Chian wine and other luxury goods. The phoenician sailors who are respected for their serious trading
business, set the sails and took to the sea, deeper and deeper toward the Mediterrarean and then on to
Poetry 152
the Atlantic beyond Syrtes and Sicily. The idea was to give the Grecian ship the widest possible berth.
And, there entering upon the Spanish waters, the Tyrian traders dropped their anchor and unloaded their
boat on the Spanish shore, far away from the Grecian sailors ! The Gipsy Scholar too should give the
Victorians and the materialist world same treatment, just keep himself away, far away from them!
From the above DETAILED ANALYSIS of The Scholar Gipsy it will be clear that this is a representative
Arnoldian Elegy in the pastoral mode. It has almost all the themes that were close to Arnolds heart. Its
melancholy mood and tone are typically Arnoldian. The poem is biographical also since it gives us the
Oxford background which Arnold shared with the Scholar Gipsy, though in a later age or time. It reveals
Arnolds attitude to Nature and above all, it is, in the Arnoldian mould, a criticism of life as, according
to him, all good poetry ought to be Critics, such as W.L. Jones have said that The Scholar Gipsy is one
of the happiest in conception and execution of all Arnolds poems. Its charm lies partly in the subject,
natural congenial to the poet, and partly in the scene, which stimulates one of Oxfords poetic children to
lavish all the powers of description upon the landscape which he dearly loved. He was to return to the
same natural scenery in Thyrsis but, although in the latter poem, there may be one descriptive passage,
which surpasses anything to be found in the earlier, Thyrsis fails to give the impression of eager freshness
and ease which are felt throughout The Scholar Gipsy. Arnold has kept this pastoral elegy free from
artificial conventions. The vividness and beauty of the pictures of Nature in this poem add charm to the
poem. (For elaboration of this point see the line-by -line critical analysis of the poem in the proceding
paragraphs). Oxford is not only the backdrop but almost a protagonist in the poem. In one of his essays,
he pays his tribute to Oxford, his university, his alma mater : .....Oxford. Beautiful city ! so venerable, so
lovely, so unravaged by the fierce intellectual life of our century
Arnold and Clough, close friends had a good doze of The Scholar Gipsy in themselves, in their personality
and shared his traits. In his Essay, Culture And Anarchy, Arnold wrote : We in Oxford, brought up
amidst the beauty and sweetness of that beautiful place, have not failed to seize one truth - the truth that
beauty and sweetness are essential characters of a complete human perfection. When I insists on this, I
am in the faith and tradition of Oxford Arnold, the classicist, turns a romanticist while re-creating
Oxford in his The Scholar Gipsy.
It will be relevant here to mention about Arnolds classical models for his pastoral elegies. Among them
both Greek and Roman or Latin practitioners of this ancient art influenced Matthew Arnold who had
studied the Classics at Oxford. Theocritus, Bion, Moschus and Virgial are the major influences on Arnold.
These poets wrote pastoral elegies which celebrate the lives of shepherds and rustic folks whose simple
joys and sorrows, life and love find exquisite expression in their pastoral elegies which are set in the very
heart of Nature. Nature, pastoral life and shepherds and other simple people are idealised in the poetry of
these Greek and Latin elegits. Arnold proved to be a true successor to his Greek and Latin predecessors.
It must be noted, however, that Arnolds pastoral elegies are neither exact copies nor artificial imitations
of the Greek and Latin pastoral elegies. He has his inovations both on the theme and setting. He has
renewed the pastoral tradition and not merely incorporated it in his poetry. In The scholar Gipsy, for
example, the pastoral setting is not remote from urban areas; it is Oxford country side, within a radius of
fifteen miles or so from Oxford, the Seat of Learning and Oxford city, the hub of hectic intellectual
activity. It is not a purely idyllic atmosphere that he creates in this pastoral elegy. The shepherds he does
introduce in the very beginning of the poem but, then, he also makes them disappear at the earliest. The
poet, who goes to the Oxford-Berkshire countryside or the pastoral setting is also not a shepherd. He is
only an Oxonian who has come there, hearing and reading about the strange story of another Oxonian of
two hundred years ago who had escaped from the university and became a legend as he is known to
have turned a gipsy and joined a band of gipsies/gipsy-tribe and lived like them and never returned to his
studies and friends at Oxford. Thus,though the basic structure of the poem is that of a pastoral elegy but
the tone and spirit of the poem is Victorian and Arnoldian.
153 Matthew Arnold
Arnold also makes a departure from the conventional pastoral elegy by not idealizing the setting and the
characters in the poem. For example, the Shepherd who is adopted as a companion for the purpose of
searching the legendary scholar gipsy is a real-sounding shepherd like of whom could be seen in the
Oxford vicinity. Then, the scenery around Oxford is beautiful as it is and needed no idealization, nor has
Arnold made any attempt to do so. He has realistically depicted the Oxford countryside where he himself,
with his friends and brother Tom had roamed and perhaps played truant from the classes. All the characters
in the poem are, thus, real, not allegorical. The scenes too are re-created from the really existing originals.
Nature presented is that and as perceived by an educated English person.
It also differs from the conventional elegies in another aspect. It does not lament or mourn the death of
an individial. Not only does Aronld differ in this regard from his Greek and Latin prototypes but also other
English poets who also wrote elegies in the pastoral tradition. For example, Miltons Lycidas, Shelleys
Adonais and Tennysons In Memoriam lament the death of individuals on whose passing away these
poets felt personal grief. In The Scholar Gipsy, the poet has enlarged the scope of his grief and added
an impersonal dimension to the feeling of loss because he laments not the death of a person but the
demise of an entire era, of religious faith, of the values of life. Remarking on the tone of the poem, Hugh
Walker says that it is the natural tone of an agnostic who is, however, regretful of the vanished faith
regretful of its beauty, and regretful of the lost promise . (For more details on this point read closely the
line-by-line critical analysis of the text of the poem in the preceding paragraphs.)
Arnold, the classicist, emerges as a romantic when it comes to his responding to nature, in this poem as
in many other of his poems. The scholar gipsy is shown offering flowers to the dancing girls who are
visiting the Fyfield elm, perfumed morning and similar descriptions of Nature are almost Keatsian in
quality. (Read textual analysis for further examples and details). Swinburne, himself a poet, who indulged
in oversweet and delibertely sensuous descriptions, observes: the beauty, the delicacy and affluence of
colour, the fragrance, and the freedoms of wide wings of winds in summer over meadow and moor, the
freshness and expansion of light and the lucid air, the spring and the stream as of flowing and welling
water, enlarge and exalt the pleasure and power of the whole poem. Shakespeare who chooses his field-
flowers and hedge-row blossoms with the same sure loving hand, binds them in as simple and sweet
order .
The Scholar Gipsy is a criticism of life, to borrow Arnolds own phrase (see textual analysis for
details). Arnold was influenced by oriental philosophy, including the teachings of Gita, His message in
this poem seems to be that one cannot hope to acquire or know truth by external accomplishments or
materialistic prosperity. It is the diving spark as the scholar gipsy is waiting for the spark from heaven
to fall or Gods Grace or Prasad that brings real perfection or ultimate bliss of life. T.S. Eliot, the
twentieth century poet-critic and arbiter of the taste of his times, has been critical of Arnolds theory of
poetry as a criticism of life . We cannot fly the company of men. We all have duties to perform, social
obligations to discharge. It is impossible to have only one aim, one business, one desire as the poet bids us
here. We must all be up and doing toiling, rejoicing, sorrowing . And like the mariners of Ulysses, taking
with a frolic welcome, the thunder and the sunshine. The life picutred in The Scholar Gipsy, however
pleasing and attractive it may be made to look, in poetry, can hardly be recommended as the ideal of life,
for there is nothing in it inspiring and encouraging, nothing heroic . In a similar vein, stopford Brooks
says: He (Arnold) had insight into evils, the dullness, follies, the decay and death of the time which he
wrote; but he had little insight into its good, onto the hope and ides which were arising in its darkness . It
is true that this poem presents some difficulties if considered as a criticism of life and if Arnold is looked
upon as a moral teacher. But a poem need not perform any moral duty and yet be a beautiful and edifying
work of art. It is not in its criticism but in its beauty and truth as a poem that we look for the inspiration
and elevating thought and power of feeling and not in its philosophy or critque of values. Eliot himself
has said that the first commitment of the poet is to poetry itself and not to society. And The Scholar
Poetry 154
Gipsy does come out as a poem that is a work of art. The scholar who became a gipsy may be an ideal
too much to reach for ordinary men of the world and no body would want such a one to be born in ones
own family. But, this is true of most men who dared to differ from the mainstream or set high principles
of life for themselves or whose devotion was examplary but not fit for being followed by others. How
many fathers would want their sons to become Swami Vivekanand and leave their home, how many
fathers would want their daughters to become Meera though they may be the devotees devotees of
these divinely inspired figures of Indian Culture. Even Mahatama Gandhi every one admires but wisheshim
to be born again in some other family than his/her own. Art and life have a peculiar inter relationship but
each one has its own integrity, its own sovereignty and independence from each other. Let us not be
confused about it.
Finally, we may pay some attention to technical aspects of Arnold verse in this poem. The Scholar
Gipsy is written in stanzas containing ten lines each. And the meter used is iambic pentameter, with the
exception of the sixth line which uses trimeter. This is an example of Arnolds craftsmanship. He has
also masterfully used compound words green muffled-hills , air-swept lindens , heaven-sent moments ,
Light half-believer , a device Keats was also fond of using. We have already discussed his use of
Homeric similie at the end of the poem in the detailed critical summary- analysis of the poem in an earlier
paragraph, which is an example of his classical proclivities. Altogether, it is a classical -romantic poem, in
the pastrol elegiac mode, with modern elements of criticism of prevailing ethos or lack of it.
Major Topics on the Writer and Prescribed Text
High Seriousness in Arnolds Poetry: As a literary critic, Matthew Arnold introduced certain terms and
phrases which have become a part of literary criticism as a discipline, especially as practised and taught in
the universities and academic researchers, professors and students. Some of these terms and concetps are:
High Seriousness , Sweetness and Light , Criticism of life , Touchstone Method , Disinterestedness ,
To see the object as it in itself is , to see life steadilyand see it whole , Barbarism, Philistinism , Hellenism
and Hebraism . These terms appeared innovative to the Victorians though they roused debate and remained
controversial in later times. They have been used to evaluate literary works, poetry and other forms by critics
and literary historians. But in academic studies they have found the maximum application. Critics like T.S.
Eliot who criticised and evaluated Arnolds own poetry and criticism have found fault with his terminology.
But, he too was encouraged to invent a few terms and these have also found currency in the academic
studies on a wide scale. Some of these Eliot terms are: Dissociation of sensibility , Objective correlative ,
auditory imagination etc.
In his Essays in Criticism the concept of Truth and high Seriousness appears in the very first essay which
is on Chaucer, the first major poet of English Literature as recognised by literary historians. While evaluating
and appraising his work, especially, Chaucers Canterbury Tales, Arnold says Chaucers poetry is marked
by Truth but not High Seriousness and this is the criterion to judge the poetry of all poets. Those who meet
this criterion, are great poets and their poetry elevating to the human mind. High Seriousness is a quality of
poetry which distinguishes it from mundane poetry which is only ephemeral or limited. High Seriousness and
Truth make poetry and, indeed, all works of art, universal and lasting. Chaucers poetry, because of its truth,
is superior to the French models whom he learnt from and even imitated. But his French masters did not
have High Seriousness and Chaucer himself lacked it. Chaucer meets the criterion of Truth but does
not meet the criterion of High Seriousness . Truth alone does not make a poet CLASSIC. Therefore,
Chaucer the First English Poet, is not a classic. He recreated the Medieval Romances and gave rise to a
tradition which was followed and maintained by some great English poets after him such as Spenser, Shakespear,
Milton and Keats. But a trend- setter is not necessarily a creator of Classics. It is the Greeks who had High
Seriousness and they have left for posterities CLASSICS in their works. Homer, Dante, Shakespeare who
had both Truth and High Seriousness are the Classics of all times and climes.
155 Matthew Arnold
Arnold believed that Literature has a function to perform; that it should interpret life. It must elevate the
human mind. Poetry is, thus, a criticism of life or a profound application of ideas to life. At one place he
writes: There are two offices of poetry one to add to ones store of thoughts and feelings another to
compose and elevate the mind by a sustained tone, numerous allusion, and a grand style . Garrod, a scholar
and critic who studies Arnold closely illustartes the point about High Seriousness: Literature is a criticism of
life exactly in the sense that a good man is a criticism of a bad one . In other words, Literature aspires to the
ideal, the good,the beautiful and the powerful. In our own Indian tradition we have the trinity of SATYAM,
SHIVAM, SUNDRAM or Truth,Power and Beauty. In life such a composite person or action is hard to find.
In literatre, where imagination has a free run, it is possible to create such a composite action. Poetry and
Literature exist on several levels. For Arnold, only such Literature deserves to be respected that has within
it the strengh and validity of the values of Truth and High seriousness; which is not merly entertaining nor
merely moralizing either. But that lifts up the human heart and transports the being of man on to another
planet perhaps removed from our own world of weaknesses and foibles. Literature, in other words creates
an ideal picture of life that provides an ideal standard of life as suggested by worsfold, with which facts
of real life can be contrasted Critics have tried to equate moral profundity with High Seriousness. Perhaps
in our own times amoral approach to life and its diverse spheres has gained greater currency. Therefore,
Arnolds High Seriousness is not taken that seriously and is even debunked. But, in his own time, religious
doubt was a real and frightful issue and Arnold was looking for a substitute for religion which he saw was
losing its force. He acquired the belief that Culture that which results from the cultivation of the human
mind-could be a substitute for religion and poetry is assigned a very high place in Arnolds scheme of things
because poetry helps cultivate good minds. Therefore, he thought poery, if it has to play a high and serious
role of remaking and reshaping society as once religion did, then it must have these attributes of Truth and
High Seriousness as once Religion had.
Arnold was a dedicated educationist. In his job as a School Inspector he had the responsibility for modifying
the educational system. And, he believed in education as an instrument of transformation and not merely a
system that helps young persons acquire skills for making a living. As a poet and critic, he assumed a larger
role to directly address the Society and the intelligentsi and influence them with his ideas for a better tomorrow.
He was critical of Shelley who wrote beautiful, even passionate and powerful poems but who lacked moral
values in life. Arnold perceived man as an eternal trifler and he hated trivialization of art and beauty. Greek
Classical writers were his ideal because they, through their works, imparted states of serenity and calm of
mind. His own Victorian age was in a state of confused flux and was badly in need of calm and serenity. On
the whole, he did not have and optimistic view of life an mans future. In this regard, he was not like Shelley
and much less like Browning If winter, can spring be far behind? Shelly or Grow old with me, the best is yet
to be In fact, Arnold does not look to the future. He sees the present and the world around him and comes
to the conclusion that, he and his contemporaries were Wandering between two worlds, one dead/ The other
powerless to be born . As he tells us in his Stanzas from The Grande Chartreuse. Those were the times of
transition, a headlong hurtling it seemed to sensitive and serious minds then. In our own times, values have
further declined and there is both physical and sipiritual pollution on a global scale; there is less sensitivity and
evil has penetrated the human mind decisively. It has become a dangerous world where man complains about
tension yet continues to live and opt for a life of non-stop tension.
What about his own poetry ? Does it meet his own criterion of High Seriousness, and criticism of life .
Arnold perhaps does not reach the heights of poetic inspiration as did Keats and Shelley and Byron who,
according to Arnold had beauty in their poems but lacked High Seriousness and criticism of life. Arnold does
try to come up to the norms set by himself. In his The Scholar Gipsy and Forsaken Merman, we do have
examples of contrast with real life as it was perceived to have been lived by the Victorians.The Scholar
Gipsy was heavenly inspired and did not give up hope and faith even though he was a failure by the standards
of the work-a-day world. (Read the section on The Scholar Gipsy, critical summary and analysis to elaborate
these points further). He left the university and turned into a Gipsy to seek selfrealization and fulfilment and
Poetry 156
thus gained immortality. The Forsaken Merman also presents a contrast to the mundane world. It is not
individual solace that Arnold seeks in his poems. It is general well-being and spiritual upliftment of humanity
at large that is his aim. Whether poetry can actually achieve for men and women of this world such a state
of mind and level of pure fulfilment is a moot question. Eliot says no one thing is a substitute for another,
suggesting that poetry is poetry and religion is religion and the one cannot substitute for the other. Perhaps
poetry can only make one aware of oneself and ones environment and of ones possibilities but it cannot
perform action that is required for projecting ones self into acts of being and Nothing for realization of self.
But to become aware, to become disillusioned, in itself, is the first step toward enlightement.To that extent
Arnolds poetry is definitely a poetry of Truth as well as High Seriousness but we need not be led away that
such a poetry can achieve the heights of the Classics and/or can lucome classic in itself and by itself. What
the classics achieve is simplicity and universality of both expression and thought or feeling. A classic has
appeal equally for the highest intellectual and the most illiterate among humanity. Takes for instance Ramayana
and Gita. Gita appeals to the village women of India who have never been to school and Gita also appeals to
hightly intellectual minds like Huxley and T.S. ELIOT and Arnold himself, who borrowed the concept of
disinterestedness from Gita and Eliot found it the second greatest book evenr written. Gita is a classic of
all time and climes. Arnolds poetry is not classic in that sense, though it has loads of High Seriousness.
Doubt and Crisis of Faith in Dover Beach
Criticism of Victorian Age
Matthew Arnold displayed vigorous enthusiasm and prophet-like posture in his relationship with his own
times. Though he may have opted for questing after Truth in the manner of his Scholar Gipsy, he remained a
product and child of his own Victorian Age to whom release from intellectual conflict and confusion was not
easy. He remained embedded in the controversies of his own times. He himself described the World of the
Victorian Age as an age of divided aims , doubts , dying spark of Hope that was in need of tranquillity
and soothing of ruffled feelings (See section on The Victorian Age in the earlier part of this book). He, too,
like his contemporaries, found himself.
Wandering between tworlds, one dead
The other powerless to be born...
The rising wave of materialism brought with it sordidness of social and cultural life; expansion of democracy
was accompanied by vulgarity and degeneration of taste; increase in creature comforts led to mental tension
and fraying of the nerves; progress of science and knowledge resulted into loss of religious Faith and moral
values. Decline was general and pervasive. Yet, mainstream of the Victorian society were brash about
Industrial Revolution and Advancement of science which, philosophic minds like Carlyle, Ruskin and Arnold
thought, were mainly responsible for the disintegration of the Old Order in which Hope, Faith and Charity, the
Trinity of Christian bases of Good Life had prevailed for a long time. Arnold, both in life and Literature,
dwelled and reflected on the disappointing state of affairs of his times. In a letter to one of his closest friends
from his Oxford days, he wrote: These are damned times -everything is against one - the height to which
knowledge is come, the spread of luxury, our physical enervation, the absence of great natures, the unavoidable
contact with millions of small ones, high profligate friends, moral desperados like Carlyle, our own selves and
sickening consciousness of our difficulties . All these concerns find expression in his short, lyrical but sad
and elegiac poem DOVER BEACH which basically is a LOVE POEM. It is, in fact, a honeymoon poem. But
critics have called it an elegy on the death of love , at once religious and sceptical, philosophical and
emotional as Herber Paul has described it aptly.
This poem shows that even Arnolds marriage to Frances Lucy Wightman (he lovingly called her Flu!), after
a heart-break affair with Marguerite, a French woman, did not help him accept the Victorian ethos which he
continued to regard as degenerative and pernicious. Lord Tennyson, who is considered the most representative
of the Victorian poets, accepted the dictates of the Victorian Compromise. Tennyson wrote in his poems
157 Matthew Arnold
enthusiastically about both Science and Religion, Old and New, and with equal ease. But, Arnold who assigned
high role and destiny to poetry as a guiding force with regenerative and restorative powers for the spiritually
and culturally sick humanity, found the Victorian times UNPOETICAL . Writes he: Reflect too, as I
cannot but do here more and more, in spite of all the nonsense some people talk, how-deeply unpoetical the
age and all its surroundings are, Not unprofound, not ungrand, not unmoving but unpoetical, In other words,
people have lost their sense for beauty and their tastes have been vulgarrized under the impact of science and
democracy. He could never come to terms with his age. In Dover Beach his disappointment with his times,
his nostalgic backward, look on the glorious history of mankind and times when the sea of Faith was in full
tide and had not dried up as in his own times, infact all his major concerns find a sad and tranquil expression.
It is a poem of still and sad music of humanity . As Charles Darwin, Thomas Huxley and wasllace, scientists
and trail-blazers were being given rousing receptions everywhere in England and abroad Arnold commiserated
in his loneliness and felt alienated from his own culture and society and wrote poems like Dover Beach
that tell us of his sad thoughts about the Victorian crisis with sweetness and light .
Though the theme highlighted in Dover Beach is a recurrent theme and his other poems such as The Buried
Life and Grande Chatreuse, The Scholar Gispy also articulate the same theme of restlessness and loss of
faith of modern times compared to the fullness of Faith and tranquillity of the earlier times, the presentation
of the same receding Faith here is lyrical not narrative, nor dramatic. The metaphor of the quiet and full sea
in high tide in a moonlit night had been effectively sustained through a well-controlled expression and remarkably
well-manipulated cadence of the verse. The same sea or English channel projects both the image of high and
low points of Religious Faith. Advancing tide and waters of the English Channel symbolize the past, a past
going back to the Classical times of Greek high noon of Homer, Theocritus and Sopholes; and, the receding
tide, making a grating roar against the dried shingles on the parched shore on the British side of the English
channel, represent doubt and receding Faith of his own times, the crisis of cultural values in the England of
Arnolds day. This poem reminds us of Wordsworths picture of England who also decried the decay and
decline of a English life:
She (England) is a fen
Of stagnant water, altar, sword and pen
Fireside, the heroic wealth of hell and bower.
Why was Arnold protesting against the trends of his times?
He was not an orthodox fundamentalist. He was not a narrow-minded follower of the beaten path. Then,
why was he disappointed by the diffusion of scientific knowledge? He was not a high-brow aristocrat. Then
why was he opposing the expansion of democracy? He was not a primitive fellow. Then why was he
frustrated with modern amenities and modern inventions such as the invention of steam engine, telephone,
telegraphy, metalled roads, and improved navigation? He was not an ivory tower isolationist, then why did he
object to mixing with millions of small ones ? He was not a boor, then why did he not appreciate better
opportunities for education to the people? For a close reader of Arnolds prose and poetry these questions
are, by no means, baffling. Nor do they present a paradox. He was not against these new influences and new
forces in the social and economic life of his nation. What upset him was the baneful impact of these new
influences and forces, which have had a very poisonous and injurious impact on his mind. Men, Arnold
thought, and to a large extent he was correct in his view, was getting too much occupied with pursuit of
increasing his creature comforts and material possessions. The wealth of his mind he was losing. His feelings
were getting dried up. He was getting materially prosperous but spiritually he was getting deprived and
poorer! Arnold advocated the promotion of culture, inner development of the human mind. He stood for the
enrichment of the mental and emotional life of the individual so that he, instead of pursuing self interest
relentlessly may learn to live in harmony with his community, his society and at peace with himself. Science
gives us the spirit of inquiry and increases our curiosity. In limits, this is okay but preponderance of doubt will
destroy human values by which man has existed and humanized himself. Lack of Faith, according to him, is
Poetry 158
dehumanizing. Mans discovery should not be limited to finding of facts; it should extend to an exploration for
and reaching out to Truth. Without feeling, without the poetic touch, with out human values, Mans Mind shall
become defunct.
Victorian era was a time of multiplex Thought and Action, and Market Forces. Diverse segments of society
had started exercising opposing and differing pulls. This had disturbed the quiet scene of the preceding
centuries when time appeared to have stopped. For sensitive minds like that of Matthew Arnold the disturbance
of the social scene and advent of new forces of science, of utilitarian thought, of conflicting social segments,
each promoting their separate claims to power and pelf, emergence of the ugly instinct of selfishness and
greed, the increased speed and tension of daily life proved too much to bear. (See section on Victorian Age
and Analysis of the Text in the foregoing discussion for further elaboration and comments). And, Arnold
gave vent to his resonse to the hectic change and atrophying mind of his Age. In his poetry, and in his prose
more clearly and directly, he atacked the mindless acceptance, on the part of even thinking people, of the new
forces and influences without qualification, without objection, without any attempt at modifying their effect
on their lives. In his Essay on Culture and Anarchy, he divided the English society into three distinct categories;
The unfeeling, mindless newly rich were the Barbarians ; the middle-classes who found the new comforts
and limitedly higher economic and social status as an unmixed boon, were the Philistines , and the larger
sections of the poor people who were given greater say-only say, literally, no big benefits, under the new
democratic dispensation, were the Populace . All the three segments of English people had one thing in
common: They were soulless. They were all insensitive; not receptive to any ideas . They were all full of
self-complacency.
Arnold has been accused of putting on Olympian airs but many of his fears about the coming damnation of
the civilized man are becoming fully real in our own times. Arnold was a well-wisher of the humanity in
general. He found his times destroying their culture; becoming unpoetical, losing all sense of Beauty and
Truth; mad after material gains. He came up with remedies against this disease of their minds. He suggested
they look for and spread sweetness and light ; work and act disinterestedly , propagate the best that was
written and thought in the world anywhere. In Dover Beach, the remedy suggested is Love , love between
man and woman, may be it is married life. That love can offer succur and sustenance against spiritual
incertitude, against doubt and confusion of the darkling plain or this, our world!
Critical Comment on Disease of Modern Life
in Arnold referenced The Scholar Giosy
This phrase The strange disease of modern life occurs in Arnolds poem The Scholar Gipsy. It connotes
Matthew Arnolds disapproval of disappointment with certain unsavoury trends and developments in the
Victorian age (See the section on the Victorian Age in this books earlier portion) which were brought about
by revolutionary or speedy advancement of Science, its discoveries and inventions, expansion of democracy,
industry, trade resulting in increase of material prosperity for a larger number of people. These developments
gave rise to mans curiosity for new things and craving for amassing more and more of material possessions
and diminishing of his concern for spiritual upliftment and intellectual refinement. Doubt started replacing
faith and human values started to be discarded. Greed and selfishness began to guide or misguide human
actions. Less sensitivity to human suffering, less feeling for others misery, less consideration and courtesy
for fellow-beings. Such trends, Arnold like many other thinkers of his age thought, were injurious to the
Human Mind, unhealthy for Human Society and detrimental to Human Culture. In other words, these modern
trends were symptoms of sickness of the collective life of the English society. They represented a kind of
social disease of the times, his own times. This was the strange disease of modern times .
Arnolds somewhat pessimistic view of modernism and progress of civilization in the Victorian era is a
recurrent theme in his works poems, essays and lecturers. He often looks back with nostalgia on the ages
and times past and gone by. He assumes and believes that those were better times; those were tranquil times;
159 Matthew Arnold
those were the times when men had good will among them and peace reigned over their minds; those were
the times when man lived in harmony with nature and did not tear it apart for satisfying its insatiable appetites.
When golden mean was the principle of life and the instinct of greed was kept under control. But now all is
changed. Man has lost his estate of innocence. He is thoughtless and wicked in his life and in his ways. He
has lost the capacity to reflect and think about what is good and what is bad for him, in the long and short run.
He has become prone to grabbing anything and everything that comes his way in order to lead a sensual life
without caring for decency and good taste that alone can cultivate his mind and turn him from a brute to a
cultured being. In The Scholar Gipsy, these themes have been directly and forthrightly stated and contrasted
with the earlier times when The Scholar Gispy as student at Oxford actually lived (in the seventeenth century)
and even then played a truant boy from his studies at Oxford to seek a more simple and joyful life of
wandering and not acquiring and gathering unnecessary possessions or material gains or false values of
status and intellectual pride in his scholarly accomplishments at Oxford.
O born in days when wits were fresh and clear
And Life ran gaily as the sparkling Thames
Before this strange disease of modern life
With its sick hurry, its divided aims,
Its head O vertaxd, its palsied hearts, was rlife
Fly hence, our contact fear!
The theme is repeated elsewhere: This iron-time/of doubts, disputes/distrain, fears. In his letters to Clough
and poems, especially written in his memory (Thyrsis), he reminds him of the disease of modern life : Resolve
to be thyself, and know that he,/Who finds himself, loses his misery . Therefore, the cure against this modern
disease of sick hurry and divided aims is to look within and discover the world of the self and gain spiritual
insights for peace and serenity of life.
While composing The Scholar Gipsy, he wanted to project the legend of the scholar Gipsy as narrated by
Glanvill in a new light as a corrective to the life of an average Oxford scholar who was driven by false
ambition and crazed by modern trends to seek worldly status and material possessions which was not a true
aim of educated and intellectual life. He wanted to animate and rouse the drooping spirits of the educated
people who were willy-nilly getting strayed from the right spiritual course of life to the Victorian ways of
materialism. He wanted to act like Goethe, the German writer and philosopher whom he describes as the
Physician of an iron-age . He perhaps thought that a poet was like a prophet who must send a message, a
divine and edifying message to the world of men for their spiritual regeneration. The Victorians needed such
a prophetic and spiritual message because they had become Barbarians, Philistines and Populace without
taste or decency in their lives. They were the complaining millions of men who Darken in labor and pain ,
to borrow his own words. His Scholar Gipsy is no mere hypnotist like that of Glanvill but an idealist, a spiritual
seeker of illuminated moments, Heaven -sent moments of self-realization. He got alienated and separated
himself by making a conscious, existentialist choice for a different life than the life of material prosperity and
social recognition his class-mates were left behind to pursue. He wanted to offer a contrasted life from that
of those who live the worldly life of his times carrying the disease of modern life all the time on their body
and soul. He got rid of this diseased modern life by imposing a kind of Quarantine on himself; by opting for a
change of milieu, from the organised modern society to tribal willd-brotherhood , free from the constricting
demands and anodynes to kill the pain of modern life.
The method and technique of contrast of older times with the new times, of examples of good life with bad
life, of spiritual pursuit with the pursuit of materialism has been identified by the critics and commentators on
Matthew Arnold as criticism of life . Arnold insisted that poetry or literature ought to offer criticism of life
so that it performs a social function. This social function is not limited only to awakening or reawakening of
the reading public to the need of ideal and high principles. It should result into measurable impact and improvement
in the condition of man after exposure to great works of art and literature. It has been pointed out by some
Poetry 160
critics who have studied Arnolds works more closely that he shares this view with the Classical writers of
Greece and Rome. It may also be relevant in this context to observe that European and British Gipsies whose
life the Oxford scholar had chosen to adopt are of oriental origin. These Gipsies, researchers have found,
have a good deal common with their Indian counterparts. Thus, in The Scholar Giopsy, the view of life that
has been contrasted and offered as criticism of life is a variation on Indian life. Even in his more serious
criticism and lectures, Arnold has cited detachment as an Indian virtue . G. Wilson Knight observes:
"Arnolds poem confronts our western tradition with suggestion of a wisdom, or magic of oriental affinities or
origin . Arnold was ever eager to remove the mask of hypocrisy and illusion from the face of the Victorians.
His age was ignorant of the impact their new-found riches of materialism, sciences and democratic dispensation
on the soul and psyche. They were full of confusion and mental chaos. Some of them were full of
disappointments and despair, having lots a world of serenity and peace in exchange for perplexities and
complexities of modern life. Yet, Arnold was not scathing or biting as Carlyle was in his incendiary criticism
of own times. He preferred Stoicism, a Greek creed which prescribes forbearance and patience in the face
of the onslaughts of Fate. It is true that Victorians faced a different kind of Fate than the metaphysical Fate
the philosophers and poets portrayed in their works depicting human beings as victims of this inscrutable
Fate. The Victorians were faced with, what Galsworthy called Social Fate , a Fate of their own collective
making but beyond an individuals control and perhaps beyond collective social control too, because it is
irreversible.
According to Arnold Poetry is always referring the actual life to the ideal and illustrating the one by the
other . Like the Greeks, especially his adopted mentor, Sophocles, he sought to see life steadily and sea it
whole . He also wanted that his own contemporaries lead a life of refinement and spiritual glory. Moralistic
element is Arnolds poetry is not much appreciated in our own times because modern thought shuns moralizing.
But with this exception, Arnolds concerns are genuine. We cant take everything given by science and
everything described as progressive as essentially good for human brings. Science and technology are neutral.
Man is free to put them to whatever use. But once they are brought into play, it may not be possible to control
the forces and influences generated by them. This is where the modern man faces dilemma. He cannot turn
away from Science and Technology which are capable of getting him rid of disease, poverty and ignorance.
But by not being cautious and selective in their use he runs the risk of being destroyed by them. Arnold, with
a prophetic vision foresaw these dilemmas and in poem after poem and essay after essay and lecture after
lecture issued warnings to his age about the possible pernicious effect of the so-called progressive forces and
influences of his time and beware of this disease of modern life .
Arnolds immediate gurus or masters or role models such as Senancour also held similar views and outlook
on life. Senancour believed that life was a vale of tears and similar thoughts have been articulated by
Indian sants and spiritual teachers. Didnt Guru Nanak say Full of grief is the whole world ( Nanak, dukhiya
sab sansar )? Arnold traced the self-inflicted woes of his time to the loss of faith. We,/Light half-believers /
never deeply felt, nor clearly willd / Whose insight never has born fruit in deeds /and therefore never got
the spark from heaven! , As he observes in The Scholar Gipsy in order to diagnose this disease of modern
life . The result is, as he continues to elaborate in The Scholar Gipsy, The sick fatigue and Languid
doubt that bafflement brings . Lost is our heavenly legacy. Lost is our soul. As a cure, he suggests one
aim, one business, one desire for seeking and not necessarily finding spiritual fulfillment because Faith, true
Faith is that which ensures fulfillment in the seeking itself and not necessarily in finding it. For, finding too
would be only by Gods Grace and not necessarily the result or fruit of our effort or action. External glitter
lasts only in time while spiritual life is timeless. It is a life of increasing and expanding consciousness. It is a
life of harmony with Nature and the world around, not grabbing and striving to gain power, possessions and
pelf and keep them greedily.
Elegiac Element in Arnolds Dover Beach and The Scholar Gypsy
Matthew Arnold has been described as the poet of elegies . Compared to other poets of his age, especially,
Tennyson and Browning, Arnold does appear to be a poet of sorrows who vents his grief and sense of loss in
161 Matthew Arnold
his poetry. True, it is not personal loss that he cries about. Even when the subjects of his poems are personally
related to him, like his own father Thomas Arnold of Rugby Chapel or Arthur High Clough, his friend in
Thyrsis, or elder poet Wordsworth of Memorial Verses, personal loss is lifted to a larger plane and it is
general sense of grief and loss that is mourned and lamented. Tennyson made a compromise with his age and
he accepted old and new as a part of his times which were in a great flux. He expressed his feelings and
ideas about Faith and Doubt, Science and Religion, Democracy and royalty and other divergent and
contradictory strains with equal ease. Browning was a stubborn optimist. He did not care where he lived,
patriotically at home or as a part or even a relic of the Renaissance in Italy amidst imaginary Bishops and
Duchess who sought to satisfy their worldly vanities by building beautiful memorial tombs or getting portrayed
by painters of renown. Even old age and its debilities did not bother him: Grow old with me, the best is yet to
be .
Arnold was much involved with his countrys life. He was employed as Inspector of Schools and was thus
responsible for monitoring the state of school education in the country. He got appointed as the Professor of
Poetry at Oxford, a position he retained for ten years. In this highly valued academic position he had the
occasion and scope for critically examining the value system of his own society, prevailing ethos and its
equation with the English morality of the past ages of English history. He was a keen student of the classics
which were rated highly as the basis of not only academic education but accomplishment in social and
political life; it was often a passport to higher echelons of aristocracy and diplomacy. A person with classical
education, though of humbler social class had access to and acceptance in what used to be called polite
society in those days. Both by his professional career, educational qualification and his involvement with the
social and public affairs of his society, he was well set to comment upon contemporary issues and problems
being faced by the Victorian society. Besides, he had a natural aptitude for a role as the wise man who would
give good counsel for the general wall-being of his people. But as a critic and observer of his times, he had a
pessimistic view of the life of his countrymen.
He regarded the people of his age as unfortunate people who had lost a great heritage; who had gained the
world and worldly riches but had lost their soul and who had failed to realise how great a treasure they had
lost. But he did not hate human beings. He only pitied them and always thought of raising their cultural level.
Because, by raising the cultural level he could hope to restore them to health and sanity. He was also not an
isolationist or an ivory tower academic who liked to live away or far part from the average, intelligent people.
He counted among his friends not only the classicist like Arthur Clough but also scientists such as T.H.
Huxley, J.C. Shairp, Duke Coleride to name only a few of them But he could not come to terms with the
times. As a poet more so. In his poems, Elegy is the dominant form. In most of his poems, elegiac or the sad
note is the highest and loudest.
Dover Beach and The Scholar Gipsy, two poems very different from each other, the first lyrica and the
second narrative yet have the mood of sadness and sense of loss of Faith as common elements between
them. In a letter to Clough, he complained of the damned times , spread of luxury , physical enervation ,
the absence of great natures, newspapers, cities, light profligate friends (see Analysis of the Text in this
book for the complete quotation in the critical summary of The Scholar Gipsy). Both these poems remember
the vanished past as a loss. Both of them lament the demise of Faith which once was full and alive. Of
course, these two poems have different designs, different stanza structures, different conception, different
modes of narrative and lyrical expression but in mood and theme both are identical. In poetic elaboration of
the theme and creation of the melancholy mood Dover Beach used the landscape and the Sea symbols.
Some critics have found difficulties in the use of Sea as symbol of both the fullness of faith in times past and
its drying up in modern times. But the high tide of the sea and the receding of the sea both at the same time
symbolizing two opposite phenomenon in no way detract from the efficacy of Sea as a paradoxical symbol.
We are not considering here some thing neat and clear like a logical argument which must avoid all contradictions.
A symbol is a complex poetic device in which two opposite phenomenon, meanings and opposite images can
Poetry 162
be present simultaneously and yet effectively. More complex a symbol, greater its significantory value.
Therefore, if the Sea at its full tide reminds us of the high noon of Faith in ancient and earlier historical times
and its receding grating roar calls to our mind the disappearance of Faith like the dry shingles on the
shore of English channel, it should enhance the hidden meaning and significance behind the complex symbol
of the Sea. If man has continuity of history, his rise and fall is like that of the sea which, at full moon swells to
fullness, but recedes with a sad and melancholy sound leaving behind shingles and pebbles like the ruins of
mans own past. But the dominant note emanating from this simultaneous symbol of the past glory of faith and
the present decline of faith is that of sadness as the Sea brings eternal note of sadness in . Sophocles, the
Great master of Tragedy had also heard the same note of sadness on the Aegean Sea. The ebb and flow
of the sea is eternal which is symbolic of the ebb and flow of human misery . But for Arnold, unfortunately,
it was only the ebb of Faith to see and observe and experience. Materialism had dried up the soul of his
times.
But there is some healing, some comfort and consoling possible amidst this great loss and sorrow and the
succur and solace is available to the whole humanity. This solace is possible through love between a man and
woman; Arnold pays his tribute to married love in the lines Ah, love, let us be true/To one another in Dover
Beach. The sadness and elegiac mood of the poem are set off by this assurance of love, individual love
against general gloom. Love is real while the world is only an illusion.
In The Scholar Gipsy, the description of Victorian life and its loss of Faith is not in terms of complex
symbols. It is more forthright and direct: Mere triflers with Languid doubts suffering from the sick
fatigue are the epithets used for the Victorians while, in contrast, the Scholar Gipsy has one aim, one
business, one desire . Instead of complex symbolism, it is a clear contrast that has been used to reflect and
project the present loss of faith and the past fullness of faith. It will also be noted that in Scholar Gipsy,
Arnold, the poet emerges as an agnostic rather than as an orthodox believer in Christianity. The elegiac note
in The Scholar Gipsy is unrelieved by any antidote for the pain of loss of Hope and Faith. A morose,
existentialist alienation and despair are the dominant mood. For, the poet does not want the Scholar Gipsy to
return to this rotten world afflicted with this diseases of modern life . (See also Critical Summary and
Analysis of the Scholar Gipsy in this book in earlier sections).
Arnold's Message (As A Poet)
Arnold was a poet of social commitment. In his poems, as he asserted in a letter to his mother, is encapsulated
the main movement of the mind of the last quarter of a century . He was conscious of the fact that his
poems represent, on the whole, the main movement of the mind of the last quarter of a century, and thus they
will probably have their day as people become conscious to themselves of what the movement of mind is, and
interested in the literary production which reflect it (1869 letter to his mother). He was also aware that in his
day his poetry was not regarded as representative of the spirit of his own times, that Tennyson, the Poet
Laureate and his contemporary, had been readily accepted as the Representative Poet of the Victorian Age.
The meaning and message of Arnolds poetry, as is clear from the letter just cited, depended upon a responsive
audience and how conscious that audience was of the main movement of the mind of his times. We may
note here that Arnold has been paid greater attention in the twentieth century than in his own nineteenth
century. But he is regarded as a serious thinker and poet who did not write poetry only to please the ear. That
he was a sage and a seer . He assigned high mission to Poetry and the Poet. The poet was not only a
creator of verses but also a prophet who proclaimed a message of high significance to the humanity at large,
almost a divine message of spiritual and temporal importance. From the message perspective, his Memorial
Verses written as an elegy and eulogy on Wordsworths death assumes significance. Like the German poet
and philosopher, Goethe, Arnold wanted to feel the pulse of his times like a doctor or a physician so that he is
able to tell his contemporary audience about the ailment that they are suffering from ( disease of modern
life as he said in another poem). Goethe knew how to diagnose the disease and identify the symptoms of the
disease of his times:
163 Matthew Arnold
He read each wound, each.
Weakness clear -
And struck his finger on the place
And said-Thou ailest here, and here.
With a deep, penetrating poetic insight Arnold found that his Age was a confused world, full of tension and
unable to decide which way to go, to look back to its own past, its history for assurance and confidence or to
the flux of the present moment which held no clear meaning. Victorian age was an age of transition. Arnold
has described his own-milieu and times in memorable lines from the Grande Chartreuse.
Wandering between two worlds, one dead,
The other powerless to be born,
With no where yet to rest my head,
like these, on earth I wait forlorn.
Their faith, my tears, the world deride--
In come to shed them at their side.
Some commentators on Arnold have found that Arnold in his poetry, dwells too much on that which is already
dead but in his prose he does not appear to be so sad and melancholy and can see the birth and emergence
of a brave new world. Basil Wiley remarks: If in his verse he is often the elegist of the dead world (and of
something dead or dying within himself), in his prose he assists the birth of the new with cheerful alacrity .
This, like all generalisations, may be partly true As a critic, Arnold attaches very high importance and role to
poetry. He even believed that poetry, in fullness of time, could replace philosophy, religion and science. And
poetry shall be the main promoter and protector of Culture. In The Study of Poetry, he states: The future of
poetry is immense, because poetry, where it is worthy of its high destinies, our race, as time goes on, will find
an ever surer and surer stay. There is not a creed which is not shaken, not a received tradition which does not
threaten to dissolve. Our religion has materialised itself in the fact, in the supposed fact; it has attached its
emotion to the fact, and now the fact is failing it. But for poetry the idea is everything; the rest is a world of
illusion, of divine illusion. Poetry attaches its emotion to the idea; the idea is also the fact. The strongest part
of our religion today is its unconscious poetry.
In our own times, Form in poetry has received greater importance. Medium is the Message , says McLuhan,
this writers Guru and the Philosopher of the Electronic Age. Eliot also emphatically says that Poetry is made
of word and not of ideas. But Arnold had a different frame of reference. And, in the context of that reference
he emphasized the content of poetry rather than its form , though the two cannot be separated but it has
become a habit with the analystic mind of our times to reduce an object to its separate elements and then, if
need and capability to do so allow, recombine the separate elements or parts back into the whole in order to
comprehend and understand reality of the object under consideration. Arnold, it must be said here, did not
subscribe to the theory of Art for Arts sake". Poetry for him was for humanitys sake. It definitely had a
social function to perform. It had not only to awaken Man to his suffering and misery but also to heal him. For
this reason, Modern Poetry can only subsit by its contents: by becoming a complete magister vitae as the
poetry of the ancients did by including as theirs did, religion with poetry, instead of existing as poetry only and
leaving religious want to be supplied by the Christian religion .
Arnolds poetry presents a pattern of contrast to actual life. This becomes a part of the high function of
poetry itself. Just as a good person is a criticism of a bad person or a good act is a criticism of bad act, just as
mercy and its manifestations are criticism of cruelty and its manifestations, so also good poetry projecting
values and ideals of Truth and High seriousness is a criticism of life which is delusive, illusory, mundane and
depressive. This function of poetry was conceived by Arnold in response to the peculiar circumstances of his
times in which Faith and serenity of life had disappeared and unbridled pursuit of ambition, greed, power and
pelf had become a commonplace. Therefore, he arrived at another conclusion that Literature, Art or Poetry
is a criticism of life under the conditions fixed for such a criticism by the laws of poetic truth and poetic
Poetry 164
beauty . He explicated upon criticism in this context and defined it as the noble and profound application
of ideas to life . While modern writers and critics make a distinction between life and art and even are
inclined to keep them apart excepting to the extent that life provides art with materials to build itself on,
Arnold saw a vigorous connection between life and poetry. The two-life and art can and do act upon each
other and can be bettered by a more meaningful interaction between them. Greek Masters were his models,
especially, Sophocles who saw life steadily and saw it whole . Moderns have lost the capacity and patience
for such steady and whole grasping of lifes meaning. There is superficiality and outward tinsel and colour
rather than gaining of deep insight from the experience of life as it has been lived by man on a multidimensional
canvas. His own age presented a contrast to life as depicted in the classical (Greek) literature and also as it
was lived in the past centuries. This may be a romantic view as distance lends strangeness and charm. While
viewing the past, a good deal is left to the imagination which likes to paint beautiful colours and even ruins
look grand and majestic though hardly liveable. But, Arnolds arguments are not easy of rebuttal. The
knowledge unleashed by Science and Technology has brought greater comforts of life but at the same time
turned this world of man into a dangerous place to live devoid of human sympathy and fellow-feeling. Arnolds
message or messages have a context and to understand him and the import of his message, we must understand
his times and Arnolds response to those times. These are damned times , he protested, full of sick hurry ,
languid doubts , fatigue . He could find no place to rest his head on for relief. He went back to the Greeks-
Homer, Sophocles, Epictetus as guides, philosophers and friends, and to poetry:
The poetry that in a grand style deals with man and his destiny inspired him and he looked to it as the source
and fountain of all that is good in man. The best that has been thought and written holds the secret of mans
rejuvenation, of his being born again and again out of its own ashes. Because, when his bad act and mundane
instincts have done their work and come to a sorrowful end, there will be poetry to which he can go and open
the page from its depository of great ideas, passions and feeling and regain hope from the preserved memory
of his race. That modern man is capable of seeing life steadily and see it whole . Because, there were men
who had done so before him; so he can do so also. Poetry interprets by expressing with inspired conviction,
the ideas and laws of the inward world of mans moral and spiritual nature , he said and sent other messages
in the same vein. He speaks of the healing power of Wordworths poetry and interpretive powers of
poetry in general. For his taste, Poetry should hold the charm of natural magic as also moral profundity .
While considering his message as a poet, we have to understand his terminology and phraseology: criticism
of life , interpretation and moral profundity , Truth Beauty and their Laws; High Seriousness ,
Disinterestedness and the like. Arnold also thought that Nature too has healing powers for the frayed
nerves of man in turmoil as is clear from the message in the following lines from his Self Dependence
Ye who from my childhood up have calmed me,
Calm me, ah, compose me to the end.
He did not see a divine agency in Nature as Wordsworth did but consolation and soothing it could surely give
to the harried man of the world; it could also restore the self to the selfish persons who in the pursuit of greed
and materialist gains lose their soul. In Doverb Beach, it is Love between man and woman that performs a
similar function of imparting tranquility to a disturbed mind. In The Scholar Gipsy, it is the extinction of
duality between the ideal and its pursuer , determined and everlasting in his Faith and hope, that is articulated
as the message of the poet. Arnolds poetry seeks to send the same message as the Classicists like Sophocles
left for the posterity.
Modern and Existentialist Elements in Arnold
If questing and questioning spirit are the marks of modernity, Arnold certainly is a modernist and a modern
poet, critic and writer. He was a self-conscious writer and endowed with critical objectivity who could view
his own work dispassionately. He knew that among his contemporaries there were poets and thinkers who
were acclaimed as the representative of his times and/or for their intellectual acumen. He did not hesitate to
compare his own contribution to Literature with that of his peers, two of whom deserve special mention here.
165 Matthew Arnold
Browning and Tennyson. Quite often we have quoted from his well-known letter to his mother written in
1867 in which he comparess himself with these two eminent poets and fellow Victorians. The relevant
portion of the said letter bears repetition in the present context : ... "It might be fairly urged that I have less
poetical sentiment than Tennyson, and less intellectual vigour and abundance than Browning; yet, because I
have perhaps more of a fusion of the two than either of them, and have more regularly applied that fusion to
the main line of modern development, I am likely enough to my turn, as they had theirs . These are insightful
self observations of a poet and critic who could not only see but also foresee time future. He proved right.
Arnolds poems and criticism have evinced a remarkable degree of survival and staying power through the
passage of time. Tennyson today looks good-goody stuff; Brownings poetry outshines Arnolds but through
its parts and not as a whole. Arnolds modernity is not merely innovative or experimental as that of Browning
but because of his concern with values and principles of life and literature and because of themes in his
poems that are of lasting relevance to human beings. In his poems, namely, Dover Beach. The Scholar
Gipsy, Memorial Verses. The Forsaken Merman he raises and deals with human issues that shake us out
of the habit of taking things for granted and state of self-complacency. They moot questions of self, being,
choice and projection of that choice in acts of being. Maybe, he is not so strong when it comes to going
against ones grain for an existentialist form of self-realization but he points to the movements of our own
times such as existentialism, absurdism and even structuralism and deconstructionism. The discourse that
emerges from his works is not only a part of the main movement of mind of the last quarter of a century in
which he lived but as a forbearer of the intellectual movements of the later part of the twentieth century.
It has been aptly observed that no poet of modern times, perhaps no English poet of any time, appeals so
directly and exclusively to the cultivated taste of the educated classes" as does Arnold. He was neither
excessive in his expression nor populist in his posture as a poet and man of culture. His pursuit of Truth,
general fate of man, verities of life as themes of his poetry was persistent and vigorous. He reflected on
these themes as well as embodied them in his poems: The end aim of all literature, if one considers it
attentively, is truth, nothing but that. But the criticism which the men of genius pass on human life is permanently
acceptable to mankind; the criticism which the men of ability pass upon human life is transitorily acceptable,"
he said. He attached importance to criticism , not because it was a superior or higher activity of the human
mind but because it created a ferment and a climate for creativity. Even poetry has to be a criticism of life so
that it may give rise to more poetry. In his Essay on Wordsworth he states: It is important, therefore, to
hold fast to this: poetry is at bottom a criticism of life; that the greatness of a poet lies in his powerful and
beautiful application of ideas to life." Criticism, not with a view to gaining or scoring a point over others, not
with a view to pleasing some one or condemning a thing and person on the basis of personal bias or for the
sake of practical gains or considerations; criticism has to be disinterested and not for ulterior, political,
practical considerations.
Arnold reflects these tendencies of disinterested criticism both in his theory and practice of the literary art.
He is not an ivory tower, academic critic. He is very much a man of the world, fully involved in the daily
chores of his life and also the movements of his time and in affairs of public and social importance. He had
a broad, and cosmopolitan outlook who could look beyond his own English or racist traditions and cultures in
his quest for answers to basic questions of life. For example he cites with approval the Indian Virtue of
Disinterestedness which he interprets, perhaps erroneously with objectivity borrowing the term
detachment from Gita. According to Arnold The critic of poetry should have the finest tact, the nicest
moderation, the most free, flexible, and elastic spirit imaginable; he should be, indeed, the ondoyant divers,
the undulating and diverse being of Montaigne . He tried to develop within him what, to borrow T.S. Eliots
phrase, maybe described as the Mind of Europe and allowed himself to be freely influenced by French
writers such as Senancour ad George Sands and German Heine, and Goethe.
Arnolds modernism could be attributed to his criticism. He assigned a new function to criticism and widened
its scope. He made the practising critic aware of not only his responsibilities to art, literature or poetry only
Poetry 166
but also to society. But this Arnoldian posture should not be confused with the communist theory of Art for
Community or Society . Arnold drove attention and capacities of the critic to a close relationship that exists
between life and literature. The problems and issues of the society and community are relevant to the critic
and the poet because he seeks inspiration, materials and even methods and attitudes from his society and
culture at large. In his Essay The Function of Criticism at the Present Time he defends criticism, though
keeping it lower than Creation and credits it with germinating ideas that further pollinate poetry, literature,
arts and, in fact, the entire culture. He ascribes the dissipation of the poetic urge in the times of Pope and
Dryden and Gray to the lack of a climate of ideas and criticism. Even the Romantic writers did not have a
milieu that could be described as infused with ideas and this makes Byron so empty of matter, Shelley so
incoherent, Wordsworth even, profound as he is, yet so wanting in completeness and variety , observes
Arnold. All these poets failed to see life steadily and see it whole .
Criticism, understood within the Arnoldian reference is, a disinterested pursuit and attempt at knowing the
best that is known and thought in the world and which, by making diffused and widespread, generates
currents of new thoughts, provokes new and deep ideas, offers new insights and this process is what ought
to continually lead to renewal and refreshment of Tradition. Poets like Sophocles had that capacity and
genius for applying thought to life and embody interaction between life and poetry in the creative act:
Sophocles long ago
Heard it on the Aegean,...... we
...................................................
Find also in the sound a thought
Hearing it by this distant northern sea.
Dover Beach
This is how Arnold helped create a climate of ideas - a climate conducive to greater creativity. Instead of
accepting the turbid ebb and flow , soullessness , Vulgarity , Plebianism , haphazard provincialism
and blundering of his age, he questioned the assumptions behind the smugness and complacency of his
times. He acted somewhat in the manner of Goethes Faust who, unlike Marlowes damned Fanstus, saves
himself from damnation because he was able to overcome the intertia or sense of self-complacency. He not
only saved himself but also tried to save and uplift the barbarians, Philistines and the Populace of his age
and propel them toward creativity. His vision discarded the immediately available sensual experience and
rewards for the more abiding, more edifying, more human, spiritual fulfillment which disinterested endeavour
ensures. He was not tied to the materialistic and machine culture of his age but sought comfort and satisfaction
in the timeless soul of man. In Culture and Anarchy and Friendships Garlend he urged upon his countrymen
to wake up and come back to life from the stupor of Victorianism, stupor of ignorance, stupor of materialism.
In his Essay on Byron he writes: As the inevitable break up of the old order comes, as the English middle-
class slowly awakenes from its intellectual sleep of two centuries, as our actual present world, to which the
sleep has condemned us, shows itself more clearly -our world of an aristocracy materialised and dull, a
middle-class purblind and hideous, a lower class rude and brutal--we shall turn our eyes again and to more
purpose, upon this passionate and dauntless soldier of a forlorn hope, who, ignorant of future and unconsoled
by its promises, nevertheless this conservation of the old impossible world so fiery battle, waged it till he fell-
-waged it with such splendid and imperishable excellence of sincerity and strength.
It is because of this openness of mind to unravel the beauty and excellence of even those like Byron with
whose sense of morality or conduct of life he openly differed that Arnold today has a place among the
modernists. He overcame the general sense of insularity and closedness in which the self-complacent Victorians
suffocated and wallowed themselves. He allowed the winds and airs from all directions, alien and far lands,
to knock at his intellects door and he imbibed them with religious unction. RH. Hutton has analysed the
contribution of Matthew Arnold to modern Thought, thus: When I come to ask what Mr Arnolds poetry has
done for the generation, the answer must be that no one has expressed more powerfully and poetically its
167 Matthew Arnold
spiritual weaknesses, its craving for a passion that it cannot feel, its admiration for a self-mastery that it
cannot achieve, its desire for a creed that it fails to accept, its sympathy with a faith that it will not share, its
aspiration for a peace that it does not know. But Mr Arnold does all this from the intellectual side,-sincerely
and delicately, but from the surface, and never from the centre. It is the same with his criticism. They are
fine, they are keen, they are often true, but they are always too much limited to their superficial layer of moral
nature of their subjects, and seem to take comparative interest in the deepest individuality beneath."
There are certain aspects of Arnolds modernism which only developments in the twentieth century can
reveal. In the limited context here they can only be cursorily mentioned but they deserve full length and closer
study. These relate to the sense of loneliness and alienation and separation in his poems. These are
distinctly distinguishing features of certain modern philosophies developed in Europe toward the end and in
between the two Great World wars. The basic inspiration and development of these philosophies lies in the
works of Brentano, Husserl, Heidegger, Karl Jaspers, Jung, Kierkegaard, Merlau-Ponty, Sartre and Albert
Camus and several others in whose poetry, philosophical works, novels and plays these philosophies known
as Existentialism Absurdism, Structuralism, Deconstructionism have been projected and propounded.
Certain anthropologists such as Levi-Straus have also contributed to their diffusion and application to diverse
fields and academic disciplines.
Loneliness, alienation and separation or foresakenness or becoming a stranger from ones own people, milieu
or culture is a recurrent and repeated pattern of themes in his poems. In Dover Beach, The Forsaken
Merman, The Scholar Gipsy, Memorial Verses, this theme of alienation and becoming part or exile of
another world occurs. The theme of alienation is related to weariness and fatigue in ones own environment
and this theme too occurs in these poems. Sudden break with life till now lived without making a conscious
choice is also a feature of existentialist living as depicted in modern plays and novels and short stories of
Sartre and Camus and such moments and occasions too find expression in Arnolds above poems and several
other poems and his poetic drama. Consider the following lines from Memorial Verses:
And Wordsworth! --Ah, pale ghosts, rejoice!
For never has such a soothing voice
Been to your shadowy world conveyd...
Wordsworth has gone from us- and ye,
Ah, may ye feel his voice as we!
If Wordsworths going to the world of pale ghosts appears somewhat existentialistically far-fetched because,
after all, this going away is not a matter of choice and act of living or made in the living moments of life, then,
consider:
The story of the Oxford scholar poor
Of pregnant parts and quick inventive brain,
Who, tired of knocking at perferments door,
One summer-morn forsook
His friends and went to learn the gipsy-lore
And roam d the world with that wild brotherhood,
but came to Oxford and his friends no more. - The Scholar Gipsy
Here is a complete write-up on an Oxford scholar who leaving the alienated world of middle-class learning
and values consciously and by choice gave it up and went to an alien society, the wild brotherhood , never
to return to the life and environment he had left bored ( tired ) with. The scholar gipsy of Arnolds poem is
an existentialist character in toto. He is a Victorian or seventeenth century version, if you like, of a modern
Hippy.
Consider also the character of Margret in The Forsaken Mmermaid, a mother and wife, who on a sudden,
makes a very conscious choice to give up her home, abode, husband and children. She is a Kierkegaardian
Poetry 168
character. The Christian existentialists tell us that you are free to make an existentialist choice, to become a
Christian, to surrender to Christ . Margret goes to the Church for a prayer. This is the time of Easter, the time
of Christs sacrifice. The time to repent for her suffering and the time to rejoice for his rising again. Margret
is an existentialist. She has the daring to give up all for just one moment of self-realization on the basis of
conscious choice of her own making, and, own up responsibility for that choice, another important condition
for existentialist living.
The general mood of weariness on the occasion of honeymoon smacks of existentialist despair resulting in
alienation form the society. Shipwreck is a metaphor used by zartre, the philosopher and practitioner and a
representation of Existentialism of intellectual and literary Existentialism. Arnolds condition here in Dover
Beach is that of a Shipwrecked existentialist being. Full of despair, wearied and bored with Victorianism,
He goes deeper in his soul and finds this world a land of dreams , of delusions and illusions. He does find
solace instead of plunging into the sea for a renewed self and being. He is a conscious person on the edge
of being .
Thus, Arnold may be called a predecessor of the existentialist movement of later times, thinkers and poet
with a futuristic vision.; And, like the existentialists a man of commitment .
A.D. Cullers observation may serve as a befitting close to the present note on Arnolds modernism: It is
only the modern poet who has followed Arnold in his vision of the tragic and alienated condition of man. In
this sense Arnold may be called a modern poet, and it is certain that he would have accepted this designation.
He considered that his poem, more than those of his contemporaries, represented the main movement of
mind of the last quarter of a century .
Arnolds Theory of Poetry
In a letter to Jane, Matthew Arnold wrote: At Oxford particularly many complain that the subjects treated
(in The Strayed Reveller and Other Poems) do not interest them. But as I feel rather as a reformer in
poetical matters, I am glad of this opposition. If I have health and opportunity to go on, I will shake the present
methods until they go down, see if I dont. More and more I bent against the modern English habit (too much
encouraged by Wordsworth) of using poetry as a channel for thinking aloud, instead of making anything.
Arnold reacted rather sharply to the Romantic movement initiated by Wordsworth in English poetry. He had
great respect for Wordsworth and healing power of his poetry but thought the Romantics had tendency of
looking at life not steadily and not as a whole but partially. They were subjective and individual in their
expression. Arnold found these tendencies neither healthy nor great nor of lasting value or worth. Greek
masters were his inspiration because they saw life steadily and saw it whole. And they grasped and
captured general truth about the fate and condition of Man in their poetry rather than individual and subjective
experience of life. This contrast between the Romantics, his immediate predecessors and the Greek ancient
masters such as Homer, Scophocles and Epictetus provides a well-considered basis for Arnolds Theory of
Poetry.
In his famous Preface to 1853 Poems, which may not have become as famous as Wordsworths Prefaceto
the Lyrical Ballads (1798), Arnold came to certain conclusions on Poetry and basic issues related to the
Poets art and role. In a way, 1853 Preface is a manifesto of classical Poetry as perceived and practised by
Arnold even as 1798 Preface of Wordsworths was the manifesto of Romantic Poetry. Arnold could not
initiate a Classical Movement in English Poetry. Prehaps because he was too close in time to the Romantics
and their influences could not be rebutted or repelled. But reforms introduced by him in English Poetry
have flourished better in the twentieth century when eminent poets like Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot began to
write poetry that expressed the experience of not one generation only but of many generations, and not of
one culture only but of many cultures. Arnolds Classicism has to be understood in terms to the human
experience which provides materials to poets and poetry, and not in terms of the form or forms of
169 Matthew Arnold
poetry which is a matter of choice for the poet himself. But the main inspiration for his theory of poetry came
to Arnold from his realization that the English Poetry of his day was in need of radical reform. Melody or
lyricism alone was not a measure of poetry; Arnold became clear about this fact early in his career as a poet
and critic. Shelley and Keats may have given us sweet and sad songs but the vision of life presented in their
poetry is like a flash in a shining pan which disappears momentarily and does not move or stir our spiritual self
for deeper and renewed meaning as we read their poems again and again. Truth of life does not yield
meaning, though it might provide invaluable insights in a momentary flash. Byron, Keats, Shelley offer us
flashes of light and glimpses of Truth, but not its understanding. Beautiful thoughts and feelings, thus, need to
be kept in subordination to the total impression because the part cannot be allowed to overwhelm or
overpower or prevail upon the whole .
A poet to be a theorist has to be endowed with critical and philosophical faculty. Arnold had those gifts. He
withdrew from public circulation his poetic drama Empedocles On Etna because, in his self-assessment,
this poem didnt meet the classical ideal he was advocating to the poets of his age. It is a poem, he thought in
which a continuous state of mental distress in prolonged, unrelieved by incident, hope, or resistance; in which
there is everything to be endured, nothing to br done . In such situations, he said there is inevitably something
morbid, in the description of them something monotonous . Hence, such poems or works are not fit for public
reading. It was a measure of intellectual honesty on his part to have withdrawn his own poem from publication
as it was composed of elements that were contrary to the dictates of his own convictions.
He dwells on his literary and poetic principles and convictions time and again. In a letter to Arthur Clough,
comparing the Romantics with the Elizabethans he says: Those d-d Elizbethan poets were the trouble-
shooters. Keats was a mere style and form-seeker . Keats and Shelly had exuberance of expression, the
charm, the richness of images, and felicity of the Elizabethan poets . And, with all these qualities the Romantics
like Keats and Shelley had done disservice to the cause of English Poetry because true poetry does not
consist of exquisite bits and images . Poetry can only subsist by its contents, by becoming complete
Magister vitae as the poetry of the ancients did . As for his own Victorian Age, he thought it was unpoetical ,
it sprawled all over in its true blankness and barrenness and unpoetrylessness (Sic) . He also condemned
the so-called Spasmodic school of Poetry among whose followers may be counted Dobell, Bailey, Marston,
Ebenezer Jones, Bigger and Alexander Amith. Writing about them Buckley notes: Inflamed by brewed
passions and their own ranting emotion.. yield to a Titanic egotism... they neglected over-all theme and action
to magnify isolated emotions....
Arnold assigned a very high mission and function to Poetry in his theory. The time is not far off when poetry
would replace even science and religion . As its function is not mere diversion or entertainment. It will
interpret life for us. "Poetry" is, therefore, criticism of life . It creates a kind of anti-environment to our own
mundane world and thus makes us conscious of the alternatives available to us to our own environment. To
put it a little differently, Poetry is criticism of life in the same way as a good person is a criticism of a bad
person; or a good life is a criticism of a bad life; poetry presents ideals - characters, actions, and moods that
serve as contrasts or alternatives or other possibilities to what is available in life actually. He has an elaborate
theory about these possibilities of poetry. Poetry is a criticism of life under certain conditions and under
certain laws, as he calls them, these are the laws of poetic truth and poetic beauty . In other words, the poet
does not create life; he/she recreates it in another medium. Therefore, the laws of poetry have to be different
since the situations and persons of poetry cannot be the same or identical to the persons and situations of life
itself. They cannot be photographic reproductions either. So, it creates or should create ideal contrasts to life
that one can seek to realize in life. Poet has to organise his/her matter under the laws of poetic truth and
poetic beauty. That is the form of expression has to be aligned with the content of poetry. Truth and high
Seriousness must emanate from the poets expression and creation. Poetry should have healing power for
the pains, sorrows and imperfections of life.
Poetry 170
The Arnoldian dictum Criticism of life has been matter of continuous debate in academic circles. Arnold
himself explained it as the noble and profound application of ideas to life . It is a kind of moral injunction. He
also insisted that poetry ought to be written in a grand style . He explained it in his On Translating-Homer:
The Grabd style arises in poetry, when a noble nature, poetically gifted treats with simplicity or with severity
a serious subject .
Arnolds Theory is only a theory and poetry cannot be bound within the limits of any theoretical framework.
Therefore, we need not rely too much on it either while applying his assumptions or dictates to evaluate or
appraise other poets or his own poetry or poems but his theory serves the purpose of agitating our minds and
examining the thoughts and principles behind his theory for studying the function and role of Poetry and of
Poets in relation to the Society. His theory, like any theory, cannot be expected to be valid universally and in
all conditions, though it is general enough to be called so.
Nature and Wordsworths Influence
Matthew Arnold had close association with Worthsworth, and in spite of Wordsworth, being a Romantic
poet, not fulfilling the entire gamut of criteria set by Arnold, he admired Wordsworth and his poetry. Arnolds
masters were classical Greek poets and dramatists and in his theory of poetry Arnold draws inspiration from
the Greek as has been discussed elaborately elsewhere in this book. Wordthworth was carried away by
human passions and defined poetry as an overflow of powerful feelings . Arnold believe that passions have
to be restrained and controlled and contained as was the practice with the Greek classicists such as Homer
and Euripedes and Scophocles. Wordsworth was subjective and celebrated individual freedom and liberty
and ideas of the French Revolution in its fancy, though he was completely disillusioned by its butchery and
bloodiness in its later phases. So much was he adversely affected by this unexpected development that he
lost poetic inspiration and became insipid in his poems. But, though Wordsworth failed to see life steadily and
see it whole , his poetry had a great deal of healing power and it was this element and quality of his poetry
that made Arnold set aside his classical ideals and fall for Wordsworths poetry. Largely, Wordsworths
inspiration came from Nature. He saw in Nature a divine agency at work, This divine agency was capable of
influencing and ennobling human beings. Nature was capable of enabling man through her benign contact to
regain his innocence he daily loses to the work-a-day world of profit and loss. Arnold, on the other hand,
product of his own age, (Victorian age as he was, much influenced by new discoveries of science according
to which Nature was imperfect and Man has to exploit it for his own use) did not regard Nature as endowed
with divine attributes. But, he certainly believed that Nature could, in its serene moods, calm the agitated,
disturbed and doubt-ridden mind of man. Wordsworth was a family friend of the Arnolds and also lived in the
vicinity in the Lake District where Arnold also resided. In his Memorial Verses, written on the death of
Wordsworth at the request of Wordsworths son-n-law(see discussion of Memorial Verses under Critical
Summary and Commentary in the earlier section of this book), pays his homage to Wordsworths memory,
thus: (He)
Laid us as lay at birth
On the cool flowery lap of earth.
And, in another poem, THE YOUTH OF NATURE, he says about Wordsworth:
But he was a priest to us all
Of the wonder and bloom of the world.
But, Arnold never became a Pantheist like Wordsworth. He did not personify or deify Nature. Nature for
Arnold was not animate as it was for Wordsworth. According to Stopford Brooke, Arnolds is frequently the
nature the modern science has revealed to us, matter in motion, always acting rigidly, according to certain
ways of Nature, which for want of wiser term, we call laws. For the first time this view of nature enters into
English poetry with Arnold. He sees the loveliness of her doings, but he also sees their terrors and dreadfulness
and their relentlessness. But what in his poetry he chiefly sees is the peace of Naturess obedience to law.,
171 Matthew Arnold
and the everlasting youth of her unchanging life. Nor is his Nature poetry like that of keats who is found of
painting Dryads and Naiads and fairy-like personifications of Nature. If there are somewhat Romantic
echoes of Nature in his poetry they are Wordsworthian. While examining Wordsworths influence on Arnold
as a poet of Nature we have to understand the very distinctive aspects of Wordsworth as a poet of Nature:
Wordsworth the healer and Wordsworth the visionary. Arnold was able to comprehend Wordsworth as a
healer but he never understood him as a visionary , though he was devoted to Wordsworth as an elder
poet. He could never hear or receive intimitations from immortality. Nor could share with the elder poet his
moments of ecstacy in the company of Nature. Not rejoicing but tranquility, not elevating passion but serenity,
not joy but peace were the gifts of Nature for Arnold.
This peace was also a kind of for bearance, a kind of resignation. Or a satisfaction that comes from performing
a duty like Nature does its work without complaining, day in and out. Stars shine, the moon shines, the tide
ebbs and flows, clouds rain and they have their joy in their doing so! Or as Grierson and Smith observe about
Arnolds response to Nature: "It was the steadfast self-sufficiency of Nature as she went about the business
of her seasons that calmed and strengthened him . Such images of Nature are scattered all over his poetry,
especially, in Quiet Work, SelfDependence and Resignation: toil, unseverd from tranquillity , glorious
tasks or Natures quiet work and this quietly working Nature can teach him to do likewise travelling in
lifes common way in cheerful godliness . And in his Resignation, he states forthrightly:
That general life, which does not cease,
Whose secret is not joy, but peace.
Critics have noted Arnolds very accurate descriptions of nature and its doing. Some of them think this
accuracy of detail as his unique speciality. Remarks Hugh Walker, a historian of Victorian Era. In their
wonderful accuracy, Arnolds references to nature illustrate the consciousness of this intellect which is one
of his most honourable distinction." He could be described a botanist poet for his highly impressive accurate
description of mountains, lakes, rivers and other phenomena. He was very precise in noting the facts of
Nature, as would be graphically clear from a few passages from his verse:
Sandstrewn caverns cool and deep
Where the winds are all asleep
Where the spent lights quiver and gleam
Where the salt weed sways in the stream,
Where the seabeasts, ranged all round,
Feed in the ooze of their pastureground;
Where the seasnakes coil and twine,
Dry their mail and bask in the brine
Where great whales come sailing by,
Sail and sail, with unshut eye.
The Forsaken Merman
Long since and in some quiet churchyard laid--
Some countrynook where Ov r the unknown grave
Tall grasses and white flowering nettles wave,
Under a dark-red fruited yewtrees shade.
The Scholar Gypsy
The Sea is calm tonight,
The tide is full, this moon lies fair
Upon the straights, on the French coast the light
Gleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,
Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.
Dover Beach
Poetry 172
Silent, quiet, serene, tranquil is Arnolds Nature as Lewish Jones remarks: He loved Nature in her quieter
and more subdued moods; he preferred her silences to her many voices, moonlight to sunlight, the sea
retreating from the moon blanched land with Its mechanically long withdrawing roar to the sea in tumult
and storm. The sea was, from him, the one element in which he discovered the deepest reflection of his own
melancholy and sense of isolation.
The sea, the moon and water are the recurring symbols of the poetry. In Dover Beach these symbols appear
with tour de force with a peculiar Arnoldesque impact:
Only, from the long line of spray
Where the sea meets the moonblanch d land
Listen! You hear the grating roar
Of pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling
At their return, up the high strand.
At times, Arnolds Nature appears within the world of men to add a larger than life dimension to human
personality as in Shakespeare. Shakespeare the towering master of words, has been depicted as a colossus
planting his steadfast footsteps in the sea. as the lesser mortals are in the sea of life enlisted . The Oxford
countryside which had made him play truant from the classes has been portrayed with love and tenderness,
memory adding charm and wonder to his descriptions. Frank Watts says: The country dear to Matthew
Arnold was a very quiet country. Hinksey and Cumner the haunts of his youth to which he always returned
on his visits to Oxford, were not what are called beauty spots. They were merely uplands of ancient pasture,
down some of which, by the time of Thyrsis, the plough boys team had already gone; with a bit of woodland,
a wide outlook over Oxford it self, and the surrounding valleys, the little footpaths running from farm to farm
beneath high hedges.
In The Scholar Gipsy and Thyrsis Nature as depicted by Arnold is serene and tranquil and bears a sharp
contrast to the hectic life and sick hurry and divided aims of the materialistic world and help Arnold turn
his poetry into a criticism of life . Natures changing scenes are recorded with care. Flowers have caught
his fancy and exhale an unearthly perfume: As in The Scholar Gipsy
Of thou has given them store,
Of flowersthe frail leafed white anemone,
Dark bluebells drenched with dews of summer eves
And purple orchises with spotted leaves
In some of his poems, Arnold expresses his belief in the indifference of Nature to man. Far from being a
divine and benign agency penetrating through the wall of separation between itself and mans world as in
Wordsworth, Arnolds Nature appears to be indifferent, unconcerned and non challant. Nature outcasts
Man. That is a fact. And Arnold is wistfully aware of it. In the Youth of Nature, he says:
We, O Nature, depart
Thou survivest us! this,
This I know is the law.
In Literature and Dogma, he forthrightly states: Ah! what pitfalls are in that word Nature . Arnold does not
accept the proposition that Man can exist in harmony with Nature. On the contrary, he believes that Nature
is incomplete and if Man forsakes Society in order to live with Nature, he will lose his humanity. It will be a
life of naked instincts and of not cultivated minds. If for Wordsworth and Coleridge, Nature had oneness
with Man, for Arnold, Man and Nature have been made to dwell apart from each other. Man can seek
calmness of mind and soothing of his nerves amidst Nature in selective places like Dover Beach or Oxford
countryside. Thus, Arnold the Wordsworthian is also Arnold the Darwinian very conscious of Mans tenuous
relationship with Nature.
173 Matthew Arnold
A Note on Arnolds Intellectualism
Arnolds Theory of Poetry as discussed in the foregoing sections of this book clearly indicates that he was
not a passionate or emotional poet. He preferred serious element of thought in his poetry and almost all his
poems display his intellectualist proclivity. He did not believe in singing idle songs nor did he believe that
poetry was a form of entertainment. He thought Poetry had high destiny and could even replace science and
religion as a formative influence on mans culture. In his essay on Joubert he defined Literature as the
criticism of life and in his Essays on Wordsworth, Keats, Shelley, Chaucer he applied the test of the Laws of
poetic Truth and High Seriousness in appraising their poetry. A conscious poet and cogitative thinker and
essayist could not but be an intellectual writer of Verse. He strove all through his career as a poet and thinker
to propagate this belief that a poets greatness depended upon the degree to which he applies the noble and
profound ideas to life, and it is this quality of a poets work that distinguishes him from transitory writers who
may write powerfully on one aspect of life or the other but who never are able to make us see life steadily
and see it whole as did the Greek poets of ancient times such as Homer and Sophocles.
He agreed with Wordsworth that poetry is the breath and finer spirit of all knowledge and that poetry is
the impassioned expression which is in the countenance of all science . And he himself sought to keep the
highest norms of poetic composition in mind while publishing his own poetry. He even withdrew from publication
his poetic drama Emjpedocles On Etna because by his own standards it did not meet the high criteria he had
set for poetry.
Arnolds intellectualism can be traced and studied as a part of his classicism. They both intertwine in the
design and style of his poetry. In his insistence that a poet cannot afford to expend all his talent and genius on
projecting the beauty of the separate parts instead of subordinating them to his sense of the whole, he was
propagating Hellenism or the Greek practice of seeing life steadily and seeing it whole. And, this philosophy
is a part of his intellectualism. He always quested for simple and pure style. But this simplicity was loaded
with meaning and significance. Just as a crystal is the purest element of a substance and carries within it all
its essence so also simple and pure style must communicate Truth in its essence. Arnold came immediately
after the Romantics in terms of time and history. He found the poetry of the Romantics and that of their
imitators more overcloyed with emotion and feeling. Instead of purifying the Truth of life, it, through its
overwhelming passionate expression, flooded or drowned the Truth of life. Instead to helping us penetrate
reality and have clear vision, it confused our minds and coloured, if not blurred our" vision" of Truth or Reality.
Unthinking endorsement of all that was going on in the name of material and scientific progress and democracy
also came under his scrutinizing gaze. He debunked these ideas of progress and prosperity and largest good
for the largest numbers as illusions. He, thus, went against the grain of his own age. And, this Herculean
effort required intellectual stamina and acumen. We find the evidence of this intellectual quality in his poems
as much as in his prose works.
Goethe, the German sage and writer once remarked about Byron that whenever he thinks, he becomes a
child or in other words, he loses his maturity. Byron was not a great thinker though he was a a powerful
poet. But in the case of Arnold, it is the other way around. He is not one of those who sing because they
must. Often he is more like one who has thought out his thoughts first and then set himself deliberately to give
them a practical form, than one to whom verse is the most natural vehicle of expression . He was philosophic
in his outlook and he dwelt on the problems and challenges of life, mostly of the community or those of his
society and of his times in his poetry. His revival in the later part of the twentieth century is entirely due to his
intellectual element which has gained currency and respectability in our own times. Larger number of
universities and colleges and large numbers of students and readers have also contributed to Arnolds survival
beyond his own age, compared to Tennyson who was overwhelmingly popular in the Victorian age but is a no
longer read with that avidity any more. H. W. Paul correctly observes:
Poetry 174
No poet of modern times, perhaps no English poet of any time, appeals so directly and so exclusively to the
cultivated taste of the educated classes. To say that a classical education was necessary for understanding
him would be to go too far. But a capacity for appreciating from and style, the charm of rhythm and the
beauty of words, is undoubtedly essential. It may be said of Arnold with truth, and it is his chief praise, that
the more widely mental culture spreads, the higher his fame will be. He was not indeed a profound thinker.
He did not illuminate, like Wordsworth, with a single flash the abyss of mans nature and the inmost recesses
of the human soul. He was not, as Plato was, a spectator of all time and all existence. His aim was, as he said
of Sophocles, to see life steadily and see it whole, But he saw it as a scholar and a man of letters .
Arnold was not a profound philosopher but he had a philosophic bent of mind. He was an interpreter of mans
life. And he was also an interpreter of other minds, greater than his own. He lived up to his own ideals. He
tried to know the best that was ever written or said in the western world and even beyond. Some critics have
opined that after Milton he is the greatest English scholar who was also a poet. Education was his profession
as he was a School Inspector. He was also a professor at Oxford. He understood Education in the broadest
sense of the word. He was not a narrow-minded orthodox person. In his writing we do not find a trace of
orthodoxy, pedantry, assumed manner or mannerisms, nor was he overly and obstructively technical. His
work is academic-full of mental labour and consciously communicative. It is imbued with culture. It is work
written by a learned person and meant for other learned or learned persons. He had his intellectual biases.
The one most distinguishing of them all was his total acceptance of the Greek as ideal and perfect masters of
the creative art. And he used their performance as the touchstone to judge and measure other poets and their
works. As a man, writer critic and poet, his creed was Hellenism. He looked upon Europe as unity for
expanding intellectual and spiritual life of the western world at that time. European was the common Tradition
to which he wanted to belong; he was not of insular inclination preferring the self-complacent life of an
islander belonging only British Isles.
Arnolds Language and Style
It is helpful to know the distinction Arnold made between that which is rhetorical and what he called poetical
sense. For him mere beauty of a poetic passage or lines or verbal manipulations for poetic use of words or
heightened pitch of expression were not the essence of poetry. In his letter to Clough, a friend and like-
minded person and writer, he says: a growing sense of deficiency of the beautiful in your poems, and of this
alone being properly poetical as distinguished from rhetorical, educational or metaphysical;, made me speak
as I did...... I will die protesting against the world that the other (the rhetorical) is false and jarring . His major
complaint against the Elizabethan poet, and more vociferously, against the Romantic poets. was that they had
no verbal discipline or control over their diction or use of language. And, they cared little to together the
strings of relationship between the content and form of their poetry, or compositions. He believed that Shelly
and Keats were highly irresponsible in this regard and by their examples had damaged English poetry. These
two Romantic greats, according to Arnold, had only exuberance of expression , the charm, the richness of
images, and the felicity of the Elizabethan poets.
Keats especially was only a style and form seeker . Arnold had his own criteria to judge and appraise the
greatness of a true poet: there are two offices of poetry one to add to ones store of thoughts and feelings
another to compose and elevate the mind by a sustained tone, numerous allusions, and a grand style . In
fact, he asserted that Poetry can only subsist by its contents and not by exquiaite bits and images. A poet,
therefore, should not get lost in parts, and episodes and ornamental work but must press forward to the
whole .
This brief backdrop will arerve as a necessary curtain raiser for a fuller understanding of Arnolds grand
style , a phrse he appears to have borrowed from Sir Hoshua Reynolds in his Discourses on Art. But he
seems to use it in a some what different way. As stated earlier elsewhere in the present book, his 1853
Preface to his Poems is a significant contribution to the history of criticism. And, it is in that Preface Arnold
175 Matthew Arnold
makes his point on Grand Style clear with reference to the works of the Greek poets: They (the Greeks)
regarded the whole; we regard the parts; with them, the action predominted over the expression of it: with us,
the expression predominates over the action. Not that they failed in experssion, or were inattentive to it; on
the contrary, they are the highets models of expression, and unurpassed masters of the Grand Style." In his
reply to a reviewer who questioned him as to what he meant by Grand Style, Arnold wrote: The Grand
Style arises in poetry, when a noble nature, poetically gifted, treats with simplicity or with severity a serious
subject . Arnold found Milton observing severity of treatment; in Homers Illiad he found an example of
simplicity. He felt that neither simplilcity nor severity is the hall-mark of Cowper, Alexander Pope, Chapman,
Francis Henry Newman. HIstorian of English Literature Compton Ricket says that Arnold was a fine artist,
more limited than Tennyson in his music, less virile than Browning in his grasp of life; but unequalled in
depiciting within wistful moods of the spirit.
Arnold did imbiled lucidity, brevity and clarity from the clssical Greek masters as he had studied them at
Oxford as a student, He does not strive after an effect as did Keats. According to Duffin, Arnolds verse
shows feeling under control, emotion singing though bridled - the poets emotion must be roused by beauty,
and those other high essences amid which he is privileged to dwell, and control must be that of artistic
sensibility. In this latter aspect Arnold never fails: it is this that makes his irregular verse (not generally a
medium to be commended) so completely satisfying . His style has grace and elegance. He does not allow
levity of expression or crudeness even to make an exception to prove the rule of elgance. Nobility of thought
as well as expression are consistently and rigorously pursued in his compositions, whether of prose or in
verse. Some lines, of course,stand out as shining examples of his nobility of thought and expression as do the
following lines from The Scholar Gipsy:
Still nursing the unconquerable hope
Still clutching the inviolable shade.
Whatever he wrote he wrote at a sustained level of expression. W.L.Jones says, Few poets at any time
have produced so much which is so uniformly excellent in style . A few examples will serve as illustration for
the above remarks.
Eyes too expressive to be blue,
Too lovely to be grey
This is how he draws a contrast between Marguerite and Lucy. The entire Grand Style of Scophocles
has been summed up in half a line: He saw life steadily and saw it whole , so also the essence and spirit of
Shakespeares Tragedies is summed up in a short sentence: All pains the immortal spirit must endure . His
observastion on the much touted industrial civilization are terse as follows:
Strange disease of modern life
With its sick hurry, its divided aims.
The sea of poignancy that characterizes the scene of separation of The Forsaken Merman and the pain and
agony of alienated affections between Husband and wife, and between children and their mother Margret
are succinctly uttered as:
Childern dear, was it yesterday?
The Victorian doubt and confusion of the times and blind pursuit of materialism and general feeling of boredom
and aimlessness are captured in a few poetic words with astonishing brevity that go on reflecting the context
of times: Ignorant armies clash by night . The whole of Dover Beach, in fact, is resonant with Miltonic
Movement of verse as we find in Lycidas, Arnolds poetry does not have the melodious tones of Tennysons
poetry.
Again, Arnold cannot be called a symbolist like Yeats but certain symbols recur in his poems hauntingly
suggestive of both personal and subjective melancholy as well as of myth and history. The Sea is a complex
Poetry 176
symbol in Dover Beachd that echoes and signifies the Victorian doubt and confusion and classical assuredness
and faith of former ages through its ebb and flow. The sea in this poem is also a symbol of the poets own
melancholy self. In The Forsaken Merman, the sea is symbolic of a separate world, of alienation of human
world and the natural world at one level and of estrangement between huuman and cultural entities on the
other. Margret leaves the Kings of the seas but she also leaves a husband , a part of the failed institutions
of mans world, that is marriage.
Symbolism apart, critics have also noted a peculiar verbal quality of Arnolds verse. Again, as Duffin points
out most cogently, we have to refer to the music, sweet and sad of Dover Beach, especially of the ebb and
flow of the sea:
But now I only hear/Its melancholy long/withdrawing roar
Retreating, to the breath/Of the night-wind, down the vast edges drear/
And naked shingles of the world.
Arnods contribution to free verse has been a matter of divergent opinions among critics. Saintsbury was not
much appreciative of the internal rhythms of Arnolds poetry. However, there are other critics who have not
missed to analyses Arnolds experiments with free verse. Robert Buchanan, quite early in 1872 dwelled on
this aspect of Arnolds style in an essay in Pauls Magazine. Writes he : Just at this present moment we
want a poet, if we want anything, and we particularly want a great poet, with the courage to "loosen" the
conventional poetic speech-among living men, one poet, at least, is to be applauded for having, inspired by
Goethe, kicked at the traces of rhyme, and written such poems as the Strayed Reveller , Rugby chapel
and Heines Grave . These poems are written almost in prose but have plausibly skillful rhythms. He treats
rhythms as jingling of like endings . Regular mtetre is not a feature of his verse. like his observations of
nature, his sense of rhythm too is accurate. His poems are interspersed with dactyllic and trochiac measures.
His stanzas are often varied. The variety of his verse-form is consonant with the variety of moods in his
poetry. Though, he was not so successful in handling blank verse. Similarly, Arnold is not very fond of
metophor considered by Aristotle as the very life of poetry. The poet, in the Greek tradition, is regarded as a
creator. The poet creates the language in which he writes; he does not merely use it. Therefore, metophor,
which in a way is a device for extending the meaning and recharging it with new possibilities is a potent
instrument in the hands of a poet. Arnold, however, lacks in metaphoric use of language.
On the other hand, he is fond of using homeric epithets, comparisons or similies. These Greek similes are
quite extended and elaborate. At times, if the reader is not clear about their mythical context, he/she might
find himself/herself lost. for example, in The Scholar Gipsy at the end of the poem, Arnold introduces the
Greek simile of Dido and Aeneas who betrayed her and this and this merges with the comparison with Tyrian
Trader who shunned and avoided the greek ship. The reader is sequenced to be equipped with classical
learning to understand the ending of the poem while the rest of the poem is not so demanding as it revolves
around the living legend of the Oxford scholar who became a gipsy and led a wild life in the hope of learning
hypnotism. Though the ending is not illogioal and, in a way, enhances the poignancy as well as the strength of
the message of the poem which is to exhort the reader not to yield to the temptation of compromise in life and,
instead continue to be indifferent and willing to avoid any compromise in order to continue the lifes journey
along a difficult and tortuous path with unshaken faith and unassailable will. Similar examples can be quoted
from his other poems, most striking of them being from Sohrab and Rustum.(for detailed discussion of this
point in the Scholar Gipsy, please read the section on Critical Summary /commentary on the text of The
Scholar Gipsy, please read the earlier part of this book).
Saintsbury, historian of English Criticism, believes that Arnolds Preface to his 1853 Poems was his manifesto
of classicism wherein he set the criterion for his own poetic style. He tried to revive classicism both in form
and content.
177 Matthew Arnold
Short Question Answers
(200 Word approximately)
Q. 1. What is a pastoral elegy? Which of the following poems can be described as a pastoral elegy?
(a) Dover Beach (b) The Scholar Gipsy (c) The Forsaken Merman.
Ans.: The word postoral has its root in the Latin word pastor which means a shepherd or one who
looks after the sheep. Pastoral poetry is a special genre or type of poetry which deals with the
life of shepherds who dwelt in rural areas or rustic countryside, also described as bucolic life.
Theocritus, Virgil, Bion and Moschus, in earlier times, wrote pastoral poetry and followed certion
conventions. for example, a deceased person whom the poet wishes to pay his homage is shown
in his pastoral poem as a shepherd, who lives amidst nature which is personified, and mourns the
death of the poets subject like a human person. The poem usually began with an invocation to
the Muse (Goddess of Poetry). The poem contained many classical reference or allusions, and
rich descriptions of flora and fauna in a rural setting. The poet then heightens his themes of life,
justice scarce on earth, the deceased (main)characters struggles and suffering and finally merging
with the Divine in death and attainment of peace.
Elegy is from the Greek word elegos which signifies a mournful poem, sad and sombre in
mood, a reflective lament. Arnold is regarded as the most elegiac of English poets, who wrote
pastoral elegies, combining the above two forms-pastoral and elegiac.
Q. 2. What do you understand by the term nostalgia? What Rind of nostalgia do you sense and feel
in Arnolds The Scholar Gipsy (b) What poetic function does nostralgia perform in The Scholar
Gipsy ?
Dictionary meaning of nostalgia is homesickness from the Greek notos or returning home.
but as a literary term often used in book reviews and critical essays, nostalgia suggests craving
or pinning for the past life of gone by days in a persons life or history. The past usually appears
more pleasant and for poets and writers this psychological fact becomes a tour de force of their
art. It is a tendency more generally found inromantic poets but classical poets equally go back in
time and highlight the virtues of life as it prevailed then. The emphasis, while remembering the
past, may be on the subjective or personal or it may be common and general. Arnolds poetry
combines both these elements.
In The scholar Gipsy, for example, Arnold recalls the Oxford days of his own as well as that of
the legendary Scholar Gipsy of the poem. He also dwells upon the lost values which were once
practised by men of olden and golden times. This is the most important function fnostalgia plays
in this poem. It is offered as a criticism of life . Things past were good and Things present are
unpoetic ; past ages were glorious, the present times are nasty; full of half believers and
divided aims while The scholar Gipsy had one aim, one business, one desire .
Nostalgia sustains and holds together the diverse elements and moods of the poem.
Q. 3. Between two worlds one dead,/the other powerless to be born .
Are these lines from Dover Beach ? (b) Apply them to a discussion of the theme of Dover
Beach.
Ans. (a) No, these lines are from Arnolds Stanzas from the Grande Chartreuse
(b) But these lines aptly sum up the theme as well as the mood of the poem Dover Beach and
are oft quoted lines of the poet to describe the Victorian Age and also other times of transition.
Poetry 178
The situations of the two poems named above were similar. In both the cases, Arnold and his
wife Lucy visit the scene which later became famous because of these two poems. Both the
Monastery in Grande Chartruese and Dover Beach offer criticsm of life, a creed with the poet
Arnold. The ascetic and sparse life and living of the imtes of the life, the monastery are in sharp
and contrast to the crazy mterialism and luxury of the victorians as pleceived commented upon
by Arnold. Also, the firmness of their faith and divided aims and half-beliefs of victorians are
contrasted in the same vein.
Dover Beach was written after his marriage to Lucy. They visit the English channel on a
honeymoon night but the mood is sombre and melancholy. In this solitude on the sea, the poets
thoughts remain embedded in the question of his own times, the Victorian age. The rise of
materialism and doubt, loss of faith and good values of life trouble his mind which sees symbolized
in the ebb and flow of the waters spread out before him in the moonlit night. This poem is shorter
but deeper in thought and melancholy. Many other poets have expressed their resentment and
despair with their own times. T.S. Elipots The Waste land through the image of unreal city
and London bridge is falling down,".. and wordsworth in his famous lines The world is too
much with us also offer criticism of life and hollowness of the worldly existence where lost
souls flit about like bits of paper against a stormy wind.
Q. 4. Study The Scholar Gipsy as a comment on the disease of modern life ?
Ans. The expression disease of modern life has a direct reference to the context of The Scholar
Gipsy. But, his criticism of modern, victorien life, is not confined to this poem alone. Infact. it is
a consistently recurring theme, not only of his poems but also of his prose works, especially. the
essays. The decline of culture lowering of values, worsening of taste of pepole amidst rise of
materialism, increased knowledge, rising of expectations of ordinary pepole with the expansion
of democracy in England made the Victorian scene a confusing spectacle to sensitive minds like
that of Matthew Arnold. In his letters to Clough and his elegy Thyrsis he is more direct in his
debunking of his own times and its so called progress in all walks of life, especially in science,
economy and democracy;and, he makes it clear that the miserable and confused mind of the
average Victorian is the strange disease called modern life . He himself remained in its grip all
through life. Though he was not driven out of this modern life and, unlike Robert Browning who
lived a good part of his life in Italy, Arnold continued to live in England yet his prophetic voice
never ceased to lash out the sick mind of his age, all classes of his society.
Q. 5. Is the speaker in Dover Beach alienated? How do you interpret alienation? what is his answer
to this alienation and lack of faith in the world around?
Ans. Yes, the speaker often identified with the poet himself feels alienated from his society, the Victorian
society. Lonely in a crowd is a modern phenomenon, much commemted upon by social critics,
literary commentators and psychic consultants in our own time. Arnold himself, elsewhere says:
we mortal millions live alone
Alienation has to be interpreted in existentialist terms. In fact. modern Existentialist philosophers,
poets, dramatists find it an aspect of mans life in the time-world. The more a person becomes
conscious of his situation in life, more he feels estranged from his society and milieu. This
phenomenon is more peculiar to urban living. In the machine age, the living element in the human
soul has lesser scope for self-expression. In a world where every one is crazily running after the
same amenities and comforts of life, the scope of individuality and uniqueness becomes limited.
Thus prosperity accompanied by rising self-consciousness disturbs the mind. If he chooses not
to listen to his inner voice, he is likely to be reduced to a mere object and if he seeks self-
179 Matthew Arnold
realization with in the bounds of society, he finds himself at conflict with his social surroundings.
This is a dilemma not easy of solution and estrangement between man and his environment
grows.
Individual love is the poets answer to this estrangement : Ah ; love, lets be true to one
another/ for this world which seems/ To lie before us like a land of dreams/ So various, so
beautiful, so new/ Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light/ nor certitude,nor peace, nor help for
pain
Q. 6. Write a short note on the past that has vanished with reference to The scholar Gipsy and
Dover Beach.
Ans. The elegiac strain is strong in Arnolds poetry. For him the whole world was nothing but a
darkling plain and modern aristocracy, Middle classes, and the lower classes were the
Barbarians , philistines and the populace , all with degenerative tastes and values. He turned
to the post for succur and sustenance and relief from mental pain. His grief was not personal.
He was a man of culture and cultural leader of his times. It the general decline of culture and
disappearance of order that disturbed his mind and he sought solace in the past and gone by ages
of Greak and classical time. Whether it was an imaginary world or not, for the poets imagination
it provided a rich resource for recharging his mental batteries.
Dover Beach and The scholar Gipsy are interesting mixture of Romanticism and classicism.
Romantics always look to the past as distance in time lends charm to the things past. A ruin has
a grandeur of its own and tickles our memory to see through time and re-live the past and
imagine the building that this ruin once was. In these impersonal elegies, Arnold mourns the
death of Faith which once was like the sea spread out in the moonlit night and girdled the whole
earth but now it is only dry pebbles or shingles on the shore! In the Scholar Gipsy too loss of
Faith theme is repeated again and again in the later part of the poem.
Q. 7. Explain briefly the context of the following lines poetry
(i) He read each wound, each weakness clear,
And stuck his finger on the place
And said: Thou ailest here, and here 1
(ii) O Rotha, with thy living wave!
Sing him thy best! for few or none
Hears thy voice right, now he is gone.
(i) These lines occur in the poem Memorial Verses, Arnold wrote on the occasion of William
Wordsworths death on April 23, 1850. But the poet also recalls Byron and Goethe in his
memorial to wordsworth as they all represented an age to which they made contributions as
reformers or fighters against the wrong tendencies of time. These line refer to Goethe, a
German Philosopher, writer, poet dramatist and novelist. Goethe died in 1832 but his work is
immortal. He made very correct diagnosis of the disease of modern times and of his
contemporay society even as he very accurately pin pointed the flaws and foibles of his
society even as a doctor or physician examines a patient and feels his ailing body. And by
digging his fingers can feel and find the exact places where the pain arises so that he can
administer the right medicines or provide the right medical aid (ii) These lines are also taken
from Arnolds Memorial Verses. Rotha is the name of the river along whose banks
Wordsworth the poet was buried on his death. The poet exhorts the river to sing his best
songs through lilting of his waves because the river has the right listener. Wordsworth himself
was a poet of powerful, overflow of feelings. So he knows and can appreciate the rhythm
Poetry 180
and poetry of Nature represented by Rotha. Though WW is gone from the world of men, he
has come to Rotha, the lap of nature.
Q. 8. Explain with reference to the context the following:
(i) Come away, away children;
Come children, come down !
(ii) When the sweet airs come seaward.........
We will gaze, from the sand-hills
Singing: There dwells a loved one / But cruel is she
She left lonely for ever
The kings of the sea.
(i) These lines have been taken from The Forsaken Merman, a narrative, sad poem of
separation by Matthew Arnold. Here the Merman is calling his children who like him feel
deserted by Margret. Margret was a woman from the human world but she married the
merman of the poem who was half-human and half-sea creature. After years of happy
living and raising a family of five children, Margret one day comes for a visit to the surface
of the Sea. On the shore, she listerns to the clanging of Churchbells. It is Easter time. She
seeks permission of her husband to go back to her village church so she can pray and save
her soul . The Merman lets her go but asks her to come back soon. Margret never returns.
The lines occur when some time has passed and the merman goes out again toward the
village. He is very aggrieved at his being deserted by his wife and mother to his children.
Come children is a kind of refrain in the poem which enhances the poignancy and pathos
of the poem. The Merman imagines that Margret must have been disturbed by the stormy
wind; may be she came to the window of her house in the village, may be she looked
seaward; may be she was reminded of the life of the sea of his children and of her husband.
But finally it dawns upon him at they have been finally deserted by Margret and there is no
use of imaging such things.
(ii) Continuing in the same vein, the Merman makes his final comments in the poem about his
wife. That Margret was a cruel woman who betrayed her husbands trust and never returned
home, leaving behind her growing children, the youngest of them being very small. Now
Merman and his children can only sing their songs theme of which is the cruelty of the
woman who deserted them, forsook them after years of tender love. These kings of the sea
will forever lament the moment when Margret left them, leaving them forever deprived and
aggrieved.
Q. 9. Write a two hundred-word comment on The Forsaken Merman
This poem has been described as a romantic poem written by a classicist. The poem lilts with
almost with Keatsian cadence. Though it must be admitted that this poem too is elegiac like most
other poems by Arnold. It is a plaintive song of separation, though it is narrative in mode. It is not
a story but a chant , as a critic has remarked. The tone is intense, feeling personal and pathos
overwhelming in this poem. This is an example of mixture of romaticism and classicism for
which Arnold has special aptitude. It is lucid, clear and limpid in its flow reminiscent of the Greek
classicists. The poem has also been singled out for its autobiographical element. Margret of the
poem some commentators say is none but Marguerite whom Arnold fell in love with but could
not marry because of perhaps cultural incompatibilities. Marguerite was French and Arnold
English; in the poem, Margret is from the human world and The Merman is from the Sea Kingdom.
The sea is regarded by some scholars and academic critics as the most important character in
the poem. It creates the atmosphere as well as the tragic situation in the poem. It is modeled on
the Westmoorland lake with which Arnold was familiar since his youthful days. Then there is the
181 Matthew Arnold
typical Arnold ian nostalgia. Going back in memory of things past. Toward the end, poignancy of
this dramatic story lyrically told becomes a flowing emotion of journey through Mermans own
past life. The sea imagery enhances the contrast between the denizens of the human world and
the creatures of the perhaps freed from the pains and sorrows that come form human
consciousness. In this poem, sea Arnold makes a departure from his usual depiction of nature as
quiet and serene. Here Nature is calm as well as stormy, furious as well as serene.
Q. 10. Write a brief note on LITERATURE AS THE CRITICISM OF LIFE
Ans. This is a most important dictum Arnolds practice as poet and critic. Arnold assigned a very high
destiny to poetry and believed that it had a function to perform, nay, a mission to carry out on
behalf Society. It will be instructive to understand this dictum in Arnolds own words. In his
Study of Poetry, Arnold says:
In poetry, as a criticism of life, under the conditions fixed for such a criticism, by the law of
poetic truth and poetic beauty, the spirit of our race will find, we have said, as time goes on and
as other helps fail, its consolation and stay. But the consolation and stay will be of power in
proportion to the power of the criticism of life. And the criticism of life will be of power and
proportion as the poetry conveying it is excellent rather than inferior, sound rather than unsound
or half sound true rather than untrue and half true. For Arnold poetry was superior to science,
religion and other agents of humanist culture. By criticism of life Arnold appears to suggest
interpretation of life. Poetry is a criticism of life in the same way as a good person is a criticism
of a bad person. Poetry has to be excellent so that it bears a contrast to the mundane realities of
the work-a-day world.
Since Arnold, other views have been expressed in our own time. T.S. Eliot, for instance, thought
that the poet has no commitment to society ; He/she has a commitment to poetry only. And, that
poetry is not composed of ideas as Arnold said but of words, Arnolds dictum on Literature was
perhaps a reaction to the decline of culture and deteriorating taste of the English society. Thus,
it has contextual validity rather than a universal application.
Q. 11. What do you understand by Arnolds High Seriousness? Explain clearly.
Ans. Arnold the critic and poet was also a sage figure with a missionary zeal. He wanted to
communicate impactful massages to the declining culture of his time. He coined a number of
pithy phrases for this purpose which were loaded with meaning and cultural significance. High
Seriousness is a part of Arnoldian terminology which includes similar other phrases such as
criticism of life Hellenism and Hebraisn , Sweetness and light, Touchstone Method, Poetic
Truth and Poetic Beauty. These terms have become a part of the academic vocabulary and are
frequently used by students and teachers. High Seriousness can be traced back to Aristotle,
the Greek philosopher, and is equivalent to his phrase philosophoteron kai spoudaiteron
which has been variously translated as remarkable serious or high or philosophical with
deeper meanings etc. In his study of poetry" Arnold company poetry with history says that the
superiority of poetry over history consists in its possessing a higher truth and higher seriousness .
though Aronld as a classicist advocated the supremacy of the whole over its parts s in a work
of art for practical purpose and somewhat diverging from this emphasis on wholeness he uses
the touchstone method of judging the element of high seriousness and poetic truth in
some great poets like Homer, Dante and Shakespeare by quoting passages from Illiad, Divine
comedy, Hamlet and Miltons Paradise Lost. He ignored the claims of Chaucer to be a serious
poet because of his comicality and vulgarity. Arnolds seriousness cannot be taken as a reliable
and serious criterion for estimating the worth, quality and greatness of a poem or poet, as has
been shown by theory and practice of poet-critics such as Eliot in later times.
Poetry 182
Q. 12. Briefly define Romanticism and comment on Arnold as a Romnaticist.
Ans. Romanticism has been defined variously as triumph of imagination over convention or liberalism
in literature, or liberation and assertion of the ago or curious mixture of wonder and beauty
or revival of medievalism , nostalgic backward look on time , passionate overflow of feeling
escape from life and many more things. Romaticsm may be all these things yet it may be much
more. It is awakening of the imaginative sensibility or wonder added to common experiences
or naturalisation of the supernatural.
Arnold does not fall in any of the above definitions. He was a mixture of classicism and romanticism
because, inspired by the Greek masters he wanted to see life steadily and see it whole as a
poet, critic and man of culture. A romaticist does seek for truth within himself and his approach
as poet is subjective, yet trancendental. We do meet quite a few examples of inner projection in
Arnolds poetry. Dover Beach, The Scholar Gipsy, Memorial Verses and The Forsaken
Merman, all have elements of romanticism in them. Dover Beach is almost Keatsian in its
melancholy and lilting cadence; Scholar Gipsys escape from Oxford to seek the company the
wild brother hood and lore of hypnotisn is romatic even in conceptualization and characterization;
equally so is landscaping and depiction of the Oxford countryside. In Memoerial Verses, his
tributes to not only Wordsworth, the father of English romantic poetry but to the terrible child of
English romaticism, Byron is a proof of Arnolds romantic inclinations irrespective of his avowals
on behalf classicisn. And, to surpass tham a ll, we have The Forsken Merman which is romantic
both in conceptualization and execution.
Q. 13. Discuss Arnold as a poet of love in the context of poems prescribed in your course of study.
Ans. Robert Bridges, poet critic, thinks that a poem is a reflection of the subjective experience of a
poet or an intimate echo of the poets life. This may be partly true and to that extent applies to
Arnolds poetry also. His personal experiences relevant in this context are his abortive love
affair with the French Marguerite whom he is known to have met in Switzerland but they could
not get married perhaps because of their cultural incompatibilities. Related to this failed love is
his successful marriage to Frances Lucy Wightman. Both these experiences appear to have
inspired quite a few of Arnolds poems. But, in other poems also the theme of love does occur
and the indirect incidents portrayed in these poems even more effectively comment on the
frustration of the failed love or the promise of the married love. Dover Beach is a tribute to
married love because here in his lines Ah! Love lets be true to one another, he finds solace
and relief from the doubts and illusions of life and the world which is spread out before him like
a charming landscape of dreams but which has neither joy nor help from pain. Only true
love, married love is the mainstry of life. In The Forsken Merman failed love, betrayed love finds
a piognant and bitter expression. The Marget of this poem appears to be none else than Marguarite
of real life. Margrets desertion of her husband and children and the Mermans description of her
as a cruel woman are an echo of the intimate life of Arnold himself more particularly of his
failed love with the French woman Marguerite. Even in Scholar Gipsy toward the end of the
poem, there is a reference to Dido who was betrayed by Aeneas. Though the situation here is
reversed and it is the male partner who betrays the female partner yet indirectly this reference
points to Arnolds personal experience.
Q. 14. What do you know about STOICISM? How will you relate it to Arnolds poems that you have
read in your courses of study?
Ans. There was in Athens, the Greek city of ancient fame, a Hall or colonade also known as s to a
Poikila. Some philosphers lectured there in the Greek times. Some of them were Zeno, Diogenese,
Cleanthes. These philosophers were known as the STOICS. Later on, Greek philosophers and
183 Matthew Arnold
men of action also followed their philosphy, famous among them are Cato, Brutus, Seneca,
Epiptectus, Cicero and Marcus Aurlious.
Stoicism actually branched out from CYNICISM. The Stoics taught how to practise the right
virtue in lifes conduct and living. Epipteus, though a Greek, became a Ministter in Marcus
Aurelius, the Roman Emperors court. Both practictised more or less the same philosophy which
Epictetus had propounded. His view of Mans fate was rather dim. Thou art a little soul bearing
about a corpse . Since life is uncertain and death can come any time, it is important that man
must be doing the right things all the time lest he dies while doing a wrong thing. In Arnolds
poems, we find stoicism scattered everywhere. But, in The Scholar Gipsy, it comes through
very directly. Endurance is the test a stoicist must pass for good conduct in life. The Scholar
Gipsy retains one aim, one business, one...: and Still nursing the unconquerable hope he is
brushing through life. In the last lines of The Forsaken Merman also, the seacreatures continuing
to live with his children hoping against hope, we find an illustration of Arnolds Stoicism. Dover
Beach, ends on a note of affirmation. Lifes agonies must be endured, may be by coming together
and being true to one another in married love.
Q. 15. Goeth in Weimar sleeps, and Greece,
Long since, saw Byrons struggle cease....
(i) Explane with reference to the context the above lines.
(ii) Compare, Goeth Byron and Wordsworth, briefly pointing out why Arnold refers to them
together?
(iii) Where does he refer these poets together?(One line answer only) Full answer (200words)
(i) & (ii) Ans. Goethe, Byon and Wordsworth liveed in what has come to be called the Romantic
Age just preceding the Vicortian Age in which Matthew Arnold lived. All these men were poets
and eminent literay figures, almost culture heroes of their times. They also had varying influence
on Arnolds Mind as a poet, critic and thinker. Arnold was the closest to Wordworth who lived in
close proximity in the Lake District of England. Arnold was much influenced by him because he
thought that Wordworths poetry had the healing power for frayed neves and hardened tempers,
much needed aid in Arnolds own times when confused Victorians were sick with hurry and
the disease of modern times as the English culture and society were fast declining in spite of
the general apathy and complacency of the public at large.
On April 23, 1850 Wordsworth died. Arnold wrote a poem or dirge ,as he called it in his letter
to Clough, in the granstyle . Though this poem later called as Memorial Verses was written as
a memorial to Wordsworth or an eulogy to the elder poet whom Arnold had great respect for, he
thought it fit to include his homage to Goethe and Byron who had died earlier in 1832in Weimar,
Germony and in 1824 in Greece, respectively. Wordswoth, Goethe, Byron were three different
personalities but, for Arnold, they had something in common. In his memorial verses he recalls
them together because all of them stood up against their times. Byron was the fount of fiery
power which he used for that Titanic strife . Goethes eye plunged down the weltering
strife too as he looked as Europes dying and he advised his contemporaries: The end is
everywhere/ Art still has truth take refuse there! Wordsworth too lived and struggled against
iron time/ of doubts, disputes, destractions, fears but He laid us as we lay at birth/ on the cool
flowery lap of earth. In the final stanza of the poem Arnold distinguishes these three personalities:
Gothes age mind and Byrons force time may restore or bring again but where will Europes
latter hour/ Again find Wordsworth healing power?
(iii) As already explained these three poets have been referred to together in Arnolds Memorial
Verses.
Poetry 184
Q. 16. Discuss Dover Beach briefly as a comment on Victorian crises of Faith.
Arnolds letter to his close friend Arthur Clough will be relevant and will throw light on moot
points of the discussion here. These are damned times-everything is against one-the height to
which knowledge is come, the spread of luxury, our physical enervation, the absense of great
natures, the unavoidable contact with millions of small ones, high profligate friends, moral
desperados like Carlyle, our own selves and the sickening consciousness of our difficulties.
He, like many others of his times, was then wandering between two worlds, one dead another
to powerless to be born.
The Victorian Age saw a sudden spurt of activity and times began to move faster as if the world
were asleep for ages. Science, materialism, democracy all recorded immense growth and
expansion. At the same time, morals and religions and culture declined steeply. Science Materilism,
Democracy together appeared to have made a big assault on the steady values and verities of
life. Doubt and devaluation of authority and disbelief in a divine dispensation eroded the sources
of succur and consolation to man who for centuries had relied upon God and Faith for leading a
life of for bearance and good conduct. Social cohesion and communtiy life likewise received
jolts. In Dover Beach, which basically is a love poem and has been discussed as such earliear in
this book, also dwells on the theme of the crisis of Faith. In the poem the sea becomes the
symbol of lack of the faith of his own times as well as of the faith that gloriously ruled over the
hearts of men in ages gone by. The greting roar of withdrawing sea across the English channel
reminds him of his own times and his contemporay Victorians from whose hearts and minds faith
is receding like the receding of sea at Dover Beach, leaving behind only shingles and pebbles on
the dried up shore! But it was not like this always and Arnold is full of the nostalgia for the past
ages when the sea of faith was at full tide like the tide he had observed a while ago on this very
Dover Beach. It is a short poem but it has wide ranging thought and deepening significance and
much philosophical meaning. Though Arnold is apparently on a honeymoon trip, the crises of
Victorien times caused by the loses of Faith does not allow him to rest his mind or get lost in
romantic embraces of love. Instead, the overwhelming mood of the poem remains melancholy
and relective of the mind lost in worries and vicissitudes of life, a state of mind resulting from
Arnolds preoccupation, almost an obsession with the Victorian Crisis of Faith.
17. Q. Praphrase the first ten lines of The Scholar Gipsy. Also give meanings of the following (i) wattled
cotes (ii) wistful (iii) Bawling fellows (iv) Rack (v) shoot... (v) Gross and recross (vi) Strips
(vii) Moon-blanched grass (viii) Begin the quest.
Ans. In this opening pastoral scene, the poet urges the shepherd to leave his company for now because
his fellow companions grazing the sheep in the hills yonder are calling him. Go back to your
work, loosen the sheep from their fold; do not neglect your flock of sheep; they wish to be fed,
so delay not. Nor should you let your shepherd companions angrily strain their throats to call you
with hoarse throats.Go, right now, delay not and do not let grass blades already nibbled by the
sheep grow into shoots (meaning make haste and go). But when the fields become quiet, that is
when the working shepherds have ceased their activity and left the field; and the shepherds and
their watch dogs have become tired andgone from the scene; may be only a few white straying
sheep are lagging behind their flock and seen crossing recrossing the narrow plots and when the
grass has become colourless (blanched) in the moonlight, then Shepherd, then at that quiet evening
hour, you come again and be my companion in the quest (for the long lost legendary scholar gipsy
of Oxford university whose story is written in Glanvills book) Poetic language, it will be seen, is
not easy to be rendered in prose. The poet is a creator of the language in which writes; he has
what is called the poeticlicense , that he is allowed to take liberties with the grammar and
185 Matthew Arnold
dictionary meantings of words and use them to convey contextual and universal significance
through poetic use of language.
Word meanings:
(i) Sheep-fold made of wooden sticks (ii) wistful,. desiring, craving, feeling eager etc (iii) Bawling
fellows... angrily shouting sheperds, his co-workers in the fields. (iv) rack.. to strain to be hard
upon ones (throat here) (v) Shoot.. sprouting or growing of new, sharp blades of grass (vi) Cross..
recross.. wandering, stray, straying sheep; sheep turning white in moonlight. (vii) Strips.. narrow
grassy plots (viii) Moon-blanchsed grass.. the grass that has lost its colour in the light of the
moon. (ix) Start the search for the legendary scholar gipsy known to be visiting these verry fields
of the Oxford countryside.
Q. 18 Explain lines 34-39 of the poem Memoria Verses by Arnold.
And. ah, pale ghosts, rejoice..............mournful gloom.
The poem was writen on the occasion of William Wordsworths death in April 1850. In these
lines Arnold eulogizes Wordsworth and pays his homage to him. The foremost among Romantic
poets and leader of the Romantic movement in English peotry, Wrodsworth, who lived close to
Arnolds place in the Lakes Districts, exercised very deep influence on Arnolds mind. Here
Arnold is addressing the spirits of the underworld where Wordsworth, according to the old
myths, now onward will be residing. Now they ought to rejoice, be joyful because now
Wordsworths spirit has joined their company. And, Wordsworths spirit is a musical and singing
spirit the like of which the Hades, or underworld of the dead spirits, has not seen since the days
of the Greek mythic hero of immemorial times. The reference to Orpheus is interesting because
Orpheus, a legendary musician, the son of Apollo himself, had visited the Hades or underworld
of the dead in order to plead with Pluto, the God of Death, to release Orpheus wife Eurydice
who had died. Orpheus entered the underworld, the kingdom of Pluto, playing his lyre and singing.
His music had so moved Proseprine and her husband, Pluto, the god of death that they agreed to
release Eurydice, wife of Pluto but on one condition. The condition was that Orpheus will not
look back while on his journey back as Eurdice would follow him out of the underworld. But
Orpheus could keep his promise, he could not control himself and burning his eyes fallen and
looked at his wife Eurydice who was following him. Since he broke his promise with Pluto,
Orpheus lost his wife once again, never to return to the world of the living. Now that Wordsworth
with his sweet poems and musical verses has entered the underworld, he will be the first singer
after Orpheus to charm and hyponitize and influence its denizens, with his earthly music. It
should, hence, be a time of rejoicing and celebrating of the ghostly spirits just as it is a time of
lamenting and mourning with the living spirits like Arnold.
Q. 19. Clearly explain lines 21-28 of the poem Dover Beach by Matthew Arnold.
The Sea of Faith......of the world.
These lines from Dover Beach should not be understood in literal sense because they have deep
symboilic meanings. Arnold invests the Sea with Historical and cultural significance. He and his
wife, on a honeymoon trip to Dover Beach, a sea resort on the English channel which divides
England (an island) with the rest of Europe and France which is across the English Channel
appear to be watching the scene of the ebbb and flow of the sea in the moonlit night. The sea
here is in full tide. The sight reminds Arnold, the poet, of Faith. Faith that once its earlier times
was also full like the present Sea in the moonlit night. This North Sea in the poem loses its
physical dimension and becomes a symbol of Faith pulsated in the hearts and minds of men like
this North Sea in full tide. In other words. once in ancient times, people had Faith, Hope and
Poetry 186
Charity or the verities of life that governed their lives. They had fervour and spiritual grace and
fulfilment. But the scene is now changing to the present times when people have lost that kind of
Faith and are driven by forces of time, forces of science, forces fo materialism and industrialism.
The people now are full of doubt, depression and distractions and they are not calm and serene.
They have become skeptics, or doubting Thomases, or agnostics or godless. Just as the tide of
the Sea ebbs away or recedes, leaving the shore dry so also the Sea of Faith has now receded
leaving the hearts of men dried. Now only the naked pebbles are strewn on the shore. Arnold
who did not have much faith in the claims of material prosperity, demcractic expansion and
scientific progress here is in a sombre mood to be contrasted with the occasion of honeymoon
that is usually joyful.
Q. 20. Explain lines 48-58 of The Forsaken Merman Children dear, once she sate with you and me/
... She said: I must go, for my kinsfolk pray/In the little grey church on the shore to-day / T will
be Easter-time....Ah, me.
In these lines the forsaken Merman who has been deserted by his wife Margret recalls wistfully
the happier times and days spent by them together with their children in the kingdom of the sea,
or at its bottom. She then was a loving wife and caring mother. She looked after their children
with tenderness and loving care; but now that part of life has come to a sorry and sad end. She
heard the sound of the bells clanging in the country church from the human world. It was Easter
time when the Christian people pray together in the Church remembering the sufferring and
sacrifice of Christ, the son of God in the belief that this act of prayer shall save their soul.
Margret used to comb the hair of the littlest of their children and those were happy days but now
it looks to be a distant dream or perhaps the time that never was! The call of the Church bells
was overpowering; Margret thought she had failed hopelessly in her religious duties and was in
danger of losing her soul. She wanted to go back to the Church to pray together with her people
in the village. She was scared of damnation; her conscience was in trouble. She asked her
husband permission to go back to her people to say prayers. The Merman, who loved his wife
dearly could not say No . But he told her to come back soon, at the earliest. Margret had smiled
at that time. Merman thought it was the smile of agreement but it was actually a smile of
betrayal. She never returned home to the bottom of the sea, to her children and to her husband,
the Merman!
Q. 21. Paraphrase lines 85-107 of the poem The Forsaken Merman.
Ans. The Merman is still hoping against hope about his wife Margrets reurn. He asks his children not
to cry and call for their mother any more. It would be more proper to withdraw from the earth
and go back to the depths of the sea, their home. He is imagining about the present life of
Margret in the human world after she had left the Merman and her children behind. Maybe she
now sits and works on her spinning wheel in her village. Maybe, as she spins she also sings some
song or hums on some tune as the rest of the town is full of hustle and bustle and she is happy
about the busy life of the town. May be she is watching some child playing with his toy in the
street. And the church is lit with the sunlight and the church bell and the clergyman can be seen
in that light. And, may be, she sings with full throated voice. May be, spindle has dropped from
her hand as she got too much taken up with her own song. And, now the spinning wheel has
stopped. Suddenly, the Merman feels a kick of joy as the thought crosses his mind that Margret
is thinking and remembering her children, their children! And, may be, she has come over to the
window to look seaward or in the direction of the sea where once she lived with the Merman as
his wife and mother to his children. Softly, silently she looks to the shore along the sea. At times,
the memory of her children must become too much to bear and she must utter sighs and weeping
cries. She may be silent, she may be saying nothing about her past life but her tears and wails will
187 Matthew Arnold
tell it all. May be she feels an intense desire within herself to see her young daughter, and the
gleaming hair of the little mermaid , her daughter disturb her heart! These are the empty thoughts
of a romantic imagination perhaps, because the hard reality is that Margret has returned to the
human world never to return to the life in the Sea!
Q. 22. Explain clearly the lines 31-40 of the poem The Scholar Giosy
And near me on the grass lies Glanvil book..............
But came to Oxford and his friends no more.
The orieginal story of the Scholar Gipsy is to be found in Glanvils book entitled THE VANITY
OF DOGMATIZING, written in the seventeenth century while the poet Arnold is writing his
poem The Scholar Gipsy in the latter part of the nineteenth century or the Victorian Age.
This book is lying close to the poet right now. The poet had read the story earlier with great
interest and he feels is like reading the story once again. The story deals with the event of the life
of a scholar who was studying at Oxford university. He had talent; he had a good inventive or
curious brain or mind and creative imagination. But for his special kind of interests and skills and
talents he could find not much scope within the framework of the university education and
system of studies. Perhaps driven out by his sense of incompatibility with the Oxford environment,
this scholar simply lelf the Oxford premises and his Oxford friends on a summer morning. He
now joined the company of gipsies and from them he sought to learn the art of hypnontism, or
thought-reading. He was spotted in the company of these gipsies or wild brotherhood and
they thought that this young scholar had ruined his career at Oxford and life in general, even
though he had remarkable abilities. Whatever be the pejorative view of the world, the fact
remains that the Scholar Gipsy never returned to Oxford nor to his friends.
Q. 23. Explain lines 201-210 of The Scholar Gipsy: Oh born in days...they solitude
In these lines Arnold, addressing the legendary scholar gipsy of the poem says that it was good
that he was born in an age different from Arnolds own age, that is the Victorian Age. In the
earlier times when Scholar Gipsy was alive and left Oxfor by choice people were not assailecd
by doubts and were not in the grip of despair. Science, materialism, democracy and reasoning
which have weakened and debilitated the culture of the Victorians were not powerful forces as
they are in Arnolds times. Life was carefree, free from doubt and skepticism, free from too
much hurry and tension of life. It flowed like the sweet and soft Thames flows with its limpid
waters. People then did not have divided aims and too many schemes and pursuits to get
ahead in life or amass wealth and creature comforts. Their sensibilities were not disfunctional
like ours, The scholar gipsy was not miserable as he lived in an age of Faith and Hope and
Charity. Arnold urges the scholar gipsy most vehemently that he should keep away from the
Victorians and Victorian times infected as they are with this disease of modern times . He
should fly away from the corrupt and sick society of Arnolds times.
Poetry 188
List of Questions
Q 1. Write an estimate of Arnold as a poet.
Q. 2. Write a brief note on the life of Matthew Arnold.
Q. 3. What are the main characteristics of Arnold as a Poet?
4. Q. Which of the prescribed poems is an example of Arnolds narrative art?
Q. 5. Discuss Arnolds poetry as a mixture of Classicism and Romanticism; illustrate your arguments with
examples from your reading of prescribed texts.
Q.6. Select one poem from those prescribed for your course of study which can be described as a love
poem. Discuss the poem so selected as a love poem and difficulties you experience in giving it the
description of a love poem .
Q. 7. Arnold as a poet is not interested in expressing his subjective experience. He is more concerned with
the general movements of his times. Discuss this statement showing clearly your agreements and
disagreements citing passages from prescribed poems.
Q. 8. Write a detailed note on the Victorian Age.
Q. 9. Why Arnold cannot be called as the representative poet of the Victorian Age?
Q. 10. Specify passages from the prescribed poems that would help you identify Arnold as a Classicist.
Q. 11. Specify passages from the presecribed poems that would help you identify Arnold as a Romanticist.
Q. 12. How do you define modernity? In what respects Arnold is modern as a poet?
Q. 13. What do you understand by ALIENATION ? With which movement in modern phiolosophy
and Literature you will associate ALIENATION ? Point out a few examples from Arnolds
poetry limiting your choice to the poems prescribed to illustrate your understanding of
Alienation .
Q. 14. Would you describe Arnold as an intellectural poet or an emotional poet? IIIustrate your answer
with lines quoted from his poems.
Q. 15. Discuss Arnold as a poet of Victorian Unrest. Quote lines from prescribed poems to illustrate the
various points raised in your discussion.
Q. 16. Which one of the poems prescribed answers the Arnoldian injuntion that poetry ought to be a criticism
of life ?
Q. 17. Critically examine any one poem you appreciate most from your prescribed texts of Arnolds
poems.
Q. 18. Arnold is a poet of Nature but his attitude toward Nature is not the same as that of the Romantics
(Wordsworth, Shelley, Keats, Byron etc.), Discuss.
Q. 20. Discuss Arnold as a (i) Lyric Poet (ii) Narrative Poet (iii) Elegiac Poet giving examples from your
prescribed reading (b) Name the poems from your prescribed reading that could be classified as
(i) Lyric (ii) Elegy (iii) Narrative.
Q. 21. What is the Nature of Arnolds Melancholy? Does it reflect his personal frustrations and despair in
life?
189 Matthew Arnold
Q. 22. Write critical appreciation of (a) The Scholar Gipsy (b) Memorial Verses (c) Dover Beach (d) The
Forsaken Merman?
Q. 23. Recall five or six lines from each of the prescribed poems and explain why you find these lines
memorable?
Critics on Arnold : Selected Comments
(1) Arnolds much condemned criticism of life is at least true of his own poetry. Even in the literary sense
there is a surprising quantity of wise criticism in his verse, Goethe, Byron and Wordsworth are all
examined with wonderful insight. Memorial Verses and in The Epilogue to Lessings Laocoon we
have a discussion of the principles of the arts of music, painting and poetry. But Arnolds verse is
critical in a far deeper sense than this. It is in accordance with his own definition, Criticism of Life. In
all his deepest poems, in Thyrsis and The Scholar Gipsy, in Resignation, in the Obermann poems in
A Southern Night Arnold is passing judgment on life and his age, the life of his country; the lives of
individual men in his last-named poem, the fate of his brother, dying in exile in the attempt to return to
the country of his birth, becomes the text for a sermon on the restless energy of the English and on the
strange irony of fate which preserves for the numbers of such a race graves so peaceful on theirs by
those hoary Indian hills, This gracious of Midland Sea.
Hugh Walker-
(2) If I had to define Arnolds place in poetry. I should be disposed to say of him, quite simply, that he
[Arnold] is the greatest elegiac poet in our language; not in virtue merely of Thyrsis if anyone likes
to think Adonais a greater elegy. I am not overmuch disposed to quarrel with him but in virtue of his
Muse. His genius was essentially elegiac character. Out of what experience came, we are to explain
this dominant quality, it is not easy to know ...... His poetry, profoundly melancholy, runs from the
world, runs from it as I think, hurt, hurt in some vital part.
H.W. Garrod
(3) Thyrsis is a very quiet poem, but I think solid and sincere. It will not be popular, however. It had long
been in my head to connect Clough with that Cumnor Country, and when I began I was carried
irresistibly into this form: you say, truly, however, that there is much in Clough (the whole prophet side,
in fact) which one cannot deal with in this way, and one has the feeling if one reads the poem as a
memorial poem, that not enough is said about Clough in it; I feel this so much that I do not send the
poem to Mrs. Clough. Still had this idyllic side too; to deal with that suited my desire to deal again with
the Cumnor Country, any way, only so could I treat the matter this time.
M. Arnold
(4) Integration this is the obsessive theme of Arnolds youthful letters to Clough, the integration
of the individual, the integration of the work of art, the integration, finally, of the social order.
Paradoxically, Arnold sought the way to his own personal integration through an Elizabethan eccentricity
of conduct. In the end, however, the fate he feared and fought overtook him; the poetic power
passed away. It passed with youth and the ability to maintain the youthful dandyism. He was
always to retain a reasoned admiration of gaiety and high spirits, and a light insouciance to use
against the pointless sobriety of English culture; he was everlastingly elegant and perhaps not
annoyed at being called a Jeremiah in kid gloves. But the youthful quality which had sustained his
poetry disappears.
He seems always, in the Romantic fashion, to have been awaiting its inevitable end. Few poets can
have been more conscious of their youth. But be bustling about it; we are growing old, and advancing
towards the deviceless darkness: it would be well not to reach it till we have at least tried some of the
things men consider desirable. The theme recurs so often. How life rushes away, and youth. One has
Poetry 190
dawdled and scrupled and fiddle fiddled and it is all over. What a difference there is between
reading in poetry the morals of the loss of youth, and experiencing it !
Lionel Trilling
(5) Arnold does not make total war upon the Romantics: he is caught up in a love-hate relationship with
them. We have seen how, in his poetry, he struggled to vanquish the Romantic in himself: intense
subjectivity, a sense of alienation, a brooding melancholy are what the temperamental Romantics had
offered repeatedly, but they had not been what we want. We have seen how, in the 1853 Preface, he
sought to bring poetry (not least his own) to heel by invoking the Aristotelian virtues of disciplined form
and the noble simplicity of the grand style, at the same time taking Keats and, behind him, Shakespeare
to task, for self-indulgent Romanticism and for his enervating effect upon his imitators among whom
Tennyson is implied. Neither Sohrab and Rustum nor Balder Dead nor Merope could turn the
current in practice, for The Scholar-Gipsy and Dover Beach born down more strongly in the contrary
direction. On the theoretical front, however, Arnold could, on the surface at least, give a more single-
minded impression. In order to discipline Romanticism he takes up a classical stance; feeling and
intellect must for the maximum effect cooperate.
Michael Thorpe
(6) Arnolds love-poetry is possibly the least important part of his writing; it is certainly the least regarded.
Marguerite, the dark lady of the poems, has received an almost embarrassing amount of attention,
but the poems themselves have not been thought worthy of critical study. For myself, his love-poetry
was what first attracted me to Arnold, perhaps because it was so different from Brownings, to me the
ideal. It has a personal intimacy hardly found elsewhere; it is informed by an astringent emotion that
touches the heart more poignantly than the sultrier passions of the greater love-poets. It is everywhere
unhappy, like the complicated loves of the sonnets, and indulges a brooding meditativeness only paralleled
in Donne. And partly, I suppose, because of the injunction on a biography an atmosphere of
mystery attaches to the situation. We do not know who was the object of the poems, what were
Arnolds relations with her, or indeed if she existed at all. And yet this is genuine love-poetry.
H.C.Duffin
(7) He cannot paint the restlessness of the soul though he paints it vividly and well without painting also
the attitude of resistance to it, without giving the impression of a head held high above it, a nature that
fixes the limits beyond which the corrosion of distrust and doubt shall not go, a deep speculative
melancholy kept at bay, not by faith, but by a kind of domineering temperance of nature. This is the
refrain of almost all his poems. He yields much to this melancholy intellectually, we should say,
almost everything but morally, he bids it keep its distance, and forbids it to engulf him.
It is this singular equipoise between the doubts that devour, and the intrepid sobriety that excites him to
resistance, which gives the peculiar tone to Mr. Arnolds poems. He has not the impulse or abandon of
nature for a pure lyric melancholy, such as Shelley could pour forth in words that almost make the heart
weep, as, for instance, in the Lines Written in Dejection in Naples. Again, Mr. Arnold has nothing of
the proud faith that conquers melancholy and that gives to the poems of Wordsworth their tone of
rapture. Yet he hits a wonderful middle note between the two. The lyrical cry, as he himself has finely
designated the voice in which the true poetic exaltation of feeling expresses itself, is to be found in a
multitude of places in his poems; but in him it neither utters the dejection of the wounded spirit nor the
joy of the Victorious spirit, but rather the calm of a steadfast equanimity in conflict with an unconquerable
and yet also unconquering destiny a firm mind without either deep shadows of despair or high lights
of faith, only the lucid dusk of an intellectual twilight.
R.H. Hutton
191 Matthew Arnold
(8) If nature is just a collection of things, it is hopeless to seek any spiritual presence there which might be
a support for man. Imitating nature or seeking harmony with nature no longer means trying to plunge
our roots, like natures, in the ground of the absolute, or trying, through atonement with nature, to each
that ground. Each man must imitate nature in her mute acceptance of separation from God, and be like
a stone, rounded in upon himself, with a tones independence and persistence in being itself. Joy comes
not from participation in the general life, but from a blind perseverance in performing he acts appropriate
to our own natures. The stars and the sea are Bounded by themselves, and unregardful/in what state
Gods other works may be and they demand not that the things without them/Yield them love,
amusement, sympathy. Yet they perform their appointed tasks with joy. Each man must also learn to
be a law unto himself: To its own impulse every creature stirs;/ Live by thy light, and earth will live by
hers !
This lesson of nature is really a lesson of despair, for though nature is to be admired for her ability to
endure isolation, this calm self-enclosure, the satisfied peace of a rock merely being a rock, is impossible
for man. Mans trouble is that he finds in himself no given law to direct his, being. He desperately
needs help from outside, someone or something to tell him what to do and who to be. Can nature do no
more than bid man attempt something impossible ?
J.Hillis Miller
(9) What affirmation there in Arnolds poetry seems unimportant because it lacks the flow and thrill of the
Romantic assertion; it provides a sad substitute for the vision of love in a struggling taskd morality,
with its ideal of self-control, self-dependence, and release from passion. This is imaged in calm moonlight,
the independent stillness of the stars, the calm motion of the sea: whatever token utterances he made
occasionally to the contrary, his desire not for involvement with the one life in and around us, but for
withdrawal, from that involvement in life which he felt to be necessary, and yet unavailing in his iron
age:
We, in some unknown Powers employ,
Move on a rigorous line;
Can neither when we will, enjoy,
Nor, when we will, resign.
Fate drives me, he says, back from Obermanns world to his own course of life, where he is caught:
Wandering between two worlds, one dead,
The other powerless to be born,
With nowhere yet to rest my head.
The world of faith, of the invasion of unity, of joy, is dead, and nothing has replaced it; all that remains
is the desire to resign, to escape from the hot prison, the restlessness, the pain of life, into stillness like
that of the stars or the sea, self-poised.
It is not surprising then that his language proves often inadequate, especially in the rhetoric of assertion
and the rhetoric of love. The vocabulary has become hollow, and is not supported by the imagery or the
general tone of poetry.
R.A.Foakes
(10) When in The Scholar-Gipsy the Scholar is tired of knocking at preferments door, why is Arnold not
merely living off Swift (They crowd about Preferments gate) or off Johnson (Unnumberd suppliants
crowd Preferments gate ) ? On the face of it, Arnolds wording is full of cliches; perhaps they are
cliches newly used and renovated, but that would need to be argued for. Not to mention such things at
all is to be in collusion with ones poet. Take the well-known praise of Wordsworth in Memorial Verses
Christopher Ricks
Poetry 192
(11) It used to be frequently said in fact, it is the tradition of Arnolds own family that the two series of
love poems which Arnold called Switzerland and Faded Leaves were not inspired by an actual
love affair. However, the evidence of several sentences in the letters of Arnold to Clough seems to
refute this belief that the Marguerite of the poems was only a poetical figment. Yet even without the
refutation of external evidence, it is almost impossible to read the poems themselves without being
convinced that here is the attempt of a main to tell the truth about an important experience. Arnold is
a very intimate poet; he is an occasional poet who writes of the hour as it passes; he is a literal poet
who tries to say what he means at the moment even if what he says contradicts what he said the
moment before. It is quite true that if we accept the evidence of the poems completely and literally, we
accept what seems a tangle of contradictions: the girl rejects the lover, he rejects her; she is unworthy
of him, he is unworthy of her; her love is his dearest need, or again, it is a deviation from his true path.
It is very confusing but so much the better; these very condradictions attest to the actuality of the affair
and certainly the whole point of the story lies in them.
Lionel Trilling
(12) He had tried many resolutions of the weariness that comes with an acceptance of the Empedoclean
universe and with the frustrations of the promise of Christianity. None had really succeeded. In Stanzas
from the Grande Chartreuse published in 1855, Arnold stands in the ancient monastery, surrounded
by the remembrance of the disproved promises, seeming to hear the surprised voices of the teachers
who had seized his youth:
And purged its faith, and trimm d its fire,
Show d me the high white star of Truth,
There bade me gaze, and there aspire.
These teachers are the man of the enlightenment and their heirs who had destroyed in him
the faith among whose monuments he meditates. They are asking, What dost thou in this living
tomb ? He answers that he knows their world to be true, knows the past world to be past
yet quite reconcile himself to the new, or quite forget the yearning for the old. And somehow
among the sepulchres of the dead Carthusians he finds an apter place for his melancholy than in
modern life.
Lionel Trilling
(13) Professor Garrod, always a discerning critic and distinguished for the care with which he uses biography
to illuminate poetical meaning, accepts the reality of Marguerite on the evidence of the poems alone: I
used at one time to pooh-pooh Marguerite. In part, I was fearful of vulgarising a great poet. In part, I
did not sufficiently believe that poets mean what they say: but they do even when they do not say
what they mean; from our failure to recognise that proceed nearly all the faults of our criticism.......but
I think now that it is a mistake to disparage Marguerite. The volume of 1852 has a somewhat surprising
unity, the unity, I feel, of a single and intense experience. When you have added to it the poems which
should never have been taken away (Mr. Garrod means The Forsaken Merman and The Voice , with
these he might have included To my Friends, who Ridiculed a Tender Leave-Taking with its
interesting change of the phrase of the first edition, ere the parting kiss be dry, to ere the parting
hour go by and also The New Sirens , it is difficult not to assign to Marguerite an important place
in that experience.
Lionel Trilling
(14) The one difficulty of the poem it seems to me is in the famous third strophe wherein the actual sea is
compared to the Sea of Faith. If Arnold means that the Sea of Faith was formerly at high tide, and he
hears now only the sound of the tide going out, one cannot help thinking also of the cyclic nature of
193 Matthew Arnold
tides, and the consequent coming of another high tide only a few hours after the present ebb. In other
words, the figure of speech appears valid only on one level of comparison; the symbolic half fails to
sustain itself. Despite the magnificence of the writing of this section, I cannot help believing that it is
the weakest part of the poem when it should be the strongest; the explicitness of the comparison seems
too ready-made. Yet I have the poem as it is so deeply in memory that I cannot imagine it changed, and
would not have it changed even if I knew it would be a better poem thereby.
James Dickey
(15) Critics acquainted with the extant manuscript of Dover Beach sometimes complain that the last
paragraph does not really belong with the remainder of the poem. In this draft, the last line is and
naked shingles of the world. Ah! love & c, which certainly suggest that the paragraph beginning. Ah,
love, let us be true had already been written. But no amount of knowledge of its authors methods of
composition can prove that a finished work is or is not a unified whole. With greater critical relevance,
it may be argued that in this final paragraph Amold has forgotten about the sea. But the sea has by this
time served its purpose as a symbol; and that which it symbolized is still powerfully present in these last
lines. Moreover, the darkness remains. Precisely because it is no longer possible to believe that the
universe is in some degree adjusted to human needs, that it is informed by a divinity which sympathizes
with men in their joys and sorrows and in their hopes and fears, the poet must seek in human love for
those values which are undiscoverable elsewhere. Moreover and this is the primary meaning
of the paragraph the lovers must support each other if they are to live in the modern world without
disaster.
J.D.Jump
(16) The Scholar-Gipsy involves a dream of being from the world of becoming and leaves undetermined
whether the dream was a delusion. Thyrsis devotes itself to recovering a vision of being from the
world of becoming and insists that it is true. Both dream and vision derive from a response to the
features of the landscape.
The Cumner poems exemplify the frequently discussed move in Arnold from what may be called
uncertainty whether his dreams pass through the gate of horn or of ivory to a conviction that his
dreams are all of horn. Severely qualified though it was, the greater optimism of Arnolds later work is
unquestionable: the two Obermann poems provide another clear example. The twentieth century has
found, with Tennysonian authority, the expression of doubt more satisfyingly honest than the expression
of assurance, however, tentatively it may be offered. In itself this is a quite invalid criterion. We must
allow a poet his faith or his doubt, and ask only that it be properly realized in his poem. Proper realization
means in this context the due rendering of the Cumner countryside so that it really seems, at least for
the duration of the poem, to contain the truths it is said to contain.
The problem is the signal tree, not, certainly, whether it was oak or elm, truly solitary or near a clump
of pines, on Cumner Hurst or just above Chilswell Farm, visible or not visible on the path from South or
North Hinksey. The problem is whether the tree can do the work the poem asks it to do. It is important
to pay careful attention to what is first said of the tree, for on that saying the poem will depend. The
main details are given in the third stanza after a brief mention of the tree in the second:
That single elm-tree bright
Against the west 1 miss it ! is it gone ?
We prized it dearly; while it stood, we said,
Our friend, the Gipsy-Scholar, was not dead;
While the tree lived, he in these fields lived on.
A. Roper
Poetry 194
(17) Arnold felt no man more deeply the majesty of the poets function: he solemnly attired himself to
perform it; but the singing robe was not his daily wear. Arnold let it be repeated was not a bard; not
a Muse-intoxicated man. He had the bardic, the architectonic gift. Something of the worldling in him
forbade any such fervour, yet he brought to literature and in a happy hour, insisting by the example of
his verse as well as by the percepts of his criticism that before anything becomes literature it must
observe two conditions it must be worth saying, and it must be worthily written.
Sir Arthur Quiller Couch
(18) Matthew Arnold is undoubtedly in poetry, and I believe also in some of his prose a classic: that is to
say he has succeeded in addressing himself to all times. And yet, if ever an author, in poetry and prose,
addressed himself to his own day and generation, on the surrounding scene, it was he.......In his poetry
there is a mature wisdom appealing to the elemental and universal in man; austerely expressed, without
pomp, ornament, or tinkling music; and sometimes falling into lines as perfect and lawless as anything
we know.
Cariton Stanley
(19) Matthew Arnold is not a popular poet; his style is too severely classical; he is too reticent in the
expression of emotion and too seriously reflective to attract any but the thoughtful reader. He is his
own best critic, and has fewer faults and redundancies of style than any of the contemporary poets.
His productions are polished gems, and he never loses the sense of proportion, of the self-restraint
which belongs to the artist. At the same time, his poems are full of his own personality and of the
various forms which he adopted, the lyric and the elegiac were the best suited to him.
G.C. Macaulay
READINGS
Lionel Trilling : Matthew Arnold
H.W.Paul : Matthew Arnold
H.J.C.Griersol : Lyrical Poetry from Blake to Hardy
Douglas Bush : Matthew Arnold: English Poetry
H.W, Garrod : Poetry and the Criticism of Life
Johnson and Garrod : Arnold: Poetry and Prose
C.B. Tinker and H.F. Lowry : The Poetry of Matthew Arnold: A commentary
F.Bickley : Matthew Arnold and his Poetry
Vincent Buckley : Poetry and Morality
B.lforEvans : Tradition and Romanticism
Grierson and Smith : A Critical History of English Poetry
G. Saintsbury : Matthew Arnold
U. LeonGottfried : Matthew Arnold and Romanticism
G.K.Chesterton : The Victorican Age in Literature
Hugh Walker : Literature in the Victorian Era
195 Matthew Arnold
F.L. Lucas : Ten Victorian Poets
G.R.Stange : Matthew Arnold : The Poet as Humanist
A.D.Culler : Imaginative Reason : The Poetry of Matthew
Arnold
G.C. Macaulay : Poems by Matthew Arnold : A Selection:
E.K. Chambers : Arnold : Poetry and Prose
G.W.E Russell : Matthew Arnold
Amy Shark : Victorian Poets
J.D.Jump : Matthew Arnold
Carlson Stanby : Matthew Arnold
H.C.Duffin : Arnold the Poet
E.K. Brown : Matthew Arnold
A. Roper : Arnolds Poetic Landscapes
W.A. Madden : Matthew Arnold
Michael Thorpe : Matthew Arnold
KennthAllott,Ed : The Poems of Matthew Arnold
John Holloway : The Victorian Sage
F.R. Leavis : Revaluation
E.D.H.Johnson : The Alien Vision of Victorian Poetry
Basil Willey : Nineteenth Century Studies
Kathleen Tillotson : Review of English Studies, N.S. Vol. 3,1952
D.G. James : Matthew Arnold and the Decline of English
Romanticism
E.M. Jacqueline, Ed : Matthew Arnold
Arthur Quiller-Couch : Studies in Literature. First Series
Carl Dowron. Ed : Matthew Arnold : The Critical Heritage
Lon is Bonnerot : Matthew Arnold
S. Tillotson : Criticism and the Nineteenth Century
W.H. Dowson : Matthov Arnold and his Relation to the Thought of
our Time
John Drink-water : Eighteen Sixties
Poetry 196
A. Gatton : Two Essays upon Matthew Arnold
I. Hicks : The Stoicism of Matthew Arnold
H.Kingsmill : Matthew Arnold
J.B.Orrick : Matthew Arnold and Goeth
L.Woolf : Aster the Deluge
Frank Watts : Matthew Arnold (Writer & critics Series)
G.H .Young, Ed : Victorian England, Portriat of an Age
U.F.Lowry,ed. : The Letters of Matthew Arnold to Arthur Hugh
Clough
B- G.W.E. Russell, ed. : Letters of Matthew Arnoldl Vols Unpublished Letters
of Arnold (in Dorothy Wards possession)
Arnold Whitridage : Unpublished Letters of Matthew Arnold
1
POETRY
M.A. English (Previous)
Directorate of Distance Education
Maharshi Dayanand University
ROHTAK 124 001
Paper-V
Option-I
Section C & D
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Contents
Unit 5 W.B. YEATS 5
Easter 1916
Sailing to Byzantium
A Dialogue of Self and Soul
Leda and Swan
Lake Isle of Inisfree
Among School Children
Second Coming
Unit 6 W.H. AUDEN 67
Petition
Musee Des Beaux Arts
O What is that Sound
September 1, 1930
In Memory of W.B. Yeats
The Shield of Achilles
In Praise of Lime Stone
Unit 7 DYLAN MARLAIS THOMAS 152
I see the Boys of Summer
In My Craft or Sullen Art
A Winters Tale
To an Unborn Paper Child
Storming Day
Light Breaks where No Sun Shines
Poems On His Birthday
Unit 8 A.K. RAMANUJAN 189
Extended Family
The Difference
Fear
Second Sight
The Striders
Hindoo to His Body
Love Poem for a Wife
The Last of the Princes
Unit 9 WALLACE STEVENS 238
Domination of Black
Sunday Morning
Idea of Order at Key West
Study of Two Pears
Of Modern Poetry
Peter Quince at the Clavier
Contrary Theses
Holiday in Reality
(from Oxford Book of American Verse)
4
M.A. (Previous)
POETRY
PAPER-V (Option-I) Max. Marks : 100
Time : 3 Hours
Note: Students will be required to attempt five questions in all. Question 1 will be compulsory. This question shall
be framed to test students comprehension of the texts prescribed for Close Study. There will be one question
on each of the Units in all the four Sections. The students will be required to attempt four questions (in
about 200 words each) one from each section.
The other four questions will be based on the texts for Close Study with internal choice i.e. one question
with internal choice on each of the five units. The students will be required to attempt One question from
each of the Four unit.
Section C
Unit 5 W.B. Yeats
Easter 1916
Sailing to Byzantium
Dialogue of Self and Soul
Leda and Swan
Lake Isle of Inisfree
Among School Children
Second Coming
Unit 6 W.H. Auden
Petition
Musee Des Beaux Arts
O What is that Sound
September 1, 1930
In Memory of W.B. Yeats
The Shield of Achilles
In Praise of Lime Stone
Unit 7 Dylan Marllais Thomas
I see the Boys of Summer
In My Craft or Sullen Art
A Winters Tale
To an Unborn Paper Child
Storming Day
Light Breaks where No Sun Shines
Poems On His Birthday
Section D
Unit 8 A.K. RAMANUJAN
Extended Family
The Difference
Fear
Second Sight
The Striders
Hindoo to His Body
Love Poem for a Wife
The Last of the Princes
Unit 9 WALLANCE STEVENS
Domination of Black
Sunday Morning
Idea of Order at Key West
Study of Two Pears
Of Modern Poetry
Peter Quince at the Clavier
Contrary Theses
Holiday in Reality
(from Oxford Book of American Verse)
5 W.B. Yeats
W.B. YEATS
Easter 1916
Sailing to Byzantium
A Dialogue of Self and Soul
Leda and Swan
Lake Isle of Inisfree
Among School Children
Second Coming
Poetry 6
Unit-5
W.B. Yeats
Introduction
William Butler Yeats (1865-1939), a major poet of the twentieth century, is counted among such great Anglo-
American moderns as Virginia Woolf, James Joyce, T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound, Wallace Stevens, and Gertrude
Stein. He is certainly among the greatest of Irish poets. One might even think that his ambition to be Irelands
Homer, its first epic poet, was fulfilled. With him Ireland can be said to have found its major voice. As a colonial
subject, working within the English literary tradition with the anxiety of influence weighing heavily on him (what
with strong precursors like Shakespeare and Milton, to name only two of the many great English bards), he
developed a uniqueness of voice. This led Eliot to criticize him in 1917 as a foreign mind . While saying so,
little did Eliot realize that he was actually paying his rival a great compliment. A prolific writer, Yeats is the
author of, apart from an enormous amount of poetry, mostly of high quality, many short stories, one novel, some
poetic plays, autobiographical works, as well as quasi-mystical treatises. But it is primarily as poet that he
enjoys the highest reputation. His poetical works are known for the variety of themes they deal with, their
individuality of style, and lyrical intensity. Compared with other modern poets, he gives the casual reader the
impression of being a reader-friendly poet. But on closer scrutiny, he emerges as no less obscure than them, for
the personal and private nature of his allusions, and symbols, esoteric sources and unfamiliar images. By being
very Irish, his themes, images and subjects can puzzle non-Irish readers of his poetry. This is further complicated
by his own idiosyncratic view of history, and mythology that is articulated in his autobiographical and discursive
writings.
Thus it is that, the study of a poet like Yeats demands an extensive engagement with the biographical and
historical context of the poet and his work. And it is necessary for the readers of his poetry to prepare
themselves with some prior knowledge of his life and times, the circles he moved in, his Irish, British, and
European contexts, as well as numerous other traditions, and cultures that he either imbibed or with which he
was acquainted. This is perhaps true of any poet; but it is an indispensable approach to Yeats.
For, as the years passed he started believing more in self-portraiture than in dealing with vision. This meant that
his poetry would increasingly bear the imprint of his personal life and critical location as a colonized Irish
subject and an influential figure in Anglo-American literary and cultural movement of modernism.
I. Writer and his age
This section attempts to deal with the life of the poet as it shaped his career and aesthetic, and the factors
contributing to his poetic development. The secction has been divided into six subsections (i) early life,
(ii)Yeats and Occult, (iii) Yeats and the Irish Cultural Context, (iv) Yeats and Ireland, (v)Yeats and Philosophy,(vi)
Maud Gonne and the other women in Yeatss Life. These are issues that constantly interweave and overlap;
interact and relate with each other and so should not be treated as isolated and unrelated areas of knowledge.
(i) Early Life:
The years of Yeatss childhood and adolescence can be studied around Sligo, the familys sojourn in London,
and their frequent change of residence and his relationship with his father. The poets childhood at Sligo with
the Pollexfens was both a happy and a sad one. In many ways, these were his formative years. William
Pollexfen, Yeatss maternal grandfather inspired awe and terror in the children who were afraid of his fierceness,
7 W.B. Yeats
silence and disciplined way of life which tended to stifle a few opportunities and moments of amusement that
the children sought.
If the figure of the grandfather symbolized authority; the grandmother, with her ivory complexion was a charming
soft-hearted lady. It is through the visits to the Middletons the grandmothers family that Yeats was
introduced to the world of Celtic legends and stories which were to become an indispensable source of his
poetic images and ideas. The Middletons enthusiasm contrasted with that of the poets realatives, with their
gentle behaviour and quiet humour, and Yeats tried to acquire both.
In London he was sent to the Godolphin school at Hammersmith at the age of ten. There the young Yeats
encountered a lot of hostility and resistance at school on account of his Irish nationality and background. It is
here that the identity crisis of the young Yeats took shape. Uncomfortable with his foreign surroundings, Yeats
started looking forward to spending his vacation at Sligo.
The journey to Sligo also brought in an element of adventure and romance to his otherwise dull existence.
These are described in his only novel, John Sherman, and in his Autobiographies. In Sligo what had earlier
been a stifling life was now transformed into an endearing and expanded range of activities. Climbing the
hillocks, Knocknarea and Ben Bulben, sailing with the local folks, fishing for trout in the laughs with Jim Healy,
the stable boy, hunting, listening to the tales of the sailors and the inhabitants of Sligo, riding his red pony past
the Holy Well of St. Patrick and monastery of St.Columba, constituted his vacations.
The family moved back to Ireland in1880. The land war in 1880 made financial considerations an important
factor in deciding the question of where to settle the family. Finally, the family returned to Ireland and lived at
Balscadden Cottage at Howth, the north eastern side of Dublin Bay. Yeats was sent to the Erasmus Smith
High School in Harcourt Street, Dublin in 1881 at the age of fifteen. It was there that he declared his interest
in the philosophies of Darwin and Huxley. His inclination towards natural history may be seen as some sort of
a refuge, a compensatory exercise that Yeats indulged in ,in the absence of a religion to lean on. For Yeatss
father was an agnostic and his lack of belief affected him at a young age.
It was at this time that Yeatss conversations on poetry with his father, John ButlerYeats, formed a crucial
aspect of his education. His father talked to him of Blake and his own Pre-Raphaelite literary principles. The
enormity of this influence can be measured from the fact that his juvenilia were primarily dramatic poetry,
written in imitation of Spenser and Shelley, for it was dramatic poetry that his father esteemed as the most
superior of all kinds of poetry. Yeats recited his poetry to Edward Dowden , his fathers friend and the first
holder of the Chair of English at Dublin University. Dowden who never discouraged the young Yeats, provided
him with critical appraisals of these recitations.
The influence of his father, J.B. Yeats, upon young Yeats lasted till he was in High School. After leaving High
School Yeats joined the Metropolitan School of Art in Kildare Street, where he attended classes from May
1884 to July 1885. At the School of Art he met George Russell (AE) and together they composed plays and
spent long hours with each other. George Russell also shared Yeatss awakening interest in mysticism. Yeatss
early aesthetic principle that only beautiful things should be portrayed and that only ancient things were
beautiful can be attributed to his years at the School of Art. A month or two at the Royal Hibernian Art School
at the beginning of 1886 finished his formal education. Yet another change of residence, the move from Howth
to 10 Ashfield Terrace, off Harolds Crossroads, a suburban district, proved beneficial. The conducive location
that provided easy access to Dublin helped to widen Yeatss interest, which by now had become keenly
observant of human nature and behaviour.
(ii)Yeats and Occult
Yeats wrote once of how he was repelled by the new sciences, which in turn had robbed him of traditional
systems of faith: I am very religious, and deprived by Huxley and Tyndall [Darwinian rationalists and atheists],
whom I detested, of the simple-minded religion of my childhood, I had made a new religion, almost an infallible
church of poetic diction Though this gestures towards the poets belief in aestheticism; it also is suggestive of
why Yeats should have been attracted by esoteric and obscure belief systems.
Poetry 8
This desire for a belief system found a fitting ethos in Yeatss early life. Certain opportunities presented
themselves, which kindled in him an undying interest in and a ceaseless contemplation of these philosophies.
For him the transition from philosophy to mysticism was easily accomplished. At Dowdens house he heard
A.P Sinnetts The Occult World and Esoteric Buddhism being discussed. He read these books and passed it
on to Charlie Johnston, a brilliant pupil at the High School and the son of the Orange Member of Parliament for
South-Belfast .With Johnston, he also read Baron Reichenbachs book on Odic forces. But Esoteric Buddhism
had an indelible effect and Johnston relinquished his future aim of being a missionary and converted to Esoteric
Buddhism. Johnstons article on this subject appeared in The Dublin University Review in July 1885. This
was a paper he had read to a new group known as the Dublin Hermetic Society. This Society, consisting of
seven youths, was started, according to a note in the same issue of the magazine, to promote the study of the
Oriental Religions and Theosophy.The term Hermetic suggests an involvement in deciphering a hitherto
hidden secret philosophy which revealed itself in symbolism.
To this Yeats advanced his firm belief, derived from his reading of Shelley and Blake, that philosophy existing
in poetry is permanent. But he could not gain converts to his poetic creed. Despite this lack of success, Yeats
showed a continued interest in the Hermetic Society and its tenets. Meanwhile Johnston met Madame Blavatsky
in London and returned to form the Dublin Theosophical Lodge . Though Yeats did not become officially a
member of it, he was actively engaged in arousing the interests of others in Theosophy. George Russells
parents commented on Yeatss sway over their son in these matters.
Like Johnston, who was impressed by Madame Blavatsky, Yeats submitted to the principles of Mohini Chatterjee.
A Brahmin from Bengal and a man of repute among Theosophists, Mohini Chatterjee had been invited to visit
Dublin to aid the foundation of the new Theosophical Lodge. Yeats adopted the sombre, quietist outlook of this
philosopher. Chatterjees belief that the dead who had imagined Beauty or Justice in this world become a part
of that Beauty or Justice, and assert themselves through the minds of living men reinforced Yeats belief in
reincarnation and his faith that the poets/artists are people who have access to truth . Yeats wrote a poem
Kanva on Himself which encapsulated the Brahmins ideas in the verse form. Thirty-nine years later he
echoed these ideas in another poem called Mohini Chatterjee. Yeatss poems like Miserrimus , From the
Book of Kauri the Indian .Section V, On the Nature of God and An Indian Song that appeared in The
Dublin University Review in October and December 1886 reflected his new thoughts and interests.
In 1887 at the age of twenty-two Yeats found his way into the Kelmscott House in Hammersmith, the
residence of William Morris , the pre-Raphaelite poet and painter.He began to attend Socialist lectures held
there on Sunday evenings .Despite his great admiration for Morris, Yeats became less socialistic in his ideas.
His dislike of Bernard Shaw who frequented that place can be attributed to his general dissatisfaction with
Socialist ideas. Besides the enormous literary influence that was shaping him, Yeats also sought Mysticism at
the meetings of Theosophists . He was introduced to Madame Blavatsky by Charlie Johnston in a house at
Norwood where she conducted sessions of the Society for Psychical Research. Like Yeats attraction to
OLeary which he romanticised , he found in Madame Blavatsky a passionate nature, illogical and surrounded
by an air of mystery which filled her house too. In such an individual, he thought , could wisdom be found
which made possible communion with God. Yeats was admitted to the Esoteric Section of the society which
met weekly to study tables of Oriental Mysticism .Once Yeats insisted upon the practical demonstration of
these experiments, with the result that he was asked to resign by an official of the Section. Though later Yeats
found out that the motivation behind his resignation was Madame Blavatsky herself, who found her principles/
beliefs being challenged and interrogated.
Another individual who equally appeared to be a figure of romance occupied the space within Yeats vacated
by Madame Blavatsky. In the British museum Yeats met Lidell Mathers, who under the influence of Celtic
movement, became MacGregor Mathers, and finally MacGregor. MacGregor, the author of The Kabbala
Univeiled, was deeply interested in magic which was the subject of his research on the Continent. He introduced
Yeats to a society of Christian Cabbalists, The Hermetic Student known to its students as the Order of the
9 W.B. Yeats
Golden Dawn. The combined influence of Blavatsky and Mathers could be seen on Yeats writing which
became more sensuous and vivid on account of symbolism and symbolic systems made available to him by
both these associations.
(iii) Yeats and the Irish Cultural Context
Yeatss first major poetic output, The Wanderings of Oisin and Other Poems published in 1889, shows how
deeply the exposure described above had affected him. In what ways will be discussed in detail later. However,
worth mentioning is the fact that William Morris commented on how the poems in the volume resembled his
own poetry. You write my sort of poetry , he said, and promised to send his praise to The Commonweal , the
mouthpiece of the League. Oscar Wilde also wrote favourable reviews of Oisin. Yeats shared Morris belief
in an organic community. This led to a distrust of political institutions and parliamentary democracy in favour of
revolution. Yeats found that Morris political principles were compatible with O Learys. This was further
strengthened by the Socialist Leagues sympathy for the Irish cause. Morris lectures were an adroit blend of
Socialism and the romantic social criticism of Carlyle and Ruskin. However, Yeats could see the potential for
violence embedded in Carlyles political rhetoric. Yeats did not declare himself to be a Socialist, yet the influence
of Morris persisted afterwards. In the words of Elizabeth Cullingford, It was revealed primarily in Yeatss
Irish utopianism, and in specific instances such as his support for the workers in the Dublin Lock-Out of 1913,
his desire for art galleries and educational facilities for the poor, his attitude to social legislation in the Irish
senate, his conviction that the State should supply the basic necessities and decencies of life for its citizens, and
in his often repeated approval of the idea of limiting incomes .
Alongside his poetry, Yeats wrote prose articles based on or connected to Irish forklore. These were published
by W.E. Henley in The Scots Observer and The National Observer. Yeatss Irish background made him
different from those living in English towns, mainly because of his diversity of interest and unusual ideas. An
important figure with whom Yeats discussed the needs for the poets and artists to interact and associate with
each other was Ernest Rhys, who later commissioned his Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry. From
these conversations emerged the idea of the Rhymers Club, formed by the efforts of Yeats, Rhys, and T.W.
Rolleston. It met in the Cheshire Cheese and its members soon included Lionel Johnson, Ernest Dowson,
Arthur Symons, Richard Le Gaillienne, Selvyn Image, Edwin Ellis, John Todhunter, John Davidson and Herbert
Horne. The formation of the club in 1891 helped Yeats to cope with his nostalgia and establish himself in the
literary climate of London.
The meetings of the club were self-conscious literary gatherings dominated by the figure of Lionel Johnson.
Yeats greatly admired Johnson whose subsequent tragic failure of life is treated poetically by Yeats. These
poets of the nineties influenced both his poetry as well as his attitude to life. Following the artistic principles
propounded by Pater and practised by Rossetti, the Rhymers club had the effect of introducing obscurity into
his poetry. This can be seen in The Countess Kathleen and Various Legends and Lyrics and especially the
poems dealing with the Rose. Yeats assumed that his idea of pure poetry premised on the doctrine of
Aestheticism was above the common mans understanding, yet for the next few years he did not return to the
more comprehensible Irish subjects. Arthur Symons, with whom Yeats developed a close friendship, read him
selections from Verlaine and Mallarme, and thus introduced him to the French Symbolists.
Thoug he was now in Londodn he continued to take an active interest in the affairs of Irish society. He was
elected to the Irish senate in 1922. The years of the twentieth century prior to Yeatss senatorship, are punctuated
by successful lecture tours to the U.S. Beginning with 1903 Yeats travelled to the States in 1911, 1914, and
1920. He met Ezra Pound in 1908 and the influence of Pounds Imagist doctrine is visible in the volumes
published henceforth. Besides these men of influence, J.B.Yeats introduced Yeats, among others, to Todhunter,
a Dublin doctor turned poet and playwright, and Edwin Ellis , a painter Pre-Raphaelite in outlook. Ellis was
interested in Blake and gave Yeats an explanation of Blakes poems in which the four quarters of London
represented Blakes zoas. Yeats informed Ellis about Christian Cabbala and in the spring of 1889, they decided
Poetry 10
to work together on an explication of Blakes symbolism. Yeatss encounter with the romantic figures described
above and his readings of the poetry of Shelley and Blake, which for him contained meaningful philosophical
insight, produced a notion of perfect love . An idealized view, devotion without reward is the keynote of this
love .In love with the idea of love, Yeats expressed a desire for an unusual woman modelled on the wild and
heroic heroines of Shelley.
(iv) Yeats and Ireland:
Irelands struggle for independence from England was longstanding. But it intensified during the last decades
of the 19
th
and the early decades of the 20
th
century. Irish intellectuals could not avaoid getting caught up by the
political developments. Yeats was no exception. Concurrent with his dabbling in theology and mysticism, Yeats
got involved with the Home Rule League and Young Ireland Society. His father, who was himself a member of
it and imbued Yeats with his own views on the subject, introduced him to the Home Rule. He also introduced
him to the members of the Contemporary Club who held similar opinions. But Yeats soon turned from the ideas
of the Home Rule to the more absolute demands of nationalism. This he encountered in the figure of John
OLeary who for Yeats embodied the ideas of idealism and patriotism. The attraction for OLeary was based
both on his ideas and appearance. OLeary matched Yeatss imaginative and romantic rendering of a hero and
martyr. Bearded and venerable in appearance , O Learys large personality revealed a passionate nature
strengthened by a moral genius which had experienced real suffering .As a medical student at Trinity College
,OLeary had been inspired by the Young Ireland Movement and had become a leader of the Fenian movement
which succeeded it. He was imprisoned for five years and spent fifteen years of exile in Paris. On his return
he was highly respected as a central figure in the context of Irish nationalist struggle. Yeats began to attend the
debates and the meetings of the Young Ireland Society of which O Leary was the president.
Apart from OLearys dogged determination and unflinching spirit, his literary tastes proved to be a common
ground between him and Yeats. Despite his intense political sentiments, OLeary was sensitive to artistic merit
and worth. He was moved by the writings of the patriots like Davis, but criticized their lack of attention to
aesthetic issues. OLeary lent Yeats the works of the nationalist poets Davis , Callaman and Mangan. It was
to OLeary that he owed his knowledge of Irish patriotic literature. The awareness of the nationalist elements
in the verse helped him formulate his ideas on the need for a new type of literature distinctly Irish in tone and
subject matter. In an essay on Mangan published in The Irish Fireside in March 1887, Yeats expressed these
concerns. Yeats veering from Indian subjects to Irish ones corresponds to the change from The Dublin
University Review to The Irish Monthly and The Irish Fireside.
Yeats also stressed the dimension of personal emotion that should characterize poetry. This reveals Yeats
Romanticist leanings that privileges sincere self-expression as the primary feature of poetic articulation. At the
same time, it is important to see that Yeats romanticism is interwoven with, and inseparable from his nationalist
feelings, and John O Leary was the physical manifestation of this close association. Hence, contrary to the
popular notions, Yeats Romanticism does not preclude his engagement with political issues; in fact encourages
it.
Yeatss involvement in Irish nationalism and politics achieved European/British twist with fathers decision to
leave Ireland and settle in London in1887 . The family moved to 58 Eardley Crescent, Earls Court in June and
Yeats tried to make contacts with editors and publishers. While in England Yeats compiled an anthology of the
contemporary Irish poets entitled Poems and Ballads of Young Ireland for an Irish publishing firm. It included
four of his poems along with those of Katherine Tynan. For the London publisher Walter Scott he compiled
two selections entitled Stories From Carleton and Fairy and Folk Tales of the Irish Peasantry. These
projects helped Yeats to widen his reading in Irish literature and suggested a vast range of images for his poetic
compositions. OLeary further encouraged him by arranging his contributions to be sent to Boston Pilot and
Providence Journal, Irish American journals in which Yeats work appeared in September 1888 in the form
of correspondence.
11 W.B. Yeats
Early on, more than political freedom, Yeats was interested in the Cultural Renaissance of Ireland. His
political gestures were more often than not aimed to please Maud Gonne who was a thorough activist.
Yet, the crucial political events of the day find a place in his poetry. However, even here the focus is more
on personal friendships, emotional bonds, and artistic anxieties than on the politics per se. In Easter
1916 , he is, if anything, ambiguous in his response to the event. The cultural/literary interests
overshadow the political motives.
The last fifteen years of the century also saw Yeatss involvement with Irish nationalist causes. He met John
O Leary and to the end of his life Yeatss political outlook was determined by this. Likewise Yeats establishment
of the Irish Literary Society and his involvement with the Abbey Theatre are appropriately located within a
discussion of Irelands political context. When Ireland obtained its partial autonomy, Yeats was elected to its
senate in 1922. Yeatss interest in fascism was stirred by his desire to prove the historical speculations formulated
in A Vision. He saw fascism as the initiation of the antithetical gyre. But Yeats did not engage with it in terms
of active political action. For he remained a nationalist of the school of John OLeary who did not encourage
participation in international politics. Yeatss work as a senator did not bear the influence of fascism. In 1935
when Mussolini invaded Abyssinia until his death in 1939, Yeats condemned fascism. Yeats also condemned
communism and saw both as symptomatic of an apocalypse.
However, the examination of Yeatss allegiance to a fascist ideology, alleged or real, requires an understanding
of the term as it is deployed in different contexts. Fascism when linked with Nazism carries the connotations of
brutal totalitarianism, genocidal racism and, desire for world conquest. The term did not mean this in the 1920s.
It has also been used indiscriminately to suggest right-wing tendencies and politics, however marginal. This
discrepancy and imprecision has led critics to believe that Yeats condoned Nazi atrocities. By 1922, Ireland
had experienced civil strife for nearly four years. Yeats, like others, longed for order and stability and mistook
fascist revolution as a conservative one that aimed at the establishment of peace. Yeats was also deluded
about Mussolinis beliefs and manner of operation. He believed that Mussolini functioned through a group of
intellectual elite to realize the concept of the organic state. In short, he was taken in by Mussolinis demagoguery.
That Yeats did not support the totalitarian regime can be seen in Yeats organic theory which, propounded on
cyclicity, envisages an inevitable decline of state authority and power. A totalitarian state is premised on the
belief in its immortality, and hence Yeats views are actually subversive of totalitarianism. Yeatss nationalism
with its objective of legitimate satisfaction of internal aims is different from national fascism that believes in
hysterical self-assertion, aggression and world conquest. Yeats did not indulge in anti-Semitism either. In fact,
he saw similarities and parallels between the persecuted races of Jews and the Irish. Concurrent with these
political events was the development of the Womans Consciousness Movement. Since the 1880s women had
secured significant legal rights: the first Married Womens Property Act was passed in 1870, they were beginning
to achieve access to higher education, and finally acquired the right to vote in 1918 after much agitation from
1905 to 1914.
v)Yeats and Philosophy:
For Yeats, Irish folktales, fairytales, cabbala, magic, and the Oriental belief system did not constitute the only
window to the world of knowledge of truth, reality or the Absolute. A long line of philosophers belonging
primarily to the Western philosophical tradition shaped Yeatss worldview. Some of these names recur in his
poetry: Plato and Plotinus, and Pythagoras. But there were many others who contributed to his intellectual
growth. But first let us examine the influence of Plato and the neoplatonists.
Plato and the Neoplatonists: Central to Yeats philosophical beliefs was Platos views on the immortality of the
soul. This view was conducive to Yeats already formed belief on the subject via Hindu philosophy. Simply put
Plato thought that the soul transferred itself from one decaying body to another body. The body is a garment
with which the soul is invested . Hence, Yeats favorite sartorial image of the human body. Death, for Plato,
accounts for the separation of the body from the soul. As the soul passes from one body to another it collects
Poetry 12
or recollects knowledge which is stored there: Since the soul is immortal and has been born many times and
has seen the things of this world and of Hades and all things, there is nothing which she has not learned. So that
it is no wonder that she should be able to recollect virtue and all other things, seeing that she has learned them
previously.
Plotinus and Porphyry were neoplatonists of the 3
rd
c A.D. They blended Plato with Oriental mysticism. They,
along with the other neoplatonists used fixed symbols such as the symbol of the forest or tomb for the world.
Man was thought of as beggar dressed in rags of mortality. After death the soul is escorted by dolphins over
the seas to heaven. Soul is reality and form; body is a cloudy vapor without entity or form.
George Berkley and Edmund Burke: Yeats had the capability to fuse diverse philosophical thoughts into his
own system of belief. This is illustrated in his drawing upon philosophies as disparate as Nietzsche and Burke.
Edmund Burke (1729-97) along with George Berkeley (1685-1753) were Yeats eighteenth-century literary
and philosophic ancestors. Berkeleys philosophy that spirit or mind is the sole reality of physical things appealed
to Yeats, who invested imagination with the power to comprehend reality. Yeats sympathized with Burkes
political philosophy, according to which, tradition and inheritance and not rational or abstract thought is concerned
with liberty. Burkes discussion of the union of discipline and self-assertion seem like Yeats own concept of
the Unity of Being.A fellow Irishman, Berkeley believed that spirit or mind is the sole reality of physical things:
the existence of object consists in their being perceived in the mind. This was in opposition to the Lockeian
view that nothing that has not come from sense registers in mind. Berkeley denied that matter and the
external reality of space existed. By referring to his rationality Yeats emphasized the difference between
English and Irish thought.
Burke, though not Irish in blood, was a great 18
th
century supporter of the Irish cause. He was to influence
Yeats late in his life, and the influence is evident only from The Tower onward. Burke thought that mans
political duties result from tradition and inheritance rather than from rational thought, certainly not from the
abstract thought concerned with reality. He said that the only liberty I mean is connected with order Men
come (as young people) into a community with the social state of the parents, endowed with all the benefits .
It is this conservation of Burke that appealed to Yeats.
In spite of such exposure to great philosophers, Yeats was not a philosopher. As his father said, he was a poet
and not a philosopher.
Nietzsche: It was in 1902 that Yeats got a chance to read Friedrich Nietzsche (1844-1900), the German
philosopher. The philosophy of Nietzsche is not easy to summarize; but some of the dominant ideas have been
influential. They figure chiefly in his The Birth of Tragedy and Thus Spake Zorathustra. In the first he sees
the essence of Greek arts, especially that of tragedy, as the product of the tension between the opposed forces:
the violent, lustful, frenzied and irrational force of the God Dionysus and the rational and formal force of
Apollo. When Yeats appropriated this view and applied it to his own Hegelian historiography, he thoght of the
entire Greek civilization as the opposite of what followed: the Christian era.
Nietzsche had an intense dislike of the Christian era and Christianity as a religion, for what he thought was its
weakness and its wrong morals. He saw it as an enemy of reason, honesty, sex, power, joy and freedom.
These latter qualities can be developed by what he called the Will to Power by a superman. This is the
subject of Thus spake Zorathustra. The Superman is full of energy, mastery and free from Christian morals,
is neither repressed nor introverted. Like Yeats, many other moderns , adored Nietzsche, and misused his
ideas consciously or unconsciously to equate dictatorial forces with Superman. After all, Hitler used these
very ideas to perpetrate the holocaust.
The theory of creative production and progression through the interaction of conflicting principles is one of the
primary principles in philosophy of Nietzsche. Yeats was fascinated by Nietzsches The Birth of Tragedy.
According to it, Greek art derives its intellectual rigour from the opposition between rational forces of Apollo
and the passionate frenzy of Dionysiac energies. The two movements of the soul with its accompanying
13 W.B. Yeats
paradoxes result from this violent conflict. The affinity to Yeats own speculations is obvious. Nietzsches
admiration for the aristocratic quantities of Greek art also gained Yeats sympathy. Yeats formulated his
concept of the superman whose passion, adventurous spirit and determined will is not far from Oisins or
Cuchulains Yeats mythical heroes , thus endorsing fierce heroic action. Nietzsche is put in Phase Twelve of
A Vision, the phase of the hero. A Visions cyclical view of history is also corroborated by Nietzsches belief
in history as an endless flux, which he derived from Empedocles and Heraclitus.
Italian philosophy: As Late as 1924, Yeats plunged himself into the reading and understanding of Italian philosophy.
He concentrated on Benedetto Croces Aesthetic and The Philosophy of Giambattista Vico. Vico derived his
philosophy of history by a study of the classical writes and this culminated in his scienza Nuova (New Science),
1725. Yeats capitatized upon Vico,s understanding of myth and tradition. According to Vico, myth and tradition
are historical though they do not refer to real men. They constitute a form of Truth (for primitive men) which
is apprehended by the imagination and when cast in an artistic mould becomes poetry Yeats aligned this with
Blakes belief in imagination and the Platonic Anima Mundi. More important is Vicos cyclical view of movements
in both religious and political history Vico, like Blake saw Man as the maker of his own history and destiny.
These literary and philosophic studies coupled with his readings of Dante, Shakespeare, Ben Johnson, Donne,
Castiliogne, Swift, Shelley and Kant made for an eclectic philosophy that is deployed in the service of his
poetry in the socio-cultural context of Ireland and its struggle for freedom.
(vi) Maud Gonne and the other women in Yeatss Life
Yeatss poetry is notable for the use of real life characters, whose character traits appealed to him in real life,
and he dramatized them. However, of dozens of people with whom he was close, Yeatss poetry has a surprisingly
restricted cast of characters. Even so, they were mostly dead when brought to life as dramatis personae in his
poems. Maud Gonne was one of the exceptions. The reason why these dead people are scattered in his poetry
is not far to seek. Their function is instrumental in that they are invoked in order to contribute to the storehouse
of images or Great Memory (or Anima Mundi). This idea of the last is discussed elsewhere.
Some of the characters are dead poets whom he knew, such as Lionel Johnson, Ernest Dowson, and John
Synge, some were dead relatives: such as the Pollexfens, some dead friends such as Lady and Major Gregory,
and dead warriors, a few beautiful women. A few among the living , such as Maud Gonne, Iseult Gonne,
Georgie Hyde-Lees find a place in his cast. Some, like Florence Farr, Olivia Shakespear, may not have figured
as frequently in his poetry, but were important factors affecting his life. In 1890 at the beginning of his association
with the Rhymers Club, Yeats had met Florence Farr, a young dynamic woman who had access to artistic
social circles. She did the verse-speaking for his play The Countess Kathleen and it was her fine techniques
that later proved to be of immense help to Yeats in his theatre business . Farr is commemorated in Yeats
poem All Souls Night . In 1894 the members of the Rhymers Club introduced him to a woman Yeats called
Diana Vernon. She has been identified as Olivia Shakespear with whom Yeats had a brief affair in 1896.
Although short-lived this first consummated affair made a considerable difference to his poetic style. Yeats
maintained a life-long friendship and correspondence with her.
It is Maud Gonne (1866-1953), however, whose presence looms large over the landscape of his poetry. Many,
including Maude Gonne herself, believed that Yeats would not have been the great poet he became had he not
met her. Some have gone further in maintaining that Maud Gonnes refusal to marry the poet led to the
greatness and permanence of some of his love lyrics. She was nearly six feet tall, imperial in demeanor, and by
many accounts the most beautiful woman in Ireland. He met her in 1889, when she called at his house,
ostensibly to meet his father; it was the season of apple blossoms; she walked (Yeats wrote) like a goddess.
He never quite recovered. Tall and noble but with face and bosom/Delicate in colour as apple blossom : This
is how Yeats always remembered Maud Gonne. There is a frequent motif in Yeats work, of a man who is
touched by a faery queen and whose life is forever blighted as in the Stories of Red Hanrahan and The
Queen and the Fool . And Yeats regarded himself as a man whose emotional life was half crippled by his
obsession with Maude Gonne:
Poetry 14
A romantic, when romanticism was in its final extravagance, I thought one woman, whether wife, mistress, or
incitement to platonic love, enough for a life time: a Parsifal, Tristam, Don Quixote, without the intellectual
prepossessions. That gave them solidity. But if his life was deformed by his love for her, his art was much
quickened- though he did not like to hear her say that posterity would be grateful to her for refusing him,
because he wrote so many fine poems about it. Yeats met Maud Gonne at the age of twenty-three in Bedford
Park and this meeting proved to be a turning point in Yeats personal and poetic/artistic life. Yeats fell deeply
and passionately in love with her and her beauty, grace and a divine stature cast a spell so strong that Maud
Gonne became the motivation and inspiration behind Yeats copious poetic output. Maud Gonne was a nationalist
and a feminist activist who fiercely concentrated on the attainment of freedom for Ireland at all costs. She was
an Anglo-Irish who rebelled against the values and ideas of that very class. Though Yeats himself was engaged
in Irish politics, his efforts were primarily directed towards Irelands cultural development through the channels
of literary and artistic progress. In this he significantly differed from Maud Gonne whose aggressive, almost
ruthless self-confidence and intense devotion to Irish nationalist politics was anathema to Yeats.
Despite this from the time of his first meeting until Maud Gonnes marriage with John MacBride in1903 ,Yeats
repeatedly proposed marriage to her. He paid personal visits to her in Dublin and London and Yeats experience
with her in Howth in 1891 forms the focus of his poem The White Birds . He wrote The Countess Kathleen
(1892) for her since she wanted this play to be staged in Dublin on account of its nationalist aspect. The
Countess Kathleen sacrificed her own goods to save the souls of the Irish people from a devil in the time of a
famine. The self-sacrificing fervour of Maud Gonne is equated to Kathleens , and Yeats own position is
portrayed as the bard Kevin, which introduces an autobiographical element in the play. Maud Gonnes refusal
to marry him and the enormous strain Yeats underwent on account of this is captured in Kevins offering his
soul to the demons because his life seemed futile and hopeless. At the same time Kevin/Yeats wanted to save
Kathleen/Maud Gonne from self- destruction that is inevitable while dealing with larger than personal forces.
Yeats did not limit his interaction with her merely to a personal level. He plunged into action at the national
front. In 1898 after the violence of the Jubilee Riots of 1897, he travelled with her on a lecture tour in England
and Scotland to promote the 1898 Wolfe Tone Association and Irish nationalist celebrations. Later he regretted
this involvement and henceforth refused to be drawn in her political schemes which were increasingly becoming
violent and dangerous .
Maud Gonne was attracted to radical politics; she was for example part of a scheme to blow up British troops
on boats bound for South Africa during the Boer War. According to Yeats description, she seemed physically
aroused by violence: when glass was being everywhere shattered during street rioting in Dublin, Maud Gonne
has a look of exultation as she walks with her laughing head thrown back. Yeast though alarmed by her blood
thirsty politics, contrived to implicate himself in her emotional life in odd ways. She was interested in Yeats
occultism, and studied with him; Yeats evoked for her a past personality , a vision of a life in which she had
been an Egyptian priestess.
In the mid - 1890s, Maud Gonne became the lover of a French anarchist editor, Lucien Millevoye; she bore him
a child, who died in infancy; and she decide to assist the babys reincarnation by sleeping with Millevoye in the
vault under the childs grave. In this fashion was Iseult Gonne (1894 1954) conceived. Yeats continued his
hopeless wooing of Maud Gonne; in 1898 she told him that, though they could never be physically married, she
had had a great dream in which a great spirit put her hand into Yeats and married them; and she kissed him
on the lips for the first time and confessed to him her sordid relations with Millevoye. Then they had a
remarkable double vision:
She thought herself a great stone statue through which passed flame, and I felt myself becoming flame and
mounting up through and looking out of the eyes of a great stone Minerva. Were the beings that stand behind
human life trying to unite us, or had we brought it by our own dreams?
The double vision of statue and flame seemed to embody their complimentariness, their inter dependence as
if together they added upto a single, animate, monumental thing.
15 W.B. Yeats
When in 1903, Yeats heard the news that Maud Gonne had married a soldier, John MacBride he described
the news as a blast of lightening . He felt that she had betrayed her mystical marriage of 1898. She and
MacBride soon quarreled, and separated in 1905. The British for his part in the Easter Rebellion executed
MacBride in 1916 and Maud Gonne was again free to marry. Once again Yeats pestered her with proposals;
once again she refused; and then Yeats proposed to Iseult Gonne. To Yeats this playful, impetuous girl represented
youth and spontaneity he often pictured her by the sea, singing or dancing, with the wind blowing in her hair.
At the age of about fifteen, Iseult had suggested to Yeats that they marry but at the age of twenty-two she was
unwilling to marry the fifty- two year old poet. Despairing Yeats asked another attractive woman, Georgie
Hyde-Lees (1892 1968) little older than Iseult Gonne to marry him and she agreed. Yeats was not
immediately excited by the marriage. The new wife often went into a trance and claimed she was being
dictated to by unknown forces. The strange experience is described in Yeatss biographical writings.
Mrs. Yeats automatic writing soon started to offer much, much more than words of consolation from the great
beyond about Yeats treatment of Iseult Gonne. Thereafter Mrs. Yeats found - to her own surprise that she
could easily enter a mediumistic state, and write or speak messages from dead or unborn spirits. Over the next
few years she filled thousands of pages with automatic writing often in response to Yeats - and gave the poet
rudiments of the system elaborated in A Vision (1925): a general system for explaining history, personality, and
the progress of the soul after death. But the first purpose of the automatic writing was to elucidate Yeats
personal relations with Maud Gonne, Iseult Gonne, and his wife.
According to one of Mrs. Yeats favorite Controls, Thomas of Dorlowicz, Yeats and his three birds (three
women) formed a kind of tetrad. Yeats was Heroic, Iseult Good, Maud Beautiful, George True; Yeats represented
the fall (the loss of unity of being), Iseult the Heart, Maud the Head, George the Loins; Yeats was Instinct,
Iseult Desire, Maud Intellect, George emotion; Yeats element was Earth, Iseults Water, Mauds Air, and
Georges Fire and so on. William Blake an edition of whose poetry Yeats published in1893 conceived the
Fall of Man as the division of a single Giant, Albion (the whole human race), into four Zoas, representing the
various faculties of the soul, bickering, impeding one another, working fractiously towards reunion. Similarly, it
seems that Yeats and his wife, Iseult and Maud Gonne together constituted a single human identity. Yeats
believed that, for centuries, he and these women had known one another, sometimes as brother and sister
sometimes in sexual relations, twisting, writhing, through a thousand incarnations, exploring every conceivable
permutation of relationship:
We all to some extent meet again and again the same people and certainly in some cases form a kind of family
of two or three or more persons who come together life after life until all passionate relations are exhausted,
the child of one life the husband, wife, brother or sister of the next.
Thus, Yeats poems about Iseult and Maud Gonne and his wife are simply a form of extended self-inquiry. The
women are not autonomous beings, but portions of those four fold beings of which Yeats himself forms a part.
In addition to these three, Yeats celebrated other living women in his verse. In 1896 Olivia Shakespear, a gentle
and attractive married woman, had become Yeatss first lover; in 1914 her daughter Dorothy married Ezra
Pound. Yeatss liason with her lasted only a year, but they were to remain lifelong friends; he explained their
unsuitability as lovers as follows:
She was too near my soul, too salutary and wholesome to my inmost being. All our lives long, as da Vinci says,
we long for our destruction, and how, when we meet [it] in the shape of a most fair woman, can we do less than
leave all others for her? Do we not seek our dissolution upon her lips?
Olivia Shakespear was Yeats-like, but he craved his opposite, a more devastating relation.
Another vital presence in Yeats poetry was an Irish noblewoman, Isabella Augusta Persse Gregory (1852-
1932). A widow older than Yeats, deeply involved in the revival of Irish literature, a folklorist and playwright,
she provided (beginning in 1897) a tranquil environment in which Yeats could work, could take refuge from the
tumult of passion. Yeats first met her in 1896. She owned the famous estate of Coole Park which, after the
Poetry 16
death of her husband, was devoted to writers who could gather and discuss their work in the peaceful, surrounding
of the estate. At her home, Cool Park, County Galway, Yeats spent many a pleasant months; and he frequently
turned to her for literary collaboration (such as the play The Unicorn from the Stars) and personal advice.
After she died, in 1932, Yeats endured a period of creative sterility; he feared that the subconscious drama
that was my imaginative life end[ed] at Lady Gregorys death. Her drawing room was full of the works of her
literary friends their poems, letters and prose compositions. It was at Coole that Irish national theatre was
planned. For Yeats, opposites merged in the figure of the Lady. She represented a refined and a cultured
aristocratic way of life; a modern example of the Protestant from the Irish landed class, she was against
England and was inevitably on the side of the people. For Yeats Coole Park and Thoor Ballylee represented
the cultural heritage of eighteenth century Ireland and these demanded preservation. In the civil war in the
1920s Roxborough House, Lady Gregorys translations of Gaelic folklore into English provided Yeats with
myths and legends. She collected these from the songs and stories of travelling men and beggars at Coole, or
from the cottages in the Kiltartan district. She collaborated with Yeats on Cathleen ni Houlihan and The Pot
of Broth. She also wrote Our Irish Theatre(1913), Hughlanes Life and Achievement (1921) her own
Journals(1916-30) and Coole(1931). Throughout 1931 she suffered much pain from a malignant cancer
which she bore courageously and died in May 1932. It was Lady Gregory who had arranged his meeting with
Georgie Hyde-Lees in 1912. Yeats eventually married her in 1917 in London. In 1912 he also worked with
Rabindranath Tagore on translation of Gitanjali from Bengali. The controversy over Hugh Lane pictures also
happened in 1912 and disgusted with the Irish lack of reverence for art, he joined Ezra Pound at Stone Cottage
in Sussex in 1913. In 1915, the year in which Hugh Lane was drowned in the Lusitania, Yeats refused a
knighthood. In 1917 Yeats bought his dream Tower at Thoor Ballylee, and Yeats and his wife shifted to the
place in 1918. The importance of this place has already been indicated.
On the establishment of the Irish free state, Yeats served as a senator from 1923 to 1928. The same year i.e.
in 1923 he was awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature. He translated, in collaboration with Purohit Swamy, the
Upanishads in 1935. Yeats died on 28 January 1939 and was buried in the county Sligo.
II. Major themes and works
This section deals with various themes and issues that dominate the works of Yeats, especially those concerning
his poetry. Most of the volumes of his poetry will be analyzed chronologically. Yeatss poetry is better understood
with reference to his prose writings, especially A Vision that contains Yeats poetic doctrine. A Vision was first
published in 1925; Yeats issued a revised edition in 1938. But many of the ideas had always haunted Yeats even
during the early Years of his career. It is the latter version that is of greater critical importance. Although A
Vision is documented towards the end of Yeatss life, it is the product of his long-standing beliefs, his life-long
philosophical leanings and practice and, of course, and his understanding of history: not just at the micro level
of just Ireland, but the entire civilizational history of Europe and the whole world. Thus, ideally, this section
ought to have begun with the explication of A Vision interwoven with his other prose works, so that the detailed
examination of each volume that follows could have been aided by the perspective provided by the treatise.
However, since a large number of other factors went into the making of A Vision, which we are yet to dwell
on, it may not be possible to comprehend Yeatss arguments at this stage. So, except for a brief preview of his
system, which follows, for practical reasons we shall postpone a detailed examination and analysis of Yeatss
complex treatise later.
All the volumes published by Yeats have thematic linkages. The theme of the exploration of love in its various
moods and aspects is a major one in Yeats oeuvre. Related to this is the praise of beauty, especially Maud
Gonnes beauty. The way the beautiful finds its way into his aesthetic is also an important subject to be taken
up for discussion. Yeats love for Maud Gonne and her repeated refusal to marry him: the consequences of this
autobiographical fact for his poetry, as we have already said, cannot be overestimated. His unrequited love for
her constantly resurfaces in all the volumes, but in different ways. Also, his response to the emotional crisis
17 W.B. Yeats
arising out of it kept changing with time and circumstances. Some other thematic concerns in his poetry are:
the negotiation between the ideas and ideals of love and beauty, the conflict between youth and age, permanence
and ephemera, body and soul, passion and the lack of it. In each case the examination of the issue at hand is
tested in relation to Maud Gonne, often encoded as the Helen myth. This is not restricted to his later verse
alone. Yeatss preoccupation with the question of death, the world of becoming that hampers the fulfillment of
desires is evident throughout his poetic career. In addition to this, some volumes center round a dominant image
or symbol; and some poems are written to commemorate events or pay homage or are rooted in topical
happenings. But still these do not fall out of the larger framework, which this section attempts to outline.
Though we shall take this up later in some detail, a sneak preview might be in order:
We shall see how the genesis of the personal mythological history of A Vision can be traced back to the
automatic writing of his wife. In so far as its theme is concerned, it chronicles those historical events that
seemed important to Yeats. According to Yeats, it embraces the philosophy of the spirits , the Unknown
Instructors who provided him with metaphors/symbols of poetry. It is this idiosyncratic ordering/imposition of
time upon the history that is employed in the service and poetry perceived. History is a set of patterns and
patterns which repeat themselves after a particular period of time depending on the Phases of the Moon. The
waxing and waning of the moon that constitutes the Lunar cycle thus influences history. Yeats taps the symbolic
and mythic potential of such an arbitrary ordering of time and this manifests itself in his poetic theory and
practice.
It bears the influence of Yeatss personal interests and artistic endeavour throughout his life. Oriental mysticism,
the western philosophy of Heterodox Mysticism, his psychical research in the 1937 edition; Yeats mentions his
indebtness to various sources. These include Pierre Duhems Systeme du Monde, Toynbees A Study of
History, Henry Adams History as Phase, and Flinders Petries The Revolutions of Civilization and
H.G.Wells Outline of History. It incorporates in his own Blakean practices of vision and dream.
History is visualized as interlaced cones which are in a state of continuous motion always expanding or
contracting. Within the cone moves the perne, a spool which unwinds the thread as the sphere moves onward.
This complex of double cones and threads is referred to as gyre and the gyrations of the conical sphere are
used to explain both the historical events and each mans life. Yeats idea of gyre is derived through many
ramifications, from Plato, Heraclitus, Descartes, Swedenborg, Boehme and Blake. The double cones
are symptomatic of the opposing pulls of external phenomena and internal psychic forces that assail an individual.
The dialectical relationship between soul and self, man and nature, heart and head, youth and age is symbolized/
articulated/expressed through the movement of the gyre. This underscores Yeats belief that thesis and antithesis
are in progress simultaneously. It also shows the influence of Blake, which we have already examined, though
briefly. Blakes poetic theory, we might recall, is premised upon the conviction that without contraries is no
progression . We have also seen how Nietzsche influenced Yeats, and how he had met the idea of contraries
in Boehme.
The simultaneous articulation of the antithetical aspects of personality led Yeats to formulate his doctrine of the
Mask. The Mask is an anti-self that represents the ideal opposite of oneself. Through the use of the mask an
artist can assimilate in his poetry contradictory aspects /facets of experience and the multiple facets of personality
that constitutes reality. In fact, for Yeats creativity/art arises out of the dramatic tension between the self and
the anti-self. The theory of the mask also helps to create a narrative distance and hence personal, emotive
utterance is objectified to a certain extent. His poetry thus enacts the mediation of Individual subjectivity in a
social, historical and cultural context. Man desires his opposite.
The Wanderings of Oisin though written early in Yeats career is a statement of what Yeats came to believe
to be his major preoccupation in old age the acquision of wisdom is always at a cost of wisdom accompanies
bodily decrepitude and death. While preparing the Definitive Edition of his poetry, Yeats wrote to Olivia
Shakespeare on June30, 1932 , My first denunciation of old age I made in The Wanderings of Oisin before
I was twenty and the same denunciation comes in the last pages of the book. Structurally, The Wanderings
Poetry 18
of Oisin shows immense diversity in terms of the use of meter and rhyme. Ranging from the iambic tetrameter
of Book I, hexameter of Book III. The romantic elements are bestowed with a symbolic significance which
lends itself to multiple interpretations. The poem itself is dominated by occult symbols of birds, trees, the moon
and the sun. The birds are birds of prey like eagles and ravens which symbolize Resurrection. It narrates the
story of Oisin, Finns son who is loved by a fairy Niamh. The word Niamh means beauty and brightness; she
is the daughter of Aengus the God of beauty and poetry. Niamh and Oisin journey through three islands for a
period of three hundred years. The three islands are the island of Dancing/Living, the Island of Victories and
the Island of Forgetfulness and denote three aspects of one life: youth, middle age and old age. In terms of
larger than personal influence, it portrays the world as experienced by three types of men: the lover, the active
man and the contemplative man. Richard Ellman reads these as Sligo, London and Howard respectively. Yeats
wrote to Katherine Tynan saying that Oisin presents the incompatible things which man is always seeking
infinite feeling, infinite battle and infinite repose hence the three islands . The debate of Oisin with St.
Patrick with which the poem opens superimposes the Christian view of mortal and immortal life on the pagan
legend and hence is circular in form.
Wanderings of Oisin meditates on such issues as how man can escape the world of becoming. The immutable
and infinite islands offer no satisfaction to Oisin because the fact of desire underpins a human beings life. If it
is not the world of human activity as represented by the three islands that can satisfy the adventurous Oisin ,
then do the options rest in the world of art as represented by Byzantium. Clearly, the nature of human desire
and fulfillment runs as a continuous thread through Yeats ouevre. Oisins transition from one island to the
other is necessitated by the remembrance of his people, the Irish Fenian and Fiama. The poem sheds light on
Yeatss understanding of the intersection between individual and national destiny; a heroic figure like Oisin
cannot just indulge in individualist pursuits but has to accept his duty and responsibility to the larger community
of which he is a part. Romanticism is yet again tampered by the theme of old age and the condition of Ireland.
This point is also underscored if one considers the departures from his sources . He drew mainly from The
Transactions of the Ossianic Society. The fourth volume of the latter contained Michael Comyns poem.
The Lay of Oisin in the Land of Youth . Yeats significantly alters this narrative according to which Oisin and
Niamh travel to the land of Virtues and Victories about Yeats perennial grappling with the ideas of youth and
age , private and public the antithesis has already begun to play a major role in his poetic composition. As
Norman Jeffares says, The main light which the poem casts on Yeats own personality is that it reveals him
in love with the idea of love .
Crossways, published in 1889, comprises poems written between 1885 and 1887. The title is appropriate as
these poems present, as Yeats pointed out in 1895, some of the many pathways he was to embark upon in the
course of his poetic development. These poems have been revised and rewritten and considerably differ from
the ones that appeared in his fist book of poetry, The Wanderings of Oisin and Other Poems. Among other
things, Crossways is linked to the previous volume in its pervasive use of bird imagery peahen, parrots, dove
etc. The poems in this volume came to be read as companion poems/pieces that are often imagistically linked,
and then dialectically opposed or present the positive and negative aspects of the same theme, much in the
manner of Blakes Songs of Innocence and Songs of Experience. The poems explore the theme of love in
its varied aspects and in terms of different ways of treatment of passionate love and its fulfillment The Indian
to his Love and The Falling of the Leaves deals with the subject of the waning of love . In Ephemera ,
the treatment of fading of passion is stylistically different. It is cast in the form of a dialogue between lovers,
thus lending the lyric I a certain measure of impersonality. Related to the themes of love is the speculation
upon questions of subjectivity and personal vision that the poems engage in. The Song of the Happy Shepherd
envisages a pearly brotherhood made possible by the conviction that words alone are certain good ; for
sincere expression is the basis of poetry and truth alike, there is no truth/ saving in thine own heart. As
opposed to this cheerful song , The Sad Shepherd is unhappy because his song has been changed to an
inarticulate moan . These poems thus emphasize the importance of artists and art to a community as Yeats
19 W.B. Yeats
envisioned it. Crossways also demonstrates Yeats diverse interests and the different techniques he employs
depending upon the subject of the poem. The first eight poems of Crossways deal with Indian and Arcadian
subject matter; the remaining eight are Irish in tone and mood.
The Wind Among the Reeds (1899) represents the culmination of Yeats early poetry in its undiluted and strict
emphasis on symbolim and beauty . It shows the influence of the Rhymers Club, the French symbolists and
the literary movement of Aestheticism .At the same time , this lyrical poetry is also informed by a dramatic
impulse, the dramatic aspect reflected in the creation of three characters that Yeats accomplishes at this time
.Seeing them as principles of mind , Yeats creates Aedh, Hanrahan and Michael Robartes and endows them
with specific characteristics which he explains in the note to these poems in magical terms. Aedh represents
fire burning by itself ; Michael Robartes fire reflected in water and Hanrahan is fire blown by the wind .
For Yeats, fire symbolized imagination, hence the three figures represent imagination in its different aspects. In
terms of the role they play in the poems, Aedh is a sad lover offering up riches before all that he loves, Michael
Robartes proudly broods over his possession and Hanrahan is too changeable to gather permanent possessions.
This symbolic code shows Yeats steeped in occult and visionary philosophy. The symbols of water, sea, wind
are derived from the Rosicrucian system of symbolism and Yeats elaborates upon the significance of these in
his Notes. Water is explained as everywhere the signature of the fruitfulness of the body and of the fruitfulness
of the dreams . The sea is identified with life itself or as a symbol of the drifting indefinite bitterness of life .
Wind is a symbol of vague desires and hopes, not merely because the Sidhe are in the wind, or because the
wind bloweth as it listeth, but because wind and spirit and vague desires have been associated everywhere.
Responsibilities was published in 1914 and it bears the mark of personal and political events that took place
between the publications of The Green Helmet and Other Poems (1910) and this. Between 1910 and 1914
Yeats visited America twice. Though Yeats had ceased to attend to the details of the Abbey management he
was still interested in its performances. In 1911 he accompanied the players on the first part of the tour in
America but he left before the furious reaction of the Irish-American audiences to Synges play broke out. His
second visit was in January march 1914 for a lecture tour. As the title of the volume suggests , the poems
demonstrate Yeatss effort to grapple with personal and larger than personal forces, i.e., to see the events in
his life without the veil of idealism and thus accept responsibility for it. In the political sphere, this manifests
itself in the Yeatss indignant reaction to Hugh Lane Controversy. In 1912 Sir Hugh Lane, Lady Gregorys
nephew, offered his collection of French paintings to the Dublin Corporation on the condition that they house
them in a gallery worthy of them. But the Corporation refused and Sir Hugh subsequently handed the pictures
to the National gallery, London. September 1913 is one of the several poems that Yeats wrote to voice his
disgust at the stinginess and the lack of respect and appreciation of the contemporary Irish people for art and
beauty. The poem castigates/satirizes the local inhabitants whom Yeats sees as unworthy of the numerous and
great sacrifices of the nationalist revolutionaries like John O Leary .Ireland is not capable and not worthy of
sustaining the heroism that characterized it in earlier times. The refrain Romantic Irelands dead and gone,/
Its with O Leary in the grave ,drives home the point rather forcefully. If September 1913 documents
Yeats feelings viz-a-viz nationalist issues, In the The Cold Heaven the poet persona blames himself for the
failure of his love for Maud Gonne. In a moment of intense feeling when the poets experience approximated
to a vision , I took all the blame out all of sense and reason ./Untill I cried and trembled and rocked to and fro,/
Riddled with light. The Cold Heaven also deals with questions of life after death and the state of the soul
therein.
Responsibilities is also crucial to our understanding of Yeats ouevre as it marks a change in his style and
thought. During this time Yeats was much influenced by Ezra Pound whose imagist doctrines emphasized
clarity and precision in the presentation of ideas .Pound, who reviewed the volume, said that Yeats had at last
become a modern poet . Yeats himself refers to his transformation in his poem A Coat in the form of his
favorite sartorial image. In the poem he indicates his renunciation of the decorative poetry of the past in fvour
of the Imagist credo: the word itself is the adequate symbol. Now there is greater enterprise in Walking
Poetry 20
Naked , i.e., confronting the issues of the changing times in all its starkness. Responsibilities shows yet
another of Yeats preoccupations at this time: he made enquiries into the family history and the Prologue to
the volume describes them . Yeats takes this up in the section of his Autobiographies called Reveries which
he called some sort of an apologia for the Yeats family.
The Seven Woods published in 1903, is informed by Yeats experience with theatre what he called the theatre
business and the event of Maud Gonnes marriage in1903. His play On Baits Strand was published at the end
of the first edition of In The Seven Woods which constituted fourteen poems .The involvement with theatre
added the public dimension to his otherwise dream-burdened will , as Yeats described his subjectivity .
Corresponding to this is the use of an anomalous conversational idiom and tone along with the mellowing of
images. However, this does not reduce/mitigate the intensity of emotions and feelings which the poems articulate.
This volume continues Yeats presentation of facts of aging and mortality rather an acute/a painful
consciousness of these facts. Superimposed on this or juxtaposed to this is the autobiographical fact of Yeats
frustrated hopes and thwarted desires in the act of Maud Gonnes marriage to MacBride in1903. After having
been turned down by Maud Gonne several times ,Yeats once again proposed to her in Paris with the hope of
finally winning her hand. But Yeats faced rejection yet again . From 1899 to 1902 , Yeats articulated/gave
expression to his sorrow and unrequited love in poems like The Arrow , The Folly of Being Comforted ,
Adams Curse and Under the Moon . But the final blow came with the news of her marriage and is
poetically rendered in lyrics like Old Memory , Never give all the heart , The Ragged Wood and O Do
Not Love Too Long . As these are poems about the eventual unfulfillment in love, the poems contain the
memories of some moments of togetherness and tenderness. Along with these recollections is an assertion of
the poets undying love. Adams Curse is a case in point. The poem interrelates the three kinds of lobour: the
poets, the beautiful womans and the lovers . In doing this, the poem tells about Yeats poetic strategy the
semblance of spontaneity and sudden emotion even if in actuality it required hours of thinking and composition.
It extends this poetic principle to the principle of social and behavioural and personal feelings by giving voice to
the labour of a beautiful woman and a lover. Lovelorn and time-worn , the poet personalizes these efforts in his
statements : you were beautiful and I strove/ To love you in the old high way of love . But the present is
dominated by the weary hearted[ness] captured in the image of the hollow moon . Under The Moon is an
extensive catalogue of myths that are not to be borne by the poet. The changed attitude to myth is also
predicated upon disappointment in love.
Adams Curse , also shows the elements of narrative and drama that are introduced in the poem by virtue of
reported dialogue. Stylistically, critics see it as anticipating Yeats modernist poetics. According to T.S. Eliot ,
this was the volume in which Yeats became a modern as well as a poet. The title alludes to the Seven Woods
Of the Lady Gregorys estate where Yeats had written many of the lyrics in the volume. Michael Sidnell points
out that it is Yeats only title for the collection of the poems that directly implies the physical presence of the
poet . This topographical settings reiterates Yeats new interest in self dramatization . But the woods do not
loose their symbolic significance. Associated with natural innocence and quietude, they have recuperative
power for the poet.
Like the previous volume, the poems written between 1908 and 1912, show the influence of Yeats
involvement in theatre. The Green Helmet is a play that deals with Helmets , and Swords, and half-forgotten
thing ( Reconciliation ) in the absence of an impetus/catalyst for poetic composition .Maud Gonnes marriage
affected Yeats lyrical output, but between 1903 and 1910 ,Yeats was beginning to formulate/forge a new
aesthetic for himself and this is reflected in his lectures and correspondence. The personal lyrics of the middle
section of the volume are flanked by two public poems : His Dream and Brown Pemy that speculate
upon the themes of death and love respectively . Yeats was always fascinated with the idea of Amor as
Death and these poems illustrate this.
The more personal lyrics are thematically and imagistically integrated by the repeated use of conversational
phrases. These again may be divided into two groups : those addressed to Maud Gonne and some addressed to
21 W.B. Yeats
Lady Gregory . Maud Gonne assumes the larger than life stature as she becomes the real life counterpart of
the mythological Helen. The image of Helen pervades Yeats poetry and sheds light on Yeats complex treatment
of this myth in particular and his attitude towards myth in general. A Woman Homer Sung and No Second
Troy are such examples. With Reconciliation Yeats articulated the need and desire to ameliorate his somewhat
hard and bitter feelings for Maud Gonne on account of both her marriage and political strategies and outlook.
But, dear, cling close to me ; since you were gone, / My barren thoughts hare chilled me to the bone is a
moving expression of Yeats sense of loss. The other poems that refer to Maud Gome are Words , King and
No King , Peace: and Against unworthy Praise .
The fire poems that follow The Mask are all associated with Lady Gregory. Upon a House shaken by the
Land Agitation is Coole Park, Lady Gregorys residence where Yeats spent much of his time relaxing and
composing poetry. These are the clouds and A Friends Illness both are about Lady Gregory, written at the
time of her illness in 1909. The former recounts Lady Gregorys obsession with Coole and its history and the
latter is Yeats statement of her importance to him.
The Mask is Yeats first poem to examine this image which would become a central tenet of this personal
and poetic belief. The autobiographical facts and poetic practice are once again connected: words and All
Thing can Tempt Me . Contemplating the impact of Maud Games rejection of him on his poetry, Yeats
surmises that had she accepted him, I might have thrown poor words away / And been content to live
( Words ). Important as his poetics vocation is to him, All Things can Tempt Me once again exhibits his
uncontrollable urge to possess Maud Gonne, even if it means the loss of poetic inspiration: Yet this is tempered
by the realization that I swayed my leaves and flowers in the sun; / Now I may wither into the truth as
expressed in The Coming if Wisdom with Time . The volume thus examines / engages with themes that have
been of continued relevance to Yeats in the formulation of his poetic creed: His love for Maud Gonne, her
Hellenic beauty, the grudging acceptance of old age yet, a feeling of out of control passion are themes that go
on to form the core of The Tower.
III. Placing the Writer in a Literary Tradition Bringing
Out his Contribution
As a major and influential poet, and as a poet whose career spanned more than four decades, it was only to
be expected that Yeats participated in several artistic movements and entered into and outgrew more than one
tradition. In what follows we shall take a close look at how this happened. There is bound to be an overlap
between some of the biographical details, the major themes and works discussed above and some of the points
we take up for discussion in this section.
Yeats and the fin-de-siecle, Late romanticism, decadence: Writing around the fn-d-sicle and well into
the twentieth century, it is not surprising that Yeats came across literary movements predominant in
those years. His poetry shows the influence that these movements had had on him. Of these he retained some
and discarded the rest in his later years. Even though the Romantic Movement had exhausted itself by the
1830s, it was to be one of the strongest influences on Yeats, something he could never get out of. Years later
he would say, We were the last romantics chose for theme/Traditional sanctity and loveliness . ( Coole
and Ballylee ). Though this claim is debatable, one can nonetheless discern certain romantic traits in Yeatss
poetry, if we accommodate the argument that the newer aesthetic configurations were variants of the romantic
movement. In fact, many moderns who disclaimed their romantic lineage or allegiance have been attributed
romantic trappings. Be that as it may, the young Yeats came under the influence of the romantic visionary,
William Blake and the romantic revolutionary, Shelley. Let us here try to chart the progress of Yeats
through such movements as Romanticism, Pre-Raphaelitism, Aestheticism, Symbolism and Imagism/
Modernism. Throughout his career he strove for a unity of being which he so succinctly puts forward
in poetic form in the Byzantium poems.
Poetry 22
Yeatss drawing on the symbolist practice may have started with his reading of William Blake (1757 1827):
His father used to read the poems of Blake to Yeats, and at the age of sixteen he lent him a copy of Blake.
Yeats also produced a three volume edition of Blake in collaboration with Edwin Ellis explaining his symbols
and mythology. For Blake, the faculty of imagination in man is the main source of spiritual consciousness. This
imagination is articulated in the language of myth and symbols in poetry and other arts. Thus Man becomes the
source and epitome of Poetic Genius. Yeats accepted these views and discovered reality in the imagination.
He discusses this in William Blake and the Imagination in his Essays and Introduction. He says, In his
[Blakes] time educated people believed that they amused themselves with books of the imagination, but that
they made their souls by listening to sermons and by doing or not doing certain things In our time we make
our souls out of some one of the great poets of ancient times . The enormity of Blakes influence upon Yeats
can be gauged in the basic premise of A Vision. Blake wrote I must create a system myself or be enslaved by
another mans . Yeats did just that in his A Vision which, to him, was a vindication of his lifes works and
beliefs. He also found in Blakes writing his idea of the ultimate reconciliation of opposites in mans life and in
history. Blakes belief in contraries as he expressed it in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell can be seen in
the following statement he makes: Without contraries is no Progression, Attraction and Repulsion, Reason
and Energy, Love and Hate, are necessary to Human existence . This, as we shall see, gives rise to the two
antithetical cones in Yeatss own A Vision.
Yeats subscribed to the Blakean view encapsulated in his following statement: I must create a system or be
enslaved by another mans . His system of philosophy, as delineated in A Vision (1926), is a more
concrete form of mythology than Blakes The Four Zoas. Blakes was an abstract system, the
mystical symbols making sense by and large only to himself. Yeats draws on occult and theosophy,
among other things, in A Vision. Theosophy became a vogue in the 1830s and it was in the late 1880s
that the Golden Dawn was founded and saw its membership flourish. The Rosicrucian doctrines along
with their spirituality and mysticism made an impact on Yeats which can be followed in the volumes
The Rose (1893) and The Wind Among the Reeds (1899). Yeats participated in all the principal traditions
of his age, in the process nativizing them. He brought the Celtic heritage to bear upon them, thus
contributing in a way to the Celtic Revival. The folkloric elements, fairy tales and other Irish legends
that he mastered were made the subjects of many of his poems. The myth-making continues in the
form of his various dramatis personae like Michael Robartes, Owen Ahern and Red Hanrahan.
The fin-de-siecle:
The practice of launching movements armed with labels, manifestos and magazines, so characteristic of the
later high modernism, emerged as a strategy around the 1890s. If the history of modernism is also the history
of little magazines which Malcolm Bradbury has so aptly dubbed the shock troops of modernism, , the logical
starting point of that history has to be the 1890s when, in England, the Yellow Book and Savoy were launched.
Parodied contemporaneously, and often pejoratively referred to as decadent or fin-de-siecle, the decade was
nonetheless a crucial launching pad for modernism. The predominant slogan that was heard in the literary
London of the 1890s was that of art for arts sake . This credo was enunciated by Theophile Gautier in
France much before it was taken up by the nineties aesthetes . When we examine in a later section how
Pound and Eliot used Gautier to swerve the direction of modern poetry around 1918 the connections between
the decade and the modern movement become that much easier to appreciate. Similarly Joyce would imbibe
certain aesthetic ideals, as becomes evident from the portrayal of the egoist, Stephen Daedalus. Oscar Wildes
dicta that all artists are solipsists whether they know it or not, further go to prove the Wildean inspiration
behind his bildungsroman..
Yeats was very much a member of the Rhymers Club and his early poetry was forged in the Pre Raphaelite
haze; Pound too was to be influenced by Dowson. The latter admitted The Rhymers, who he said, did
valuable work in knocking bombast and rhetoric &Victorian syrup out of our verse. In placing a high value on
23 W.B. Yeats
beauty and style in their art, the aesthetes, following Gautier, prided themselves in their craft. For them, the
poets task became almost akin to the engravers or sculptors and the poem, a verbal icon. Such commitment
to his art led to the aesthete away from any political commitment. Until the second wave of modernism came
in the 1930s modern poetry remained fundamentally aesthetic in this sense. The public poet was superseded by
the poet who addressed, like Yeats, the man who is but a dream, or, like Eliot the hypothetical intelligent man
who does not exist. Even as late as 1938 Yeats would reflect this aesthetic ideal in his lines:
How can I, or that girl standing there/My attention fix/ On Roman or on Russian/Or on Spanish politics?
Owing their aestheticism to French writers such as Gautier, Baudelaire, Flaubert and others, the 90s poets had
already brought in foreign elements into the English tradition, which were exploited to the hilt during the high
modernist period. For Gautier, as indeed for the 90s poets, art was emphatically not what it was in the
Romantic tradition, a cooperation with tradition that completes it . Nature could no longer suggest a process
of composition, for natural spontaneity was distrusted. Art became the opposite of nature: formal and artificial.
Thus, by bringing about the divorce between Nature and Art, art-for-arts-sake paved the way for high modernism.
Hence the movement, in modern poetry, towards sophistication and mannerism, towards introversion,
technical display .
Thus, also, the movement from what was nature made to what was man made: the life in the city. Since city life
had been found unpoetic as a subject matter for poetry in the greater part of the 19
th
century, the 90s poets
set out to depict it. They did so partly in reaction no doubt, but there were other reasons as well. First, as a vast
and at that time unique capital city, London intrigued and preoccupied them. Second, the rising interest in the
rights of the ordinary man, as projected by the socialist movements which brought to a sharp focus the plight of
the London types. Examples abound in the 90s poetry, - Symons City Nights: In the train . Dowsons
Spleen, Henleys London types , and Davidsons Thirty Bob a week.
Of Davidsons poem Eliot was to say how he had found inspiration on the content of the poem, and in the
complete fitness of content and idiom: for I also a good many dingy urban images to reveal . Eliot for the
same reasons was equally grateful to Baudelaire whom Frank Kermode calls the great poet of the modern
city , who seems to have influenced the 90s poets no less. But, the city as a symbol or metaphor for the decay
and degeneration of civilization came to be exploited to a greater extent only in the hands of the great moderns.
Eliot, it would seem had such considerations in the mind when, later in life, he would say that he certainly had
much more in common with the poet of the generation of the nineties than the English poets who survived to
[his] own day .
Thus, pre-Raphaelitism, Aestheticism and Symbolism (the French Symbolists) were the dominant traditions
of the fn-d-sicle that defined Yeats politics in the pre-1900 era. Yeats enjoyed William Morris
poems for their dream-like quality and mysticism. Something of this feeds into his first few volumes,
especially the poem Lake Isle of Innisfree which espouses all these Romantic, Pre-Raphaelitic and
Aestheticist ideals. Yeats had heard of Oscar Wilde and actually met him in 1888. He was impressed
by the style of the chief protagonist of the Aestheticist Movement and tried to cultivate that apparently
effortless refinement in his own work at the time. Arthur Symons was responsible for bringing
Symbolism to England through his celebrated publication The Symbolist Movement in Literature
(1899). Although the roots of this Movement lie in Romanticism, yet it tried to define a new aesthetic
for the fn-d-sicle and was indeed an avant-garde Movement of its time. The symbol stood for
something which would be reached at in steps, the reader pushed into exercising her imagination to
grasp it. The thrust was on (word) associations, allusions, sensuous perception of reality, aural rather
than visual elements among other things.
As we have seen, when a boy, Yeats read Morris poetry. He first met William Morris in 1886 in Dublin
and after that had become a regular visitor at Morris household. Although Yeats father with two of
his friends had established a Pre-Raphaelite Brotherhood, it was through Morris that Yeats was
Poetry 24
introduced to the aesthetic theories and controversies which had dominated artistic circles in the
previous generation. Coming late in the long line of the Pre-Raphaelites from around 1850 Ruskin,
Whistler, Pater, the Rossettis Morris was a sort of culminating point of notions about social values
and art. His concept of courtesy, decorum and a regulated social order seeps into Yeats later work.
One can suggest parallels between Yeats own Celtic folkloric ambience and Morris mediaevialist
mythology. Yeats also recognized the importance of Paters dictum in the Conclusion to The Renaissance:
To burn always with this hard, gemlike flame, to maintain this ecstasy, is success in life. This was
to become the Aestheticist tenet and Wilde concretized it in his personal life and literary style.
According to Alasdair Macrae, In his poetic career [Yeats] was to swing about between an espousal
of hermetic poetry, seemingly related to a notion of Art for arts sake , and a deployment of poetry
as an instrument for ideological or attitudinal change and promotion. . The Lake Isle (written 1888),
is a compound of the aestheticist tenets and the romantic yearning for a self-sufficient place. The
whole poem has an atmosphere of a pre-Raphaelite languor.
The foremost romantic influences on Yeats were those of Blake (which we have already discussed in
some detail) and Shelley. Working with Edwin Ellis, Yeats had devoted some four years to Blakes
poetry. The two editors elucidated Blakes mythological system of symbolism. By the time he came
to work on Blake, Yeats had already embarked on explorations in the mystical tradition with George
Russell (AE). Both Russell and Yeats shared an interest in the occult and Yeats was fascinated by
the visions that others recorded. He was eager to discover their symbolism. Another thing that
appealed to Yeats vis- -vis Blake was the latters dialectic of contrary forces operating together.
Shelleys Prometheus Unbound became one of the sacred books for Yeats. In 1900 he published
The Philosophy of Shelleys Poetry , one of the seminal essays on the symbolic patterns in the poetry.
Along with his studies in romanticism his explorations in occult continued. He had inherited his fathers
rational atheism, but was drawn to ideas of hierarchy, magic, hidden ancient wisdom. For the rest of
his life he explored these mysteries, at first in psychic research and spiritualism, and among secret
societies, later among hermetic philosophies. In 1887 he joined Madame Blavatskys Theosophical
Society in London. Another lifelong fascination, the Irish legends and fairy tales, remained with him. He
found Lady Jane (Speranza) Wilde a major source of these ancient legends. Between 1888 and 1894
Yeats went out to collect folklore and over the following years he continued this practice, either around
Sligo or in Connaught, in cooperation with Lady Gregory. Mary Battle, his maternal uncle George
Pollexfens housekeeper, was another source for Yeats of amazing stories. According to Yeats, for
Mary Battle, unblinkered with the modern bias, the ancient myths and legends were still alive and
being re-enacted in the landscape around her. His earlier volumes viz. Crossways (1889), The Rose
(1893), The Wind Among the Reeds (1889) and the long narrative poem The Wanderings of Oisin
(1889) draw on these Celtic folklores and myths. Most of the poems in these volumes also rely on
overt symbols, the major ones being that of the rose and the cross [from Ros - rose and Crux -
cross]. In Yeats case, even Symbolism goes through stages. His early poetry developed by and large
on a single primary symbol, that of the rose. Rose could stand for any desirable object, thus subsuming
a multitude of disparate objects. The Song of Wandering Aengus and When You are Old are other
examples of poems wherein the influence of Irish legend and Occultism is felt.
These symbols may vary from poem to poem but are nevertheless crucial to the themes. Besides rose
and cross there are other symbols such as Swans, Moon, Tower, Staircase, in Yeats repertoire. Blake
and Shelley were probably his most trusted exemplars and from Shelley, in particular, he gleaned
patterns of symbols: caves, sages, rivers, journeys, shells, towers, winds, and the eagle and the serpent.
He learned how a symbol can be introduced to the reader, then developed, repeated and echoed. Yeats
brought Celtic mythology to Symbolism thereby making his brand of Symbolism esoteric enough. He
had moved from Pre-Raphaelitism into Symbolism; Pound was able to help him move out of that
25 W.B. Yeats
Symbolism which had about it the trappings and air of the 1890s decadence and to become a poet
of the twentieth century.
In the French Symbolism, the whole poem is turned into a mood through the incantatory power of the
sound of the words. Symbolism saw the poem as verbal (and semi-musical) event, resonating with
suggestion, brilliant, evocative, but refusing to yield up any one unequivocal conceptual meaning. Symbol
far from being an expression of the self, becomes an attempt to reach out for something unreachable
and inexpressible (without the help of a symbol). In 1921 Yeats talks of his symbols in one of his
letters. The chief symbols around these years were of the sun, the moon in all her phases, the tower,
the mask and the tree. In Adams Curse [In the Seven Woods (1904)] the moon appears as a
symbol of (in)constancy and shell as signifying emptiness, desolation. This poem also relies on the
Symbolist articulation of mood through the words that contribute to the musical effect (ll.8-10).
Yeatss symbols have a range that is less traditional than esoteric. It was Ezra Pound who helped the older
poets transition from Symbolism to Imagism/Modernism. Imagism as a Movement set itself in
opposition to Symbolism. The emphasis on hardness and objectivity were aimed at removing all that
Romantic and Symbolist dross from poetry. Pound proved to be the staunchest critic and simultaneously
a keen disciple of Yeats, correcting the master ruthlessly wherever required. The Green Helmet (1910)
and Responsibilities (1914) are some of the volumes where the changes in his idiom are marked. The
volume Responsibilities is dedicated to Ezra Pound.
Nevertheless, Yeatss early training was too strong to turn him into an extremist modern like Pound. Even in
the mature volumes such as The Tower (1928), the Romantic streak continued. The old symbols gave
way to the new ones, the mythology/philosophy matured but the esoteric element remained. We shall
look at Yeatss affiliation with modernism in a later section. To be able to relate Yeats to the modernist moment/
movement it might be necessary to trace the latter.
Modernism and Yeats
What is modernism/modernist poetry?: In what seems to be a telling moment in the history of modern poetry
Ezra Pound wrote to Harriet Monroe, editor of Poetry (Chicago), the following lines about a young compatriot:
I was jolly well right about Eliot He is the only American I know of who has made what I can call adequate
preparation for writing. He has actually trained himself and modernized himself on his own . It is such a
comfort to meet a man and not have to tell him to wash his face, wipe his feet, and remember the date (1914)
on the calendar.
The lines are well known. But as with many famous utterances, some significant aspects of Pounds letter
have gone unnoticed. For, though he was by no means the first to use the term modern in connection with
new things ( new was another of his favourite synonyms for modern ) that were happening in the world of
letters, he was using the term in the sense which has endured most. Also, he was perhaps the first to use the
term in its verbal form, as latter day sociologists often do: modernization as the process and modernism as
the product. Further, the clarity and confidence with which Pound documents the modernist moment in poetry
(Wyndham Lewis was to coin the phrase the men of 1914 ), what it contemporaneously meant to be modern ,
are virtues not always met with in subsequent histories of modernism. Instead of these qualities what the
uninitiated student of modern poetry encounters today in most histories are confusion and imprecision.
In fact, though there is a general agreement over the year in which literary modernism came of age (most
critics point to 1922), no such critical consensus has been claimed for the years of its birth and passing (with
many doubting whether modernism has passed at all). Even some of the progenitors of modernism, who have
seen it all happen, and who might say like the magi that There was a birth definitely, we had evidence and no
doubt, have suggested directly or by implication different dates of birth. Lawrence, for example wrote, in
Kangaroo, that On or about December 1910 human nature changed. ( Mr. Bennet and Mrs. Brown p.
321). Eliot, writing more specifically of the evolution of modern poetry, would recall that the point de repere
Poetry 26
usually and conveniently taken as the starting point of modern poetry is the group dominated. Imagists in
London about 1910 . Yeats, on the other hand, would go a little further back to declare somewhat good
humoredly: then suddenly 1900 everyone got off his stilts. Such a diversity of opinion among the great moderns
seem to have confused later genealogists no less, with Richard Ellman and Charles Fieldson tracing the origins
of modernism back into the romantic era. But whereas the moderns were very much in the thick of events and
could not have viewed their situation with a fair degree of objectivity, the latter group ought to have been more
objective, and less confused. As with the dating, so with the definitions. The reasons why critics and historians
continued to disagree for decades on the subject were chiefly the wide variety of perspectives and definitions
they employed to grapple with the very concept of modernism.
If Lionel Trilling thought of modernism as essentially the drive toward freedom from society, culture and
civilization and from anarchic surrender to experience , and found it nihilistic and apocalyptic; and Frank
Kermode and Irving Howe similarly isolate the modernists: sense of an ending and nihilism as its characteristic
features; Edmund Wilson found in it the essential traits of symbolism. That is to say, whereas some emphasized
the cultural assumptions that went with modernism, a whole Weltanschauung that they thought shaped it,
others stressed the formal and stylistic aspects of modernist works. Hardly have these questions been settled
with postmodernism seems to have superseded (some would say extended) modernism and the latter is
being looked at, or down upon, from fresh perspectives.
Commonly, at least in the social sciences, modernism denotes the active participation in those social and
intellectual changes which ushered in the modern era. In this sense both Marx and Mill, Freud and Darwin
were all modernists. In literary history, however, the term is used to denote the highly self conscious cultural
and artistic movement which attempted to create new aesthetic forms in reaction against romanticism , with
which, it was later discovered, it shared many traits. So much so, not only modernists were called belated
romantics, but even the post modernists had begun calling themselves late romantics. Be that as it may,
modernism as an epoch goes far back in time beyond 1900, but as a specific literary period its beginnings are
more recent. It may be said to have started when artists self-consciously sought a total break with the past.
With the depletion of traditional value systems and an increasing mistrust of established institutions the artists
began to look for new art forms and modes of utterances of their modern sensibility. The most decisive and
irrevocable came with the breaking out of the First World War , no doubt, but the symptoms of the onset of the
new world were already manifest to sensitive artists decades before the outbreak of the War. But a break
with the past did not mean a break with tradition. The moderns, paradoxically enough, rejected the recent past
in order to establish contact with a more authentic (for them), remote past. What led the modernist writers to
reject the Victorian value system was their fundamental opposition to the consensus that had come to exist
between the author and the reader. They tended to see themselves as belonging to the avant garde disengaged
from bourgeois values, and disturbed their audience by adopting complex and difficult new forms and styles. In
the field of literature modernism took various forms. In fiction, for example, the accepted continuity of chronological
development was upset by Joseph Conrad, Marcel Proust and William Faulkner. James Joyce and Virginia
Woolf attempted new ways of tracking the flow of characters thoughts in their narrative modes. This style
was now called the stream of consciousness after the psychological concept was formulated by William
James, brother of Henry James. In poetry similarly, Ezra Pound and T.S. Eliot replaced the logical exposition of
thoughts with clusters or collage of fragmentary or disjointed images and complex allusions. And so on, in other
genres and art forms.
Moving away from an important 19
th
century engagement of the writer with Nature or the Country ,
modernist writing becomes predominantly cosmopolitan and metropolitan. It expresses a sense of urban cultural
dislocation. As a matter of fact, the single most important image that distinguishes most modern poetry from all
earlier poetry is that of the city. The city, the metropolis, or the megalopolis is the ultimate symbol of the modern
world; and therefore , the modern poet is essentially a poet of the city. Traditionally, poets had drawn their
subjects, characters and locales from the country and nature and hence the predominance of the pastoral
27 W.B. Yeats
element in much of the poetry upto the Victorian times. But it is a plain historical fact that modern poetry grew
in metropolitan centres like London, Boston Paris and so on. And the modern poet sang of the city men,
drawing the bulk of his imagery from the cities and portraying the city life with all its squalor and gaping
humanity. The industrial towns too were not spared as subjects for poetry.
But even the city is neither the final nor the sole criterion on which can be based a proper understanding of the
modern element in literature. Much of the poetry of Edward Thomas and Hardy is not city poetry at all. It is
really the contrast between Innocence and Experience, as John-Heath Stubbs would say, that characterises
the antithesis of style that one associates with the modern movement. The challenge of Experience, the
expansion of subject matter demanded, for some modern poets at least, new styles; and the best poetry of the
modern movement can be easily seen as a triumph of style matching the mood and subject matter of Experience.
Experiments with style led some modern poets to use vers libre and prose stanzas. But the best of them used
new variations of the traditional metre and stanzaic forms rather than free verse. As Eliot said, No verse is
free. There is only good verse, bad verse and chaos .
The elements briefly discussed here occur to a more or less extent in various schools of modernist poetry. But
the movement was far from being as coherent or linear as it has been made out here. Only the historical
perspective creates the illusion of uniformity. The modern movement seeded out of the coterie spirit which is
the highest common factor between the movements, major or minor is, that it grew around coteries and coterie
publications: Symbolism, Futurism, Expressionism, Imagism, Vorticism, Dada and Surrealism. Armed with their
own manifestoes and little magazines, the coteries launched movements of their own and fought internecine
debates. Many of these are now forgotten; some appear in retrospect to have been more influential than
others.
As we have already suggested, the situation of 1914 did not happen all of a sudden. The training of Eliot and
Ezra Pound mentions in his letter, quoted in the beginning, is applicable to the individual cases of the other
modernists as well, Pound himself included. And such a training involved an appreciation and inculcation of the
1890s ethos, including, as we have seen, the latters coterie spirit. As Eliot was to say later, [I] cannot help
wondering supposing that poets of the generation of the nineties had survived perhaps they were men
who could [had] they survived, they might have spoken in an idiom sufficiently like my own to have made
anything I had to say superfluous .
Imagism:
But again, as Ross pointed out the Georgian revolt is not represented by the periodic appearance of the
Marsh anthologies, (the innovative zeal did not last beyond the first); but by the growth of many other movements
and campaigns: Imagism, Vorticism, Futurism, the War poetry and the poetry represented by such coterie
publications as Wheels, Art and Letters and Coterie, and the innovations of unaffliated poets. Of these, the
Imagist movements, seems to be by far the most crucial and needs to be discussed in some detail. The history
of imagism is difficult to trace, mainly because of the disagreement over points of detail between individual
members: F.S. Flint, Pound, and Amy Lowell, and an impresario like Ford Madox Ford. But this is no place to
sort out the historical tangle and decide between rival claims. Suffice it to say that Hulme was the father figure,
who gathered together in 1909 at the Eiffel Tower restaurant a group comprising others, Flint, Edward Storer
and Pound and discussed frequently a new, dry and hard poetic before Pound caught on to it and gave it the
propulsion it needed to be known as a movement. Another influential figure was Ford, who though not exactly
an Imagist, believed in certain Imagist dicta regarding the modern idiom and vers libre, and was instrumental
in bringing changes atleast in Pound around 1910-12.
So far as the name is concerned, Pound was to recall in 1927 that, the name was invented to launch H.D. and
Aldington before either had enough stuff for a volume ; and the name was first used by him in 1912. Before
they were published in the now famous Des Imagistes anthology, H.D. and Aldington were published as such
by Harriet Monroes poetry (Chicago) at Pounds behest:
Poetry 28
I have had luck again and am sending you some modern stuff by an American, I say modern, for it is in the
laconic speech of the Imagistes, even if the subject is classic Objective no slither; direct no excessive use
of adjectives, no metaphors that wont permit examination. Its straight talk, straight as the Greek!
Aldingtons poems were also part of Pounds despatch, but he did not want his own poems to be published
before theirs; dont use them until you have used H.D. and Aldington, S.V.P. He made H.D. sign herself as
after the french manner Imagiste . Shortly before this, however, he had reprinted five poems by Hulme at
the back of his own volume of poems Ripostes (1912), where he reffered to the imagistes as Les Imagistes,
and as the descendents of Hulmes forgotten school of 1909. In the subsequent Imagist manifesto published
in the March 1913 number of poetry, Flint supplied the followng credo:
1. Direct treatment of the thing, whether subjective or objective.
2. To use absolutely no word that does not contribute to the presentation.
3. As regarding rhythm: to compose in the sequence of the musical phase, not in the sequence of a metronome.
Pound subsequently supplied a few Donts for the Imagists, and defined an image more positively as an
intellectual and emotional complex in an instant of time. In fact, Pounds conception of the Image was based
on an ideal deriving from such sister arts as painting, sculpture and music, as he describes in his account of his
composition of In a Station of the metro .
The less ardent members of the school seldom pursued the ideal of Pound. When Amy Lowell took over the
movement Pound dubbed it Amygism .
Yeats and Pound: By the time The Green Helmet (1910) was published Pound had already come into
Yeats life. The relationship started off with Pound as the student of the by now famous poet. Within
a year or two it had progressed to a stage where it was hard to tell who the student was and who
the master. Pound wanted to pull Yeats out of the decadent Symbolist trappings. One of the faults
with Yeats subjectivity, according to Pound, was a tendency to lapse into sentiment. Pound insisted
on the qualities of hardness, concreteness and objectivity in poetry. He was dead set against the
superfluous adjectives that the Tennysonians and the Aesthetes abound wth. Fallen Majesty
(Responsibilities), is a typical example of Poundian correction. The last line of the poem read: Once
walked a thing that seemed, as it were, a burning cloud. Pound in a typical bold stroke struck out
as it were on the basis of superfluity and tautology. Yeats accepted Pounds objection but could not
accept the correction. Instead he rewrote the last line: whereon a thing once walked that seemed a
burning cloud.
Responsibilities can be taken as Yeatss initiation into the practice of Imagism, or the tenets as
outlined by Pound in his Imagist manifesto. A Coat best exemplifies the new idiom as Yeats adopted
it. The poem works on a single emblem of coat. The coat works as an image as it is totally bare
of any superfluous adjectives. The starkness and bareness of the image contributes to a hardened
visual effect. In this poem he tries and succeeds in snapping out of the Symbolist evocative method.
The sartorial image is used for his earlier poetry which he says was covered with embroideries / [.
. .] of old mythologies . By the end of the poem he is done with those embroideries as is signified
in the new ethic which he adopts. The poem itself works in accordance with this dictum.
Yeats poetry of these middle and the later phases shows how a modern symbol is different from both
Romantic symbol and Modernist image. The twentieth century symbols combine the concreteness of
image with the evocative power of symbol. Rose, swan and moon which frequently occur in his earlier
and middle poetry are symbols that work in the traditional sense (the Romantic use / denotative
manner) apart from the complexities that are worked into them. The swans in the poem The Wild
Swans at Coole [ The Wild Swans at Coole 1919] apart from their signifying function work as
moods. Yeats always thought of Maud as a swan but here they (the swans) bring in a whole lot of
29 W.B. Yeats
complexities of the relationship between Yeats and Maud. Even though the poem belonged to the
middle phase of his career, he is not completely out of his Romantic leanings. The poet persona is
imagining the meetings of the past and the scene is a very close rendition of Wordsworthian spots
of time technique, the whole Romantic revisitation of the place (as in Tintern Abbey ). The poem
also relies on a whole lot of other Romantic ethos, such as that of paradoxes (Stanza 2).
In the later poems [The Tower onwards] Yeats works on concretizing the symbols into images.
However, the images can also work like symbols as is shown in the use of the symbol of the tower,
stairway, and gyres among others. Here it is an image that acquires a symbolic value. In The Tower
the tower itself features as the setting for the poem, where the poet standing on its battlements gives
in to the ruminations of the past, about old age, imagination during the course evoking mythical and
real characters.
In the later poems old age becomes one of Yeats greatest anxieties and the theme is dealt with in
a number of poems, Sailing to Byzantium and The Tower being chief among them. In The Tower
Red Hanrahan is a figure, created by Yeats earlier in his short stories, chosen by Yeats to represent
himself and old age in general. Old Raftery is a legendary bard of Homeric dimensions representing
the powers of imagination. The poem works on a dialectical model of realism and imagination (Parts
II and III) out of which imagination comes out triumphant. Hanrahan is the poets alter ego, thus best
understands him due to similarity of circumstances.
In Byzantium [The Winding Stair and Other Poems 1933] comes another example of image that
works as a symbol. The dome in the first stanza is not described at all. Instead one conjures up the
image of the dome in ones mind. Because of its evocation the dome acquires the character of a
symbol. Similarly, in Sailing to Byzantium the gyres are hardly described. The reader has to associate
with Yeats description of the same in the earlier poems and his philosophical system as enlisted in
A Vision. In describing the aged person (Stanza 2) he uses sartorial image a tattered coat . Again,
it is the words themselves that act as an image (in this case tattered ) and impart concreteness to
the description rather than taking away from it.
The mythical method that Yeats applied to his poetry becomes another feature of modernist technique.
In fact, T. S. Eliot in his 1923 essay on Ulysses [ Ulysses, Order and Myth ] calls it a step toward
making the modern world possible for art, toward [. . .] order and form [. . .]. This is a method
which derives parallels between contemporaneity and history. Eliot sees the mythical method as being
close to tradition, the whole classicist ethos as he had espoused in his essay Tradition and the
Individual Talent . Yeats relied on the tradition of Irish folklore and Greek mythology. Further, he
stretched the boundaries of the myth by bringing in personal associations. In the poems such as No
Second Troy , Leda and the Swan , and Among School Children the figure of Helen is deployed
in various ways, for various purposes. Apart from charting out the obvious parallels between Helen
and Maud, he sought a relation between the contemporary state of affairs in Irish politics and the
Battle of Troy specifically in No Second troy . The Second Coming is a poem written in the
aftermath of the First World War. But it is only a mythical beast that can best describe the confusion
wrought out by the hostile political scenario of the twentieth century Europe.
Yeatss heavy reliance on Gaelic legends and the folk heroes such as Cuchulain, Fergus among others
was dictated by his interest in the cultural heritage of Ireland. Indeed he strongly felt that there
should be a pride in that national heritage that should lead to a new flowering of art and national life.
His plays give a nationalist texture to these mythologies. The Countess Kathleen (1899) and Cathleen
ni Houlihan (1902) are the plays with propagandist values. Maud Gonne was made to enact the role
of Cathleen. J. M. Synges A Playboy of the Western World (1906) proved to be another
controversial nationalist play of its time. Yeatss acquaintance with John OLeary proved significant as
the latter introduced him to a wealth of Irish literature and urged him to read back through it in order
Poetry 30
to understand the patterns of culture. Other useful friendship in this direction proved to be that with
Lady Gregory. Thus, the understanding of his cultural heritage not only helps him in forging a new
poetics but in developing a nationalist literature as well. It opens before the country a wealth of native
tradition, thereby limiting reliance on outside traditions (the English among others). In the fight against
colonialism, this proves to be a significant step.
Yeatss career graph charts a progressive path from his Romantic leanings to Modernism. However,
the Romantic streak continues even in the later mature poetry. Through his interest in the Occult,
Theosophy and Gaelic legends and folklores he brings a personal ethos to bear upon the traditions he
handled. If Symons and before him Wilde and Pater helped him along the Aestheticist-Symbolist tenets,
then Pound catalyzed his transition into Modernism. If Modernism demanded a radical aesthetics in
style and idiom, Yeats recreated a singular kind of Modernism wherein the stanzaic forms of the
poems are retained but with a new, stark idiom approaching colloquial style. After reading the Epilogue
to the volume Responsibilities, the last lines which go: [. . .] all my priceless things / Are but a
post the passing dogs defile Pound declared that Yeats had finally become a Modern poet. In fact
Yeats showed that formal elegance can go along with modernity of diction. He brought respectability
and credibility to such an alliance as he was already established on the literary circuit. Indeed, Pound
and Eliot for all their Free Verse wrote some of their poems in the stanzaic form.
Whatever tradition Yeats followed, he personalized it.
IV. Detailed critical analysis of major topics on the
writer and the prescribed texts
The major topics for discussion in the context of Yeats and his work have all been touched upon, albeit briefly,
directly or indirectly elsewhere in the other sections. But in this section we shall take them up in some detail.
As we have seen, irrespective of the so called phases in his career, Yeats was always concerned with the
questions of aesthetics, personal, national, and civilizational history. Thus the topics which emerge for discussion
are as follows:
Romanticism and Yeats / his theory of poetry
Yeatss dislike of rhetoric is well-known. He shared this trait with fellow moderns. This was part of a general
reaction against the kind of poetry that Victorian poets had popularized. After the private nature of the poetry
of the early 19
th
century, poets such as Tennyson and Browning and Arnold beieved in addressing the reader
directly, poetry tended to be rhetorical in the sense that the poet wrote poetry with a message for the Victorian
public. The poets believed in the social function of poetry. Though such poetry became popular and met with
some success, with lesser poets it tended to be banal. Taking rcourse to Imperialistic jingoism the next generation
of poets, apart from the aesthetes and decadents, continued the trend. To this group belonged Rudyrad Kipling,
Thomas Watson, Alfred Noyes, and some otehrs. It is this kind of poetry that the younger generation disliked,
and eschewed, with Pound calling it Victorian poppycock. Wring the neck of rhetoric was the clarion call.
Yeats offered his own definition of poetry, mainly as being non-rhetorical. In spite of his absorption in the Self,
Yeats continued to be as self critical as before, believing in the self proclaimed motto that, to paraphrase him,
one makes rhetoric out of quarreling with others, and poetry by quarreling with oneself. One way by which he
could fight the self was by finding an appropriate anti-self. Hence his theory of the Mask (see the section on
the major topics for Yeatss theory of the Mask).
It is in this dramatization of his Self that Yeats differs from the great Romantics, for whom the Self was
nonconflictual. Though both, Yeats and the great Romantic had a shared preoccupation in the Self, and wrote
their poetry out of that preoccupation the main difference lay in their understanding of the subject. Yeatss
poetry is often compared with the metaphysical school. It may be because Donne and Marvell wrote poetry
that was argumentative, ratiocinative and dramatic, because of, among other things, their profound
31 W.B. Yeats
skepticism. Yeats seems to have married the dramatic style of the school of Donne with the romantic
tendencies.
The romantics and the other 19
th
century poets who followed them valued emotions over reason. Heart was
privileged over the brain, as it were. But most modernists believed in fusing the two. The memorable phrase
that Eliot used to describe this fusion was the unification of sensibility. Yeats said something very similar about
poetry, when he talked of the whole man blood, imagination, intellect, running together .
Yeatss theory of the Great Memory or Anima Mundi:
Yeatss notion of the Great Memory comes from his preoccupation with his poetic craft, influenced as it was
by his interest in supernaturalism, particularly the belief that the memory of the dead acts on the living. Where
do poetic images come from? Once he wrote that some of the great lyrics, such as Keatss Ode to the
Nightingale pre-existed, and Keats was merely the vehicle through whom the images passed. In fact, for
most of his poetic ideals the romantics, beginning with Blake, provided him with his personal aesthetic. He
modified or extended some of their ideas. The Blakean ideal for example: Invent your own system, or be
enslaved by other peoples. About Blake he would say: Blake spoke confusedly and obscurely because he
spoke of things for whose speaking he could find no models in the worldabout him. He was a symbolist who
was trying to invent his symbols .He was a man crying out for mythology, and trying to make one because
he could not find one to his hand. Yeats could well be stating the case about himself, and his A Vision. Similary,
while editing a volume of Blakes poetry he sympathised with his dislike of vagueness of outline. Blake, having
been an illustrator and engraver valued sharpness of outline. Yeats, after overcoming his initial training, strove
for hardness and the concrete.
This striving towards hardness of outline is not to be confused with a drive towrds the realistic mode, the
imitative. In fact he hated realism in the arts. Like many other binaries he used, he spoke of the two modes: the
reflective or mimetic and the suggestive and subjective. If the mirror stood for the mimetic, then the lamp stood
for its opposite. Thus for him the image cannot be static or representational, it had to be symbolic. Yeats, of
course, knew that some imitation was bound to come into play.
As time passed, he would subtly revise his earlier position: There were two options for the poet in his time:
either to continue in the Romantic symbolist tradition predominant especially in French poetry, or to try to
create something less ethereal and more fully human.
In literature, partly from the lack of that spoken word that knits us to normal man, we have lost in personality,
in our delight in the whole man blood, imagination, intellect, running together but have found a new delight,
in essences, in states of mind, in pure imagination, in all that comes to us most easily, in elaborate music. There
are two ways before literature upward into ever-increasing subtlety .or downward, taking the soul with us
until all is simplified or solidified again. That is the choice of choices the way of the bird until common eyes
have lost us, or to the market carts.
Thus, the everyday world, the world of the carts was to be treated in such a way as to embody visions of the
extraterrestrial, the view of the high-flying bird. [Hence his continuing with the romantic pun on bird/bard.] The
mirror of his must not reflect, but fuse quotidian reality, to burn with images unseen before.
Yeatss poetry shows a lifelong search for images, not the ones which reflect but illuminate. He sought these
images everywhere: from Irish myths and legends to fairy tales, from the visionary poetry of Blake and Shelley
to the world of magic and mysticism. Later in life he sought them out in ancient wisdom those among the Indian
Upanishads and the anient Greeks and Romans. His search for these images led him to believe in the idea of
a universal warehouse of images, which he called Anima Mundi (the soul of the world)
Yeats first introduces the notion of the Great Memory in his essay, Magic (1901). He felt that Anima Mundi
is a part of three doctrines that had been handed down from early times:
1. that the borders of our minds are ever shifting, and that many minds can flow into one another, as it were,
and create or reveal a single mind, a single energy.
Poetry 32
2. That the borders of our memories are as shifting, and that our memories are part of one great memory,
the memory of Nature herself.
3. That the Great Mind and the Great Memory can be evoked by symbols.
He would often associate the great mind with a spool or bobbin which winds, thread like memories. The
unwinding of the spool would therefore signify remembering. His fullest participation in the world of images
was to come with his wifes automatic writing . He narrates the circumstances which led to his wifes
trances in A Packet for Ezra Pound (1929): On the afternoon of October 24
th
1917, four days after my
marriage, my wife surprised me by attempting automatic writing. What came in disjointed sentences, in almost
illegible writing, was so exciting, sometimes so profound, that I persuaded her to give an hour or two day after
day to the unknown writer . She wrote some scattered sentences. The unknown writer said, we have
come to give you metaphors for poetry. He took his theme from Yeatss then recently published Per Amica
Silentia Lunae. I had made a distinction between the perfection that is from a mans combat with himself and
that which is from a combat with circumstance, and upon this simple distinction he built up an elaborate
classification of men .
Yeatss View of the Self
One species of self portraiture in Yeatss verse is the depiction of carnal self, intricately involved with many
women the Wild Old Wicked Man, as Yeats called him in one late poem. But there is another kind of self-
portraiture, harder and purer, eerie, sexless:
Once out of nature I shall never take
My bodily form from any natural thing,
But such a form as Grecian goldsmiths make
Of hammered gold and gold enameling
To keep a drowsy Emperor awake
(Sailing to Byzantium )
Yeats, as man and as poet, was unusually afraid of incoherence, sensation of being soft wax; and such images
as the golden bird in the famous poem (written in 1926) offer an aesthetic refuge from the shapelessness of
commonplace life. In 1906 Yeats described the evolution of his art as a turning away from his ordinary self:
I had set out on life with the thought of putting out my very self into poetry I thought of myself as
something unmoving and silent living in the middle of my own mind and body Then one day I
understood quite suddenly, as the way is, that I was seeking something unchanging and unmixed and
always outside myself, a Stone or an Elixir that was always out of reach, and that I myself was the
fleeting thing that held out its hand. The more I tried to make my art deliberately beautiful, the more
did I follow the opposite of myself
It is important to note that, for Yeats Art is not self-expression the self is too shifty, evanescent but search
for impersonal beauty. By 1909 this feeling that the proper subject matter of art is the opposite of oneself
developed into the doctrine of the Mask. In the poem Ego Dominus Tuus (1915) and the essay Per Amica
Silentia Lunae (1917), Yeats expounded the belief that every man has an ideal counterpart, an intimate double,
an anti-self in whom every trait is the opposite of his own. Poets, according to this doctrine, gain imaginative
intensity through the struggle to realize in their poems a vision of the Mask. Thus the lecherous Dante labored
to create a Dante of austere and unforgiving purity, the poet as we infer him from the poem. The irritable and
intense William Morris elaborated a vision of peaceful bucolic indolence. The penniless Cockney Keats dreamed
of unparalleled luxury and splendor. The reader of Yeatss work must try to suspend some of his Freudian
convictions, such as the postulate that a mans fundamental self is the birth-self, the baby, an incoherent
monster of appetite. To Yeats, the fundamental self is what a man strives to become, and not what he originally
is.
33 W.B. Yeats
Yeats tried to define his own character according to this model:
I know very little about myself and much less of that anti-self: probably the woman who cooks my
dinner knows more than I. It is perhaps because nature made me a gregarious man, going hither
and thither looking for conversation, and ready to deny from fear or favour his dearest conviction,
that I love proud and lonely things.
The random, restless, compromising Yeats was driven by fantasies of impossible solitude, integrity, focus. Little
wonder, then, that in his poems he should present himself as a golden bird, or a statue of a kind of god hovering
just beyond the range of vision, that dazzling, unforeseen, wing-footed wanderer. To realize a vision of the
anti-self is to evoke the private divinity that lies beneath such fragmentary incarnation of self. The golden bird
of Sailing to Byzantium is the idol of Yeatss personal godhead, always tempting, always out of reach.
Several times Yeats recorded the sensation that he was petrifying, turning into an image. Yeats gathered many
folk tales about surrogates logs, leaves, heaps of wood-shavings arranged into human likeness that the
faeries left behind when they snatched people away. Such surrogates appear in Yeatss plays The Land of
Hearts Desire (1894) and The Only Jealousy of Emer (1919); and once Yeats awoke from sleep to hear a
voice, not his own voice, speaking through his lips: We make an image of him who sleeps, and it is not him who
sleeps, but it is like him who sleeps, and we call it Emmanuel . In his novel The Speckled Bird, abandoned
around 1902, Yeats ascribed this shiver of involuntary speech to the chief character, who feels his body
becoming impersonal, magical, a kind of tomb-sculpture. To be the dummy of supernatural ventriloquists was
perhaps Yeatss closest approximation to his Mask. He had almost become a savage idol, stark and hieratic, a
block of wood crudely cut into human shape.
Yeatss Theory of the Masks
In order to understand Yeatss poetry it is necessary to be acquainted with his theory of the Mask. Between
1909 and 1925, he was preoccupied with the formulation, elaboration and definition of the theory of the Mask .
By the Mask Yeats meant the self fabricated around the natural man by conscious artifice. Far from being
a pejorative term standing, for, say, hypocrisy, it is a poetic virtue, a poetic skill, a device. His early formulations,
around 1909, were the result of a commonplace experience with people. He saw that wherever he looked
people wore masks. These masks offered the joys of imaginative self-liberation, a kind of superior childs play.
He said,
I think all happiness depends on the energy to assume the the mask of some other self; that all joyous or
creative life is a rebirth as something oneself, something which has no memory and is created in a moment and
perpetually renewed.
Yeats further thought that a man cannot be judged, cannot be defined and dismissed, if he cannot be located in
the first place; and the mask helps him in escaping such judgement. It permits him an endless disassembling of
identity. Later Yeats would believe that the mask can be either a vehicle of self realization or an escape from
self realization, depending on the type of man. Each man has unique mask.
Love for Yeats presented an important test case. Each man or woman can use mask to discover or strengthen
love. But there is a risk involved. So Yeats offers two theories of the mask:
1. The Benign Theory: in this case lovers played roles in order to help one another realize their nobler
selves. It seems to me that true love is a discipline Each [lover] divines the secret self of the other, and
refusing to believe in the mere daily self, creates a mirror for the lover or beloved to copy in daily life; for
love also creates the Mask.
The lovers can improve one anothers being : This Yeats called inter-imitation .
2. Sinister situation: here the man is not a wise fellow who divines the best self of his beloved, and helps her
to realize it in daily life; he is instead deceived and anxious. The woman is not sympathetic. Here the
mask is not a felicitous ideal but a dazzling screen.
Poetry 34
Yeats poem The Mask exemplifies this darker aspect.
The other topics which could be discussed are, Love and beauty, youth and age,
and Yeatss symbolism.
Yeatss Symbolism
The role that symbols play in Yeatss aesthetic theory is inextricably connected with his view of the nature of
imagination and both arise out of his mythological system. Yeatss complex symbolism is the product of his
philosophical engagement with Western heterodox mysticism and eastern philosophies and religions. Emerging
from this is the belief in Anima Mundi or the Collective Unconscious which is the guiding force behind the
intellectual superstructure that Yeats erects. As Yeats says in his discursive work, Essays and Introduction:
All sounds, all colours, all forms, either because of their pre-ordained energies or because of long association,
evoke indefinable and yet precise emotions, or, as I prefer to think, call down among us certain disembodied
powers, whose footsteps over our hearts we call emotion; and when sound and colour and form are in a
musical relation, a beautiful relation to one another, they become as it were one sound, one colour, one form,
and evoke an emotion that is made out of their distinct evocations and yet is one emotion.
Yeatss symbolism also bears the imprint of the contemporary French Symbolists. The strain of symbolism
prevalent in Yeatss times saw it as a natural language , as opposed to allegory, which is the conventional
language. This natural language was the only way that the higher or spiritual realities could be comprehended
by the aid of the imaginative faculty. In Symbolism in Poetry, an essay written in 1898, Yeats discusses the
French Symbolists denunciation of allegory that calls into play the right knowledge whereas symbolism relies
upon right instinct for its understanding . Yeats identifies their comprehension of symbols and symbolism with
that of Blakes. Commenting upon the significance of Michaelangelos Moses he says, its symbolism has
helped to awaken the modern imagination thus asserting the importance of symbolism and the Symbolist
Movement to modernist aesthetics.
Yeatss ideas that symbolism is particularly concerned with the supernatural, also derives from the French
Symbolists. However, for all Yeatss interest in the Symbolist Movement, Yeatss poetic theory and practice
significantly differs from that of the French Symbolists. For Baudelaire the symbol is the end product. The
world is used to evoke the symbol that is of prime interest. But in Yeatss poetry symbol is deployed to mediate
between the phenomenal and the noumenal world. A symbol evokes the world and the higher principles and is
therefore, both sensuous and spiritual, material and philosophical.
In his essay entitled Magic (1901) Yeats attempts to make distinctions between inherent symbols and
arbitrary symbols i.e. symbols arising out of a received tradition or invented arbitrarily by the poet. This is
further qualified in the essay on Symbolism where Yeats goes on to define emotional symbol and intellectual
symbol. Emotional symbol like the arbitrary symbol depends primarily upon personal associations. The
intellectual symbol on the other hand evokes ideas mingled with emotions , and so provides an access to
tradition and thereby shapes a personal response to an inherent symbol . Yeatss art derives its intellectual
force from the interaction of symbols that reverberate with personal resonance and the impersonal Occult and
Rosicrucian symbols. Both may be further related to archetypal patterns and symbols in the form of myth.
The poem, Her Vision in the Wood conjoins the blood-beddabled breast of the man with the torn body of
the woman. It describes the embittered feelings of an old woman too old for a mans love and the rage of
exhausted passion, within the framework of the Adonis myth. The poem capitalizes upon the image of the
dying god, the present loss of fertility that will eventually lead to rejuvenation and thus ensure the cyclicity of
the fertility myth. Parallel to this is the loss of the womans fertility and her desperate masochistic attempts to
recall the lip of lover . This bodily decrepitude is compensated by the image of the bleeding god who Half-
turned and fixed a glazing eye on mine, / And, though loves bitter-sweet had all come back ; there occurs the
rekindling of passion even as its physical fulfillment seems unviable. The poem asserts that the womans vision
35 W.B. Yeats
is no fabulous symbol . Yeats said that a vision is myth in action . The poem, while demonstrating this, also
extends the apparently esoteric nature of Yeatss symbolism to encompass archetypal experience. Her private
vision that conjures up her hearts victim and its torturer is endowed with a larger significance by the
reference to the Adonis myth. The self-induced trance could equally be a Quattrocento painters throng or
Mantegnas thought or bodies from a picture or a coin . More generally the poem can be read as a
sensuous and concrete manifestation of the fact of desire and passion in old age.
Yet another way to relate to myth and history through symbols, is by establishing a direct or oblique, or even a
negative connection to it. The Helen of Troy symbol and its relation to Maud Gonne is one such example.
Throughout his oeuvre Yeats visualizes Maud Gonne in terms of Hellenic beauty. Yeats also gives a political
spin to this personal comparison by linking up Helens and Maud Gonnes destructive passion. Like Helens
impulsive act of elopement with Paris ended in the siege of Troy And Agamemnon dead ( Leda and the
Swan ), so Maud Gonnes intense involvement with politics has stifled her life-force. Was there another Troy
for her to burn? ( No Second Troy ). However, that it is a negative connection, is clear when one considers
the primacy of desire and passionate fulfillment as reflected in Yeatss poetry. Seeing Helen and Paris as ideal
lovers , the comparison with Maud Gonne stresses the loss of potential passionate experience that Maud
Gonne could have achieved, given her beauty and grace and Yeatss amorous feelings for her. Instead she has
become A Helen of social welfare dream,/ Climb on a wagonette to scream ( Why Should Not Old Men be
Mad ). The symbol also sheds light on Yeatss own unrequited love for Maud Gonne. Like Helen Maud
Gonne has, all living hearts betrayed ( The Tower ).
Linked to this is Yeatss use of the myth of Leda and Zeus-Swan whose union engendered Helen. Yeats sees
this as the First Annunciation giving birth to Greece, and it corresponds to the Second Annunciation. Yeats uses
this to order two thousand years of classical history as delineated in A Vision. The creation of a personal
mythology makes possible the development of related symbolism that employs symbols in varying contexts.
Yeatss use of Celtic mythology also fits into this paradigm. But just as A Vision is a philosophical understanding
of historical events and personages, so the symbols are both mystical and political in nature.
In Autobiographies, Yeats said, when a man writes any work of genius, or invents some creative action, is it
not because some knowledge or power has come into his mind from beyond his mind? It is called up by an
image as I think but our images must be given to us, we cannot choose them deliberately . The practical,
political aspect of symbolism is also described. Nations, races and individual men are unified by an image or
bundle of related images. The symbol of the Rose is one such example. It features in his early poetry where
Rose signifies both Maud Gonne and Ireland. The Rose includes personal lyrics and songs about Ireland and
Irish mythology. The Pity of Love , The Sorrow of Love , When You are Old are addressed to Maud
Gonne. Fergus and the Druid , Cuchulains Fight with the Sea , To Ireland in the Coming Times document
Irish heroic legends and Yeatss attitude towards it. Red Rose, proud rose, sad rose of all my days ( To the
Rose Upon the Rood of Time ) brings together the personal and the national within the ambit of the poem . The
symbol of the Rose shows the influence of Blake and Shelley. Embodying love and nationalist feelings it also
connotes Intellectual Beauty. The Rose which is so pervasive in Yeatss early poetry is conspicuous by its
absence in the later volumes. However, this is not to imply that Yeatss symbolism lost its political undertones.
For Irelands mythical and historical people instead of objects, were invested with a symbolic potential. Cathleen
ni Houlihan, the warrior Cuchulain, the warrior- poet Oisin and freedom fighters like Wolfe Tone and John
O Leary came to symbolize a quest for life and freedom.
Like the Rose, animal and bird symbolism derived from Irish mythology that formed the characteristic feature
of The Wanderings Of Oisin and Other Poems and Crossways does not feature in such a striking manner
after this. However, birds especially the swan, retain a special significance for Yeats. He wrote:
Certain birds, especially as I see things, such lonely birds as the heron, hawk, eagle and swan, are
the natural symbols of subjectivity, especially when floating upon the wind alone or alighting upon
Poetry 36
some pool or river, while the beasts that run upon the ground, especially those that run in packs, are
natural symbols of objective man.
Along with the well-known connotations of purity, fidelity, strength and immortality the swans become symbolic
of fulfilled love and youthful passion. The nine-and-fifty swans of The Wild Swans at Coole are unwearied
still . Their hearts have not grown old ; /passion or conquest, Wander where they will, / Attend upon them
still; unlike Yeats whose unconsummated affair with Maud Gonne and the physical fact of old age contrasts
sharply with the swans. Yeats identifies himself with the swan in The Tower . Like the poets songs, the
swan must fix his eye /Upon a fading gleam,/ And there sing his last song. All the above-mentioned
meanings coalesce in Coole Park and Ballylee, 1931 :
At sudden thunder of the mounting swan
I turned about and looked where branches break
The glittering reaches of the flooded lake.
Another emblem there! That stormy white
But seems a concentration of the sky ;
And, like the soul, it sails into the sight
And in the mornings gone, no man knows why;
And is so lovely that it sets to right
What knowledge or its lack had set awry,
So arrogantly pure, a child might think
It can be murdered with a spot of ink.
The bird is also invested with mystical, mythical potential as illustrated in Leda and the Swan.
Besides birds, Yeats wrote in a letter to Sturge Moore, My main symbols are Sun and Moon (in all phases),
Tower, Mask, Tree, (Tree with Mask hanging on the trunk), Well. It is significant to note that Yeats hails his
doctrine of the Mask and the anti-self as a symbol. As Yeats explains in A Vision, under certain circumstances
the Mask is called the Image and it is the image [either] of what we wish to become, or of that to which we
give our reverence. The importance of a symbol in Yeatss aesthetics is thus highlighted.
The Tower is another dominant symbol and is best studied in conjunction with its counterpart, the Winding
Stairs . The importance of this symbol can be indicated by the fact that Ireland is a land of towers and Thoor
Ballylee, Yeats own residence, the much wished for and dreamt of place, is a tower rising above and dominating
the cottages around it. Historical actuality and symbolical suggestions are thus blended in the image of the
tower . An emblem of aristocracy it stands for the poet and his work and becomes the focus of his life-
experience. The spiritual security of the tower furnishes a contemplative dimension and thus symbolizes wisdom
and detachment necessary for spiritual pursuits. The poems in the volume by the same name, The Tower
(1928) aptly demonstrate this. In the tower there is the winding stair and Yeats sees it as Jacobs Ladder as
visualized by Blake. The stairs facilitate a connection with his Irish past intellectual and cultural:
I declare this tower is my symbol, I declare
This winding, gyring, spiring, treadmill of a stair is my ancestral stair;
That Goldsmith and the Dean, Berkeley and Burke have travelled there (Blood and the Moon).
If the Tower is the symbol of soul-making, the Winding Stairs identified with the Japanese sword and its silk
covering in A Dialogue of Self and Soul is Yeatss symbol of life . The sword and its covering representing
the union of masculine and feminine principles relate to both the Tower and the Winding Stairs, as these also
stand for the male and female genitalia respectively. As Yeats, said The Tower is characterized by power ,
The Winding Stairs poetically articulates the subconscious gaiety that leaps up before danger or difficulty ,
thus embodying the possibility of beauty and regeneration. Together they symbolize the coexistence of contraries
that helps to achieve Unity of Being as captured in the figure of the dancer at one with the dance ( Among
School Children ).
37 W.B. Yeats
Byzantium, a poem belonging to the The Winding Stairs brings together the figure of the dancer with the
symbol of fire: dying into a dance, /An agony of trance, / An agony of flame that cannot singe a sleeve . The
importance of the symbol of fire and its connection with imagination has already been remarked upon in the
discussion of The Wind Among The Reeds .Closely linked to Yeats use of fire and light are the symbols of the
Sun and the Moon .The Moon is especially significant to Yeatss poetic theory, as the lunar cycle forms the
basis of progression and change. This is reflected in The Phases of the Moon . Under the Moon gives a
catalogue of legendary Irish figures especially women whose beauty was folded in dismay under the
famished horn/ Of the hunters moon, that hung between the night and the day . Adams Curse captures the
gradual decline of love in the image of the hollow moon . Blood and the Moon juxtaposes the Purity of the
unclouded moon with the war-ridden, blood-saturated ground of Ireland. The Song of the Wandering
Aengus brings together the symbols of fire, sun, and moon. Wandering in search of the glimmering girl ,
arisen out of little silver trout fed to the fire , Aengus hopes and determines to find her, And pluck till time
and times are done / The silver apples of the moon / The golden apples of the sun.
The richness and the indefiniteness of references make the symbols at once more mysterious and beautiful. By
their triple allusion to self, world, and the spirit, Yeatss symbolism provides a key to his ideas about history,
philosophy and art.
V. Detailed Critical Summary of the texts
The Lake Isle of Innisfree:
Background: The poem was published in a volume called, The Rose (1893). The poems in this volume primarily
deal with the complex relationship between the natural and the supernatural world. According to the Rosicrucian
philosphy that he was studying at this time, there is a ladder between the two. The rose is the primary symbol
of the philosophy. It stnads for anything that is very desirable, and hence quite flexible. Alongside this philosophy
he was equally drawn towards the opposite Hindu view interpretated for him by Mohini Chatterjee that the
sensible/natural world is a distraction from the real/transcendental world which lies beyond. Many poems of
the volume attempted to strike a balance between the two. In some poems the first view seems to be upheld;
in some, the second. In The Lake Isle he seems to offer the view that it is in this world that the seeker might
glimpse the heavenly, the kingdom of the spirit.
The Context
This is one of the most well known, and the most anthologized of Yeatss poems. Its success among its early
readers and critics took Yeats by surprise. The poet himself in the following passage taken from his autobiography
describes the genesis of the poem.
My father had read to me some passage out of Walden, and I planned to live some day in a cottage
on a little island called Innisfree I thought that having conquered bodily desire and the inclination
of my mind towards women and love, I should live, as Thoreau lived seeking wisdom.
[Note: The American intellectual, Thoreau is famous for his work Walden in which he writes the story of how
he practiced the Emersonian virtue of self reliance. His ideals influenced Gandhi.]
Innisfree is a little island in Ireland. As Yeats recalls, elsewhere in his Autobiography:
I had still the ambition, formed in Ships in my teens, of living in imitation of Thoreau on Innisfree, a
little island in Lough Gill, and when walking through Fleet Street [a famous street in London] very
homesick I heard a little tinkle of water and saw a fountain in a shop window which balanced a little
ball upon its jet, and began to remember lake water. From the sudden remembrance came my poem
Innisfree , my first lyric with anything in its rhythm of my own music.
Some of the details in the poem are from one of Yeatss stories called John Sherman . Some others are from
an advertising display that Yeats may have actually seen in the tiny island such as: Bee Glade anyone
interfering with the bee shall be severly dealt with or The beans must not be eaten etc.
Poetry 38
Summary: We have discussed the three phases in Yeatss career and seen how the Pre-Raphaelite movement
influenced his early poetry, and how there was a late romantic strain in the poems composed during this period.
This means that one is apt to notice lyrical features, with emphasis on sound and music, some of which
anticipated the later symbolist mode (After all, the symbolists believed later in evoking an atmosphere , rather
than stating it, through sound and images.
The romantic features are identifiable in the nostalgic and escapist elements that his poetry had. You might
recall Wordsworths nostalgia for his lost childhood and innocence, his escapist desire to flee from London into
the lap of nature. Keatss odes (especially the ones on the Grecian Urn and Nightingale are redolent of
nostalgia and escape.
In the Lake Isle , Yeats experienced a similar yearning. Though the names of cities like London and Dublin
are conspicuous by their absence. Its presence is felt in the ennui, the crowd, the dirt and squalor of the city,
which compel the poet to run away to Innisfree. The escape through its syntax ( I will instead of I shall ),
and, of course, now is clear.
Note how the will of the first stanza changes to shall in the second, and then back to will in the third.
This is as if to indicate to the reader the near slackening of the determination in the first stanza to the return to
some sort of a resolution.
The poem is replete with natural imagery: a hallmark of romantic poetry. bee-land glade , veils of the
morning , cricket songs, glimmer of the midnight, and the purple glow of the moon, and the linnets, the lake
water and so on. All these help the reader to conjure up an image of the place of escape, Innisfree ,. The
name itself conveying the same sense of freedom from boredom and ennui of city life.
When Thoreau lived near Walden Pond, he did so all alone, symbolizing the American/Emersonian virtue of
self reliance, independence. If that individual freedom was a political statement, indicating the freedom of
America from the erstwhile British rule, is it possible, that Yeats was making a political statement Irish
freedom struggle?
Notes:
Title Innisfree: Yeats mentioned this island again in an uncollected poem, The Danaan Quicken Tree , in
which the poet sails to Innisfree to eat the berries of an enchanted tree-according to one legend poisonous to
mortals, and according to another, enable to endow them with more than mortals powers.
arise and go: I had begun to loosen rhythm as an escape from rhetoric but I only understood vaguely
that I must use nothing but the common syntax. A couple of years later I would not have written the first line
with its conventional archaism Arise And Go nor the inversion in the last stanza. The poems rythmic
secret is the substitution of a bacchius for an iamb in lines 1 to 3.
of clay and wattles: compare The Wanderings of Oisin I 249: A house of wattles, clay.
a hive for the honey-bee: in John Sherman (1891), the hero imagines a happy marital life in a small house
with a green door and a new thatch, and a row of bee hives under a hedge . For reference to bees, see The
Stares Nest by my Window , II. 1 5; and Among School Children V 2: Honey of generation .
purple glow: Yeats explained in a radio broadcast that this referred to the reflection of heather in the water.
The word Innisfree means heather island. This obscure allusion to water completes the tabulation of the four
elements in II. 6 8.
Lake water lapping: in 1920 Joyce added a postscript to a long letter to Pound: This is a very poetic epistle It
should be read in the evening when the lake water is lapping.
Lake Isle of Innisfree
The poem is included in the second volume of Yeatss poetry The Rose published in 1893. It belongs to Yeatss
early Romantic phase. The poem was written when Yeats was living in London in1890. It expresses the poets
39 W.B. Yeats
desire to visit and spend time at Innisfree. Innisfree is an island in Lough Gill, Country Sligo, the place where
Yeats spent the formative years of his childhood and adolescence. Yeats recalled this in the Reveries
section of his Autobiographies :
My father had read me some passages out of Walden and I planned to live some day in a cottage on a little
island called Innisfree, and Innisfree was opposite Slishwood where I meant to sleep. I thought that having
conquered bodily desire and the inclination of my mind towards women and love, I should live, as Thoureau
lived, seeking wisdom
The repetition of the word go in the first line of the poem underscores the ardent wish of the poet to spend
time in these natural surroundings. Along with this repetition there is the use of archaism in the first line arise
and go and inversion in the second and third lines of the first stanza: And a small cabin built there and Nine
bean rows will I have there . Such syntax and the choice of words lend it a rhythm and a tone that contributes
to the sense of urgency.
This sense is intensified in the next stanza. The poet caught in the hustle and bustle and humdrum of a busy city
hopes to find peace and solitude in the islet. He paints a vague, dream- like romantic picture of Ireland and the
implied contrast with London emerges as a subtext. The third and the last stanza reiterates the yearning and
seeks to provide a reason for the same. The poet seems to be continually reminded of the serenity and beauty
of the lake water. Standing on the grey pavements or roadway of London, he feels emotionally and
aesthetically drawn to Ireland. Yeatss account of it in The Trembling of the Veil in Autobiographies sheds
light on the autobiographical origin of the poem. He says :
I had still the ambition, formed in Sligo in my teens, of living in imitation of Thoreau on Innisfree, a little island
on Lough Gill, and when walking through Fleet Street very homesick I heard a little tinkle of water and saw a
fountain in a shop-window which balanced a little ball upon its jet, and began to remember lake water. From the
sudden remembrance came my poem Innisfree, my first lyric with anything in its rhythm of my own music.
The sudden remembrance and the whole argument of the poem situates it in the Romantic tradition and
reminds one of the Wordsworths aesthetic beliefs, especially the poem the Tintern Abbey . The Lake has
been criticized as being escapist and nostalgic.
Innisfree actually was a protest against London. I see no reason to disbelieve Yeatss own statement that at the
time when he wrote it, he was longing for County Sligo. And County Sligo is not a Never-Never Land. The
poem is a mannere poem and, in a sense, escapist, but the escape which Yeats hankers for is not merely a
whimsical fiction; it is an escape to a real place in Ireland which represented to him certain Irish realities.
This is further strengthened by Yeatss own views on Irish history, legends and landscape. According to him
this knowledge should be fixed upon the memory of the poet and thus make love of country more fruitful in the
mind, more a part of daily life. In this sense, The Lake Isle of Innisfree can be considered a patriotic poem.
Yeats himself said that Innisfree was his first properly Irish poem.
Easter 1916
This is one of the finest poems on the subject of a political event. W.H. Auden once said that a better poem had
been written about a small Irish uprising in 1916 than about the whole of world war II. He went to make the
following statement about it: Yeats could write great poetry about the troubles in Ireland because most of the
protagonists were known to him personally and the places where the events occurred had been familiar to him
since childhood. The reasons Auden sites are certainly valid from a poets point of view. But there are deeper
reasons than these which account for the poems greatness. Postcolonial critics, however, seem to think that
Yeatss ambivalent stand on the uprising was irresponsible, whatever the poetic merit of the poem. We shall
take up these questions by and by. Since the poem is composed to commemorate a particular occasion it
belongs to the lyrical sub-genre, occasional poetry, a form that Yeats perfected. Auden, in recognition of
Yeatss mastery of the form pays a tribute to him on the occasion of the poets death in his own poem, In
Memory of W.B. Yeats (1939).
Poetry 40
Context
On the 24
th
of April 1916, some 700 members of the Irish Republican Brotherhood occupied the centre of
Dublin and proclaimed the founding of an Irish state free from the British crown. British soldiers quickly moved
in. The battle continued for a five days, and after the fifth day the British army duly gained the upper hand, and
the uprising collapsed. The leaders were court-marshalled, some of them were shot dead. In all fifteen of the
rebels were executed, among them was John MacBride, Maud Gonnes husband. The events leading to the
execution shook Yeats into poetry (as Auden puts it in one of his poems: Mad Ireland hurt you into poetry ).
Yeatss plans are evident in the following lines he wrote to Lady Gregory: That he was planning to write a
poem about the men executed, and that terrible beauty has been born again and that I had no idea that any
public event could so deeply move me and I am very despondent about my future .
Background
The poem turns around change, and hence the repetition of the phrase, all is changed utterly . This is part of
the refrain that governs the poem. The refrain, and therefore, the poem, is better understood when the full
range of implications of the term, change is appreciated. Yeats, for example, tells Lady Gregory in the same
letter cited above that all the work of years has been overturned, all the bringing together of classes, all the
freeing of Irish literature and criticism from politics. The way of perceiving the past as a happy and desirable
state of affairs, and therefore the subject of comedy, is contrasted by the perception of the consequences of
the uprising as undesirable, unhappy, and thus of tragic dimension. The poem turns on this theme: the mutation
of comedy into tragedy. For Yeats, tragedy must always be a drowning and breaking of the dykes that separate
man from man, and it is upon these dykes comedy keeps home. The rebels were all comedians, until the
rebellion begins. Then under some kind of historical pressure, coal fuses into diamond. All the rebels grow
impersonal, universal, outside the flux of nature, they are no more individual than stones or tombstones. These
remarks by the poet go a long way in explaining some of the images/lines in the poem.
Summary and notes
Stanza I
The first verse paragraph presents a vivid picture of the quotidian life of members of a certain class, the
bourgeoisie. The images are carefully chosen as are the small gestures of courtesy. The personal pronoun is
deliberately anonymous sounding; at the same time contemporary readers would immediately have identified
who they were. The reluctance to name the rebels, though they were known to the poet personally, is a
deliberate strategy to impersonalize the characters: a task that history performs. Ironically, at one point Yeats
says, he names them as a mother names her child. It is only at the end of the poem that some names are
named.
them : the rebels
where motley is worn: motley is the costume worn by comedians. The allusion may be to Shakespeares
famous image of the world as a stage. The rebels are represented as actors, who were all comedians on the
worlds stage before the rebellion began. Then suddenly all [is] changed utterly : comedy turns into tragedy.
Some critics have compared this to a passage in an early review: this faithfulness to things tragic and bitter
the Celt has above all others. Those who have it, alone are worthy of great causes. Those who have it not,
have in their some vein of hopeless levity, the harlequins of the earth.
All changed, changed utterly: change is an important motif in Yeatss work. It is central to his idea of history,
personal, national or epochal. The moon, with its changing phases, therefore, becomes an important symbol for
him. In another famous poem Yeats uses the same idea of change: The Wild Swans at Coole , l. 15: Alls
changed.
A terrible beauty is born: This phrase is one of the most famous oxymorons in English poetry. It suggests to
many Yeats ambivalence towards the cause of Irish freedom struggle. But from the poets letter to Lady
41 W.B. Yeats
Gregory discussed above the phrase is expressive of the poets complex response to the event. The feminist
critic Elizabeth Cullingford compares this with Shelleys On the Medusa (1819) V 1-6: the tempestuous
loveliness of terror all the beauty and the terror there a poem on the petrifying power of grace. Pater
remembered these lines of Shelley when he wrote of the interfusion of the extremes of beauty and terror in
Leonardos mind when he painted the Medusa (The Renaissance [1893]). Shelley, Pater and Yeats all posited
a collapse of Edmund Burkes distinction between the sublime and the beautiful.
Stanza II
That Woman: Con Markiewicz (1868-1927), nee Gore Booth, whom Yeats had known since 1894. She was
active in the Rebellion but her death sentence was commuted. Yeats celebrates her beauty and poise in On
a Political Prisoner and In memory of Eva Gore Booth and Con Markiewicz.
Until her voice grew shrill: A contemptuous reference to political rhetoric. Her voice became shrill and high,
but [in the 1890s] it was low and soft .
This man had kept a school: Patrick Pearse (1879-1916), the chief of the Rebellion and Commandant-
General of the Provisional Government; his surrender to the British at the Dublin Post Office ended the
Rebellion. He had founded a boys school and was actively involved in the movement to promote the Gaelic
language. Pearse also appears in Sixteen Dead Men , l. 10, The Tree , l. 2, The O Rahilly , l. 12, Three
Songs to the Same Burden III 24, The Statues, l. 25, and The Death of Cuchulain (1939), l. 215. According
to Pound, Yeats had said that Pearce was half cracked and wouldnt be happy until he was hanged. He seems
to think that Pearce had Emmet mania, same as some other lunatics think that they are Napoleon or God.
Our winged horse: Pegasus, a mythical creature representing poetic inspiration. Also appears in The fascination
of Whats Difficult , l. 4. The line alludes to the fact that Pearce wrote poetry.
This other: Thomas MacDonagh (1878-1916), an English teacher at University College, Dublin, and author of
a play performed at the Abbey Theatre. In 1909 Yeats described him as a man of distinguished feeling ,
crushed by the mechanical logic and commonplace eloquence of Ireland. He also appears in Sixteen Dead
Men, l. 12.
This other: John MacBride, whom Maud Gonne had married in 1903. Yeats uses angrier words in A Prayer
for my Daughter when he indirectly refers to him. Also compare The Grey Rock , l. 47: some poor lot .
The marriage was unhappy and they seperated in 1909. MacBride abused Maud Gonnes children.
Some: Maud and Iseult Gonne.
Stanza III
From the middle of this stanza Yeats suddenly heaps images of motion with verbs such as comes, range,
Change to give the impression of change and motion.
Enchanted to a stone: evocative of Irish myths and folklore. Stone also symbolizes that which is static. Recall
the poets letter quoted earlier: All the rebels grow impersonal, universal, outside the flux of nature, they are
no more individual than stones or tombstones. Compare The Two Kings , l. 94 the heart akin to the dumb
stone ; and first love , l. 8: a heart of stone .
Trouble the living stream:
Trouble the living stream: suggestive of the world of change, flux, living.
As against the stone the living stream signifies the changing world, the world of becoming. Yeats once wrote
of an obsessive vision of a woman shooting at a star, an image that stood still, as it were, in the midst of the
stream of my daily thought, so little did it resemble it.
Moor-hens: This is symbolic of all that is born, begotten and dies: the world of flux..
The Indian upon God, l. 3.
Poetry 42
Stanza IV
That is heavens partYeats quoted these lines and commented that, when he wrote them, he was thinking of
an old Irish politician who composed a ballad of no literary merit; the ballad lamented that new poets and new
movements should have taken something of their sacredness away from Tone, Emmet, Roe the great old
names of the Irish heroes who fought England a hundred years ago.
As a mother names her child: according to Shepherd and Goatherd, l. 89, the dead live their lives backward
until they become children again here too death exerts some simplifying power.
No, no, not night but death: now the poet reasserts the terrible truth, after the beautiful smile of the mother
and child the poem is governed as its refrain suggests, by terror and beauty.
England may keep faith: the Home Rule Bill, granting Ireland a measure of independence, was passed by
parliament in 1913. Then it was suspended in 1914 when The Great War began. Yeats considered that the
Rebellion might have been averted by more skillful politicians. It was always thought that the suspension would
some day be lifted.
Excess of love / Bewildered: Cullingford notes that this recalls Shelleys Alastor, II. 18-82: sickened with
access/of love .
Connolly: James Connolly (1870-1916), a trade union leader and military commander of the uprising. He also
appears in The Rose Tree , l. 2, The O Rahilly , l. 12, and The Death of Cuchulain, l. 215.
Green: Irish national colour. This figures in Joyces colour symbolism too.
Easter 1916
Easter 1916 belongs to the volume entitled, Michael Robartes and the Dancer published in 1921. This
volume includes a group of poems commenting on the changed nature of things in Ireland caught in the throes
of civil strife. Easter 1916 is the earliest of these poems. It commemorates the Easter 1916 uprising in the
country. Supported by the IRB, the Irish nationalists saw the First World War as providing an appropriate
opportunity to gain independence for Ireland. This, then, was an extremely crucial event in the history of Irish
nationalism. Yeatss views on the topic have been critically attacked, for Yeats assumed an apparently neutral
stance vis-a-vis Irish nationalism. Yeatss endeavour was oriented towards attaining intellectual liberty and
cultural unity. The poem enacts the process by which comedy mutates into tragedy.
According to Yeats, Tragedy must always be a drowning and breaking of the dykes that separate man from
man and it is upon these dykes that comedy keeps house . Implicit in the idea of tragedy is a sense of
destruction, but it is still preferable to comedy as it unifies man with man. Like the characters in a comedy, the
rebels that the poem describes held idiosyncratic views before the rebellion, but when they were executed,
there was a feeling of togetherness. This oxymoronic idea of tragedy as being beautiful is embodied in the
phrase terrible beauty and the line A terrible beauty is born functions as the refrain throughout the poem.
The poem begins in a colloquial manner describing accounts of ordinary meetings between individuals. Yeats
says he has met them ; initially he remains vague about their identity of the rebels and clubs them together as
them . These mundane meetings between him and these people with vivid faces have been curt though
courteous, polite though meaningless . An instants nod of the head a sign of recognition, a brief meeting or
a longer one all are characterized by Polite meaningless words , the politeness and lack of purposeful
intelligence typical of a bourgeois society. Yeats seems to state that he, along with them , inhabits an Ireland
where motley is worn, motley being a metonym for comedy. The poem thus sets up an antithesis between
the polite meaningless words which constitutes the casual comedy of pre-revolutionary Ireland, the Ireland
where motley had been worn, and the tragic terrible beauty that is born of the Easter uprising.
The second stanza provides a catalogue of the Irish nationalists with their idiosyncrasies and peculiarities.
Lines 16-23 describe Con Markievicz whose passionate involvement in politics made her voice grow shrill .
43 W.B. Yeats
She seemed to have betrayed the young and the beautiful Constance Gore Booth he had admired before
for her aristocratic qualities. Lines 24-25 describe Patrick Pearse(1879-1916), the poet and founder of St.
Endas School.Thomas Mac Dough(1878-1916) is the helper and friend described in lines 26-30. A poet and
critic, he was a man of great potential, a man with a vision in life. Lines 31-34 allude to John MacBride, Maud
Gonnes husband, who is supposed to have treated her badly.Yeats calls him a drunken, vainglorious lout ,yet
says that he is numbered in the song the song that Yeats sings as the Homer and historian of Ireland because
he relinquished his personal, private nature and was transformed by becoming a part of the national sacrifice.
Yeats extends his drama image by having them resign their parts in the casual comedy and become terrible
and violent in their struggle for freedom.
In the first two stanzas, change has been the main idea behind Yeatss metaphors but in the next two stanzas
there occurs an ironic reversal. Yeats says it is in the insistence on one purpose alone through time that has
transformed them into a stone . Not transforming their ideas, they have become stone-like. The lack of
change makes them the only unchanging object in a world of flux. Being like a stone they trouble the living
stream , the embodiment of change that sweeps disturbed by them. The long sentence (lines 44-58) defines
minute by minute a huge range of activities that are marked by continual change. Horse riders, birds,
clouds, all change the elements of nature by virtue of their activity.
In the last stanza Yeats suggests this explicitly. Too long a sacrifice can make the stone of the heart. (Line
59-60) The heart turned into a stone is, at last, sacrificed. Death is both metaphor and fact. These rebels are
not asleep like a mother who sings her child to sleep, but dead. No no, not night but death . Yeats meditates
upon the need or otherwise of their sacrifice. This depends on Englands reaction to the Easter uprising. Yeats
acknowledges that their deaths are brought about by a heroic dream, a dream founded, a heroic dream, a
dream founded, perhaps, on an excess of love . This love almost drove them insane and brought about their
death. The poet celebrates them in his verse whereby they gain immortality. At the time of composition of the
poem and in later times whenever Ireland is remembered (Line 80, see annotation for green ) these
revolutionaries will be remembered for participating in the tragic affair of the uprising.
The Second Coming
Context
Many intellectuals historians, economists, writers of the period known as modern (late 19
th
and early 20
th
century) forecast various kinds of catastrophe which might destroy Europe. These may be called the apocalyptic
narratives, the most well-known being The Decline of the West, the massive work by Spenglar, the German
historian, who forecast that the West would soon lose its dominance and yield to the East. The volumes were
translated into many languages, including English. It became quite an influential work and in many ways
spawned the discourses on the subject. It may also have led to Herman Hesses novel Siddharth. The outbreak
of the First World War seemed to confirm such prognosis. Economists like John Maynard Keynes forecast
economic disasters. Even poets and writers such as Hardy wrote monitory poems. Some of D.H. Lawrences
characters too discuss impending catastrophe. The most memorable and pervasive poetic treatment of the
subject, of course, was to be Eliots The Waste Land (1922). Even in his Hollow Men he sings of This is the
way the world ends/not with a bang but with a whimper . Yeatss poem can be seen to belong to this long line
of apocalyptic outcries.
Through this poem Yeats attempts to subvert traditional Christian theological belief, that which posits that at the
end of the millenium Christ will be born again to redeem mankind, like his first birth. Yeats, being to some extent
a Nietzschean, offers a grim prognosis. Like Hegel, who offered his dialectic view of history, and not unlike
Blake who believed in contraries, Yeats logically suggests that after the serenity of the Christian era, the next
era will be inaugurated by the birth of a savage God. This was in keeping with his system of gyres. Yeats
was confirmed about his prognosis about the Second Coming after the horrifying first World War.
Poetry 44
In his note on the poem Yeats describes the system of gyres: how all the progress of the human soul and the
progress of history can be analyzed mathematically as the movement of two interlocking spinning cones. In our
age the primary cone, the cone of the Christian era, objective and self-effacy, has enlarged, it has weakened,
it has lost its fervour
New God the antithetical cone the antichrist.
Summary
Stanza I
Title, The Second Coming: As forecast in the Scriptures, Christ will come again. But Yeats wrote in 1926, I
do not believe in it [the Second Coming] at least not in its Christian form.
Yeats quoted these lines to illustrate the sentence I did not foresee, not having the courage of my own thought:
the growing murderousness of the whole world.
The falcon: This bird of prey was (and still is) tamed, trained and used for various purposes by falconers. It
seems to inscribe in air the shape of the historical gyre spiraling outwards to its farthest bound. In the automatic
script for 17 April 1918 Yeats asked Thomas, Is not world as spiral ascends getting farther from reality . A
passage from the 1910 draft of The Player Queen anticipates this image the Chancellor is anticipating the
ruin that will come to the state if the Queen retires to convent or martyrdom: Come, your majesty, I am like a
falconer that bears upon the wrist a hawk that struggles to lose itself in the heavens, and all I understand is to
keep the jesses tight; yet it may be, before the day end, some murderers hand may cut them .
Mere anarchy: according to A Vision, anarchy and adoration of violence are characteristic of the end of a
historical era.
Spiritus Mundi: another name for the Anima Mundi or Worlds Soul, the treasure house of images not
invented by man but given to him from beyond. II think of Anima Mundi as a great pool or garden where [a
series of related images] moves through its allotted growth like a water-plant or fragrantly branches in the air.
A shape with a lion body and the head of man: a sphinx in the automatic script for 2 June 1918, Yeats
asked, referring to the initiator roof the cycle that will replace the Christian cycle, Can we call it the Sphinx.
Perhaps the two most important precursors of this image are the murderous sphinx of the Oedipus legend, who
asked the famous riddle whose answer is man; and the sexually obsessive, feline and aesthetic sphinx of
Wildes poem The Sphinx (1894), the concubine of Egyptian Gods. In A Packet for Ezra Pound , Yeats
takes Oedipus as the opposite of Christ; and the Sphinxs bloodiness and sexines make it also appropriate as
the contrary of the pale, abstract Christ.
Desert birds: in Calvary (1929), l. 28, great desert birds pick bones bare.
Twenty centuries of stony sleep: the whole Christian era. Yeats sometimes thought of Christianity as stony,
sometimes as sleepy.
What rough beast: in a summary of his career as a poet, Yeats wrote that around 1904 I began to imagine, as
always at my left side just out of the range of sight, a brazen winged beast that I associated with laughing,
ecstatic destruction. Similarly Yeats predicted at the end of the refined, almost disembodied fin-de-siecle art
that he loved: After Stephane Mallarme, after Paul Verlaine, after Gustave Moreau after our own
verse what more is possible? After us the Savage God .
Slouches towards Bethlehem to be born: As is well-known, Christ was born in Bethlehem. Yeats thought
that the next civilization may be born, not from a virgins womb, nor a tomb without a body, not from a void, but
of our own rich experience . Yeats liked to describe the origin of an antithetical civilization as a sensual
thrashing, a spasm of horror.
The Second Coming
This poem included in Michael Robartes and the Dancer (1921) is a poetic rendering of philosophical and
45 W.B. Yeats
ideological concepts that attracted Yeats throughout his life. The poem demands an awareness of Yeatss
views as delineated in A Vision (a detailed description of it is given in a preceding section). In this poem Yeats
hints at the destruction of the two-thousand-year Christian cycle and the birth of the new, violent anti-civilization
represented and ruled by the figure of the beast . This is explicitly stated in terms of the movement of the
gyres. In fact Yeats maps out the reversal of the worlds gyre that will inaugurate a new historical era.
The poem begins with the depiction of ceaseless motion of the interpenetrating gyres that is captured in the
image of the flight if the falcon which represents the outer, objective and impersonal gyre. The first six lines
present powerful images of blood-letting, destruction and overwhelming chaos. In the disciplined Christian era,
falcon is the Prime Mover/God. But now the lack of association between the two betrays a state of faithlessness
and disorder - Things fall apart , that is the world, not just Ireland, that Yeats inhabits. It is the blood-
dimmed tide of violence that reigns supreme. Blood dimmed indicates smeared with blood as well as the
source of blood itself. This tide or a second movement (in terms of the gyres) has been initiated and as a
consequence the ceremony of innocence is lost. The idea of ceremony conveys Yeatss belief in a concept
of aristocratic order and long cherished, traditional principles. Innocence is opposed to the sexual and social
violence let loose in the world.
The next two lines explain the effect of this chaos. Fanatical men, endowed with passionate intensity have
gained an upper hand whereas the best have lost all sense of purpose and direction. This brings to the
forefront the issue of Yeatss fascist leanings, which has been discussed elsewhere. The first stanza encapsulates
circumstances marked by violence, anarchy and bloodshed. Yet this transformation wrought by these catastrophic
events seems to bring about a welcome change for Yeats and thus is a celebratory one. The argument about
Yeatss belief in authoritarian hegemony is further strengthened by the mention of the fact that in an earlier
draft of the poem Yeats explicitly used the word Germans interwoven with his picture of general crisis and
thus vent his hatred for the race. Though in an effort to lend universal, historical significance to his poem, he
removed this topical allusion.
The next stanza begins with Yeatss attempt to explain the convulsions of history that was rocking the world
during the First World War. This is explained as a revelation and the second coming The next seven lines
describe the birth, appearance and nature of the beast whose second coming it is. Yeats tends to authenticate
his vision of the beast by alluding to it as an image suggested by and drawn from his great warehouse of
images, the Spiritus Mundi.Line 14 suggests that the beast is a sphinx, a creature from the Sophoclean era.
The poet attributes a blank and pitiless gaze to it, thus suggesting the impersonal rather, a cruel ,violent
nature of the beast. This also links it up directly with the opening of the poem which describes the historical
process in terms of the movement of the gyres. This is better understood by quoting a note that Yeats wrote
for the Cuala press edition of Michael Robartes and the Dancer:
the end of an age, which always receives the revelation of the character of the next age, is represented by
the coming of one gyre to its place of greatest expansion and of the other to that of its greatest contraction. At
the present moment the life gyre is sweeping outward, unlike that before the birth of Christ which was
narrowing, and has almost reached its greatest expansion. The revelation which approaches will however take
its character from the contrary movement of the interior gyre. All the scientific, democratic, fast-accumulating,
heterogeneous civilization belongs to the outward gyre and prepares not the continuance of itself but the
revelation as in a lightning flash, though in a flash that will not strike only in one place, and will for a time be
constantly repeated, of the civilization that must slowly take its place when the revelation comes it will not
come to the poor but to the great and learned and establish again for two thousand years prince and the vizier.
Line 18 describes this second coming as darkness , yet it seems that Yeats looks forward to it, for the stony
sleep of the twenty centuries of Christian era seem to bear the weight of criticism. As the second stanza
reveals, Yeats deploys biblical imagery only to subvert it and thus suit his own mythology. The magi envisioned
the birth of Christ but Yeats, in an act of undermining Christian orthodoxy, predicts the birth of an anti-Christ.
Poetry 46
And the future, as he said in A Vision, would be hierarchical ,multiple, masculine, harsh, surgical. The
antithesis of Christ, the rough beast slouches towards Bethlehem, the seat of dogmatic, leveling, unifying,
feminine, humane, peace its means and end , Christian civilization and the poem thus ends rhetorically.
Stylistically and structurally too, the poem reinforces Yeatss vision. The use of blank verse is unique to a lyric
of this kind. The first few lines are in rhymed couplets but as the poem progresses half rhymes take over. The
tight/rigid couplet form suggests the fact that old civilization has been strangled. But the subsequent loosening
of rhyme scheme and the enjambment of lines enact the fact of an annunciation.
The Second Coming thus forms a part of the overarching myth of catastrophe that the modernists believed
in. The bloodiness of the First World War facilitated a metaphor for the beast. D.H.Lawrence in The Rainbow
, Eliot in The Wasteland, Virginia Woolf, W.H. Auden and Spender all saw the war as signaling a major cultural
and historical shift in the annals of human civilization.
Sailing to Byzantium
Context
The poem, from title onward, might indicate that like Lake Isle another attempt on the poets part to escape
reality into a mythical world or an imagined past. In fact it is difficult not to read the poem as one of escape
from and not an engagement with modern life. We can understand the poem better and apprehend the sources
of Byzantiums attraction by investigating a little Yeatss construction of the space, part historical, part mythical,
part imagined. But we must have some idea about what biographical/historical circumstances and what poetic
ideals propelled and preoccupied Yeats around this time.
The poet was growing old, and the subject of old age which so preoccupied Yeats all through his life (you might
recall that when he was young, in two of his early poems entitled, When You Are Old and Adams Curse
he took up the subject), now obsessed him. So much so, it foregrounds in many of his poems, from 1919
onward. He started cursing his old age even while philosophizing about it. Like Red Hanrahan, he became a
great cursor of old age .
This is what he said about Byzantium in A Vision in the chapter on the 15
th
phase of the moon:
Byzantium . substituted for the formal Roman magnificence, with its glorification of physical power, an
architecture that suggests the Sacred City in the Apocalypse of St. John. I think if I could be given a month of
Antiquity and leave to spend it where I chose, I would spend it in Byzantium .I think I could find in some little
wine-shop some philosopher worker in mosaic who could answer all my questions, the supernatural descending
nearer to him than to Plotinus even, for the pride of his delicate skill would make [religious truths] show as a
lovely flexible presence like that of a perfect human body.
The passage is a crucial intertext for our understanding of Yeatss Byzantium poems, as well as illustrating and
clarifying some of his preoccupations about art. It shows first of all that Byzantium is a symbol which is
recoverable through imagination, and as such a journey to the city is not so much a physical as a metaphorical
one. The virtues of the imaginative space are locatable in the following features: i. It is stripped of all materiality,
made abstract, almost aerial. ii. In Byzantium the boundary between life and art is collapsed. Men are fused
into mosaic, and symbols have a perfect human body. (iii) The cooperative nature of artistic production results
in the anonymity of the artist. Byzantium is a community of workers and intellectuals. Though it is such an ideal
city, it is finally inadequate.
The Background
1. The poem appeared first, as the first poem in Yeatss collection, The Tower (1928). He wrote it in 1926,
the poem marking a point in his maturity while at the home of Lady Gregory in Coole Park near Gort in
Co. Galway. In many ways the year 1922-23 was a year of fulfillment for Yeats. In 1922 Yeats became
a senator of Ireland, and the winning of the Nobel Prize brought him further glory and prestige, giving him
some measure of worldly success. Many of the poems written during the period of 1922-1928 which
47 W.B. Yeats
found their way into The Tower were the result of this theory of the Mask. Some of the masks that he
donned here are those of the smiling senator, the public man, visiting schools or meeting the soldiers, in
brief, the sage.
Around this time some of Yeatss ideas propounded in Per Amica Silentia Lunae were also percolating
into A Vision which appeared in 1926. The poems in the collection, The Tower, are arranged according to
the structure of the mystical treatise. The Great wheel is the subject of the first book of A Vision. It
deals with the program of the soul through the lunar month, the cycles of the moon being the central
symbol in A Vision. The 28 phases of the moon through a month (from full moon to no moon) amount for
the account for the 28 incarnations of the month. The first poem in The Tower Sailing to Byzantium ,
therefore, traces the progress of the poet-personas soul from the mundane and ephemeral world of the
present to the ideal and eternal world of Byzantium. From then on the poems which follow broadly define
the trajectory of the lunar cycle Nineteen hundred and nineteen , Two Songs from a Play , Leda
and the Swan , and finally All Souls Night , are among the key poems describing the cycle. The title of
the poem refers to the ancient city of Byzantium, capital of the Byzantine ruled by the Turkish Sultan, the
city is now called Istanbul.
2. Yeats was in some ways a Blakean, Hegelian and Nietzshean: he loved to think of everything in terms of
contraries. Like Blakes contraries innocence and experience , Nietzsches Apollonian and Dionysian,
Yeatss primary dialectic was around life in this world (Ireland) and that in Byzantium. From this pair of
binary opposites, everything else follows. Byzantium symbolized the anti-world; contrary to a world full
of sadness of life, Byzantium becomes, for Yeats, a domain of great appetites, greatly gratified. In a
vision, he wrote about how Emperor Justinian built the Cathedral of Hagia Sophia (AD560), which
closely approximates a historical beauty of the full moon.
Notes on the poem
Stanza I
That is no country: The indicative pronoun makes it obvious that the speaker has already sailed out of the
reality of his own country. Critics often directly associate that country with Ireland, because of the similarities
between Yeatss description and the geopolitical entity, Ireland. Consequently they identify the I with Yeats
himself. But one must avoid such equations, if one were to go by Yeatss theory of the Mask. Compare this
with Keatss I am already with thee in Ode to the Nightingale
Old men: This provides an example of Yeats aforementioned preoccupation with old age. Together with,
therefore have later in the poem, it indicates that the poetic persona considers itself old.
The young in one anothers arms: Following the reference to old age, this starts a series of contrasts around
which the dialectic structure of the poem is organized. Observe the series of binarisms: age versus youth, art
versus life, permanence versus ephemera, body versus soul, and so on. This phrase as well as the early prose
drafts of the poem show that the implicit subject of the whole poem is sex, not platonic love. The stanza
proceeds to pile up images of vitality and pleasure. However, the catalogue is halted by the phrase, Those
dying generations , followed by whatever is begotten, born and dies . The collocation of the active and
passive voice is worth pondering. This is in sharp contrast to the world of art, best represented by the magnificence
of Byzantium , I think that in early Byzantium, maybe never before or since in recorded history, religious,
aesthetic and practical life were one. In 1912 he had visited the city of Ravenna, in northern Italy and had
seen there some examples of early Byzantium art. He recognised that many generations of people had witnessed
the pictures, but that the pictures themselves had maintained their vitality and freshness, they seemed ageless,
the figures portrayed in them also achieved a permanence that was not possible in reality. The predicament
facing Yeats, is what he perceives to be a growing dichotomy between his ageing body and his still youthful
mind or intellect. He offers, in the opening stanza, the contrast between those who concentrate on the sensual
world and those who are preoccupied with the permanent world of art.
Poetry 48
Stanza II
Old man: The first line of this stanza elaborates the theme of old age suggested in its counterpart in the first
stanza. The undesirability of age is vividly captured through the image of the scarecrow.
Unless soul clap its hands and sing: According to A Vision impersonal and impartial artists are said to look
on and clap their hands at the spectacle of the objective world. Thus what the phrase here seems to imply is
unless one concentrates on the intellect of soul and by doing so seek to escape from the constraints of the
human body . In an imaginary battle between body and soul, in the medieval tradition, which continued through
centuries, either the soul or the body gains an upper hand. The image of the soul clapping is suggestive of its
celebration of victory over the body.
Monuments of its own magnificence: indicative of self-referentiality. This is again in contarst to what happens
in the world of becoming ( neglecting monuments of unaging intellect )
I have sailed: This confirms the personas metaphorical journey in time and space having been already performed.
Stanza III
Sages: He begins by referring to a particular painting he saw in a Ravenna church, the painting depicts martyrs
being burned for their faith. Yeats, who had edited Blake, said in a letter that he associated the sages with two
of Blakes pictures with Christian themes. His interpretation suggests that t the flames represent the Holy
Spirit. In other words, the moment of their deaths was equivalent to moving from the mortal life to immortality,
and achieving a permanence through both the life of the soul and the Byzantine painting.
perne in a gyre: refers to a spinning wheel such as those Yeats would have seen during his youth in Sligo. He
is referring to the movement of thread through bobbin and spool, a movement that is so fast that it is imperceptible
to the naked eye. Both the image of the gyre and its movement, as well as bobbin and spool are best understood
with reference to his theory of the gyre as propounded in A Vision. The persona asks the sages, now immune
from decay, to reenter the world of process long enough to seize him away to their realm of immortality. The
emphasis on the personas sexual urge and desire unmatched by the bodily decrepitude continues, though as
something to be wished away rather than easily dismissed.
Stanza IV
Though successful in his journey, the poet is yet to meet his ultimate goal. Since nature follows a cycle leading
to old age, there is bodily decay and death. It is here that his aim becomes clear: to opt out of that cycle by being
gathered into the artifice of eternity. He begins by declaring that in this world of art, he would not take on the
form of any natural thing, which like the images of the opening stanza, would be susceptible to the ravages of
time, decay and death. Instead, he would take the form of a golden bird - an image based on golden birds that
adorned trees in the palace of the Byzantine emperor. Yeats seems determined to finally break with the sensual
mortal world, and reject life as we know it, in favour of an intellectual permanence produced by a work of art.
However he has not fully succeeded, the use of the word drowsy, rekindles the sensuous overtones of the
poem, suggesting that the poets intellect is limited by his human condition, that in seeking a perfect existence
his intellect is unable to avoid that which appeals to his senses. This becomes more obvious in the final lines of
the poem, in line 30 is the voice of the golden bird that Yeats highlights again, contradicting his purpose in the
poem. It is not the beauty of the hammered gold that Yeats now refers to, but the beauty of the birds voice
which cannot come from a golden bird in a painting. The final line of the poem -: Of what is past passing or to
come. reflects the line from the opening stanza: Whatever is begotten, born and dies. In an effort to
represent permanence and timelessness, and in achieving a resolution to his quest, the poet, paradoxically
completes the poem by dividing time into past, present and future, suggesting that his intellect remains within
the bounds of his human condition. Although the poem is ostensibly about Yeatss attempts to achieve an
artists permanence, through: Monuments of unageing intellect. represented by Byzantine art. Some critics
suggest that Yeats is far more concerned with his loss of sexual potency, his references in the opening stanza
49 W.B. Yeats
to the young in one anothers arms etc. are perhaps indicating a jealousy of the young and perhaps his
concentration is a direct result of his recognition of his physical failings. The image chosen by Yeats to represent
the ideal artist suggets that the golden bird, was only introduced in the poem in the final drafts. Earlier drafts of
the poem show Yeats wishing to take on the form of Phideas a statue in Byzantium which represented the
perfect like Adonis. This shows that at least during the writing of the poem, Yeats was wishing for physical
perfection. This theme is also continued in Among School Children , where Yeats refers to Golden-thighed
Pythagoras , and refers to the virility of Pythagoras. Yeats juxtaposes contrasting images of the sensuous
world and the world of art, thereby creating a tension and conflict which he hopes to resolve by the end of the
poem.
Such a form: Yeats said once that, I have read somewhere that in the Emperors palace at Byzantium was a
tree made of gold and silver, and artificial birds that sang . The stanza firmly asserts that art can offer a body
superior to mere flesh. Yeats was not satisfied with the celebration of Byzantine glory that he is able to offer
in the final stanza. Sturge Moore, a senior contemporary of his pointed out the anomaly of the image of the
golden bird singing to keep the drowsy emperor awake. Yeats wrote another poem to rectify this error, simply
entitled, Byzantium .
Sailing to Byzantium
Sailing to Byzantium occurs in The Tower (1928) which marks Yeatss efflorescence and achievement as a
great poet. This poem has a companion piece called Byzanium published in The Winding Stair and Other
Poems(1933).
In the poem, Byzantium is a mythical city symbolizing the holy, spiritual life of the soul. But Yeats probably
derived his idea from the real, historical city of eastern Christendom called Byzantium.It was, here, Yeats says
in A Vision that may be never before or since in recorded history, religious, aesthetic and practical life were
one The painter, the mosaic worker, the worker in gold and silver, the illuminator of sacred books, were
almost impersonal, almost without the consciousness of individual design, absorbed in their subject matter and
that the vision of a whole people. So Byzantium connotes an ideal realm of existence. In 1931 Yeats wrote
about the subject matter of this poem.
Now I am trying to write about the state of my soul, for it is right for an old man to make his soul, and some of
my thoughts upon that subject I have put into a poem called Sailing to Byzantium. When Irishmen were
illuminating the Book of Kells Byzantium was the center of European civilization and the source of its
spiritual philosophy, so I symbolize the search for the spiritual life by a journey to that city.
The motif of journey affords the poet a contemplation of philosophical and
aesthetic issues. The issue poem is constructed between the antithesis between the youth and old age, nature
and art, body and soul, thought and imagination and the world of Becoming and the world of Being. Yet the
poem does not present a definite stance on either of these issues. It is one of the several poems in Yeatss
literary corpus that he meditates on these seminal themes. Even within the progression of this poem, the poets
avowed intention of renunciation and the sub textual yearning for natural, physical world makes the poem
complex and highly suggestive.
The first stanza of the poem captures the physical, sensual activity of the natural world at once marked by
fecundity and decay. The poem opens in a conversational manner and the use of that suggests that the poet
has already embarked upon his journey and left Ireland. In Celtic mythology Ireland has been known as Tir na
nOg i.e. the Land of the Young. The next four lines describing the preoccupations of youth engaged in love-
making, birds singing songs, abundantly fertile seas and the presence of fish, flesh or fowl all suggest an
Ireland teeming with life and activity. But the sense of passage of time and the reality of eventual decay is
underscored by the use of the phrase dying generations . This idea is again repeated in line 6 and assumes an
axiomatic status. Whatever is begotten, born and dies . According to the poet, owing to sensual music i.e.
Poetry 50
the delight in the life of senses, people forget the unageing or the eternally existing soul that is not subject to
temporal decay. It is in pursuit of the life of the soul that is not possible amidst youthful, feverish activity, that
the poet undertakes a journey to Byzantium. Monuments of unageing intellect besides referring to the soul,
also refer to the object of arts, which, too are timeless creations. In the second stanza the poet further elaborates
upon his stance and gives reasons for his intended opting out of the world of decay. He says that old age makes
a man paltry i.e insignificant and unsubstantial a tattered coat upon a stick , and the only way in which he can
be redeemed of this shadow like existence is by dwelling upon spiritual issues and principles- soul clap its
hands and sing . But it is difficult to listen to the metaphorical song of the soul in a world dominated by the
literal song of the birds and sensual music of youth. The land that the poet wants to leave is immersed in
studying the structures produced by it, or in other words, not heeding the message of the soul but pursuing
worldly wisdom. The last line of the stanza tells us that he has already reached Byzantium.
Once in Byzantium, the third stanza shows the poet praying to the saints and sages of Byzantium for spiritual
assistance. The sages are embodiment of wisdom and higher knowledge. They are depicted as standing in a
Byzantium gold mosaic, the heavenly realm from which they are being asked to descend, perne in a gyre ,
and be the singing -masters or the philosophical and spiritual guides of the poet. This appeal for divine
intervention also betrays, through the confessional mode, the poets involvement in the world of youthful passion.
His heart is sick with desire , that is, overwhelmed by desire and hence subject to decay and death: And
fastened to a dying animal (line22). The use of fastened recalls the caught of first stanza and dying
animal refers back to the dying generations thus establishing a link between the world of Becoming described
in the first stanza and the poets own state of mind. He is in Byzantium, but is not free of physical longing and
desires. Yet there seems to be realization that this is not right, it knows not what it is and hence prays to be
assimilated into the fold of the saints. The much celebrated phrase artifice of eternity , then, expresses a
paradoxical idea that that which lives forever is artificial. But artificiality is not falseness and so a work of art
becomes supreme by virtue of its eternal existence.
The next and the last stanza expresses the firm intention of the poet that having purged his base desires by
spiritual aid, he will shun all natural things and processes. He wants to become a part of the dematerialized
Byzantium world. He wishes to acquire the status and nature of art in becoming a golden bird, much like those
hammered and enamelled by the Grecian artists. In being an object of art he also wants to create art to
narrate songs of past, present and future. Gold is symbolic of purity and hence there is the excessive use of
golden imagery to characterize this world. The song of the bird harkens back to the first stanza of the poem
where the poet sang of mortal pursuits. The poet will be again involved in the real world.
The poem, thus has a cyclical structure and shows that an absolute disjunction between body and soul, and by
extension between nature and art is not possible.
Among School Children
The poem was first published in the volume The Tower (1928). Yeats, who always believed in sequencing the
poems logically, so arranged the poems that two of them immediately preceding this one dealt with conception
(Leda and the Swan) and birth (A Prayer for my Son). In the poem under discussion, the poet arrives at the
theme of childhood; at the end of The Tower comes old age (A Man Young and Old) and death ( All Souls
Night). The theme of this poem is education: in February 1926 Yeats visited St Otterans school, established
according to Montessori principles in a report to the Irish Senate on the condition of schools, Yeats praised
the movement for its aptness to an agricultural nation ( Newspapers carried a favorable report on a visit to a
convent school made twenty years earlier). But in the poem he regards St. Otterans school with colder eyes:
as in earlier poem about education, Michael Robartes and the Dancer , Yeats here concludes that education
should be a dance, not ciphering or reading or sewing or any sort of labor. The poet rejects any sort of
education (such as that associated with Plutos academy) that excludes any part of experience; instead he
finds that life gains purpose, gains meaning only by moving towards ever greater wholeness and largeness.
51 W.B. Yeats
Yeats wrote a note shortly after his school visit: Topic for poem. School children, and the thought that life will
waste them, perhaps that life will waste them, perhaps that no possible life can fulfill their own dreams, or even
their teachers hope . It brings in the old thought that life prepares for what never happens. (compare the end
of Yeats Reveries Over Childhood And Youth : all life weighed in the scales of my own life seems to me a
preparation for something that never happens. )
A sixty year old smiling public man : the self conscious poet is aware of the disengaged, arbitrary roles he
plays, the appearances he presents (compare IV 8)- he has lost the integrity of being that is celebrated at II 8
and VIII 1-8
A ledean body: Maud Gonne. In the context of Leda and the Swan , this epithet at once lauds her as the
mother of a heroic age and suggests how history deformed her life.
Our two natures blent / into a sphere: at the end of his suppressed autobiography, Yeats described their
complementary nature: My outer nature was passive but for her I should perhaps have never have left my
desk- but I knew my spiritual nature was passionate, even violent. In her all this was reversed, for it was her
spirit only that was gentle and passive and full of charming fantasy.
Platos parable: in Platos Symposium, the Greek comic playwright Aristophanes describes how people used
to be two headed, four armed, four legged, bisexual; but Zeus severed the man spheres into separate men and
women, just as hair cleaves a cooked egg. Stephen Winnett has transcribed a passage from a 1917 draft of The
Only Jealousy of Emer on the same theme, in whuch Fand tells Cuchulain that she can offer him completion
of self: Have you not heard that man before his birth / Is two in one : the yolk & white of the egg / And that
one half is born in wretchedness / while the other half remains among the Sidhe. For Plato, see The Tower I
12. For other agglomerations of a man and a woman into a sphere, see Ribh at the Tomb of Baile and Aillinn
, l. 14; and the Hindu creation myth in TP, p. 119, in which the first person was as big as man and wife
together; he divided himself into two, husband and wife were born.
Yolk and white of the one shell: Donald Torchiana notes that in 1919 Maud Gonne designed a book illustration
showing two swans squeeze into a tight sphere.
Daughters of the swan every paddlers heritage: the Laedean body has reminded the poet of Hans
Christiaan Andersens fable of the ugly duckling. Children are eggs that can hatch into any adult shape even
Maud Gonnes.
Quatrrocento: fifteenth century see also Her Vision in the Wood , l. 19 and Under Ben Bulben IV 17. In
one draft Yeats wrote Da Vinci .
Hollow of cheek as if it drank the wind: compare Two Songs of a Fool II 6: she drank the wind (referring
to a hare, emblematic of Iseult Gonne); A prayer for my Daughter, l. 64: an old bellows full of angry wind
(referring to Maud Gonne); and In Memory Of Eva Gore-Booth I 12: skeleton-gaunt. Yeats once wrote
of certain bad men who fed the gaping mouths with the east wind until they had destroyed all taste for better
food .
Shadows for its meat: compare Another Song of a Fool , l. 12: roses for his meat ; and The Statues , l. 19:
Hamlet thin from eating flies.
Pretty plumage: This anticipates the opposite, the image of the old scarecrow . Old, because it was used
earlier, and also because it refers to old age. This can be compared with All my fine feathers would be plucked
away (The Gift of Haroun Al-Rashid).
Old scarecrow: for another scarecrow also an image of the disembodiment caused by old age see Sailing
to Byzantium II 2. The scarecrow recurs here at VI 8.
Honey of generation: I have taken the honey of generation from Porphyrys essay on The cave of the
nymphs . Porphyry was a neoplatonic philosopher; he wrote a famous essay on Homers Cave of the Nymphs,
Poetry 52
showing it as an allegory of the unborn souls descent the sexual pleasure of the parents acted as a kind of
honey, luring the childs soul into incarnation.
Betrayed: The sorrow of death is not so bitter as the sorrow of birth, and had our ears the subtlety we could
listen amid the joy of lovers and the pleasure that comes with sleep to the wailing of the spirit betrayed into a
cradle.
Recollection or the drug: the newborn babys recollection of his beatitude before birth, that makes him
miserable about his present estate; or the drug the honey of generation that causes the baby to forget.
Yeats found no warrant in Porphyry for considering [the honey] the drug that destroys the recollection of
pre natal freedom .
Yeats quoted a draft of this stanza in a letter to Olivia Shakespeare: Here is a fragment of my last curse upon
old age. It means that even the greatest men are owls, scarecrows, by the time their fame has come .
Plato thought nature but a spume: Plato (see The Tower I 12) taught that the physical world, mutable and
corruptible, was only a humble shadow, an undignified copy of a world of ideal Forms.
Soldier Aristotle: Platos pupil Aristotle (384-322 BC) gave a little more dignity to the physical world, by
teaching that reality was form ingrained in matter. An early draft of this stanza stressed Aristotles talent for
category: Aristotle was / The first who had a place for everything .
A king of kings: Alexander the great (see On a Picture of a Black Centaur , l. 12). Aristotle, remember,
was Alexanders tutor, hence the taws (form of birch) .
Golden thighed Pythagoras: Pythagoras (c. 582-507 BC) was was said to have discovered the fact that
musical pitches can be described mathematically as ratios of vibrating lengths of string; he also developed a
doctrine of metempsychosis, teaching that the soul perpetually migrated from one body to the next. Like
Platos and Aristotles, his investigations into reality took him (according to Yeats) too far from the hard facts
of bodily life. The epithet, golden thighs, was applied to Pythagoras in classical times; compare golden armed
Iollan (The Shadowy waters, l. 406), and the transvestite singer with gilded finger nails in The Resurrection
(1931), l. 193. Pythagoras reappears in The Delphic Oracle upon Plotinus, l. 9, The Statues, II. 1 and 9, and
in News for the Delphic Oracle , l. ; and in A Full Moon in March (1935), II 16-18, a singer sings of loves
excrementitousness: Crown of gold or dung of swine.
What a star sang: see A Prayer for my Son , l. 19.
Careless muses: see The Tower I 11.
Old clothes upon old sticks: no inquiry into ultimate changeless reality can compensate for the decay of the
philosophers bodies. For other scarecrows see Sailing to Byzantium II 2.
Worship: in stanza VI, the poet asked whether human purpose might be found in the objects of affection. In the
terms of A Vision, stanza VI concerns creative mind, stanza VII will.
They too break hearts: the nuns heart is broken by her veneration of an icon, just as the mothers heart is
broken by her love for her child. Compare The Friends of His Youth, where old Madge nurses a stone at her
breasts and Thinks that the stone is a child .
Presences / That passion, piety or affection knows :the beloved, the icon and the child, respectively. The
Presences addressed by the poet include all objects of human affect.
Self-born mockers: in The shadowy Waters, l. 567, the Gods are called Immortal Mockers . For self-born,
see A Prayer for my Daughter , II. 67-68.
Labour is blossoming or dancing: in the previous stanzas, all the things that could complete human life or
endow it with meaning continually evade mans grasp; but in this final stanza the poet suggests that there is
another perspective than that of the sad mutable world a perspective that reveals the unity of man and what
he loves, what he thinks, what he works on (compare Quarrel in Old Age , II. 12-16).
53 W.B. Yeats
The body is not bruised to pleasure soul: compare The Two Kings , II. 179-83: where we build / Our
sudden palaces in the still air / Pleasure itself can bring no weariness, / nor can time waste the cheek, nor is
there foot / That has grown weary of the wandering dance .
Nor blear eyed wisdom out of midnight oil: compare The Living Beauty , 1. I: wick and oil are spent ; and
the image if the Platonist toiling at his midnight candle in My House, l. 20.
Are you the leaf, the blossom or the bole?: the chestnut tree is an indivisible whole a metaphor for the
human being who attains Unity of Being. These lines can be compared with a speech in which Yeats urged
school teachers to teach religion as a part of history and of life itself, a part as it were, of the foliage of
Burkes tree.
How can we know the dancer from the dance?: in this poem about education, the poet understands knowing
as making discrimination; but the kind of education he values is not analysis, but synthsis. In the dance., the
artist and the artifact are one; there is no distinction to be known.
Yeats conceived human life as wretchedly corruptible, human faculties as wretchedly divided and self-impeding;
but he often teased himself with a vision of personal wholeness and liberty. At the end of A Vision (1937),
Yeats wrote of the thirteenth sphere or cycle which is in every man and called by every man his freedom ;
the poem celebrates the moment of blessed introspection when a man sees his own integrity, the dance figure
traced by his total effort.
Among School Children
Among school children is also included in The Tower (1928). As the title indicates, the poem describes an
actual visit to a school. As Senator of the Irish Free State, Yeats visited the S.Otterans School, Waterford in
February 1926 for inspection. So the poem, at least at the start, promises to be a public address. But the way
argument develops makes it a personal and meditative poem.
The first two lines of the first stanza depict Yeats walking through the schoolroom, as in an inspection, and
inquiring about the modes and methods of education in the school. The conversation with the old nun who
has been identified as Reverend Mother Philomena , the principal of the school seems to be tinged with ironic
humour. The phrase best modern way alludes to the Montessori methods of teaching that aims at developing
the childs individuality. Yeatss perception of himself as the Sixty- year old smiling public man is also ironic.
There is a sharp turn of thought in the second stanza. Amidst the school children, Yeats is suddenly reminded
of Maud Gonne, the possessor of a Ledaean body . In sharp contrast to the first stanza that describes young
children with their wonder stare , Yeats thinks of Maud Gonne in her old age when bent above a sinking
fire she told him of an incident from her own childhood leading to a days unhappiness and misery. The use of
the word bent suggests old age and is reinforced by the use of the word sinking in the next line. For Yeats
it became an instance when their two opposite natures were reconciled, blended into a sphere owing to a
sympathetic understanding of each other. According to Yeats, this reconciliation was like the yolk and white of
an egg both contained in one. The parable of the egg suggests primordial unity. At the subtextual level, this
can be read as Yeatss longing to consummate his otherwise unfulfilled desire for Maud Gonne. The phrases
Ledaean body and Platos parable allude to classical mythology and learning.
The third stanza continues the same thought and line of argument as the previous one. The poet still thinking
of the grief and rage that Maud Gonne recounted, he tries to visualize her as a child and looks at young school-
girls to see glimpses of Maud Gonne, to see how she might have looked at that age. But the poet is careful to
distance her from ordinary children. He acknowledges that she is the daughter of the swan (Refer to the
Zeus-Leda myth), yet may share characteristics and features of every paddler that is, ordinary people.
Thinking about Maud Gonne, his heart is overwhelmed with passion (Line 23) and Maud Gonne assumes a
forceful living presence as a child.
Stanza four again depicts the present image of Maud Gonne in her old age.As opposed to the living child of
Poetry 54
the previous stanza, Yeats wonders whether the hollow cheek is fashioned by Quattrocento, the fifteenth-
century Italian artist. Such hollowness seems to have been fed on wind and shadows. Hence the insubstantial
figure of Maud Gonne in old age is contrasted with the bubbling energy of a young child. The image of Maud
also leads him to think of his own appearance in old age. Acknowledging that he looked handsome when
young, had pretty plumage , and is no more than a scarecrow now, he still does not succumb to self-pity and
seems to bravely cope with the fact of old age. The first four stanzas thus oscillate between childhood and old
age and a sense of inevitable loss is discernible in the poem. These stanzas provide the framework for the
poets meditation on the question of unfulfilled expectations discussed in the remaining four stanzas.
In the fifth stanza Yeats says that if a young mother with a child on her lap can visualize or think about her son
as a sixty year old man, his age betrayed by his looks and hair; she will surely consider if such a fate is enough
compensation for the pain and the trouble that she experienced at the time of birth of her child. Along with the
pain of childbirth are attendant other anxieties about the way the child will fare in life. In this meditation Yeats
introduces the concept of the honey of generation . This refers to the soul that has been trapped into the body
and the next line encapsulates two reactions of the soul- like the effect of a drug, it sleeps and forgets its past
glory or it may struggle towards remembering past blessedness.
This philosophical concept is carried on to the sixth stanza. In this stanza Yeats says that although Plato saw
the world as a shadowy representation of the more real actual world of ideas yet time has its effects on the
objects regulated and controlled by it. Aristotle, whose philosophy deals with solid matter as compared to that
of Plato, as a tutor used the birch stick upon the bottom of Alexander the king of kings. This line implies that
human intellect dominates over mere temporal power. Pythagoras, the Greek philosopher with his philosophy
of numbers, measured the intervals between musical notes on a stretched string, but all these philosophers
Plato, Aristotle and Pythagoras could not defer old age and ultimately became scarecrows. In such a case, are
the achievements of human intellect ultimately reduced to nought?
With stanza seven, Yeats gathers the various strands of thoughts and observations discussed earlier in the
poem. The reference to a nun in stanza one and to a mother in stanza five are brought together here. Yeats
says that both create and worship images. The nun worships an actual stone or a bronze image of god but the
mother creates an image of her child in her heart. Line 53 means that these images break heart by pointing
to the human inability to achieve perfection. These presences or images that nuns worship, the images of
children that mothers cherish and the image of the lover in the heart of the beloved are created by the passion
of lovers, the piety of nuns and the affection of mothers. These are symbolic of heavenly glory outside the
world of Becoming. Though self-born that is, being images they do not really require a medium to be born, yet
they too break hearts and mock human enterprise by exposing the limitations of mortal life.
In the eighth and last stanza the poet refers to human labour and gives two instances of it: the blossoming of the
chestnut tree and the act of dancing. According to the poet, labour is fruitful only when body is not employed
in the service of the soul i.e. there is no disjunction between the body and the soul. Beauty that is born out of
the despair of creating an image of perfect beauty is not real beauty, as wisdom acquired by exhaustive
hardwork is not truly valuable. The blossoming of true labor is captured in the image of chestnut tree that
symbolizes unity of Being. The tree is majestic, full of blossom and is all its parts roots, leaves, trunk, and
flowers. Like the chestnut tree, perfect dance is that in which one cannot distinguish between the dancer and
the dance. Inextricably merged into each other, the dancer and the dance, and the chestnut tree are symbolic
of unity of Being in the world of nature. True labour, then, is the merging of the spiritual and the physical and
indicates the wholeness of life that one should strive to attain. The poem is a meditation upon numerous issues
central to Yeatss aesthetics and beliefs.
Leda and the Swan
Background
Yeatss note explains that his study of mythological brutality began with a meditation on contemporary politics:
55 W.B. Yeats
I wrote Leda and the Swan because the editor [AE] of a political review asked me for a poem. I thought
After the individualist, demagogic movement, founded by Hobbes and popularized by the Encyclopedists and
the French Revolution, we have a soil so exhausted that it cannot grow that crop for centuries . Then I thought,
Nothing is now possible but some movement from above preceded by some violent annunciation. My fancy
began to play with Leda and the Swan for metaphor, and I began this poem; but as I wrote bird and lady took
such possession of the scene that all the politics went out of it and my friend tells me that his conservative
readers would misunderstand the poem. In an interview Yeats continued this line of political analysis:
Everything seems to show that the centrifugal movement which began with the Encyclopedists and produced
the French Revolution has worked itself out to the end. Now we are at the beginning of a new centripetal
movement [towards Mussolini and authoritarian government].
Fragments showed the exhausted soil of which the Yeatss note speaks, the impoverished and impoverishing
idea world of empiricist philosophy and democratic politics; Leda and the Swan offers a vivid metaphor for
the terror of the antithetical age to be born. According to A Vision 2000 BC (the age in which the swan came
to Leda to inaugurate the heroic age) AD 2000 rhyme with each other; and so it is to be expected this poem
bears many similarities to The Second Coming. Indeed there is a sense in which both the poems depict beast
rapes of Yeatss imagination by a vehement overwhelming image. The sexual frenzy, the emphatic jagged
diction of the sonnets opening, were unprecedented in Yeatss poetry. In Pansies (1929), D.H. Lawerence
published a sequence of poems on the Leda theme: the vast white bird / furrows our featherless women / with
unknown shocks / and stamps his black marsh feet on their white marshy flesh.
Drafts of this sonnet first appeared in a magazine under the title Annunciation. The whole poem is quoted to
introduce the chapter in A Vision on historical process, Dove or Swan . A comprehensive review of Yeatss
sources in mythology, poetry, sculpture, and painting (perhaps the most important as Michelangelos image of
Leda and the Swan, a copy of which Yeats kept by his desk as he wrote the poem) appears in Ian Feltchers
W.B Yeats and his Contemporaries, pp.220 51.
Title Leda and the Swan: Zeus took the form of a swan in order to rape the mortal girl Leda; she presently laid
three eggs: two eggs [had] already hatched Castor and Clytaemnestra [the wife of Agamemnon, the Greek
leader during the Trojan War] broke the one shell, Helen [of Troy] and Pollux the other ; the third hung in a
Spartan temple, strung up to the roof as a holy relic. In the 1927 version of The Resurrection, II. 2 74 75, a
character hears an eyewitness account of this Spartan temple, and exclaims, An egg of Leda, did you say?
And unhatched? What frustrated destiny! . But Yeats, in his last short story, invented a sequel in which this
destiny was no longer frustrated: Michael Robertes and his friends come into possession of the third egg the
size of a swans egg Hyacinthine blue and prepare to hatch it; this will lead to the return of the heroic age.
For other references to Leda, see His Phoenix , 1.4: that sprightly girl that is trodden by a bird ; Among
School Children II 1: Ledean body (referring to Maud Gonne); and Lullaby , II. 13 18, where Leda is
oddly solicitous of her rapists comfort.
In a passage added to The Adoration of Magi in 1925, a mysterious voice prophesies the transformation of
this world: another Leda would open her knees to a swan, another Achilles beleaguers Troy . In The Player
Queen (1922) an actress, flirting with actors dressed as animals, sings, Shall I fancy beast or fowl? / Queen
Pasiphae chose a bull, / While a passion for a swan / Made Queen Leda stretch and yawn . And in The
Hernes Egg (1938) a king claims that virgins invent divine ravishers to appease frustrated sexual desire: Ovid
had a literal mind, / And though he sang it neither knew / What lonely lust dragged down the gold / That crept
on Danaes lap, nor knew / What rose against the moony feathers / When Leda lay upon the grass .
The first four lines: in the first printing these lines read, A rush, a sudden wheel, and hovering still / The bird
descends and her frail thighs are pressed / By the webbed toes, and that all powerful bill / Has laid her helpless
face upon his breast.
webs bill: compare Attractas song in The Hernes Egg about her intercourse with a divine heron: When
beak and claw their work begin / Shall horror stir in the roots of my hair?
Poetry 56
vague fingers: Leda was a popular subject for painting in the Renaissance - this phase may refer to blur
representing the rapid movement of Ledas hand as well as to her hesitancy of resistance against an irresistible
force. (The next poem in this volume is explicitly about a picture of a mythological animal.) Compare vague
wing (The Dreaming of the Bones, 1 III).
thighs: this edition follows AV, p. 267, in putting a comma, instead of a question mark, after this word.
strange heart beating: Because, after all, it is a gods heart, not a human beings. The heart beat manifests the
gods full descent to earth.
The broken wall: the destruction of Troy as one of the consequences of Zeus insemination. Also a suggestion
that the virgins hymen was now ruptured.
Did she put on his knowledge with his power: This can be compared with The Gift of Harun Al Rashid ,
I. 169: I must buy knowledge with my piece; and Ribh considers Christian Love insufficient, I. 23: What
can she know until He bid her know! Mankinds incompetence at comprehending historical revelation is a
common theme in Yeatss work: I see Phantoms also ends with a mans difficulty in constructing The half
read wisdom of daemonic images.
Summary
Leda and the Swan, can be read in many ways: political, sexual, mythical, historical, anunciatory, and so on.
It is certainly about rape. But that is hardly a critical discovery.
Why Yeats should have decided to treat the subject poetically is a question that might lead to a better understanding
of the poem. Thus, to understand fully the poem, a close reading of the text must be combined with certain
intertextual strategies.
Leda and the Swan is a sonnet, one of the most sophisticated forms of literature known. The poem is written
in the traditional form of a sonnet, yet the subject matter is unusual given the context of its time and location.
The sonnet form, traditionally is used to express profound emotions, such as romantic or Platonic love. This
paradox is representative of the many oppositional elements which abound in the text and which help form the
basis for understanding the oppositions which influence bot h Yeats and the poem.
The rhyme scheme is traditional (ABAB CDCD EFG EFG) yet interestingly imperfect in that four of the
rhymes are not perfect: push and rush, up and drop . This again is another oppositional element, typical
of Yeats, and could be seen to symbolize the opposition between Yeats, the last Romantic, and Yeats, the
Modernist. A transition exists in the poems language, from an aggressive intensity to a vague passive distance.
The language in the beginning of the poem sets the tone of an aggressive sense of urgency. Priscilla Washburn
Shaw makes an excellent point when she states, The action interrupts upon the scene at the beginning with a
sudden blow, and again, in the third stanza, with a shudder in the loins. It may seem inaccurate to say that a
poem begins by an interruption when nothing precedes, but the effect of the opening is just that. The effect of
this device is that it draws the spectator/narrator, and subsequently the reader, into the action and into the
poem. The action continues for the first three lines of the first quatrain. Yeats doesnt bother with a full syntax
until the final line of the quatrain, at which point, the urgency relaxes. The language in the first full quatrain is
representative of the opposition inherent in the poem; in this case, between intensity and distance.
The imagery, and wording in general, in Leda are also representative, in an initial reading, of oppositional
elements within the text. A first reading shows Leda described in concrete terms and the swan in abstract
terms. Leda is the staggering girl and the poem refers to Her thighs, her nape, her helpless breast, and
her loosening thighs. The swan is never actually called Zeus or even the Swan (in fact, Agamemnon is the
only name mentioned in the body of the poem). The swan is described as great wings, dark webs, that
white rush, blood, indifferent beak, and feathered glory.
A second reading of the poem, however, shows that ambiguities do exist. The concrete and abstract merge.
Generalized terms are used for Leda ( terrified vague fingers ) and concrete terms for the swan (wings, bill,
57 W.B. Yeats
beak). The purpose of this ambiguity could be, as Nancy Hargrove explains, to stress that the god is, after all,
a real, physical swan engaged in a physical act . Regardless, this ambiguity is,
again, representative of the conflict within the poem. Verbs play a major role in understanding Leda and the
Swan. They are present tense through the octave and the first part of the sestet ( holds, push, feel,
engenders ). They then shift to past tense in the last part of the sestet ( caught,
mastered, Did ). The verbs in the present tense imply an intense immediacy while those in the past tense
distance the reader (and perhaps the aggressor as well) from what has just occurred. Additionally, as Nancy
Hargrove points out, there is a juxtaposition between active and passive verbs so that the active verb forms
( holds, engenders ) belong to the swan while passive verb forms ( caressed,
caught, mastered ) belong to Leda. The verb forms, then, play an active role in contributing to a close
textual reading. Yeats continuously makes use of various devices to further heighten ambiguous, oppositional,
and dramatic elements within his poetry. In his minimal use of the possessive adjective, and the consequently
greater use of somewhat unusual alternative for ms, Yeats achieves effects which are curiously suspended
between the concrete and the general , thus highlighting the ambiguities in the text. Further still, the linguistic
suggestiveness of the absence of any qualifiers for body is considerable . It is considerable in that it makes
us even more aware of the ambiguities (whose body?). It linguistically suggests the lack of an identity; it is
essentially a dehumanizing element.
While the subject matter of the poem is violent and disturbing, the structure of Leda conveys feelings of
safety and beauty. The intensity of the rape is controlled by the narrow confines of the sonnet, an aesthetically
pleasing and heavily structured art form. The sonnet form achieves for Leda a violence and historical sweep
held in one of the most tightly controlled of poetic forms. The violence of the rape is then controlled within the
constraints of the sonnet. Additionally, the sonnet itself is brief, thus ensuring the rape will be brief as well.
While the rape is controlled through the structure of the poem, the organization of the poem reflects in an
orderly manner the progress of the rape. The first quatrain presents the assault. The second quatrain reflects
Ledas emotions. The first half of the sestet presents the ejaculation scene. The cut line represents a dramatic
moment in time: a death-like silence. The final part of the sestet shows the act receding into memory while
posing the question of meaning.
Yeats makes use of several technical devices to convey the intensity of what is being portrayed in the poem.
Among these devices are alliteration ( brute blood ), iambic pentameter, and the meter in general. Bernard
Levine notes that no regular metrical pattern exists but there is a pervading rhythmic base in which verbal
stress displaces the accent-guided line. The meter imitates the gasping and throbbing pulsations of the rape by
its irregularity, its sudden sharp caesuras, its sentences spilling over from line to line, its dramatic broken lines
in the sestet, its piling of stressed syllables.
The ambiguities in Leda imply a confrontation both real and imagined, physical and intellectual. There is an
ambiguity surrounding the staggering girl in line three. Staggering as intransitive participle means that the
girl is literally physically staggering, but the transitive verb form shows that she staggers the mind (of the
swan), so to speak. One notices another ambiguity in the connotation of the word still in line one. The bird
is described as having just dropped down on Leda, yet the word still implies a timeless continuity.
The text, then, presents the rape scene, painting a vivid and terrifying picture of its aggressive violence and its
subsequent transition to passivity. The text also shows a pattern of oppositions and ambiguities which are
manifestations of a series of conflicts between the material world and the spiritual world: the physical and the
intellectual. The apparent opposition between abstract and concrete is representative of that between human
and divine. Shaw views it in a more personal light: as the opposition between self and world.
The oppositions inherent within the text, and the subsequent series of conflicts which they represent, are
important in that they are manifestations of and parallels to oppositional conflicts occurring in Yeatss own life.
Poetry 58
The violent textual rape is the result of his inability to reconcile these personal conflicts and the poem, then, is
an example of Yeats displacing his frustration, and doing so in a positive and safe manner. If this assertion is
indeed accurate, Leda and the Swan would be consistent with Yeatss later poems. Edmund Wilson, the
famous American critic writes, The development of Yeatss later style seems to coincide with a disillusionment .
Similarly, Cleanth Brooks argues that Yeats proposed to substitute a concrete, meaningful system, substituting
symbol as a way of combating harsh, technical reality. Leda is consistent with the assertions.
A Dialogue of Self and Soul
A Dialogue of Self and Soul belongs to the volume The Winding Stair and Other Poems which
was published in 1933. The volume belongs to the later phase of Yeatss career. Yeats had matured both
physically and mentally by this time. Even though he was long past his sexual prime, he felt
rejuvenated. The anxiety over aging which had pursued him since his earliest days [as is reflected in
his early poems such as When you are Old (The Rose 1893)] was gradually lessening. He seems
to have come to terms with the natural cycle of events. Moreover, his philosophy had matured as is
reflected in A Vision (1925) which went through two more editions by 1933. Yeats was familiar with
the Greek intellectual tradition but became serious only after 1900. He had also read Nietzsche.
However, in his later poetry he revises and redefines these traditions. The Romantic strain is never
too far off even in the mature poetry. The world of imagination remains triumphant over that of
spiritual speculations.
The poem A Dialogue of Self and Soul , according to Robert Snukal, is based upon the choice
between a noumenal and a phenomenal world, between a retreat into pure mind or the repeated fall
into matter. The poet persona chooses the world of here and now as is affirmed by the gradual
ascendancy that is given to the Self, which in the second half of the poem becomes the sole speaker.
Although the poem is entitled a Dialogue, by the second half the Selfs domination over the Soul is
so complete that it ceases to be a dialogue. Yeats follows the Medieval tradition of dialogue between
the body and the soul but makes certain changes: instead of Body we have Self. George Russell noted
in his book Song and Its Fountain (1932) that [. . .] [Yeatss] imagination was dominated by his
own myth of a duality of self. This motif of a projected image of the self has its foundations in the
Romantic tradition (painting and poetry) and overlaps with the idea of the doppelganger and alter
ego so prevalent in nineteenth-century fiction such as Stevensons The Strange Case of Dr. Jekyll
and Mr. Hyde (1886), with slight variations in Bram Stokers Dracula (1897), or, Oscar Wildes The
Picture of Dorian Gray (1891) which fictionalizes the dichotomy.
A Dialogue relies on such antinomies or masks as it is explained in the simultaneous contraction
and expansion of the two cones, which Yeats calls the gyre . By this time he had internalized his
philosophy that he could write an entire poem based on its central symbol of the gyre. In A Vision
he explains the antithetical movement of the gyre wherein when the outer (objective) cone expands,
the inner (subjective) contracts and at their extreme positions, a reversal of movements takes place.
Yeats aligns the symmetry of this structure with that of the different phases of moon. He divides the
soul into what he terms Four Faculties, two pairs of contraries: termed Will and Mask, Creative mind
and the Body of Fate. This division derives from Blakes dictum: Without Contraries is no progression.
Attraction and Repulsion, Reason and Energy, Love and Hate, are necessary to Human existence. His
most sustained exposition of his theory of the anti-self and Mask is in the long essay Per Amica
Silentia Lunae published in 1917 wherein art/poetry is seen as extending the self. A Dialogue is
structured as a gyre wherein Self and Soul portray antithetical cones. The poem begins with the Soul
at its highest intensity therefore completely dominating the Self.
This poem takes up the theme of the conflicting desires of the poets Self. It uses the imagery of the
tower and the winding stairs among other things. The winding stairs in itself replicates the movement
59 W.B. Yeats
of the gyre. Part I of the poem is dialectical, alternating between the Soul and the Self. The first
stanza is given over to the Soul which is in ascendance. Yeats has the lunar cycle in mind (ll. 7). He
incorporates the Christian tradition of Dark Night of the Soul in his own system of philosophy as
espoused in A Vision. Dark Night of Soul or The Ascent of Mount Carmel or Spiritual Canticle
deals with the notion of mysticism. According to this tradition, an individual soul must first reach an
understanding that it is arid without its Maker, therefore in need of fulfillment and illumination.
Winding. Stair:
Yeats had bought the ancient Norman tower, which late in life, stood for, among other things, Irish history,
aristocracy, and traditon. Its vertical stairs became a symbol for the idea of the whirling gyre. Because of its
journey in time, the tower helped Yeats summon sould of the dead.
The hidden pole: A reference to the pole-star
Then begins its descent to know itself, marked by a set of attempts on individual self to rid itself
of various kinds of temptations and dependencies. Having progressed into this period of increased
detachment the soul reaches darkness as it has purged itself of desire and appetite. Now, having gone
through purgation, the soul is in a state which is open to illumination.
That quarter where all thought is done: according to A Vision, the last quarter of the lunar month (Phases
22-28) is marked by an Abstraction that has for its object or result the elimination of intellect.
Satos ancien blade: Yeats received a gift from a japanese admirer of his poetry. The sword was wrapped in
an emroidered silk. The sword was oned by the family of the person for 550 years. It had been forged 550
years ago. Thus the sword syblolized ancient wisdom, and the wrpped silk symbolized anima mundi
Yeats revises this Christian mystical tradition slightly. In the third section of A Vision, which deals with
life after death, the soul goes through reliving its earthly life, gradually reaching a blessed state, after
many incarnations. This notion of reincarnation goes back to Plato. Another addition Yeats makes to this
section is his concept of Anima Mundi, according to which it is possible for the souls of the dead
to communicate, through Anima Mundi, with writers and artists.
The second stanza is given over to the Self. Satos sword which is still razor-keen, [. . .] like a
looking-glass / Unspotted by the centuries and the wooden scabbard which is tattered [. . .] faded
adorn symbolize changelessness of heart. (ll. 3-4, 8). The embroidery which is torn from a court
ladys dress symbolizes aristocracy. Aristocratic values are sympathetic to art and culture. The winding
and binding (of the wooden scabbard) refer back to the System, viz. the winding and unwinding of
the Great Memory (Anima Mundi) or the memory of a race. Great Memory works through the
individual artists. In dying a poet contributes to the wealth of the racial memory and in using it in the
life-time he unwinds it. Gradually the Soul is shown as loosening its hold on the argument. The Souls
rejoinder starts with a rumination over imagination before moving on to the noumenal. Ancestral night
that is mentioned in Stanza 3 has its bearing in the Christian mythology. Yeats distinguishes night and
day in his philosophical system. Night is suggestive of one God associated with denial of self and
Christs sacrifice. It is also associated with Socrates. Here the soul turns towards spirit seeking
knowledge. These are some of the associations Yeats makes with the Dark Night of the Soul. Day
holds pagan associations, linked as it is to Homer and many Gods. It is a Nietzschean idea backing
the affirmation of self. Here the soul turns away from the spirit and is life affirming. Even here the
subject of ageing comes up but that is more in the context of imagination. The Christian spiritual
tradition may be able to deliver from the cycle of death and birth, but only if the attention is removed
from all earthly things.
The Self in Stanza 4 picks up where it left off in the second stanza. The sword mentioned earlier
was forged by Montashigi in fifteenth-century. Again the dialectic between night and day is set up.
Poetry 60
The sword with its embroidery of flowers is seen as emblematic of day or the pagan tradition as
opposed to the tower which signifies the night or the affirmation of soul. The crime talked of in
ll.8 is the same one of participating in the natural cycle of birth and death. The Self is gaining in
intensity by showing willingness to go through the cyclicity of nature.
The crime of death and birth: The familiar theme in Yeatss poetry. Life and death is what awaits a being
caught in the cycle of nature.
Montashigi: according to Jeffares, a sword maker who lived in Osafune in the early fifteenth century.
Hearts purple: If I say white or purple in an ordinary line of poetry, they evoke emotions so exclusively
that I cannot say why they move me; but if I bring them into the same sentence with such obvious intellectual
symbols as a cross or a crown of thorns, I think of purity or sovereignty .
I set / for emblems: the conscious process of emblem creation, symbol making, is an important theme in
Yeatss later work.
The basin of the mind:
The basin full to the brim and overflowing is an image, which suggests, for Yeats, plentitude. He was fascinated
by the Irish myth of a river overflowing with beer. Horn of plenty is another such image suggestive of plentitude.
Deaf and dumb and blind:
The end of all consciousness.
Is from the Ought, or Knower from the Known: in the technical terms of A Vision, these four entities are,
respectively, Will, Mask, Creative Mind, and Body of Fate that is, desire and its object, and intelligence and
its object. The soul is speaking of a condition when the human faculties will no longer be distinct from one
another, a condition outside the reincarnative cycle.
Only the dead can be forgiven: the Self contradicts this at II 27.
The Soul talks of the spiritual fullness in the last stanza of Part I. Is and Ought ; Knower and
the Known are antinomies. Is corresponds to the will, ought to mask ; knower to creative
mind and known rational mind. In both the sets one state aspires for its opposite. But the intellect
cannot make the distinctions when imagination is given full play. The confusion sets in as the intellect
becomes completely non-functional. (ll. 4-7). The Soul is speaking of a condition where the human
faculties are no longer functional. By the end of Part I the Souls argument is considerably weakened
as compared with its earlier certitude.
Part II is dominated by the Self, thereby expressing Yeatss belief in the life of the body. The notion
of reincarnation is used here. According to Robert Snukal, one of the ways in which the myth was
couched was in terms of sight; that is, to be aware of this world is to be blind to heaven. It is not
much farther from the Christian mystical tradition wherein the souls progress is discussed through
deprivation and purgation. In order to ascend to Heaven, the soul must leave all the earthly temptations
behind. The drop mentioned in ll.1 is that of oblivion which a living man is supposed to have drunk.
In the first two stanzas of Part II the poet persona is trying to relive his life imaginatively from
boyhood to manhood. He has no regrets as he states in Stanza 3, I am content to live it all again .
(ll.1). The body and the decrepitude which sets in the form of old age are no excuse for opting out
of the self and glorifying soul. The strength of the self that it derives from its apparent weakness is
owing to the power of imagination. As against the soul the body suffers decrepitude but because it
summons imagination to its optimum use, it can triumph over the soul. No matter how mistaken he
is and how often he is led into the ditch the poet persona would opt for life.
My tongues a stone: the soul falls silent because it has verged on sacred mysteries beyond articulation in
human speech. Yeats himself sometimes felt the same incapacity: I tried to describe some vision to Lady
61 W.B. Yeats
Gregory, and to my great surprise could not. I felt a difficulty in articulation and became confused.
Ditches: see II 19.
Ignominy of boyhood: compare a Prayer for my Son . It seems that between parts I and II, we have moved
from the last quarter of the Great Wheel of reincarnations the quarter of God to the first quarter of the
lunar month (phases 2-8) the quarter of nature, in which a man slowly extricates himself from a state of
complete absorption in the physical world. The Self seems to be speaking partly about the growth of a man in
the course of one lifetime, partly about the growth of a mans spirit through many incarnations phase 2 is
called the Child.
The unfinished manbrought face to face with his own clumsiness: compare this rabid self-sketch with
Yeatss self descriptions: Perplexed by my own shapelessness, my lack of self possession on passing a
tobacconists I saw a lump of meerschaum not yet made into a pipe. She [Maud] was complete; I was not .
Disfigured shape / The mirror of malicious eyes / casts upon his eyes: I have found that if many people
accuse one of vanity, of affection, of ignorance, an ignoble image is created from which the soul frees itself
with difficulty, an undiscerned self-loathing; if men speak much ill of you it makes at moments a part of the
image of yourself that is your only support against the world and that you see yourself too with hostile
eyes .
Blind mans ditch: The legendary blind Irish poet, Raftery is said to have written a poem celebrating the
beauty of a peasnt girl which drove some young men crazy. They set out to see and verify for themselves
whether she was indeed the beauty Rafters song made her out to be. Unable to find their way at night, they
were drowned in a bog of Cloone. Yeats celebrates this as a triumph of imagination in his poem The Tower .
Wintry blast: a proud woman: for example, Maud Gonne.
Forgive myself the lot! : according to the soul, purgation can be achieved only in death, but the Self, as it moves
towards its zenith, is willing to take responsibility for its own salvation.
So great a sweetness flows: the same phrase appears in Friends , l.27.
We must laugh: There is in the creative joy an acceptance of what life brings which arouses within us,
through some sympathy perhaps with all other men, an energy so noble, so powerful, that we laugh aloud and
mock in the terror or the sweetness of our exaltation, at death and oblivion.
We are blest by everything, / Everything we look upon is blest: the whole volume is full of blessings
compare the first two lines of Blood and the Moon; Coole and Ballylee, 1931, II. 44-45: whatever most can
bless / The mind of man; and Vacillation IV 10: I was blessed and could bless. Yeats wrote to Ethel Mannin
that our traditions only permit us to bless, for the arts are an extension of the beatitudes . Once again
Yeatss sexual anxieties come to the fore. Frog-spawn and the fecundity of the ditch are metaphors
for the seminal fluid. In the blind man , one can pick up a reference to Raftery ( The Tower ) who
was blind but created a beautiful wench. (Stnz. 3 ll. 3-4). In The Tower the poet says that the
people jostled among themselves to catch a glimpse of this girl but were led astray. One of them even
drowned. The point Yeatss persona is making in both these poems is that the life of imagination is
far richer than any philosophical or mystical speculation. The proud woman in the last line of Stanza
3 could be either Helen or Maud Gonne. By now Mauds charm has worn off for Yeats and he sees
his early wooing of her as a folly , especially as this woman is not a kindred of his soul . In the
last stanza there is a sense of peace and tranquility. Despite the (subjective) Self having the last word
against the (objective) Soul, nothing is resolved or diffused; all the contradictions are held in balance.
Yeatss cyclical theory of change contains some elements of Nietzsches theory of the eternal
recurrence, as is espoused in the declaration of the Self figure in the concluding stanzas of the poem.
The noumenal and the phenomenal are held in check at the end of the poem. On the one hand the
poet persona will not shirk from the worldly responsibility. On the other hand he sees this in
accordance with Gods blessing.
Poetry 62
The antinomies in the poem are held in a tenuous unity. At about the age of twenty-four Yeats
became obsessed with the sentence Hammer your thoughts into unity. Unity of being came to be
a central aim of his activities thereafter and is most nearly approached in The Tower and the
subsequent poems. As he approached old age he came to accept that his optimism for political unity
of Ireland was misplaced but he retained his belief in the source of such a unity in the Anima Mundi,
the reservoir of archetypes of images or myths of the central experiences of the tribe.
VI. Short Answer type Questions
Try to answer the following questions in about 200 words each::
The Lake Isle of Innisfree
1. Identify the romantic elements in the first stanza of the poem.
2. Compare the last stanza with the last lines of Wordsworths poem The Daffodils .
Easter 1916
1. What is Yeatss attitude to Irish nationalist politics as delineated in the poem?
2. What is Yeatss response to the death of the rebels?
3. Discuss the significance of the title Easter 1916 ?
Leda and the Swan
1. The phrase Ledaean body occurs in the poem Among School Children . How, if at all, does the
treatment of the myth differ in Leda and the Swan ?
2. Do you think the depiction of the Zeus-Leda encounter sheds any light on Yeatss attitude to women?
Explain.
The Second Coming
1. How does the rough beast differ from Christ in the poem The Second Coming ?
2. Does the poem shed any light on the issue of Yeatss attitude to fascism?
3. Do you think that the knowledge of Yeats A Vision helps in a better understanding of The Second
Coming ?
Among School Children
1. How does Yeatss perceive his relationship with Maud Gonne at the time of the writing of the poem?
2. Discuss the poem from the perspective of Yeatss public role as a senator.
Sailing to Byzantium
1. What country is Yeats referring to in line 1? What is that country like?.
2. List the imageries in the first verse paragraph.
3. The second paragraph contains an argument. Paraphrase the argument.
5. Think about the image a tattered coat upon a stick . Write a short paragraph on it.
6. In what sense has the speaker sailed the seas and arrived in Byzantium?
7. What does Byzantium stand for?
8. Explain the phrase Monuments of unageing intellect ?
9. What is Yeatss attitude to old age as depicted in the poem?
A Dialogue of Self and Soul
1. What is the symbolic significance of the embroidered silk in the poem?
63 W.B. Yeats
2. How does the poet explain the ascent to heaven as the inability of the intellect to know Is from the
Ought or Knower from the Known ?
VII. Long Answer type questions
1. Yeats believed that whatever of philosophy has been made poetry alone is permanent. Is this true of
Yeatss own poetry? Discuss.
2. Yeats said: whatever the passions of men have gathered about, becomes a symbol in the Great Memory.
In the light of this statement, write an essay on Yeatss use of symbols with reference to the poems
prescribed.
3. W. B. Yeats claimed, my glory was I had such friends. Critically examine the statement in the light of
the poems you have read.
4. A Dialogue of Self and Soul dramatises the tension which is central to Yeatss poetry. Do you agree?
Discuss.
5. Easter 1916 celebrates at once Irelands new martyrs, and its transformation in the poets conception
of heroism. Critically examine the poem in the light of the statement.
6. The greatest love poet in the English language since the seventeenth century. Do you agree with such
an assessment of W.B. Yeats? Discuss with reference to the poems you have read.
7. In responding to the conflicting claims of love, nationalism, art and spiritual quest, Yeatss poetry does
not limit itself to a narrow and exclusive vision of life. Critically examine any two poems of Yeats in the
light of this statement.
8. In building his Dialogue of Self and Soul, Yeats in fact is speaking of the conflicting claims of art and
asceticism. Do you agree? Discuss.
9. W.B. Yeats claimed my glory was I had such friends. Critically examine any two of his poems as
unforgettable .
10. In a fallen world we are tortured by our longing for perfection, but the conditions of mortality time,
change, and death render our ideals for ever inaccessible. Critically examine two poems of Yeats in
the light of this comment.
VIII. Suggested Readings
Several kinds of approach to the poetry of Yeats are possible. In his life time critics and reviewers approached
his poetry by paying close attention to his poetic craft and the form of his poetry. The exoticism arising out of
the strangeness of celtic folklore and myths and legends, the wellsprings of his early works was also a favourite
subject. The lyrical, dreamlike quality of his poetry, its emotional content were commented on. Many reviewers
tried to trace his development as a poet. When his works were studied in universities, many academic critics
such as Edmund Wilson, F.R. Leavis, Cleanth Brooks, paid attention to the craft, the editorial changes he made,
and his allegiance to the great tradition of English poetry. All the while, of course, critics tried to see the
interconnection between his system and poetry. Gradually, his works were seen as belonging to another source,
the Irish context. In the context of Anglo-American modernism, the modernist traits he shared with Pound and
Eliot were seen to be in conflict with his romanticism. Henn, Ellman, and Jeffares were the preeminent Yeats
critics. In the 1950s critics like Graham Hough and Frank Kermode tried to establish connection between the
Symbol and the Image, romanticism and modernism. Yeats too was discussed in this general context. From the
1970s, Yeats criticism tried to adopt political approaches such as those of feminism and nationalism, and
postcolonialism etc.
The following works are a selection from all these changing trnds and movements in Yeats criticism over seven
decades.
Poetry 64
A. Norman Jeffares W.B Yeats: A New Edition Macmillan 1984
.. New Commentary on the Poems of W. B Yeats Macmillan 1984
.. ,ed. W.B.Yeats: the Critical Heritage. London: Routledge and Kegam Paul , 1977
Adams, John F. Leda and the Swan : The Aesthetics of Rape. Bucknell Review 12.3 (1964):
47-58.
Adams, Joseph. Yeats and the Masks of Syntax. New York: Columbia UP, 1984.
Archibald, Douglas. Yeats. Syracuse: Syracuse UP, 1983.
Arden, W.H In Memory of W.B. Yeats . The poem
Auden, W.H. The Public v. the Late Mr. William Butler Yeats article Partisan Review
Spring 1939, reprinted in Casebook, ed.Elizabeth Cullingford, Macmillan. 1984
Bloom, Harold Yeats, Macmillan. NY, London. 1970
Balakian, Anna. The Symbolist Movement: A Critical Appraisal. New York: New York UP,
1977.
Bhargava, Ashok. The Poetry of W.B. Yeats. Atlantic Highlands, N.J.: Humanities P, 1980. Bloom,
Harold. Yeats. New York: Oxford UP, 1970.
Brennan, Matthew. Yeatss Revisions of Leda and the Swan . Notes on Contemporary Literature
13.3 (1983): 4-7.
Bloom, Harold. Ed. William Butler Yeats. New York: Chelsea House, 1986.
Brooks, Cleanth. Yeats: The Poet as Myth-Maker. The Permanence of Yeats. Ed. James Hall
and Martin Steinmann. New York: MacMillan, 1950. 67-94.
Burke, Kenneth. On Motivation in Yeats. The Permanence of Yeats. Ed. James Hall and Martin
Steinmann. New York:MacMillan, 1950. 249-63.
C.K. Stead The New Poetic Hutchinson 1964
.. Yeats, Eliot, and Pound and the Modernist Movement Macmillan 1986
Cullingford, Elizabeth. Gender and History in Yeatss Love Poetry. Cambridge:
Cambridge UP, 1993
Ellman, Richard. Yeats: The Man and the Masks. New York: Norton, 1948.
. The Identity of Yeats. New York: Oxford UP, 1954.
Eliot,T.S W.B. Yeats 1939
. . A Foreign Mind 1919 (A review of WSC)
Frank Kermode The Romantic Image Routledge 1957Fite, David.
Harold Bloom: The Rhetoric of Romantic Vision/
Amherst: U of Mass P, 1985.
Fletcher, Ian. Leda and the Swan as Iconic Poem. Yeats Annual
No. 1. Ed. Richard J. Finneran. Atlantic Highlands, N.J.:
Humanities P, 1982. 82-113.
Hall, James Hall and Martin Steinmann. Eds. The Permanence of Yeats. New
York:
MacMillan, 1950.
Hassett, Joseph M. Yeats and the Poetics of Hate. New York: St.
Martins, 1986.
65 W.B. Yeats
Hargrove, Nancy D. Esthetic Distance in Yeatss Leda and the
Swan . The Arizona Quarterly 39 (1983): 235-45.
Harris, Daniel A Yeats Coole Park and Ballylee. Baltimore, Md., 1974.
Henn, T. R. The Lonely Tower (London, 1949; rev. edn, 1965), pp. 1-6, 7-13.
Henn, T.R. The Lonely Tower. London: Methuen, 1966.
Jeffares, Norman. W.B. Yeats: Selected Poems, London: Macmillan, 1997.
Johnsen, William. Textual/Sexual Politics in Yeatss Leda and the Swan . Orr 80-89.
Kenner, Hugh Extract from the essay, The Sacred Book of the Arts , Sewanee Review,
LXIV, 4 (1956); reproduced in Kenners Gnomon (New York, 1958), pp. 9-22.
Lynch, David. Yeats: The Poetics of Self. Chicago: U of Chicago P, 1979.
Levine, Bernard. The Dissolving Image: The Spiritual-Esthetic Development of W.B. Yeats.
Detroit: Wayne State UP, 1970.
Macrae, Alasdair D. F. W. B. Yeats: A Literary Life. London: Macmillan,
1995.
Malins, Edward. A Preface to Yeats. London: Longman Group, 1974.
Macrac, Alastair D.F. W.B. Yeats: A Literary Life. London: Macmillan, 1995
Oppel, Francis Nesbitt. Mask and Tragedy. Charlottesville: UP of Virginia, 1987.
O Donnell, William H. The Poetry of William Butler Yeats. New York: Ungar, 1986.
Olney, James. Sex and the Dead: Daimones of Yeats and Jung. Critical Essays on W.B. Yeats.
Ed. Richard J. Finneran.Boston: G.K. Hall, 1986. 207-23.
. The Rhizome and the Flower: The Perennial Philosophy- Yeats and Jung.
Berkeley: U of California P, 1980.
Orr, Leonard, ed. Yeats and Postmodernism. Syracuse: Syracuse UP, 1991.
Orwell, George. Review article on V. K. Narayana Menons The Development of William Butler
Yeats, in Horizon, VII, 37 (1943); reproduced in Sonia Orwell and Ian Angus
(eds), The Collected Essays, Journalism and letters of George Orwell (London,
1968, vol. 2, pp.271-5.
Richard Ellman Yeats: The Man and the Masks Faber 1949
. The Identity of Yeats Faber 1954
. Eminent Domain London: Oxford University Press 1965
Spivak, Gayatri Chakravorty. Finding Feminist Readings: Dante-
Yeats. American Criticism in the Poststructuralist Age. Ed.
Snukal, Robert. High Talk: The Philosophical Poetry of W. B. Yeats. Cambridge: Cambridge
UP, 1973.
Stead, C.K. Pound, Yeats, Eliot and the Modernist Movement. London: Macmillan, 1986.
Thurley, Geoffrey. The Turbulent Dream: Passion and Politics in the Poetry of W.B. Yeats. St.
Lucia: U of Queensland P, 1983.
Wilson, Edmund. W.B. Yeats. The Permanence of Yeats. Ed. James
Hall and Martin Steinmann. New York: MacMillan, 1950. 15-41.
Poetry 66
Seiden, Morton Irving. William Butler Yeats: The Poet as a Mythmaker. Michigan:
Michigan State UP, 1962.
Webster, Brenda S. Yeats: A Psychoanalytic Study. Stanford:
Stanford UP, 1973.
F.R. Leavis New Bearings in English Poetry 1932 rpt 1982 Pelican
T.R Henn The Lonely Tower 1989 revised 1965 Methuen
Whitaker, Thomas R. Extract from ch. VIII, The Soiritualised Soil , in Swan and
Shadow (Chapel Hill, N.C.,1964), pp. 171-87.
1
Contents



Chapters Page No.
I. W. H. Auden and his Age
II. W. H. Auden: Themes and Works
III. Literary Tradition: W. H. Auden The Trend-Setter
IV. Critical Analysis of the Prescribed Poems:
1. Petition
2. Musee Des Beaux Arts
3. O what is that Sound
4. September 1, 1939
5. In Memory of W. B. Yeats
6. The Shield of Achilles
7. In Praise of Limestone
V. W. H. Auden: A modern poet
VI. W. H. Audens Technique
VII. W. H. Auden: The Theme of individuality
VIII. W. H. Auden: The Concept of Love
Chapter-Wise References
List of General Essay-Type and Short Questions
Suggestions for further reading
















2
Chapter-I

W. H. AUDEN AND HIS AGE

W. H. Auden: Life and Career

Wystan Hugh Auden is recognised as the most representative poet of his times on the
British Literary scene. Rightly does R.G.Cox remark, Here was unquestionably a new talent, the
voice of an individual sensibility alive in his own times capable of vigorous expression.
1
Auden
was born on 21
st
February, 1907 in York. Both his parents were in medical profession. Soon after
his birth, Auden family shifted to Birmingham in 1908 where his father became Medical Officer
and Professor of Public Health in the University. The atmosphere at his home was quite scientific.
There were plenty of books on science which unfolded the intentions of Auden family regarding his
career that he should adopt the career of a mining engineer. He was admitted to St. Edmunds
School in 1915. Here he came across Christopher Isherwood who was three years senior to him.
After this he did his schooling in Norfolk at Greshams School, Holt from 1920-25.

Auden stayed at Oxford from 1925-28 for further studies. He joined Christ Church under
the guidance of his tutor Nevil Coghill of Exeter College. Here he became keenly interested in
English poetry both old and modern, particularly in the most exciting modern poems of T.S. Eliot.
Three years stay at Oxford became monumental as it was at Oxford that oft quoted Auden Group
was formed. Here his interest in writing poetry was developed to a great extent. He edited Oxford
Poetry in collaboration with Charles Plumb in 1926 and again in 1927 with C.Day Lewis. He took a
good deal of interest in the study of psychology and Psycho-analysis. He defined poet as a person
who observed the ills of society as a detached clinical analyst diagnosing the ills and giving them
psychological treatment in the form of poetry. He dedicated his first volume of poetry to Isherwood.
This volume was printed by Stephen Spender on a hand-press in 1928 at Oxford.

Audens parents wanted to send him abroad for a year and he made a choice in favour of
Germany for this purpose and went there in 1928 and spent a year in Berlin. Here he came across a
number of new experiences-Rakess poetry, the theatre of Bretch, German cabaret songs, and John
Layards ideas based on Freud, Groddeck and especially on HomerLane. During this visit
Isherwood joined Auden in March 1929.

After this he came back home and like numerous middle-class writers of his time he
became a school master in Scotland and then at a place close to Malvern. He was thoroughly
interested in his teaching profession and simultaneously he published his early work which sent a
wave of thrill among the reading public of the thirties. Then came a series of his publications-Paid
on Both sides, Poems 1930, The Orators, 1932 and The Dance of Death in 1933, collaborated with
Isherwood on the play the Dog Beneath The Skin for the first season of the Group Theatre at West
minster Theatre in London. In 1935 Auden married a girl called Erika Mann. After a year in 1936,
he visited Iceland in the company of Louis MacNeice a master-poet at Birmingham school. Here he
produced another of his creative works Letters from Iceland, 1937; in collaboration with Louis
MacNeice.

Auden produced his best known play written with Isherwood The ascent of F6 and a new
published volume of poems Look Stranger, which was dedicated to Erika Mann. It is learnt that
Auden married Erika Mann who was the daughter of a prominent German novelist, Thomas Mann
to provide her with a passport for England. Then in January-March 1937 he visited war-torn Spain
2

and published his famous poem Spain. By this time Auden had become as eminently successful as
a poet that in November, 1937 prestigious magazine of poetry, New Verse brought out a special
3
number on him. This magazine distinguished him as the first English poet for many years who is a
poet all the way round.
2
Then he went to China along with Isherwood. They went there by way of
the United States and during this trip they decided to return and settle in America. In collaboration
Auden and Isherwood produced their most explicit play On the Frontier. In 1938 he edited The
Oxford Book of Light Verse. In fact, his visit to China, his decision to settle in America, his writing,
On the Frontier, and then his editing A Book of Light Verse in a single years time speaks volumes
for his versatile personality. Charles Madge, a college friend wrote about him:

But there waited for me in the summer morning
Auden fiercely. I read, shuddered and knew.

Thus, Audens contact with a number of leading writers and musicians, theatrical groups
and his frequent visits to foreign countries gave him versatility to earn for him a unique place
among the most successful literary men of the twentieth century.

While living in America Auden got his selected essays printed in The Dyers Hand in 1962
and lectures which he delivered at the University of Kent in Secondary Worlds in 1968. In the fields
of Music and Opera, Auden sought collaboration in composition of Hymn to St. Cecilia, with
Brittan and The Rakes Progress with Stravinsky. English version of Mozarts The Magic Flute,
Don Giovanni, Henzes opera, Elegy for Young Lovers, may be included among his variegated
literary works. To cap it all, Davison has remarked about his abundant literary out put that to list
Audens multifarious literary works is now a task for a bibliographer, and the breadth of his interest
might be suggested by random choice of a few people he has written about, edited, translated or
reviewed, Skelton, Pope, Rilke, Thurber, Neihbuhr, Freud, Kipling, Kierkegard, Kafka, Betjeman,
Baudelaire, Dante, D.H. Lawrence, Henry James, Cervantes, Somerset Maugham, Poe, Colette,
Virgil, Shakespeare, Cocteau, Lewis Carroll, Van Gogh, Dag Hammarskjld, Goethe, etc.

Auden had gone back to live in the United States of America after he was succeeded by
Robert Graves as Professor of poetry at Oxford University. He lived there until he was invited by
his own college, Christ Church to live on its campus but he could not live long as he died in Sept.
1973.

Auden and Ishwerwood had strong desire to settle in America and they had decided about
this during their China visit, in accordance with that both of them left England for settlement in
America on January 18, 1939. They acquired American citizenship in 1946. In America, Auden
remained actively and constantly involved in his creative literary and publication work. His
professional work included teaching in Schools and Universities and delivering public lectures. In
the meanwhile, he kept on visiting Europe now and then. He used to spend a part of each year on
the Italian island of Ischia from 1948 onwards. Then he bought a farm house in Kirchstetten, Lower
Austria in 1957 for spring and summer residence.

Auden was awarded a number of prizes and prestigious honours-kings Gold Medal,
Pulitzer Prize, Bollingen Prize, Feltrinelli Prize, Guggenheim Fellowship, National Book Award for
a number of excellent achievements in manifold fields. To add to this he was elected to the
American Academy and to a fellowship at Christ Church. In 1956, he was appointed Professor of
poetry at Oxford University. He remained in the office until 1961 as a distinguished Professor of
poetry.

In fact, Audens social awareness spurred him on to come to grips with the real socio-
politico-economic conditions of the times. His creative poetic output during the period bears
testimony to his profound concern about the contemporary situation. Franois Duchene rightly
suggests, Auden at his best has treated some of the major troubles of his times in ways that
4
measure up to daily lives.
3
Auden recognised the gravity of the contemporary crisis in its entirety
and made an attempt to project it by raising challenging contemporary issues in his poetry. His
analytical approach to the issues of the ailing society of the times and his efforts to reach definite
conclusions make him a prominent poet among the socially conscious poets of the period. Perhaps
for this reason, Robin Skelton considers him a leader, an innovator and a representative poet of his
time and generation.
4


W. H. Auden: Formative Influences

The character and literary temperament of W. H. Auden who established his hegemony by
proclaiming the urgency of collective action and need for active involvement in the immediate
cause, were moulded by a variety of influences-his parents, his home environment, his reading
habits intellectual, literary, emotional and socio-economic-political factors. Rightly does
M.Khrapchenko remark, The artists overall views, formed during a life time of experience in a
particular society and under particular historical circumstances give their qualitative distinction and
shape to his ideas and observations.
5
Christopher Ishwerwood pointed out that the three factors
responsible for moulding Audens character and personality were his Parentage, both his parents
being in Medical Profession, his home environment provided him with scientific training, scientific
interest and proper schooling and helped him to acquire scientific knowledge, outlook and
technique. His Anglican upbringing which developed his interest in music, his preoccupation with
rituals and his Scandinavian background coupled with emphasis on Icelandic sagas all these
influenced Audens world view to a great extent.

Influence of T. S. Eliot and others

Auden came under T. S. Eliots strong influence while he was a student at Oxford. He
considered Eliot worthy of serious consideration to enlighten his poetic journey. He carefully
perused Eliots poetry, his critical theories and then developed his ideas and beliefs. He used
allusions, Jargons and private Jokes following Eliots practice in this sphere. A German poet Rilke
was also a powerful influence on him.

Skeltons short laconic verse and the Anglo-Saxons were among other powerful influences
on him. Auden was a voracious reader and whatever he read, he assimilated and thus his reading
habits exerted an unconscious influence on his writing. He read A.E. Houseman, Walter de La Mare
Thomas Hardy, Edward Thomas and Robert Frost who imperceptibly influenced his personality.

Though in 1941, Auden himself described Dante, Langland and Pope as three major
influences on him yet he appreciated Dryden, Tennyson and Robert Bridges also. The influence of
Hopkins, Robinson, Emile Dickinson on Audens mind cannot be underestimated.

In 1929 Auden came under the influence of American Psychologist HomerLane whose
doctrines deeply influenced his mind. Audens early poems and The Orators abound in references to
HomerLanes theories of psychological causes to diseases. Auden was also influenced by John
Layard, HomerLanes follower, to a reasonable extent.

Impact of Freudian theories

The advent of Freudian psychology added a new dimension to the study of human
behaviour with its emphasis on the unconscious operations of the mind. Freud and his followers had
come out with new knowledge and understanding about sexual attitude and responses. For example,
they showed that repressed sex instincts lead to neurosis and physical ailments like cancer. Richard
Hoggart points out that Audens psychological interest has been consistent: he knows a good deal
about the subject and has read widely and carefully in it. That he sometimes used its jargon rather
5
glibly, and was on the whole a Freudian, does not detract from his seriousness. Freuds influence on
him was greater than that of any other psychologist, but Auden does not make sustained use of
Freuds theories. He thinks Freuds map of mind largely correct, and finds the cross-reference
between his own imaginative perceptions and the findings of the psychological scientist, stimulating
and fertile.
6


The influence of Lawrence and William Blake

Regarding Lawrences impact on the young men of the twenties and early thirties, W. H.
Auden remarked that as a thinker Lawrence did influence the young men of the period as for as
questioning the existing society was concerned but his influence was limited to that only. On the
other hand, as has been noticed by critics. Blakes influence is greater; he began to interest Auden
at the same time as Lawrence, and his appeal has increased over the yearsso much so that in New
year Letter Auden, naming the tribunal which shall judge him, puts Blake second only to Dante.
The influence of Blake on Auden is equivalent to that of Freud. Audens The Orators clearly
manifests Blakes contribution where his impact is reinforced in the marriage of Heaven and Hell
and The Proverbs of Hell. His attack on feelings of frustration and fear, the call of liberation and
vigour, thrust on emotions all speak volumes for Blakes influence. Auden perfectly endorses
Blakes concept of the will. Bernard Blackstone clearly defines the concept of will and points out
that Blake in his concept of will anticipates the findings of modern psychology. He says By will
here he means the faculty by which we try to change ourselves according to a pattern prescribed by
the reason, by moral codes and by religious organisations. This attempt must always end in disaster
(even if the victim does not always recognise it as disaster) for the reason has no faculties for
understanding the whole of personality. It is concerned with a very limited portion of the human
totality. Only the understanding, drawing its life from the senses, the instincts, the obscure physical
processes, as well as from the reason and the intuition, is fitted to deal with the whole. So (Will in
Blakes sense aggravates the split between intuition and reason, presents special problems to the
exceptional man, and helps to create the warped and lonely. On all these points Auden agreed with
Blake.
7


Influence of Karl Marx

In the existing state of urgency and unavoidable pressures in the British society two
solutions were discerniblea collective resistance to fascism and pacifism. The poets of the thirties
were driven to the left. They found Marxist view of society, art and culture, the most appropriate
framework for a proper understanding of the existing dilemmas. The left wing trend imparted a new
social significance to their poetic vision and sharpened their technique.

Their attitude towards Peace Pledge Union founded by Canon Dick, Peace Ballet
undertaken by League of Nations, Peace News Journal, Peace Marches and Peace Demonstrations
remained negative. Stretchers book The coming struggle for Power 1932, which underlined the
application of Marxist ideas to the history of Britain, strengthened the faith of these poets in the
inherent virtues of the working class and made them adopt a favourable attitude towards the Soviet
Union. Under the same inspiration, they could recognise, with greater clarity, the need for collective
resistance against fascism. Arthur Koestlers remarks are pertinent in this context .every period
has its own dominant religion and hope and Marxist socialism has become the hope of the early 20
th

Century
8
.

Strengthening communism in Russia sparked a revolutionary zeal and awakened the social
consciousness of the poets of the period to shoulder the responsibility of investigating into the
causes of dismal conditions and abrasive realities which engulfed the then British scenario. The
6
intellectuals were persuaded to the left and as economic depression and violence persisted further
to the left. Communism appeared to offer dramatic and radical solutions to dramatic and radical
defects.
9
Maxwell further suggests, In Kaleidoscopic decay, the communists represent the
alternative to fascism which both enshrined human values and is enduring enough to be politically
effective
10
.

For the left wing writers of the thirties the immediate inescapable reality was that capitalism
seemed to be collapsing, as evidenced by slump and massunemployment and general misery in the
western democracies, and the triumph of fascism seen in Marxist terms, as the ultimate, most
vicious form of capitalism in Italy and Germany. Soviet Russia claimed to offer the only hope for
humanity, and its claims were accepted unhesitatingly at their face values.
11
.

Marx as a political economist, a social theorist, a revolutionary zealot influenced him the
least. His Marxism is much more a conception of human nature than a political theory, diagnoses of
social illness, not a partisan programme for action. Auden set the fresh trend by synthesising
contemporary psychology and socialist thought mirroring forth a novel way of poetic expression for
the execution of his social commitment. Rightly does Replogle remark The period from about
1933-38 can be labelled Audens Marxist period, just as the earlier can be labelled Freudian.
12


Influence of Kierkegaard and Niebuhr

Auden came across Kierkegaards works during 1936-39 and his theories left a profound
impact on him. He learnt through his existentialist philosophy not only the philosophical reason for
accepting life but also the basis for its acceptance. According to Kierkegaard human life can be
divided into the two distinct parts-the human and the divine. As for as the human part is concerned
his views are similar to those of Marx and Engles. Justin Replogle remarks Put simply it is an
empirical philosophy insisting, contrary to empirical evidence, that God exists. That such a belief is
logically contradictory and absurd is precisely Kierkegaards point. Life is absurd, precisely
because, though God exists, men, confined to their empirical knowledge, cannot know Him, or even
demonstrate His existence. An unbridgeable gulf separates man from God. By nature limited to
temporal experience, three dimensional perception, empirical knowledge men can never leap across
to the timeless multi-dimensioned existence on the other side. And yet they are commanded to do so
in one sense, without moving an inch they can.
13



Richard Hoggart remarks, Auden has always drawn sustenance from a few selected
thinkers though the thinkers change from time to time. Since the Forties two of the most influential
have been the Danish existentialist theologian Soren Kierkegaard (1813-55) and the living
American theologian Reinhold Niebuhr. In Kierkegaard to take only one instance, he was
particularly interested to consider original anxiety, the basic insecurity of man which reflects his
fallen nature and his possible salvation. Much in Niebuhrs thought bears on Audens interest not in
the mystical, but in the moral dilemmas and social involvements of man living in time and space,
held in the fruitful grip of choice of freedom-with necessity
14
.

Carlo Izzos remarks that Only in the light of mind like Audens which, at the same time,
gives out brightness and is itself enlightened, can todays society see itself reflected with all the
flaws that may rupture it and find the way to redemption out of the blind alley in which it seems to
have lost itself
15
.

Influence of Christian theology

Audens later poetry reflects the influence of Christian theology. The influences of
Kierkegaards philosophy and Christian theology were almost simultaneous on him. He read
7
Kierkegaard in late 1937 or early 1938 and at the same time he started going to the Church. In 1939
he wrote that while a purely religious solution (for human hopes) may be unworkable.. the
search for it is, at least the result of a true perception of social evil and by 1940, he was using
Kierkegaards terminology in his criticism. In 1956 he wrote, I have come to realise that what is
true in what (Blake, Lawrence, Freud and Marx) say, is implicit in the Christian doctrine of the
nature of man (in that) each of them brought to some particular aspect of life that intensity of
attention which is characteristic of one-sided genius. Audens later work For the Time Being
mainly emphasises his religious concepts and beliefs. In Nones, 1951, he celebrated life and its
blessings. His later poems Harae Canonicae plead for forgiveness for all sinners and conclude
with a delightful hymn of celebration of life in Lauds. Auden ultimately finds peace and serenity
in Christian theology as is manifest in the words, with calm of mind all passions spent
16
.




Emotional impact

Regarding the emotional impact of the contemporary situation on the sensibility of the
poets, Virginia Woolf points out that in the 1930, young men studying in colleges could not go on
discussing aesthetic emotions and personal relations. They realised that the very tower of art and
amenities of life was founded upon injustice and tyranny and it was wrong for a small class to
possess what other people paid for, wrong to stand upon the gold that their fathers had made from
their bourgeois professions
17
. These poets accordingly felt emotionally disenchanted with the values
of their class and wanted to make a break with the liberal tradition.


W.H. AudenHis Age

The most representative poet of his time, W. H. Auden came to grips with the real socio-
politico-economic conditions of contemporary England. In fact, Audens analytical approach to the
contemporary ailing civilisation and his efforts to reach definite conclusions make him a prominent
poet among the socially conscious poets of the thirties. Robin Skelton considers him a leader, an
innovator and a representative of his time and generation
18
. Hence, it is imperative to highlight the
social context of the period to understand a poet of such a great stature in proper perspective. As
F.W. Bateson has aptly remarked in English PoetryA critical Introduction, If we are to discover
the qualities that make a poem good rather than merely pleasurable, we must read it in its original
social context and relate the meaning of the poem to the social forces operative at the time of its
composition. in the interplay of past and present meanings, a more permanent critical verdict may
eventually be attainable
19
.

A glimpse back at the historical vista reveals the urgency of looking at the things in a fresh
way and relating the poetry of the period to the social and political happenings of the then Britain.
So a comprehensive survey of the social, political and economic fronts is a prerequisite to establish
a milieu which evoked a specific kind of response from the poets of the period. A social order as
such is necessarily the affirmation of certain values. In the social context, therefore, the values
implied in the poem become explicit and its relative goodness and badness declares itself
20
.

The Great War (1914) had already created a haunting sense of desolation in the poets of the
twenties. They felt that everything was done for and no real solutions were possible. As D.E.S.
Maxwell points out materially and spiritually the Great War had proved a ruinous adventure.
Inherited modes of conduct and beliefs had lost their validity. But it seemed to the poets of the
twenties that there was nothing to replace the fragmented traditions
21
. The pressure of the situation
was further aggravated in the nineteen thirties.

When the decade opened Britain was under the vicious spell of the Wall Street Crash of
1929 which brought in its wake the Great World Depression and which further led to a grave
8
economic crisis and wide spread misery J.M.Keynes, the renowned British economist highlighted
the evidently disastrous consequences of the peace treaty for Britain in his book Economic
Consequences of the Peace. This economic collapse had resulted in rampant unemployment and
endemic poverty with three quarter million people unemployed in England and about seven
million people living on dole, with gaping hungry mouths. Stephen spender could capture the
grimness of the economic crisis in the lines:

They lounge at corners of the street
And greet friends with a shrug of shoulder,
And turn their empty pockets out,
The cynical gestures of the poor
22
.


It was a period of crisis, dismay and as Auden has described it, of smokeless chimneys,
damaged bridges, rotting wharves and choked canals Writing about this period Stephen Spender
remarks in his book Background to the Thirties The Thirties and After, This was a decade in which
many middle-class assumptions in democratic Europe and America seemed shattered.
Unemployment exerted its scathing attack on down-trodden and hunger marches were a matter of
routine. Capitalist system seemed on the verge of complete break down as it could neither stop
starvation nor give employment to the poverty stricken but at the same time supported the cultivated
leisured class whose aesthetic values were unconnected with politics and social conditions in such
circumstances many young writers came to feel that this type of art involved a kind of refusal to
recognise those conditions which emerged out of the political and social systems
23
.

Auden along with Stephen spender, C. Day Lewis and Louis MacNiece popularly known
as The Auden Group promptly responded to the major developments of the period and made a
sincere attempt to grapple with the contemporary issues from a fresh angle. G.S. Fraser suggests
that these poets saw around them a world which offered a sense of safety which was treacherously
false. They turned away from that apparent safety to images of danger courageously faced and
visualised actions which were imbued with a consciously shared human purpose. They found it
impossible to remain passive when confronted by an England slugged by the slump, full of the
unemployed leaning against the walls, reading papers with delicate cautious puffs, a single cigarette.
They wanted to make men more alive in the tensions and dangers of the time and encourage them to
see the possible power and beauty of the world in their time also
24
.


The socio- cultural milieu also presented a bleak picture. The rise of a technology based
culture and the positivistic rationalism on which its edifice was based led to a questioning of
accepted social beliefs, conventions and traditions. In this context R.A. Scott-James remarks, The
20
th
century has, for its characteristic, to put everything, in every sphere of life, to the question and
secondly, in the light of this scepticism, to reform, to reconstruct to accept the new age as new
and attempt to mould it by conscious, purposeful effort
25
. Instead of generating confidence in
mans capacity to build up, through his reason, a new value system in accordance with the needs of
the times, the growth of science and technology merely produced in the middle classes, a levity and
cynicism which discarded all values as fake and irrational. Consequently, confusion and uncertainty,
prevailed in every sphere and man stood completely dazed.

The advent of Freudian psychology added a new dimension to the study of human
behaviour with its emphasis on the unconscious operations of the mind. Freud and his followers had
come out with new knowledge and understanding about sexual attitudes and responses, for example,
they showed that repressed sex instincts lead to neurosis and physical ailments like cancer. His
theory of Oedipus complex seriously affected the family relationships. This also served, at that
juncture, merely to aggravate the tendency towards deep cynicism. As a result of Freudian theories
9
flippant legitimisation of distortions and perversions in the matters of sex became a fashion. Man
Woman relationships grew mechanical and devoid of any genuine emotional richness. Even in a
period of economic crisis, emancipation of women was confused with frivolity and escapist
entertainment.

Post First World War period may also be treated as an era of revolt against authority.
Scepticism on both fronts-political and religious, disillusionment and cynicism were the order of the
day. It was an anti-heroic period when interrogating finger was raised against action and success.
Old authoritarian patterns of conduct were disintegrating but in the absence of their replacement by
more rational norms, whole armies of uprooted and alienated young men and women emerged on
the scene and they did not know what to do with themselves. They :

. wait inertly in bar
In netted chicken farms, a light house,
Standing on these impoverished constricting acres,
The ladies and gentle men apart
26



Accepted patterns of social relationships collapsed and an atmosphere of uncertainty and
disdainful rejection of positives prevailed. The Socio- economic disparities became so large that
they had created a social segregation resulting in injustice, inequality and exploitation of the under-
privileged at the hands of privileged ones. Even the educational institutions provided strong
evidence of discrimination which created a big hiatus in human relationships

On our cream walls donations, Shakespeare head
Cloudless at dawn, civilised dome riding all cities
Belled, flowery, Tyrolese valley open handed map
Awarding the world its world, And yet for these
Children, these windows not this world, are world
Where all their future is painted with a fog
A narrow street sealed in with a lead sky
Far from rivers capes and stars onwards
27
.

Thus, the social and emotional chaos which invaded the ruling middle-class had to be
exposed. The smart elites who were shallow beneath their brilliant faade had to be given a shock
treatment.

On the political front, the liberal government proved inefficient to meet the existing
challenges. On the international plane, the Soviet Union was confronted with fascist Italy and
resurgent Nazi Germany and in 1936 ideological conflict was to become a real battle-ground in
Spain. Then as if to accentuate the crisis, the Spanish Civil War broke out. The Spanish civil war
which broke out in 1936, not only cost Spain a million dead but appealed to poets all over the world
as a test of western civilization in its most mature and human form. So long as the poets wrote about
their own experience in the civil war all was well, for they could use their advanced technique to
give an exact form to their new experience. But some of them felt called to do more than this, to
speak for their own country in its agony, to appeal to large audiences and encourage their fellows in
their heroic efforts
28
. The mounting pressure of fascism on the international plane also posed a
standing threat to the very existence of liberal democracy. On top of all this, there was a growing
sense of anxiety about the impending threat of another world war. In this context, Samuel Hynes
remarks, By 1936 war was a part of ordinary consciousness. It thrust itself into the major literary
works of the yearAnd as the threat became clearer and more vividly documented, the efforts to
find way to prevent it became more strenuous and more partisan
29
. On the international plane, the
10
situation was worse. In March 1939 Hitler occupied Rhineland again; in May 1939, the Italians
captured the capital of Abyssinia, Japan waged an undeclared war on China in July 1937, then
Hitler troops captured Vienna in March 1938 and Germany completed the conquest of
Czechoslovakia between Autumn, 1938 and March 1939. Then the negotiations at Munich by
Hitler, Mussolini and Chamberlain and finally in Sept. 1939, the Second World War started with all
its fury.

A definite fall was registered in the literary standards of the time. Though the rate of
Literacy was rising, visible decline in the quality of literature was discernible. Cheap books,
magazines, papers, etc. were pouring out in a large number. The cultural taste of the people in song,
dance and rustic craft, etc. no longer existed.

The Cinema, the Radio, the Literature projected criminal tendencies and love stories were
made purposely for commercial purposes. Vulgarity, cruelty and crudity dominated the scene. There
seemed absolute absence of finer and subtle emotional responses in human relationships. Moreover,
the media nourished the sensibilities of the people with day-dreaming and their grasp on reality was
loosening. All this adversely affected the art and literature of the times.

This socio-cultural-economic, political and literary milieu impelled the poets of the period
to visualise an alternative social set-up where healthy human relationships, free from the stifling
distortions of the existing system, could become possible. The major developments of the period
influenced the literary sensibilities of the prominent poets of the period and contributed to the
articulation of a response from them which carried within itself an acute awareness of socio-
cultural-economic, political and literary responsibilities.

The impact of these developments can be seen directly or indirectly in the literary works of
the poets of the period. Samuel Hynes finds Something new in their determination to act, even
among negations, and the hope for poetry of new beliefs
30
. There was, a clear rejection, at this
juncture, of the earlier Ivory Tower approach. The peculiarity of the 1930s was, as spender
observes, not that the subject of a civilization in decline had been taken up but that the hope of
saving or transforming the society had now arisen and it was combined with a firm determination to
with stand social oppression and tyrannies
31
.

The poets of the thirties not only attacked the modernists for adopting a cynically bitter
attitude towards the challenges posed by the contemporary society, they also championed collective
socio-political action as a remedy for the grave problems created by the existing situation.
Underlining the importance of active involvement in the social issues of the times in the case of
these poets, C.M.Bowra remarks, in the twentieth Century crowded as it is with international
and civil wars, social revolutions and awakening continents, Vigorous and comprehensive
reappraisals of what man owes to himself became inevitable and the poets in such a situation could
hardly be expected to keep clear of politics or remain indifferent to public affairs
32
.

It is not surprising that in such objective circumstances Rex Warner, a poet of the thirties,
should sing songs of revolution:

Now you can join us, now all together sing all power
Not tomorrow but now in this hour,
All power
To lovers of life, to workers, to the hammer,
Come then companion, this is the spring of blood,
Hearts hey-day, movement of masses,
Beginning of good
33

11
Chapter-II

W. H. AUDEN: THEMES AND WORKS

W. H. Auden (1907-1973) emerges as the most representative poet on the British Literary
scenario. He recognised the gravity of the contemporary crisis in its entire entirety and proclaimed
the urgency of direct political and collective intervention. He felt that the privileged elements who
presided over the existing system not only created socio-political and economic problems for the
oppressed humanity through their narrow and short-sighted view but also practically mutilated their
own humanity in the process. Auden tried to investigate into the specific causes of the prevalent
chaotic situation with scientific precision and objectivity and raised challenging issues in his poetry.
Richard Hoggart in his, Introduction to Auden remarks, He has produced a body of verse which
commands our respect and admiration in a number of ways; he has been the brilliant and sometimes
profoundly evocative explorer of dilemmas within the human will; in his vividly epigrammatic,
conversational and alert verse he held a mirror to a complex decade
1
.

In fact, Audens versatility and prolificacy as a poet is par-excellent. His actively
productive literary span extends over a period of thirty five years. During this span, as Donald
Davies puts it .no other poet writing in English today, has attempted as much as Auden; just as
no other poet of his generation can place beside his body of work so exciting for its peculiar insight,
its range of reference, and its skill in use of language and rhythm. In the variety of subjects and
manners he has used successfully, Auden has to be found a parallel outside contemporary poetry
altogether-in the painter Picasso
2
. Undoubtedly, Audens growth as a poet has been constant. A
bird eye view of his works will afford the reader a glimpse into the vast variety of his works and his
extraordinary capacity to grow in accordance with the times. His creative period may broadly be
divided into two phases-the English phase (1928-40) and the American phase (1941-69).

The English Phase: The Thirties Decade

W. H. Auden responded to the major problems of his time and made efforts to reach
definite conclusions, which enabled him to establish his hegemony over the socially-committed
group of poets, who shared his attitudes and perceptions during the thirties. Jeremy Robson remarks
in his article Audens Longer Poems, Leavis apart the majority of the critics would seem to grant
Auden his just place as the most accomplished and versatile of living poets and one who has been,
and who remains, exceptionally influential. Clearly he dominated the generation of the 1930s with a
power and range that few could approach
3
.

In terms of perspective and sensibility, W. H. Auden belonged to a section of radicalised
middle-class intellectuals, who broke away from the ruling class to align themselves with the
proletarians in the hope of bringing about radical changes in the existing system. He was for the
capitalism only to the extent it provided an extended scope and sanction for individual freedom and
initiative. He was rather pained by the inequalities it created for a large mass of people. The left-
wing ideology present in his poetry is a genuine manifestation of his radical concern for reform but
his commitment to the individual freedom always finds expression in a form which is possible only
under the capitalist system. This contradictory response ultimately results in his being a radical
reformer and not a revolutionary transformer of the existing system.


In fact, Audens radicalism was an inherent attribute of his literary sensibility and his
poems during the thirties reflect his acute awareness of the contemporary crisis. Barbara Everetts
comments regarding existing scenario are quite pertinent, It is one of high ground, from which the
hawkor the helmeted airmen survey, in isolation a world spread out below them : valleys
12
containing pockets of decaying existence, industries failed or failing, villages in miscommunication
from one another, individuals afraid and innocent. The lonely hillsides and the huddled and troubled
communities between their means of production and of communication run down, themselves
reduced to a hostile separation offer also an image of the failed and lonely individual, attempting
to break through his silence by momentary and intense, though sterile, relationships. Every effort
towards unity the groups of people to cohere into a society, the individuals to meet in love, the
mind to hold together in peace-is frustrated
4
.

The manner in which Auden has handled the vital socio-political and economic issues of the
times speaks volumes for his positive and pragmatic approach. Richard Hoggart strongly
appreciates Audens strong sense of social responsibility and great purposiveness
5
. In fact,
Audens aim during the whole of this period was concentrated on the establishment of qualitatively
better social order congenial enough for the healthy and wholesome development of the individuals
against the contemporary system, which bred distortions and perversions.

In the early phase, his survey of the socio-economic decay of the contemporary society
enabled Auden to provide an insight into the havocs of the oppressive working of the industrial
civilization and the resultant adverse impact on the individual psyche but he shrinks from relating
this malaise to the working of the inherent logic of the system. However, he retains confidence and
optimism in mans potentialities to overcome the crisis through a collective assertion of moral
resistance. He considers it a high time to:

Prohibit sharply the rehearsed response,
And gradually correct the cowards stance.
Cover in time with beams-those in retreat
6
.

In the active social phase, Auden envisages that without substantial changes in the material
conditions, change of heart is a far off feasibility. He, therefore, emphasises the urgency of
undertaking a concrete programme of direct dynamic action from inner change to the change in
the environment. However, even in this militant phase Audens typical liberal concern for the
individual withholds him from total revolution in the system. Towards the climax of the decade, he
recedes back to his private self anxious once again to realise individual concerns through social
vision.

The sharply visible shifts in emphasis reflected in preponderance of psycho-analysis in
early poems, radicalism in the poems of the middle phase and dignified and unillusioned stoicism of
the final phase are in a large part only surface shifts. In fact, Audens social perspective and social
engagements remain consistent throughout the decade.

In the early English phase (1930-33) Auden published The Orators and the Poems, 1930.
The Orators, though a work of great merit, is not easy to comprehend. In spite of a number of
obscurities and immaturities, it emerges as a successful and brilliant literary piece. It consists of five
sections-The Initiate which contains an argument, a Statement and Letter to wound. Journal of
an Airman is another section. Then Six Odes consists of a variety of poems. At the end there is an
epilogue. The orators of one kind are representatives of a wasteful and treacherous demagogy. The
others represent the restrictive and frustrating influences existing with the mind of a single
individual. The book is an attempt to break free from- the voices and attitude, within and without a
man, which bar the way in his quest for freedom, love and life. The Orators expresses Audens
feeling as a political reformer, a middle-class intellectual trying to usher in the Marxist revolution
and eliminate the bourgeois class of which he himself is a member.

13
Auden introduced into the field of poetry a small volume of his poems in 1928. Stephen
Spender, who owned a private press, printed privately this volume by bringing out only forty five
copies. Later, Auden revised this volume and during the process eleven poems were rejected and
twenty one new poems were added to the volume. A fresh collection of Audens poems was
published in 1930. Richard Hoggart observes while describing his early verse, It is the verse of a
young man prepared to experiment widely with forms and manners of expression, but particularly
suspicious of lustiness, and anxious to evolve a hard cerebral style
7
. So this volume was further
revised and many additions were made and the second edition of the poems came into being in
1933. This volume, which was full of vigour and freshness, enhanced Audens status as one of the
most remarkable poets of the period.


In the middle phase (1933-39) Audens reputation, says Barbara Everett, almost
certainly rests on the work he produced during 1933-40. The earlier work-the 1930 poems, and The
Orators has an original vitality and powerful immediacy never quite present afterwards, and the
volumes published since 1940 have a greater suavity and intellectual maturity; but any one wising to
recommend Auden at his most easy, fertile and interesting, would have little hesitation in turning to
the work of the middle and late nineteen-thirties
8
. The main works of this period are:

1. Two volumes of lyric poetry-Look stranger, And another Time.
2. Four Plays-The Dance of Death, The Dog beneath the Skin, The Ascent of 6 and On the
Frontiers.
3. Two Travel Books-Letters from Iceland and Journey to a War.

Since here we are concerned with Auden: his themes and works as a poet, so perusal of two
volumes of his lyrical poetry themes raised there in becomes imperative.


1. Look Stranger, 1936

This volume consists of 32 poems more successful and popular than any other of his
books contains. Auden wrote these poems when the Marxist influence on him was at its height. The
title poem presents the picture of England in turmoil. The rest of the poems also deal with the
contemporary crisis. Audens main concern, here, is to trace all the evils present in society and in
individual to the absence of love. He therefore, suggests that we should learn to love and banish
hatred from our minds if we want the relations of society and the individual to come out of the
morass in which they are.

2. Another Time, 1940

It has three sections : (a) People and Places, (b) Lighter Poems which include ballads,
cabaret songs, etc. (c) Occasional poems which include elegies on W.B.Yeats, Sigmund Freud
and Toller, Spain 1937, September 1, 1939 and Epithalamion.

Another Time marks the transition from the early Auden to the later Auden and
clearly indicates the change in his moral attitude. It gives us a foretaste of the manner Auden is
going to adopt both in his themes and technique. Besides, it has some distinctive qualities too as it
contains some of his most discursive and reflective poetry
9.


These were his major works during his English Phase. Unlike his predecessors, W. H.
Auden does not merely present the chaotic situation and watch the decay passively; he raises
multifarious issues of vital social significance.

Auden exposes the social values of the ruling middle class their pretensions their ethical
decline and their moral turpitude. In Consider this and in our time (1930), Auden unveils the
hypocrisy and emotional bankruptcy of the sick and decaying bourgeois society. The poem
14
reveals the ugly impact of the emotional hollowness present in the urban middle-class people. In
fact, their self-centred and mistrustful attitude has produced in the middle-class a sense of insecurity
and lack of confidence. Auden tries to diagnose the social malady by identifying its symptoms in the
wide spread neurosis and death wish prevalent among the members of the middle-class. He is
indignant at their deliberate and conscious acceptance of their diseased condition and predicts
extinction for the representative bourgeois elements:

The game is up for you and for the others,
Who, thinking, pace in slippers on the lawns
Of College Quad or Cathedral close,
Who are born nurses, who live in shorts?
Sleeping with people and playing fives
Seekers after happiness..
(TEA, P.47.)

Here, Auden attempts to bring about some improvement in the total climate by shattering
the complacency of those who are victimised by the system and yet are unknowingly co-opted into
it.


Again Its farewell to the drawing rooms civilised cry (Jan.1931) renders an ironic
exposure to the moral degeneration of the members of the ruling middle-class, who spend their
lives in:


The buying and selling, the eating and drinking,
The disloyal machines and irreverent thinking,
The lovely dullards again and again
Inspiring their bitter ambitious men
(TEA, P.209.)
s
Auden highlights the gap between their preaching and the practice in the following lines:

The behaving of man is a world of horror,
A sedentary Sodom and slick Gomorrah.
(TEA, P. 208. )
Auden brings out the intensity of the approaching disaster by effectively unmasking the
inconsistencies of an attitude of surrender or the easy escape into sterile utopias of hedonism. In
Epilogue (October,1931) of The Orators, Auden protests against the typical petty-bourgeois
middle-class intellectuals fearful attitude to change.

He criticises the selfish attitude of the privileged classes in their chosen position, cut off
from the world of grief, hunger and fear in his poem Out on the lawn I lie in bed (June, 1933). He
ridicules their false sense of delight founded on wilful ignorance:

And, gentle, do not care to know,
Where Poland draws her Eastern bow,
What violence is done?
Nor ask what doubtful act allows,
Our freedom in this English house,
Our picnics in the Sun.
(TEA, P.137.)

The poem underlines Audens faith in the inevitability of a social environment which does
not breed apathy and timid self-centeredness.

15
In his poem Here on the cropped grass (1933), Auden seems to suggest that cultivation of
private life indirectly implies evasion of public responsibility:

The presses of idleness issued more despair
And it was honoured,
Gross hunger took on more hands every month,
Erecting here and every where his vast
Unnecessary workshops,
Europe grew anxious about her health,
Combines tottered, credits froze,
And business shivered in a bankers winter
While we were kissing.

(TEA, P.142.)

A sense of disenchantment with his own class, its privileges and the concepts of freedom
and happiness, introduces a new socially vital theme in Audens poem the issue of alienation
arising from the mechanical nature of human relationships. In No change of place Auden builds up
this theme representing it through the failure of socio-economic system and the resultant void
created in human life. He suggests confrontation of desolation with a strong sense of individual
responsibility. In Prologue (1932) Auden refers to the symptoms of alienation in emotionally
bankrupt heirs of decadent middle-class society. They:

.inertly wait
In bar, in netted chicken-farm, in lighthouse
Standing on these impoverished constricting acres,
The Ladies and gentlemen apart, too much alone
(TEA, P.119.)

The poet suggests that environmental change through the unifying force of love might bring
about adjustments in social institutions and enable people to shed their sickening isolation. In May
with its light behaving (1934) the poet emphasises the need to move beyond possessive love to an
emotional awakening for public contact, a larger relationship to overcome a sense of isolation.

In Doom is dark and deeper than any sea-dingle (1930), the poet advocates a higher kind
of love far above.


..dreams of home,
Waving from window, spread of welcome,
Kissing of wife under single sheet; .
(TEA, P.55.)

Still more, in That night when joy began (Nov.1931), even in private moment of the
lovers union, Auden mentions about mornings levelled gun and tress-passers reproach (TEA,
P.113.).

Though he affords us glimpses into love as a cure for social insecurity and alienation, a total
oblivion into illusory love is definitely missing. Auden condemns self-regarding love and illusory
escapes into romantic dreams.

In his poem The Chimneys are Smoking (April, 1932), Auden seeks the fulfilment of
public vision through private means by presenting the individual struggle of the lovers as a struggle
of life against the malignant disintegrating forces. In O what is that sound (Oct.1932), Auden
16
builds the theme of social commitment by placing private love vis--vis situational urgency and
making the lover finally respond to the call of duty. Audens condemnation of the self regarding
love and the illusory escapes into romantic dreams comes out strongly in Easily, my dear, you
move, easily your head (Nov.1934) and August for the people and their favourite islands
(Aug.1935).

Audens realisation of the insufficiency of individualistic love to cope with the broader
issue demanding urgent action and finally his desire to merge individual into social demonstrates his
strong urge to find radical solutions to radical issues.

Stephen Spender suggests, Love is the cure for individual and for society yet the
inadequacy of such an abstract ideal must have dissatisfied Auden making him seek the workings
out of the task of love with in the social movement of his time
10
. Hence, Auden takes up the issues
of exploitation, injustice and inequality and strongly feels that these are directly related to the
failure of the capitalist system. His intellectual sensibility makes him feel that middle-class
intellectuals can no longer afford to be apathetic to the prevailing crisis. He exhorts them in Get
there, if you can.

Shut up talking, charming in the best suits to be had in town,
Lecturing on navigation while the ship is going down
(TEA, P.49.)

There is a definite urge for action in the concluding lines:

If we really want to live wed better start at once to try,
If we dont it does not matter, But wed better start to die.
(TEA, P.49.)

Although Audens approach shows all the trappings of his liberal humanism his militant
stand does add to the radical content in the poem.

Again, Auden raises the issue of economic insecurity and exploitation of workers in the
capitalist system in his poem, Brothers who when the Sires roar and expresses his solidarity with
the proletariat in common fears and assures them that if they lend their support they will make this
system tumble down (TEA, P.121).

The tone might give the impression that Auden has finally chosen the path of total
revolution but being a radicalised middle-class intellectual, he has his limitations. He can only
imaginatively align himself with the working class struggle and end up trying to improve their lot
within the framework of the existing system because of his bourgeois sensibility, which at times
might make Auden look like a compromised accomplice of the system which he seeks to denounce.
Nevertheless, his efforts to make the existing system shorn of its ills, his championing the interests
of the proletariat through distributive justice and the generous acceptance of common man are
definitely positive.

Auden raises the issue of inequality and injustice in another poem entitled, O for the
doors to be open (1935), where he depicts a sick society wrought with distinctions of the rich and
the poor. In Its farewell to the drawing-rooms civilized cry (June 1937) his outcry for providing
justice to the exploited and down trodden evidences not only his acceptance of the identity of the
common men but also his genuine concern for their lot. But here also his middle-class sensibility
interferes with his total identification with the interests of the workers Hundreds of trees in the
wood are Unsound; I am the axe that must cut them down to the ground, (TEA, P.208.). Thurley
remarks, Audens best political poetry, though informed with genuine sympathy for the victims of
17
capitalism, stems essentially from an astute awareness of his own real position in class war and of
what things he most cherished in life
11
. Though, Audens assurances may not be vital enough, still
his humanistic approach supplemented by a radical imparts revolutionary fervour to the socially
active phase of his poetry.

The radical content of Audens social vision gets further strength from his treatment of the
challenges posed by war. In Its farewell to the drawing-rooms civilized cry (1937) Auden is
deeply struck by a sense of urgency to initiate immediate action. He feels that skirting the deep
crisis which has loomed large over the socio-political horizon by indulging in polite nothings may
become suicidal. The following line evidently suggests this: Now matters are settled with gas and
with bomb. (TEA, P.208.). In Spain Auden raises the vital issue of future prospects of man
while acknowledging the great scientific, religious, philosophic and artistic achievements of
yesterday and visualising a tomorrow of more wonders, Auden keeps an emphatic focus on the
necessity of struggle today to outlive the hostile forces and establish a just city for the betterment of
individuals. Auden strongly feels the necessity of dynamic force of movement as he perceives that
fevers menacing shapes are precise and alive (TEA, P.212.). A.T.Tolley discerns Marxist
viewpoint in Audens statement in the poem that men are made by what they do and are not passive
victims of life force
12
. He illustrates this in the following lines from Audens poem itself:

Oh no, I am not the mover..,
I am your choice, your decision, yet I am Spain.
(TEA, P.211.)

Auden views the political situation as the clearest manifestation of modern malaise Ronald.
Mason rightly appreciates Spain as emphatic and eloquent expression of the European seriousness
ever since the beginning of the thirties. He suggests that Audens Spain is a revelation of his
farsightedness
13
. It is important to point out that in Spanish Civil War Auden favours active
collective action against fascist tendencies and gives a poetic transcription to anti-fascist feelings in
this poem.

September 1, 1939, though, deals with topical issues of the second world war but Audens
scepticism about the success of any radical measure to change the society also comes to fore. There
is a growing feeling about thirties decade being a low dishonest decade (TEA, P.245.).
M.L.Rosenthals remarks seem quite pertinent when he suggests that in this poem as in others
written in the same period, Auden was still political, but like many others of his literary generation,
had turned away from the activistic idealism that marked his more whole heartedly Marxian
writing
14
. Investigating into the causes that led to war Auden concludes that Hitlers self-love
resulted in Fascism and his fascist tendencies were responsible for the contemporary eventuality. He
provides Freudian psycho-analysis for Hitlers behaviour and attributes all crimes to the individual
wish. War, he concludes, is the outcome of egotistical love:


For the error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love.
But to be loved alone
(TEA, P.246.)

A person who earlier held rational and scientific view of life seems to betray a conservative
outlook in holding out abstract theories regarding internal human revengeful feelings as cause of
war. He gives humanistic solutions to the crisis. He who earlier gave a call for direct social action
with trumpet and anger and drum (TEA, P.209.), has now become conscious of Faces along the
18
bar (TEA, P.246.) and is desperately seeking to project an affirming flame. The poem, in fact,
marks the later phase in Audens poetic output during the thirties decade when his enthusiasm was
gradually receding and a change of attitude was taking place.

Audens ruminations over the causes may appear sad and his conclusions individualistic,
yet his concern with the exploited individuals and his emphasis on their awakening, his
condemnation of imperialism ironically exposing Americas apparent neutrality in the Second
World War crisis are indications of his radicalism.

In Musee Des Beux Arts ( Dec., 1938.), Audens condemnation of human apathy to
individual suffering implies an ironic attack on the self-centredness of people in general. The
poem, indirectly, reflects his deep concern for the anguish of the lonely suffering individuals also.
The poem, thus, shows Audens sliding perceptively into an inwardly inclined phase. Even in The
Unknown Citizen he decries a system which curtails the freedom and happiness of the individuals
and thus, raises the issue of individual freedom and identity. He ironically suggests that the
success and identity of the unknown citizen are defined by his conformity to the rigid standards of
the mechanisation of an individual by economic, commercial and even ideological institutions
which exploit him to their suitability. The poem shows Audens sharp critique of the
contemporary ethos and his liberal concern for the freedom and happiness of the individuals.

In his two significant poems Miss Gee and Victor Auden has raised his voice against
another form of social malaise, which is responsible for distorted emotional responses of the
individuals i.e. the authoritarian and over-protective attitude of the parents towards their
children. Auden holds over-religious puritanical training responsible for creating all kinds of
inhibitions and resulting ultimately in morbid mental conditions.

In Memory of W.B.Yeats (1939) Auden underlines that art should play a constructive role
by generating love and other human values required for the establishment of a well ordered society
which he considers as necessary pre-requisite for the healthy development of the individual :


Make a vineyard of the curse,
Sing of human unsuccess
In a rapture of distress;
In the deserts of the heart
Let the healing fountain start.
(TEA, P.243.)

The analysis of the representative poems of Auden spanning the thirties decade, thus shows
that Auden promptly responded to the contemporary socio-political and economic situation and
offered a sharp critique of the vital issues of the times. Towards the end of the decade Audens
social attitudes grew inwardly inclined and the dominant radical thrust was subdued. His radical
liberal perspective restrained him from going beyond the frontiers to overhaul and reconstruct the
existing society. The predominance of the liberal concerns in the later phase of this decade of
Audens socially productive literary period may subdue the overall social impact of the poems to
some extent but the urgency of social vision for healthy development of individuals remains intact
throughout Auden himself remarks Individual in vocuo is an intellectual obstruction. The
individual is the product of social life
15
.

John T.Wrights comments seem very relevant here. Auden sees the reality in sudden
shifting perspectives and presents a general truth or Marxs truth but other truths as well and
especially truths that relate one sphere in which we live to others the public to personal, the
interior to the cosmic and social
16
. Audens perspective for building up a just society through
19
liberal humanistic means remains constant in his poetry. His poems show that all his efforts were
directed towards bringing about changes in the existing set up, extension of human personality by
promoting human values of love, truth and justice challenges of life and optimistic confrontation
with the challenges of life the values that could give man his due place in society so that both
individual and society may struggle for a meaningful existence.


W.H. Auden: The American Phase-The First Decade, 1940-50

On January 18, 1939, Auden migrated to America and settled down in New York. His
sudden decision shocked and dismayed the contemporary British poets and critics and various
interpretations were made. It was opined that Auden got disillusioned with the existing conditions in
the then Britain and felt the need to stay away from England to channelise his artistic talent in a new
direction.

The earlier English Auden believed in a Good State and the American Auden showed
explicit faith in the City of God. Earlier he was seeking to establish a good democratic state. In
America his orientation was towards establishment of a just city. Being the most representative city,
as far as culture and civilisation are concerned, New York was the most appropriate place for Auden
as he himself puts it in one of his poems:

More even than in Europe
The choice of patterns is made clear
Which the machine imposes, what
Is possible and what is not,
To what conditions we must bow
In building the just city now


A faith in Christian theology is predominant in all the writings of Audens American phase.
This development, though, appears sudden after his English phase was, in fact, a continuation of the
beliefs and ideals imperceptibly cherished by him even in his early phase of life. A perusal of his
early poems reveals prayers, invocations, change of heart and humanistic solutions like love and
sympathy to the social problems. It was, in fact, a constant evolution leading to his acceptance of
Christianity. Auden might have migrated to America to meet his requirement of a new idiom and
new modes of expression. While in the English phase Auden drew inspiration mainly from Freud
and Marx, Kierkegaard-the existentialist philosopher and Niebuhr, the theologian became his main
sources of inspiration in America. Suffering of the individual soul, the importance of moral choice
and the nature of sin were the main issues which troubled Keirkgaard and Niebuhr and Audens
writings during this phase predominantly deal with such issues.

During his first decade in the U.S.A. from 1940-50, Auden published three long poems-
New Year Letter, For the Time Being, and The Age of Anxiety which are clear manifestations
of his theological and artistic views.

New Year Letter, 1941

This literary work contains the letter itself, the sonnet sequence entitled The Quest and a
Prologue and an Epilogue rendering the work a compact structure. Written in octo-syllabics
rhyming together, the letter is in the form of a long reflective poem. New Year Letter, as Richard
Johnson has put it in Mans Place: An essay on Auden, The First full articulation of the
philosophical bases of Audens mature style and equally, a fine example of the way in which style
details refines and clarifies meaning. The work is not a final statement of a systematic position. It
advertises its own tentativeness by its epistolary form and its high spirited, self-qualifying manner.
It does not show much of the religious side of Auden, although its ideas are essentially those that
20
underlay his formal return to Christianity. Nonetheless, because it is discursive in manner and
eclectic in reference, it offers an introduction in ideas fundamental to Audens later poetry and to
some of his characteristic poetic tactics
17
.


Eighty one pages of notes, including short poems in the manner of Blake and Rilke,
quotations, anecdotes, statistics and summaries have been added to the fifty nine pages of verse
(Text), which makes it difficult to sharply distinguish the poem and the notes. Nevertheless, most
remarkably the poem bring together a vast range of diverse references or concords. The poem
comprises meditations on literature, war politics, history, theology and philosophy, etc. A
coincidence of events: the end of a year, the end of a decade, the end of a historical era, and the
beginning of the second world war, as Richard Johnson has pointed out in his book Mans Place: An
Essay on Auden, is what inspired Auden to write this sequence
18
Three parts of this poem
correspond to the three categories-the aesthetic, the ethical and the religious, propounded by
Kierkegaard. The poem traces the historical roots of the crisis,..he crisis of the movement, as
Richard Johnson remarks, is primarily a crisis in mans knowledge of himself and the world, and the
immediate problems the dissolution of order in Europe and the rise of fascism stem from
accepting simple solutions to complicated problems
19
.

In fact, the feeling of guilt and sin are always present in the disorder which engulfs human
beings and disregard to moral and human values result in violence. Part-II of the poem deals with
the role of Devil in human behaviour leading to disastrous consequences as in the case of Hitler.
Part-III handles a variety of topics extending from history, politics, social sciences, philosophy and
theology to the depiction of America. The poem concludes with an appeal to God which leads him
from doubt to belief in the Almighty. But it can not be put in the category of religious poem. It, in
fact, is as Richard Hoggart remarks, an argument in verse, perceptive, careless, suggestive,
bookish, vivid, almost everywhere competent, and in places brilliant and moving
20
.

Though, as Richard Johnson, has put it in Mans place: An Essay on Auden, the central
paradox is that of mans double nature. By this Auden means that man knows himself as two
radically different entities: anthropomorphic, egocentric universe that extends outwards from each
man; and as a physical me, an object, a small item in a giant universe that surrounds, includes, and
acts upon him. Yet it is viewed in the larger context of a society as a whole
21
.

Commenting upon the poem, R. N. Srivastava in his book W. H. Auden: The poet remarks
The epilogue is the best thing in New Year Letter, for it does not have the defects either of the
Letter which is a little too intellectual, or of the quest which looks like the work of a conscious
artist. It is also more successful in communicating the authors personal faith at which he has just
arrived. It has greater dignity, more intensity, and points out more emphatically the need for
humility and striving in the face of violence and death. The most important thing about the Epilogue
is that it is finally free from the misery of doubt, as the author now becomes finally committed to
Christianity
22
.


Thus, New Year Letter epitomises Audens spiritual development and his ultimate
acceptance of the Christian faith. In this poem Auden has used the technique of finding objective-
correlatives-the mythical technique and this certainly signifies a new development in Audens
technique and it is discernible in his other works of the period also.

The sea and The Mirror, 1944

William Shakespeares play The Tempest provided Auden with the mythical background
most suitable for this literary creation. As Richard Johnson puts it His (Audens) reading of The
Tempest is based on the notion that it is in part an allegory of the inner dialectic of the human
21
personality
23
. The sea and the Mirror present both this reading and its own allegory of human
character. Auden uses various technical devices to achieve his end and displays a synthesis of all
the qualities, of art and life, of individual and society and of conflicting desires of the mind. About
this work, Barbara Everett remarks, It is a small master piece, one of the funniest, cleverest, and
fundamentally, though paradoxically, serious thing Auden has ever produced
24
.

Richard Johnsons remarks in this context are also worth quoting. The work has
ceremonial processional quality, with characters, forms and ideas paired off in intricate balances,
giving the reader the pleasure of finding the achieved design
25
.



Again Richard Johnson comments It is impossible, the work suggests, to understand its
substance without following its own complex point of view still, there is an object to be understand,
a view to be seen, and a model of human existence presented
26
.


In The Sea and the Mirror Auden makes an attempt to explore the relationship of the
Mirror of Art to the Sea of Life. He uses the structure of Shakespeares play The Tempest as a
common ground upon which to build new ideas the poem consists of three sections. In the first
section, the symbolism of Prospero and Ariel indicates Auden belief that his spiritual quest will take
him beyond the realm of art. In the second section, the other characters who are returning in a ship
to Italy celebrating their regeneration symbolise the return from the world of the play to the world of
reality. In the third section, Caliban while defining his role and the role of Ariel spells out the
relation between the world of art and the world of reality. In the preface the stage manager,
addressing himself to the critics tells them that art is concerned with life without explaining its
surprise and mystery. Prospero to Ariel begins by outlining the basic terms on which the unknown
must be approached. Caliban to the Audience is a very long address, covering about half of the
total length but a brilliant one.


R. N. Srivastav remarks, The Sea and the Mirror mark the turning point in Audens
career, for now he renounces the use of art as magic. But it displays Audens technical
accomplishment as each character speaks in a different form-Ballad, Villanelle, Sestina, Sapphics,
Elegiacs, terza rima, syllabic verse and the prose style of Henry James. Besides, it contains some of
Audens finest poetry. Prof. Beach also considers it the best of the three long poems
27
.


For the Time Being, 1945

This work, which is subtitled A Charismas Oratorio, takes further the argument of New
Year Letter and reveals his leanings towards Christian faith more vividly. An Oratorio, in fact, is a
composition for choral singing, generally on a sacred theme. The gospel narrative of The Nativity
(birth of Christ) provides the required mythical background for His long poem and helps to invoke a
profound moral and emotional response from the reader.

This Oratorio consists of nine sections. In the first section Advent depicts the dismay and
lifelessness of the ancient world before Christs birth. The singers sing about an atmosphere of fear
and doubt which looms large everywhere. The Annunciation the second section, personifies-
Intuition, Sensation, Feeling and Thought-the four major human faculties as it happens in the case
of the morality plays to indicate that mans personality has become fragmented and consequently
has lost its wholeness. Joseph, the third section, is like a popular song. St. Joseph is presented as an
ordinary human being who is sceptical about Marys purity. This leads to the temptation not to trust
God. In the semi-chorus, Joseph and Mary are exhorted to pray for all types of sinners. The next
section, The Summons shows a contrast between human wisdom and Christian revelation. The
magi (three wise man) are summoned to face the reality. The star advises them to have faith.

22
In The Vision of the Shepherds the fifth section, the Shepherds are summoned to face the
truth like the three wise men. These shepherds wait for the good news with hope and faith. Angels
announce the truth of love which will become the ruling force, in future. The next section entitled
At the entire Manger begins with Marys tender lullaby to the new born. This lullaby is followed
by the songs of the wise men and the Shepherds and the seventh and finally their address to the
chorus section, The Meditation of Simeon unfolds the philosophical meaning of the Incarnation
vis--vis love. This section expresses Audens religious views and underlines the influence of
Niebuhr. In the Eighth section entitled The Massacre of the Innocents there is depiction of Herod
who is both the historical character and the liberal of the late 1930s confronting the threats of war
and fascism. In this section, he is presented as a proud nationalist confronted with the Irrational. He
takes the help of military to protect law and order. He symbolises a man who cannot bring himself
to believe without sufficient proof. The Soldiers speech unfolds the dire consequences of Herods
decision which will be nothing less than the massacre of the innocents. In the concluding section,
The Flight into Egypt Joseph and Mary hear the voices of the Desert which tempts them to stay in
the world, but they remark that insecurity is essential human condition. In this way the vision comes
to an end and the world of reality stands there quite unchanged, though, for those who have seen the
child, the things are not quite the same. Monroe K. Spears regards this work to be a fine work of
Auden Considered on its own terms and at this distance in time, the work (For the Time Being)
may be seen as a unique and remarkable success both formally and as a whole
28
.

The Age of Anxiety 1947

This poem consists of six parts- Prologue, The Seven Ages of Man, The Seven Stages,
The Dirge, A Masque and the Epilogue. The poem is marked with, as R.N. Srivastav puts it,
the dramatic form with dialogue, the singing contest, elegy, love songs laments with courtship of a
Shepherdess, a dirge, formal artificial diction and meter. Auden uses the old English meter with its
alliterative line and four heavy stresses..
29
Commenting on the scene of action in this poem,
Barbara Everett remarks, with The Age of Anxiety, Auden returns to the local scene, for the
greater part of the action occurs in a New York bar. The bar is, perhaps, an urban replacement for
those Islands of escape and pleasure that recur in Audens earlier work, where lonely individuals
meet in a fugitive search for an artificial togetherness. The bar in The Age of Anxiety is the place
where men meet to have their solitude in common
30
.

In this poem the four characters-Malin, Rosetta, Quant and Emble are personifications of
thinking feeling, intuition and sensation respectively, intended to indicate that mans personality has
lost its wholeness and has been disintegrated. All the characters seek to attain spiritual knowledge,
but their search is not deep enough as all of them seek escape routes only.

The first part i.e. The Prologue introduces characters in their private reveries. Instead of
predominant war symbolism, these characters discuss mans constant attempt to escape guilt,
anxiety and fear. The second part The Seven Ages interprets Shakespeares is seven stages of
mans life psychologically Malin initiates each stage and the different characters narrate their
experiences. The theme throughout remains the loss of innocence. The third part The Seven Stages
is a quest for the lost innocence. Here Rosetta performs the role of a guide. The six stages of their
journey re-enact the fall. The fourth part The Dirge is an elegy written on the death of American
President Roosevelt, but it has general implications which make it mourning over the death of the
secular law-givers who assume the role of a kind of God endowed with superhuman faculties.

In the fifth part the quest pattern is taken up again. The infatuation between Rosetta and
Emble develops into physical relationship. Malin and Quant appeal to them to continue to live with
23
their illusion, but they fail to fulfil their cherished dream as all their illusions fade away. Emble
passes out and Rosetta gives up her dream and makes a long speech. She laments that she is bound
to suffer from evil, insecurity and fate.

The concluding part is called The Epilogue which depicts Malins meditations on the
nature of love and time. She comes to the conclusion that although feeling may recognise the
emotional need for God, it is really left to Intellect to make the Christian choice. The poem
underlines the central theme Christianity is the only hope since there is no possibility of mans is
redemption by depending solely on his own resources. The poem ends on a note of despair like
Audens earlier poem September 1, 1939. R.N.Srivastava quotes different critics who have
expressed different views in the context of this poem. Richard Hoggart opines that the
disappointment is greater after the expectations aroused by The Sea and The Mirror and For the
Tim Being. Prof. John Fuller believes that, actually The Age of Anxiety is rich not only in noble
despair, but in a kind of inner glee and inventive response to the conditions of life which is the mark
of great literature. John Bayley goes so far as to call The Age of Anxiety Audens greatest
achievement to date and the one which best shows the true nature of his scope and talent. Monroe
K.Spears opinion is the most balanced, My own view is that The Age of Anxiety is almost as far
from being Audens best as it is from being his worst poem
31
.

The Last Phase, 1950-70
Auden remained a writer throughout his life. The stability and tranquillity he achieved after
a reconciliation of opposites become manifest in his poetry of the sixties. Barbara Everett remarks,
Nones, The shield of Achilles and Homage to Clio are the only three successive volumes in
Audens career which, if bound together, would offer something like a coherent political character,
the different poems arousing no bewilderment by a diversity of tone and subject
32
.


Collected Shorter Poems, 1950

Auden published an edition of his shorter poems after making a number of alterations,
modifications and additions in the poems written during different periods of his career. The volume
consists of four sections; Poems, Paid on Both Sides, Songs and other Musical pieces and In
Time of War and its commentary. Barbara Everett remarks, Auden offers a final and stabilised
edition of a view of life strongly conditioned by the temporal
33
.

In 1960, again, minor adjustments and modifications were made, though, there were no
fundamental changes.



Nones, 1951

This volume consists of Audens most beautiful songs and light verse. Written in a
colloquial style, the lyrics in this collection are specifically excellent. The title of this volume, as
G.S. Fraser, puts it, is intended to suggest nonce that is, this is poetry for the nonce, for the time
being. But gives the foretaste of what is to come in The Shield of Achilles and Homage to Clio
34
.
Poems like Nones, Prime, etc. were reprinted as part of Horae canonica The Shield of Achilles
and In Praise of Limestone become the forerunner of the Bucolies of The Shield of Achilles in
view of theme and technique. The reader is reminded of Horace because of its tone and concerns. In
this volume, Auden reflects mans weakness and ignorance to the same extent as it was shown in his
earlier poetry, but here, the feelings of hatred have been replaced by sympathetic understanding.
Auden continues using the landscape for mirroring forth variegated conditions of human life but his
new landscape strikes a departure, man, here, asks no answers from it.



24
The Shield of Achilles, 1955

The most well-organised of all the volumes Audens The shield of Achilles comprises
three sections. The first section consists of seven Bucolics which shows one aspect of mans
relationship with nature. In Sun Shine and in Shade is another section which consists of fourteen
poems. Though the poet employs different techniques to bring home his point, the main thrust of the
poems remains on man-in-society or man as a social animal. In The Shield of Achilles, the shield
is symbolic of human condition. Through contrast the poet shows that modern shield is devoid of
any beauty or goodness which further reflects that modern world is devoid of goodness and there is
emptiness, sterility and emotional vacuum. The poet underlines the need of the Christian faith which
would restore its goodness and health.

Horae Canonica is the third section which consists of seven poems based on canonical
hours, the set times of the church for prayer and meditation. This sequence begins with Prime and
concludes with Lauds. Like The Age of Anxiety, this section is complex one. This section
celebrates the crucifixion of Christ. Auden makes use of Christs crucifixion as an illustration to
underline the fact of inevitability of death. The poet makes, the readers realise this fact from Prime
to Lauds and ultimately there is awakening. In the central poem Nones the poet highlights the
communal and individual guilt and accountability for the crucifixion after the act is performed.
Nature, on the other hand, is depicted as innocent and devoid of sympathy and guilt sense. The
collection underlines Audens final statement on the subject of Christian belief.

Homage to Clio, 1960

This volume deals with the pivotal theme of contrast between the kingdom of Clio, Muse of
Time and therefore, of human beings, and the kingdom of rulers of plant and animal life symbolised
in Artemis and Aphrodite. Both Aphrodite and Artemis symbolise sexual urge and hunting-the two
basic desires of man and therefore, they must be fulfilled. On the other hand, birth and death are
inevitable facts and hence, Clio should not be defied.

First Things First, in this volume, presents nature as indifferent to human values. Again, in
the prose interlude, Dichtung and Wahrheit, Auden deals with the relation between poetry and
truth and the role of poet. Dame Kind in part-III deals with poetic diction- from the colloquial and
bawdy to the technical and archaic.

R.N. Srivastav remarks Homage to Clio was coldly received by critics who rated it
inferior to The Shield of Achilles. Thomas Gunn, Srivastav quotes, in a review of the book wrote
that this was Audens worst work. Monroe K.Spears, however, felt that Some of the failures and
peculiarities of Homage to Clio seem to derive from an uncertainty of rapport with the audience.
The poems in lighter vein, which Auden defined as nonsense verse, were probably a reaction
against American seriousness in poetry, but they failed to impress the critics
35
.

The above three volumes-Nones, The Shield of Achilles and Homage to Clio bring out
Audens extraordinary technical skill. Barbara Everetts remarks seem worth quoting, His large
technical talents, his quick mind, and his omnivorous interest in human phenomena make, whatever
he does write, entertaining and absorbing. The large body of work that he has produced is - with all
its flaws and unevenness - one worthy of considerable respect
36
.

About the House, 1966

This volume comprises two parts. The first part consists of a poem sequence about various
rooms in Audens house in Austria. The poet also underlines the sanctity of daily life. The activities
of daily life have been presented both as symbolic of his existential nature and its meaningfulness.
25

In the second part of the volume, Ins and outs, A Change of Air, You and Elegy of
J.F.K. have been included. These deal with the themes of uncertain respect for the present world,
spiritual enlightenment, conflict between mind and body and implied references to the assassination
of American President John F. Kennedy respectively.

City without Walls, 1960

This volume deals with the theme of the complexity of modern civilization a recurrent
theme in Audens poetry. The poet synthesises seriousness with lightness of tone and his manner of
handling the issues remains intellectual. However, the poems of this volume differ from the earlier
poems in tone. Instead of reconciliation and hope of earlier poems these poems are marked by
bitterness of love and irony.


Ugliness and vices of the degenerated modern civilization find full expression in the title
poem. The poet ironically unveils the self-centeredness and apathy of modern man. Prologue at
sixty, the sequel to this poem combines high seriousness with lightness of tone and is in the form of
a self-elegy. It ironically underlines the modern ethos and synthesises the private and public voices
which lend an extraordinary grandeur and force to it.


Thank you Fog

Thank you Fog was published in 1974 posthumously. Auden wrote this volume of poems
after his return to England from America in 1972. The poems in this volume express Audens thrill
and happiness to be back home. As far as technique and style are concerned, this volume does not
show any remarkable departure from the earlier volumes.

Audens light verse includes light poems of social comment, Jazz Lyrics, The Blues, The
Ballads, Drinking Songs, etc.

To sum up, psychology was Audens predominant interest in the beginning, then Marxism
gained momentum and Marxian ideology strongly preoccupied him in Nineteen Thirties. Then
Auden began to realise that the totalitarian state deprived the individual of the freedom of thought
and expression. Hence, Auden was drawn towards liberal humanism resulting in declaration of war
against Fascism on an international plane. After 1939 he was gradually driven to Christianity and
ultimately he achieved a firm and unshakable faith in Christianity which unequivocally gets
manifest in his later works.












26
Chapter-III


LITERARY TRADITION: W.H. AUDENTHE TREND SETTER

The pronounced dramatic thrust of events in W. H. Audens period demanded a response
which had a more direct and specific connection with the actualities of social life than the abstract
and general response to the problems of their times we find among the poets of the preceding
decade. Audens attempt to confront the urgent and immediate challenges of the times compelled
him to react very sharply to the aesthetics prevalent in the preceding decade. His poetry, in fact,
could be seen as emerging in direct contrast to the poetry of hisimmediate predecessors. Unlike the
poets of the previous decade, Auden Group Auden being the trendsetter, assumed a radical
posture to counteract the unpleasant realities of the contemporary scene and refused to look upon art
as a sanctuary or safe haven from the turmoil, turbulence and decay of actual social life. Clifford
Dyment underlines the essential difference between the poets of the twenties and the thirties by
showing how the world outlooks or the perspectives in the two cases are significantly divergent. He
suggests that the poets of the nineteen-thirties commended Eliots achievements and were ready to
be benefited by the technical innovations introduced by him in the art of poetry, yet their world-
view was markedly different from religious outlook adopted by T. S. Eliot. They took note of
Eliots sharply critical picture of contemporary civilization, but they also recognised that this
criticism emanated, in large part, from distaste for vulgarity which as a man of cultivated sensibility
he saw around him. The younger poets felt that something more disturbing than vulgarity was
involved here. They also felt that withdrawal from contemporary scene was a mistake on Eliots
part.
1


Auden showed a radical concern for public issues. He did not allow his poetic talents to be
confined to the expression of his private anxieties. The poets of the twenties, on the other hand, felt
that there could be only a personal and private solution of the problem of spiritual sickness which
they saw around them. They brought to bear upon their survey of modern scene a spiritual outlook
which demanded from each individually a stance of transcendence and disengagement from the
spectacle of dreadful decay. They were least interested in changing the external social conditions
which, to them, were only a manifestation of the rottenness at the core of an individuals spiritual
being. This is evident from the following famous lines from Eliots The Waste Land:

What are the roots that clutch, what branches grow
Out of this stony rubbish? Son of man,
You can not say, or guess, for you know only,
A heap of broken images, where the sun beats
And the dead tree gives no shelter, the cricket no relief.
And the dry stone no sound of water.
2


The ideological thrust of Auden and the other prominent poets of the decadeStephen
Spender, C. Day Lewis and Louis MacNeice, on the other hand, was towards re-orientation of
society on leftist lines which would be an anathema to older poets like W.B.Yeats and T. S. Eliot for
whom recapturing of tradition, religion and mythical beliefs by the individual was the real answer.
This change in his social perspective determines the basic content of his poetry as well as the
manner of expression adopted by him. He acknowledged the overpowering sense of moral
confusion and spiritual uncertainty that had overtaken modern man, but they chose to take upon
themselves the specific task of investigating in to social causes that had led to this phenomenon.
Instead of limiting themselves to the expression of intense anguish and an ever growing sense of
27
desolation over a situation, which was visualised as an abstract and external catastrophe, they
believed in concrete action. The following lines of Stephen Spender illustrate the view point of
these poets:

Who live under the shadow of a war,
What can I do that matters?
My pen stops, and my laughter, dancing, stop
Or ride to a gap.
3


These lines suggest that Spender could visualise the approaching disaster of war even in
early thirties and could suggest a line of concrete action to meet the challenges. In contrast with the
theoretical approach adopted by the modernists of the twenties, who turned their back upon the
concrete social realities in their preoccupations with cultural and spiritual values, the poets of the
thirties came to grips with the down to earth realities of their times:

The hooters are blowing,
No heed let him take,
When baby is hungry
Ts best not to wake
Thy mother is crying
Thy dad is on the dole.
Two shillings a week is
The price of a soul.
4


Since the subject matter dealt directly with the day to day issues, the manner of expression
was also forthright and straightforward. The overall impact of social developments on the sensibility
of the Auden Group was reflected in their poetry with its full immediacy. Stephen Spender
highlights the difference in their approach in relation to that of the previous decade when he
suggests that the poets of 1920s appeared to be making a leap in the dark and their vision of
greatness of European past actually implied contempt and hatred for the present. Their emphasis on
tradition, according to him, was merely a projection of their hatred for fragmented modern
civilization and opposition to the whole ideas of progress. A conservative political stance was
implicit in their poetry and some of them went to the extent of looking upon the fascists as
supporters of tradition. As against this, the poets of the thirties incorporated in their vision an urgent
determination to uproot fascism. They considered it a necessary and immediate task for poetry to
become instrumental in the fulfilment of such an over riding social cause. Spender adds that the
poets of the thirties identified themselves completely with the pressing social cause of their time.
5


Critics like F.R.Leavis had reacted in their own way against the modernists
transcendentalist outlook on life. Like the modernists they too recognised the seriousness of the
crisis and felt deeply concerned about the decline and decay of cultural standards on account of the
spread of mass civilization. The awareness of contemporary crisis in the case of the Leavisites was
at least as acute as that of the modernists but instead of feeling merely baffled by the painful
dilemmas created by the modern conditions of living or finding easy solace in some religious
dogmas, they emphasised the need for strenuous moral resistance on the part of every sensitive
individual in defence of his humanity. They insisted on finding solutions to the problems and
actively advocated moral reform based on individual efforts. F.R.Leaviss scrutiny group aimed,
primarily at rescuing, through a collaborative effort, the moral, Intellectual and human values which
had come under threat on account of growing pressure of mass-civilization. Such a collaborative
effort was viewed by them as the minimum necessary assertion on the social plane for the fulfilment
of vital human needs of the sensitive elites. Leaviss position could be considered on the social
28
consciousness front as a step ahead of T.S. Eliot whose approach had centred on mysticism and
abstract spiritualism. The Leavisites, of course, advocated only individual effort to resolve the
prevalent crisis and stopped short of contemplating a directly political collective action.

Auden and his group not only attacked modernists for adopting a passively gloomy or
cynically bitter attitude towards the challenges posed by the contemporary society. They also
championed collective socio-political action as a remedy for the grave problems created by the
existing situation. Underlining the importance of active involvement in the social issues of the times
in the case of these poets, C.M. Bowra remarks, In the twentieth Century crowded as it is with
international and civil wars, social revolutions and awakening continents, vigorous and
comprehensive reappraisals of what man owes to himself became inevitable and the poets in such a
situation could hardly be expected to keep clear of politics or remain indifferent to public affairs
6
.
It is not surprising that in such objective circumstances Rex Warner, a poet of the thirties, should
sing songs of revolution:

Now you can join us, now all together sing all power
Not tomorrow but now in this hour, all power
To lovers of life, to workers, to the hammer, the sickle, the blood
Come then companions, this is the spring of blood,
Hearts hey-day, movement of masses, beginning of good.
7


Of course, in the twenties as well as the thirties, the poets were oppressed by an acute sense
of social disintegration and decay of civilization but there was a sharp distinction in the approaches
they adopted for reintegration and rejuvenation of the shattered contemporary civilization. The poets
of the thirties definitely had a more sharp awareness of the social factors which had generated this
crisis and were also guided by a firmer conviction in the need for collective intervention for the
purpose of meeting the challenges of the situation. The poets of twenties, on the other hand, showed
only a vague grasp of the social processes through which the crisis situation had emerged and the
interpretation of chaotic society they offered did not enjoin upon them the duty to make any
collective intervention on the political plane.

Thus, the prominent poets of the thirties W. H. Auden, Stephen Spender, C. Day Lewis and
Louis MacNeice-promptly responded to the major socio-political and economic developments of the
period and made a sincere attempt to grapple with the contemporary issues from a fresh angle.















29
Chapter-IV

CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF THE PRESCRIBED POEMS

1. Petition

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

SirAuden is addressing his prayer to someone may be god, the spirit of HomerLane or John
Layard
The supreme HealersThe use of the word is vague.
No man's enemyA friend to all
Forgiving allHe who forgives every body including the sinners.
ButExcept, (here) It is used to indicate that there is only one exception.
Be prodigal(here) To be kind and generous in excess
Power(here) Moral strength
LightWisdom
A Sovereign touchThe power of the Stuart kings of England, James-I, Charles-I and Charles-II to
cure even the incurable diseases by mere touch. They were called the supreme Healers.
Neural itchThe diseases of itching and neurosis-physical and mental diseases which according to
Auden and thinkers like Homer Lane and John Layard have psychological causes.
The exhaustion of weaningMental tiredness or nervous breakdown caused by weaning. 'Weaning'
in fact, is the process by which a child is taught to be fed by some other method than the breast-
feed. Here this term is used to denote the fact that over protection or excessive attachment to mother
may result in Mother Fixation or Oedipus complex which is a maladjustment, a kind of
psychological ailment.
DistortionsDeformity, deformation and act of distorting
The Liar's quinsyHomer Lane finds out lying as a cause of quinsy, which means sore throat.
Ingrown VirginityAn unmarried woman's desires for love, sex and child are repressed or remain
ungratifiedthese turn inwards and result in physical diseases like cancer. Auden's poem Miss
Gee is an excellent example of this.

Prohibit sharplyTo prevent strictly
The rehearsed responseRepeated reaction, (here) it suggests that repression of emotions results in
maladjustments in human psyche and consequently in a cowardly response to the realities of life
signifying escapist attitude.
Coward's stanceAn Escapist's behavior or attitude
Cover in time with beamsFind out by focusing the search lights on.
Those in retreatThose who fall a victim to defense mechanism- unable to face the challenges of
life and resorting to escape routes.
SpottedLocated
PublishTo give publicity to
At the end of drivesAt the end of the road
HarrowAnnihilate/destroy
The house of the dead (here) The old, decayed and rotten civilization
Look shining atTo shower blessings
New styles of architecture(here) New civilization or a new social set-up
A change of heartPsychological change.

30
Explanation The sonnet is addressed to 'Sir' who may either be God or the supreme Healers
the spirit of Homer Lane or of John Layard. The beginning of the poem is quite abrupt. The poem
opens with appreciation of "Sir" who forgives all and is enemy of none. Christian virtues of love
and charity are made manifest through imparting of the quality of friendliness and forgiveness to
Sir-the supreme Healers. This supreme Healer forgives all human beings except those who negate
God's will i.e. who commit the sin of repression of emotions which is the outcome of man's pride in
his own intellect and reasoning power. The sin is no doubt, unpardonable but the poet prays to "Sir"
or God to bestow human beings with strength and wisdom to avoid repression of desires and give
full expression to those desires so that they may not have to suffer psychological ailments.

Auden uses the imagery of sovereign touch; Stuart kings had the power of curing the
incurable disease by mere touch. Auden makes a prayer to God to bestow upon the human beings
some such remedy of sovereign touch, which may cure the psychological maladies of the modern
man. He attributes psychological causes to physical diseases. He shares the viewpoint of Homer
Lane and John Layard that psychological causes inhibition or repression in various forms cause
physical diseases which become manifest in " Intolerable" neural itch, over protection in childhood
may result in mother - fixation and suppression of natural physical desires may lead to mental as
wells as physical diseases. Sore throat, according to HomerLane, has a psychological origin.
Repressed sexual desires may lead to dangerous disease like cancer. In this way suppression or
repression of emotions causes widespread maladjustment in human psyche. Such psychologically ill
people show cowardly or unsatisfactory reactions to life and thus represent an escapist attitude.
Cowards are, in fact, those people who have been repressing their emotions constantly. They are
unable to face the challenges of life and like a coward seek ways to escape from the reality. Auden
prays to the supreme Healers or God to help these psychologically ill people in giving up their
distorted emotional responses and correct their escapist attitude to life. In fact, if a positive vision is
incorporated in themif they are brought out of their psychic ailment, with their fears shorn off, they
will develop positive outlook on life and there will be a definite change.

Auden prays to the supreme Healer to focus the search light on them without losing time. If
they are cured of their psychological malaise, they will turn back and return to life and will leave
disturbed attitude to reality. Such a reversal of attitude is, no doubt, difficult to bring about but the
Supreme Healer should do so before it is too late. Auden expresses the necessity of bringing forth
the public healers who live in country house or at the end of the road. He seems to instruct the
supreme healer and shows the urgency of replacing the old, decayed and rotten civilization with a
new social order. The poem, thus, points out Auden's faith in the necessity of a change of heart in
order to bring about a change in the existing social order.

Introduction First published in the Poems, 1930, the poem, 'Petition' signifies a transitional
phase in Auden's poetry. It is typical of Auden's psychological poetry wherein he seeks
psychological solutions to social maladies.


Summary The poet addresses some supreme power that forgives all human beings except those
who commit the sin of repression of emotions. He prays to Him to be kind enough to forgive the sin
of negation of His will and to bestow human beings with strength and wisdom to avoid repression of
desires and give full expression to their desires. The poet uses the imagery of sovereign touch.
Stuart kings of England were blessed with the power of curing the incurable diseases by mere touch.
Auden prays for such supreme remedy, which may cure the modern mans psychological malaises,
which are caused by repression of desires.

31
Auden, no doubt, endorses the view point of Homer Lane and John Layard in attributing
psychological causes to physical ailments inhibition or repression in various forms causes physical
diseases which become manifest in sore throat, intolerable neural itch, over-protection in childhood
may result in mother fixation and repressed sexual desires of a virgin result in dangerous diseases
like cancer. In this way suppression or repression of emotions causes widespread maladjustments in
human psyche. Such psychologically ill people project cowardly and unsatisfactory response or
reaction to life. Cowards are people with repressed emotions. They are unable to face life and like a
coward seek ways to escape from the truth or reality. They evolve a sort of defence mechanism
which represents an escapist attitude to life. Auden prays to the supreme healer to prohibit this
rehearsed response strictly and firmly. He prays to Him to help human beings to give up distorted
emotional responses and adopt a positive out look on life and its realities.

Rosenthal finds a genuinely religious component in Auden's writing, not only in the
Romantic prayer for the realisation of vision but also, often in an assumption of the existence of
God. This is seen, for instance, in the early 'Petition', which must be intoned like the Lord's prayer if
we are to get the real feel of it. Petition is a catch-all prayer in favour of every kind of regenerative
theory, all revolutionary innovations, every 'change of heart'. It wills that individuals be released
from the sick rigidities of our culture, expressed psychosomatically as 'the intolerable neural itch',
'the exhaustion of weaning, 'the liar's quinsy', 'the distortions of ingrown virginity'. Auden, in this
poem, brings together ideas derived from Marx, Lawrence, Homer Lane, Groddeck and other
'Healers'. He looks upon these figures as Moslem looks upon the Old Testament heroes, Jesus and
Mohammedas prophets of divinity whom the poem's opening lines address:

Sir, no man's enemy, forgiving all
But will its negative inversion be prodigal.
1


Auden makes a prayer to the supreme healer to focus the search light like a watchman on
those who are psychologically ill people trying to escape from facing the challenges of life without
losing time. If they are cured of their psychological malaise, they will turn back and return to life,
and thus, leave their distorted attitude to the realities of life. Such a reversal of attitude is, no doubt,
difficult to bring about but the supreme Healer should help the human beings to do so before it is
too late. For the accomplishment of this yeoman's task public healers, psychiatric healers (Homer
Lane, John Layard and others) should be brought to limelight.

The poem, thus, points out Auden's social awareness and his faith in the necessity of a
change of heart in order to bring about a new social order. This change of heart is brought about by
correcting emotional responses of the people to life. Early thirties marks a psychological phase in
Auden's creative output. Hence, in this poem he seeks psychological solutions to social maladies.

The poem makes a petition for a change of heart though Auden's mission remains a new
social set up. Rilkean sonnet characterized by assonance rather than rhyme helps the poet in
achieving organic unity and compact thought content. Auden's imagery in this poem is characteristic
of modernist imagery typical of T. S. Eliot and Allen Tate's poems. Images drawn from psychology-
'Sovereign's touch', images representing old rotten society and new social order are strikingly
unusual. The use of ambiguous phrases like Liar's quinsy signifying escapist attitude is
remarkable. Auden's belief in change and his adoption of psychological solutions to the maladies of
individual as well as society are successfully affirmed in this poem.

Though Auden did not include it in the Collected Shorter Poems, 1950 after giving it
reconsideration, yet as John Fuller points out, the poem is One of the most chronologically
diagnostic of Auden's poems. It is typical of Auden's early poetry, both in matter and manner.
2

.
32

Critical Appreciation W. H. Auden, in the early phase of his poetry, emphasizes the necessity
of a change of heart in order to bring about a new social order. In this poem, 'Petition' or 'Sir no
man's enemy forgiving all' (Oct., 1929) Auden advocates a change of heart through psychologically
curing the distorted emotional responses, which develop an escapist attitude to life. He makes a
Freudian investigation into the causes of maladies and underlines that external illness is due to
internal maladjustments in the form of prolonged repression of natural urges. Hence, he advocates
free expression of natural desires to evolve healthy personalities. Inhibition or repression in various
forms causes physical diseases like sore throat and cancer and Intolerable neural itch, etc. Over
protection in childhood may result in mother-fixation and suppression of desires may result in
maladjustments in human psyche. Such psychologically ill people project a cowardly or
unsatisfactory reaction or response to life.

If a positive vision is incorporated in the escapist or psychologically ill people and if they
are brought out of their ailment with their fears shorn off, they will develop positive out look which
will lead to a change of heart and which will further lead to a change in the social set-up. Such a
reversal of attitude is, no doubt, difficult to bring about but it is not impossible. Auden prays to the
supreme Healer that it is high time to:

Prohibit sharply the rehearsed response,
And gradually correct the coward's stance
Cover in time with beams those in retreat.

The poet suggests that psychological cure of individual psychic imbalances may further
help in changing the existing social order. Under the dramatic thrust of socio-economic and political
events establishment of new social order is an immediate issue, which Auden takes up in this poem.
This sonnet characterized by assonance helps the poet in effectively achieving organic unity and
compact thought content. A Suggestion of complete change is made manifest through concrete
images. Images drawn from psychology 'Sovereign's touch', 'images representing old rotten society
and new social order', 'the house of the dead' and 'new styles of architecture' respectively are
strikingly unusual. Though, ambiguity in phrases like liar's quinsy', coward's stance is definitely
there but his imagery in this poem is characteristic of modernist imagery represented by T. S. Eliot's
and Allen Tate's poems. The poet has used Freudian terms 'exhaustion of weaning', 'distortions of
ingrown virginity' to diagnose individual as well as social maladies.

In the ultimate analysis the poet suggests psychotherapy or psychological solutions to
individual as well as social maladies. Unlike his predecessors Auden does not merely present the
chaotic situation and watch the decay passively, he also condemns the escapist attitude and is in
strong favour of concrete changes in the existing social set-up.

John Bayleys remarks are most befitting in this context, Auden combines an intense
interest in the human heart with a desire to reform society and he thinks our psychological ills
greater than our political. He is convinced of the urgent need for mental therapy, he believes that the
spread and assimilation of the feelings of psychology can help society towards health he is sure that
such action is morally desirable
3
.

Auden's desire for the establishment of a new social order, his attitude regarding positive
outlet to be given to the natural desires, his reaction against repression of desires and inhibitions,
imperceptibly inherited from the then middle class culture, his anti-authoritarian approach reflected
in his condemnation of parental over-protection reflected in Mother Fixation, his condemnation of
escapist attitude of people, his positive vision of incorporation of hope into escapists by curing them
of their fixations, his obsessions, etc. demonstrate his social awareness but Auden's faith in the
33
necessity of a change of heart in order to bring out a new social order, his invocations to the
supreme Healer, then to the Healers, his reference to the magic touch of king reveal his orthodox
views and a change of heart approach suggests individualistic solutions and hence, the poem finally
brings out Auden's radicalised middle-class liberals perspective.

Essay-Type Questions:
1. Petition represents psycho-analytical phase of W. H. Audens early poetic career.
Comment.
2. Write down critical appreciation of the poem, Petition.
Write short notes on the following:
1. Audens versification in the poem, Petition.
2. Imagery in the poem, Petition.















34

2. MUSEE DES BEAUX ARTS

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Musee Des Beaux ArtsThe museum of fine arts situated in Brussels. Auden visited this museum
in 1938 during his winter sojourn. This visit gave him inspiration to compose the given poem.

The old mastersThe ancient painters like Brueghel, an Italian painter, 1520-69.
Its human positionThe place and significance of individual suffering in the scheme of things.
It (here) Individual suffering
Dully alongWalking along in an aimless or causal manner, strolling.

Explanation In this poem, the poet uses the imagery of Brueghels paintings to bring out the
theme of suffering inherent in human condition and human apathy to individual suffering. The poet
begins the poem in a dramatic manner. At the very outset, he states that the conception of ancient
artists regarding individual suffering was quite logical. They rightly understood the nature of human
suffering and correctly painted it in their works of art. They were sensitively responsive to the place
and significance of individual suffering inherent in human condition in the scheme of things. They
opined that suffering is an integral part of human life. It may happen to an individual at any time
when some other individuals are busy in performing their routine activities like eating meals,
opening a window or walking along in a casual manner.

Words-Meanings and the Explanatory Notes:
The aged The old
Reverently Respectfully, religiously
Passionately Eagerly
Miraculous birth Birth of Christ
Skating on a pond Playing games such as skating, etc.
Martyrdom The crucifixion of Christ
UntidyDirty
The torturers horse The executioners horse

Explanation After defining the real position of suffering in human life, the poet points out that
the routine activities continue in life in spite of individual suffering. The world at large remains
indifferent to individual suffering. In this stanza he gives examples of two paintings of Brueghel to
bring out the general indifference of humanity towards individual suffering. He refers to the first
painting The Numbering at Bethlehem, which depicts the birth of Christ at Bethlehem. He says
that on the one side, the old people are religiously praying and are eagerly waiting for the
miraculous birth of Christ and strangely enough, on the other side, the children are playing as usual.
They are busy in their activities like skating on a pond at the boundary of the jungle. The lines
depict that the world is apathetic even to the unusual events like the birth of Christ. Here, the poet
makes a searching observation on the subject of human apathy to extraordinary events like the birth
of Christ through the contrast of the aged and the children.

Again, the poet reinforces his idea mentioned in the beginning that the ancient painters
understood the real position of suffering in life i.e. inevitability and the general indifference towards
it. The poet validates this point by introducing details about a painting of Brueghel which depicts
the Crucifixion of Christ. The poet points out that the ancient painters knew that even a great tragic
event like Christs crucifixion is just a usual occurrence for the world. The painting displays that
35
Christ is being crucified in a secluded corner in an untidy place. In another corner the executioners
horse is rubbing its back against a tree quite unconcerned. The dogs are leading their doggy life and
are not even the least bothered about the tragic incident. In this manner the poet underlines the
indifferent attitude of the worldly creatures to the sufferings of an individual.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Brueghels IcarusOne of the most original and most popular paintings of Brueghel, an Italian
painter of 16
th
Century.
For instance For Example
Leisurely In an easy manner
Ploughmen Farmer
The disaster The misfortune, (here) the fall of Icarus.
Splash (here) The sound of Icarus falling into the sea
The Forsaken cry The painful and miserable cry
Expensive Costly
Delicate Soft, fine
Amazing Wonderful/surprising
Icarus According to Greek mythology, Daedalus was an artist who made the Cretan Labyrinth (a
maze). In order to get out of it, he designed wings of wax for his son Icarus and himself. Icarus who
was excessively ambitious flew too near the sun and fell to death when the waxen wings melted.
Icarus is quoted as an example of excessive ambition bringing about an inglorious fall but here in
this poem the poet (Auden) uses Brueghels Icarus pictured in painting as an illustration of central
argument of his poem i.e. as a symbol of individual suffering.

Explanation These are the concluding lines of the poem. Here, the poet refers to another
painting of Brueghel titled Fall of Icarus, which is built round the theme that excessive ambition
brings about an inglorious down fall. According to Greek mythology, daedalus was an artist who
made the Cretan Labyrinth (a maze). In order to get out of it he designed wings of wax for his son
Icarus and himself. Icarus in a fit of ambition flew too near the sun and fell to his death when the
waxen wings melted. Icarus is quoted as an example of excessive ambition bringing about an
inglorious downfall. The poet uses Brueghels painting of Icarus as an illustration of the statement
he has made at the opening of the poem that the old masters of art understood correctly the position
of human suffering in this world. In the painting, Icarus is shown to be falling from above down into
the sea. But everything appears to be indifferent to this happening. It appears to be diverting away
from the tragedy in a leisurely manner. The farmers working on their fields must have heard the
sound and his agonising miserable cry but they did not bother because for them it was not an
important event. The sun kept on shining as usual unconcerned about the fall. Its rays rather fell on
Icaruss white legs which were fast disappearing into the green water of the ocean. The crew of the
costly and delicate ship must have observed a boy falling out of the sky as something wonderful-a
miracle and remained indifferent to the tragic fall. The ship was in a hurry to reach its destination.
So it kept on its voyage calmly without showing any concern for the misfotune of Icarus.

These lines give details of the setting or the background against which Icarus is shown
falling into the sea. The ploughmen, the sun and the ship all are shown going about their own
business, turning leisurely away from the disaster of the young boy falling into the sea. The words
turn away and leisurely are highly ironic, so too are the phrases not an important failure and
sailed calmly on. What is remarkable about Audens description of these items is his deliberately
36
level tone, which makes the irony all the more sharp. The cold indifference of life to an individual is
sharply evoked. Both humanity and nature are indifferent to individual suffering.

Introduction W. H. Auden visited Musee Des Beaux Arts (The Museum of Fine Arts) in 1938
during his winter sojourn in Brussels. In this museum he came across three beautiful paintings of
Brueghel, an Italian painter of 16
th
Century. Deeply inspired by those paintings Auden composed
one of his most celebrated short lyrical pieces entitled Musee Des Beaux Arts (The Museum of
Fine Arts) in December, 1938. Brueghels paintings transported Auden from the world of art into
his own world of complexities and enabled him to confront the reality in a fresh manner. The
thought content in the three paintingsThe Numbering at Bethleham, The Massacre of the
Innocents and Fall of Icarus motivated him to envisage the central argument of the poem. The
poet uses the imagery of Brueghels paintings as an objective co-relative to demonstrate the
universal nature and timelessness of the themeindividual suffering versus human apathy.



Summary Auden begins his one of the most celebrated short lyrics Musee Des Beaux Arts by
extolling the ancient painters like Brueghel. At the very outset, he states that the concept of the
ancient artists regarding individual suffering was quite rational, they rightly understood the nature
of human suffering and correctly painted it in their paintings. They opined that suffering is inherent
in human condition. This view pictured in their paintings motivated Auden to make a moving
observation on suffering. The poet points out that the routine activities continue in life in spite of
individual suffering. The world at large remains indifferent to individual suffering. The poet uses
imagery from Brueghels paintings to validate his own view point. He refers to the first painting
The Numbering at Bethleham, which depicts the birth of Christ at Bethleham. He pinpoints that
old people are sincerely praying and are eagerly waiting for the miraculous birth, whereas, children
are playing and doing activities like skating, etc. Childrens apathy shows general indifference to the
unusual events like the birth of Christ.

The poet reinforces his idea of inevitability of suffering and the general indifference to it by
introducing another illustration. He, again, refers to Brueghels painting The Massacre of
Innocents which precisely depicts the crucifixion of Christ. The painting displays that Christ is
being crucified in a corner in an untidy place, while in another corner, the executioners horse is
rubbing its back against a tree and the dogs are leading their doggy life. Even a great tragic event
like Christs crucifixion is a usual occurrence for the worldly creatures.

The poet concludes the poem by referring to another painting of Brueghel entitled Fall of
Icarus which is built round the theme that excessive ambition brings about an inglorious down fall.
Auden uses Brueghels painting as an illustration of the central argument of this poem. In this
painting Icarus was shown to be falling from above down into the sea. No body took notice of this
tragic incident. The ploughman did not consider it an important event so he did not bother about his
cry of pain, the sun shone as usual, its rays were falling on his white legs, which were disappearing
in to the green water of the sea and the crew of the costly and delicate ship, which sailed calmly on
without showing any concern to the misfortunes of Icarus, must have observed a boy falling out of
the sky as some thing wonderful and remained indifferent to the tragic fall. All these illustrations
ironically bring to sharp focus the intended effect and establish the fact that humanity and nature are
indifferent to individual suffering.


Critical Appreciation W.H. Auden successfully and systematically develops the theme of
indifference of humanity and nature to the individual suffering with the help of imagery of
Brueghels paintings. The strength of the poem lies in the searching and moving observation it
37
makes on human suffering. The poem shows the poets awareness of the fact of human apathy to
individual suffering. The poets keen observation, profound perception and deep insight go a long
way in bringing his viewpoint to the forefront.

The poet opines that individual tragedy is insignificant in the scheme of Nature and the
world. At the very outset of the poem he states that the great painters correctly depicted the place
and significance of individual suffering in the scheme of things. They knew that the routine
activities will continue in spite of suffering on individual plane. Nature and humanity at large are
pathetically indifferent to it. Whatever be the depth or magnitude of the individual suffering, the
world moves on callously with its routine activities.

Audens in-depth analytical insight into the art of painting makes him discern ironically the
underlying human indifference to suffering through the contrast of age and childhood. In
Brueghels Numbering at Bethleham the poet uses contrasting images by making the old anxiously
and eagerly waiting for the miraculous birth which further symbolises bright future expectations and
by presenting the children who ignore the incident and keep on playing. The ironical sting is
discernible in the expectations of the old and the indifference of the children. Usually the young
look to the future (like the rebirth of Christ) with sanguine expectation and the old are indifferent
and passive about future. The reversal, here, is highly ironical.

Again the poet shows the indifference of Nature to the most momentous of human suffering
through another painting of Brueghel namely, The Massacre of Innocents. On the one hand, Christ
is being crucified in a secluded corner and on the other hand, the executioners horse is rubbing its
back against a tree quite unconcerned. The dogs are leading their doggy life and are not even the
least bothered about crucifixion. The poet evokes the desired effect by contrasting images embodied
in clear phraseology.

there always must be
Children who did not specially want it to happen, skating
On a pond at the edge of the wood:

Contrasted against the aged who are reverently passionately waiting for the miraculous
birth and the image of crucifixion of Christ contrasted against the dogs go on with their doggy life
and the torturers horse scratches its innocent behind on a tree. Again, the painting of the fall of
Icarus is representative of individual suffering and the apathy of the world to it. The agonising cry
of Icarus as he fell into the ocean and the indifference of the ploughmen for whom it was not an
important failure, Natures apathy depicted through the sun rays callously falling on his white legs
disappearing into the green water of the sea and the callous indifference of the crew and the ship,
which sailed calmly on when Icarus fell. All these details project an insight into the distortions in
the egocentricity and self-love of the modern man. Ironically the tragedy took place in idyllic
surroundings but no body took notice of it. In the existing scheme of things individual suffering fails
to evoke poignant emotions and hence, it becomes irrelevant. The conspicuous predominance of
other things in Icarus paintingthe ploughman, the sun shine, the ship painted in the minute
details and the faint image of disappearing legs, through contrast shows that individual suffering is
like a speck in the vast world phenomenon and therefore, insignificant.

Audens keen eye penetrates beneath the surface to extract the inner response from the
painting. Finally, the poem turns out to be a bitter ironic condemnation of human indifference to
individual sufferingusually people remain busy in their own activities without showing a concern
for the suffering of others.

38
Though apparently the poem shows Audens digging at the selfish nature of human beings,
condemnation of typically selfish English attitude and thereby reveals his broad social perspective
that he wants people to show empathy or sympathy to suffering. The poem indirectly suggests the
poets deep concern for the anguish of the lonely suffering individual also. The very theme of the
poemindividual predicament versus human apathy exposes Audens radicalised middle-class
liberals sensibility. He raises the issue of human apathy to individual suffering which shows his
progressive temperament in the sense that he wishes to develop community feelings among people
but the treatment of the issue shows that his bourgeois concern for the individual simmers beneath
the universality of the poem. The poem unfolds Audens personal crisis towards the end of the
decade when his revolutionary enthusiasm was at its lowest ebb and he was passing through a
transitional phase. The poem with its supple argument, conversational tone and melody leaves an
indelible imprint on the readers mind.

The poem, thus, shows Audens sliding perceptively into a phase where he is more and
more inwardly inclined. He seems to seek private vision of the happiness of the individual through
projection of a public reality.

Essay-Type Questions:
1. Attempt a critical appreciation of the poem, Musee Des Beaux Arts.
2. What is the theme of the poem, Musee Des Beaux Arts.
Or
Illustrate with examples the theme of Individuality in the poem, Musee Des Beaux.
Write short notes on the following:
1. Write about the indifference of Nature and humanity to individual suffering.
2. Role of Brueghels paintings in the poem.
3. Audens Technique in the poem.




















39
3. O what is that sound


Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Thrills excites
Scarlet Soldiers Soldiers dressed in scarlet coloured uniforms.

Explanation This poem apparently deals with the theme of violence, betrayal of love and
patriotism but a deeper scrutiny brings out a juncture when the lovers are placed in a situation where
he has to make a choice between his love and the cause he represents. In the given lines the
intrusion of soldiers into the private lives makes the beloved extremely anxious and she shares it
with her lover and the lover quite casually and complacently replies to her queries. The beloved
listens to the sound of the arrival of the soldiers. She (here) tells her lover that she is listening to the
thrilling sound of the drum beating down in the valley. She wants to know about this from her lover.
In a very casual and complacent manner her lover replies that the sound that she hears is the sound
of the movement of the soldiers around the village. Soldiers who are dressed up in Scarlet uniforms
are marching on.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Flashing Glinting/blazing/sparkling
The sun on their weapons The sunlight reflected by their weapons.

Explanation Then the beloved sees very bright and clear light flashing at a distance. She wants
to know about this clear and bright light. Her lover replies to her query in the same casual tone and
complacent manner. He says that the soldiers are moving slowly forward and the bright light
actually is the sunlight reflected by their weapons.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Gear Weapons, armour
Manoeuvre (here) exercise
Warning (here) Warning the enemy by wielding weapons

Explanation The theme is built up through a series of questions and in the given lines question
answer series continues. The beloved on seeing the marching scarlet soldiers asks her lover what
those soldiers are doing with their weapons. She further asks what they are doing there in the
morning equipped with their armour. The lover affectionately consoles his beloved by satisfying her
queries in a casual manner. He tells her that they are doing their usual exercise or practice and there
is nothing serious. He further tells her that perhaps they are giving a sort of warning to the enemy.
The lines reveal the beloveds anxiety to find the fact that the scarlet soldiers are equipped with
armour and have visited the village in the morning time. The lines unfold the lovers concern for his
beloved also as he wants to comfort his beloved by saying that there is nothing serious.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Wheeling Turning
Kneeling Bending down on knees to observe better or may be to make prayer to the Almighty.

Explanation The beloveds eyes are fixed on scarlet soldiers. Now she observes their next
move. Her observation gets reflected in the next question which she puts to her lover. She anxiously
asks why the soldiers have left the road they were following. She further asks with repeated
emphasis on last word of the second line why they are turning in a particular direction. The lover, as
40
usual, replies in a causal tone that the soldiers are turning to a particular direction because there
must be a change in the orders from the authorities. The lover observes that his beloved is kneeling
so he asks her why she is doing so. The repetition of the word wheeling by the beloved suggests
intensity of emotions and urgency of the situation. She is shown kneeling which brings two
explanations for this act in the readers mind-she either bends on knees to observe the scenario
better or she, in her anxiety and fear of the intrusion of the scarlet soldiers in their private life,
kneels down to offer her prayers to the Almighty. The lover, however, is not in a position to
understand her particular behaviour.
Words-Meanings and the Explanatory Notes:

The doctor The famous doctor in the village
Forces Soldiers

Explanation The observation of the beloved is acute enough. She is minutely observing the
marching soldiers. She finds that they have stopped near the house of the village doctor. She fears
that some one must have got injured and the doctors help is being sought. They have stopped near
the doctors house probably they have stopped their horses there to seek the doctors help for the
injured. She asks a question in this regard from her lover as if to confirm that her fears are genuine.
But the lover, on the other hand, tells her that there is nothing serious and none of the soldiers has
got wounded meaning thereby that her fears are false and that she shouldnt be anxious. The lines
reveal the beloveds anxiety and the lovers consolations to her. These help in building up the theme
through anxiety on the one part and the emotional support on the other.


Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Parson clergyman

Explanation The beloved notices that the scarlet soldiers have stopped near parsons house.
She thinks that the soldiers perhaps want the parson of the village who is an old parson. She asks
from her lover about this to reassure herself that she is right but underneath her apparent uncertainty
lurks the fears associated with the soldiers. The lover again consoles his beloved by telling her that
the soldiers have not stopped to find the parson or to do him any harm but they are just passing by
his gate. They have not gone into his house. The series of anxious questions and casual responses
help to build the main theme.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Farmer Particular farmer in the village
Cunning Crafty/artful
Farm The land used for cultivation/the field

Explanation In the given lines the beloved refers to the village farmers house. She observes
that the scarlet soldiers, with their glinting weapons, have stopped at the crafty farmers house. The
farmers house is quite near and the beloved gets worried about herself and her lover also. She
thinks that the soldiers may intrude into the farmers house. But again the lover tells her that they
have moved past the farm and have started running. With these words the soldier lover prepares
himself to go and respond to the call of duty.






41
Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Deceiving False, (here) the repetition of this word unfolds the intensity of the beloveds
emotions, her fears, her anxieties and sense of horror at the sight of the scarlet soldiers. She is afraid
that her lover will desert her.
But I must be leaving (here) The soldier lover is telling his beloved that he must go and do his
duty towards larger community.

Explanation The lover in these lines prepares to go and respond to the call of duty. The beloved
who is already extremely anxious and afraid is at a loss to understand the situation. The lover, who
was earlier consoling her with his casual, brief and comforting words suddenly decides to leave her.
She pleads with him to stay with her. She reminds him of the oaths of love which he had taken and
promises which he had made. But the lover has to go. He is not oblivious of his promises of love but
he is caught in such a situation where he has to make a definite choice between two alternatives-
between his individual love i.e. love for his beloved and the cause which he represents. The
predominance of public concern over the individual one is made explicit in these lines, in the lovers
favourable response to political expediency in the face of individual love and faith. The lines also
bring out Audens pragmatic view of love which can bear the pangs of separation and can achieve
the heights of love for a larger community and there by reflects his social perspective. Audens anti-
escapist approach also comes to fore, as in spite of his beloveds earnest pleas and his own promises
of love for her, nothing can prevent him from responding to the pressures of public duty.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes.
Splintered Broken into pieces

Explanation This is the concluding stanza of the poem. The beloved finally observes them
breaking upon the door of their house to enter into it and take away the soldier lover who is an
honest rebel. She can hear them breaking the lock first and then the door and then she observes that
they have turned towards the soldier stamping the floor with their heavy shoes.

There is anger in their eyes and they have come to catch her soldier lover. These observations
put an end to her queries as the soldier lover makes the final choice and runs away to join his army.
The scarlet soldiers violently smash their locked door and here the climax of the poem is reached
rapidly enough as at this juncture the lover makes the final choice. The emotional outbursts of the
beloved at the sudden developments in the situation are deep enough and reflect the effect of forces
of public events intervening into the private lives.

Introduction O what is that sound is a lyrical ballad. It was originally called The Quarry. It
was written in Oct., 1932 and was first published in December 1934 in New Verse. It was later
included in Audens Collected Poems, 1950. It is written in traditional ballad stanza and comprises
all the traditional elements of this genre. Its easy and simple diction corresponds well with its form
and beautifully conveys the poets view point in a conversational manner.

Summary The poem dramatically begins with a dialogue between two lovers. The situation in
which these lovers are placed is definitely tense, full of passionate outbursts, implications and
suspense. In a village setting Auden builds up the theme of the poem with a series of questions and
answers.

The beloved listens to the thrilling sound of the scarlet soldiers slowly approaching. She
wants to know about the bright light flashing so clearly over the distance and comes to know that
the bright light is actually the sunlight reflected by the weapons with which the soldiers are
42
equipped. She expresses anxiety over their presence in the village in the morning. The lover
affectionately consoles her by telling her that there is nothing serious. The soldiers are doing their
routine exercise or perhaps they are giving a warning to the enemy. Again she gets confused to see
them wheeling and kneels down. The lover satisfies her confusion by telling her that the soldiers
must have received some new order from the authorities. The lover, however, is not in a position to
understand the act of her keeling down. She either does so to observe the scene of scarlet soldiers
better or fears lead her to kneel in prayer to the Almighty. Then she finds them passing by the house
of the doctor, the parson and the farmer three important figures of village. Suddenly she finds
them knocking at door of their house and then immediately the lover decides to go from there. The
beloved pleads with him:

O where are you going? Stay with me here!
Were the vows you swore deceiving, deceiving?

But the lover gives her false consolations:

I promised to love you, dear,
But I must be leaving.

The lover, who throughout this poem kept on consoling her with his casual, brief and
comforting words in the two concluding stanzas, suddenly decides to leave her in spite of her
insistent requests.

Audens lover makes his final choice in favour of his duty. He is not oblivious of his
promises of love but he is caught in a situation where he has to make a choice between his love and
the cause he represents. The poem focuses on the emotional state of the lovers and the urgency of
the situation in a village setting. The poem begins quite dramatically and reaches a rapid climax.

Audens main aim seems to be to build a situation and an atmosphere a romantic situation
and an emotionally charged atmosphere, yielding forth his peculiar view point through the dialogues
of two lovers. He successfully builds up the theme through contrast the hurry and anxiety on the
part of the beloved and brief and composed replies of the lover and the contrast of individual love
and political expediency. Though openly Auden advocates the public issue, the private concerns
continue lurking beneath the texture of the poem. Nonetheless, Auden manages to place the public
concern above the private one in this poem. His final emphasis on the lovers choice in favour of
duty, in spite of his intensity of love for his beloved and his freedom to serve larger community
even at the cost of individual love represent his active social phase.

Critical Appreciation O what is that sound is a lyrical ballad comprising all the traditional
elements of the genre. It is written in the traditional ballad stanza and easy and simple diction which
corresponds well with its form and which further helps in conveying the poets viewpoint in a
conversational language.

The poem presents an emotionally charged situation - a situation which is definitely tense
and is full of implications and suspense. Apparently the poem deals with the theme of violence,
betrayal of love and patriotism. Spears points out that in the early Thirties nightmare image of
soldiers brutally intruding upon private citizens was common. The pattern of the dialogue is of rapid
questions by the woman in the hurried anapaestic beat and ending with the word repeated, as
though, in horrified unbelief answered by the man in briefer lines laconically and deceptively
unemotional. The following words, which Auden puts into the beloveds mouth, affirm Spears
view point:

O where are you going? Stay with me here!
Were the vows you swore deceiving, deceiving?
43

A close scrutiny brings out the final choice of the lover in favour of a call for duty. Audens
lover is not oblivious of his promises of love but he is caught in a situation where he has to make a
choice between his love and the cause which he represents. The lovers choice in favour of duty is
unavoidable; hence, his betrayal may be termed as thoughtful and calculated.

The lovers final decision to respond to the call of duty enables the poet to build the theme
of social commitment by presenting a contrast between private love and situational urgency. The
pressures of private concerns beneath the manifest social concerns are clearly discernible in
expressions denoting the approaching thumping march of the scarlet soldiers, the beloveds
passionate reactions to these as well as to the lovers false consolations:

I promised to love you, dear,
But I must be leaving.

Here, the final emphasis on the lovers choice in favour of duty in spite of his intensity of
love for his beloved and his freedom to serve a larger community at the cost of individual love
represent Audens active social phase.

The poem, thus, expresses a dextrous fusion of private and public vision where the concern
of Audens lover for the public issues weighs far above his private individual love for his beloved.
The predominance of public concern over the individual one is made explicit in the lovers
favourable response to the political expediency in the face of love and faith, and the thematic pattern
romantic lovers placed in a situation which calls for action for a larger community brings out
Audens pragmatic view of love, which can bear the pangs of separation and can achieve the heights
of love for a larger community, reflects Audens social prospective. Audens anti-escapist approach
also comes to fore, as in spite of his beloveds earnest pleas and anxieties, he does not find love
tempting enough to prevent him from responding to the pressures of the public events.

The poem also reveals the poets fear of public events menace of violence intruding upon
the private lives. The vocabulary - marching thumping soldiers, scarlet soldiers and the beloveds
emotional reactions at their sight represent the forces of public events intervening into the private
lives of the people. The repetition of the last word in the second line of each stanza underlines the
sense of urgency in the central situation of the poem. The intensity of the ladys emotions her
fears, her anxiety at the sight of approaching scarlet soldiers is deep enough. But the call of duty for
a cause is all the more intense and puts an emphasis on the urgency of making a definite choice.
Auden, here, champions the public cause and not the romantic escape into the emotional love of his
beloved.

The simple form of the poem helps in conveying the poets viewpoint in an effective
manner. The poem, however, is remarkable for its lyricism-a characteristic of traditional ballad.
Simplicity of language, clarity of expression and richness of vocabulary are strikingly noticeable in
the poem. Auden successfully builds up the theme through the device of contrast the hurry and
anxiety on the part of the beloved and brief and composed replies of the lover and the contrast of
individual love and political expediency and social love. The simple ballad form is aptly suited to
make the message insistent and the urgency of its repetitions and tone sharp enough to reinforce the
gravity and horror of the situation.

On the other hand, Audens projection of his lover giving casual and complacent replies to
his beloveds anxious and restless queries show that the lover wants to comfort his beloved by
saying that there is nothing serious. This shows that Audens lover is torn between public and
private anxieties. Though openly he advocates the public issue, the private concerns continue
44
lurking beneath the texture of the poem. Nonetheless, Auden manages to place his public concerns
above the private ones in his poem.

Essay-Type Questions:
1. Trace the development of thought in the poem, O what is that Sound.
2. Write down the theme of the poem, O what is that sound.
3. Write down the critical appreciation of the poem.
4. O what is that Sound is a manifestation of Audens active social phase.
Write short notes on the following:
1. Audens concept of love.
2. Individual love versus situational urgency or social love.























45

4. September 1, 1939


Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Dives Bars, taverns
Fifty second street A part of NewYork city
Uncertain and afraid Fearful of inevitable war and not sure about future
Clever hopes The hopes which were built-up as a result of negotiations with Hitler and
Mussolini.
Low dishonest decade The decade of Thirties from 1930-40 was dishonest because the
compromise was made with dictators like Hitler and Mussolini who were bound to ditch.
Waves of anger and fear Anger at the aggression on Poland and fear of attack.
Bright and darkened lands The nations which were untouched by war and the nations where
clouds of war were looming large.
Unmentionable odour of death A vague uncertain feeling of impending death
Offend - To cause injury, to hurt

Explanation The poem was written on the date when Hitler attacked Poland. At this juncture,
the poet was in the U.S.A. He was sitting in one of the bars in the Fifty second street in NewYork.
He was afraid of the imminent war and uncertain about future because the thirties decade had
proved to be dishonest because dishonest efforts were made to reach a compromise with Germany
knowing very well that a compromise with dictators like Hitler and Mussolini was meaningless.
There were feelings of anger and fear everywhere. The countries which were yet untouched by war
and those where war clouds were looming large were equally disturbed. The fear of impending war
and the resultant death intruded into the private lives of the people also. As Hitler attacked Poland
on 1
st
September, 1939, there was a vague uncertain feeling that death or destruction was close by.
In the above lines Auden has expressed his sense of disillusionment.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Accurate scholarship Appropriate knowledge
Unearth Reveal
Offence Crime
Luther The father of Protestantism who initiated the process of disintegration of Christendom
into separate states.
Linz Birth place of Hitler, (here) the place is mentioned to refer to the insults and injustices
suffered by Hitler in his boyhood.
Imago Final stage of evolution of an insect. Here, it is used for fully grown up Hitler.
psychopathic god A person who is abnormal. Here, the expression refers to Hitler assuming such
behaviour because of the psychological injuries he had suffered earlier.

Explanation In these particular lines the poet investigates into the causes of war. He grapples
retrospectively with the issue. Auden points out that an appropriate study of history will reveal the
true cause of the offence which created upheaval in German nation. The study will reveal that
Luther, the father of Protestantism began the process of disintegration of Christendom into separate
states. With the result, Germany was separated from Roman Empire. The adult Hitler caught the
spark German nationalism became a madness with him and he burned with a desire to acquire
absolute power. The poet holds injustices and insults suffered by Hitler in his boyhood responsible
for his behaviour and fascist tendencies responsible for the eventuality. Here the poet underlines that
46
it is a known fact that the school life is formative period for the children. Their behaviour and
manners are moulded and given orientation at schools. Those who are treated harsh and taught evil
become harsh and evil when they grow. Thus, Auden provides Freudian psycho-analysis for Hitlers
behaviour and attributes it to the psychological injuries done to him in his boyhood.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Exiled Thucydides A Greek historian condemned as traitor and so sent into exile for 20 years.
Elderly Rubbish Non sense spoken gravely
Apathetic grave (here) Indifferent and insensitive people
Enlightenment Knowledge / awareness
Habit forming pain Suffering to which one becomes habitual
Mismanagement Improper administration.

Explanation In the given lines the poet refers to Thucydides, a Greek historian who was
condemned as a traitor and was exiled for 20 years. Thucydides analysed the nature of democracy
and the fact that the dictators have exploited and twisted the principles of democracy to suit their
selfish ends. They give nonsensical speeches gravely and continue to deceive people because the
people are indifferent and passive. They are devoid of wisdom and knowledge. They have accepted
the status quo. They have become habitual, taking suffering in their stride. It is as if it were a habit
forming pain, a routine matter. They have become dead to rational thinking and have lost their
sensitivity. The poet concludes this stanza by pointing out that the masses are going to suffer due to
their irrationality, insensitivity and apathy and the improper administration of the politicians and
leaders. In these lines, Auden indirectly underlines the need for public awakeningif the masses
are wide awake they can interrogate the administration. Ignorance of masses, Auden discerns, is a
negative point and in his observations lie leftist leanings.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Neutral air The reference is to the U.S.A. which appeared neutral in the early stages of war.
Sky scrapers Multi-storeyed high buildings in New York
Proclaim Declare
Collective Man The state, the establishment, society
Competitive excuse Different countries compete with each other in justifying their actions and
giving lame excuses for the predicament of common man.
Euphoric dream False dreams of healthy and happy life
Imperialism Policy of extending a countrys empire and influence
International wrong The wrongs done by America to the other countries of the world.

Explanation W. H. Auden was sitting in a bar on the Fifty Second street in New York. In this
stanza he makes his observations about America and other capitalist countries. He points out that
Americas fake neutrality gets exposed in sky scrapers and pseudo talks of Collective Man and
speaks volumes for the hypocrisy of capitalist countries. Such countries compete with each other
justifying their own actions and giving lame excuses for the causes of human predicament but the
reality is other wise. Their false promises of a happier, healthier and brighter life are soon broken
when the true face of imperialism is unveiled. Auden, here, compares the tall buildings and other
reflections of collective power to the mirror in which human beings can clearly see the true face of
imperialism and the wrongs which have been done by so-called neutral countries to the other
countries of the world.

47
In these lines W. H. Auden makes an effort to discover the maladies in the American
capitalist system and he uses significantly Marxist vocabularyImperialism, competition and
Collective Man, etc. He brings out the hypocrisy of capitalist countries. He underlines the fact that
capitalist countries give individual freedom and indirectly encourage the spirit of competition
between unequals which results in exploitation of different weaker nations by stronger ones.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Faces along the bar Ordinary people in the bar
Average day Daily routine
Conventions Routine activities
Conspire Make a secret plot
This fort Refers to the bar, which protects the people like a fort.
The furniture of home Comfort and security of home
Lost in haunted wood Lost in horror and darkness of jungle
The night (here) It refers to uncertain and unknown future

Explanation Auden feels that the increasing imperialistic tendencies of capitalist countries are a
standing threat to the happiness of the individuals. He refers to the men and women lost in their
routine activities of life. They have little capacity to counteract the hostile forces of the world so
they seek escape routes in superficial entertainments. He clearly hints at the ordinary people sitting
in the bar. While being lost in superficial pleasures of life, they do not want to be disturbed at all.
For them, lights should never go out and music should have no ending. The bar protects them like a
fort from the hazards and challenges of the outside world. They do not want to give up their routine
entertainments as they are afraid of reality. They are like children afraid of the darkness and horror
about the uncertain future like the children who are fearful of darkness and horror of night.

The stanza reveals that the poet is more concerned about the security of the private
individuals than about the public event of outbreak of the Second World War. Shift of emphasis in
his stancefrom the public to the privatecomes out very clearly in his bourgeois concern for the
safety of individuals.


Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Windiest militant trash High sounding but empty talks which the politicians do to befool the
masses.
Crude Rough, (here) harmful
Nijinsky A Russian dancer (1890-1950)
Diaghilev A Russian organiser of dances who wanted to be loved alone.
Error bred in bone A sin which is in the very blood of all human beings.
Craves Longs for, desires strongly
Universal love Love of all

Explanation In these lines the poet condemns self-love. He says that high sounding empty and
incoherent nonsensical talk with which the political leaders try to befool the masses is not as rough
and harmful as the desire of human beings to be loved alone. Auden states that Nijinsky who was a
Russian dancer (1890-1950) wrote about Diaghilev, a Russian organiser of dances, that he wanted
to be loved alone. Auden calls Nijinsky made because what he wrote about Diaghilev is true of the
common man. It is a mistake, a sin, which is in the very blood of human beings. Every man and
woman strongly desires what he or she can not have. It is a wish to be loved alone and not love for
all, which is the cause of human predicament.
48

In this stanza Auden condemns selfish and possessive love and advocates universal love as
a panacea for the ills of mankind.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Conservative dark The darkness of routine activities in which the common men are lost to the
extent that they do not know the reality.
Ethical life Morality or life which gives importance to moral values.
Commuters Daily passengers/ordinary people
Concentrate To devote attention
Compulsory game The game of befooling and deceiving the masses or common people
The deaf Those who do not listen or are insensitive to religious or moral values
The dumb Those who can not speak out or express themselves

Explanation In these lines Auden unveils the spiritual sterility of human beings. He says that
the common men fail to see the reality because they are thoroughly lost in the darkness of their
routine activities. When they (ordinary people) make an effort to come out of the darkness of
selfishness and try to adopt ethical life and follow some moral values like being sincere to their
wives and do their work sincerely in the office, then the rulers or the administrators once again start
their game of befooling and deceiving them because it is some thing irresistible for them and the
game goes on incessantly. There is no end to this. None can save the rulers from their degeneration
because they have lost their moral moorings.

In the above lines Auden unveils the spiritual sterility of the people. In their routine
activities they think of morality only in crisis - the reference to ethical life, in these, lines is in the
context of crisis of World War II.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Voice (here) Language to expose modern hypocrisies and pretensions
The romantic lie The mistake that one can escape reality through romantic love.
Sensual man in the street Common man given to the pleasures of sex and possessive love.
The lie of Authority The mistake which the rulers commit in thinking that their worldly power
represented by sky scrapers, etc. can protect them.

Explanation The poet is unable to suggest any alternative. He has only his voice. As s poet he
has expressiona language to expose modern hypocrisies and hidden liesmistake in the brain of
the common man that he can escape reality through romantic love and the mistake which the rulers
commit in thinking that their worldly power represented by tall buildings and other things can
protect them in an hour of crisis. The poet says that there is no such thing as the State or Collective
Man. He says that the view that one exists alone is wrong but then he considers the view of
Collective Man or the State to be equally wrong. The question of survival is important. There is no
choice as one can not afford to be hungry whether one is an ordinary citizen or the police. The only
solution to the human predicament is universal love when self-love and possessive love change in to
love for all or universal love. Human beings must love one another or they will cease to exist.

On re-reading his poem Auden modified the concluding line of this stanza and wrote, we
must love one another and die but he was not satisfied with this line because this makes the whole
issue inextricable and hopeless. This suggests that the situation is irreparable even universal love
cannot resolve the crisis. Ultimately, Auden decided in favour of not including this poem itself in
49
his Collected Shorter Poems, 1950. Auden himself explains his reasons for rejecting this poem,
.The whole poem I realised was infected with an incurable dishonesty and must be scrapped.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Defenceless Unprotected/helpless
The night Darkness of formidable event of war
Stupor Dazed condition or senselessness
Dotted Scattered like dots.
Ironic points of light (here) The reference is to a few wise and peaceful people who remain
unacknowledged.
The just The wise people who flash out their messages to ignorant masses.
Composed Built up
Eros Greek god of sexual love, Romantic love which is selfish and possessive.
Beleaguered Surrounded/tortured. Suffering from
Negation and despair Negative thinking death wish and rejection of spirituality which lead to
disappointment
Affirming flame Illuminating message of hope.

Explanation The poet feels handicapped to offer any tangible solution to the contemporary
crisis. He feels disillusioned to see the existing state of affairs at the time of out break of the Second
World War. He has only his language to expose the hypocrisy, the folded lies of the modern age, the
mistake in the brain of the common man given to the pleasures of sex and love that he can take
escape from reality into the world of romantic love, the mistake in the minds of the rulers of the
world.

In this concluding stanza he says that the world lies in dazed or unconscious condition
unprotected in the darkness of formidable event of war. Even at this juncture, the illuminating
messages of hope from a few wise, just and peaceful people shine here and there like points of light.
Here, the poet uses this simile ironically because the just people are flashing out their optimistic
messages to the ignorant people who are unable to acknowledge their significance for them. As the
points of light will be visible only when human beings will open their eyes and see them. Similarly,
the sanguine messages of the just will become meaningful only when the common men will pay
attention to them. The poet includes himself in the same category. He says that he is also made of
the same fault of self-love and dust. Like ordinary people he also suffers from spiritual sterility and
hence, filled with despair. But he wants to give a message of hope that universal love is the only
solution for the survival of humanity in an hour of crisis.

In these lines Auden affirms his faith in the humanistic values directed to the healthy
development of individuals which will further help in the establishment of a well-ordered social set-
up.

Introduction First published in New Republic Oct., 1939, Audens poem, September 1, 1939
assumes its title from the date of Hitlers invasion on Poland. The occasion of the poem was the
resurgence of fascist power with Hitlers attack on Poland and the resultant threat of World War-II,
which shattered Audens revolutionary dreams in a nightmarish manner. The poem captures the
poets reflections on the mood of Europe vis--vis momentous and formidable historical event. At a
later stage Auden found, as he himself puts it, the poem is infected with an incurable dishonesty
and finally did not include it in his Collected Shorter Poems, 1950.

50
Summary The poem begins with Auden sitting in one of the bars situated on Fifty Second
Street in New York. In this poem, the poet deals with the topical issue of the Second World War. He
captures the mood of Europe on the eve of the out break of the world warthe feelings of fear and
uncertainty that preceded the war and investigates into its causes and finally gives suggestions to
resolve the crisis. The setting of the poem is a bar in the city of New York. In the first stanza, the
poet refers to the waves of anger which engulfed the worldintruding even upon the private lives
of the people with an uncertain fear of impending doom. He is sitting in a Bar, afraid of the
imminent war and uncertain of future because hopes that had been built up on skilful negotiations
and pacts with Hitler and Mussolini were shattered. He calls the decade of the thirties dishonest
because he thinks that dishonest efforts were made to reach a compromise with Germany. In the
second stanza, the poet investigates into the causes that led to the war. Grappling retrospectively
with the issue, the poet concludes that the German Nationalism which began with Luther became a
sort of madness with Hitler, letting loose an atmosphere of disintegration and violence. The poet
holds injustices and insultsthe psychological injuries suffered by Hitler in early life responsible
for Hitlers behaviour and fascist tendencies responsible for the eventuality of war. He
unequivocally points out:

Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return

In the third stanza, the poet refers to Thucydides, a Greek historian (460 BC- 400 BC) who
was condemned as a traitor and had to live in exile for 20 years, or pointing out political causes of
war. Thucydides analysed the nature of democracy and the fact that the dictators have exploited and
twisted the principles of democracy to suit their selfish ends. They continue to deceive people
through their nonsensical talks because the masses are devoid of wisdom and knowledge and have
accepted the existing state of affairs. It is as if it were a habit forming pain a matter of routine.
Thus, the irrationality, insensitivity and apathy of the masses lead to their exploitation at the hands
of cruel administrators and rulers. The poet indirectly hints at the impending war which will happen
due to the failure and mismanagement of their leaders, rulers and politicians.

In the fourth stanza, the poet says that American dream of neutrality is merely euphoric.
The skyscrapers and the notion of Collective Man clearly hint at the grave implications of this
stance. Actually the capitalist countries give individual freedom and indirectly encourage
competition between unequal ones which results in exploitation of different weaker nations by
stronger ones. Such countries compete with each other justifying their own actions and giving false
excuses for the causes of human predicament but the reality is otherwise. Their false promises of a
happier and healthier life are soon shattered when the true face of Imperialism is unveiled.

In the fifth stanza, the poet gives the reader a peep into the tense situation which is so
formidable that people are afraid of confronting it. The poet visualises men lost in their petty private
anxieties having little capacity to counteract the hostile forces. Hence they seek escape routes to
superficial entertainments without being disturbed. They do not want that lights should ever go out
or music should ever cease. The bar protects them like a fort from the hazards and challenges of the
outside world.

In the sixth stanza, the poet points out that the empty and incoherent nonsense with which
the politicians try to deceive people is not so crude as human beings desire to be loved alone. What
Nijinsky, a Russian dancer, wrote about Diaghilev, an organiser of dances who wanted to be loved
alone is true of every human heart. It is a mistakea sin which is in the very blood of all human
beings. Hitlers self-love made him ambitious which further led to his imperialistic tendencies.
51
Auden, in this stanza, condemns selfish and possessive love and advocates universal love and
humanistic means to resolve the contemporary crisis.

In the seventh stanza, Auden brings out insensitivity of human beings to the spiritual,
religious and moral values. However, fear of impending war and ensuing death compel some
morality out of spiritually sterile people. Auden feels that nothing can save the deaf and the dumb
from the catastrophe except morality.

The poet concludes the poem with a vague suggestion of points of light. These points of
light are the few just and wise people who flash out their illuminating messages for the ignorant
masses. The poet himself is victim of Eros, death wish, rejection of spiritual values which cause
despair but in an atmosphere of negation and despair he seeks to give the world sanguine message
of hope that universal love is the only panacea for the survival of mankind. Auden affirms his faith
in the humanistic values directed at the development of individuals.

Critical Appreciation September 1, 1939 deals with the topical issue of the Second World
War but Audens scepticism about the success of any radical measure to change the society also
comes to fore. There is a growing feeling about thirties decade being a low dishonest decade. The
poem expresses Audens disillusionment and bitterness at the resurgence of fascist power with
Hitlers attack on Poland and the resultant threat of World War-II which shattered Audens
revolutionary dreams in a nightmarish manner. It captures the poets reflections on the mood of
Europe in the face of momentous and formidable historical event. The poet refers to the waves of
anger which engulfed the darkened lands of the earth affecting adversely even the private lives with
an uncertain fear of impending doom.

Investigating into the causes that led to war Auden concludes that Hitlers self-love resulted
in fascism and his fascist tendencies were responsible for the eventuality which intruded even upon
the private lives of the people. Grappling retrospectively with the issue he concludes that the
German Nationalism, which was triggered with Luther, became a sort of madness with Hitler
letting loose disintegration and violence. The poet holds injustices and injuries suffered by Hitler in
childhood responsible for Hitlers fascist tendencies:

Those to whom evil is done
Do evil in return

Auden, thus, provides Freudian Psycho-analysis for Hitlers behaviour and attributes all
crimes to individual wish for self-love the surging sense of identity which comes from lack of
faith in and acceptance of existence of others:

For the error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love
But to be loved alone.

The impact of incidents in the German society, no doubt, moulded Hitlers personality but
making war an individual burden and attributing it to Hitler is not justified. It was rather the
cumulative impact of the whole ethos of the times. Hence, a sense of uncertainty lurks beneath
Audens analysis of the causes of war in this poem.

The poet refers to Thucydides who analysed the nature of democracy and the fact that the
dictators have exploited and twisted the principles of democracy to suit their selfish ends. They
52
continue to deceive people through their nonsensical talks because the masses are devoid of wisdom
and knowledge and have accepted the existing state of affairs; it is as if it were a habit forming
pain, a matter of routine. The people have become deadened to rational thinking and have lost
sensitivity. Thus, the irrationality, insensitivity and apathy of the masses are the factors which lead
to their exploitation at the hands of cruel administrators and rulers.

Auden indirectly underlines the need for public awakening if the masses are wide awake
they can interrogate the administration. Ignorance of masses, Auden discerns, is a negative point
and this observation shows his leftist leanings.

Auden has bitter realisation that American dream of neutrality is merely euphoric and it is
high time that America reconsidered its stand. He clearly hints at the grave implications. The sky
scrapers and the notion of Collective Man representing one State or an establishment are standing
evidence of this fact. Capitalist countries give individual freedom and indirectly encourage the spirit
of competition between unequal ones which results in exploitation of different weaker nations by
stronger ones. Such countries compete with each other justifying their own actions and giving false
excuses for the causes of human predicament but the reality is otherwise. Their false promises of a
happier and healthier life are soon shattered when the true face of imperialism is unveiled.

Thus, socio-economic and political exploitation ultimately results in Imperialism.
Americas fake neutrality gets exposed in skyscrapers and pseudo talks of Collective Man and
speaks volumes for the hypocrisy of capitalist countries.

Auden makes an effort to discover the maladies in the American capitalist system and he
uses significantly Marxist vocabularyImperialism, competitive and Collective Man, etc, Yet
his expressions voice his fears rather than confidence of a committed poet:

But who can live for long
In an euphoric dream
Out of the mirror they stare
Imperialisms face
And the International wrong.

Auden feels that the increasing Imperialistic tendencies of capitalist countries are a standing
threat to the happiness of individuals. Moreover, he visualises men lost in their petty private
anxieties having little capacity to counteract the hostile forces. They seek escape routes in
superficial entertainment without being disturbedthe lights must never go out and the music must
never cease. The bar protects them like a fort from the hazards and challenges of the outside world.
Their escapist attitude is likened to the childrens state of being:

Lost in haunted wood
Children afraid of the night
Who have never been happy or good.

Thus, the poet here seems to be more concerned about the security of the private individuals
than with the public events.

Auden opines that human beings suffer from a desire to be loved alone. Hitlers self-love
made him ambitious which further lead to his imperialistic tendencies. Auden here condemns selfish
love and possessive love and advocates universal love and humanistic means to resolve the crisis.
He unveils the spiritual sterility of the people who seek escape from outer realities into romantic
love an escape from the public events into private vision and forget morality which can lead them
to redemption and which is possible through humanistic values. None can save the rulers from their
53
degeneration because they have lost their moral moorings. Auden here seems to recollect the
euphoric dream of the earlier years of establishing a socialist state and destroying Imperialism,
about earlier period of great cultural achievements and concludes:

Defenceless under the night.
Our world in stupor lies..

This disillusionment shows that the poet feels handicapped to offer any definite solution
any alternative. He has only his voice, his language to expose the hypocrisy, the unfolded lies of the
modern age, the mistake in the brain of the common man given to the pleasures of sex and love that
he can escape reality through romantic love, the mistake in the minds of the rulers of the world that
their power represented by the skyscrapers can protect them. Auden feels that the only solution to
the human predicament is universal love.

There is a vague suggestion of points of light, in an atmosphere of negation and
despair, the just and wise people who flash out their illuminating messages for the faltering
ignorant humanity. The poet himself is a victim of Erosdeath wish, rejection of spiritual values
but he is imbued with a desire to give the world a message of hope that the universal love is the only
panacea for the survival of mankind and he affirms his faith in the humanistic values. Audens
concern for the exploited individuals and his emphasis on their awakening, his condemnation of
imperialism his ironic exposure of Americas neutrality in the Second World War crisis are
indications of his radicalism and show his social consciousness but his ruminations over the causes
of war appear passive and his solutions individualistic. A poet who earlier held rational and
scientific view of life seems to betray a conservative outlook in holding out abstract theories
regarding eternal human revengeful feelings as causes of war.

In his book, The modern poets-A Critical Introduction, M.L.Rosenthal in his article Auden
and the thirties comments, In this poem as in others written in the same period, Auden was still
Political but like many others of his Literary generations has turned away from the activistic
idealism that marked his more wholehearted Marxian writing. He did not seek programmatic
alternatives to the communist and popular Frontist set of his earlier thinking. Apparently the whole
realm of political action had became more and more distasteful and with it the need to identify with
the people that communist thought stresses although one can say, the people, yes and follow out
other lines of activism without being a communist. Auden was still very much a political poet, but
in a new way; he used the political situation as an incentive for coaching himself into a tragic vision
of mans fate and for incantation of Judaeo-Christian humanitarian pieties
5
.

Rosenthal further comments, The poem like many of Audens foreshadows his later
assertions of a more orthodox Christianity and of a basic social conservatism. Aesthetically such a
development was almost expected yet in his later work as in his earlier, the irresolute and
tentative edge of sensibility cuts across the doctrine and the dogma early and late, Auden is
obsessed with the question of what man is to do with his terrible new responsibility for himself, now
that the time of unconscious evolution, biological and social, has ended
6
.

In fact, the poem marks the later phase in Audens poetic output during the thirties decade
when his enthusiasm was gradually receding and a change in his attitude was taking place. A shift in
emphasis is discerned here. From outward events the emphasis is shifting to inward from the
public vision it is receding into private concerns. Hence, in this poem too, he is seeking private
causes to the contemporary crisis and providing individualistic solutions to the social malaise.

Some critics feel that the poem is written in laconic style. Auden has used terse and tense
diction. There is conspicuous lack of imagery. They also note ambiguity and vagueness in the poem.
54
The shortcomings of diction and style may be ignored in view of the didactic stance and prophetic
tone of the poet. Though the poem strikingly lacks in imagery, yet the images of skyscrapers
symbolic of power, the image of activities in bar reflecting escapist attitude and the bar itself
symbolising the world at large, correspond well with the contents of the poem. The poem, no doubt,
suffers from ambiguity and vagueness at some places. The poet does not give any explanation of the
expressions like just people and ethical life and holds no accountability for it. Auden himself is
known to have rejected this poem and he did not include it in his Collected Shorter Poems, 1950 as
he was not satisfied with the line, We must love one another or die, in the 8
th
stanza.

Though the poem has certain weaknesses, yet it does show Audens reactions to the
catastrophe and brings forth his analysis of the causes and there by shows his social awareness. In
the degenerating contemporary situation his concern for moral and humanistic values is directed to
the development of individuals which will be instrumental in establishment of a well-meaning and
well-ordered society.

Essay-Type Questions:
1. What is the theme of Audens poem, September 1, 1939.
2. What are the crucial issues which Auden raises in his poem, September 1, 1939.
3. September 1, 1939 is an honest criticism of the contemporary situation. How far do you agree ?
4. What message does the poet want to convey through the poem, September 1, 1939 ?
5. September 1, 1939 is a topical piece which reflects the mood of Europe on the eve of the
outbreak of the World War-II.
Write short notes on the following:
1. Audens concept of love.
2. Audens Freudian psycho-analytical method.
3. Ambiguity and vagueness in the poem.
4. Audens attitude to war.














55
5. In Memory of W.B.Yeats

Section-I
Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Disappeared Died
Disfigured Distorted
Dead of winter (here) It was extremely cold.
Sank Came down
All the instruments The Instruments which record weather conditions.

Explanation W.B.Yeats died when winter was at its peak in the month of January. It was
extremely cold. The rivulets were frozen due to extreme cold. There was an air of desolation
everywhere. There were no passengers on the airports as people had postponed their flights due to
bitter cold. Hence, airports assumed a deserted look. The snow was falling and the public statues
were covered with snow and their forms got distorted. In the evening, when the sun was going to set
the level of mercury came down in the barometer and it became piercing cold. All the weather
instruments indicated that the day of W.B.Yeats was really very cold and dark. The stanza begins
in an informal manner. Instead of using the word death the poet has used the expression
disappeared. The poet has used scientific imagery to describe the death of W.B.Yeats. The state of
affairs in Europe and the reality of the poets death simultaneously get reflected in the lines. The
poet has used realistic and common mens language.

Words-Meanings and explanatory Notes:
Peasant river Countryside river
Fashionable quay Modern harbours
Mourning tongues Sorrowful expressions of the people.

Explanation Natures apathy to individual suffering has been brought out in this stanza. W.B.
Yeats was undergoing death pangs but Nature was not affected at all. It continued running its usual
course unconcerned about his serious illness. The wolves kept running on through the forests which
were evergreen. Even the countryside river kept on running its normal course. It was least attracted
by modern harbours near the towns. The poet was dying and the people were expressing grief and
concern over his deteriorating health. The poet is of the opinion that W.B.Yeats may die physically
but will continue to survive in his poems. The lines depict Natures indifference to human suffering
on the one hand and on the other hand focuses on the point that the poet will continue to live
through his poems, which encompass his art, which is immortal.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
As himself As a living human being
SquaresParts
Invaded Attacked, (here) pervaded
Revolte (here) Refused to co-operate
Provinces of histor Different parts of his body

Explanation The given stanza reflects the heightened feeling of sadness associated with the
moment of the poets death. As W.B.Yeats was on his death bed, the poet feels that as a living being
it was his last afternoon. The anxiety, the pathos and hurry loomed large in the atmosphere. There
were nurses moving around in hurry. They were actively attending on him. Everywhere there were
56
rumours about his impending death. He was becoming weak and senseless. Different parts of his
body which were like provinces of the empire refused to co-operate. Different parts of his mind
became empty and lost their power of feeling and thinking. The outer parts of his body became inert
and insensitive to everything as the current of feeling stopped to flow. Numbness prevailed over his
body due to loss of sensation and ultimately he breathed his last. He was dead but as poet he will
continue to live in the hearts of his admirers. The minute details about the actual moment of W.B.
Yeats death and the realisation of the fact how life gradually slipped away from his body rendering
him dead evoke intense pathos in the readers mind. However, the last line holds a pointer to the
immortality of art as the poet asserts that Yeats will continue to live in his poems.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Affections(here) Feelings, thoughts, sensibilities, etc.
Another kind of woodStrange, unfamiliar countries
Foreign code of conscienceRules of conduct and art
The words(here) Poetry
UnfamiliarUnknown
ModifiedChanged

W.B.Yeats died as a person but he will remain alive in his poems through his admirers. He
will live in the form of his poems which are scattered in a number of cities. As a poet he is
completely at the mercy of feelings and emotions of the unknown people (critics). His poetry will be
appreciated in strange unfamiliar countries. Now he will be praised or criticised according to the
rules of conduct and art which were quite unknown to the poet. His poems will be interpreted
according to the sensibilities, likes and dislikes of the living critics. W. H. Auden highlights the fact
that the poetry of a dead poet like W.B.Yeats will get transformed by the interpretation of the living
critics. The living critics and his admirers will judge his poetry and give it a new meaning according
to their conceptions of art.

There is no glorification of the dead but Auden has underlined the real position of a poet
who though dies physically, yet keeps on living in his worksread, interpreted and evaluated by all
kinds of people.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
AccustomedHabituated
Cell of himself(here) Prisoner of his ego
A few thousand(here) Readers and Admirers of W.B.Yeats

Explanation In this stanza the poet depicts the fact that the routine activities of life continue and
worldly affairs go on. The world at large is apathetic to individual suffering. He brings out this fact
through the tragic incident of W.B.Yeatss death. The poet opines that people will forget W.B.Yeats
as a person, though, as a poet he will continue to survive. His death as a person will be forgotten /
lost in the hectic routine activities of life. The brokers will shout as usual on the floor of the Bourse-
a busy commercial centre. The poor will continue leading their miserable life to which they are
habituated to a great extent. Each person has his ego (he is imprisoned in the vicious circle of his
ego), but he is greatly assured of his freedomhe considers himself to be free. But a few thousand
people will think of the day of W.B.Yeatss death as the day on which they did something different
to some extent. The last two lines of the stanza are reiteration of the fact that the day of W.B.
Yeatss death was dark and extremely cold. The lines express human apathy to individual suffering
57
through indifference of the world at large to the tragic incident of W.B. Yeats death. The poet uses
the device of repetition to strengthen the factual description of the day of Yeats demise. The stanza
is an implied satire at the contemporary creed of individualism which is responsible for creating an
illusion of freedom for isolated individuals.


SectionII
Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

The Parish of rich womenLarge number of rich women like Lady Gregory, Olivia Shakespeare,
etc., who admired the poet and inspired him to write poetry
Physical decayDeterioration in health, process of old age, disease and death

A mouthA language, a way of saying things, a style

Ranches of IsolationIsolated parts in human psyche
In the valley of its sayingThe source of its being, the human sole

Explanation This elegy is a departure from other conventional elegies in the sense that it does
not glorify Yeats, it rather points out that like common human beings Yeats had infirmities,
shortcomings and weaknesses. The poet was a common man with all the absurdities and follies, but
his poetry will survive above everything. A large group of rich women like Lady Gregory admired
and inspired Yeats way of life, his social and literary success were encouraged by flattering women
like Lady Gregory. His personality had its own weaknesses. But his deteriorating physical health
and injustices with in Ireland hurt him to write poetry. The poet underlines here that his poetry
could not bring about any change in the conditions of Ireland and its people. The poet raises his
finger at the insensitivity of the people to the voice of poetry and remarks that poetry cannot bring
about any change. The poet compares poetry to a river which can fertilize only the soul. It cant
bring about any improvement in the outward world. The human soul is not subjected to the action of
the administrators of the world. Poetry flows from the isolated corners of the human mind and
nourishes human grief. It is a style, a language which gives comfort to human soul through its
expression of human condition. In this way the poet redefines poetry and holds a mirror to its real
significance in human life.

Section-- III

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Honoured guestThe body of Yeats
Irish vesselUsed for W.B.Yeats who was Irish
IntolerantDoes not care for
With the strange excuse Because they were masters of language

Explanation The concluding section of the poem makes a formal statement that time does not
care for what the poets said but the way they said it. This section brings out the inevitability of
death. The poet addresses the earth to receive an honourable man W.B.Yeats. He is now like an
Irish vessel without poetry a physical being who is dead and has been buried. Time destroys
everything and everyone. It does not spare anybody, weather he is brave, innocent, beautiful or ugly.
It destroys a beautiful body in a week but it has no effect over art. Time values and adores art and
artists. It worships language and poets and excuses their faults like cowardice, conceit, pride, etc.
Artists may die physically but they remain alive in their art. The lines, thus, bring out the
58
immortality of art and mortality of human beings through the reference to the physical death of the
poet and the immortality of his poetry.

Time respects great artists. Their great works are remembered after their death. So yeats
will continue to live in his poetry. Time will forgive his common human weaknesses and follies. It
forgives the faults of character like cowardice and pride, etc. of a great artist. W. H. Auden gives
two examples to clarify his point of view. Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) was an imperialist in views
but he was a great English author who won Nobel Prize for his writings. So time forgave him and he
is still remembered and honoured. Paul Claudel was a French poet who supported the Fascist cause
but as he was a good poet he survived through his poems and proved true James Shirleys line-
Only the actions of the just smell sweet and blossom in the dust. Thus, the stanza brings out the
idea that time honours the greatness of an artist and it will honour W.B.Yeatss greatness as a poet.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

The dogs of Europe bar Selfish, blood thirsty leaders like Hitler and Mussolini
SequesteredSeparated and isolated
Intellectual disgraceHatred due to ideological and political differences
Stares fromIs to be seen on

Explanation In this stanza the poets intense grief caused by the death of a fellow poet turns
into anger against those who were responsible for throwing Europe into chaos. He changes the focus
from individual to the entire milieu and universalises the theme. Auden makes a departure from
conventional elegy when he extends his subject. The poem no longer remains confined to the
immediate subject of W.B.Yeatss death; it speaks as much of the times in which Yeats lived as it
does of the poet. In fact, the real strength of the poem lies in the lines about the sorry state of affairs
in Europe caused by war and violence on the continent. In the chaotic situation when W.B.Yeats
died, selfish and blood thirsty leaders like Hitler and Mussolini were crying for war. The entire
Europe was torn into hatred, prejudice and mistrust and all the nations waited for the impending war
isolated from each other due to hatred and selfishness. Hatred due to ideological differences was
reflected on the faces of human-beings. There was absolutely no pity or fellow-feeling in the hearts
of the people. It appeared as if the seas of pity and sympathy had frozen and dried. These details
unearth the chaotic conditions in Europe at the time of Yeatss death.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

The bottom of the nightThe innermost depths of truth
PersuadeConvince
Farming of a verseGift of writing poetry
Make a vineyard of the curse Turn a curse into a blessing
Unsuccess Failure
A rapture of distressHappy despite distress/failure
Deserts of the heartDry hearts, devoid of sympathy and fellow-feeling

W. H. Auden feels that at such a juncture Yeats poetry will guide the misled humanity. It
will change the curse into a blessing and will make human beings happy. He, therefore, exhorts the
poets soul to follow the right to the innermost depths and make every possible effort to explore the
hidden truth. He should convince the people to learn to take delight in life, despite the threats of
impending war. He alone can make the people confident and happy through his forceful and
vigorous poetry. His poetry will teach us to sing about human future joyfully in spite of distress.
59

The hearts of people are devoid of sympathy and follow-feeling. The poet, through his
poetry, should start the fountain of sympathy in their hearts. The poet should first free men from the
prison of self and then inspire them to accept and praise their life, despite its many limitations and
drawbacks. The poet is confident that Yeatss poetry will give message of hope and courage.
It is great poetry alone, that can enlighten and bring a change in human soul. Auden does not praise
Yeats as great genius. But he conveys to us the real value and importance of his poetry even in
times of crisis. Yeats or any other artist is not to be worshipped as a man because all men are made
of common clay. He is to be valued and honoured for the greatness of his art. Time will worship and
make him immortal for his language, for his art.

Introduction In Memory of W.B.Yeats, one of the masterpieces of W. H. Auden, is an elegy
which was written to mourn the death of W.B.Yeats, a renowned Irish poet who died in 1939. The
poem strikes a departure from other conventional elegies in its informal manner, its simple diction,
its realistic portrayal of the dead poet, its depiction of indifferent attitude of Nature and humanity to
individual predicament and finally its extending beyond the immediate subject of W.B.Yeats death
and emerging as a representative poem of its times.

The poem is divided into three sections which form three units of varying lengths. Each
poetic unit apparently deals with independent strain of thought but taken together the poem
successfully evolves Audens radical liberal intellectuals perspective. Section I of the poem gives
details about W.B.Yeatss death, the indifferent attitude of Nature and humanity to his death.
Section-II deals with the theme that the strength of poetry lies in the manner in which it objectifies
the human condition. Section-III deals partially with the significance of art and language and
partially with inevitability of World War-II and the duty of a poet. Auden assigns a responsible role
to the poet to resolve the contemporary crisis.

Summary W.B.Yeats died in the month of January 1939. The day of his death was extremely
cold. There was an air of desolation everywhere. The rivulets were frozen, the airports were
disfigured due to snowfall. All the weather instruments indicated that the day of W.B.Yeats death
was really very cold and dark.

Very pathetically, the poet points out the fact of Natures indifference to W.B.Yeats death.
Unconcerned about his serious illness, the wolves kept on running through the evergreen forests.
Even the countryside river kept on running its normal course. The poet feels that as a living human
being it was his last afternoon. Nurses were quickly attending on him. Everywhere there were
rumours about his impending death, gradually his body became weak and inert and his mind lost its
power of thinking. He was dead physically but he will continue to live in the hearts of his admirers.
The minute details about the actual moment of W.B.Yeatss death evoke intense pathos.

Now as a poet he will be praised or criticised according to the rules of conduct and art. His
poems will be interpreted according to the sensibilities, likes or dislikes of the living critics. His
death as a person will be forgotten in the hectic activities of routine life. The brokers will shout as
usual on the floor of Bourse. The poor will continue to live their miserable lives. The day of the
W.B.Yeatss death will be taken only by a few people as the day when they did some thing slightly
unusual.

In the second section of the poem Auden does not glorify Yeats. He rather points out that
Yeats had shortcomings, weaknesses and follies like common human beings but his poetry will
survive above everything. Though his poetry could not bring about any radical change in the
material conditions of Ireland because of the insensitivity of the people to the voice of poetry, yet it
60
flows from the isolated corners of human mind and nourishes human grief. It is a style- a language
which gives comfort to human soul through its expression of human condition.

The third section brings out the inevitability of death. W.B.Yeats is dead and has been
buried. Time is a great destroyer. It does not spare anything but it values and adores art and artist. It
excuses their faults like cowardice, conceit and pride, etc. W.H. Auden gives two examples to
authenticate his viewpoint. Rudyard Kipling was an imperialist in views but he is still honoured
because he was a great English author who won Nobel Prize for his writings. Paul Claudel, though,
supported the fascist cause yet he survived through his poems. In the second half of section three of
the poem, Auden expresses his anger against those who were responsible for throwing Europe into
chaotic situation. He points out that selfish and blood thirsty leaders were crying for war. The entire
Europe is torn into hatred, prejudice and mistrust and all the people and the nations wait for the
impending war. Their faces reflect hatred due to ideological and political differences. It appears as if
the seas of pity and sympathy have been frozen and dried.

At such a juncture W. H. Auden feels that Yeats poetry will guide the strayed humanity. It
will change the curse into a blessing and will make the people happy. A poet alone can make the
people confident and optimistic through his forceful and vigorous poetry. He should convince the
people to learn to rejoice despite the threats of impending war. The poet should first free man from
the prison of self and then praise their life, despite its constraints and drawbacks. The poet is
confident that Yeats poetry will be a harbinger of hope and courage in an hour of dismay.

Thus, in this poem three sections of varying length with apparently different strains of
thought project Audens vision of a well-ordered social set-up replete with sympathy and fellow-
feelings and not a society torn completely by animosity and hatred. This shows that Auden wants to
develop individuals so that they may learn to appreciate each other. Auden attacks the concept of
individual freedom which instigates competitive spirit, self-centredness, hatred and consequently,
war but he advocates humanistic means to resolve the contemporary crisis. This approach shows
Audens radical-liberal-intellectuals perspective.

Critical Appreciation One of the master pieces of W. H. Auden, the poem In Memory of
W.B.Yeats is in the form of an elegy. It was written on the death of W.B.Yeats, a renowned Irish
poet who died in 1939. The poem strikes a fresh approacha departure from other conventional
elegies like Miltons Lycidasor Shellys Adonis. Its informal manner, its use pf common mens
language and realistic portrayal of the dead poet signify his revolt against conventional elegy by
focussing on the indifference of Nature to the sad event of W.B.Yeatss death, whereas in the
traditional elegy Nature sympathises with human suffering. The poet underlines the fact that the
death of an individual has little impact on routine human activities. Nature and human life go on as
usual, unconcerned.

In this poem the poet puts emphasis on the permanence of art. W. B. Yeats as an individual
dies but his poetry survives, though, with all modifications. It is what its readers make it according
to their sensibilities, likes and dislikes. The poet brings out the insignificance of an individual after
his death through metaphorical conceit. After death an individual loses his identity and his
individuality, as W. B. Yeats became his admirers. Henceforth, he will be nothing but what the
readers and admirers will think and interpret him and his poetry. Unlike conventional elegies this
elegy does not idealise, or glorify the dead poet. It depicts Yeats as he was, an ordinary man having
common virtues, infirmities and follies.

The poet points out that the way in which poetry is expressedthe language and the manner
i.e. art is important. The source of its existence is human soul which is not subjected to the actions
61
of the administrators. Physically an individual dies but spiritually he lives in his art. The follies of
human beings become insignificant if they have a command over art or language. Style, of course, is
the man. Time does not care for what the poet said but for the way he said. The poet points out that
the uniqueness of poetry lies in the manner in which it objectifies the human condition.

The poem is unconventional in the sense that it extends beyond the immediate subject of
W.B.Yeatss death and becomes representative of its times. It speaks as much of Yeats time as it
does of Yeats himself. He is not only talking about W.B.Yeatss death but also about the mood of
Europe as Geoffrey Thurley points out: It is winter, not only in the year (1939) but in the life of
Europe, and the natural mourning for a great man merges into the anticipatory mourning for the end
of European civilisation over which the dead poet had kept such vigilant watch
7
.

Auden expresses his anger and contempt at the sorry state of affairs in Europe caused by
war and violence. Hence, the poets grief over the death of Yeats turns into angry outbursts against
those who were responsible for the existing chaotic conditions. Auden points out that in this terrible
year of W.B. Yeatss death, selfish and blood thirsty leaders of EuropeHitler and Mussolini herald
war crisis and the nations split apart due to hatred and selfishness and live in the constant dread of
impending war. People hate each other due to ideological and political differences. They are
absolutely devoid of fellow-feelings and sympathy. Auden underlines the creative role of art in the
flux of contemporary crisis. He defines his concept of the poet and highlights the social role of
poetry, which reflect a high degree of social consciousness in his poetic vision. Auden
optimistically exhorts the poet to play a constructive role in this hour of dismaymake every
possible effort to explore the hidden truth in the contemporary crisis and persuade the people of the
nations to rejoice despite the horror of war looming large on the horizon. He inspires them to :

Make a vineyard of the curse
Sing of human unsuccess
In a rapture of distress.

In the hearts dry of human sympathy and fellow-feeling produce the springs of sympathy so
that humanity is cured of selfishness and lack of sympathy and can learn to appreciate art.

Thus, Auden points out that the poet can strike a psychological ebullition in the minds of
individuals and thus exert an ennobling influence which will eventually help in the establishment of
a better society. So W. B. Yeats is to be honoured and valued for the greatness of his art. Hence, he
suggests that art should play a constructive role by generating love and other humanistic values
required for the harmonious development of individuals.

The poem emerges as an attack on bourgeois concept of individual freedom, which
instigates a competitive spirit and leads to adoption of crooked means to achieve success and which
is distorted into self-centeredness and hatred consequently leading to war but Audens assigning a
creative and constructive role to art for making a well-ordered social set-up replete with sympathy
and fellow-feelings and not a society torn completely by animosity and hatred shows that Auden
wants to develop the individuals spiritually so that they may learn to appreciate each other. This
approach shows Audens radical-liberal-intellectuals perspective. Thus, he advocates humanistic
means to resolve the contemporary crisis. In this sense his private vision and public vision have
been synthesised to fulfil his intended goal of betterment of individual as well as establishment of a
well-meaning and well-ordered society.

To conclude, this poem is a modernised version of the conventional elegy. Its informal tone,
common mens language, factual description and its enlargement of the subject from the individual
62
to the existing socio-political scenario in the erstwhile Europe not only prove Audens ingenuity but
also lend an additional grandeur to the poem and make it a unique work of art.

Essay- Type Questions:
1. Attempt a critical appreciation of the poem, In Memory of W. B. Yeats.
2. Write down the theme of the poem, In Memory of W. B. Yeats.
3. Trace the development of thought in In Memory of W. B. Yeats.
Write short notes on the following:
1. Role of poet.
2. Apathy of Nature and humanity to human suffering.
3. Audens attitude to war.
4. Audens imagery.



















63

6. The Shield of Achilles
Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

SheThetis, the mother of Achilles, one of the Greak heroes of Trojan war.
Vines and olive treesSymbolic of orchards engraved on the shield of Achilles.
Marble Well-governed citiesWell- administered cities with marble buildings.
Wine-dark (here) Stormy and wild
The shining metalThe shield made by modern artist.
Artificial wildernessContemporary chaotic world where every thing is artificial.
A sky like leadUgly and dark contemporary atmosphere because of spiritual desolation and
hollowness.

Explanation In this poem Auden employs the technique of Greek myth to present a contrast
between the glorious and adventurous past with the desolate and barren contemporary situation. The
poet begins the poem by referring to Greek mythology in which Thetis, the mother of Achilles looks
at the shield hung over Achilles shoulders. In fact, the shield of Achilles, one of the Greek heroes
of Trojan war, was made by Hephaestus, who was the blacksmith of the gods. In these lines the use
of the word shield is symbolic. It is a symbol of the culture and conditions of life. The shield of
Achilles was characterised by beautiful scenes of adventure, art and sea adventures, etc. On this
shield were engraved orchards of vines and olive trees, well-administered cities with buildings of
marble and wine-dark seas with beautiful ships sailing on them.

Thetis, Achilles mother is surprised to find that the modern artist had depicted dark
pictures of artificial and desolate life of the contemporary world. The modern shield of Achilles
projects the contemporary chaotic world, where everything is artificial and the contemporary
atmosphere signifies desolation, bleakness and barrenness. The lines effectively bring out the
contrast between cultured past and chaotic present. It is written in short lines and is characterised by
incantation, music and Homeric echoes.


Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

FeatureCharacteristic
Bare and brownDesolate and barren, without any vegetation
CongregatedGathered together
BlanknessEmptiness, hollowness
Unintelligible multitudeMasses deprived of power to communicate their feelings, etc.
No sign of neighbourhoodThe state of being lonely even in a crowd, a characteristic feature of
cities.
A million boots in lineMillion of soldiers standing in a line.
Waiting for a signWaiting to obey an order
Without expressionBlank


Explanation Thetis, the mother of Achilles looks for familiar scenes in the modern shield of
Achilles and is surprised to find just the contrast of what she saw in Achilles shield of the past,
which was made by Hephaestus, the blacksmith of the gods. The modern shield which Auden uses
as a symbol of contemporary culture presents a vast landscape which is a total wasteland without
any characteristics of change visible. It is desolate, bleak and barren without any vegetation. It is a
lonely place where there are no friends or neighbours around. An extreme sense of alienation is
noticeable. It is a world stricken with starvation-problem of food and shelter. In this world, which
64
the modern shield projects, there are multitudes of soldiers who behave like thoughtless dumb-
driven cattle unable to communicate their sufferings, their emotions and their inner loneliness and
mechanically follow the orders of their rulers. They display blank faces without any sign of emotion
or feeling. This stanza unfolds complete spiritual desolation and insensitivity which overwhelms the
entire modern world. The modern shield reflects a sense of absolute desolation, deprivation,
insensitivity and blankness. The stanza is written in Iambic pentameter in comparatively longer
lines.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
A voice without a face(here) The indication is towards lack of personal contact. The military
commanders, Generals, rulers, etc. speak to their people over the Radio-Their voice is hard and their
face remains unseen.
Dry and levelPlain without rise and fall of emotions.
Column by Column (Used for marching soldiers) One by one, line after line, group after group,
etc.
Enduring a belief (here) Believing the justification of a cause
Logic (here) Plain reasoning behind their going to war

Explanation The shield projects that in the modern wasteland there is lack of personal contact.
The military Commanders, Generals and rulers, etc. speak to their people over a radio and the
people or the soldiers can listen to their voices only. Their faces remain unseen. They can listen to
their plain, dry, dull and unsympathetic voice. The commanders validate the justness of the cause
and persuade the unthinking people, who are hollow from within, to go to the war, surely, to come
to grief or to be killed in the battle field. Unlike the past, in the modern age no body is cheered up,
or encouraged speech and no questions are asked and no answers are encouraged. They are just to
obey without asking questions. The unemotional voice of the General or the ruler dictates them that
their cause is righteous and just and that they have no option but to obey and follow the instruction.
The lines throw sufficient light on the insensitivity of the rulers and the helplessness of the ruled-a
typical phenomenon emerging in the modern world. Audens concern for helpless unthinking
individuals who are ready to obey orders like dumb-driven cattle, shows the later phase of his poetic
career where he was inwardly inclined. This stanza is written in iambic Pentameter. Auden uses
here the pattern of longer lines. It forms the conclusion of the first part of this poem which consists
of three parts.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Ritual PietiesReligious rites and ceremonies-here, these scenes engraved on Achilles shield
HeifersCows
LibationDistribution of sweets after some religious ceremony.
The shining metalThe modern shield
AltarThe place of worship
Flickering Forge-lightDim light, which blacksmith uses to do his work.

Explanation Thetis, the mother of Achilles had seen the scenes of religious rites and
ceremonies engraved on the shield of Achilles, who was one of the Greek heroes of Trojan War.
She had seen on the shield the white flower-garlanded cows and the scenes of distribution of sweets
after the sacrificial ceremony performed on the altar. Thetis today is wonderstruck to find that those
scenes are missing on the modern shield. By the dim light, which the blacksmith uses to do his
work, he has made some other scene instead of the altar and scenes of religious rites and ceremonies
white flower-garlanded cows, Libation and sacrifice.

65
The lines reflect Thetis sense of wonder and dismay over the changed scenario engraved
on the modern shield of Achilles, quite unlike the classical shield. This stanza, which forms the first
part of the second major part of the poem, is written in short lines and rings with incantation, music
and Homeric echoes. It unveils disappearance of religious values from the modern world scenario.


Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Barbed wireWire with sharp hooks
EnclosedSurrounded
Arbitrary spot (here) It is a spot (concentration camp) where war prisoners were kept.
LoungedSpent time lazily
Cracked a jokeMade a joke
SentriesSoldiers on guard
SweatedPerspired
Decent folkGentlemen
PostsStakes

Explanation Thetis is pained to see the scenes of concentration camps engraved on the modern
shield. There is a place, where prisoners of war are kept. This place is surrounded by sharp-hooked
wires from all sides. At this place mockingly enough, the officials who get bored are spending their
time lazily and the soldiers on guard are perspiring because of hot weather. There is a scene of three
pale prisoners of the concentration camp who are being taken to three stakes planted vertically on
the ground to be tied and later shot dead. There is a crowd of so called gentlemen and women, who
stand there motionless and speechless and just watch the scene of martyrdom. The stanza brings out
aimless and directionless violence in the modern times. In a flash back the stanza takes us to the past
acts of cruelty, when Christ was crucified but that, Auden points out, was martyrdom for the
redemption of mankind. But this massacre of the modern times is a mockery of Christs sacrifice. It
merely reflects spiritual degeneration of the people who are helpless and soulless. The poet, here,
underlines spiritual sterility, insensitivity and unsympathetic attitude of the officials on duty and the
general masses towards such killings.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Mass and MajestyThe reference (here) is to the three soldiers who were flattered and persuaded to
undertake the hazards of war by the generals and rulers.
That carries weightThe reference is to the three soldiers-made Prisoners of war, who were
befooled by their sweet-tongued dictators / rulers to go to war- their argument being the cause was
just and they were important and would bring laurels to their nation.
Lay in the hands of othersThey were completely at the mercy of the enemy.
They were smallReference is to their realisation that they were insignificant.
Their shame was all the worst could wishThey suffered the worst possible insult.
Lost their prideRealisation of their insignificance made them small in their own eyes and they
were no longer proud of their heroism, etc.
And died Died before physical death, died spiritually.


Explanation These three soldiers, who were taken prisoners of war, were tied to the stakes
fixed on the ground. These soldiers were the common men who were flattered and persuaded by the
generals and rulers to undertake the hazards of war. Ironically, they were befooled by their sweet
tongued rulers \ the dictators to go to war. Their generals told them that they were going to fight for
a just cause. The rulers argued that they were honourable men and important ones who were sure to
66
bring honour to the country. Unfortunately, they were captured by the enemies and were made
prisoners and were kept in the concentration camps to be brought to the stakes and shot dead. At this
juncture, the soldiers became aware of their insignificance and suffered the worst possible insult.
The realisation of their insignificance made them very small in their own eyes and they were no
longer proud of their heroism. In fact, they were dead spiritually before their physical death. W.H.
Auden, in this stanza, exposes the hollowness and meaninglessness of war and soldiers. He
investigates into the cause of war-the role of rulers and the helplessness of the soldiers who are
killed for reasons unknown to them because they are lured into the trap of rulers and dictators.
Written in iambic pentameter and longer lines this stanza exposes the hypocrisy of warfare in the
modern world.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
AthletesPlayers
Weed-choked fieldThe field overgrown with weeds (here) spiritual desolation

Explanation This stanza brings the reader to the concluding (third) part of the poem, which
consists of three stanzas. On the modern shield Thetis looks for the scenes which she saw on
Achilles shield of ancient times. On that classical shield there were carvings of athletes busy in
playing games and men and women dancing to the rhythm and music with quick steps. Thetis is
grieved to find that modern artist has carved fields overgrown with wild plants on the modern shield
instead of play grounds and dancing floors. This short line stanza throbs with music and rhythm as
the reference shifts to Greek mythology, where Achilles shield displays play grounds and dancing
floors. It reflects past cultural values juxtaposed against spiritual sterility of the present times.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Ragged urchinA boy in (torn clothes) tatters
LoiteredMoved about leisurely
Vacancy (here) The modern wasteland
AxiomsMaxims or self-evident truths

Explanation Thetis, the mother of Achilles, while searching for familiar scenes of the past,
finds engraved on the modern shield, a shabby boy in tatters who moves about lonely, aimlessly and
in a leisurely way on the modern wasteland, instead of players busy in playing games. In direct
contrast to the healthy games of the past this ragged boy cruelly aims a stone at a bird with the
intention to hurt it and the bird is shown to fly away in the engraving on the modern shield. This
indicates vicious games played in the modern world. Here on the modern shield are engraved the
scenes of girls being raped or becoming victims of sexual violence and the boys quarrelling with
one another carrying knives. Thus, the modern shield mirrors forth two important features of
modern wasteland sex and violence. Sympathy, love and friendship which were characteristics of
the past are shamelessly lacking in the present age. This stanza is an ironic comment on the modern
wasteland, which is blotted with vicious sexual violations and acts of senseless violence. The
modern shield displays absolute absence of the sympathy, love and promises of friendship.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

ArmourerThe maker of armour, the blacksmith
ThetisThe mother of Achilles, (here) it is a symbol of audience or on lookers
HephaestusThe blacksmith of the gods-symbol of ancient artist.


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Explanation This is the concluding stanza of the third part of the poem. On seeing the different
scenes engraved on the modern shield, which reflects the contemporary culture. Thetis feels
disappointed and terrified to think that the modern artist has made a terrible shield which exhibits
that completely chaotic situation prevails in the modern world and the thin lipped artist of
Achilles shield has left the place. The concluding lines underline the inevitability of death a
person who would slay others will himself be slain by someone else one day or the other. Achilles
would also not live for long. War brings destruction and death. Thus, Auden condemns war and
violence and pleads for Christian values of love, sympathy and fellow-feelings. He has built up this
theme with the help of mythical technique and through the stylistic device of contrast. The past and
the present highlight the contemporary wasteland and emphasise the urgency of establishment of
moral and religious values of love, sympathy and fellow-feelings to change the existing scenario.

Summary The poet begins the poem by referring to Greek mythology in which Thetis, the
mother of Achilles, the great Greek hero of Trojan, looks at the shield made by Hephaestus, hung
over Achilles shoulder. Thetis looks for familiar scenes of adventure, art and sea adventures
scenes depicting past culture and conditions on the modern shield. She is surprised to find that the
modern artist had depicted bleak pictures of the artificial and desolate contemporary world. The
modern world, engraved on the shield, is desolate, bleak and barren without any sign of positive
change. It is characterised by deprivations, insensitivity and blankness. In this world which the
modern shield projects, there are multitudes of soldiers who behave like dumb-driven cattle and
mechanically follow the dictates of their Generals who speak to them over a radio in dry and
unsympathetic voices. The commanders persuade them to go to war by justifying the cause and
lured in their trap people go to war, surely to come to grief or to be killed. The soldiers have no
option but to obey and march in line to the battle field.

In the second part of the poem, the poet focuses light on the spiritual sterility and lack of
religious and moral values in the modern world which the modern shield reflects. Instead of scenes
of religious rites and ceremonies, distribution of sweets, white flower-garlanded cows and sacrificial
ceremony being performed on the altar, modern shield mirrors forth scenes of concentration camps
where war prisoners were kept. There is the scene of three pale prisoners of the concentration camp
being taken to be tied on stakes to be shot dead. Auden, by implication, suggests that this scene is a
mockery of Christs crucifixion. It merely reflects spiritual degeneration of the people who are
helpless and soulless. Ironically these prisoners were befooled by their sweet tongued rulers or
dictators and persuaded to undertake the hazards of war. Unfortunately, they were captured by the
enemies and were made prisoners, kept in the concentration camps and were finally brought to the
stakes to be shot dead. At this juncture the soldiers became aware of their insignificance and
suffered worst possible disgrace. This made them very small in their own eyes and they were no
longer proud of their heroism and they died as men before their bodies died. This exposes the
hypocrisy of modern warfare and spiritual degeneration prevalent in the modern world.

In the concluding part of the poem the poet once again juxtaposes the past cultural values
against spiritual sterility of the present times. Thetis looks for carvings of athletes busy in playing
games and men and women dancing to the rhythm and music, but to her dismay the modern shield
flashes across fields overgrown with wild plants, a shabby boy in loiters, who totters about
aimlessly. The ragged boy cruelly aiming a stone at a bird which is shown to fly away, the girls
being raped and the boys quarrelling, carrying knives project a terrible picture of modern society.
Two major characteristics of modern culture, thus, get exposed here sexual abuse and violence.
The modern shield, in fact, displays absolute absence of sympathy, love and fellow-feelings. Thetis
feels extremely disappointed and frightened to think that the modern artist has made such a terrible
68
shield which shows scenes of complete chaos in the modern world that she cries in dismay. Finally
she is awakened to the inevitability of death a person who would slay others will himself be slain
by someone else. This shows the futility of warfare as it brings destruction and death. Thus, Auden
has successfully used the mythical technique to highlight the contemporary wasteland through
contrast of the present and the past and finally he condemns war and violence and pleads for
Christian values of love, sympathy and fellow-feelings. The poem marks the later phase of his
poetic career when he was inwardly inclined and was seeking humanistic means to resolve the
contemporary socio-political and cultural crisis.

Introduction First published in Poetry in Oct, 1952 W. H. Audens poem The Shield of
Achilles was later included as the title poem in the volume of poems entitled, The Shield of
Achilles, 1955 and then in the Collected Shorter Poems. The poem consists of three parts, each part
comprises three stanzas. In the first two parts, the first part is written in short lines stanza
characterised by incantation music and Homeric echoes. In the next two stanzas, Auden has used
Iambic Pentameter and comparatively longer lines. In the third part, the second stanza is in Iambic
Pentameter and in the first and the third stanzas again music, coupled with Homeric echoes,
predominates and makes it a unique lyrical piece. In this poem Auden builds up the theme of
desolation, barrenness and hollowness of modern world through contrast by using classical myth of
Achilles and his Shield to juxtapose the past and the present and thus brings out the desolation,
emptiness and barrenness of the contemporary scenario contrasted against the heroic past. He strikes
a very effective parallelism by alternating the glorious past with the hollowness of the scene and
thus producing antithetical effect. The poet begins the poem by referring to Greek mythology in
which Thetis, the mother of Achilles, looks at the shield hung over the shoulders of her son.

The Shield of Achilles, one of the Greek heroes of Trojan War, was made by Hephaestus
who was the blacksmith of the gods. This shield was characterised by beautiful scenes of adventure,
art and sea adventures, etc. On it were depicted orchards, well-governed cities with marble buildings
and calm seas with beautiful ships sailing on them. To her wonder on the modern shield of Achilles,
the modern artist had depicted the bleak pictures of artificial and desolate life of the contemporary
world. The modern shield of Achilles projects a vast landscape desolate, bleak and barren without
food, rest or a place for shelter. There are multitudes of soldiers behaving like thoughtless cattle,
mechanically following the dictates of their leaders and rulers who do not have any personal contact
with them. They merely give them orders through radio in a dry and unsympathetic voice, justify
the cause by statistics and persuade them to go to war, surely to come to grief or to be killed. This
exposes the emptiness and worthlessness of adventure in desolate and bleak modern age.

Auden reinforces his point through another conspicuous contrast which underlines
degeneration of religious values. Achilles mother observes a scene of a concentration camp
depicted on the modern shield instead of the depiction of the scenes of ritual pieties/white flower-
garlanded heifers which remind one of the romantic poet, John Keats reference to Grecian Urn in
his Ode on a Grecian Urn. There, on the shield, she observes:

Three pale figures were led forth and bound
to three posts driven upright in the ground.

The scene unfolds the utter futility of ideals as the prisoners of war, who are tied to the
posts to be shot dead, suddenly become aware of the hollowness of the ideals they fought for and
lost their pride and died as men before their bodies died. Christ was also crucified. His crucifixion
was termed as martyrdom as it was for the cause of redemption but massacre in the modern age is
aimless, insignificant and carries no meaning, no significance. It is rather a sign of spiritual
69
degeneration of the people who are helpless and soulless-the killed and killers both. The poet
underlines the insensitivity and unsympathetic attitude of the officials on duty and the general
masses towards killings. The third part of the poem reveals Thetis searching eye trying to locate on
the shield:
For athletes at their games.
Men and Women in a dance
Moving their sweet limbs.
Quick, Quick to music

Contrary to the carvings of athletes busy in playing games, and men and women dancing to
the rhythm and music with quick steps, engraved on Achilles shield, the modern shield displays no
playgrounds or dancing floors. Here Thetis comes across weed-choked fields where a ragged urchin
loiters about, where girls are raped, where acts of violence are committed ruthlessly and aimlessly
and where old values of sympathy love, promises of friendship are unscrupulously lacking. The
contrast reflects that in the past heroic warriors fought for a cause they fought for religion, for
country even for love, but brutal and soulless violence is the order of the day in modern times.

Thetis, the mother of Achilles, is frightened to view the contemporary scenario engraved on
the modern shield and goes away crying in despair at the degeneration of religious, moral and
spiritual values in the modern age.

About this poem Monroe K. Spears remarks. The shield symbolises art, image of the
human condition. Audens version however, is mock-heroic, contrasting the Homeric description to
the life the modern artist must represent. In the shield of art Hephaestus (the artist) shows Thetis
(the audience), not the classical city but the plain of modern life on which multitudes are ordered
about by totalitarian rulers (a faceless voice reciting statistics through a loudspeaker). Instead of the
ritual pieties, we have barbed wire enclosing an arbitrary spot where there is a travesty of the
crucifixion being performed by bureaucratswhile ordinary decent folk watchin which helpless
individuals are shamelessly deprived of human dignity before death
8
.

In the concluding stanza Auden brings out Thetis despair and the inevitability of Achilles
death. There is a reference to the hobbling away of Hephaestus, the thin-lipped armourer, who made
such a classical shield representing symbolically the inevitability of death of man, though he may be
as brave as iron hearted man slaying Achilles himself - even Achilles could not escape death. The
implication here is that making a shield like that of Achilles in modern times is insignificant in the
face of inevitability of death.

Auden successfully employs the technique of classical myth to build up his theme of
spiritual decay and desolation in the modern age through the contrast of past having significant
artistic and cultural values with the chaotic present, with its loss of spiritual and artistic values.
There is an implied suggestion of Christian belief in inevitable end of old world order and the
emergence of the new world order. The poem belongs to the later phase of Audens poetic career
and, therefore, it shows spiritual and religious leanings.

Essay-Type Questions:
1. Attempt a critical appreciation of the poem, The Shield of Achilles.
2. Trace the development of thought in the poem, The Shield of Achilles.
3. What is the theme of the poem, The Shield of Achilles?
70
Write short notes on the following:
1. Contemporary world reflected through the Shield.
2. Use of Symbolism.


71

7. In Praise of Limestone

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes :

Inconstant onesThose who constantly change their views-the opportunists (called the limestone
ones in the poem).
IngeniousClever, skilful persons showing ingenuity.
ConsistentlyConstantly
ConduitsWater channels, drains
ChuckleTo show signs of glee or to laugh in a repressed manner.
Private PoolPrivate world
RavineA Mountain cleft
LoungesTo recline idly
Displaying his dildoReference (here) is to sexual overtures to seek pleasure
ExtensionsExpansions
ConspicuousStriking to the eye

ExplanationIn this poem Auden presents a word-picture of limestone landscape, which
symbolizes an idyllic world of art, where norms of good and evil are quite different from those of
human world. Modern world of human beings follows an artificial, theoretical and impractical
religion and a strict code of morality which stand in stark contrast against the religion which is free
from retribution, guilt and shame, which artistic world exhibits.

Here, the poet defines limestone men and describes the scenic beauty and the characteristics
of the limestone men. The poet calls the human beings who keep on changing their views, the
limestone ones. According to the poet such people are, in fact, the opportunists who seek material
advancement by moving with the wind. Just as the limestone, when it is dissolved in water loses its
individuality, similarly, the opportunists change according to the changing needs of the hour and are
ready to lose their identity to achieve material heights. Hence, such people always feel nostalgic for
the limestone landscape.

The poet draws attention to the attractive appearance of the limestone landscape by pointing
at its round slopes, which are fragrant with a fragrant shrub, thyme. Just beneath its pleasant surface,
the poet points out are the caves and the water channels through which flows the water. There is a
reference to those springs which while they flow appear to produce a chuckling sound expressing
glee. Metaphorically, this limestone landscape symbolises a human world where people are
inconstant like limestone. They keep on changing and adopting themselves to the requirements of
the changing time like the water which flows beneath the limestone through the most convenient
routes. They make out private worlds of their own and each in his own world lives a life given to
sensuous pleasures, availing himself of each given opportunity and sucking honey like a butterfly
from one flower to another and keeps sticking to his own world like a lizard.

In a conversational language the poet brings to the notice of the reader the well-marked
limestone landscape with definite outlines. He underlines that this region is the most congenial place
for limestone men as it provides men who are afraid of the unknown and the undefined, with the
security of motherly love. For a man who is given to the pleasures of sex and love and who leans
against a rock lazily, making sexual overtures fully assured that whatever his faults may be he is
perfectly secure and loved and hence, fully given over to the enjoyment of the present moment, this
72
limestone landscape offers the most secure refuge. Here, limestone men are free to attract others and
win over others and hence, enjoy worldly pleasures and achieve material success.

The poet compares these limestone ones with little children at play. Just as the children live
in their own fairy lands and make-believe worlds easily imagining one thing at one time and
something else at another and their imaginings are neither logical nor consistent, similarly, the
grownups (the limestone ones) keep on making private world of their owna world where they can
pursue selfish pleasures and motives. Just as the children compete among themselves and use fair or
foul means to win their mother's attention or love, so do these pleasure seekers of limestone
landscape indulge in competitioneven cut throat competition for worldly power and wealth. Thus,
it is the landscape for which the opportunists constantly feel home sick.


Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:

Band of rivalsGroup of competitors
Voluble discourse A Loud discussion
Temper-TantrumsFits of anger
Lay (here) Song, a short narrative poem or balled
Accustomed toUsed to
CraterMouth of a volcano
Blazing furyFlaming anger
Local needs of valleysRoutine requirements of that area
Lattice-work Inter crossing bars
Nomad's combWanderer's instrument for untangling hair, etc.
EncounteredFaced
FungiPoisonous growth
Monstrous formsWild horrible forms
ComprehensibleUnderstandable
PimpA pander, one who helps in wicked designs
FakeFalse, counterfeit, fraudulent
Tenor (here) Highest male voice
Bring down the house (here) Earn loud applause
The best (here) The saints to be
The worst(here) Over-ambitious and bloodthirsty people like Caesar

Explanation In this stanza the poet draws the reader's attention to a group of limestone men
who keep on competing with each other using fair or foul means. Though, they are seen arm in arm
sometimes, their steps are not in harmony and they always try to harm their rivals. They can be seen
involved in loud discussions with each other about the moral and ethical aspects of God. They know
each other to the extent that they cannot think that there can be any important secrets. They do not
know any rigid code of morality. They can not think of a god whose anger is so volcanic that he
cannot easily be pacified by a hymn or a line of poetry in His praise. Living in the limestone
landscape they are habitual of limestone-persons who can easily be moulded like the limestone
which can be easily cut and given any shape. Hence, their god can easily be pleased and won over
by sweet tongued flattery. Limestone people are well adjusted within their limited surroundings. It
is a world where everything is familiar and conventional and so they are afraid of the new, the
unknown, the mysterious and the infinite. They are born fortunate. They have never come across
poisonous growth, insects of the jungle and the horrible forms which involve dangers and horrors of
73
life. They have never seen bad days or faced challenges. They take life easily in its stride without
any fear or threats. So when any one of them is destroyed or falls on evil days or takes to evil days
they can understand the operations or working of his mind because he was very much like them-a
limestone one. It doesn't matter whether one becomes a pander, a person who helps in wicked
designs or a dealer who deals in false Jewellery or an opera singer who uses his fine resounding
voice in an operathese will earn for them a lot of loud applause. This is the word picture of the
limestone landscape metaphorically presented by the poet.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes :

ImmoderateExtraordinary
HumorWait or Intention
Tamedmade useful or managed
AlteredChanged
Intendant(here) Prospective over-ambitious person like Caesar
Slamming the doorClosing the door with force and noise
Older colder voice(here) the call of the ocean
Envies (here) Objects of envious feeling

Explanation In this stanza the poet points out that those who are above average or below
average do not like to live in this limestone country. Only the ordinary or the average people want to
stay there. Saints, who are above the worldly affairs, may be termed as the best and over-ambitious
and bloodthirsty people like Caesar come in the category of the worst. The best seek extraordinary
places which extol intrinsic beauty, moderate or dim light and where life holds deeper and more
persuasive meanings than mere pleasure seeking and cut-throat competitions for material
achievement in the form of power and wealth characteristic of limestone country. The saints to be
respond sorrowfully to the call of the hard rocks of granite that their wit or intention is fallacious
and their display of love is merely accidental whereas death is permanent and certain. Then clays
and gravels extend a cordial invitation in a soft and profound tone by pointing to the specific place
reserved for drill of the armies, they can achieve even much more there, for example, build dams to
tame the rivers, etc. Over-ambitious persons can get constructed grand and magnificent tombs.
Those who were over ambitious and wanted to be powerful and great, ambitious like Caesar listen
to the call and in a fit of anger leave the place to bring about radical changes. They in fact, extol
material existence but they are not pleasure seekers. They want to attain power to control and rule
the earth. But the reckless or rash people are attracted by the ocean, which has always been an
object of fascination for the adventurous people, but in whose vast expanse of water human
aspirations are lost for ever. In fact, ocean's might is unchallengeable. No doubt, it offers freedom,
which involves risk of life and promises nothing. In fact, the poet underlines the fact that reckless
adventures involve risk and lead such people no where.

Words-Meanings and Explanatory Notes:
Dilapidated provinceWasted or ruined province
TunnelA subterranean artificial passage through a hill (here tunnel represents time linking the
past to the present)
Earnest habitsincere habit
Calling the sun the sunto call a spade a spade-the stark truth
Anti-mythologicalAct against mythology
ModificationsTransformations or changes
GesticulatingMaking gestures or indicating
74
Angle (here) Point of view

Explanation In these particular lines the poet underlines the lesson which history teaches i.e. in
the world nothing is permanent. The world is not as it appears to be. Different approaches to life
prove the validity of this fact. This world is devoid of the quietness of a place where every thing is
settled or fixed. It is a degenerated and ruined world. But all this does not end the matter. It poses a
worldly duty upon itself to call in question the rights of human beings. The poet, who is appreciated
for the sincere habit of calling a spade a spade i.e. stark realism, feels uncomfortable by the
mysterious statues which seem to interrogate his anti-mythological myth of limestone landscape,
obviously made out of the realities of life and not out of the imaginary performances of gods and
goddesses. Indisciplined and rowdy university students pursue the scientist down the tiled path
between trees or a gallery, no doubt, with pleasant offers but they seem to criticise his concern for
the remotest aspects of Nature. The poet is not an exception. He is also criticised for not being one
among themnot wasting time, not getting caught, not lagging behind and not resembling beasts
who always act in the same manner, and finally, for not being a thing like water or stone whose
conduct or way of behavior can be predicted.

However, death is a fact. If human beings become aware enough to realise it then they are
right. If sins can be forgiven and if there is life to come, the various shapes, which limestone can
easily assume made merely for pleasure, emphasis that the fortunate will not bother about the point
of view from which they are considered because everything is transparent. There is no secret-
nothing to hide. Death is the ultimate reality. Human nature is weak and inconsistent. It is as strange
and unreal to think of perfection in love or a life to come as are the different shapes assumed by the
limestone. One should accept the reality of life and face its challenges instead of hankering after
empty dreams and finding out escape routes to religion or romantic love.

Introduction One of the most remarkable poem of W. H. Auden, about which G.S.Fraser has
most appropriately commented in his essay The career of W. H. Auden that It is One of the most
beautiful of all his recent poems. In Praise of limestone was first published in Horizon in July
1948. This poem later formed part of another volume of Auden's poem Nones. In fact, the
technique and style adopted by the poet to build up the main argument necessitates the intensive
study of the poem to understand its main thrust.

Summary In this poem Auden has presented a limestone landscape, which symbolises an
idyllic world of art, where norms of good and evil are quite different from those of the human
world. Modern world follows an artificial theoretical and impractical religion and strict moral code
which stand contrasted against a religion, which is free from retribution, guilt and shame, exhibited
in the artistic world.

The poet calls the opportunists the limestones because they are inconstant ones who seek
material advancement by moving with the wind. The poet draws attention to the attractive limestone
landscape with its round slopes, underground caves and conduits, its chuckling springs and points
out that this landscape is symbolically a human world where people are inconstant like limestone.
They keep on adapting themselves to the requirement of the changing time and through the most
convenient routes they make private world of their own and each in his own world lives a life given
to sensuous pleasures and material achievements. The poet earmarks the well-marked landscape
with definite outlines and underlines that this region is the most congenial place for limestone men
as it provides men given to pleasures of sex, love and other material comforts, the most secure
refuge and security of motherly love. The limestone men keep on seeking or pursuing selfish
pleasures and motives in their private world and like children who vie with each other to win
75
mother's attention or love and use fair or foul means, these pleasure-seekers also compete for
worldly power and wealth.

They are sometimes seen arm in arm but their steps are never in harmony with each other.
So they always try to harm their rivals. They get involved in loud discussions regarding the moral
and ethical nature of their God. They are so well familiar with the ways of each other that they can
not think that there can be any important secrets. They cannot conceive of a god, whose temper-
tantrums are moral to the extent that He cannot easily be pacified by a hymn or a line of poetry in
His praise. They know that their god is not so volcanic that He can not be easily pleased or won
over by sweet tongued flattery. Limestone people are well adjusted in their limited surroundings.
They are born lucky and take life in its stride. When any one of them falls on evil days or takes to
evil ways, they can understand the working of his mind because he happens to be one of them.


But the bestthe saints to be and the worstover-ambitious persons like Caesar do not like
to live in this limestone country, only the average live there. The best seek extraordinary places
which extol intrinsic beauty, which are away from gaudy light and where life has more persuasive
and deeper meanings than mere pleasure seeking or material achievements. They respond
sorrowfully to the call of the granite wastes saying that their intention or humor is fallacious and
their display of love is accidental where death is permanent. The over-ambitious persons are given
many other incentives by the clays and gravels like a place for drill of armies, building of dams to
tame rivers and magnificent tombs to be constructed but they leave the place in anger. They want to
bring radical changes. They extol material existence but they crave for power to control and rule the
earth. But the people who are reckless are attracted by the call of the ocean, which has always
fascinated the adventurers but in whose vast expanse of water human aspirations are lost forever.
The ocean offers freedom but it is at the cost of life-adventurous life involves risk and may lead
nowhere. Human efforts can not challenge its might.

The poet underlines the lesson which history teaches i.e. in the world of reality nothing is
settled or definite. It is a fact that this world is not as pleasant as it appears to be. It is devoid of the
quietness of a place where every thing is fixed or settled. This is a degenerated and ruined world,
which makes an appeal regarding its duty to call into question the rights of human beings. The poet
who is appreciated for his stark realism feels uncomfortable by the mysterious statues which appear
to doubt his anti-mythological mytha myth formed out of the realities of life and not out of the
imaginary warnings of gods and goddesses. He is criticized for his actions and behavior because he
does not lose time, does not get caught, is not left behind and because he does not behave like the
beasts, who always act in the same manner and also because he is not a thing or a stone whose
conduct can be predicted.


In spite of this Auden feels that death is a fact, a certainty. If human beings realise it then
they are right. The various shapes, which limestone men can easily assume, made merely for
pleasure, emphasise that the fortunate people will not bother about the point of view from which
they are considered because everything is transparent. There is nothing to hide. Death is a fact.
Human nature is weak and inconstant and so to think of perfection in love or future life seem as
strange as are the different shapes assumed by the limestone landscape. This implies that one should
accept the reality of life and face its challenges and should not take recourse to escape routes to
religion or romantic love.

Critical Appreciation In Praise of limestone was first published in Horizon in July 1948. Later
it formed part of another volume of Auden's poems Nones. It is one of the most remarkable poems
76
of W. H. Auden, about which, G. S. Fraser has most appropriately commented in his essay, The
Career of W. H. Auden that it is one of the most beautiful of all his recent poems. In this poem
Auden presents a limestone landscape which symbolises an idyllic world of art where there are
human figures carved in limestone.

Auden gradually builds up the main argument by presenting a well marked limestone
landscape with definite outlines, characteristics of limestone men, the best and the worst types of
people-the saints-to-be and over-ambitious Caesars respectively and finally reckless adventurers
who want to enjoy freedom which involves risk to life and try to challenge ocean's might. His
ultimate analysis leads him to a stark realization-death is a certainty, it is a fact, Human nature is
weak and inconsistent and so it is as strange and unrealistic to expect perfection in love or future life
as are the different shapes assumed by the limestone landscape. By implication the poem underlines
the fact that one should accept the reality of life and face its challenges and should not hanker after
empty dreams and should not take recourse to escape routes to religion or romantic love.

Justin Replogle remarks that the fine lyric, In praise of limestone within its elaborate
metaphorical landscape, considers four ways of responding in life. Limestone men live solely for
pleasure. Their tribe spreads all the way from unsophisticated simple living unspoiled in the natural
state, Rousseau dreamed of, to aesthetes in high civilisation graced by conspicuous fountains and
formal vineyards. Unable to imagine anything beyond their control, these attractive limestone
types can experience neither Religious despair and joy nor Ethical good and evil. They are Aesthetic
saints or Caesars. Saints live elsewhere, on granite wastes, while Intendant Caesars prefer "clays and
gravels". Saints are obsessed by time-death, chance and uncertainties beyond human control. So
they soon flee the limestone softness for a harder land where every austere rock reminds them of
human pettiness and limitation. Caesars, like their limestone cousins, cherish earthly existence, but
not for its pleasures. They thrive on power and act to transform the earth to control it and make it
yield. So they seek out malleable builder's soil, gravel and clay. A really reckless fourth group
prefers the ocean, in whose liquidity human aspirations sink without a trace. The sea offers freedom
by annihilation and guarantees that no human triumph shall mar its indifference to men's efforts.
Those who prefer freedom, the freedom of life-denial are so completely uncongenial to Auden that
the he never mentions them again even to disapprove
9
. Auden's selection of an idyllic setting for
this poem lends it an extra grandeurthe landscape in pastoral surroundings with its rounded
slopes and secret system of caves and conduits and the springs that spurt out everywhere with a
chuckle. An atmosphere of mystery, suspense and secrecy lend a romantic setting to the landscape
which is the most congenial place for limestone men given to pleasures of love and sex. The
limestone men keep on seeking or pursuing selfish pleasures and motives in their private world and
like children who vie with each other to win mother's attention or love and use fair or foul means,
these pleasure seekers compete for worldly power and wealth.

These limestone men (Human figures carved in the limestone) stand 'arms in arm' but their
steps are never in harmony with each other. They are involved in loud discussions. They are so well
familiar with the ways of one another that they cannot think that there can be any important secrets.
They cannot conceive of a god whose temper-tantrums are moral and volcanic to the extent that He
cannot easily be pacified by a hymn or a line of poetry. They know that their god can easily be
pleased by sweet-tongued flattery. Limestone men are well adjusted in their limited surroundings.
They are born lucky and take life in its stride. When any one of them falls on evil ways, they can
understand the working of his mind, as he happens to be one among them. Though, the idyllic world
of limestone men holds temptations to saints-to-be, over-ambitious Caesars and the reckless ones,
they slip away from it. Thus, the limestone landscape with its limestone men is an idyllic world of
77
art where concepts of good and evil are quite different from those of the real human world. The
human world follows an artificial, theoretical and impractical religion and a rigid code of morality
which stands contrasted against the religion of artistic world of limestone men, which upholds a
religion free from retribution, guilt and shame and which affords a glimpse of powerful expression
of natural human instincts and desires.

Finally, the poet strikes a personal and religious note and leads the poem quietly to its
climax by underlining the fact about weak and inconsistent human nature and strangeness of
seeking perfection in love or future life and comparing it with the fragile nature of different shapes
assumed by the limestone landscape. He says:

.but when I try to imagine a faultless love
Or the life to come, what I hear is the murmur
Of underground streams, what I see is a limestone landscape.

Auden, in fact, quite skillfully projects a variety of moods in this poem. The characteristic
technique and leisurely style of the poem lend an additional edge to its appreciation. About this
poem Barbara Everett in her book Auden remarks that the success of Auden's later style, lies in the
leisurely, apparently casual, but in fact, deliberate, winding movement towards a quiet climax that is
half denied by, but half resists, the profusion of circumstantial detail that precedes it
10
. In fact, the
technique and style adopted by Auden to build up the main argument of the poem necessitates a
thorough perusal of the poem to understand its main thrust.

The poets handling of a variety to moods and feelings leading to the central subject,
gradually developing the main argument through the contrast of artistic world and the human world
and in a sustained dramatic tone and finally by implication a pragmatic approach to face the
challenges of life with fortitude and not to seek escape routes to romantic love or religion are indeed
remarkable features of the poem.

Essay-Type Questions:
1. Trace the development of thought in the poem, In Praise of Limestone.
2. Attempt a critical appreciation of the poem, In Praise of Limestone.
3. Write down the theme of the poem, In Praise of Limestone.
Write short notes on the following:
1. Audens use of symbolism.
2. Incongruous diction.
3. Audens versification.
4. Landscape Imagery.

Questions:

Note: The Students are advised to take help from the detailed stanza-wise Explanation, Summary
and Critical Appreciation of the given poems for the preparation of answers to the textual essay-type
and short questions.
78
Chapter-V

W.H. Auden: A Modern Poet


W.H. Auden (1907-73) is the most representative poet on the British literary scenario.
Socially and politically conscious in a leftwing way, he established his leadership over the group of
poets, who shared his attitudes and perceptions by proclaiming the urgency of collective action and
the need for active involvement in the immediate cause. Perhaps for this reason, Robin Skelton
considers him a leader, an innovator and representative voice of his time and generation
1
.


Keeping in view the variety and abundance of his literary outputs Auden is a modern poet.
Richard Hoggart in his Introduction to Auden remarks, He has produced a body of verse which
commands our respect and admiration in a number of ways; he has been the brilliant and sometimes
profoundly evocative explorer of dilemmas within the human will; in his vividly epigrammatic,
conversational and alert verse he held a mirror to a complex decade
2
. In fact, Audens versatility
and prolificacy as a poet is per-excellent. His actively productive literary span extends over a period
of thirty five years. During this span, as Donald Davies in Remembering the Thirties puts it,
..no other poet writing in English today, has attempted as much as Auden; just as no other
poet of his generation can place beside his body of work so exciting for its peculiar insight, its range
of reference, and its skill in use of language and rhythm. In the variety of subjects and manners he
has used successfully, Auden has to be found a parallel outside contemporary poetry altogether in
the painter Picasso
3.


Audens attempt to confront the urgent and immediate challenges of the times compelled
him to react very sharply to the aesthetics prevalent in the preceding decade. His poetry, in fact, can
be seen as emerging in direct contrast to the poetry of his immediate predecessors. Unlike the poets
of the previous decade, Auden Group - Auden being the trend-setter, assumed a radical posture to
counteract the unpleasant realities of the contemporary scene and refused to look upon art as a
sanctuary or safe haven from the turmoil, turbulence and decay of actual social life. He showed a
radical concern for public issues. He did not allow his poetic talents to be confined to the expression
of his private anxieties. The poets of the twenties, on the other hand, felt that there could be only a
personal and private solution of the problems of spiritual sickness which they saw around them.
Instead of limiting himself to the expression of intense anguish and an overpowering sense of
desolation over a situation which was visualised as an abstract and external catastrophe, Auden
believed in concrete action. Here in lies a poetry of revolt, a characteristic feature of modern poetry.
Colloquial diction, difficult and prosaic vocabulary, which signify Audens poetry, make him a
modern poet.

Another marked feature of Audens poetry is humanitarianism. A communist To others
later entitled as Brothers, who when the sirens roar represents the highest watermark in the middle
phase of his poetry dealing with the issues of socio-economic exploitation, injustice and inequality.
Auden expresses his solidarity with the proletariat in common fears and assures them that if they
lend their support, they can make this system tumble down
4
Again, his humanitarian impulse
inspires him to raise the issue of inequality and injustice in the poem O for the doors to be open.
The poem presents a sick society wrought with the distinctions of the rich and the poor. In Its
farewell to the drawing rooms civilised cry his outcry for providing justice to the exploited and
down-trodden evidences not only his acceptance of the identity of the common man but also his
genuine concern for their lot.
79

In Audens poetry another modern trend emerges as the most predominant feature-its
realism. Auden made a sincere attempt to grapple with the contemporary issues from a fresh angle.
His direct involvement in some of the topical developments and the strong sense of commitment to
the cause of society shows his poetry to be a realistic one. He, in fact, wrote down-to-earth poetry.


Auden and his group attacked T.S. Eliot and other modernists for adopting a passively
gloomy or cynically bitter attitude towards the challenges posed by the contemporary society and
championed collective socio-political action as a remedy for the grave problems created by the
existing situation. The ideological thrust of Auden and his group was towards re-orientation of
society on leftist lines which would be an anathema to older poets like W.B. Yeats and T.S. Eliot for
whom recapturing of tradition, religion and mythical beliefs by the individual was the real answer.
This change in his social perspective determines the basic content of his poetry as well as his
manner of expression. He acknowledged the overpowering sense of moral confusion and spiritual
uncertainty that had overtaken modern man, but he chose to take upon himself the specific task of
investigating into the social causes that had led to this phenomenon and to resolve the crisis.


Audens later poetry evidences another modern characteristic i.e., of revival of religious
faith. The compositions of Francis Thompson, W.B. Yeats, Masefield are clear manifestations of
this modern trend. A faith in Christian theology is predominant in all the writings of Audens
American phase. This development, though, appears sudden after his English phase, was, in fact, a
continuation of the beliefs and ideals imperceptibly cherished by him even in his earlier phase of
life. A perusal of his early poems reveals prayers, invocations for a change of heart and humanistic
solutions like love and sympathy to social problems. It was, in fact, a constant evolution leading to
his faith in Christianity.

A revival of interest in the poetry of Donne and other Metaphysical poets of the 17
th

Century is a remarkable trend in the modern poetry which gets reflected in the poetry of W.H.
Auden also. His startling and far-fetched imagery is a reflection of the imagery used by
Metaphysical poets. Though Audens poetry deals with down to earth realities, the undercurrents of
romanticism, a typical modern trend, are also felt. Love in its various shades remains a major theme
of his poetry. Like Romantics Auden has also made extensive use of symbolism in his poetry to
communicate his viewpoint. His use of landscape, war and journey as symbols is quite effective
modern trend. Auden commands a rich and varied medium of expression. He has also experimented
with new verse forms and techniques. He was constantly experimenting, making modifications and
developing his technique. He captures the readers attention by using brilliant and vigorous phrases.
Among the technical devices, which strengthen his style, are personifications, allegorical images,
use of adjectives, simile, short declarative statements, symbolism traditional verse forms, Rhetorical
devices, metres, use of long catalogues and idioms, etc.

Some critics have reservations about W.H. Audens being a modern poet. R. N. Srivastav
quotes John Blair who called him a second generation modern
5
.

Auden may be traditional in his
views about the role of the poet, he recognised the gravity of the contemporary crisis in all its
entirety and made an attempt to project it by raising challenging issues in his poetry. He tried to
investigate into the specific causes of the chaotic situation and sought to offer possible solutions to
the issues. Towards the end of the decade of Nineteen Thirties his social attitudes grew inwardly
inclined and the dominant radical thrust was subdued. He turned towards Christianity for support.
As far as technique was concerned, he was highly modern. All his efforts were directed towards
bringing about changes in the existing setup, extension of human personality by promoting human
values of love, truth and justice and optimistic confrontation with the challenges using life-values
80
that could give man his due place in society so that both individual and society may struggle for a
meaningful existence. R. N. Srivastavs remarks seem quite appropriate, Auden stands out among
modern poets by his earnest effort to be a great modern thinker. He was well-versed in history,
philosophy and theology and had a remarkable grip on contemporary currents of thought in political
theory science and psychology. No wonder, he has been such a great influence on younger poets
both in England and America. His virtuosity and the versatility of his powers over language will
long remain a source of inspiration and, in course of time, may earn him the title of the poets
poet
6
.










































81
Chapter VI

W. H. AUDENS TECHNIQUE


The overall impact of social developments on Audens sensibility was reflected in his
poetry with its full immediacy. Since, the subject matter dealt directly with the day-to-day issues.
Auden had to make corresponding adjustments in form and technique. He was a master of a variety
of styles. His literary output extended over a large period during which he was constantly
experimenting, making modifications and developing his technique.

In the poetry of early Nineteen thirties Audens style tends towards difficulty to the extent
even of obscurity. One significant cause of this obscurity is that he writes in a telegraphic style, in
which there are significant omissions like connectives, conjunctions, articles, auxiliaries and
sometimes even pronouns. This becomes challenging for the reader because such ellipses hinder his
understanding and many times remain beyond his grasp. In part I of It was Easter as I walked in
the public gardens his fondness for abbreviated expressions and omissions of articles or
connectives is clearly discernible:

Where solitary man sat weeping on a bench,
Hanging his head down, with his mouth distorted
Helpless and ugly as an embryo chicken.
(TEA,P.37.)

The omission of a before the word, solitary and as before distorted make the reading
difficult. Again, there are some omissions, which create a disjointed and disturbing effect in the
following lines:

Coming out of me living is always thinking,
Thinking changing and changing living,
Am feeling as it was seeing
In city leaning on harbour parapet
To watch a colony of duck below
(TEA, P.37. )

Here, Audens deliberately compressed style makes the reading and comprehension of the
poem quite difficult. His use of poly syllabic phrases to lend an extra grandeur to the occasion
becomes manifest in his use glittering generalities in his poem In Sickness and in Health written
at a later stage.


In fact, Auden, during this period, was experimenting with all sorts of forms and manners of
expression making his style difficult to the extent of developing an incomprehensible cerebral style.
Christopher Isherwood, Audens great friend and collaborator remarks about his early poetry, I
liked one line he would keep it and work it into a new poem. In this way, whole poems were
constructed, which were simply anthologies of my favourite lines, entirely regardless of manner or
sense. This is the simple explanation of much of Audens celebrated obscurity.
1



Auden hypnotises the reader by using brilliant and vigorously incisive phrases in individual
lines but his use of this kind of phraseology, sometimes, results in lack of coherence and
82
compactness. To add to this, private jokes, myths, allusions, private and personal symbols together
make his early poetry difficult and obscure.

Auden, no doubt, uses effective vocabulary but his use of imagery lacks organic growth. A
pertinent example of his incoherent and uninteresting imagery is found in his poem Petition in the
following lines:

..the intolerable neural itch,
The exhaustion of weaning, the liars quinsy,
And the distortions of ingrown virginity.

(TEA, P.36.)

These details, however, do not suggest that Auden was inefficient in his technical skill and
versification. Nevertheless, one thing is clear that he never bothered to correct or polish his verses
due to his casual attitude in this regard during the early period of his poetic career. At a later stage
Auden did retrospection and recognised his earlier shortcomings and went to the extent of calling
his poetry of the early phase pure rubbish. Audens capacity for assimilation was commendable.
He read a number of writers and assimilated their style and rhythms and benefited from T.S. Eliots
innovations in technique also.


In his socially active phase, Auden acquired more clarity and maturity in technical skills
with the passage of time. He, being a constant seeker of techniques of communications, attained
greater command over language, imagery and versification. Even this search for a new idiom was
one of the reasons of his migration to America. He could create new expressions, new poems out of
the potentialities of language. Regarding intellectual tone of Audens poetry, Justin Replogle
remarks, his poetry more than that of any important poet of our time, is made out of conceptual
diction, words that by themselves, out of their context of phrase or line, produce in the reader not
feeling states but intellectual responses.
2
Audens diction, in fact, is predominantly conceptual
which makes his poetry prosaic. His poetry does not produce ecstasy of sensuous sound, which
makes his poetry prosaic and this leads to its slow and grudging acceptance. His poetry, in fact, is a
poetry of direct statement. He puts his conceptual words in order to make a sentence in verse which
gives the impression of something prosaic, dull and uninteresting.


Among the technical devices which strengthen his style are personifications allegorical
images, use of adjectives, simile, short declarative statements, symbolism, traditional verse forms,
Rhetorical devices, metres, oratorical devices, use of long catalogues and idioms, etc. His
personifications of conceptual nouns lend life and vitality to his expression. His allegorical
constructions supply action and verbal animation to his diction. An excellent example of Audens
use of is to be seen in his poem In praise of Limestone, where Auden has used expanded
allegorical image allegorical landscape. It is a masterpiece which unfolds the potentialities of
such a technical device which has the power to create something really of the highest order. Again,
to strengthen his expression Auden makes ample use of adjectives which impart peculiarity and
uniqueness to his language. Not only in his early poetry but also in his later poetry, there is no
dearth of adjectives.


Simile is another technical device which abounds in Audens poetry to the extent that it has
come to be known as Auden simile. His similes Here war is simple like a monument, Museums
stored his learning like a box, And paper watched his money like a spy, etc. are some of the
examples of his use of this device. Auden also makes use of short declarative statements like
wisdom is a beautiful bird, Touching is shaking hands, etc. In addition to the above devices,
83
Auden has used Rhetorical devices. In the late Nineteen Thirties Auden developed the habit of
making his statements followed by colons or implied colons to give his verse an additional edge.

Auden uses the device of symbolism to arouse emotions in the reader. There is frequent use
of symbols from geography and landscape to depict the psychological states of mind. These
symbols have also been employed to expose corrupt and degenerated industrialised and urban
society. The shield in The Shield of Achilles projects the contrasting perspectives of a civilization.


Then, In Praise of Limestone, is a befitting example of Audens use of long verse-
sentences. In this poem there are several examples of run-on lines of irregular stops with in lines.
Among other devices, use of long catalogues, usage words and idioms may be included which help
to produce the desired effects in his poetry.





































84

Chapter-VII

W. H. Auden: The Theme of Individuality

The question of individual identity is one of the most crucial and pressing issues that Auden
takes up in his poetry. He initiates it in one of his early poems entitled, It is time for the destruction
of error (1929) where he painfully notes that the fashionable rich classes evade the real issues
through their indulgence in the superficial kind of entertainment. He is grieved to note that these
people view the destruction of error as only an ineffective threat symbolised in the storm to be
evaded by bringing in chairs. He condemns this apathetic and non assertive response on their part
because their attitude will pose a serious threat to their individuality. Auden apprehends planned
attacks against the individual and refers to the plans being made:


To haunt the poisoned in his shunned house,
To destroy the efflorescence of the flesh,
To intricate play of the mind, to enforce
Conformity with the orthodox bone,
With organised fear, the articulated skeleton
1
.


Similar warning is reiterated in a number of Audens later poems, particularly, the poems
selected for intensive study.

In In Memory of W.B. Yeats the poet underlines the indifference of Nature and Society to
W.B. Yeats death as an individual. W.B. Yeats was undergoing death pangs but Nature was not
affected at all. It continued running its usual course. Unconcerned about his serious illness, the
wolves kept running on through the evergreen forests. His death as an individual will be forgotten in
the hectic routine activities of life. The brokers will shout as usual on the floor of the Bourse-the
busy commercial centre. Each person has his own ego i.e. he is imprisoned in the vicious circle of
his ego, but he is greatly assured of his freedom he considers himself to be free. Auden pleads for
the freedom of the individual who is not only threatened but actually imprisoned;

In the prison of his days
Teach the free man how to praise.
(TEA P.243.)

The poet suggests that art should play a constructive role by generating love and other
human values required for the establishment of a well-ordered society which he considers as a
necessary prerequisite for the healthy development of the individuals:

Make a vineyard of the curse,
Sing of human unsuccess
In a rapture of distress;
In the deserts of the heart
Let the healing fountain start.
(TEA, P.243.)

In The unknown Citizen Auden decries the system which curtails freedom and happiness
of the individuals. Here his criticism of the system is subjected to his deep concern for the well-
85
being of the individuals in a society. The poet points out that the identity of an individual has
already been destroyed. He is merely a number-JS/07/M/378. He ironically suggests that the success
and identity of the unknown citizen are defined by his conformity to the rigid standards of the
regimental establishments. He is identified as a faceless creation of the Bureau of Statistics, One
against whom there was no official complaint. The poet criticises the mechanisation of an individual
by economic, commercial and even ideological institutions which exploit him to their own
suitability. The ironic exposition of the implications of this forced conformity, expected from the
unknown citizen, shows Audens powerful critique on the contemporary ethos and his liberal
concern for the freedom and happiness of the individuals.

In another poem Musee Des Beaux Arts also the poet raises this issue by pointing out that
the world at large remains indifferent to an individual and his suffering by giving three examples.
The poet successfully and systematically develops the theme of indifference of humanity and Nature
to the suffering of an individual with the help of imagery of Brueghels paintings.

At the very outset of the poem the poet states that the great painters correctly depicted the
place and significance of individual suffering in the scheme of things. They knew that the routine
activities will continue in spite of suffering on individual plane. Whatever be the depth or
magnitude of the individual suffering, the world moves on callously with its routine activities. The
poet uses contrasting images to bring out the subtle irony by making the old anxiously and eagerly
waiting for the miraculous birth of Christ and by presenting the children who ignore the incident
and keep on playing. Again, the poet highlights this issue of Natures indifference to the most
momentous of human sufferings through another painting of Brueghel, namely, The Massacre of
Innocents. On the one hand, Christ is being crucified in a secluded corner and, on the other hand,
the executioners horse is rubbing its back against a tree, quite unconcerned. The dogs are leading
their doggy life and are not even the least bothered about the crucifixion. The painting of The fall
of Icarus is representative of individual suffering and the apathy of the world to it. The agonising
cry of Icarus as he fell into the ocean and the indifference of the ploughman for whom it was not
an important failure, Natures apathy depicted through the sun rays callously falling on his white
legs disappearing into the green water of the sea and the callous indifference of the crew and the
ship which sailed calmly on when Icarus fell all these details offer an insight into the distortions in
egocentricity and self-love of the modern man. Ironically, the tragedy took place in idyllic
surroundings but no body took notice of it. In the existing scheme of things individual suffering fails
to evoke poignant emotions and hence it becomes irrelevant. The conspicuous predominance of
other things in Icarus painting-the ploughman, the sunshine, the ship painted in the minute details,
and the faint image of disappearing legs, through contrast shows that individual suffering is like a
speck in the vast world phenomena and therefore, insignificant. The poem, indirectly, suggests the
poets deep concern for the anguish of the lonely suffering individual.

In September 1, 1939 Auden shows his deep concern for the safety of individuals. At the
time of composition of this poem, the poet was sitting in a New York bar, Uncertain and afraid
(TEA, P.246.), viewing himself and his fellow-beings as lost in a haunted wood (TEA, P.246.) like
Children afraid of the night who have never been happy or good. (TEA,P.246.). Auden was afraid
of the imminent war, and uncertain of future because the thirties decade had proved to be dishonest
because dishonest efforts were made to reach a compromise with Germany knowing very well that a
compromise with dictators like Hitler and Mussolini was meaningless. Auden is concerned with the
safety of the individuals as the fear of impending war and the resultant death intruded into the
private lives of the people also. He visualises men lost in their petty private anxieties having little
capacity to counteract the hostile forces. He who gives a call for direct social action with trumpet
86
and anger and drum (TEA, P.209.) has now become conscious of Faces along the bar (TEA,
P.246.) and is desperately seeking to project an affirming flame

Investigating into the causes that led to war Auden concludes that Hitlers self-love resulted
in Fascism and his fascist tendencies were responsible for the eventuality which intruded even upon
the private lives of the people. Auden further points out that the high-sounding, empty and
incoherent non-sensical talk with which the political leaders try to befool the masses is not so rough
and harmful as the desire of human beings to be loved alone. He refers to Nijinsky, who was a
Russian dancer (1890-1950) wrote about Diaghilev, a Russian organiser of dances, that he wanted
to be loved alone. Auden calls Nijinsky mad because what he wrote about Diaghilev is true of the
common man. It is a common human weakness. Each man or each woman wants to be recognised
as an individual:

For the error bred in the bone
Of each woman and each man
Craves what it cannot have,
Not universal love
But to be loved alone.
(TEA, P.246.)

In Audens later poem In Praise of Limestone the theme of individuality asserts itself in
the form of an appeal for the freedom to express ones emotions freely, to be free to change
according to ones desires. Here the limestone landscape with its limestone men is an idyllic world
of art where concepts of good and evil are quite different from those of the real human world. The
human world follows an artificial, theoretical and impractical religion and a rigid code of morality
which stands contrasted against the religion the artistic world of limestone upholds - a religion free
from retribution, guilt and shame, and which affords a glimpse of powerful expression of natural
human instincts and desires.

In The Shield of Achilles Auden talks about automatons devoid of all sense of identity or
individuality. The poet refers to Greek mythology in which Thetis, the mother of Achilles, the great
Greek hero of Trojan, looks at the shield made by Hephaestus, hung over Achilles shoulder. Thetis
looks for familiar scenes of adventure, art and sea adventure-scenes depicting past culture and
conditions on the modern shield:

She looked over his shoulder
For vines and olive trees,
Marble well-governed cities,
And ships upon untamed seas.

Here the image of Untamed seas unfolds Audens concern for freedom. Thetis is surprised
to find that the modern artist had depicted bleak pictures of the artificial and desolate contemporary
world. The modern world, engraved on the shield, is desolate, bleak and barren without any sign of
positive change. It is characterised by deprivations, insensitivity and blankness. In this world, which
the modern shield projects, there are multitudes of soldiers who behave like dumb-driven cattle and
mechanically follow the dictates of their Generals, who speak to them over a radio in dry and
unsympathetic voices. The commanders persuade them to go to war by justifying the cause and
lured by and befooled by their sweet tongues, they undertake the hazards of war, surely to come to
grief or to be killed. The soldiers have no option but to obey and march in line to the battle field like
automatons.

87
Audens poem Prologue at Sixty epitomises his appreciation for individuality in the
following lines:

a Mind of Honor must acknowledge
the happy eachness of all things.

The above details show that in his poetry, particularly, in the poems prescribed for intensive
study W.H. Auden has successfully and effectively built up the theme of individuality.























88
Chapter - VIII
W. H. AUDENS CONCEPT OF LOVE

W. H. Auden frequently uses the word love in his poetry. To understand his concept of love
one has to go through the development and growth of his literary outputs. Being a socially
conscious poet, he thought of love as a supportive mechanism for the establishment of healthy and
harmonious relationships, which are required for a better social set-up. Hence, he thought of
romantic love in terms of an escape route or self-regarding love.


In the psycho-analytical phase of his creative output during the thirties, Auden had been
identifying the symptoms of psychic maladies leading to social crisis. He placed specific emphasis
on the role of love as an instrument to implement change of heart process for ushering in of a better
social order. In Sir, no mans enemy, forgiving all (Oct., 1929) Auden advocates a change of heart
through psychologically curing the distorted emotional responses which develop an escapist attitude
to life. In his poem, No change of place, (1931) Auden points out that the delicate sentiment of
love has become mechanical and is devoid of direct emotional expression. He, therefore, emphasises
the need to make it a stronger and more emotional factor to strengthen human relationships.

In Prologue (1932) Auden refers to the symptoms of alienation in emotionally bankrupt
heirs of decadent middle-class society. He suggests that the unifying force of love may bring about
adjustments in social institutions and help in ushering in of a social change. In this poem Auden
emerges as the exponent of love as something that gives ordered pattern to mans understanding of
social reality. Auden strongly advocates social love for the establishment of a stable society and for
bringing about an environmental change, which might ultimately enable people to shed their
sickening isolation.

In May with its light behaving the poets treatment of the issue of alienation emphasises
the need to move beyond possessive love to an emotional awakening of social love. Auden
considers the socio-economic system responsible for loneliness of individual and underlines the
importance of something more stable and lasting than temporary escape routes into pleasure trips.
His realisation of a need for a deeper kind of relationship based on a broader concept of love
becomes evident in the line:

How insufficient is the endearment and the look
1


Thus, in the final analysis Auden seems to advocate Joyous awakening to love as an
instrument of social change. Stephen Spender suggests: Love is the cure for the individual and for
the society yet the inadequacy of such an abstract ideal must have dissatisfied Auden making him
seek the workings out of the tasks of love within the social movement of his time
2
.


In the socially active phase, Auden lends an extra dimension to the concept of love by
raising it from individualistic basis to the collective social good. In the poems like Doom is dark
and deeper than any sea- dingle, That night when joy began, The chimneys are smoking, O
what is that Sound, Easily, my dear, you move, easily your head and August for the people and
their favourite islands, Audens response to the social crisis and his aversion to illusory escapes
into romantic individualistic kind of love come to limelight.

In Doom is dark and deeper than any sea-dingle (1930), the poet advocates a higher kind
of love far above:

89
.dreams of home,
waving from window, spread of welcome
kissing of wife under single sheet,.
(TEA, P.55.)

Even in private love, the poet perceives a social sense. All these emotions make him
conscious of forward looking love. At this stage, the attraction of private anxieties is difficult to
overcome. Nevertheless, the beginning has been made. Still more, in That night when joy began
(Nov.1931), we are made conscious about the existence of social reality. Even in private moments
of the lovers union, Auden mentions about mornings levelled gun and trespassers reproach
(TEA, P.113). Auden shows us glimpses into love as a cure for social insecurity but a total oblivion
into illusory love is definitely missing. Again in The Chimneys are Smoking (April, 1932), the
individual struggle of the lovers represents the struggle of life against the malignant disintegrating
forces. Auden is seeking once again the fulfilment of public vision through private means and a
distinct shift of emphasis from individual to collective can be easily marked.


Audens radicalism in this context finds forceful expression in his poem O whats that
sound (Oct.1932). Auden places the lover in a situation where he has to make a choice between his
love for his beloved and the call of duty enabling the poet to build the theme of social commitment
by presenting a contrast between private love and situational urgency. The pressures of private
concerns beneath the manifest social concerns of the poem are clearly discernible in expressions
denoting the approaching thumping march of the scarlet soldiers (TEA, P.126.) and the beloveds
passionate reactions to these as well as the lovers false consolations:

I promised to love you, dear,
But I must be leaving.
(TEA, P.126.)

Here, the final emphasis on the lovers choice in favour of social duty, in spite of his
intensity of love for his beloved, represents his pragmatic view of love which can bear the pangs of
separation and can achieve heights of love for a larger community and thereby reflects his social
perspective.


Audens condemnation of the self-regarding love and the illusory escapes into romantic
dreams comes out strongly in Easily, my dear, you move, easily your head Nov.1934).The poet
disfavours individualistic love, which moves easily through the nights delights and the days
impressions (TEA, P.152.) without any concern for the sombre skies of Europe and the Danube
flood (TEA, P.152.). He projects the inadequacy and incompleteness of individualistic love
because of its lack of concern for broader social issues. Auden investigates into the causes of social
malady and pleads for a positive outlet to natural desires which, if repressed can become perverted.
His consciousness of an objective world of hunger and deprivations reflects a heightened sense of
forward looking love:


Ten thousand of the desperate marching by
Five feet, Six feet, Seven feet high,
Hitler and Mussolini in their wooing poses
Churchill acknowledging the voters greeting
Roosevelt at the microphone, Van der lubbe laughing
And our first meeting
(TEA, P.153.)

90
Audens belief suggests his radicalism in the line ..through our private stuff must
work/His public spirit (TEA, P.153.) but the intervention of individualistic love is ironical in the
following lines:
The voice of love saying lightly lightly,
Be Lubbe, Be Hitler, but be my good
Daily, nightly.
(TEA, P.154.)


In his emphasis on individual responsibility to mould love in a positive or negative manner,
Auden calls for an action which should have a social base but depending on the capacity of the
individual to overcome selfish individualism. Love, here, is supposed to emerge as a basis for social
relationships, social harmony and individual fulfilment. As analysed in earlier poem also, Audens
solutions when they emanate from individual capabilities, are essentially rooted in his social vision.


Audens spontaneous urge for social kind of love is further reflected in August for the
people and their favourite islands (Aug., 1935). The poem unfolds his disillusionment with illusory
ideas of individualistic love held precious by him and Isherwood in the early thirties. The poet
considers illusory, the dreams of freedom enjoyed by the holiday-markers and condemns the
evasive efforts of these apparent controllers of the complicated apparatus of amusement, (TEA,
P.155.). The poet is greatly critical of any romantic escape into self-regarding love and regrets
believing earlier that one fearless kiss would cure the million fevers (TEA, P.156.). Love
represented through private joking and the solitary vitality is insufficient, as a mere flabby fancy
like the studied taste and the whisper in the double bed (TEA, P.156.) in the face of contemporary
social challenges. Here, Audens major contribution lies not in underlining the power of love to cure
the psychological ailments but in the extension of the power of love to get over the material chaos.
Again, in his poem Fish in the unruffled water (March 1936), Auden projects love as a powerful
factor in establishing a better and happy social order.

In Miss Gee (1937) and Victor (1937) Auden talks about distorted emotional responses
and repression of physical desires. Towards the end of the decade Auden seems to seek solutions to
private concerns through social criticism. During this period his social attitudes seem to have grown
inwardly inclined and the dominant radical thrust gets subdued and he looks to humanistic means to
resolve the contemporary crisis. In Memory of W.B.Yeats, W. H. Auden underlines the role of
love to generate fellow-feelings among human beings so that they may shake themselves of
negative feelings of jealousy and hatred and develop healthy harmonious human relationships. In
September 1, 1939 Auden concludes that egotistical love is the cause of suffering. Here he seems to
advocate the psychological revolutionary treatment of change of heart through universal love, we
must love one another or die. (TEA, P.246.)

To conclude, in his American Phase, Auden turned towards Christianity for solace and
support and advocated humanistic values love, fellow-feeling and sacrifice. Obviously, Audens
concept of love in this phase has wider connotations. It is this extended form of love which can
resolve the all pervading contemporary crisis. It is not self-fulfilment but sacrifice and suffering
which go into the making of such a wider concept of love.





91
CHAPTER-WISE REFERENCES

Chapter-I
1. R.G.Cox, The Poetry of W.H.Auden The Modern Age Vol.VII The Pelican Guide to
English literature ed., Boris Ford (Harmondsworth: Penguin Books Ltd., 1964), P. 378.
2. Christopher Isherwood, Some Notes on Audens Early Poetry, New Verse (Auden Double
Number), November, 1937.
3. Francois Duchene, The Case of the Helmeted Airman: A study of W. H. Audens Poetry
(London: Chatto and Windus, 1972), PP. 212-213.
4. Robin Skelton, ed., Introduction Poetry of the Thirties (London: Penguin Books, 1964),
P.35.
5. M. Khrapechenko, The writers creative individuality and the Development of Literature
(Moscow: Progress Publishers, 1977), P.9.
6. Richard Hoggart (quoted in) W.H. Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), PP-19-20.
7.
8. Bernard Blackstone (quoted in ) W. H. Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New
Delhi: Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P. 21.
9. Arthur Koestler (Quoted in) W. H. Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.4.
10. D.E.S. Maxwell, Poets of the Thirties ( London: Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1969), P.2.
11. Ibid., PP. 3-4.
12. Bernard Bergonzi, Reading the Thirties Texts and Contexts (London: Macmillan Press,
1978), P.135.
13. Justin Replogle (quoted in ) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak, (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.21.
14. Justin Replogle(quoted in ) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilalk (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.22.
15. Richard Hoggart, Introduction to Audens Poetry Auden-A Collection of Critical Essays:
Twentieth Century views ed., Monroe K. Spears ( Prentice Hall, INC Englewood Cliffs,
N.J. 1964), P.121.
92
16. Carlo Izzo, The Poetry of W.H. Auden Auden-A Collection of Critical Essays: Twentieth
Century views ed., Monroe K. Spears (Prentice Hall, INC Englewood Cliffs, N.J. 1964),
P.136.
17. W.H.Auden (quoted in) W.H. Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi: Rama
Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.25.
18. Virginia Woolf, The Leaning Tower vide: English Prose selection for degree Course
(India: Gauhati: University, 1966), PP. 186-187.
19. Robin Skelton, ed., Introduction Poetry of the Thirties ( London: Penguin Books, 1964),
P.35.
20. F.W. Bateson, English Poetry - A Critical Introduction (London: Longman Group Limited,
1971), P.19.
21. F.W. Bateson, English Poetry: A Critical introduction (London: Longman Group Limited,
1971), P.189.
22. D.E.S. Maxwell, Poets of the Thirties (London: Rout ledge and Kegan paul, 1969), P.2.
23. Stephen Spender, Collected Poems (London: Faber and Faber, 1985),P.45.
24. Stephen Spender, Background to the Thirties- The Thirties and After (London: Macmillan
Press Ltd., 1978), P.21.
25. G.S. Fraser, The Modern Writer And His World (Verschoyle: 1953, revised ed., Pelican,
1964, 1970), P.214.
26. R.A. Scott-James, (quoted in) W.H. Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1989), P.1.
27. Edward Mendelson, ed., The English Auden: Poems, Essay and Dramatic writings (1927-
1939), (London: Faber and Faber, 1977), P.119.
28. Stephen Spender, Collected Poems (London: Faber and Faber, 1955), P.80.
29. C.M. Bowra, Poetry and Politics (London: Cambridge University Press, 1966), PP.124-125.
30. Samuel Hynes, The Auden Generation: Literature and Politics in England in the 1930s
(London: Faber and Faber, 1976), PP.193-194.
31. Samuel Hynes, The Auden Generation: Literature and Politics in England in the 1930s
(London: Faber and Faber, 1976), P.19.
32. Stephen Spender, World within World (London: Faber and Faber, 3 Queen square, 1977),
P.249.
33. C.M. Bowra, Poetry and Politics (London: Cambridge University Press, 1966),P.1.
93
34. Robin Skelton, Poetry of the Thirties (London: Penguin Books, 1964), P.61.

Chapter-II
1. Richard Hoggart, Introduction to Audens poetry Auden A Collection of Critical
Essays: Twentieth Century views ed., Monroe K. spears ( Prentice Hall, INC Englewood
Cliffs, N.J. 1964),P.124.
2. Donald Davis, Remembering the Thirties The Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse ed.,
Kenneth Allot (London: Penguin Books, 1962), P.199.
3. Jeremy Robson, Audens Longer poems W.H. Auden: The Critical Heritage ed., John
Haffendon ( Routledge and Kegan Paul, 1983), PP 73-74.
4. Barbara Everett quoted in W.H. Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak ( New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), PP. 26-27.
5. Richard Hoggart, Auden: An Introductory Essay (London: Chatto and Windus, 1951), P.16.
6. Edward Mendelson , ed., The English Auden: Poems, Essays and Dramatic writings (1927-
39), (London: Faber and Faber, 1977), P.36.
7. Richard Hoggart (quoted in) W.H.Auden: The Poet ed., R.N. Srivastav ( Delhi: Doaba
House), P.7.
8. Barbara Everett (quoted in) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.33.
9. R.N.Srivastav, W.H.Auden: The Poet ( Delhi: Doaba House), P.18.
10. Stephen Spender, W.H.Auden and His Poetry Auden - A Collection of Critical Essays
Twentieth Century views ed., Monroe K.Spears ( Prentice Hall, INC Englewood Cliffs,
N.J., 1964), P.30.
11. Geoffrey Thurley, The Ironic Harvest: English Poetry in the Twentieth Century ( London:
Edward Arnold Ltd., 1974), PP.62-63.
12. A.T.Tolley, The Poetry of Thirties (London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1975), P.348.
13. Ronald Mason, W.H.Auden Writers of Today (London: Sidgwick and Jackson, 1948),
P.106.
14. M.L. Rosenthal, New Heaven and Earth The Modern Poets: A Critical Introduction (New
York: Oxford University Press, 1965), P.193.
15. W.H.Auden, I Believe The Personal Philosophies of Twenty Three Eminent Men and
Women of our Time ed., Cliffton Fadiman (London: George Allen and Unwin Ltd., 1940),
P.19.
94
16. John T. Wright, W.H.Auden ( New York: Twayne Publishers INC, 1969), P.61.
17. Richard Johnson, Mans Place An Essay on Auden (Ithaca and London: Cornell
University Press, 1973), P.5.
18. Ibid., P.6.
19. Ibid., P.7.
20. Richard Hoggart (quoted in ) W.H.Auden: The Poet ed., R.N. Srivastav ( Delhi: Doaba
House), PP.25-26.
21. Richard Johnson, Mans place An Introductory Essay on Auden (Ithaca and London:
Carnell University Press, 1973), PP.9-10.
22. R.N. Srivastav, W.H. Auden: The Poet (Delhi: Doaba House), PP.26-27.
23. Richard Johnson, Mans place- An Essay on Auden (Ithaca and London: Cornell university
Press, 1973), P.48.
24. Barbara Everett (quoted in) W.H. Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.39.
25. Richard Johnson, Mans Place An Essay on Auden (Ithaca and London: Cornell
University Press, 1973), P.47.
26. Ibid., P.59.
27. R.N.Srivastav, W.H.Auden: The Poet (Delhi: Doaba House), P.32.
28. Monroe K. Spears (quoted in) W.H.Auden: The Poet (Delhi: Doaba House), P.30.
29. R.N.Srivastav, W.H.Auden: The Poet (Delhi: Doaba House), P.33.
30. Barbara Everett (quoted in) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers Karol Bagh, 1987), P.40.
31. R.N.Srivastav, W.H.Auden: The Poet ( Delhi: Doaba House), P.35.
32. Barbara Everett (quoted in) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak ( New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, 1987), P.43.
33. Ibid., P.44.
34. G.S.Fraser (quoted in) W.H.Auden: The Poet ed., R.N.Srivastav (Delhi: Doaba House),
P.35.
35. R.N.Srivastav, W.H.Auden: The Poet (Delhi: Doaba House), P.39.
36. Barbara Everettt ( quoted in ) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.46.
Chapter-III
95
1. Clifford Dyment, C.Day Lewis (London: Longman, Green & Co. 1955), P.7.
2. T.S.Eliot, Collected Poems (London: Faber and Faber, 1974), P.63.
3. Stephen Spender, Collected Poems ( 1928-1985) (London: Faber and Faber, 1985), P.34.
4. Ian Parsons, ed. Poems of C. Day Lewis (1925-1972), (London: Jonathan Cape Limited and
Hogarth Press, 1977), PP.90-91.
5. Stephen Spender, Reactionaries The Thirties And After (London: Macmillan Press Ltd.,
1978), PP.195-201.
6. C.M. Bowra, Poetry and Politics, (London: Cambridge University Press, 1966), P.1.
7. Robin Skelton, Poetry of the Thirties (London: Penguin Books, 1964), P.61.
Chapter-IV
1. M.L.Rosenthal, New Heaven and Earth The Modern Poets: A Critical introduction (New
York: Oxford University Press, 1965), PP.193-194.
2. John Fuller (quoted in) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak ( New Delhi: Rama
Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol bagh), P.121.
3. John Bayley, W.H.Auden Auden: A Collection of Critical Essays Twentieth Century
views (Prentice Hall, INC Englewood Cliffs, N.J.1964), P.78.
4. Monroe K. Spears (quoted in) W.H.Auden: Select poems ed., Raghukul Tilak ( New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.152.
5. M.L. Rosenthal, New Heaven and Earth The Modern Poets: A Critical introduction
(NewYork: Oxford University Press, 1965), P.193.
6. Ibid.,P.195.
7. Geoffrey Thurley, The Ironic Harvest: English poetry in the Twentieth Century (London:
Edward Arnold Ltd., 1974), P.75.
8. Monroe K. Spears (quoted in) W.H.Auden : Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.195.
9. Justin Replogle (quoted in ) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.159.
10. Barabara Everett (quoted in ) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New
Delhi:Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.158.
Chapter-V

1. Robin Skelton, ed., Introduction Poetry of the Thirties (London: Penguin Books, 1964),
P.35.
96
2. Richard Hoggart, Introduction to Audens Poetry AudenA Collection of Critical Essays:
Twentieth Century views ed., Monroe K. Spears (Prentice Hall, INC Englewood Cliffs, N.J.
1964), P.124.

3. Donald Davis, Remembering the Thirties The Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse ed.,
Kenneth Allot (London: Penguin Books, 1962), P.199.

4. Edward Mendelson, ed., The English Auden: Poems, Essays and Dramatic Writings (1927-
1939) (London: Faber and Faber, 1977), P. 121.

5. R. N. Srivastav, W. H. AudenThe Poet (Delhi: Doaba House, 1688, Nai Sarak), P.102.

6. R.N. Srivastav, W.H. AudenThe Poet (Delhi: Doaba House, 1688, Nai Sarak), P.102.

Chapter-VI
1. Christopher, Isherwood, Some Notes on Audens Early Poetry, New Verse (Auden
Double Number), November 1937), P.4.

2. Justin Replogle, (quoted in) W.H.Auden: Select Poems ed., Raghukul Tilak (New Delhi:
Rama Brothers: Educational Publishers, Karol Bagh, 1987), P.99.

Chapter-VII
1. Edward Mendelson, ed., The English Auden: Poems, Essays and Dramatic Writings (1927-
1939) (London: Faber and Faber, 1977), P.40.

Subsequent references to the text of the poems in this chapter are from the same edition,
here after, abbreviated TEA and given with relevant page numbers within parenthesis
immediately after the quotation.

Chapter-VIII

1. Edward Mendelson, ed., The English Auden: Poems, Essays and Dramatic Writings (1927-
1939), (London: Faber and Faber, 1977), P.152.

Subsequent references to the text of the poems in this chapter are from the same edition,
here after, abbreviated TEA and given with relevant page numbers within parenthesis
immediately after the quotation.

2. Stephen Spender, W. H. Auden and his poetry AudenA Collection of Critical Essays:
Twentieth Century views ed., Monroe K. Spears (Prentice Hall, INC Englewood Cliffs,
N.J., 1964), P. 30.






LIST OF GENERAL (ESSAY-TYPE) QUESTIONS ON W.H. AUDEN AND HIS POETRY

1. Is it correct to say that Audens verse related to the political, social and intellectual
climate of Nineteen Thirties? Give reasons for your answer.
97

2. The diversity of Audens work is indeed amazing. Discuss.

3. Trace the early influences on Audens early work.

4. Bring out the characteristics of Audens early poetry.

5. Psychology and Marxism shaped Audens early poetry. Discuss.

6. Do you agree with the view that Auden is essentially an anti-Romantic poet?

7. Why is Auden described as the most representative poet of the Nineteen Thirties?

8. Describe Audens concept of love.

9. Auden is a satirist with a difference. Discuss.

10. Can love be said to be a major theme in Audens poetry? Discuss.

11 Learning love and unlearning hatred is proposed as a remedy in almost every poem of
Auden. Elaborate.

12. It is said that Auden and his Group appealed to the people of their generation because their
poetry sprang from a common feeling of guilt and responsibility. Discuss.

13. Auden seeks out new styles as a means of discovering new insights. Elaborate.

14. Auden has tried to resolve the central problem raised by war as the prime example of mans
infallible nature. Discuss.

15. Discuss theme of individuality in W.H. Audens poetry.

16. Auden has been called a stylistic chameleon. Discuss.

17. Discuss Audens use of contemporary imagery with examples.

18. Give a general estimate of W.H. Auden as a poet.

19. Comment on the statement, Auden is the most important and influential modern poet after
T.S. Eliot.

20. Describe W.H. Audens poetic achievements, giving examples from the prescribed poems.

Short Questions : Write Short notes on the following :

1. Audens imagery.
2. Audens use of allegory in his poetry.
3. Auden simile
4. Audens symbolism.
5. Role of middle-class sensibility in Audens poetry of Nineteen Thirties.
6. Audens versification
7. Audens attitude to war
8. Role of poet in Audens poetry
9. Audens concept of love
10. Obscurity in Audens Technique
98
11. Auden as a second generation modern poet.
12. Humanistic solutions to contemporary chaos in Audens poetry


































SUGGESTIONS FOR FURTHER READING


99
1. Mendelson, Edward. ed., The English Auden: Poems, Essays and Dramatic writings (1927-
1939) London: Faber and Faber, 1977.

2. Allot, Kenneth. ed., The Penguin Book of Contemporary Verse Harmondsworth, MiddleSex,
England: Penguin Books Ltd., 1962.

3. Skelton, Robin. ed., Poetry of the Thirties London: Penguin Books, 1964.

4. Bahlke, George W. The Later Auden New Brunswick: Rutgers University Press, 1970.

5. Beach, J.W. The Making of the Auden Canon London: Oxford University Press, 1957.

6. Bhattacharya, B.K. W. H. Auden and the other Oxford Group of Poets New Delhi: Bahri
Publications, 1989.

7. Blair, John G. The Poetic Art of W. H. Auden Princeton: N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1965.

8. Bogan, Louise. Quest of W. H. Auden, Selected Criticism New York: Noonday Press, 1955.

9. Bowra, C. M. Poetry and Politics London: Cambridge University Press, 1966.

10. Bradbury, Malcolm. The Social context of Modern English Literature Newyork: Schocken
Books, 1971.

11. Buell Frederic. W. H. Auden as a Social Poet Cornell University Press, 1971.

12. Cox R. G. The Poetry of W. H. Auden The Modern Age Vol.VII. The Pelican Guide to
English Literature ed., Boris Ford, Harmondsworth: Penguin Books Ltd., 1964.

13. Daiches, David. Present Age: After 1920 London: The Cresset Press, 1958.

14. Davison Dennis. W. H. Auden London: Evens Bros., 1970.

15. Duchene Francois. The Case of the Helmeted Airman: A study of W. H. Audens Poetry
London: Chatto and Windus, 1972.

16. Everett, Barbara. Auden London: Oliver and Boyd, 1964.

17. Fuller, John. A Readers Guide to W. H. Auden London: Thames and Hudson, 1970.

18. Haffendon, John. W. H. Auden: The Critical Heritage London: Routledge and kegan Paul,
1983.

19. Hoggart, Richard. W. H. Auden London: Longmans, Green and Co. Ltd., 1961.

20. Hynes, Samuel. The Literature and Politics in England in the 1930s London: Faber and Faber,
1976.

100
21. Johnson, Richard. Mans Place An Essay on Auden Ithaca and London: Cornell University
Press, 1973.

22. Kettle, Arnold. Poetry and Politics Milton Keynes: The Open University Press, 1976.

23. Maxwell, D. E. S. Poets of the Thirties London: Routledge and Keyan Paul, 1962.

24. Osborne, Charles. W. H. Auden: The Life of a Poet London: Eyre Methuen Limited, 1980.

25. Replogle, Justin. Audens Poetry London: Methuen and Co., 1962.

26. Srivastva, Narsingh. W. H. AudenA Poet of Ideas Delhi: S. Chand Co., 1978.

27. Rodway, Allan. A Preface to Auden London: Longman Group, 1984.

28. Spears, Monroe K. ed., Auden: A Collection of Critical Essays Twentieth Century Views
Prentice Hall, INC Englewood cliffs, N.J. 1964.

29. Tolley, A. T. The Poetry of the Thirties London: Victor Gollancz Ltd., 1975.

30. Rosenthal, M.L. The Modern Poets: A Critical introduction New York: Oxford University
Press, 1960.


















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Poetry 152
DYLAN MARLAIS THOMAS
I see the Boys of Summer
In My Craft or Sullen Art
A Winter's Tale
To an Unborn Paper Child
Storming Day
Light Breaks Where No Sun Shines
Poems On His Birthday
153 Dylan Marlais Thomas
Unit-7
Dylan Marlais Thomas
One of the greatest poets of English literature Dylan Thomas was born in 1914 in Swansea where he spent his
childhood years and a large part of his youthful and exuberant growing days towards adulthood. He was
descended from small farmers on both sides of his family who belong to the Welsh speaking part of South-
Wales. His father, a teacher used to read Shakespeare to his son when he came home from school and the
young Dylan started to write poems at early age of about eight. In later life Dylan said that his proper
education consisted of the liberty to read whatever I cared to I read indiscriminately and all the time.
In 1931 when Dylan left Swansea grammar school, he began his most important year as a poet this continued
till he went to London in 1934 during which he wrote all the poems in his first volume, Eighteen Poems, and
many of those in Twenty Five Poems. He spent much of his time with other young bohemian writers in Soho
pubs when he was in London. Dylan who was an unknown poet won acclaim and fame with the publication of
Twenty Five Poems in 1936. He married Caitlin Macnamara in 1937, they were both poor and although Dylan
later made large sums of money by broadcasting, film scripts: journalism and finally his exhausting American
poetry: reading tours, he was never able to keep it. The perpetual threat of poverty contributed to his early
disintegration.
He was giving a performance of his play Under Milk Wood, when he collapsed and died in New York in 1953.
He was thirty nine.
Dylan Thomas and His Welsh Background
One: I am a Welshman; two; I am a drunkard; three: I am a lover of the human race, especially of women.
This concise, comic and not untruthful account of himself was given by Dylan Thomas to an audience in Rome
in 1947, it shows that he was well aware of the extent to which his poetic temperament and his imagination
were the products of his Welsh environment.
With his remark we may compare two earlier statements made by Thomas
I hold a beast, an angel, and a madman in me and my enquiry is as to their working, and my problem
is their subjugation and victory, down throw and upheaval, and my effort is their self-expression.
Second,
Poetry, recording the stripping of the individual darkness, must inevitably cast light upon what has been hidden
for too long, and, by so doing, make clean the naked exposure. Freud cast light on a little darkness he had
exposed. Benefiting by the sight of the light and the knowledge of the hidden nakedness, poetry must drag
further into the clean nakedness of light more even of the hidden causes than Freud could realize.
The tone and substance are self-conscious and rhetorical, showing the impact of surrealism and Freudian
psychology on a young mind. But they represent attitudes the poet was to outgrow sooner or later. Dylan
Thomas grew from dragons tooth to druid in his own land. The movement in his poetry was from a clinical
towards a religious purpose a path undertaken with a definite purpose and commitment.
Writing under the influence of early attitudes, Thomas often dissipated his prodigious energy. His work was too
diffuse, and his imagination frequently lacked direction and proper channelisation. With an increase in
craftsmanship, a growing sense of purpose and dedication as a poet, came a widening, and at the same time a
greater control, of theme and form that defined the general nature of his poetry in his later years too . There is
Poetry 154
an extension of sympathy and understanding; the use of Christian myth and symbol; the emergence of a poetry
of vision towards poetic structures mature and stable. But the potentiality of this development was present in
his early work, the achievement represented by Collected Poems and Under Milk Wood indicates that Thomas,
with an increasing sureness of instinct, came to make the best use of his poetic talent.
The progress of a writer depends, however, not only upon his own canalization of his energies, but also upon
the prevailing climate of influence and taste. Thomas began publishing in the thirties, but from the beginning he
was neither a political nor an intellectual poet. The first impact of 18 poems and, two years later, of Twenty five
poems, lay in their originality: they were unlike any other poetry written in English at the time. Certainly there
were few affinities with such poets as Auden, Spender, and Empson. His poetry was the product of a strongly
individual imagination fostered by ways of thought and feeling of typical Welsh in origin.
The distinctive characteristics of Thomass work are its lyrical quality, its strict formal control, a romantic
conception of the poets function, and religious attitude to experience. These are the major characteristics
shared by other Anglo-Welsh writers; they were not qualities particularly current among English writers of the
thirties. If we remember the difference between Thomass use of Christian thought and symbol and T. S.
Eliots we need hardly seek any relationship there. Thomass ideas derived from a different tradition. Religion,
such as he knew it, writes Karl Shapiro, was direct knowledge. Religion is not to be used: it is simply part of
life, part of himself; it is like a tree; take it or leave it, it is there. That is, it was part of the man; a way of feeling
he inherited and imbibed right from his early childhood rather than acquired. The religious element in Thomass
poetry is the key to its correct interpretation; it was the most important result of Welsh influence. When he
said he was a Puritan he was not believed; but it really was true. This fact is central to a full understanding of
his work, for Puritanism had long directed Welsh life and thought. Its influence, for better or worse, was
inescapable and could be palpably felt by a discerning reader.
The Welsh influence was present in three forms. First and the most important, there was the direct and
inevitable influence of a particular community with particular traditions. Secondly, there was the influence of
other Welshmen writing in English, these Anglo-Welsh writers helped to create a national consciousness, the
sense of a life being lived that was peculiar to Wales: with them Thomas discovered a community of ideas and
outlook a distinct world view. The third influence present in his environment was the tradition of culture existing
in and through the Welsh language. Since he knew no Welsh this influence came through the two channels
already mentioned: contact with Welsh-speaking relatives and friends, and through translations of Welsh poetry
and prose.
As Geoffrey Moore writes in an article viewing the poets work against his Welsh environment:
The national feeling engendered by so many hundreds of years of Welsh speaking survives now
without the actual bond of language. The harp of Wales sounds in the ears of Welshmen whether
they are archdruids from Bangor or boys from the back streets of Cardiff. Without being hopelessly
mystical about race, one can with some confidence assert that both it and environment have an
effect on the nature of a people and the art that springs from them the spirit of place and of
country is an inescapable influence. To this degree, and to the degree that Dylan Thomas opened
himself to the scenes and people and manners of the place in which he was born, it is meaningful to
talk about the Welsh quality of his work.
Welsh influence is, inevitably, present in his earliest work, but he was then less aware of it as such. It was when
Thomas for the first
As Dylan moved away from Wales he began to see its life and tradition in perspective, and realized how they
differed from the life and traditions of England. What was more important, he became aware of himself as
belonging to this native culture, a culture which was becoming increasingly related to that of England but
inescapably of different origin and a typically different creed. His parents spoke Welsh, but he himself, though
not fluent in the language knew as much as any inhabitant of South Wales, he was familiar with the more
155 Dylan Marlais Thomas
common phrases in use and well acquainted with the sound and verbal music of the Welsh tongue.
In his Note to the Collected Poems Thomas wrote:
I read somewhere of a shepherd who, when asked why he made, from within fairy rings, ritual observances to
the moon to protect his flocks, replied: I d be a damn fool if I didn t! These poems with all their crudities,
doubts, and confusions, are written for the love of Man and in praise of God, and I d be a damn fool they
weren t.
There is a distinct bardic ring about this statement; Thomas is claiming a high function for the poet, though as
usual there is dog among the fairies mocking wisdom, which, in the light of such apocalyptic and romantic
claims, is a defensive irony. This is so, for example, in Authors Prologue to the Colleted Poems, Over Sir
Johns hill, and Poem on his birthday. The poet here is a man endowed with special wisdom. In his
statements about his work Thomas was very careful to support this myth already created in the poetry. This
high estimation of the poets place and function in the overall configuration of the society derive from specific
tradition of Welsh life and thought. For in ancient Wales or Ireland a poet was not merely a professional verse-
writer: he was acknowledged to exercise extraordinary spiritual power. A. G. Prys Jones writes:
These influences had always been in his environment . . . No one who had read his poems or heard him
declaim them can fail to recognize his bardic affinities or the racial source of his headlong rhetoric, his
passionate intensity, his powerful imaginative strength and his mystical, religious vision. In one very real sense,
he belonged to the company of the great pulpit orators of Wales who were often bards . . .
To this tradition can be attributed, in part, Thomass confidence in his romantic and apocalyptic manner. General
cultural movements such as surrealism and Freudian theories of art had, at best, clinical rather than religious or
moral pretensions. It was his Welsh environment which offered a background of thought and culture fostering
belief in the more primitive, mystical, and romantic conception of the poet.
The Environment of Dylan Thomas' Poems
Dylan Thomas first book of published poetry, Eighteen Poems, appeared in 1934 and was followed two years
later by Twenty-five Poems. The form / contents and the techniques of the two volumes were similar in many
respects; the critical reactions to these volumes, with a few exceptions, were similar also. Critics, favourable
or unfavourable, found the poetry difficult, irrational, and undisciplined, but also thought it sufficiently important
to demand critical comment. H.G. Porteus called the poetry an unconducted tour of bedlam . Louis MacNeice
decided that it was wild but rhythmical drunken speech, Stephen Spender made the categorical pronouncement
that it was just poetic stuff with no beginning or end, or intelligent and intelligible control .
By 1934 there could scarcely have been anything remarkable about a writer whose works were irrational and
undisciplined. Movements such as dadaism and surrealism had notoriously forsworn reason and discipline as
vices, and the spate of works produced by dadaists and surrealists was quite sufficient to drown eighteen
poems by a relatively unknown artist. What was remarkable about the poetry of Dylan was that it had its
effect even before it was understood, and sometimes even when it was misunderstood as it could still be by
many. The very minimum of the effect, moreover, left the reader with the impression that a poet with a
remarkable sense of language and rhythm was saying something important about subjects of importance; at
the very worst, he had somehow strangulated his statement by his violence and obscurity.
There was a further facet which differentiated Thomas work from that of other poets. It was unclassifiable.
Its themes , in so far as they could be grasped at all, were the age-old ones of birth, sex, and death, but they
were conceived and treated in a way that was anything but familiar. In an age which was beginning to discuss
myth and symbol as universalizing all human experience, this poetry used myth so private and symbol so special
that it had the effect of recording unique experiences in a distinctly unique manner. The age was beginning to
demand that poetry indicate a social reference; the poetry of Thomas, quite obviously, had no social responsibility
of the obvious kind. The age was acquiring the habit of considering and judging poetry in terms of the tradition
Poetry 156
that had given rise to it; the poetry of Thomas was apparently unrelated to any tradition traceable. The age
was fond of explicating/elucidate obscure poetry; the poetry of Thomas was so obscure that no one could
explicate it.
Altarwise by owl-light in the half-way house
The gentleman lay graveward with his furies;
Abaddon in the hangnail cracked from Adam,
And, from his fork, a dog among the fairies,
The atlas-eater with a jaw for news,
Bit out the mandrake with to-morrows screem .
Edith Sitwell, in a highly appreciative review, sought to interpret these lines and thereby not merely engaged
herself in some controversy but provoked the following reproof from the poet himself:
Miss Edith Sitwells analysis . of the lines The atlas-eater with a jaw for news / Bit out the mandrake with
to-morrows scream seems to me a bit vague. She says the lines refer to the violent speed and the sensation-
loving, horror-loving craze of modern life. She doesnt take the literal meaning: that a world-devouring ghost-
creature bit out the horror of tomorrow from a gentlemans loins. A jaw for news is an obvious variation of
a nose for news, and means that the mouth of the creature can taste already the horror that has not yet come,
or can sense its coming, can thrust its tongue into news that has not yet been made, can savour the enormity of
the progeny before the seed stirs, can realize the crumbling of dead flesh before the opening of the womb that
delivers that flesh to to-morrow. What is this creature? Its the dog among the fairies, the rip and cur among
the myths, the snapper at demons, the scarer of ghosts, the wizards heel-chaser. This poem is a particular
incident in a particular adventure, not a general, elliptical deprecation of this horrible, crazy, speed-life.
We have to consider and take the poets insistence an oft-repeated one that his poetry be read literally. If
we begin by considering the relation of Thomas paraphrase to the lines in question, certain things are evident
at once. World-devouring paraphrases atlas-eater ; but an atlas is not literally the world. If we are to
understand atlas as standing for world , we can do so only by first understanding a geographic atlas as
representing the world. Similarly with the adaptation of a nose for news into a jaw for news ; such a jaw
becomes a possibility only if we equate news with the latest events or happenings, as in fact we do in the
conventions of ordinary conversation. So, too, with mandrake for horror ; the mandrake is a horror only in
the conventions of witchcraft. In short, the relation of the paraphrase to the verses can be seen only if we
observe that Thomas is describing things by reference to other things which, in one convention or another, are
their representatives or surrogates or in other words indicative of a larger context.
The language is scarcely literal in the ordinary sense, as the reader can easily surmise himself by attempting to
determine, after Thomas literal exposition, precisely what the dog among the fairies is. If we take
metaphor as the substitution of names made warrantable by a resemblance between the things signified by the
names that is, as the putting of the name of A for that of B, on the ground that A resembles B, or seems to
we can scarcely suppose that Thomas lines are metaphorical. A metaphor, then, involves verbal
substitution merely, whereas in these lines of Thomas we have the ideas of atlas substituted for the idea of
world because an atlas is a cartographic representation of the world; the use of the word is merely a consequence
of a conceptual substitution which has already occurred. In short, we have here, not metaphor, but symbolism.
We must beware at this point. First of all, there is a general tendency in contemporary discussion of art to
assume that all art is symbolic. If the point of this is that a few strokes of the painters brush are not really a
cat, but still represent a cat; that a block of granite, chiselled a bit, is not really Venus, but represents Venus;
suppose we grant that all art is symbolic. What is the difference between poetry which really can be read
literally and the poetry of Dylan Thomas? What is the difference between Tintern Abbey or the Ode to a
Nightingale and the portion of Thomas Altarwise by owl-light sonnet just quoted? One generally
finds, moreover, that those who assume that all art is symbolic will assume, as having absolute force, some
157 Dylan Marlais Thomas
universal symbolic system, such as that afforded by the Freudian or Jungian psychology. The consequence of
such an assumption is that the value or meaning of the symbol is known before the symbol is inspected in its
context. There is some warrant for this position in that any attempt to set forth a symbolic system must
perforce assign certain values to the symbols under certain conditions; but the view that symbols have a fixed
and unconditional value, or even function in all cases as symbols, is expressly disavowed by both Freud and
Jung. What is more important, it is contrary to fact.
That it is contrary to fact in the present instance can be seen at once. Thomas admitted to the influence of
Freud; but the reader who seeks to interpret the symbols of Thomas in terms of Freud is not likely to find the
poetry very clear. Such a reader will be gratified, no doubt, to observe that Thomas speaks of the forest of the
loin , that he frequently connects birth with an emergence from water, and in a few other matters appears to
conform to the Freudian symbolic. But the negative instances will quickly diminish that gratification. Whereas,
for Freud, fruit symbolizes the female breast and definitely does not symbolize offspring, it is generally a child-
symbol for Thomas (as indeed it is in common discourse). Whereas, for Freud, caves, churches, and chapels
refer to the female genitalia, Thomas uses caves to signify the innermost recesses of the self, and churches
and chapels particularly sunken ones to signify lost pristine faiths. Thomas associates ladders and climbing,
not with sexual intercourse, but with mans spiritual ascent. The reader who has the Jungian archetypes in
mind is likely to fare no better, although the experiences with which Thomas deals are archetypal enough; and,
much as Thomas is concerned with the experience of birth.
It is folly to pretend to interpret what anyone says before you have listened to what he has to say; it is worse
folly to declare what a work of art must be before you have observed what it is. If universal symbolic systems
had unconditional validity, there would be no problem of interpreting Thomas, or any poet worth the name. In
Thomas case his symbols, far from yielding to the easy key of a ready-made symbology, demand close
inspection/introspection, and ultimately yield their meaning only when the reader, by an act of intuition, recognizes
the particular derivation of the symbol.
For instance:
The twelve triangles of the cherub wind?
The reader who approaches this with symbolic presuppositions is likely to remain baffled, if, on the other hand,
he simply thinks about winds a bit, he is likely to remember the tradition of twelve winds blowing from twelve
points of the compass and to recall that ancient maps conventionally represented winds as issuing from a small
human head with its puffed-out cheeks blowing furiously. When he realizes further that cherubs are often
depicted in old religious pictures as bodiless heads, and that, as shown on a flat map, the winds would describe
triangles, he has interpreted the symbol.
Indeed, the symbolism of Thomas is drawn from a whole variety of sources. It falls under three general heads:
(a) natural, (b) conventional, and (c) private. The natural symbolism is of the sort that almost any poet, indeed
almost any human being, is likely to employ. Light is a symbol of good or knowledge, dark of evil or ignorance,
warmth of life or comfort, cold of death or discomfort, ascent of progress or resurrection, descent of regression
or death, and so on
The conventional symbols depend for interpretation upon knowledge of the conventions of the subject from
which they are taken. How numerous the kinds of these are may be seen from the fact that Thomas draws
them from cartography, astronomy and the history of astronomy, physics, chemistry, botany, anatomy, mechanics,
and in particular such pseudosciences as go under the name occulta astrology, alchemy, witchcraft, and
black magic, among others; from games and sports; from a mass of myth and legend, including some rather
recondite rabbinical materials; as well as from the more usual resources of literature and history.
The private symbolism can best be interpreted by following him from work to work, whether of verse or prose,
and observing his habits. One observes, thus, that he tends to use wax as a symbol of dead or mortal flesh, oil
as a symbol of life, the sea as a symbol of the source of life, salt as a symbol of genesis in the sea. Scissors or
Poetry 158
knives are symbols of birth (on the ground that the birth-coil is cut open, the birth-string cut) or of death (on the
ground that the thread of life is cut, the branch lopped) and of sexual connection (on the ground of its relation
to life and death). He analogizes the anatomy of man to the structure of the universe, too, and sees the human
microcosm as an image of the macrocosm, and conversely; and this analogy begets a whole series of symbols.
Wounds, one of his most persistent symbols, stand for a number of things; the pain of life, the heart, the navel
wound. Tailors are often symbols of what sews man together or sews his shroud or cuts the vital thread.
Embalmment, particularly of the Egyptian sort, is a symbol of an obstacle that cannot be overcome, or that can
be overcome, in the attempt to resurrect the spirit. In all these private symbols there is undoubtedly a fertile
field for psychological inquiry; but the psychologist who wishes to investigate had better be willing, first of all,
to find out what Thomas is saying.
Commenting on the nature of modern poetry Eliot has remarked that this age is a complicated one and therefore
requires a poetry which is complicated A second notion, much knocked about in the press of late, that
contemporary poets have gone in for obscurantism out of sheer perversity, seems even more trivial. Poetry in
general does not have to be anything determinate at all, as ought to be clear to anyone aware of the vast variety
of good poetry in different forms contrived upon different principles and involving different subjects and devices.
Symbolism itself is merely a device, and a special order of symbolism is merely a special order of devices; and
there is obviously no necessity that poetry or any other art should employ any one device invariably. Thomas
is a symbolist, but not all of his poems are symbolistic; indeed, as he developed he seems to have drawn farther
and farther away from the use of symbolism. A device may be well or ill used; whether it is well or ill used
depends upon the powers of the device-what the device can do-and upon its being more or less effective than
any other device in meting the particular exigencies of the individual poem.
Since all the arts involve invention, and continually discover new devices or new uses for old devices, it is never
possible to make a list exhaustive of all the possible uses of a given device; but we may note that symbolism has
several principal powers. First, since symbolism involves the representation of one idea through the medium of
another, it can cause us to entertain ideas remote from, or totally outside of, ordinary experience, by the
extension of ideas we already possess; thus mystics tend to use symbols in their descriptions of the mystical
experience precisely because that experience is an extraordinary one. Second, since the symbolic concept, the
idea which stands for another, is always presented in the form of an image (something which can be either
perceived by our senses or imagined), symbols can make immediate and vivid what otherwise would be remote
and faint, and thus act powerfully upon our thoughts and emotions. Anyone who has observed the influence of
patriotic and religious symbols will be well aware of this particular power of symbolism.
In the same vein, symbols can either focus our attention upon a single aspect of something or cause us to
conceive that thing in many aspects simultaneously, and so determine our emotional reactions to it. Death, for
example, can be conceived in its benignant or its malignant aspects or both, and produces different emotions as
it is differently conceived. The artist who symbolizes it by a smiling shadowy angel presents to us a quite
different conceptual aspect, and arouses in us quite different emotions, from those produced by the artist who
takes for his symbol the corpse amid all the terrors of the charnel-house. Furthermore, it is possible by the
choice of a particular symbol to regulate the degree, as well as determine the kind, of emotional reaction; the
artist may, for instance, not only arouse a fear of death by his symbol but arouse greater or less fear by the
choice of a symbol more or less dreadful. Finally, we can frequently infer from a given symbol something of the
character, beliefs, state of mind, or situation of the person who employed the symbol; we should have little
difficulty in inferring, from their different symbols for death, a difference between the pagan Greek and the
medieval Christian views of death; and a writer can utilize our tendency to make inferences of this kind,
depicting the mood, thought, and character of his personages by letting us see the symbolic processes of their
minds.
Other devices metaphor and simile, particularly share in these powers; but symbols tend to have much
greater range and power. A figure of speech is a figure of speech; whatever it puts before us we tend to
159 Dylan Marlais Thomas
contemplate, not as an actuality, but as a manner of speaking. A symbol, on the contrary, exhibits something to
us as an actuality, and so affects us more strongly. Metaphor and simile are based upon resemblance only;
symbols are based upon many other relations. Thomas, or any poets, use of symbols must be judged in terms
of its effectiveness in the individual poem; but his general tendency to use them is accounted for, in part at least,
by the quality of his imagination. He has been praised as a poet who dealt with the major themes of birth, life,
love, and death but some of the worst poetry in existence has been written on these themes, and there is
nothing inherent in them, as themes, which demands any particular poetic treatment, symbolic or otherwise.
What is much more to the point, and what is likely to strike his reader first of all, is Thomas extraordinary
imaginative conception of these themes? His imagination permits him to enter into areas of experience previously
unexplored or to unveil new aspects of perfectly common experiences. Part, indeed, of his obscurity results
from the sheer unfamiliarity of the world which he presents to us; like certain mystics, he is often forced into
symbol and metaphor simply because there is no familiar way of expressing something in itself so unfamiliar.
His imagination is first of all a strange one, an odd one; he sees things quite differently from the way in what we
should. We should see flowers on a grave; he sees the dead who periscope through flowers to the sky . We
should see the towering flames after a fire raid; he sees the fire-dwarfed street . We should see geese high
in the air; he sees geese nearly in heaven . He looks into what we should find opaque, looks down at something
we are wont to loop up at, looks up where we should look down, peers in where we should peer out, and out
where we should look in.
His poetic imagination has its limits, but within those it has enormous range and power so enormous that we
are apt to think of it as unlimited. It transports him instantly into the mysteries of the womb; it informs him how
the child feels at the moment of birth, how the foetus feels during its process of development, how the seed
feels at the moment of conception, how all would feel and think if they were prescient of the whole of life.
Death is no terminus for him; he descends into the grave and suffers the strange and secret existence of the
dead, suffers the resolution of the body into its elements and the transmutation of those elements into other
forms of life. He can look back on life as only a dead man could, and can rise from the grave in the Resurrection.
The Creation and the ultimate Catastrophe are no limits to him; he penetrates into the mind of God before the
Creation, and can feel what would be felt by the scattered particles of a universe utterly dissolved. He can be
mineral, vegetable, or beast as easily as he can be man; he can penetrate the depths of the earth and the
abysses of the sea, and move about in the depths of the unconscious mind as a diver might walk the ocean
bottom.
These are tokens of a mighty, an appalling imagination that sweeps us up with it, like an angel, and forces us to
endure that visions of another world, thronged with enchantments and horrors. This is a great natural force,
we cannot be unmoved by it; but there is more than natural genius, there is art; we should not stand so in the
immediate presence of strange things, did not Thomas exert every power of image, symbol, and metaphor to
transport us there
Thomas employs symbols in many ways, but his principal use of them is to make immediate and factual what
metaphor and analogue would have left remote and fanciful, to coerce the imagination and so coerce belief; he
arouses our emotions before we have time to doubt. Through the repeated use of symbols in this fashion, he
builds in his first two volumes, as very real indeed, a fantastic universe of his own.
Thomas, like Baudelaire, is at times nothing more than a stage-magician and frights us with fires patently false.
But it is nave to suppose, as Shaw does in his criticism of Shakespeare, that because poetry involves touches
that might be effective in melodrama, it is itself melodramatic. The essence of the sensational forms is that
they exaggerate and readily depart from truth in order to achieve the sensation they propose; the essence of
tragedy is that its action must embody grave and universal truths. The world of the early Thomas is not a
melodramatic one because, as symbolic, it presupposes a reference of its horrors to something further, and
does not propose them for their own sake; it does not exaggerate, it can barely approximate the horror of what
it symbolizes. Thomas tells us that to a serious and sensitive individual, life in the absence of a sustaining faith
Poetry 160
is a nightmare, and so it is; that it is the worst of nightmares, and it is; and if that nightmare is as horrible as
possible, images which adumbrate that horror do not exaggerate it they express it. Without their reference,
the symbols of Thomas would be melodramatic, even morbid; because they have reference to the serious
suffering of a man of some nobility, they are tragic.
Critics on Dylan Thomas' Poetry
Drunk with melody and what the words were he cared not. This view, pronounced by Robert Grave in his
1954-55 Clark lectures at Cambridge, was common among early commentators on Dylan Thomas. During this
lecture Grave offered a one pound note to anyone who could make sense of the opening lines of Thomass
poem If my head hurt a hairs foot. When M. J. C. Hodgart came forward to claim the money, offering the
now well-known interpretation that the unborn child in the womb is addressing the mother, Graves remained
unconvinced. If Graves made such an offer today, he could expect a queue of students demanding payment.
They would have only to look up the poem in William York Tindalls useful A Readers Guide to Dylan
Thomas (1962), where it is explained that nothing by Thomas could be plainer than this debate between
embryo and mother. In his introduction Tindall even goes so far as to assert that Close reading and comparison
of texts prove Thomas as rational and orderly as any poet this side of Alexander Pope. Tindalls book
demonstrates the considerable change in critical opinion that has taken place.
The appraisal and condemnation now appear to some extent misinformed. Particularly since the publication in
1957 of Thomass letters to Vernon Watkins it has been realized that he not only was an artful maker of
complicated rhythms and verse structures, but also cared very much what the words meant. His discussions
with Watkins show that he knew precisely what effects he intended, and to some degree justify his controversial
claim that his poems should be read literally, the notebooks in the Lockwood Memorial Library of the State
University of New York at Buffalo prove how carefully he revised;; and a number of recent theses have
helped to clear up many of the obscure points in his work
The new approach towards understanding of Thomas does not mean, however, that controversy is ended.
Academic scholars may too easily believe that their growing insight into his meaning necessarily leads to higher
estimate of his poetry. After his death in 1953 a reaction to his influence began, and many young poets of the
1950, particularly in England, felt his experiment in syntax and imagery was pretentious. Donald Davie accused
Thomas of indulging in pseudo-syntax, abandoning the task of articulation so that the objects to which he
refers, tumbled pell-mell together, can no longer be identified. Davie placed Thomas among those modern
poets who fail because their work falls into isolated units. The sentences that seem to drive forward in time
through their verbs do no such thing, for the poems proceed by repetition rather than by the establishment of
proper syntactical arrangements between beginning, middle, and end. For Davie, the abandonment of syntax
testified to a failure of the poets nerve, a loss of confidence in the intelligible structure of the conscious mind,
and the validity of its activity. Our attitude to Davies criticism must depend, to a large extent, on how far we
sympathize with the view that Thomas could only express the confusion in which we live by a complete break
with orthodox forms of articulation.
At a first reading the surface brilliance of the early poems suggests a violent, uncontrollable energy; but, as
Robert M. Adams asks in his essay on Crashaw and Thomas: Is it a defensible aesthetic position to say that
so long as each individual section of his poem is built on sufficiently violent and intensive contrasts the poet
need provide no structure of mood, tone, imagery, temporal order, or grammatical assertion?
In poem after poem he questions the meaning of his own genesis. Particularly in the early poetry, this conflict
is presented through puns such as worm or seedy, through dialogue poems such as I see the boys of
summer, and through a repeated war between opposite kinds of imagery. The theme is not developed
locally, for progress in the poems is achieved through verbal play, repetition, and incantation. Whether in these
poems Thomas achieves rational control, as Tindall suggests, is still a very open question. This leads to a
further critical problem. In his late poems such as Poem in October, Fern Hill, and Over Sir Johns hill,
161 Dylan Marlais Thomas
Thomas achieved a new lucidity and serenity, and many readers have felt that in the 1940 he at last began to
solve his technical problems; yet William Empson, in a review admits that he prefers the early obscure poems.
It is true that in the early poems Thomas discovered a form which communicated fully the strain under which
he lived, and that the later poems withdraw from such problems into nostalgia.
David Holbrook has criticized the subconscious psychological motives underlying Thomass obscurity. There is
evidence that as he reviewed his poems their obscurity increased. It is also true that for twenty years he
proved incomprehensible to some of the most perceptive critics and poets of his time and that most of the
spellbound listeners to his inspired reading had little idea what the poems were about. In his book Dylan
Thomas and Poetic Dissociation (1964), Holbrook argues that Thomas developed his imagery of wombs
and tombs, sex and corpses, as a means of protecting himself against adult reality. In spite of Thomass care in
preparing his work, his poems affect a kind of hallucination or dissociated phantasy. He invented a
babble-language which concealed the nature of reality from himself and his readers and in its very oral
sensationalism, in its very meaninglessness, it represented for him and his readers a satisfying return to the
delusions of the stage of infancy when we tend to resist the uncomfortable exigencies and losses consequent
upon the development of a growing reality sense. This may be linked with the mans alcoholism and his sexual
promiscuity.
Certainly a palpable evidence could be traced for Holbrooks argument that Thomas could never accept an
adult sexual relationship. His Welsh protestant conscience appears to have been disgusted and shocked by his
first experiences with women, and all his life he felt drive by uncontrollable sexual impulses. The famous
pranks and the hard drinking also suggest some kind of neurotic alienation from ordinary life. Holbrook goes
too far, however, when he accuses Thomas of inventing a babble-language to cover up his own psychological
problems. Thomas had acquired a popular knowledge of Freud and Jung, and it can be argued that his
understanding of the irrational power sex holds over human life is decidedly realistic.
It is known that in the 1930 Thomas read the surrealist magazine, transition, and in 1936 he visited the
International Surrealist Exhibition in the New Burlington Galleries at London. The many references to dreams
and madness in both his poetry and prose reflect this interest in irrational forms of art. The wild fantasies of
Gothic romance provided nineteenth century romantics with a means of representing violent emotions
unacknowledged by the conventions of their society; so the ghosts, vampires, and watches of Thomass poems
depict the nightmare powers in control of man. These alien forces are most often associated with sex, but there
are also a number of poems where he reacts with horror to the madness of war. He was born in October 1914,
at the very time when the young men of Europe were about to die by the millions on the Western Front:
Rammed in the marching heart, hole
In the stitched wound and clotted wind, muzzled
Death on the mouth that ate the gas.
Shocked and appalled by the suffering and killing in the two wars, he found it difficult to impose any rational
sense on this horror. His imagination found a more appropriate expression in opposing and contradictory images.
In his writings, however, Thomas resisted the attraction of surrealism and struggled against complete submission
to the anarchic and the irrational. In prose and poetry alike he sought self-under-standing, and his work accordingly
offers repeated portraits of the artist. By exhortation, bardic gestures, and assertive rhythms, he labours to
coerce his readers and himself into acceptance of life. By exuberant fancies, wit, and gaiety, he exorcises the
powers of darkness, or at least contains them within a bound they dare not pass. As the careful arrangement
of stanza and rhyme conflicts with the neurotic reaction to sex in Love in the Asylum, so throughout his
poetry verbal play and exhilaration of language work against images of sterility and disgust. Of his poem A
Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London Empson writes that the poet says he will not say
what he says. His refusal to mourn is a form of mourning; so in many poems, such s And death shall have no
dominion and Do not go gentle into that good night, the assertions ask for the impossible. At times the
rhetoric moves close to hysteria, but Thomas is determined to create, to build his ark on the flood of life.
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At a time when the language of poetry had seemed to be in danger of being pulled apart between the meaningless
exuberance to be in danger of on the pen hand, and the self conscious precision of poets influenced by positivistic
theory on the other, he has achieved a balance between the two, in his best poems, while retaining and even
drawing our attention to the separateness of both.
Sudden and premature death of Dylan Thomas produced elegies and appreciations in extraordinary numbers
on both sides of the Atlantic. Thomas was the most poetical poet of our time. He talked and dressed and
behaved and lived like a poet; he was reckless, flamboyant, irreverent, innocent and bawdy. His verse, too, had
a romantic wildness about it that even a reader who could make nothing of it recognized as poetic. And
surely the exaggeration of the sense of loss at the death of a poet is a sign of health in any culture. In a note to
the collected edition of his poems, Thomas wrote: These poems, with all their crudities, doubts, and confusions,
are written for the love of Man and in praise of God And in his prologue to the same volume he proclaimed
his intention of celebrating the world and all that is in it:
A single piece of evidence, i.e., any one poem from his small corpus is perhaps enough to prove that, for all the
appearance of spontaneity and sometimes of free association that his poems present to some readers, Thomas
was remarkably conscientious craftsman for whom meaning was bound up with pattern and order. No modern
poet in English has had a keener sense of form or has handled stanzas and verse paragraphs whether
traditional or original with more deliberate cunning. It is worth stressing this at the outset because there are
still some people who talk of Thomas as though he were a writer of an inspired mad rhetoric, of glorious,
tumbling, swirling language which fell from his pen in magnificent disorder. He has been held up by some as the
antithesis of Eliot and his school, renouncing the cerebral orderliness of the 1920s and the 1930s in favour of a
new romanticism, an engaging irresponsibility. On the other hand there are those who discuss his poems as
though they are merely texts for exposition, ignoring the rhyme scheme and the complicated verbal and visual
patterning to concentrate solely on the intellectual implications of the images. The truth is that Thomas is
neither a whirling romantic nor a metaphysical imagist, but a poet who uses pattern and metaphor in a complex
craftsmanship in order to create a ritual of celebration. He sees life as a continuous process, sees the workings
of biology as a magical transformation producing unity out of identity, identity out of unity, the generations
linked with one another and man linked with nature. Again and again in his early poems he seeks to find a
poetic ritual for the celebration of this identity:
Thomas did not rush towards the celebration of unity in all life and all time which later became an important
theme of comfort for him; he moved to it through disillusion and experiment. The force that drives the flower
and the tree to full burgeoning and then to death would destroy him also, only later came the realization that
such destruction is no destruction, but a guarantee of immortality, of perpetual life in a cosmic eternity.
Evidently it is this thought that sounds the note of triumph in Ceremony After a Fire Raid and which provides
the comfort in A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by fire, of a Child in London. A Refusal to Mourn is a poem
worth pausing at, for it illustrates not only a characteristic theme of what might be called the middle Thomas,
but also a characteristic way of handling the theme. The poem is ritualistic in tone; its dominant images are
sacramental; and cunning contrived rise and fall of the cadence of each stanza adds to the note of formal
ceremony. There are four stanzas, the first two and one line of the third containing a single sentence which
swells out to a magnificent surge of meaning. Then, after a pause, the final stanza makes a concluding ritual
statement, an antiphonal chant answering the first three stanzas. The paraphrasable meaning of the poem is
simple enough: the poet is saying that never, until the end of the world and the final return of all things to their
primal elements, will he distort the meaning of the childs death by mourning. One dies but once, and through
that death becomes reunited with the timeless unity of things. But the paraphrasable meaning is not, of course,
the meaning of the poem, which is expanded at each point through a deliberately sacramental imagery while at
the same time the emotion is controlled and organized by the cadences of the stanza. The first stanza and a half
describe the end of the world as a return from differentiated identity to elemental unity.
163 Dylan Marlais Thomas
Anybody who knows Thomass idiom, obscurity is not deliberate but rather an essential. We have only to recall
This bread I break was once the oat to realize the significance of the first three lines of the second stanza.
The water bead and the ear of corn are symbolic primal elements, to which all return at the end. But why Zion
of the water bead and synagogue of the ear of corn ? The answer is simply that these are sacramental
images intended to give a sacramental meaning to the statement. It is a kind of imagery of which Thomas is
very fond of. One might still ask why he says synagogue and not church. The answer is that he wants to
shock the reader into attention to the sacramental meaning. A more everyday religious word might pass by as
a conventional poetic image, but synagogue attracts our attention at once; it has no meaning other than its
literal one, and therefore can be used freshly in a non-literal way. In the third stanza words like mankind,
blaspheme, stations of the breath (recalling stations of the Cross ) play and easily discernible part in the
expansion of the meaning, while the pun in grave truth represents a device common enough in modern
poetry. The concluding stanza gives the reason, the counter-statement, this echoes, in its own way, the opening
stanza; but its tone is new; it is that of liturgical proclamation. We need not wince at the suggestion that long
friends means (among other things) worms; worms for Thomas were not disgusting, but profoundly symbolic:
like maggots they are elements of corruption and thus of reunification, of eternity. How much a poem of this
kind owes to the imagery and to the cadence, as well as to the careful patterning, can be seen at once if one
takes the perhaps extreme method of turning its paraphrasable content into conventional rhymed verse.
His earlier poems often fail by being too packed with metaphor suggestive of identity. Words like Adam ,
Christ , ghost , worm , womb , phrases like the mouth of time , deaths father , beach of flesh ,
hatching hair , half-traced thigh abound, and though each has its orderly place in the poem the reader often
feels dulled by the continuous impact of repeated words of this kind. A fair number of Thomass earlier poems
are obscure for this reason. It is not the obscurity of free association or of references to private reading, but an
obscurity which results from an attempt to pack too much into a short space, to make every comma tell, as it
were. With his continuous emphasis on birth, prenatal life, the relation of parent to child, growth, the relation of
body and spirit, of life of death, of human and animal to vegetable, and similar themes, and his constant search
for devices to celebrate these and identify them with each other, he does not want one word to slip which may
help in building up the total pattern of meaning In his desire to avoid that breaking up he sometimes piles up the
images and metaphors until the reader simply cannot construe the lines. But it must be emphasized that this is
not the fault of a bad romantic poetry, too loose and exclamatory, but comes from what can perhaps be called
the classical vice of attempting to press too much into a little space which is indicative of his obscurity too.
Dylan Thomas progressed from poems in which his techniques of identification are sometimes pressed too far,
through a period of occasional verse in which he focused his general notions on particular incidents and
situations to give a grave and formal ceremonial poetry ( A Refusal to Mourn, Do not go gentle into that
good night. On the Marriage of a Virgin, etc.) to a period of more limpid, open-worked poetry in which,
instead of endeavouring to leap outside time into a pantheistic cosmos beyond the dimensions, he accepts time
and change and uses memory as an elegiac device ( Poem in October, Fern Hill , Over Sir Johns hill ,
Poem on his birthday ). But these divisions are not strictly chronological, nor do they take account of all the
kinds of verse he was writing. There is, for example, A Winters Tale , a middle poem, which handles a
universal folk theme with a quiet beauty that results from perfect control of the imagery.
Out of the less lucid open-worked poems of the third period, Poem in October , though written earlier than the
others in this group, can stand as an excellent example. Again we have the sacramentalizing of nature ( heron
priested shore ) and we have also a sense of glory in the natural world which Thomas learned to render more
and more effectively as his art matured. Again, one cannot see the quality of the poem from an extract; elegy
is combined with remembrance and commemoration, and the emotion rises and falls in a fine movement.
Not for the proud man apart
From the ranging moon I write
On these spindrift pages
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Nor for the towering dead
With their nightingales and psalms
But for the lovers, their arms
Round the griefs of the ages,
Who pay no praise or wages
Nor heed my craft or art.
Dylan never deliberately desired to be difficult or esoteric. He drew on the Bible and on universal folk themes
rather than on obscure late classical writers or Jessie Westons From Ritual to Romance. Unlike Eliot, Thomas
accepted man as he was: he had a relish for humanity. By the end of his life he had learned to be both poetically
honest and poetically simple a difficult combination, especially in our time. And in choosing the spoken verse
of the radio as a medium he was pointing the way towards a bridging of the appalling gap in our culture
between professional critic and ordinary reader or even a layman.
Temprament of Dylan Thomas
Dylan Thomas once remarked that his poetry is the record of his individual struggle from darkness to illumination.
The world of these early symbols is the universe of his darkness; he builds new worlds as he advances in that
struggle towards light. It is notable that after the Altarwise by owl-light sonnets, he discards nearly all of this
particular body of symbols and gradually develops new symbols and new diction to correspond with his ever
changing view of life. In the early poems, Adam is a symbol of sin and of the perishing flesh; in the later, Adam
is upright Adam/ (who) Sang upon origin . Eden is at first thought of as the garden where the Apple was
eaten; it later becomes associated with the innocence of the earth; the earth is seen as recapturing that
innocence at times, in token of the Redemption.
A lurking danger is always there, when a poets work exhibits some kind of rounding-out and development in
a particular direction, that we may tend to treat his poems merely as parts of one long poem. If the poetry of the
dark period is concerned wholly with personal problems, the poetry of the middle phase is charged with
powerful and poignant feeling for others for his wife, his children, his aunt, and the victims of air raids and
the poems of the later volumes are, for the most part, exultant expressions of his faith and love towards
humanity. There are even touches of humour in Once Below A Time and particularly in Lament . Over
Sir Johns hill and Poem on his birthday contemplate death with calm acceptance; the universe of darkness,
with its swarming horrors has disappeared. He does not move from that Inferno to a Paradiso, but he has
recaptured, in the charming natural world of Wales, something of the lost Eden and something of a foretoken
of Heaven. There is undoubtedly a development from doubt and fear to faith and hope, and the moving cause
is essentially love; he comes to love of God by learning to love man and the eternal world.
The three periods in his work are not only distinct in their subject matter; they are distinct in their diction and
prosody too. The language of the first period is limited, its vocabulary so small that it reminds one of Basic
English. Repletion of certain words is so frequent as to suggest obsession with them; indeed, one critic, has
thought their frequent use an instance of verbal compulsion. Fork , fellow , half , vein , suck , worm
seem to dot every page; the phrase deaths feather , among others, recurs in poem after poem. When a
limited vocabulary is used to designate a multiplicity of things, ambiguity is bound to result and we find Thomas
using, or rather exploiting, his key-words in a whole variety of senses/meanings. Fork , for instance, is used
in nearly all of its senses as noun or verb. The sentences of this period are generally short, the verse itself is
short-breathed, very much based on the line-length, and its pulsations are irregular in beat and uneven in
strength, as if a heart were to beat violently for a moment, stop altogether, and suddenly resume again with full
gusto typical of Dylan.
After the selection of the poems following the Altarwise by owl-light sonnets, the later poems are, generally
speaking, characterized by a marked increase in vocabulary and a discarding of some of the old fork , is
never used again after the first sonnet as well as by extension of breath through longer and longer grammatical
165 Dylan Marlais Thomas
units. In the sonnets the iambic pentameter line, although now used as a unit of construction rather than as a
limit, is still much in evidence; in A Refusal to Mourn a single sentence extends into the third stanza; in
Poem in October most of the long and complex stanzas consists of a single sentence. As the old symbolism
is rejected or transformed, symbols also decrease in number and in frequency of use, and there is increasing
employment of metaphor and images both in degree and kind.
Towards the last phase terseness is supplanted by verbosity; sentences, clauses, phrases become long. Adjective
is piled on adjective; masses of words are jammed together to make one compound epithet, until the ordinary
reader could scarcely stretch his breath over the long reaches of language. Despite the enchanting imagery,
one has the feeling that the requisite eloquence is sometimes strained. The early work had presented a
multiplicity of ideas and emotions in very small compass; the last poems stretch a single thought or emotion to
its utmost limits, and perhaps beyond. Curiously enough, he never achieves lucidity; the obscurity wrought by
his early terseness slips into the obscurity wrought by his final verbosity. The early poems depend upon a
technique of isolation, of singling out the essential factors of an experience; the very last depend upon a
technique of accumulation. Perhaps he becomes a bit too consciously the bard, overwhelming us with copiousness
of language, his eloquence, booming at us, working upon us too obviously, even exciting himself unnecessarily.
Taken together this goes back to the kind of poet he essentially is. That can best be seen by comparing
Thomas the poet with Thomas the prose-writer. The poet is great; the prose-writer, despite many evident
marks of genius, merely highly competent; but the prose-writer is far more versatile than the poet. The prose-
writer assumes many characters, devises many situations, and plays upon emotions which range from the
serious to the comic. The poet assumes a single character; and, strictly speaking, he is a poet only of the most
exalted emotions, the most exalted sadness or joy. Call him what you will, tragic poet, bard, poet of sublimity;
the point is that his proper character is a lofty, a heroic one. You will find despair, but it is the despair of
Philoctetes. So with everything he feels. Compare A Refusal to Mourn or Ceremony After a Fire Raid
or After the funeral with John Crowe Ransoms Bells for John Whitesides Daughter or Walter de la
Mares Sunk Lyonesse , and it will be manifest to you that Thomas never achieves, indeed never attempts,
certain ranges of emotion.
Always invariably Dylan comes through love to his faith, we never see him in the poems, really thinking how
others think or feel; they exist simply as objects of his own emotion. In his poetry he is capable of immense
emotion for another; but he cannot stand in anothers skin. As we read him, we are shaken by what he feels
for another, not by the sufferings and the feelings of that other. Moved by grief for a burned child, nobly and
powerfully moved as he is, he does not suffer imaginatively the experience of the child, he sees the pain and the
horror from without, and the resolution he reaches is a resolution for his own being, not for the child. This
curiously external view is revealed in one of his least successful poems; the death of a hundred-year-old man
provides him matter for a string of fantastic conceits, and the poem is really unintelligible, not because it is
particularly obscure, but because the emotion he exhibits is impossible to relate to any emotion that the event,
however conceived. Thomas imagination could transport him anywhere, through space and time; but it is also
true that, wherever it takes him, he sees nothing but himself. He can enter into worm and animal, but he will
look out through his own eyes. He can create worlds; but he creates his worlds in his own image, and remains
the centre of his own thought and feeling. He is not a Dante, a Chaucer, a Shakespeare, or a Browning, who
stood inside the men they made; he is a Keats, a Byron, a Yeats, or an Eliot if at some sort of resemblances are
to be drawn.
The two limitations his restriction to certain ranges of emotion and his restriction to one character must not
be taken too seriously, for they amount to this; that he was a lyric poet of the lofty kind. But they cannot be
disregarded; a poet so restricted must either aim at or achieve the sublime, or he fails. When the conception
underlying his poem is a powerful and lofty one, and controls all the devices of his poem, Thomas is magnificent;
when the conception is trivial, or when his treatment of it does not sufficiently manifest it, he is disappointing.
His art demands great energy of thought and passion and all the accoutrements of the grand style; when the
Poetry 166
high conception is wanting, energy becomes violence and noise, the tragic passions become the melodramatic
or the morbid, ecstasy becomes hysteria, and the high style becomes obscure bombast. Within a given period,
his good work and his bad involve the same devices; it is their employment, what they are employed in and
what they are employed for, that differs; and it makes all the difference that could be apprehended.
Fern Hill and Poem in October , are both luminous with all the weathers of childhood; A Refusal to Mourn
the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London , apprehending the childs death in its relation to the whole universe (all
creation is spanned, awesomely, from beginning to end, in the first stanza, and the last carries us back to the
first dead ); the Altarwise by owl-light sonnets (surely among the greatest poems of our century) all of
these are founded upon conceptions possible, we feel, only to a man of great imagination and feeling. Sometimes
the conception is of the very essence of passion and feeling such as only a towering character could support
When we talk of Thomas faults one thing is starkly clear that the very principles which exhibit his genius when
he is a genius also exhibit his failures when he fails. Let us put it this way, there are no rules or laws of art.
The only necessary by which the artist, as artist, is bound is that that essential element imposed upon him by the
particular work he seeks to execute. But if he is executing it, as he must, in a particular medium language,
let us say he can only make it do what language can do. He can discover new possibilities of language and
realize them; but they must be possibilities and not impossibilities. If he is representing something dramatically
(i.e., on the stage), his work will have to be something that can possibly be represented on the stage. And if he
proposes to affect us, his audience, in any way, he will have to invent something that will affect us. Bound to
one thing, he is at once bound to many; he suffers the restrictions of his medium, of the way in which he
proposes to use it, and of the laws of human nature. Thus we respect the poet who observes no more than we
do and conceives it no more profoundly than we should, if only he formulates it better than we could; we
respect him still more if he does this better than most poets have. We respect still more the poet who observes
more than we do, and still more than poet who feels or conceives more than we; and in proportion as the
performance surpasses such standards, our respect increases.
Singular judgments arrived at through these principles may be incorrect, because the particular work may
somehow be misapprehended; the artist may complain of the particular judgment, but he has no appeal against
the principles. Not that they are necessarily right, they may very well be wrong; the point is that they are the
grounds on which we inevitably judge. The subtlest and the crudest judgments proceed from them. In Dawn
Raid Thomas sees and feels less than we should have, perhaps less than anyone should have seen and felt,
and so his verbal skill goes for naught. When he is Thomas, when he rises to his true stature, he towers indeed.
To see that, you have only to ask yourself whether you think much of a birthday as a poetic theme; and then
read Twenty-four years , Poem in October , and Poem on his Birthday .
The Poetic Character of Dylan Thomas
We have been examining the more general characteristics of Thomas art; we may now turn to the more
particular question of his poetic practice. This can be treated under three heads: the kinds of activities he
represents his poetic character as engaged in; the particular devices, over and above language, through which
he shows us that character as so engaged; and his handling of language. Thomas tends, like most lyric poets,
to exhibit single character acting in a single situation rather than several interacting in a single situation. Those
famous old ballads, The Nut-Brown Maid, Man, Put Thine Old Cloak about Thee, The Lass of Lochroyan,
and Edward, Edward, all show the interactions of several characters in a given situation; what the poet
exhibits is not the uninterrupted activity of a single individual but the interplay among several individuals acting
upon and reacting to one another. Poems like Keats Ode on Melancholy, Shellys Ode to the West Wind,
Arnolds Dover Beach, on the other hand, give us the uninterrupted activity of a single individual. This is not
a question of how many people are present at the supposed scene of the poem; it is a question of whether the
activity shown involves several agencies or one agent only in one or singular events thus recorded.
167 Dylan Marlais Thomas
Let us try to understand, of the activity and not of whether monologue or dialogue is employed. The latter
relates to how the poet represents, whereas we are considering what he represents. Thomas deals with u
single agent, but some of his poems are in dialogue form I see the boys of summer and Find meat on
bones, for example although in the first of these instances he carefully disguises that fact by omitting
quotation marks. In such<cases dialogue is a device of representation merely. This is obvious if we reflect that
such a poem as Brownings The Bishop Orders His Tomb at St. Praxeds Church shows us several characters,
that is, the Bishop and his nephews, in interaction, although this is presented through the Bishops monologue;
whereas Thomas dialogues are merely devices to state two different sides of a case or two different moods,
and merely externalize the internal conflict of a single character. The use of dialogue for this purpose is quite
common in lyric poetry, and is perfectly distinct from the dialogue of drama.
The poet who deals with the uninterrupted activity of a single person in a single situation can do a number of
different things besides. He can present an emotional activity merely; show his character feeling joy or melancholy
at the change of seasons, grief at separation from his love, and so on. If the poet depicts this sort of activity, we
can tell what emotion or desire the character feels, but we cannot state his moral condition; we know what the
character feels but not whether he is ethically good or worse. The poem The Lover in the Winter Plaineth for
the Spring is deservedly famous because of its powerful passion; we sense the passion at once and arc moved
into instant sympathy with it. But, clear as the passion is, we can say nothing of the moral character of the
lover. Morality in fact is irrelevant to this sort of poem, for such poems treat of emotions simply, and no one is
good or bad simply because he has emotions or plain simple feelings.
In such poems the person is characterized as having desires of the sort we think of as universal, or as feeling
emotions that anyone might feel in his situation. We should neither praise him nor blame him for feeling as he
does; we only sympathize with him. The case is very different when the poet exhibits to us a moral activity,
shows us the inner workings of a soul which is good or evil; here our emotional reaction to what we see is not
based simply upon human sympathy, but upon our moral approval or disapproval of the character. We do not
here necessarily sympathize with the feelings of the character; we may quite possibly feel the opposite of what
he feels. In Brownings Soliloquy in a Spanish Cloister, for example, we are shown a character consumed
with deadly hatred; far from feeling his hatred, we disapprove of it, and give our affection to the innocent old
monk whom he hates.
This particular way of two kinds of lyric activity, the merely emotional and the moral, are private, in the sense
that they are concerned with thinking and feeling and not with doing. There is an obvious difference between
feeling such violent hatred as is felt by our man in the Spanish cloister and acting on that hatred. A third kind
of lyric activity, however, is action itself; the poet shows us his character acting upon someone else, threatening,
pleading, commanding, or whatever. Compare the soliloquy just mentioned with Brownings My Last Duchess,
and you will see the difference at once. The fellow in the cloister feels anger, contempt, disgust, delight, and a
whole series of emotions in consequence of his hatred; he plots and schemes; but he does not do anything. The
Duke in My Last Duchess, however, is doing something; he is threatening, and not too subtly either; he is
warning the Counts emissary what he expects from his next Duchess; if he should be disappointed, he will be
quite prepared to deal with her. We have, then, three distinct kinds of lyric activity: the simply emotional, the
moral but private, and the act itself. Each of these may be matters either of a single moment or of a process;
for example, the activity can be that of the character at a single moment of emotion (as in The Lover in Winter
Plaineth for the Spring ) or that of the character in an emotional process, over a succession of moments, as in
Shelleys Ode to the West Wind.
Dylan Thomas is a poet of the internal moral workings of the soul, and he deals, not with moments, but with
processes. This is no doubt what he meant when,- in one of the few places where he discusses his poetry, he
remarked that it was essentially narrative. But processes are simple or complex, and it is principally the more
complex process which engages Thomas. It is not a matter of whether the process is short or long, composed
of few stages or many; it is a matter of whether at a given point the process involves a single line of causation
Poetry 168
or several and, further, whether it involves causes which co-operate or causes which conflict. A man wants a
drink of whiskey and takes it; that is a simple process. He hesitates whether to take whiskey or gin and makes
up his mind; that is slightly more complex. He hesitates on moral grounds; that is more complex. The more
there is in greater conflict, in short, the more complex. The selection of the dynamic rather than the static, of
the complex rather than the simple, has its consequences for poetic method, as Thomas himself was well
aware. In a letter to Henry Treece he defends himself against the charge of dif-fuseness as follows:
When you say that I have not [Norman] Camerons or [Charles] Madges concentric movement round a
central image, you are not accounting for the fact that it consciously is not my method to move concentrically
round a central image. A poem by Cameron needs no more than one image; it moves around one idea, from
one logical point to another, making a full circle. A poem by myself needs a host of images, because its centre
is a host of images. I make one image though make is not the word; I let, perhaps, an image be made
emotionally in me and then apply to it what intellectual and critical forces I possess let it breed another, let
that image contradict the first, make, of the third image bred out of the other two together, a fourth contradictory
image, and let them all, within my imposed formal limits, conflict. Each image holds within it the seed of its own
destruction, and my dialectal [dialectical?] method, as I understand it, is a constant building up and breaking
down of the images that come out of the central seed, which is itself destructive and constructive at the same
time.
What I want to try to explain and its necessarily vague to me is that the life in any poem of mine cannot
move concentrically round a central image; the life must come out of the centre; an image must be born and die
in another; and any sequence of my images must be a sequence of creations, recreations, destructions,
contradictions. I cannot, either as Cameron does, and as others do, and this primarily explains his and their
writing round the central image make a poem out of a single motivating experience; I believe in the simple
thread of action through a poem, but that is an intellectual thing aimed at lucidity through narrative. My object
is, as you say, conventionally to get things straight. Out of die inevitable conflict of images inevitable,
because of the creative, recreative, destructive and contradictory nature of the motivating centre, the womb of
war I try to make that momentary peace which is a poem. I do not want a poem of mine to be, nor can it be,
a circular piece of experience placed nearly outside the living stream of time from which it came; a poem of
mine is, or should be, a watertight section of the stream that is flowing all ways, all warring images within it
should be reconciled for that small stop of time. I agree that each of my earlier poems might appear to
constitute a section from one long poem; that is because I was not successful in making a momentary peace
with my images at the correct moment; images were left dangling over the formal limits, and dragged the poem
into another; the warring stream ran on over the insecure barriers, the full stop armistice was pulled and
twisted raggedly on into a conflicting series of dots and dashes.
This passage is itself curiously diffuse, curiously confused in its metaphors; but it is not, unclear. The poet who
deals with a moment, or even the poet who treats a simple process, can unify his poem in terms of a single
image. The poet concerned with a complex process cannot; he must affect unity by the formal limits of the
poem, and within those formal limits everything is in conflict. This is true enough, but it will be even more
convincing if we look into the reasons why it is true. The static or momentary poem is necessarily analytic; it
breaks a single moment of experience, to use Thomas phrase, into its constituent elements; but the experience
is still whole and single, a single idea, a single intuition, a single emotional reaction or sensation. As a consequence
a single image, metaphor, or symbol may be employed to reintegrate the elements factored out by the poet
into the whole of which they are parts. An image represents a moment of sensation, metaphor and symbol
represent a moment of thought and feeling; all will serve only so long as there is something constant in sensation,
thought, or feeling. If sensation, thought, or feeling change, they will serve no longer; and the more radical that
change, the more radical will be the change in image, metaphor, or symbol. A process of the soul involves
changes of sensation, thought, and feeling, hence changes in the images, symbols, and metaphors which express
these subtle experiences.
169 Dylan Marlais Thomas
Dylans typical poems are dialectically complex, in the sense that they balance idea against idea, argument
against argument; indeed, his images, symbols, and metaphors are often succinct statements of argument, and
the reader who fails to recognize them as such is often in danger of misreading the poem as a whole. Thomas
has been romanticized as a primitive, an aboriginal, a hairy wild man out of Wales, the elemental antithesis of
the intellectual;

I see the boys of summer has been much admired for its faery imagery ; that it is a terse
and complicated argument about how life ought to be lived seems to have escaped notice. Poem after poem
presents argument, if one sees at all what is being presented. A process in the weather of the heart and
Light breaks where no sun shines work out, with extreme complexity, the relations between man and the
external universe; so too, though more simply, does The force that through the green fuse drives the flower.
When once the twilight locks no longer is a meditation on the origin of the idea of death, terminating in the
decision that life is to be lived vigorously. My world is pyramid is a strange meditation on the physical child
and the secret child, and resolves the problem of death in these terms, through the discovery that the secret
child survives.
The essential complexity of Thomas poems goes far beyond the matter of complex argument and statement.
Their complexity is really due to their presenting three lines, so to speak, at once: the process of conscious
thought, the process of the emotions, and the process of the subconscious. Imagine three files of people
passing through a narrow corridor and pushing against one another in all directions; you will then have a
simplified parallel to a Dylan Thomas poem. I say simplified because the conflicts are not as simple as that;
there is quite possibly a conflict within the dialectical line, as opinion clashes with opinion, argument with
argument; and there can be emotional conflict and subconscious conflict as well. We have to examine Thomas
words very closely:
Daft with the drug thats smoking in a girl
And curling round the bud that forks her eye.
An old mans shank one- marrowed with my bone,
And all the herrings smelling in the sea,
I sit and watch the worm beneath my nail
Wearing the quick away.
It is quit evident that the point thus far, we may observe, is that the character does fear all these thing? (A
really detailed study of the imagery would show how very bitterly he fears them). Now we learn that he is prey
to all of them already. He is madly in love; the very bone of his shank unites hint to the old man he must be; the
stench of the sea of debauchery is already in his nostrils; death is already gnawing at him in the very pure of his
veins. Notice that whatever he fears, he also desires as much as he fears. What attracts or compels him is also
what repels him; he shares his world with the devil.
There is subconscious conflict here, since all the processes of life are associated with sex; sex is desirable,
indeed compelling, but it does not sufficiently gratify to shut out fear, and, moreover, it is associated with sin,
senile impotency, pain, and death, and so undesirable. Yet, since association is reciprocal, these in turn are
desirable, indeed compulsive, since they are linked to sex. Again, there is rational conflict, because he is aware
that what attracts him also repels him, and cannot come to terms with himself as to whether what he desires is
really desirable or not. He knows, too, that his rational decision will not matter in the end, for he is compelled;
at the same time he would like his rational decision to triumph. And there is emotional conflict stemming both
from his reason and from his subconscious. The former with its ought and ought-not, can and cannot,
balances each of these with its contradictory, and generates emotions based on conflicting moral dictates and
conflicting ideas of the possible and impossible. The latter generates emotions of simultaneous hope and fear
based on simultaneous desire and aversion; and the emotions generated by the conscious mind also conflict
with those generated by the subconscious.
The passage and the language is dreadfully revelatory of all this. He is in love; but see how he puts it. He is
daft, but this is no pretty convention of love-madness ; he is suffering hallucinations as if he had taken a
Poetry 170
drug the drug thats smoking in a girl. Notice a girl a highly impersonal, possibly even contemptuous,
designation of the beloved. He does not see her as beautiful; he sees her anatomically, in terms of the bud that
forks her eye the branching veins of her eyeball. Forks her eye is a painful image; we are bound to call to
mind a sharp prong in connection with the sensitive organ of the eye, and the effect is unpleasant in itself. But
there is more than that; in a poet as addicted to puns as the early Thomas, we may look for puns; and there is
a suggestion both of the fork of the girls loin, as visible in her eye, and of the pitchfork of the devil with whom
the character shares his world further attraction and repulsion. The girl herself is not responsible for the
attraction; it is the drug. This curls smoking up through her body, but is not part of her; it comes from the
devil; we have the devils fork and the smoke of hell-fire visible in the eye of the beloved. He is repelled; but in
the moment of repulsion at sex, he also dreads the impotency of age, the old mans shank already preparing
in his groin; at the moment of repulsion at the thought of impotency, he dreads the sea of scums and can
already smell its stench. He sits and watches the vein pulsing below his fingernail; and he sees it as a worm
wearing the quick away, robbing him of life even as its pulse gives him life.
We can with some certainty now observe that the character in this poem one assumed again and again and
constant throughout changing moods and situations is a modern Hamlet; but, in the old phrase, he out-Hamlets
an out shins Hamlet. Hamlets problems stem from a particular situation; Thomas character has as his problem
life itself. He is, a simpler character than Hamlet; while he has a grim humour of his own, he lacks Hamlets
mordant wit and cynical gaiety. His imagination, too, is foul as Vulcans stithy, but though it has its flights like
Hamlets, it never, in the early poems, rises free of hell-smoke. If he is simpler than Hamlet, his problems are
more complex and general than Hamlets. Hamlet shifts more rapidly from mood to mood, but is actually less
indecisive than Thomas hero. It is not that he does not make decisions; he makes them repeatedly in the early
poems, but we remain unconvinced of their durability, or of the possibility of their realization.
It has been suggested before that he is a tragic figure; his hideous, all-penetrating doubts; his painful joy in his
transitory convictions; his love of truth and hatred of falsehood and hypocrisy; his willingness to stand by the
consequences of any solution he finds for his problems; his terrible sensitivity; and his evident genius. Like
Hamlet he shows genius and that in conflict with itself on the basic issues of life.
The Modes of Poetic Representation
We may now turn to the question of how Thomas depicts, that is, the general devices by which he represents
his subjects. We have already touched on one of these devices, the pseudo-drama. Pseudo-drama is the use
of dialogue to suggest that the action represented is the interplay among several distinct persons, whereas in
fact there is no such interplay because the persons of the dialogue are not distinct. The Nut-Brown Maid
shows us the interplay of action between two really distinct persons, the Maid and the banished man, who
turns out to be an Earls son; they are as distinct as Macbeth and Lady Macbeth. But in such poems as the
medieval Debate between Soul and Body or Elinor Wylies This Corruptible, in which Mind, Heart, and
Soul discuss, the interplay is feigned only; there are not several persons here, but one, for Heart, Mind, Body,
Soul, are all one person. Again, pseudo-drama is a use of monologue in which a supposed character (who is
really, however, only the object of thought of someone thinking) utters the thoughts of the person thinking of
him. Whether dialogue or monologue is employed, characters are assumed as mere masks and made the
mouthpieces of the real agents. Crazy Jane and the Bishop, in Yeats Words for Music Perhaps, are masks
of this kind; so are all the characters of Eliots The Waste Land (in fact, he tells us himself in one of his
notes that they all resolve into one). To put the whole thing more generally: pseudo-drama is the use of
dramatic devices to represent an action that is not dramatic.
Among Thomas pseudo-dramatic dialogues are I see the boys of summer, Find meat on bones, and If my
head hurt a hairs foot ; the masks in these are, respectively, the boys of summer and the person criticizing
them; the father and the son; the unborn child and its mother. Instances of pseudo-dramatic monologue are
Before I knocked, My world is pyramid, and When once the twilight locks no longer ; the mask in the
171 Dylan Marlais Thomas
first is Jesus, in the second the secret child, in the third the spirit; but all are mouthpieces of the Thomasian
hero, think as he thinks, feel as he feels, and speak in his characteristic idiom, with his distinctive vocabulary
and turns of language that is contrived to suit his own idiosyncrasies.
This typical technique of pseudo-drama has many uses; it permits concreteness, immediacy, and vividness
where these otherwise would be impossible; it can heighten the contrast between two opposing points of view,
or between conflicting motives and desires; it can produce a striking degree of economy as well. Thomas also
uses pseudo-narrative, the narrative parallel of pseudo-drama. The three principal poems utilizing this device
are the Altar-wise by owl-light sonnets, A Winters Tale, and the Ballad of the Long-legged Bait ; the
poet had projected a fourth In Country Heaven, of which In the white giants thigh is a fragment. In these
the characters are also masks for aspects of the underlying lyric character; for instance, the girl in the Ballad
is a symbolic mask of the fleshly desires of the character and remains so till the very end.
Real impact and effectiveness of these devices lies in the especially vivid actuality and immediacy which they
confer; but they also serve, like representative devices in general, to select those aspects of the lyric activity
which are necessary for the effect, to arrange these in the order in which they will have their greatest force
(for example, to increase their effect through suspense and the unexpected), to set them in a context which will
make them intelligible and probable as well, and to bind them into a whole as effective as possible. The scale
on which events and activities are represented is also important to their intelligibility, credibility, and effect, and
this, too, is a matter of devices of representation.
Essentially a lyric poet does not necessarily represent the whole of the lyric action; just as the novelist and the
dramatist may exhibit only a part of their plot, leaving the rest to inference, the poet may present only a part of
the lyric action. Conversely, again like novelist and dramatist, he may exhibit more than the activity if this
requires for its effect some emotional preparation or information. Finally, he may represent the whole of the
activity, and nothing more. There is nothing invariable about Thomas procedure in this respect; he begins
before, after, and with the beginning of his lyric actions, according to the demands of the individual poem. A
few poems, like Over Sir Johns hill, have some sort of introduction; a greater number begin with the activity,
or after it has begun. The force that through the green fuse drives the flower, for instance, starts immediately
with the intuition that the forces which create and destroy both man and vegetable are identical, and pursues
the consequences of that intuition; If I were tickled by the rub of love, , begins after the idea which initiates
the lyric action. The choice of one or another of these kinds of beginnings depends upon the amount of
emotional preparation, or of information, required for the proper effect, A fairly constant, and quite peculiar,
characteristic of Thomas, however, is his use of what we may call circumstantial ambiguity. There is a
curious difficulty, as one first approaches his poetry, of determining who is saying what or doing what to whom
in what circumstances. Part of the difficulty, no doubt, is due to the difficult language, but part of it, as certainly,
is due to his deliberately minimizing, in some instances even omitting, the ordinary indications which settle such
questions. He reminds one of a dramatist who should leave out the title of his play, the indications of place and
time, the cast of characters, the assignment of speeches, and all stage directions to leave the reader totally
independent.
I see the boys of summer gives none of the conventional indications that it is, dialogue; certain other pieces,
such as Do you not father me and the sonnets, ascribe speeches to speakers like seaweedy, the antipodes,
and the fake gentleman in suit of spades (as a matter of fact these are not even really speeches!), and so on.
The ambiguity in representation, as in diction, is not merely deliberate; it is studious and deliberately worked on
by the poet. Part of the difficulty of Thomas poetry stems from the oddity and originality of his imagination;
part, as he once acknowledged,- from the terrific compression he was trying to achieve; part, no doubt, from a
certain wilfulness or, at any rate, from his peculiar habits as a poet. Yet we must not suppose that obscurity can
have no artistic purpose, that it is a mere fault of literary composition.
This deliberate obscurity and complexity is a device; and one obvious use of it is to force the reader to give a
poem the close attention it requires; properly handled, the cryptic excites curiosity rather than disgust, returns
Poetry 172
the reader again and again to contemplation of the work until the problems it sets have been resolved. Or one
should say properly handled : what makes the difference between proper and improper handling, between the
production of curiosity and the production of disgust, is the value of the work to which attention has been so
forcibly directed. The poet who puzzles us to force our attention to a work which is not worth attention is a vain
fool, deserves our contempt and will get it; but the poet who tantalizes us in order to make us read more closely,
and so understand more perfectly and react more completely to, a piece that is delicately and subtly made is
perfectly within his rights. He is entitled to the attention he demands, and he rewards us handsomely at the end,
not only with the satisfaction which attends the achievement of something difficult, but also with our increased
pleasure in the poem as poem. Obscurity, like clarity, is not a criterion but a device of art; it is folly to praise or
condemn a work because it does or does not entail the use of a given device. We have rather to ask what the
artist gains or lose by using it or not using it, what he does with it or could have done with it or at the end
whether it succeeds in the desired foregrounding of the complex.
There are more important reasons for obscurity or complexification. We can see something of these if we
consider how the poet .produces emotional effects in us. If we leave aside the sympathetic reactions produced
in us by sound and rhythm, we can say, with fair accuracy, that poetry moves us by causing us to entertain
opinions. That opinion is so involved in emotion can be seen from the fact that if, for example, we think that
something dreadful is about to happen to ourselves or someone we cherish, we shall feel fear, whether the
thing is really dreadful and imminent or not; conversely, if we do not think so, we shall not feel fear, regardless
of the true case; and so with the other emotions. But opinion itself is not sufficient; the opinion must be actively
entertained, that is, present to the mind, not merely in the background; and it must be present to the mind in the
form of an image either of the pain and harm to be suffered or of the dangerous agency that may inflict it. For
mere ideas and opinions in the abstract do not move us, as experience shows; they must be concretized and
made actual in the imagination (or present to sensation) before they have any working power.
It might be said, thus, that the poet controls the emotions of the audience by regulating the amount of knowledge
or opinion (concerning the poetic characters and their fortunes) possessed by the audience at any particular
moment, and by regulating the imaginative form which such opinion takes! Dramatist, novelist and even lyric
poet through their representations of the activities of their characters deal out informal ion bit by bit. What the
audience feels is a function of what it knows at a given point, of the relation of this to what has gone before, and
of any inference which can be made on such bases. Of course the particular emotion or emotions felt at a
given point are a resultant also of the whole train of precedent emotions; but when these are examined in
retrospect they will also be found to vary with the amount of information available at the point of their inception.
Emotions are particularly heightened by suspense and the unexpected. Suspense is not an emotion in itself, as
can be seen from the fact that it can attend many contrary emotions, such as fear and hope; it is merely tension
resulting from prolonged uncertainty or from prolonged expectation.
The extraordinarily skilful facet of Dylan Thomas is evident in the techniques of representation. Great art is
impossible of exhaustive discussion, and there is no point in trying to be exhaustive; but consider, for example,
the Ballad of the Long-legged Bait. The poem begins abruptly with the start of a voyage. Before two lines
are complete, we have a sense that there is something odd about this voyage; it is not the fisherman who takes
a last look at the land and bids it goodbye, but the other way round. Another oddity in the second stanza: the
boat seems to be moving as fast as a bird hooking over the sea. In the third, the looking land says, For my
sake sail, and never look back. Our curiosity is aroused; we wonder whether these impossibilities result
merely from metaphorical statement. The strangeness increases: night falls, the sun is shipwrecked west on
a pearl, and the moon swims out of its hulk (if so, it rises in the west!).Bit by bit the tale unfolds. We are
ready to pity the girl, but we learn that she longs among horses and angels and we learn that she is evidently
in a kind of sexual ecstasy, in which all the creatures of the sea join.
She dies as a result of this, but any painful emotions we might feel are eliminated as we learn that she was all
the wanting flesh which was the enemy of the fisherman, that she was Susannah and Sheba and Venus and
173 Dylan Marlais Thomas
the women sent by the Tempter in erotic dreams, in short, all Sin, who had a womans shape ; and so to the
magnificent conclusion in which all that was lost through Sin, Time, and Death emerges with the lost continent
from the sea. As these things are successively disclosed, we move through curiosity, wonder, astonished
horror, bewilderment, regret, and resignation to a surprised delight. We are held in constant suspense until the
last line of the poem, for until then we do not know what the action is, or who the agents, or what the
circumstances. Nor can we foretell the next development of, the action; each new turn undercuts our feelings
for the events that have gone before, and sets them in a new light. The host of impossibilities incline us to doubt;
the furious actuality of the images forbids us to doubt; we are thus inclined to wonder instead.
The poet Thomas forces us to bear in mind every point of the tale, if we would avoid utter confusion; but at the
moment when we view it as a whole, we see that the tale has a further reference; and that reference resolves
all of our problems and confusions. As we consider each element of the representative device, our admiration
for Thomas is likely to increase. Why was it right, in this instance, to fix on the object of thought rather, than on
the thoughts and emotions of the character thinking? Because these latter are inferable from the object of
thought. The symbolic imagery can arouse more powerful emotions, more rapidly and economically, than could
the literal delineation. The poem is cast into a narrative which begins after the decision of the fisherman to
mortify the wanting flesh, and which bars us from the workings of his mind to increases suspense. In the
same vein the narrator should know the real significance of the voyage to heighten, step by step, the conflict
between our superficial interpretations until we are at last driven into comprehension and understanding.
The Language and the Devices in Dylan Thomas' Poetry
Major difficulty in Thomas poetry is that offered by his diction the choice and the range of words he uses in his
poems. We depend upon diction first of all to get at the poem; unless we can grasp its meaning, we can hardly
penetrate to character or activity or situation or anything else; and Thomas puts such formidable obstacles in
the path of his reader as sometimes to dampen all hope of understanding him. An obvious way to remove such
difficulty would be to supply the reader with a translation or paraphrase of each of the difficult poems. But this
has several serious disadvantages. In the first place the reader is likely to take the mere meaning for the poem
itself. Again, paraphrase frustrates the poets purposes by removing all need for intellectual activity on the part
of the reader, although precisely that activity is necessary for the effect of the poem. Again, paraphrase leaves
the reader quite unaware of the particular verbal techniques of the poet. Finally, it puts a kind of permanent
screen of explication, criticism, and analysis between the reader and the poem
Dylan Thomas is fond of words with multiple meanings and multiple syntactic functions. He uses these for
various kinds of puns and similar tricks, for achieving simultaneous meanings, and for parody. For example,
My world is pyramid plays on various meanings of the word fellow, which can be a noun meaning a
person, partner, friend, or companion; an adjective meaning associate, accompanying, etc.; and a. verb with
similar meanings. Again the sonnets play upon words like wether; weather, rung (like a bell), rung (of
a ladder), which, witch, where there is similarity of sound only.
Sometimes he wants simultaneous meanings of a multiple-meaning word; in A grief ago, the phrase boxed
into love has simultaneous meanings; as Thomas himself declared, boxed has the coffin and the pug-glove in
it. He will mix levels or kinds of language most startlingly, current with archaic, literary with slang and thieves
lingo, either to achieve simultaneous meanings or to make you consider which meaning he intends. For instance,
in To-day, this insect, air-drawn windmill does not mean, as we should take it in current language, drawn by
the air, but has its archaic sense of drawn on the air (i.e., imagined, illusory ); like Macbeths air-drawn
dagger. Thomas will also affect parody through the use of similar words: minstrel angles for ministering
angels, maid and head for maidenhead, man through macadam for man through Adam, God in bed,
good and bad. He uses such parodies for many purposes but chiefly to sharpen an antithesis. He likes to coin
words and devise new uses for words.
Poetry 174
The coined expressions are nearly all compounds, and some are very strange indeed: grave-gabbing, mothers-
eyed, scythe-eyed, skullfoot, bird-papped, etc. These compounds are based on no one principle; sometimes
they merely put together two words in their literal meanings, sometimes they involve metaphor, sometimes they
are condensed paraphrases. Thomas will use nouns quite commonly as verbs, for example, Jacob to the
stars means climbs Jacobs ladder to the stars,

and there are many similar instances of his wrenching a
word out of its conventional function. His metaphors are likely to give a good deal of trouble.
In the first place, he dislikes the obvious kinds and goes in for types in which the resemblance is extremely in
obvious; sometimes it is a resemblance which is fancied only, and likely to be fancied only by a man in a
particular mood or pursuing a particular train of thought. Second, Thomas likes to make the metaphor appear
self-contradictory. Third, he likes to mix metaphors, to achieve various special effects through the dissonances
they beget. The result is that his metaphors, being made as they are out of such materials as the metaphysical
poets used in their conceits, become enigmas or riddles, since, unlike the metaphysical poets, Thomas does
not make explicit the grounds for his fantastic comparisons and analogies
Dylans often used metaphors could be classified in separate categories. First, there is the apparently self-
contradictory metaphor in which the contradiction comes from incomplete statement; either Thomas has given
you the missing part already or will come back later and supply it. In Our eunuch dreams, for instance, we
have one-dimensioned ghosts. Ghosts here is itself a metaphor for images on a movie screen; but how are
these one-dimensioned ? Thomas returns to the metaphor in the succeeding section of the poem, in the lines
The photograph is married to the eye, / Grafts on its bride one-sided skins of truth, and we realize that what
he meant by one-dimensioned is one-sided ; there is no further side to a photograph or a movie image. The
trick here is that he counted on our reading one-dimensioned literally, whereas it is a metaphor. He uses this
particular trick here to emphasize his point that, while the photograph and the image are half-true, dreams are
totally false.
In the next category he uses metaphors which deceive you as to what is being analogized to what. This again
involves partial statement which has to be filled out with something that went be fore or comes after. For
example, in When, like a running grave we have time tracks you down, one is quite likely to think of time
here merely as a hunter tracking, but the last stanza clarifies this; time is also being analogized to a runner on
a cinder track who on completion of his course shapes an oval, an 0, a zero standing for the nothingness of
death.
Thomas uses what we may call the metaphor of logical consequence. One of his most famous and supposedly
most simple poems, In my Craft or Sullen Art, contains some five or six of these. Sullen art means so
stubborn, unresponsive, refractory, that if it were human one would call it sullen. Spindrift pages means if
Keats was one who wrote in water, my more ephemeral work ought to be called spindrift. Ivory stages
means stages whereon people act falsely, like actors ; it involves an allusion to the Virgilian gates of ivory and
of horn through which the false and the true dreams, respectively, come. This sort of metaphor always contains
some supposition or allusion from which the metaphorical term results as a logical consequence; frequently the
supposition is a metaphor of Thomas own.
He is also fond of a highly composite metaphor in which the parts are unintelligible until we grasp the whole.
In Over Sir Johns hill, for instance, the hill is called just and the heron is called holy. How so? the
reader may ask. These terms derive from Thomas over-all comparison of the events taking place to a trial and
execution; the hill is just because it is a judge, and it is a judge because, like a judge pronouncing the death
sentence, it puts on a black cap in this instance a black cap of jackdaws. The hawk is seen as, the hangman
executing small birds, and, since he is a hangman, his stoop is seen as a rope (and a fuse is a sort of rope, so his
rope is called a fuse ). The heron is the chaplain or priest and so is called saint and holy. Once one gets
the whole, the parts are clear. He effects metaphor also by his compounds. These do not usually offer much
difficulty. Lamb white days, for instance, means days innocent as a lamb is white ; a springful of larks
175 Dylan Marlais Thomas
means as many larks as you would find in a whole spring ; apple towns means the trees in apple orchards;
and so on.
Thomas likes various kinds of implied or suggested metaphor. We had an example of one sort in the lines
quoted earlier from the Ballad of the Long-legged Bait, where the storm was analogized to a supernatural
warship, although the warship itself was never mentioned. This sort of metaphor is produced by mentioning
attributes of a thing until a kind of rough definition results. Another sort comes from taking a stock phrase and
altering part of it to produce an implied analogy, as, for example, a nose for news is altered into a jaw for
news, the stations of the Cross into the stations of the breath, once upon a time into once below a
time.
He uses periphrasis in so many different ways that classification is difficult and perhaps pointless; indeed, he
writes as if he were one of the Welsh enigmatic poets of the fourteenth century. One of his less successful
poems, Because the pleasure-bird whistles, carries this to an extreme that has irritated many critics. In this
poem Because the pleasure-bird whistles after the hot wires means Because the song-bird sings more
sweetly after being blinded with red-hot wires or needles ; a drug-white shower of nerves and food is the
long way around for snow, snow being conceived both as the snow of cocaine addicts and as manna from
heaven.
Thomas also uses the Anglo-Saxon device of kenning, as in windwell for source of the wind ; and he uses
an odd form of periphrasis which makes a familiar thing unfamiliar by describing it accurately but in the manner
of a primitive definition: thus shafted disk for clock, bow-and-arrow birds for weathercocks. His
syntax is full of pitfalls for the unwary. We have seen already that he tends to use words in other than their
conventional functions; but he is also fond of ambiguous reference, false parallelism, ellipsis, something that we
might call false apposition, and something else that we may call delayed complement. As in the first stanza
of Poem in October many words intervene between hearing and its infinitive object beckon and many
again between beckon and its object myself.
Thomas deliberately increases such ambiguities by the use or omission of punctuation. For example, in the first
three lines of A Refusal to Mourn, a little hyphenation would have clarified everything, thus: Never until the
mankind-making / Bird-beast- and flower- / Fathering and all-humbling darkness. The reader who perseveres
will find that Thomas seldom does what he does pointlessly, and usually rewards the effort of interpretation
most handsomely. Obviously he cannot be read literally; to read him so would be either to run headlong into
bewilderment or to miss nine-tenths of what he was saying. We can make the mistake of taking him too literally
when he says that he wishes to be read literally; his paraphrases, explanations, and commentaries show him to
be a man with anything but a literal mind.
What he meant, is that he wanted to be read, not read into. It is common practice for critics nowadays, to
impose a host of meanings on poetry which the text itself in no way justifies, sometimes even contradicts. For
such hypothesis-ridden readers any poem is merely an occasion for working their favourite automatic apparatus.
Any poem means, not what the poet thought he meant, but what the hypothesis dictates that he must have
meant. This is worse than an infringement on the freedom of speech; this is dictation of thought and feeling.
Thomas wanted the reader to begin with the idea that he might be speaking literally; to declare some- thing
a symbol or a metaphor only after it was evident that it could not be a literal expression; to find out, in that case,
what kind of symbol or metaphor it was; and so go, eventually, from the text, to Thomas meaning. This is the
right way to read Thomas, and the right way to read anything; and it is the only right way to read poetry that has
significance and immortality written all over it.
Comments on Selected Poems
The following paraphrases are intended merely to give a general idea of the poems with which they deal, and
so to start the reader on the process of reading Thomas. (The discussions and ideas given below rely on the
treatment in the readers guide up to a very large extent)
Poetry 176
I See the Boys of Summer
This poem is a pseudo-drama involving the boys , their critic, and the poet. The critic speaks first, and
charges the boys with seeking ruin; they destroy harvests, freeze the seeds in the soils, are frigid in their loves,
and put the Flood before Eden; they destroy the sweetness of summer, entertain thoughts of winter in summer
itself., and in the very sunlight think of darkness; the moon also means nothing to them.
Further, if the boys take no account of time and season, the summer children , as yet unborn, make time
within the timeless womb, and reckon day and night where they are not. The critic predicts that nothing will
ever come of such fellows; probably in the winter of their old age they will feel the heat they should have felt
in the prime of their summer. The poet, speaking in the last line, cries out that, if so, they will have preserved
youth in their old age. In Section II the boys defend their view: time and the seasons must be challenged, or
the very stars are made into bells which chime the hour; to observe time is to be at the mercy of death, night,
winter; the old man, watchman of death, does not offer any comforting cry such as Twelve o clock and a
moony night!
No, they say, let us be the dark deniers who doubt and deny all; who draw everything out of its opposite; death
out of the woman of life, life and love out of dead lovers, light out of the darkness of the sea, straw and not
grass out of the planted seed (the reference is to a fertility ritual in which a womb is planted to insure the
birth of vegetation). We shall reverse everything; elevate the deeps of the sea and lower the high birds,
flood the dry deserts with waters, look through gardens for funeral wreaths, celebrate Christmas in spring, and
so on. The poet remarks that the boys promise to include in their experience all the extremes of life.
In the last section the critic says this will end in ruin; there is a time for everything; when man is dead and eaten
by maggots, what can he do then? The boys retort that they are young; he responds that no one stays that way;
he, for instance, is now what their father was once. The boys refuse to acknowledge any such father; they are
the sons of flint and pitch , the ageless universe. The poet remarks that the extremes are really one; that in the
whole view North Pole and South Pole are the same, the poles are kissing as they cross .
When we first encounter the poem we admire a dazzling surface, a quarrel of images with no immediate sense.
Frozen loves , cargoed apples , boiling honey , and jacks of frost create a climate of extremes where
brawned wombs weathers and dogdayed pulse seem more at ease, but monotony of rhythm and regularity
of structure indicate some order within this chaos. Even dissonance and assonance are to a certain extent
alongside these. (dissonance mean an approximate rhyme in which vowels disagree and consonants agree,
e.g. goat-gate, thrashflesh, assonance mean an approximate rhyme in which consonants disagree and vowels
agree, e.g. rake-pain). This order of disagreements, we must agree, offers an experience like nothing else
and a good experience, too. But poetry, made of words, is not music, whatever these arts have in common.
Examination of this thing of words shows the element of sense that words must bear. Indeed, examination
shows a rational theme that determines and orders what we have been struck by. To see how rhythm, rhyme,
structure, and image serve this theme we must explore the images and place the contenders in what seems to
be a debate.
The speaker, taking a dim view of the boys in Part I, sees their ruin. Justifying themselves in Part II, the boys
answer their critic. Part III, asserting the structure dialectic, resolves this conflict of thesis and antithesis by a
kind of synthesis. Of the debaters, the boys claim our notice first. Summer is the season of fulfilment; yet the
boys of summer, like improvident grasshoppers, are doomed. Probably these boys are all men in their
aspects of sperm cells, embryos, and adolescents. That they are also Welshmen, drive from mine, factory, and
home by the depression of 1931 (the year Thomas had to leave school) and ruined in London, is not altogether
very unlikely. Plainly the speaker who sees these complex boys is one of them, sharing their fate. Poets,
Welshmen, adolescents, sperm cells, and embryos all of these at once these boys are victims of fate and
time. Temporal process, suggested by sun and moon, is established in four stanzas by the four seasons, autumn,
winter, spring, and summer.
177 Dylan Marlais Thomas
The first stanza, is a contention among images of heat and cold, wet and dry, love and sterility, and involves the
autumnal game of bobbing for apples; but apple and flood, from Genesis, suggest conception. As fertility and
sterility, life and death, creation and destruction proceed together, each binary involves its opposite.
The second stanza, following conception and genesis in the first, concerns the development of the embryo in
the dark hive or void of the womb which holds deaths frost. The signal moon may be that of the ninth month.
Womb and moon are zero by shape and promise. That the boys at this point are also adolescents in the sun
is made almost plain by their activity. Playing with words and with themselves, they finger jacks of frost. Still
in their mothers the adolescents, the summer children of the third stanza enjoy the brawned wombs weathers
until obstetrical spring paints emerging skulls with light at birth and promises bony death. As embryos, they
paint the shades (ghostly darkness) of the quartered (four, inhabited) seasons on the walls of their dams
(mothers and retainers of amniotic fluid).
Grown up at last or fully statured, the boys of summer come to nothing in summer. Their hot pulse is frozen
stiff; yet thaw is not impossible. As there is ice in summer, so there is summer in ice. This ambiguity,
complicating doom by hope, is confirmed by seedy, the generative word, which includes fertility and decay.
Our seedy boys lame the air as the pulse of love and light bursts in their throats
The part two, shows these seedy men of nothing, responding more to the nasty tone of their critic than to his
ambiguities, cap them with ambiguities of their own; for nothing is simple in this debate. It may be, that all men
are victims of time; but making the most of time, let us challenge it before the clock strikes the chiming
quarter of midnight or death. Midnight may be irreversible, but blowing, however vain, is the activity of vital
winds, poets, and whales; and ringing the bell of the starts could imply New Year.
Being Deniers , we may deny promise, they agree in the second stanza; and it may be true that begetting
children brings death into the world, but even men of straw are better than nothing. Death in the second line
certainly indicate/means birth. Cramp refers to embracing and death by water. The fair dead who flush the
sea are embryos, pulling the chain of the amniotic cistern. Davys lamp , lighting the dark submarine or
subterranean womb, seems Welsh.
In the third stanza, four-winded spinning , green (life), seaweed and iron (metal in Thomas world is
flesh) present nature. Holding the sea up to drop her birds is another image of birth, which flushes the
wasteland, bringing momentary fertility. Spinning, ball, and comb complicate water by suggestion of the
fatal sisters and their thread. The wreath suits death and poets alike. Country gardens have introduced the
merry squires of Christmas Mr. Pickwicks host at the Manor Farm Nailing the squires of Christmas to the
trees, we confuse Christmas with Good Friday, birth with death yet Easter means rebirth. Drying loves
damp muscle and breaking a kiss in no loves quarry mean loves end in sterility. The poles of the last line,
not only cross and phallus, are all the antipodes that have obsessed the speakers. Pointing to life and death,
promise is both ironic and literal. The boys of summer, as ambiguous as their critic, have said nothing more
than he intended to say.
In part three, a quick interchange between the old boy and the ruined boys, speaking alternate lines, adds little
but an air of finality to the established theme of life and death, creation and destruction. The maggots barren,
as doubtful in grammar as in sense, includes wormy womb and tomb, the double pouch in which all men are
both full and foreign . The old boy as the man their father was unites the living and the dead, fathers and
sons.. The last line, a geographical conceit, like Andrew Marvells plainsphere, unites all contraries, ambiguously.
No less double, exclamatory O see carries two attitudes. Cross, implying union and crucifixion, includes
sex, two generations, religion, death, poetry in short, life, our general cross.
Here the danger of guessing the senses of a thing like this is that idea, replacing poem, will drive out the
elemental marvel. If we can put the commonplace idea into its place among many elements, awareness of the
idea may enrich the rest but subordinating the idea is difficult. Our first experience of this poem as something
rich, strange, and mysterious, remains better than our present experience, limited by awareness of the
commonplace ambiguity that centres the parts.
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A detailed examination helps us to admire the poets art. All the parts, we find, conspire. Conflicts among
images, is not there alone to dazzle us, but to present the conflicts of life. Rhythmic monotony and formal
regularity give the feeling of eternal process, while dubious rhyme mixes our feelings. Mans condition and his
fate emerge as theme; but verbal play and the gaiety of language prove life good, however bad it may seem to
be from the out side.
Light Breaks where no Sun Shines
As we embark on our exploration in trying to answer unanswerable questions about this dark poem on light, let
us see what is certain here. In the beginning in place of the usual dissonance and rhyme, there is new assonance
(shines, tides, light) interwoven with tenuous consonance of s in the first stanza. Later stanzas return to
habitual dissonance and its shades. Similarity of form may imply similarity of subject, certainly the images are
familiar. We have met wax, oil, worm, water, poles, globe, light, and the others in poems preceding this in The
Collected Poems, though not necessarily preceding this in date of composition. The quarrel of opposites is
familiar. Here we have another series of contradictions and paradoxes, conflicts among the old antagonists of
dark and light, inner and outer, above and below, microcosm and macrocosm. The monotony of rhythm, the
recurrence of verbal patterns, and the repetition with variation in place of detectable forward movement are
equally familiar. Yet the essential theme remains a puzzle.
Although it may appear as plainly a war between darkness and light, in which light may be the winner, this
poem leaves us in the dark about the nature of light, that appears as glowworm, candle, day, spring, and dawn
This is a progression from small lights to big. Is light literal or metaphorical or now one, now the other? If
metaphorical, does it mean creative power or enlightenment? The dawning of awareness a new awakening or
the coming of knowledge seems as likely a theme as any. The poem is about individual development from
fertilized egg to maturity and the coming of knowledge proper to each stage. The poem could be viewed as an
abstract arrangement like a recent painting.
Light breaks certainly states the uncertain theme. Breaks , connecting this light with dawn, agrees with
push in and file through, the other verbs of intrusion; yet breaks can mean ending as well as beginning. No
sun, no sea, no flesh in this place, yet, paradoxically, there are light, waters, and flesh. Light without sun
suggests the first day of Genesis or, if light is life, a cells first night in the womb. Outer sea and inner waters
recall the green fuse . The things of light as broken as light itself, are ghosts with glowworms in their
heads , like those worms of the boys of summer . Since they file flesh in its absence, these wormy ghosts,
which make womb seem tomb, may be the knowledge of life and death that instinct furnishes a cell or what
precedes a cell. No amniotic water, no flesh here, may be, because this is so long before conception that the
knower is hardly there at all. The stanza could mean that knowledge of sex, frustration, and sublimation is
present in child, embryo, cell.
The Dawn, replacing general light, breaks in the head, behind the eyes . Enlightenment is localized in the
brain. Meanwhile our blood flows like a sea between the poles of head and toe. Perhaps adding a little to the
sea of stanza one, this sea is windy . The external world seems evermore near with us. If the first stanzas
are about conception, this one suggests birth. The gushers spouting oil recall those of In the beginning. But
the gushers are in the sky with stars, not below where they belong. The divining rod that locates them may be
the divine rod. The dark sockets are those of candles and eyes. Moon and globes continue celestial and
geographical metaphors. A pitch moon is dark as a socket. The globes are also eyes since vision is as
necessary as candle for enlightenment. But after dark night, Day lights the bone . This could be birth or
resurrection from the tomb. The knower knows the skinning gales not October winds but those of spring
that strip old winters snowy robes off. The lids to be removed are those of eyes and coffins .We have had
something to do with day and spring, womb or tomb, birth or rebirth, without knowing precisely what. Someones
vision is opening wider to some windy light; yet the limit of the eye is known to this visionary.
179 Dylan Marlais Thomas
The light breaks over a wasteland of secret lots, waste allotments, and stinking tips or dumps the secret
of this soil strikes our eye. This enlightenment is social, moral, or religious, like that of Eliots Waste Land,
apparently alluded to. But dawn ambiguously halts over the waste. Halt certainly means that dawn pauses
to increase the light on dark places or it means that dawn stops dead, depriving dark places of further light. But
more than social or moral, the lots and tips are intellectual, like the dawn of stanza three. The tips are those
of thought, dumps for dead and stinking logics . Jumping blood (the sea of stanza three), replacing dead
thought, may be Lawrences thinking with the blood. Enlightenment now occurs below the neck rather than
behind the eyes. Eliot and Lawrence seem present here, the one by virtue of tips and vacant lots, the other by
virtue of blood.
Now we know for sure is that many paradoxes and contraries, uneasily side by side, agreeing and disagreeing,
produce a confusion that may be that of life and so intended. As John Wain said, looking at an abstraction on
my wall, Theres a lot going on there.
A Refusal to Mourn the Death, By Fire, of a Child in London
The war of burning brains and hair feared no more, provided elegiac Thomas with welcome replacements
for Ann Jones and the married virgin. Here, the girl to be mourned has ruined house or street for tombstone to
tell where she died. In burning babies and water to put them out, Thomas found an agreeable subject. Fire and
water are destructive and vital. Brightness falling from air to earth rounds the cycle of elements out Ritual
turns on paradox. Here, the ceremonious elegist paradoxically refuses to mourn what he mourns or, as
William Empson says, the poet says he will not say what he says. Nature is holy, as Thomas tells the sleeping
child of In Country Sleep . We come from nature and return to it for secular renewal with the bees and
flowers.
Dylan Thomas viewed the outbreak of the war in 1939 with gloomy loathing. The least politically conscious of
men, he detested the prospect of violence and bloodshed, partly because it all appeared purposeless and
wasteful, partly because the war was bound to disrupt his life and hinder him from following his vocation as a
poet. This unheroic and unashamed selfishness governed his conduct, and his attitude towards the war. He did
not, however, feel able to seek exemption from military service for religious reasons, and was saved from such
service by being found medically unfit. He spent most of the war in London, and experienced the German air-
raids on the city. It is noteworthy that the few poems he wrote about the war are all based upon these
experiences.
The childs death is the result of a German raid. Why should he call his poem A Refusal to Mourn .? The
answer is partly that Thomas wishes to dissociate himself from any suggestion of political propaganda, to shun
the easy emotionalism aroused by the killing of a young girl in an enemy raid on London. But the deeper
reasons for his refusal can only be discerned if we consider the nature of his poetic temperament and the
character of his art.
Thomas experienced with unusual intensity a comparatively limited range of emotions: ecstatic joy, exalted
grief, overwhelming despair, terror and disgust. Moreover, he lacked the ability, perhaps even the desire, to
enter imaginatively into the experience of another person, to see through the eyes of anybody other than
himself. His poetry is essentially a lyrical incantation, the poetic equivalent of the fervent eloquence beloved of
Welsh preachers and known in Welsh as hywl.
Thus Dylan Thomas is not concerned in this poem with the suffering of the burned child as experience by that
child and with the grief of her parents, or with the tragedy of individuals in war-time. He is primarily celebrating
the cosmic process of creation, destruction and recreation; he is employing the Biblical imagery of light and
darkness, fire and water, corn and salt, in order to convey the incomprehensible mystery of all human life.
A study of the poem should be enough to dispel the lingering relics of the superstition that Thomas was a
surrealistic poet who cared neither for intellectual order nor for poetic craftsmanship. It would be truer to
Poetry 180
argue that he often tried to compress too large and complex an intellectual structure into too small a space, and
that his relentless desire to find the exact word or phrase became an obsession which at times betrayed him
into excessive ingenuity. But in A Refusal to Mourn the intellectual design of the poem is beautifully concerned,
and the language is perfectly fitted to the design.
The best way to grasp the richness and skill of the poem is to read it aloud. The reader will then inescapably
experience the remarkable oratorical power of that long first sentence, which extends from the first to the
thirteenth line; the strictness of the rhythmical pattern; the subtlety of rhyme, assonance and alliteration which
bind together the elements of the poem. Yet the poem is by no means a mere piece of metrical virtuosity, or of
rhetorical manipulation. It is, on the contrary, a solemn meditation which employs with classical exactitude and
strength the traditional symbols of the Bible and of Christian doctrine.
The poem opens with the declaration that the poet will not in any way mourn the dead child until the world
ends. The first four lines are, syntactically, a little puzzling.
Never until the mankind making
Bird beast and flower
Fathering and all humbling darkness
Tells with silence the last light breaking .
But their difficulty vanishes as soon as we grasp the fact that it is the darkness which makes mankind, fathers
bird, beast and flower, and humbles all things. As so often in Thomas, the use of a few hyphens would have
immediately clarified the relationship of the words to one another. It is probable that the conjunction of
mankind with bird, beast and flower owes something to a passage from D.H. Lawrences Apocalyse which
runs:
For man as for flower, beast and bird, the supreme triumph is to be most vividly, most perfectly alive.
Thomas thinks of the darkness as the source of all life, since, in the opening chapter of Genesis, God is
represented as summoning light from the primal darkness. There may also be the suggestion that most human
procreation takes place at night: it is characteristic of Thomas to fuse a number of possible meanings into one
phrase.
There follow several Biblical references, all designed to emphasize the sacramental nature of existence, the
unity of life and death. He speaks of his own death, when he
must enter again the round
Zion of the water head
And the synagogue of the ear of corn
Thereby investing with a religious significance his reabsorption into the elemental unity. Zion and synagogue,
like the other allusions in this second stanza, have an Old Testament origin, but in Wales many Nonconformist
places of worship are known as Zions, and Thomas thus unifies the symbols of the Bible and the familiar
objects of daily life in his native land.
In the third stanza he declares his refusal to indulge in sterile moralizing over the death of the child.
I shall not murder
The mankind of her going with a grave truth
Nor blaspheme down the stations of the breath
With any further
Elegy of innocence and youth.
He is not primarily concerned with the childs death, but with the fact of death which is the condition of
mankind. Thomas is often at his most serious at the moment of making a pun, and in this stanza he employs the
device of a pun with brilliant effectiveness. A grave truth is both a truth about the grave, and a solemn truth.
Even more daring is the phrase stations of the breath .
181 Dylan Marlais Thomas
The first thirteen lines of the poem must be spoken without any station, or stopping for breath, and the phrase
derives from the Stations of the Cross, which depict the stages of Christs journey to the place of crucifixion.
The final stanza emphasizes the universality of the childs death:
Deep with the first dead lies Londons daughter,
Robbed in the long friends,
The grains beyond age, the dark veins of her mother,
Secret by the unmourning water
Of the riding Thames.
After the first death there is no other.
The long friends are, almost certainly, the worms in which the child is now clothed. She has entered again the
unmourning elements. The reference to the riding Thames evokes the imagery of Stanza I, where the seas
is tumbling in harness. The last line of the poem can be interpreted in several ways. It can be taken to mean
that after physical death the soul is immortal. Or it may be interpreted as a denial of immortality, a rejection of
the Biblical doctrine of the second death inflicted on the wicked, an assertion that physical death is the end of
life. There is a third implication that the first death, the death of Adam and Eve, is the prototype of all death.
These three meanings, although impossible to reconcile logically and emotionally at variance with one another,
are poetically harmonious and are acceptable to the reader no matter what his metaphysical beliefs may be.
The last line, rising to majesty, provides elegiac consolation for the simple reader and for the alert, a pleasing
doubt. The first death , recalling the first dead , could be that of Adam, Eve, Jesus, this child, or anybody
(Compare Donnes an issue from the first death , Deaths Duel ). That there is no other death after the
first means, as the context demands, that death is followed by perpetual life: Christian heaven or natural rebirth
in bird or flower. In either case death shall have no dominion. But, whatever the demands of context and the
elegiac tradition, this line is ambiguous. After the first death, there is no other can mean that death is death.
There is no other because, once dead, you are dead for good. A poet as aware as Thomas of what he was
about must have intended this ambiguity, which seems there to combine with admirable exactness and
condensation his two beliefs: that life is eternal and death, final. The believing unbeliever, at once holy and
secular, hopeful and desperate, believed what he knew to be untrue. This great and fitting conclusion to a
structure of paradoxes precisely joins what a double talker wants with what he knows.
A Winter's Tale
Narrative is essential, said Thomas, speaking of poetry in Replies to an Enquiry. Though many of his poems
are static abstractions of concretions, many show movement in theme from stanza to stanza, and many are
dramatic. Few are narratives in the customary sense. There are narrative elements in such poems as A
Warring Absence , Once Below a Time , or even The Conversation of Prayer . Poem in October tells a
little story. But the unmistakable narratives are Ballad of the Long-legged Bait and A Winters Tale .
Narrative in a poem is good, Thomas continues, paraphrasing T.S. Eliot, because, while the mind of the reader
is detained by events, the essence of the poem will do its work on him. The essence of the poem must be the
sound of shape and the shape of sound. A Winters Tale , a sounding shape, shows a crafty delight in
alliteration, rhythm, structure, texture, and vowels. There are many fine-sounding lines: Torn and alone in a
farm house in a fold, or Though no sound flowed down the hand folded air, or A she bird dawned, and her
breast with snow and scarlet downed . Indeed, this story is more remarkable for craft than for story. Plainly
the poem, lacking the magic it attempts, is the deliberate, calculated, product of great skill. Dream fantasy in
kind or fairy tale with mythical centre, this contrivance is the story of a sorrowing hot-and-cold man, alone by
the fire in the cold dark. His prayers for human warmth are answered by a vision of a burning she bird in the
snow. A dream of quest and capture ends at a dark door, gliding wide. Engulfed by his dark firebird, he dies
in two senses, sexually and actually. In this fantasy of love and death, the poet revisits the asylum for another
look at that girl mad as birds the phoenix, Lawrences bird in pot, has figured in Unluckily for a death.
Poetry 182
Snow, in contention with fire, is the central image here. Seasons and times, seeds and dusts abound, awaiting
call, in this white preservative. Though snow is dead white we wade to life and, wading, die. We die to love
and love to die and all life long enjoy the fires of ice. .
The five-line stanza with short first line is that of the ballad, lengthened and given heavier movement by
intervention of Hopkins. Five sprung stresses in the long lines give variety while rhyme, both good and
approximate, gives the assurance of custom; stanza is linked to stanza by echo of word and image. The first
two stanzas set the scene by a confusion of snow and water that anticipates melting at the end. The frozen
fields float, twilight is a boat, and the vale of the farm a cup. Snow blind twilight is better for omission of the
hyphen, and so the other unhyphenated adjectives, Hand folded , for example, which frequently recurrent,
suggests white linen or book. And, which appears four times in the second stanza, introduces the syntax of
dream, which, according to Freud, is innocent of logical connectives
The next three stanzas introduce the protagonist, a man , evidently a poet since apocalyptic scrolls of fire
burn in his heart and head . Although he is nameless and his story proceeds in third person, first person
singular is around, behind the scenes. This man is alone on a firelit island, surrounded by snow, and, although
no man should be an island or on one there he will sit, insulated, till cock crow combs through the white
farmyard and the morning men go out to dig and the milkmaids go out in clogs to walk the fallen sky. These
lovely oafs at their white trades anticipate the boy at his blue trades at Fern Hill and the bouncing goose girls
of The White Giants Thigh. This bucolic vision, celebrating future dawn, is the happiest of the poem. But
back to present night. On such a night Christ, ever in Thomas service, was born On a star of faith pure as the
drifting bread of the snowy Eucharist. Turned old, an ambiguity, may mean grew up, became old, or turned
of old.
In the next two stanzas the lonely man, as forsaken as Jesus on the cross, weeps. But on no cross, he can
kneel and pray for communion. The heaven of his desire, forever sought, is the bride bed. As the believer
lost and the hurled outcast of light, he combines, like Stephen Dedalus before him, the conditions of Lucifer
and Christ, light and dark. His cup and cut bread are the remains of his last supper, and snow, equally
Eucharistic, becomes the bread of water, which birds, the harvest melting on their tongues, will receive. A
nameless need, plainly romantic, will drive him forth to run cold as snow over the glass of the frozen pond,
past the icy statues of the stables and the sky roofed sties , an instructive meeting of above with below.
Meanwhile, on the point of love (loves cross, its impaling stake, or its almost), he directs his cries to heaven,
the home of prayers . May his hunger go howling on bare white bones is the most impressive line of this
section. But the quick of night is a successful play on the dead of night.
The prayer for bride bed, in the eleventh stanza, is as paradoxical as marriage. Let me be saved by being lost,
the man prays with the hero of Vision and Prayer , and be delivered by being engulfed The word time ,
emerging from this puzzle, introduces the recapture of past time in the following stanzas. Stanzas 12 and 13
concern the past, preserved in the seedy snow and evoked from it. Minstrels sing under Hardys greenwood
tree from now deserted villages, and nightingales, now grains of dust, sing on the winds and wings of the
dead . The voice of snow, the dust or water from some vanished spring magically spells and tells this
winters tale. Wizened stream, as frozen as the withered spring and the long gone glistening dews of the
past, thaws and trings its bells. In short, Time sings from the dead and intricate snowflake that preserves it.
Listen, which suitably introduces these two stanzas of past music, ends them suitably and links them by a kind
of chiasmus. Stops, falling here and there within the lines, impart an unusual movement to the thirteenth stanza.
Alliteration helps the belling, baying, and bounding song along.
Times music of the long ago land, aided by dissonant hand or sound and by elaborate alliteration, glides the
dark door wide. Stanza 14 heralds this storys heroine, a burning she bird like Caitlin a firebird to warm the
snowbound hero up. She rises, arrayed in rays of bright light. Alliteration, ever more intricate, attends this
phoenix, in whose light the hero, dazzled by sound, enjoys a vision. In stanzas 15 and 16, Look, replacing the
183 Dylan Marlais Thomas
Listen of stanzas 12 and 13, forms a parallel. Dead minstrels sing in stanza 12. Here, dead dancers, like
those of East Coker , move on a green spread now white with snow. Movement in the past has taken the
place of past sound, to embody another aspect of the poetic tradition. Calligraphy of leaves and lines of age
on the stones are fossils, as the twenty-fourth stanza proves Emerging from the past with centaur and phoenix,
fossils also respond to the harp plucked by waters dust , the evocative snows of poetry. That all this is
dream or vision seems indicated in stanza 17. The soft feathered voice flies through the house where the
man is still kneeling alone, asleep on his knees or, awake, seeing things. The head of his phoenix is folded or
enfolded by her wings
The running, ragged scarecrow of snow, he scares the priest like blackbirds and runs them ragged the poles
of the year, hardly those of summer and winter, must mean the arctic and the Antarctic of winter. The cloth
of counties, like the hedges cloak, is both white snow and black vestments of priests. A scarecrows antlers
must be his stick. A scarecrow trying to attract a bird is odd, but a phoenix is no crow. Listen and look as he
chases her through the goose plucked sea of the slow flakes, through all their times and lands and tribes,
deep frozen and out with the phoenix for cooking. Stanza 21, beginning with a catalogue, recapitulates. The
fields of seed and time dying flesh astride , for example, repeats elements of the ninth and eleventh stanzas.
Heaven, grave, and burning font, plainly sexual, mark triumph and death:the door of his death glided wide.
But sexual possession of the bird is in the far ago land , preserved and revealed by the snow. Retreat to the
past is his success as it was to be that of Dylan Thomas. Indeed, this poem seems an allegory of Thomas
marriage, his recovery of the past, his poetic career, the nature of poetry, and, maybe, his premonitions of
death. Poetry, love and death involve one another and generate a space that defines its ongoing contours.
Apparently, he is still safe in the farm as the tale ends in stanza 22. The rest is coda. Stanza 23, reviewing
material from stanzas 12 and 15, adds flying fish figure=skating over lakes. The next stanza recalls nightingale,
dew, centaur, and fossil. However shorn this rite of midwinter spring, it continues for two more stanzas, a
terminal flourish that adds little to what we know or guess. We know that the engulfing bride is a whirlpool.
We may guess the heavenly peace in its wanting centre, where, like Eliots Chinese jar, a man enjoys movement
and stillness, time and eternity at once. Thomas paradise of the multifoliate bud, we agree, is improved
as a bidet would be by hot and cold running water; and melting snow , bringing the flowers of heavenly
spring, is a good a way as any to end a winters tale.
In My Craft or Sullen Art
First cursory glances indicate that Yeats is the director of these proud verses seems established by many
echoes. Except for the feminine endings, which assure individual movement, the lines of three stresses are
those of The Fisherman. Thomas has caught something of Yeats coldly passionate feeling and something of
his tone, nobly austere. The pattern of five good rhymes lends an air of finality and assurance. All rhymes are
good, even that of psalms and arms. Going naked, suitable for indignation and advice, has other use. This
bare poem concerns poet, poetry, and audience.
The problems that attend the poets simplest lines begin at the beginning with craft or sullen art . The or
imply the identity of craft and art and a distinction between them. As a craftsman, Thomas, at his best, was
certainly an artist. In On Poetry (Quite Early) he makes a distinction between the intricate craft which
may approximate accidental magic and art itself. Preserving a distinction, or implies a connection. The word
sullen, for which Thomas must have preceded us to the dictionary, owes some meanings to its Latin and
Middle-English origins. Gloomy, morose, peevish, and ill-humoured, the meanings that come readily to mind
are secondary. The primary meaning is lonely, solitary, unsociable, and unique. Among the accretions are
crabbed, obstinate, and austere. Thomas sullen art , crowded with these meanings, is lonely and austere
from his point of view, and, since this is a poem of artist and todays audience, unsociable, crabbed and maybe
morose in the eyes of that audience that reads it.
Poetry 184
Dylan the craftsman pursues his art under Yeats raging moon, sign of imagination and inspiration here, while
lovers sleep. Lovers, for who he labours, seem lovers of women and life common men, the common wages
of whose hearts are commonly no payment at all. Their most secret heart implies depth, unawareness, and,
like Yeats secret rose, a multitude of remote and unknowable privacies. The griefs in their arms, not only
women, are the troubles of life and thieving time the griefs of the ages. By the singing light of the moon
that directs the tide, Dylan, the lonely craftsman, labours without hope of fame or money, the common incentives.
He dismisses strut or the public pretensions of poets and the trade of charms or poetry as business, the
exchanging of magic spells for cash. Ivory stages seem an odd synthesis of the private and the public, of
ivory tower and theatre. However noble and austere in his tone, Thomas seems torn between the pleasures of
strutting on an ivory stage and of solitude in tower or steeple somewhere in the remotest corner of the world.
There, strutting alone, he devotes his craft to the spindrift of modest, impermanent art. The proud man apart
/ From the raging moon has a Yeatsian sound. Such proud men, account executives or brokers maybe, are not
his audience; for, apart from the moons pull, they are indifferent to spindrift and singing tide. Just as sensibly,
Thomas also excludes the dead even the towering dead of poetry: Milton, translating psalms in his high,
lonely tower , and Yeats in his, or tower less Keats among his nightingales . The trouble with the grieving
lovers for whom the poet writers is that, heedless of his craft or art, they do not praise or pay. The payment of
their most secret heart , responding beneath their notice to borrowed copies perhaps, seems inadequate.
Hence the art of this poet without audience is sullen in every sense and his neat structure more ambiguous
than his brave airs make you think or rather compel you to think.
Fern Hill
Fern Hill is the farm of Ann Jones, the aunt who is celebrated in After the Funeral . This farm, the place of
holidays from Swansea, glows in memory with brighter shoots of everlastingness . In The Peaches , a
recapture of the past in prose, Annie Jones presides over Gorsehill, which, although it affords a dingle, is
dilapidated and muddy. Yet there was nowhere like that farm-yard in all the slap dash country. Transfigured
by the eyes of youth, ramshackle outhouses yield glory. Something of this glory is recaptured in A Prospect
of the Sea and in the merry barnyards of A Winters Tale and The Long-legged Bait. Though not devoted
to the farm, Poem in October and The Hunchback in the Park are comparable visions. Fern Hill brings
poems by other poets to mind: Vaughans Retreat, Marvells Garden, and Hopkins sonnet of May-day in
girl and boy. Not how it feels to be young, the theme of Fern Hill is how it feels to have been young.
Time, which has an art to throw dust on all things, broods over the poem. Time is our enemy, yet, as Eliot says,
it is only in time and through it that we escape from it. Youth is an ignorant escape that time allows, and wiser
memory another. But art, at once in time and out of it, is times great evader and destroyer. Fern Hill is
Thomas victory over what he laments. The green and golden joy of childhood and the shadowy sorrow of
maturity become the joy of art. An elders opinion of anothers youth forbids such happiness and art.
The stanza of Fern Hill seems a variant upon that of Poem in October. The young and easy rhythm, below
timing or above it, conspires with alliteration and assonance to shape a symphony in green and gold major. As
the poem transcends time and timing, so the craft rebukes analysis. Unlike A Refusal to Mourn, Fern Hill
is not a poem in which an elaborate argument has been compressed into a few lines. On the contrary, it is a
spacious, expansive poem, a lyrical incantation which displays scarcely any intellectual or emotional development.
Every one of the stanzas returns to the one theme of the poem, retelling the tale of childhood, celebrating in a
slightly different form the glory of that lost state. Repetition is indeed the guiding principle of the poem. It is
sometimes argued that Fern Hill recaptures the mood which pervades the writings of Vaughan and Traherne
and there are passages in the poem which recall the prose and verse of these seventeenth-century mystics.
Some of these images recur in Fern Hill , but the obsession with time which pervades Thomass poem
differentiates it sharply from the meditations of Vaughan and Traherne. Time held me green and dying this
is the overwhelming burden of the poem; and it is in keeping with the whole tenor of Thomass work. For
Dylan Thomas the journey towards death begins at the moment of conception.
185 Dylan Marlais Thomas
There exist over two hundred manuscript versions of the poem. Thomas used to rewrite the entire draft of a
poem even if he made only one minor correction to it, and he would also devote an entire sheet of paper to
trying out alternative versions of a single line before fitting it into the pattern of the poem. Fern Hill may be,
intellectually and emotionally, a simple poem, but it is one of Thomass most cunningly constructed pieces of
verbal artifice, what he once called a formally watertight compartment of words.
It would be possibly by a detailed analysis to point to the incredibly complex pattern of verbal interplay which
distinguishes the poem. Once again the best way of apprehending the total musical effect of the poem is to
read it aloud, and then to read it again slowly, so that the formal devices may permeate ones understanding of
the poem. It is enough for our present purposes simply to mention the most efficacious of these devices the
elaborate metrical pattern repeated in every stanza; the structure of sound patterns linking stanza to stanza; the
use of assonance and alliteration; the metrical and rhythmical variations; even the deliberately calculated
repetitions of colours.
These devices can only be appreciated by the individual reader speaking the poem himself, or listening to its
being read aloud. It is, however, possible to call attention to certain other features of the poem which reinforce
the effect of these formal, structural elements. The first point to notice is the simplicity of the vocabulary, the
absence of any difficult, learned words, the avoidance of the verbal daring and virtuosity which Thomas revels
in at other times. Almost the only tropes which he permits himself are the playful twisting of colloquial phrases,
or the compression of a simple idea into a brief image. He uses the phrase happy as the grass was green ,
once below a time replaces the normal once upon a time ; at my sky blue trades is a vivid way of saying
as I went about my business under the blue sky, just as lamb white days signifies days innocent as white
lambs.
Secondly, the world of childhood is evoked by Thomass naming of objects, by his avoidance of abstractions, by
the constant, breathless piling up of description linked by the conjunction and, often placed at the beginning of
a line for greater emphasis. Thomas also employs the device of supposing that the farm vanishes as the child
falls asleep, to reappear only when he reawakens. The childs world is thus recaptured by a reversion to the
thought-processes of childhood.
And nightly under the simple stars
As I rode to sleep the owls were bearing the farm away .
And then to awake, and the farm, like a wanderer white
With the dew, come back, the cock on his shoulder.
The primal innocence of the scene is emphasized by the employment of Biblical images to suggest the paradisal
quality of the childs experience.
And the Sabbath rang slowly
In the pebbles of the holy streams .
it was all
Shining, it was Adam and maiden,
The sky gathered again
And the sun grew round that very day.
So it must have been after the birth of the simple light
In the first, spinning place ..
But, despite the ecstasy, the golden happiness of childhood so vividly re-enacted in this poem, the predominant
mood is one of regret, and the recognition of mortality casts its shadow.
The final stanza is an elegy for the doomed child:
Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days, that time would take me
Up to the swallow thronged loft by the shadow of my hand.
Poetry 186
In the moon that is always rising,
Nor that riding to sleep
I should hear him fly with the high fields
And wake to the farm forever fled from the childless land.
Oh as I was young and easy in the mercy of his means,
Time held me green and dying
Though I sang in my chains like the sea.
Elements from the previous stanzas acquire pathos and new meaning from new context. The lamb white ,
careless days of innocence are over. Led by the shadow or the dark ghost of his childish hand to the moony
loft where he once slept, Thomas, revisiting the farm, finds glory gone. He wakes again this time to a farm
forever fled from the childless land, which glows in memory alone.
Led by time and at this mercy, even when young and easy , the poet knows now that time has always held
him. Once green, he was dying like all green things like the ignorant, green sea itself. As the sea sings in
the chains of moon and sun so the chained boy sang then. But tuneful time allows morning songs. Waking
to death, the poet still sings green and golden songs: the coins on his eyelids sing like shells of the tide-tongued
sea.
Poem on His Birthday
This is the fourth and last of the birthday poems. Birth and autumn again put Thomas in mind of death and
fabulous, dear God. From under Sir Johns hill the heron comes to speed a more desperate voyage than those
of Once below a time , Lie still , and The Long-legged Bait . Now, crossing the bar that detained him,
Thomas puts out to sea in Lawrences ship of death. The twelve stanzas, crowning years of experiment in
assonance, alliteration, and rhythm, are dense and clear. Syntax weaves freely in and out of prosodic pattern.
The scene is Laugharne with its full tilt, swiftly running river and its switchback sea, where tides and waves
go up and down like a roller coaster. The poets ramshackle, seaside house is high on stilts among steeple
stemmed herons. These holy birds, who assisted at an earlier birthday bring each of the first three stanzas to
a close. As the poet celebrates and spurns his birthday, herons, parodying him, spire and spear . The time
is October, whose sun is as small, yellow, and hot as a mustard seed . Inconsiderable as a sand grain and
yellow as the sun, the day is mined with a motion, like sand in Hopkins hourglass. Thistledown fall is seedy
October and the thistles downfall. Driftwood , turned by sea and wind, prepares us for the voyage in a
drowned ship . Remark the assonance and woven alliteration of sandgrain day in the bent bays grave . In
the sepulchral second stanza, flounders, gulls, curlews, and eels of the conquered waves all those dying
animals, doing what they are told to do by life, Work at their ways to death . So too, in his long tongued
room , the wounded poet, toiling and tolling, works his way toward deaths ambush . The bell of poetry,
celebrating and lamenting birth and death, rings from the herons steeple. Dying herons and tolling poet bless
life.
As he sings towards anguish in the third stanza, the hawks of the seizing sky kill finches, as in Sir Johns
precincts, and otters kill fish. Shells in the winds (winding streets) of sunken towns bring thoughts of shipwreck
and death to the craftsman at the hewn coils of his trade Hewn implies headstone cutting, and coils are
arts intricacies and all its troubles. One with dying animals, the poet sees herons walk in their shroud , as
John Donne once walked in his to preach Deaths Duel. The livelong rivers robe of the fourth stanza is the
shortlived herons shroud. Praying for life and prey to herons, minnows prepare wreaths for their funerals. As
the water of herons is their shroud, so the water of dolphins is their turnturtle dust, or water turned on its back
to die. What we live in is our tomb; and our work our death. Seals, at their trade of fishing, will be food for
sleeker and larger mouths than theirs. Far at sea with minnow, dolphin, and seal, the poet works like his
marine parallels to a common end. But, more than death, his eternal end is poetry. Crouched is the posture
of poets, tailors of shrouds, and dying embryos. Under a serpent cloud could be the place of fallen man and
his climate. Adam, who brought death into the world, must sweat to die.
187 Dylan Marlais Thomas
In Thomas early poems there is a multitude of images in violent disagreement. Here so far, a multitude of
images has been in general agreement an agreement that, like blood, Slides good in the sleek mouth But the
momentary disagreement of tomb and womb, of silence and bell, of white tears and black, is quickly settled
by angelus knells, a synthesis of birth and death that agrees with everything said so far.
In the drowned ship, the voyager hears his age struck by a sunken ships bell. Little wonder, for a navigator
who fixes his position by falling stars must expect to founder. Better navigators use sextants at noon. Just as
well to be sunk, however; for the morrow holds terror of atomic war, maybe. The imagery of cage, chain,
and the bolt has served Thomas earlier vision of war. Like unbolting love , the hammer seems both
creative and destructive. Having forged burning Tygers, it knocks them to bits.
As he emerges in stanza six from his dark immersion, the poet of Vision and Prayer is lost in light again.
Dark is a way to the light of God and heaven. As in the earlier poems, both God and heaven remain
uncertain. A fabulous god, both wonderful and mythical, sits in a heaven that never was / Nor will be ever.
Yet God and heaven are always true; for myth is truer than fact. Although a void, heaven is paradoxically,
a crowded blackberry patch, where the dead grow for Gods joy. Grow means thrive and heap up. Once
again Thomas long struggle through the dark towards the light seems over; but as he comes to light, what
comes to light is lights ambiguity. In the unknown, famous light he is lost indeed. Famous , great , and
fabulous are words from Yeats, not T.S. Eliot. Since air shaped or imagined heaven is a blackberry patch,
There , which commences the seventh stanza, includes heaven and earth or the place of the dead. Thomas
felt at home in graveyards. Laugharnes shore, no less sepulchral than the blackberry patch, is littered with
dead horseshoe crabs and
In Laugharnes heap of marrow bones, the poet, wandering with the spirits of the dead, is not, but might be, at
peace with blessed, unborn God and His Ghost . His Ghost , even if the Holy Ghost, means that God is as
dead as the horseshoe crab whose ghost haunts the shore ; but dead God is unborn . Referring maybe to
Jesus before the Nativity, unborn also means non-existent. The souls of the dead are fit priests for such a
god; for every soul is gulled and chanter. Gulled means winged, eaten with the other garbage, and fooled.
Chanter may mean a celebrant at the altar or, as Webster tells us, a deceitful horse-dealer, who gulls the
gullible. And chanter implies enchanter; and in this context a magician is another deceiver. Young Heavens
fold may mean Eden, the manger, or an enclosure for leading foolish sheep into. The cloud quaking peace of
heaven is no less dubious.
But dark is a long way, which the poet is still pursuing. Being lost in such light as he knows, he is lost in the
dark, on the earth of the night, alone / With all the living like the rest of us. He is aware of the general
resurrection that will bring all the dead to light; for he has read the Apocalypse. But waters giving up their dead
and rocketing winds blowing bones out of the grave seem more natural than supernatural, more suggestive of
future wars than of any but cloud quaking peace. Whatever the agency of resurrection, it will bring the dead
Faithlessly unto Him . Thomas dark way seems a faithless, hopeful approach to a light that never was nor
will be. But Dantes stars are still quick; and on the dark way up, hope has charity by the hand. Continually
praying, Thomas prays again. A colon in the ninth stanza, introducing his prayer, marks a necessary but
surprising shift from third person to first. Stephen Dedalus commends a poet who, in the course of a poem,
shifts from lyrical first person to dramatic third.
Midlife (thirty-five years) in stanza nine recalls Dantes journey from dark to light, as voyage to ruin recalls
the voyage towards oblivion of Lawrences ship of death , which, breached in autumn by wounds , is
unsteered in the dark towards problematical light and peace. Though already wrecked, the poets tumbledown,
long tongue continues, like those of his druid herons, to bless and count blessings. Those counted in the tenth
stanza are mostly temporal; the four elements, the five senses, and love of the spun slime that Joyce calls
whorled without aimed. Tangling through the slime of man and nature, the poet proceeds with little faith but
great fortitude toward the Clough-Cuckoo-Land of kingdom come . Its lost, moonshine domes are from
Poetry 188
dreams of Coleridge and Yeats. Such domes are moonshine, but the Freudin sea is a real blessing; for it hides
mans secret selves . Though the seas black, base bones seem another graveyard for old ram rods this
time there are spheres (pearl or microcosmic spheres0 in the flesh of skeletal seashells . Pearls and
moonlit domes offer hope for those sunk by Prosperos tempest or tangled in slime.
The last and greatest blessing seems delight in nature. Hulks may be sundered and the poet may be one
man alone with all the living, but sun, sea, and world are joyous. The louder the sun blooms , the more it
brings Lawrence and Joyce to mind. The ramshakling, long-legged sea may menace tumbledown old ram
rods, but, nautical to the last, they tackle the gale. As the sea exults and the world, revealing faith in itself,
gives praise, the exultant poet echoes the praise, with more triumphant faith, the flattest line of the poem, can
apply to world or poet; but whichever our application, such faith is a secular, not a theological, virtue. World,
Word, and poet are romantically one.
The bouncing hills of Laugharne triumphantly become heavens hill where images roar. Autumn, as in
Poem in October , is transformed into thunderclap spring , Mansoulded islands, the voyagers landfalls,
become angelic, shining men. No longer alone, the charitable captain, almost like Noah of Authors Prologue,
welcomes all men aboard as passengers or crew for a voyage to death in sunken, drunken ship.
189 A.K. Ramanujan
A.K. RAMANUJAN
Extended Family
The Difference
Fear
Second Sight
The Striders
Hindoo to His Body
Love Poem for a Wife
The Last of the Princes
Poetry 190
Unit-8
A.K. Ramanujan's Biography: A Critical Sketch
Born on 16 March 1929, into a Tamil Brahman family in Karnataka, Attipat Krishnaswami Ramanujans
upbringing provided him a fertile environment for his creative imagination to flower and flourish in many
directions. In the first place he inherited a tri-lingual environment and three corresponding cultures. When he
spoke to his father on the second-floor study of the familys three-storey house in Mysore he used English; with
his mother in the kitchen, Tamil was spoken. And on the streets outside, he communicated in Kannada. In
Ramanujans critical idiom, Tamil is the language of interior landscape, English is the language of outer domain.
Kannada is language of communication at local level. The three languages clash and collide in the mind of the
poet and generate the possibilities of rich cultural discourse, which may not necessarily be very assimilative.
While approaching Ramanujans poetry, the play of multiple languages is to be kept in mind.
Besides the linguistic variety, Ramanujan inherited a very complex set of values from his parents. His father
Attipat Asuri Krishnaswami was a professor of mathematics at Mysore University and at the same time
intriguingly enough he was a staunch believer in astrology. In his essay, Is There Any Indian Way of Thinking?
Ramanujan observes the duality in fathers profile thus: he could read the Gita religiously having bathed and
painted his forehead the red and white feet of Vishnu, and later talk appreciatively about Bertrand Russell and
even Ingersroll . Ramanujans father entertained two kinds of exotic visitors: American and English
mathematicians who called on him when they were on a visit to India, and local astrologers, orthodox pundits
who wore splendid gold-embroidered shawls dowered by the Maharaja . In terms of his outer description too,
the father was a mixed being: He wore neat white turbans, a Sri Vaishnava caste mark, yet wore Tootal ties,
Kromentz buttons and collar studs, and donned English serge jackets over is muslin dhotis which he wore
draped in traditional brahman style . In a poem, presumably a portrait of his father, Ramanujan describes the
polarity of his fathers mental make-up thus: Sky man in a man-hole/ with astronomy for dream/ astrology for
nightmare .
Ramanujans father had a study crammed with books in English, Kannada and Sanskrit. This in a way ensured
an intellectual climate in the family. The friends of Ramanujan recount the rather vibrant intellectual scene of
his household thus: On summer nights the children gathered on the third floor terrace while their father pointed
out and explained the constellations. Sometimes at dinner listened intently as their father translated for their
mother the stories of Shakespeare and other Western classics into Tamil .
Ramanujans mother was traditional to the core. She was an orthodox brahman woman of her time limited by
custom in the scope of her movement and control. She was more or less a typical housewife. Though she did
not possess the intellectual prowess of her husband, yet she had a sound anchoring in native ethos and folk
literature. She was neither typical nor limited in her learning and imagination. She was widely read in Tamil and
Kannada, and comfortable in the world of ideas. Most of the Tamil and Kannada proverbs, idioms and tales
that Ramanujan employs in his poetry seem to have come from his mother. Mother, despite her not being
modern, is a regular presence in his poetry. About six-seven poems have exclusively been written on the
mother. Mother stands for home and native landscape in the poetry of Ramanujan.
These were the parents who gave Ramanujan the telling metaphor of father tongue and mother tongue. By
the time his father died, when Ramanujan was only twenty, the older man had already helped shape his sons
devotion to an intellectual life. As a youth Ramanujan was perplexed by his fathers seemingly paradoxical
belief in both astrology and astronomy. Curiously Ramanujan chose magic as his first artistic endeavour. While
191 A.K. Ramanujan
in teens, he had the neighbourhood tailor fashion him a coat fitted with hidden pockets and elastic bands in
which he concealed rabbits and bouquets. The desire to be magician was perhaps a strange use of the insight
he gained from his fathers quirky belief in the irrational. Ramanujan later on evinced properties of a magician,
of his many poems end on a note of brilliant unforeseen conclusions.
Ramanujan had always a wide variety of interests. His father, in fact, after browsing through his sons shleves
filled with literature, philosophy, anthropology and zoology, wryly termed him intellectually promiscuous. In
college Ramanujan majored in science in his first year, but later on the persuasion of his father he switched
over to English literature. He subsequently received a BA with honours in English Literature from Mysore
University in 1949. That same year, he took a job of teaching English in Kerala. Shortly afterwords, Ramanujan
moved to another teaching position in Dharwar in Karnantaka. He earned the reputation of master-performer
who mesmerized his students through his ingenuous images and metaphors. He would use a diversity of texts
and contexts, oral and written tales, poems etc. to look at the posed questions from a fresh and highly innovative
perspective. He used to address to packed class-rooms.
Ramanujan meanwhile had developed a love for Shakespeare, who remains a constant presence, though at a
sub-textual level, in his creative output. But in 1957, Ramanujan gravitated towards social linguistics. He did
his Ph.D. on the generative grammar of Kannada, and received doctorate. from Indiana University in 1963.
Once in America, he attracted admiration from all quarters. He was accommodated in the South Asian
Languages programme at the University of Chicago. Though he was reluctant to take up his assignment as
Tamil teacher, yet he undertook the job with all sincerity, and developed an interest in Tamil classics to the
extent that he became the first-rate translator later on.
Ramanujan died on 13 July 1993, with many honours to his name. Most prominent among them were the
Padma Shri, award of the Government of India, a MacArthur Fellowship, and election to the American Academy
of Arts and Sciences.
Introduction to A.K.Ramanujans Works
After his formal education, Ramanujan taught as professor of English at Belgaum, Dharwar and Baroda
before moving to US in early 1960s as a professor of Dravidian Languages at the University of Chicago.
Impressed by the intellectual capabilities of Ramanujan as a Ph.D. scholar at Indiana University, his teachers
recommended his name for a vacancy in South Asian Languages at Chicago University. He agreed on the
condition that he would be given a free hand in pursuing his interests in Tamil and Kannada literature.
To begin with Ramanujan published two early collections of poems in Kannada (Proverbs 1955; Hokkulalli
Huvilla, 1969), but after that he concentrated on writing in English. He published his first collection of poems
in English The Striders in 1966, followed by another collection entitled Relations in 1971. Selected Poems
was published by OUP, Delhi in 1976. In 1977 he once again switched over to Kannada and wrote Mattu Itaru
Padyagalu, a book of Kannada poems and Mattobbana Atmakate a novella in the same language. In 1986,
he came out with another collection of poems in English under the title The Second Sight. The instinct to write
in Kannada remained alive and he wrote Kuntobille, a book of poems in 1990. In 1995 two years after the
death of the poet, his friends and colleagues published his collected poetry entitled simply as Collected Poems,
which includes poems from last unpublished collection called The Black Hen.
All along his creative ventures, Ramanujan remained almost obsessively pre-occupied with his enterprise of
translating classical Tamil and Kannada texts in English. Not only did he translate Tamil sangam texts, he also
translated medieval bhakti poets, writing in Tamil as well as Kannada with equal elan and commitment. It is not
true that Ramanujan only translated the classic texts to satisfy the oriental interests of the West in ancient
India. He translated a novel of U R Ananthamoorthy called Samskara a text which some believe has
acquired a canonical status in Indian literature largely because of its excellent translation. Dilip Chitre in his
article on Namdeo Dhasal. entitled Namdeo Dhasal: Poet of the Underworld informs that Ramanujan also
translated a couple of Marathi dalit poems for an American journal.
Poetry 192
Ramanujan championed the cause of Indian literatures in translations at a time when there was no serious
taker of such an enterprise. He co-edited a number of books on Indian literature(s) across languages. As early
as 1974, Ramanujan co-authored with Edward C. Dimock Jr. and others to produce The Literatures of India.
He, along with Vinay Dharwadkar edited a collection of poems from various Indian languages under the title
The Oxford Anthology of Modern Indian Poetry in 1994 a year after his death. As a matter of credo,
Ramanujan sought to start a positive dialogue among Indian language literatures. He had undertaken a mission
to make Indian Literature(s) international through his translations, and compilations of various translated works
in form of anthologies.
Ramanujan wrote extensively on Indian culture, its folklore, food habits and mythologies with the sharpness of
a well-bred social scientist and anthropologist. Some of the chaste anthropological, sociological and cultural
essays he wrote, included: Who Needs Folklore? ; Towards an Anthology of City Images ; Is There an
Indian Way of Thinking? , Varieties of Bhakti etc. Ramanujan is a true claimant of Geertzs ideal of
anthropological authorship. His collection of folktales of India, most of which he himself culled from the oral
narratives in circulation in the countryside, not only brought forth the uncanny brilliance and wit of indigenous
wisdom to international limelight, but also widened the cultural spectrum of Indian culture which was hitherto
understood in terms of the marga only. Ramanujan was awarded the Padma Shri in 1976, a MacArthur Prize
Fellowship in 1983. He was elected a Fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences.
Critical Appreciation of the Poems Prescribed
The Difference
The poem consists of two parts. The first part deals extensively with the process of icon-making of the divine
by the community of traditional artisans. Ramanujan, known for his precise eye and sense of detail, offers a
step-wise commentary on the division of labour among the traditional village artisans. Women undertake the
raw work of mould[ing] a core of clay and straw , they wind strings of beeswax around it . Men undertake
the finer work of eyes and toenails . In order to create a metallic icon of the divine, these men pour eight
metals through a hole in the head made on the top of the clay. Ramanujan does not miss an opportunity to take
a dig at Hindu metaphysics. The hole on the top of the mould, is compared with the hole on the head which,
according to Hindus, is the escape hole that opens for release of soul at the time of death. In Hindu metaphysics,
this hole stands for the end of life, in the process of making of the metallic divine, this hole brings the divine into
tangible forms. In Hindu metaphysics, the hole stands for release from worldly bondage; in the making of the
icon, the hole brings back the abstract divine back into worldly form.
After pouring the ashtadhatu in the mould, the artisans bake the pot of the inchoate god . The use of
inchoate as adjective to the divine is quite significant. It gives the artisan a sense of creating the divine,
maker of the god itself. Secondly in such a scheme, the God is not given and granted, it is made and iconized
thorough a well-laid out process. The moment it is baked, it begins to make faces. In Ramanujans poetry, the
iconized god is at best a caricature of the abstract divine. Gods rather static and fixed gaze is rather embarrassing
for His human-makers.
Once the baking process is over, and the pot of the inchoate god cools down, the artisans take a knife and
hack it . The language of violence is deliberately employed to underline the pangs of creating the image of
divine. The gleaming god is like a newly born baby radiant and bright. Without the artisan as father, the god
would die in the public imagination rather too soon. Artisan in this sense is the maker of the divine. He ensures
an immortality to the divine.
The traditional artisans after performing the sacred act of shaping the divine, switch over to the mundane job
of making terracotta toys and other playthings for the children. Life in its ordinary forms and shapes does not
attract the attention of the traditional artisans for to them the domain of the spiritual is more authentic and
fulfilling than the usual plane of existence.
193 A.K. Ramanujan
In the second part, the poet, master as he is of overturning the hierarchies, reverses the order of traditional
artisans preferences in favour of his own set of consumer-oriented preferences. If the traditional artisans
prefer to shape the icons of the divine first and make horse, toys;/life scenes of women/pounding rice with
lifted pestles;/ boys; or a drummer girls with the leftovers later; the poet as a highly individualized and arrogant
commercialized artisan would do my {his} dancers first,/jet bombers/and tiny Taj Mahals for tourists . The
inversion is stretched to its most naughty limits when he says that gods will bake/only if time permits, if theres
metal left,/and desire,/or if my childrens quarrels need new gods for playthings . The icons of gods and
goddesses happen to be nothing more than playthings good enough to placate the quarreling children. The
implication is that being devout is being childish. Gods are good enough to humour the children. In Ramanujans
poetry children act as unwitting rebels who, with all their innocence and immaturity, happen to expose the
hollowness of the institutionalized divine. The parodic latter half of the poem is motivated as much by the post-
modern perfunctory ethos of consumerism and obscene commercialism, as by the faithfulness of the natives in
the icons of the divine. Commodification of the divine for grossly utilitarian ends constitutes one of the major
strategies of parody in Ramanujans poetry. The community life of the native countryside is set against the
grossly utilitarian city life.
The way Ramanujan overturns the traditional sanskritic bhakti-paradigms in the poem deserve serious attention.
The poet-persona, as modern clay-artisan, mocks at the giant sized Lord Vishnu, and expresses his inability to
carve out or mould His statue. In fact more than inability, it is the lack of desire to undertake the task. With his
characteristic naughtiness, he argues that the clay that he is left with, is good enough to fashion/ his [Vishnus]
big toe . But shaping the toe would not do him any good, it would hardly yield him the idea or feeling of the
divine. The skeptic persona deflates the myth of the Vishnu thus:
but I know I ve no way at all of telling
the look,
if any, on his face, or of catching
the rumoured beat of his extraordinary heart.
The god is dismissed as mere rumour, a gossip of the first order, a false consciousness. Instead of reaching up
to the crown of Vishnu, as the traditional devotee does, the poet-persona dismisses the entire enterprise of his
search for the divine at the first step of the ladder itself. Toe is the end of his eclectic semi-irreverential
enterprise The supra-human aspects of Indian iconography are regularly held to ridicule in Ramanujans rather
humanistic universe. The Greco-Roman anthropomorphic representation of the divine is preferred over the
esoteric symbolic and spiritual Indian art.
In fact the contemporary theories of postmodernism and post-structuralism seem to provide Ramanujan paradigms
and metaphors basic to his creative output. These theories deliver him the poetic design, the argument and in
fact, a much sought-after different poetic idiom. In the poem not only the very title is inspired by Derridian
philosophy of difference , or Lyotardian concept of differend , even on the level of content and subject
matter the poem seems to be at best an extended execution of this idea only. The poet persona flaunts his
playful post-modern attitude towards the divine by way of juxtaposing it with the god-fearing community of
traditional artisans. In the postmodern theory, God is a wishful fiction, an essentialized abstraction, a metaphysical
untruth. In Ramanujans different poetic universe too, the divine as transcendental signified is nothing more
than a rarefied unreality. If traditional village artisans choose to iconize the divine first and toys later on, the
different poet persona as the self-styled a community of one (172), would shape gods only if time permits,
if theres metal left/ and desire/ or if my (his) childrens quarrels need new gods / for playthings . This is a
typical postmodern playful dismissal of the divine.
As far as the structure of the poem is concerned, it is a poem conceived in two parts. In the first part, the story/
process of the community ritual in shaping metallic icons of the divine has been recounted in terms that are
reversed in the second. In a village of traditional craftsmen, while the women mould a clay and straw/ [and]
Poetry 194
around it/ strings of beeswax , the men do the fine work of eyes and toenails/ picking / with hot needles the
look in the eyes . It is only with the leftovers that these traditional artisans make horses, toys etc. In the
second part of the poem, it is the poet-persona who takes over the role of village artisans single-handedly and
subverts their order of preference in shaping the icons of divine first and toys later on. I as community of
one , first of all would not divide the role of moulding clay and metal among men and women, he would instead
do both the things himself. Then, instead of shaping the divine, he chooses to do his dancers first,/ jet bombers/
and tiny Taj Mahals for tourists . The folk beliefs and rituals are deliberately reversed by the consumerist
modern poet-persona. The second part of the poem is a counter-narrative to the first.
If one were to account for the bi-partite structure of the poem in terms of Tamil poetics, it could be accounted
for in terms of movement from puram to akam, i.e. from outer to the inner. Akam poetry is the poetry of
interior landscape, puram stands for poetry of the outer world. The first part of the poem offers images of a
community of craftsmen and women of a village who perform different operations to shape metallic icons of
the divine. In the second part of the poem, the persona as an individual takes over single-handedly the role of
entire community ( But I, a community of one ), thus internalizing the external, and personalizing the
communitarian. The studio as site of modern craftsman as against the open fields of village craftsmen generates
different set of preferences. Instead of shaping the divine, the persona shapes Taj Mahals for purely commercial
ends. The second part of the poem constitutes akam-ization of the puram form of the first part.
If the poem is approached in terms of the play of time frames, it could be studied in terms of juxtaposition of
two time frames the communal and the private, the objective and the subjective, the pedagogical and the
performative. Subjective/ private time has its specific priorities and preferences. If community (of craftsmen)
spends its prime time in shaping the divine figures out of clay and straw, the stray individual might choose to
spend the same time in shaping his toys. In the first part of the poem, the poet describes the routine of
traditional craftsmen: Its with leftovers that they [the community of artisans] make horses/ toys; life scenes
of women/ pounding rice with lifted pestles . . . . In the second part of the poem, the order of preference or
the time-schedule is reversed. The eclectic poet-persona, however, would do my [his] dancers first,/ jet
bombers/ and tiny Taj Mahals for tourists . In the fragmentary vision of the persona, eternity is no more than
a a rumoured beat of his [an] extraordinary heart .
Overall the poem evinces the poets sound forgrounding in both the traditional and modern set of values. The
modern is not an original response to the reality, it is more or less a reversal of the traditional. It is very difficult
to say whether the poet approves one set of values at the cost of another, but what comes clearly in the poem
is the fact that Ramanujan as a poet is trader of ambivalences. Ambivalence is the very condition of modern
living.
Extended Family
In Ramanujans poetry the focus is on the genealogy of the self, its processes of becoming, and its evolution
from an arbitrary origin to its dissipation and diffusion in different directions without visible continuities or
predictable programmes. The poet examines his descent in terms of various fragmentary experiences that
compose and decompose his self continually. The poet traces his evolution in terms of those motley and
unsteady experiences and impressions that pre-empt the possibility of his smooth linear growth. Ramanujans
self does not evince any measure of unity or synthesis a point which the enthusiastic unity-conscious Indian
critics have always missed. Indian critics, obsessed as they are with Indian metaphysics of the ordinary human
self lapsing into a grand impersonal Self, try to figure out the metaphysical sublimation of the self in the poetry
of Ramanujann too.
Self is an utterly divided site in Ramanujans poetry. This fragmentation of the self is not a state of loss or
lament, the fragmentation is not a marker of entropy or loss, it is a marker of enrichment, multiple belongings
and lineages. In simple words, Ramanujans self revels in its dispersal and diffusion. The self embodies a
carnival of experiences, a cacophony voices; it is a volume in perpetual disintegration, a site of constant
195 A.K. Ramanujan
becoming and unbecoming. The poet-persona discovers in his self, peculiar traits of his entire family right from
dead grandfather to an unborn great great-grandson.
Grandfather as a relation outdoes father in the family-scape of Ramanujans poetry. He stands for tradition
with all its ritual trappings. Along the axis of time, he stands for pristine, uncorrupted and sacred countryside
past. While in Chicago the poet, keeping the native family tradition alive, bathe(s) before the village crow .
Chicago proves to be a rather secular and non-sacred parodic site of the poets native land where the dry
chlorine water replaces the holy Ganges and the naked Chicago bulb becomes a cousin of the Vedic sun .
Such parodic tropes belittle both the postmodern Chicago and equally conservative native Karnataka. Clearly
the self hops between two cultural frames one of mechanized America and other of rural India.
Ramanujans poetic consciousness thus permeates primarily between Chicago in the foreground and Karnataka
in the background in a way that uproots the poet eternally. This uprootedness engenders in him a double voice,
a dialogical vision characteristic of post-colonial condition. In such bi-cultural tropes, Ramanujan decommodifies
and Indianizes dry chlorine water or Chicago bulbs, putting metaphor to work in a kind of reverse colonization.
It is however difficult to say whether Ramanujan enlivens the hackneyed America or modernizes ancient India
by employing cultural metaphors of two civilizations in such a dialogic frame. One can see the operation of two
cultures being invoked in a parodic relationship in other poems as well. In Waterfalls in a Bank Ramanujans
bi-focal vision comes into play in similar terms. In the poem while watching waterfalls in America, the poet
goes back to his Tamil past thus: And then one sometimes sees waterfalls/ as the ancient Tamils saw them,/
wavering snakeskins,/ cascades of muslin .
In such a dialogic frame, while the poet-persona seems to make his adjustments in alien landscape through the
strategy of equivalences, he is also hinting at the limitations of such an enterprise. The naked Chicago bulb
is his working equivalent of Vedic sun , yet it is too facile an object to be compared with Vedic sun .
Similarly, the Ganges is discovered in the dry chlorine water , yet the equivalence is absurd and remote. The
poet-persona not only belittles the mechanical Chicago life, he also ridicules the obsessive brahmanical life-
style back home. It is not that Ramanujan cannot think independently about his cultural landscape, he is employing
Chicago not to assert any fundamentalist or rank nationalist association with his home. Both the landscapes
are juxtaposed, and yet none is redeemed.
After grandfather, in the inventory of influences, it is the turn of father. Father in Ramanujans poetry receives
a rather unfriendly treatment. He is invoked in terms of his eccentricities. The poet-persona slap[s] soap on
his my [his] back / like his father . In Love Poem for a Wife I , the same image comes to play: how noisily/
father bathed/ slapping soap on his back . If Grandfather is remembered in reverential terms, father is drawn
in terms which are at best caricaturized, if not altogether derisive and dismissive. Somehow the poet-persona
does not come to terms with his fathers obsessions. In a poem A Wobbly Top , he describes his relationship
with his father as two perfect concentric circles on the fast moving wobbly top. Interestingly it is father who
gifts the top to the son. In other words, it is the father who provides his son, the occasion, the medium and the
tools necessary for disagreement with his son. In Obituary also, the dead father is invoked in a rather
unceremonious manner thus: Father when he passed on, / left dust/ on a table full of papers/ left debts and
daughters . The caricature of father is drawn in terms which are not innocuously humorous: Being the
burning type,/ he burned properly/ at the cremation . The place and manner of fathers birth and death are
mentioned in terms that are more derisive than mere descriptive: his caesarian birth/ in a brahmin ghetto/ and
his death by heart-/ failure in the fruit market.
Ramanujans persona does not look upon his father as utterly oblivious of Indian proverbial wisdom. Besides
remembering fathers noisy bath, he, like his father, think[s]/ in proverbs . Father is straightaway connected
to proverbial wisdom a wisdom which lacks the veracity of self-experience. Ramanujans father is a strange
bundle of contradictions, traditional to the core, yet very modern in terms of his intellectual make up, a learned
astronomer who believes in astrology. This is how the poet-persona in another poem portrays him: Sky-man in
Poetry 196
a manhole/ with astronomy for dream,/ astrology for nightmare . The so-called outer domain assigned to
patriarchy is also ghettoized in the sense that it also tends to be exclusive and arrogant.
Only after the grandfather and the father, the poet-persona brings his own self into play. The role of the
individual is very limited. All soaked and watered by the inheritance and paternal legacies, he has the nominal
role of wiping himself dry , that too with an unwashed turkish towel. In Ramanujans poetry being unwashed
is not abnormal. It is a signifier of the personas ordinary human self a self not necessarily clean and pure.
The purity of past is at once set in contrast with the impurity of present. Indian obsession of cleanliness does
not enamour the poet-persona.
Important aspect of Ramanujans family-scape is that it accords quite a significant space to women-relations
in the making of his self. Mother as keeper of the inner domain, is remembered for her daily prayers and
kitchen clatter . Her prayers in the alien environs of Chicago sound Japanese . Ramanujan deliberately
brings in different cultural nuances into the fold of his makeup. Tamil prayers in Chicago create a distinct
cultural-mix which for want of better word Ramanujan terms as Japanese . At every juncture of his growth,
the poet-persona is intensely aware of his cultural displacement. As a displaced being he becomes all the more
nostalgic of his native past which is invoked in terms not entirely celebratory.
Ramanujan is very possessive about his daughter. In the absence of the wife as a support, the poet-persona
looks up to his daughter. Of all the relations, which is by-passed so clinically in his so-called extended-family,
it is the relation of wife. Clearly strained marital life and two divorces plays heavy on the mind of the persona.
Wife as we shall read in other poems, appears more as a rival and an estranged other.
Writing about a daughter, that too a growing one is a moral challenge, which only seasoned and sensitive poets
can undertake and fulfill. Ramanujan, as a self-critical father, assigns a definite role to his children in his make
up. This is reversing the usual direction of bequeathing inheritance. Instead of a father bequeathing manners
and culture to his wards, it is the wards who bequeath their father some measure of integrity. From her
daughter, the poet-persona as father learns shyness: like my little daughter/ I play shy . The dynamics of
shyness is dwelt upon further thus: hand over crotch/ my body not yet full/ of thoughts novels and children .
It requires tremendous moral and aesthetic control to describe daughters shyness in terms of putting hand
over his crotch .
By all biographical accounts available, Ramanujan had no son. Yet in the poem, in the extended family of the
poet, there is a reference to the little son . This fictional son stands for the babies in general. As an adult, the
poet-persona discovers in his self, an uncanny presence of a perennial child in him. Like his little son, he
hold[s] my [his] peepee and play[s] garden hose/ in and out/ the bathtub . The fact that this son is a fictional
one adds a rare poignancy to the poem, and lifts the poem from being extremely personal to an impersonal one.
The expansive profile of the self is reinforced through such insertions.
Unborn is as much a presence as the dead past is. By stretching time frame to the unborn, the poet tends to go
beyond the normal trend of recording evolution in terms of backward journey into time. History becomes a
journey into future too. I am not yet/ may never be/ my future/ dependent/ on several/ people/ yet/ to come .
The self is not just a product of past and present, it is also the site of future. The self is no longer defined in
terms of heritage or a possession that grows and solidifies, rather it is seen as unstable assemblage of faults,
fissures, and heterogeneous layers that threaten the fragile inheritor from with or from underneath.
The self remains unfinished, in all likelihood it would ever remain so. Such an open-endedness is quite redeeming
in the sense that it does not commodify the self into a closed final product. Being indefinite or being eternally in-
the-process is not a position of loss or disadvantage. It is not a state of tentativeness or incertitude. It is
197 A.K. Ramanujan
acceptance of the flow of life. By tying down his future to several people who have yet to come, the poet-
persona ensures an immortality which is very different from the immortality of spirit, cherished so feverishly in
Indian metaphysics. Ramanujan as a poet anchored in the present, does not want either past or future to go
unattended in his present. The present of the self subsumes both the past as well as the future.
If one looks at the poem, in the context of contemporary tendencies of writing about the self, one finds
Ramanujans approach towards the self is not an exception. In Salman Rushdies Midnights Children Saleem
Sinai, the protagonist, makes an issue of wild profusion of my [his] inheritance . What goes into the making of
a self is not just the chromosomes of the parents or five basic elements viz. earth, air, fire, space and water. A
whole lot of memories, impressions, dreams, fears, smells, idiosyncrasies of forefathers, history of nation etc
inform and shape the consciousness of Rushdies protagonist. Rushdie gives an inventory of influences that
constitute Saleems inheritance thus: On that day, my inheritance began to form the blue of Kashmiri sky
which dripped into my grandfathers eyes; the long sufferings of my great-grandmother which would become
the forbearance of my own mother and late steeliness of Naseem Aziz; my great-grandfathers gift of conversing
with birds which would descend through meandering bloodlines into the veins of my sister the Brass Monkey;.
For the proper contextualization of the poem The Extended Family , it would be much better to read other
poems of the poet that deal with the theme of the self and family. In Elements of Composition , for instance,
the poet once again dwells on the various discourses that go into the making of his self. In the poem, he goes
beyond the sphere of family and incorporates outer social experiences as well. Far from being a simple product
of fathers seed and mothers egg, the poets self is composed of scary dreams, the look/ of panic on
sisters face/ an hour before / her wedding , the sight of the lepers of Madurai and a host of other impressions
that normally go unaccounted for or even sidelined as minor aberrations in the growth of the self. : . . . and
even as I add, / I lose, decompose/ into my elements .
The Striders
There is nothing unquestionably reverential or sacred in the poetry of A.K.Ramanujan. From divinity to self,
mythology to history every idealized and notional construct of reality is turned upside down through deft
parodic inversions and clever ironic twists. The serious and the non-serious, the holy and the profane, the
sacred and the blasphemous collapse into each other without any sense of moral outrage. To de-mystify the
grandeur of the great and the godly, the poet would invoke most petulant and petty stuff for his poetic metaphors.
The rarefied divine which is dislodged as grand gossip, a metaphysical lie and a fictional conspiracy in Ramanujans
topsy-turvy poetic universe, is pitted against the ghastly and the grisly insects. No wonder in the poets mytho-
poetic universe not only prophets/walk on water, even certain thin-/stemmed bubble-eyed water bugs
perch on the ripple skin/of a stream The mighty Hindu water-gods are deliberately set up against the
weightless insects of New England. The bugs, as utterly weak creatures, are reminders of the helplessness
of the divine.
In fact in Ramanujans poetry, insects with all their stingy and stinky attributes are regularly deployed to de-
mythify the power of the divine. In another poem Some Relations , in the abode of the god, the praying
mantis retains its deadly sting thus: a praying mantis, deathly still/ on a yellow can of DDT/in the Madurai
temple . The inability of DDT cans to de-fang or de-poison the temple-precincts of poisonous insects reinforces
the impotency of the holiest of holy Hindu temples. Neither insecticide nor the gods can checkmate the deadly
designs of the poisonous insect. In the same poem, someone is shown cleaning out scorpions/ from the
many armpits of Shiva . Not only does the poet-persona caricaturize the non-human iconization of Shiva as
many-armed deity, he lampoons the entire credo of idol worshipping. Idols are happy sites for the dangerous
and the deadly insects to grow and multiply.
Small insects, their sting notwithstanding, always invite Ramanujans admiration for their diligence and
industriousness. The way ants design and build their cantonment, and lay out their barracks outdoes the human
endeavor. In a poem Army Ants , the poet marvels at the aristocratic tasters of ants for they have
Poetry 198
separate apartments / for the queen , colonies/ for the various castes , several nurseries/ for the abstract/
and the bean-eyed young . The clinical precision which ants show in clearing up the flesh of dead snakes is
looked upon with the innocence of a child in a poem entitled Old Indian Belief : theyll [ants] / leave snake
skeletons/ complete with fang and grin/ for a schoolgirls picnic . The snake-ant binary constitutes a polarity
potent enough to yield humour as well as dread in the mind of the reader.
More than its thematic strength, the highpoint of the poem is its chiselled and delicate imagery. The graphic
description of the insect with all its microscopic details creates an effect that is serious and not-serious at the
same time. The water-insect is thin-stemmed/ bubble eyed . Both thin and bubble as adjectival prefixes
of the compound words reinforce the rather fragile physical frame of the insect. Bubble is also a signifier of
transient and dreamy world- view. Also the application of bubble is in consonance with the watery abode of
the insect. Capillary tubes as legs once again point out to very fragile frame of the insect, but the very fact
that these legs are tubes suggests that Ramanujan as a poet is as much interested in outer as he is in the inner
operation of body parts. Capillary tubes not only ensure firm hold on the water surface, they also hint at the
sucking nature of the insect. These tubes are dry outwardly giving an optical illusion of water-insects non-
interactive relationship with the water-below. Dry also stands for the disinterested and indifferent nature of
the insect with the environment around. In terms of its body weight, insect is weightless which is to say that
it does not sit heavy on the ripple skin of its watery-habitat. Being weightless is an ambivalent position. At a
literal level, it stands for a very weak and feeble power that insect may possibly wield, at a slightly indirect
level, it could stand for the rarefied soul which does not bulk under the pressures of gravity or other such
physical pulls.
In the entire description of the insects delicate positioning on the water-surface, Ramanujan evinces his keen
understanding of the basic laws of physics. Capillary tubes as an image is highly scientific. Weightlessness is
a concept of astrophysics, usually seen in operation in places where the pull of gravity is minimal. Ripple skin
as a figurative expression of taut water surface of the stream is very much in keeping with the laws of surface
tension that liquids evince in some measure. The point that needs to be kept in mind is that Ramanujan does not
invoke mere imaginary adjectives to lend a purple perspective of reality. His descriptions are highly scientific,
and it is this scientific veracity and rigour of his imagery that lends a unique poetical accuracy in his idiom. His
idiom is scientific as it is poetic; it is accurate as it is figurative.
In order to dramatize and overplay the position of insect vis- -vis the divine, he gives a colourful description of
the landscape. The bug, the poet observes, sits on a landslide of lights . The use of landscape as against the
water-scape is significant for the water-insect. The water-stream happens to be its landscape. The water
insect enjoys the lights that falls on the surface of the water. It sits ever so precariously on the kaleidoscopic
water-surface in the posture of a yogi. As it sits on the water-surface, it drowns/ eye-/deep / into its tiny strip
of sky . In Ramanujans poetry this kind of reversal of significations is very common. Water-scape turns into
landscape and one drowns in the sky.
Interestingly enough, Ramanujan even while he juxtaposes the prophets with the water-bugs, shies away from
describing the divine at all. The non-description of the divine is deliberate and functional. The mythical is taken
for granted and is a part of value the system. Hence, it does not require any re-statement. Any re-statement of
the given does not offer creative possibilities. Insects, as marginal characters of human landscape, require
attention and space, the divine as presiding presence does not need poetic affirmation.
The frequent deployment of insect-imagery in Ramanujans poetry has serious political ramifications. Most
often the small insects and birds, which appear powerless enough to generate violence or wild uproar to upset
the balance of society in a revolutionary manner, turn out to be cunning enough to outwit the powerful . And
this outwitting of the powerful by the powerless and the small constitutes one of the basic dynamics of protest
in Ramanujans poetry. The usage of animal as characters for political messages in his poetry is in keeping with
Panchtantra and other such beast tales found in other civilizations where they perform a similar kind of
function.
199 A.K. Ramanujan
The Last of the Princes
It is not that Ramanujan ridicules only the abstract and high philosophical concepts or constructs of divinity ,
soul or Self ; even history as the chronological account of secular domain becomes the subject of his
relentless inversions. History as a record of grand royal heroes and warriors is de-romanticized by way of its
juxtaposition with ordinary personal experiences. If politics is scrambling for power among insects, history is
nothing more than a petty account of fight among aunts over the property of the dead great-aunt. In his poem
History, the poet records the historical sight of two/ daughters, one fair,/ /alternately picked [picking]
their mothers body clean/ /of diamond ear-rings, /bangles, anklets, the pin/in her hair etc.
In The Last of the Princes, the poet digs up the grand imperial Mughal history only to subvert it in terms of
the ludicrous present. The decline of the great mughals is de-mystified and in the process sufficiently
humanized. The descendents of Aurangzeb did not vanish from the scene all of a sudden: They took their time
to die . The tone is casual and even dismissive. The poet does not hold the dynasty in awe and wonder. The
last of the princes of the mughal dynasty died of utterly human reasons: some of bone TB/ and other of
London fog that went to their heads . Instead of locating the decline of Mughals in terms of their policy of
overreach or what historians usually overplay as Deccan Ulcer, Ramanujan gives his own account of the fall
of the Mughals.
One reason that led to the decline of Mughals was their lavish and extravagant life style. The later Mughal
kings and chieftains had developed a taste of imported wine and women . Some were too satisfied for being
mentioned in the ballad either for their bravery or for being their austerity. The myth of Mughals had acquired
the status of folklore. The love affairs of mughal princes and princesses immortalized in folk ballads and stories
created a sense of superiority among Mughal descendents. They began believing in what was mere mythical.
The royal mynahs and parrots with a horde of wives in the harem had given the last of the great mughals a
legacy of lewd and lascivious court culture. Unable to rise to the demands of modern life, the princes were
bound to lose the glory of their dynasty.
The last of the princes is left only with memories of his forefathers. The rich and fabulous past makes his
rather ordinary present all the more miserable. It becomes extremely difficult for him to negotiate between two
time frames one of romantic past and other of impoverished existential terrain. The past stands for plenty and
glory; the present is diseased. The prince therefore while cherishing his exotic past, lives on to cough. A whole
lot of diseases that the prince suffers from bring into focus his rather sordid present: . . . he lives on, to cough,/
remember and sneeze, a balance of phlegm/ and bile, alternating loose bowels . . . Importantly remembering
too is disease.
The two girls Honey and Bunney of the last Mughal prince go to school/ on half fees , and his first son,
trainee/ in telegraphy, telegraphs thrice already for money . The anglicized names of the daughters of the
last Mughal princesses, their schooling, the son undergoing training a telegraphy are signifiers of change which
belie the grandeur of Mughal past. The colonial culture has already invaded the inner chambers of rather
closed Mughal household. The fact that the daughters are being sent to school is a marker of slow acceptance
of female education among muslim women. Half-fees suggests the low-income status of the last of the
princes. Despite poverty, the wife of the prince is pregnant again. This is an indication enough of Mughal
backwardness in general. Ramanujan thus through the uncanny eye of a poet as de-constructor looks at the
Mughal tragedy from an intensely human perspective.
In the poem, the last of the princes is at best a mimic man lost between two cultures one of the Mughal past
and another of colonial present. The colonial encounter reduced the native Indian, irrespective of his status,
into a mimic man in the sense that he is to strike a working relationship between two civilizations. The schooling
of the daughters and the education of son in telegraphy are two tropes that reveal the irrevocable presence of
colonial education system. The poem is as much a dirge on the slow and steady decline of Mughal dynasty as
it is a sordid commentary on the unsettling of native ethos at the invasion of colonial culture.
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In terms of structure, the poem is built along very sharply defined binaries. The glorious past is juxtaposed with
the sick present. The erstwhile prosperity brings into focus the poor present. The rich cultural past is set
against the mechanized modern present. The last of the princes is the site of this binary clash of values. He is
a victim of memory and experience, of remembrance and reality, of history and existence. Despite the deft
play of binaries, the poem does move towards a logical finale. The son sending three telegrams for money
stands for the complete reversal of Mughal fortunes in India.
History is Ramanujans favourite hunting ground for poetic metaphors. In The Last of the Princes , Mughal
history becomes a metaphor of rise and decline of human fortunes. In the process of writing poems on historical
situations, the poet with his rather maverick poetic make up, de-constructs the myths perpetuated by the
official and nationalist versions of history.
Fear
The fears are no different from hopes in Ramanujans ambivalent world. The poet-persona is hopeful as well
as fear-struck, staring out of a window/ of a house on fire . Yet the belief that fears are more ubiquitous than
hopes runs through his poetry. He has an uncanny belief that fears are more definite and precise which even
an ear can see and an eye can smell. This is how he would sum up the archetypal presence of fears in the
human unconscious: Born blind/ a whole skin glistening/ and a seeing ear,/ they do not have to grope . These
fears cannot be apprehended by ordinary human senses. As Eyes cannot follow/ a bird over the bill , or
Ears hear a whistle a wheel, but not the grass , the nose too has it limitations: Noses know when anything
burns/ anywhere but cannot/learn the smell of fear ( Blind Spots ). Obviously this fear is not conspicuous to
the naked eye. It is never bold and belligerent. Born-blind such a fear can be spotted only by skin listening
and seeing ear . A sensitive mind can sense or anticipate fear, hopes are elusive as well as illusive. In fact in
the entire range of modern Indian English poetry, the fears are deliberately understated or conveyed in hushed
tone for a clear and loud articulation of such fears entails antagonism with the all pervading system of coercion.
The modern Indian English poets, like their British counterpoints do not blare out their apprehensions.
Ramanujans fears do not spring as much from the outer international or national incidents of violence or mass
destruction as from tiny insects like lizards and scorpions revealing the mundane dimensions of his outlook. In
the poem Fear , the poet begins on a note of general environment of terror and violence at macro level. A
series of images from the world of violence are catalogued in a manner that one is gripped with a sense of
threat and intimidation. The global range of references in the poem that the poet invokes to hint at all-round
violence is an ample evidence of the poets sharp political awareness.
Right in the beginning, the poet creates a dialogic situation. There is the other in the poem, therefore, the self
of the poet addresses to the other thus: For you, fear/ is Terror . Fear is not as much as a synonym of terror
or vice versa, the two terms rather bear a binary relationship. While fear is retained in the lower case, terror
is deliberately spelled with T capital. Terror is fear in its most visible form. The beauty of the fear is that its
source is indefinite and unknown. Terror is too bland and blatant. It does not enamour the poet as much. Terror
is fear in macro form, fear on the other hand is very personal feeling of insecurity. Terror is public; fear is
private. Terror is social and political; fear is intensely psychological. The poet is not discounting Terror, he is
only juxtaposing it with archetypal fears that the man inherits right from his birth onwards. The outer Terror
accentuates the inner fear. Therefore Terror does hold a functional value in the personal and private world of
the poet.
The poet enlists number of international events that have rocked the world for their mass-violence. The first
image that comes to him is that of the nuclear attack on Hiroshima and Nagasaki in 1942. The museums as
archives of past bring live the images of the mass destruction: the wound museums/ of Hiroshima . In
Ramanujans poetry museums are reckoned as live and animate theatres of the past. In a poem entitled
Museums , the horses in the painting are so vibrantly portrayed that they seem to break away from the frozen
frame into royal gardens to trample the flowers/ in the emperors gardens/ night after night . The museums in
Ramanujans poetic universe represent arrested time as against dead time or static time.
201 A.K. Ramanujan
From outer manifestations of violence, the poet moves inward. He senses the smell of cooking/ in Dacca
sewers . From over-seeing, the shift is towards under-seeing. The underground is a favourite terrain of
Ramanujans poetic hunt. The poet under-sees or over-sees to reinforce the universality of violence. The
obverse of the scene is equally ob/scene. The poet could be seen slipping into the inner recesses of the seen/
scene to lay bare the politics of the visible. In the poem It , underground Ganges stands for the undercurrents
of indigenous culture that keep purring his subconscious like tummy gargles , but does not exactly wet his
throat . The underlined message is that Ganges does cause some turbulence in the self, but falls short of
quenching its spiritual/ sacred quests. Seabed is the poets chosen refuge: I sink to the seabed in a barrel
( Smalltown, South India ) The under-water world has its own dreads: Water-layers salt and pickle the sun/
Toes mildew green, trees are porous coral . It is a brackish image of the world above. Dacca sewers
became the chosen abode of political adversaries during the Bangladeshs freedom struggle.
Reference to Madame Nhus/ Buddhist barbecues pertains to violence perpetrated on non-violent Buddhists
in the Far East. Buddhist barbecues is an oxymoron. The alliteration created in phrase highlights only the
barbarity of the situation. The next image in Ramanujan armoury is that of that well-known child/ in napalm
flames/ with X-ray bones/ running, running . This particular image pertains to US-Vietnam war. Frustrated by
guerilla attacks of Vietnamese, the US resorted to chemical weapons. The US army dropped napalm bombs
which unleashed fire on the ground. Ramanujan refers to the world famous photograph which showed a
Vietnamese child running naked in the streets with his back burning in flames. The X-ray bones stand for the
skeleton like figure of the impoverished Vietnamese child.
As the poet gives a running account of mass-violence, he demolishes the role of news agencies for bringing
into focus only the violence visible in the outer sphere. Reuter news agency with its reach and access to the
important world centres is the real maker of history. The poet seeks to offer a perspective of violence different
from what is being reported by the news agencies. Ramanujan, as a poet of the ordinary and the small, locates
fear and dread in the inner recesses of mans unconscious. The wound museums/ of Hiroshima/ the smell of
cooking/in Dacca sewers/Madame Nhus/Buddhist barbecues/ that well-known child in napalm flames / with
X-ray bones running do not intimidate him to an extent to which a tiny lizard/ with its stare, deadsnake/
mouth/ and dinosaur toes . The overarching tendency, however, is to withdraw to the inner chambers of
consciousness in the face of external threat and fear.
In the poem, a movement from outer to inner, from macrocosmic to the microcosmic is all too evident. The
poem begins with the description of fear in the exterior landscape: wound museums/ of Hiroshima ; the
smell/ of cooking/ in Dacca sewers ; that well-known child/ in napalm flames/ with X-ray bones/ running,
running, . . . . In terms of perception and precision, Ramanujan is alert and alive to whatever tragic and
destructive happens around the world. Whatever be the propensity to shrink to his inner self, as a twentieth
century poet, it is indeed difficult for Ramanujan to shut his eyes off from the perils of nuclear war, chemical
and biological weapons, ethnic violence and state-sponsored terrorism. In the next section of the poem, the
poet turns inward, not to avoid the horrors and challenges of the world outside, but to feel their presence in the
inner domain. Akam poetry is not poetry of the insulated self, nor is it a poetry of the narcissitic self-indulgence;
it is poetry of a sensitive self who internalizes the external and meets out the challenges of the world in his tiny
little chamber of the mind in his own small ways. The second section brings forth the intensity of insecurity that
the poet-persona experiences while he is very much inside his room: a certain knock / on the backdoor/ a
minute/ after midnight, . . . . The external knocks at the door of the internal, that too at midnight, sending waves
of fear in the already terror-struck persona. Midnight is not a time of passive retrieval or easy sleep, it is a time
when all kinds of archetypal fears and hallucinations take over the very unconscious of the poet. Akam does no
longer remain a form of love poetry, it becomes an apt form of fear poetry in the subversive poetics of
Ramanujan. Fear like love too is an intensely private feeling.
The observation that the fear of white snake is archetypal is strengthened by the fact that the poet describes as
a fossilized fear imprinted on his skull: flattened to a fossil/ in the crease/ of my rolling/ sleeping/ ignorant/
Poetry 202
skull . The fact that these fears haunt him during his sleep also hints towards their primordial presence. The
poet uses a very significant metaphor of monkey cap for his ignorant skull. Clearly he has in his mind the
Darwinian theory of perceiving man as descendent of monkey. The fears are not historical or even existential,
they are pre-historical and date back to the very evolution of man from monkey.
Second Sight
As a translator and a commentator of bhakti literature, Ramanujan has an impeccable foregrounding in Hindu
mythology and metaphysics. In his Hymns of Drowning, he translates, the poets who adored Vishnu as their
main deity, in his Speaking of Shiva, the poet-translator translates the vachanas of Shiva-worshipping bhakti
poets. The complex dynamics of exchange between translation and creativity can be seen operating in the
poetry of A.K.Ramanujan

in different ways. It is pertinent to take note of Ramanujans own ideas about the
relationship of his poems vis- -vis his translations. In one of the interviews given to Chirantan Kulshreshtha, he
says:
I found that there were any number of poems which I would have liked to have written myself. I do not
translate out of love but out of envy, out of kind of aggression towards these great poems I think one translates
out of a need to appropriate someone elses creation, done better than one could ever do .
Apparently enough it is the enterprise of translation that propels Ramanujan into writing poetry. He wonders
why he could not think and write as the ancient Tamil poets did. His poetry is an aggressive response to the
creations of his Tamil poet-ancestors. However, at no point does Ramanujan believe that his poetry stands up
to the quality of sangam Tamil poets. Despite acknowledging close inter-penetration between his translation
and his poetry, he hesitate[s] to put my own [his] poems next to them .
Many poems of the poet, including Second Sight take off directly from his experience as a translator. He not
only imitates the Tamil forms, he shares thematic concerns with his bhakti poets. Here sharing thematic
concerns does not imply that the poet is in perfect consonance with bhakti poetry; he has his own egoistic
improvisations, re-considerations and even re-visions. In Second Sight , the poet writing very much in the
traditional vachana style of poetry of Kannada bhakti poets, puts into perspective the relevance of Shivas
myth of Third Eye in a departmental store in America.
But before the poem is taken for detailed critical scrutiny, let us understand the poetics of vachana poetry first.
Vachanas constitute the very form as well as content of kannada bhakti poetry. As against the tradition of
shruti and smriti valorized in Sanskrit oral tradition, vachanas is an active mode of learning. It is neither
knowledge received nor remembered, it is knowledge uttered here and now. Ramanujans poetry does not
have the spontaneity of vacanakaras

for he is more a poet in the intellectual mould a poet who reacts to the
knowledge received and remembered, but at times, particularly in his shorter poems, one comes across a
persona who is far more forthcoming and straight.
Second Sight has an unmistakable tinge of directness that is usually associated with the vachanakaras.
Doing away with the rarefied received knowledge/ myth of Hindus having Third Eye , the poet-persona,
strikes a this worldly note thus:
I fumble in my nine
pockets like the night-blind
son-in-law groping
in every room for his wife
and strike a light to regain
at once my first, and only
sight.
The aesthetics of here and now overtakes the aesthetics of eternity or timelessness. Vachanakars as protest-
poets always held Only/ sight to be the only reliable human attribute that is to be believed and cared for.
Although to grant some kind of impersonality to the poet, it is better to attribute the poem not to the poet directly
203 A.K. Ramanujan
but to his persona, but in such poems, there is hardly only gap between the poet and the persona. Such poems
very much like vachanas, are uttered, not through a persona or mask, but directly in the person of the poet
himself (Speaking of Shiva). Like vachanas these poems are highly personalized utterances.
Insight or the inner eye, which the upanishadic seers describe rather enigmatically as the Eye of the eye is
privileged over the normal human eye in the spiritualist accounts of Indian thought. In Shaiv-philosophy it is also
termed as Third Eye, the eye of the mind over and above the two eyes which ordinary mortals are born with.
Standing in a queue in a Departmental Store of Chicago, Ramanujan, a Hindu with supposedly second sight,
feels quite helpless. The resultant comment is as much a dig at Hindu metaphysics, as it is on the Orientalist
Western onlookers who take it too literally:
I fumble in my nine
pockets like the night-blind
son-in-law groping
in every room for his wife, . . .
The imagery of pockets and son-in-law groping/ . . . for his wife has material and sensuous connotations
which are often underplayed vis- -vis the so-called lofty Indian metaphysics. Maybe, Ramanujan is invoking
some sort of epicureanism of the Charvakas or the Lokayatas which is usually kept aside from the essentialist
accounts of Indian thought as a counter-discourse to the Vedantic canon. Informed by the dialectics of dharma
and postmodernism, the poem concludes on a note of inversion:
and strike a light to regain
at once my first, and only,
sight.
Inversion is a dialogic device as what it negates later on, is established first. The emphasis on first and
only is an indication enough of how precariously the poet is caught between his inherited dharma on one
hand, and the acquired post-modernism on the other. In order to counter the Orientalist construction of Hinduism
as being mere metaphysical, the gross assertion of the physical through the first and only/ sight leads
the poet back to the colonial narrative of the material or the carnal. Richard King explains this predicament of
Indian post-colonial intellectual thus: . . . , for in opposing British colonial rule, Hindu nationalists did not fully
transcend the presuppositions of the West, but rather legitimized the Western Orientalist discourse by responding
in a manner that did not fundamentally question the Orientalists paradigm .
It would not be out of place to discuss another poem of Ramanujan, where he in the fashion of native bhakti
poets holds canonical Shaivism to some kind of critical ridicule. Ramanujan is not a mindless and submissive
Shiv bhakta, prostrating at the feet of the divine eternally. He thinks and feels like an ordinary human being. In
his A Devotees Complaint , he disfavours the shaiv idea of absolute asceticism. If Shivas touch dries out
the human in the devotee, it is of hardly any human use. A bhakta should not cease to be a living and throbbing
human being. His complaint as a devotee therefore is:
If Shiva touches you -
when you cut your finger
in the kitchen
not blood but ash spills
from your cut as it did
for that ascetic
who dried out for Shiva
Poetry 204
The ash-blood binary is the binary of dharma and postmodernism in its most fundamental form. The poet does
seek the grace of Shiva, but at the same time he wants the blood to run through his veins. After all what can
hold the devotee if he becomes a sack of ash? Ramanujan has a special penchant of testing divines graces in
spaces like kitchen, bathrooms and toilets.
Son-in-laws are unwanted relations. They receive very harsh treatment from Ramanujan. Seen as stupid
nitwits, short-lived idiots ( Small Scale Reflections on a Great House , they are condemned as drags on the
family. In the poem under consideration, when someone asks the Hindu poet-persona about the second sight
that Hindus are supposedly bestowed with, he begins to fumble like the night-blind/ son-in-law groping/ in
every room for his wife . The image of the night blind son-in-law is derived from the Kannada folk tale in
which a night-blind son of an old widow somehow manages to marry a nice girl from a good family . The
story is all about the cleverness with which he manages to hide his night-blindness from his in-laws. The poem
gathers a sting if the story is read along with it as its possible co(n)text.
A Hindoo to his Body
Ramanujan has written many poems which deal directly with the theme of his approach towards Hinduism. In
these poems Hindu is spelt in Americanized way as Hindoo . Obviously the poet as a hyphenated Indo-
American re-interprets his Hindu background in terms of his experiences in the US. Hindoo therefore stands
for an American-Hindu, or an Americanized Hindoo. The Hindoo-poems in a way dwell around the interesting
interface between inherited dharma on one hand and adopted (post-)modernism on the other, in an extended
and exclusive manner. The travails and tribulations of a diasporic Hindu come forth in these poems in a tone
which is surprisingly least remorse or elegiac. The poet, located as he is on an alien perch, is able to look at
Hinduism from a very distinct perspective. The canonical Hinduism, orientalized so much for its excessive
spiritualism and facile escapism, undergoes semantic mutations. One comes across a very different Hinduism
in these poems.
In canonical Hinduism, the body-soul conflict is settled invariably in favour of the claims of the soul. Soul is
supreme, and constitutes the very self of a being. Body is mere an outer covering, a protective shell. It is held
that after death, the imperishable soul the so-called essence of life leaves the physical frame and rises
upwards the sky. The entire enterprise of conventional Hinduism is directed towards the enhancement of the
self in terms of the march of the spirit or the soul. Ramanujan with his characteristic inverted humour caricaturizes
the body-soul divide created in all religious discourses, including Hinduism through a very non-religious, if not
irreverent and heathen, invocation to dear body that brought me [him]/ curled in womb and memory . Body
is very dear to the poet, for it is the locus of memory and future.
In A Hindu to His Body , the poet inverts the traditional Hindu focus by asserting the participation of the
physical in the spiritual. Spiritual is mere fiction, unless it is seen and experienced by the human self. Without
physical attestation, the experience of the so-called ecstatic spiritual is nothing more than a rarefied rumour.
Body is a metaphor of the poets tangible being for it empowers him to clutch/ at grace, at malice; and ruffle/
someone elses hair . In Ramanujans dyadic universe, grace and malice co-exist. A sensuous verification is
required to prove the existence of the two human gestures.
Self-caricaturization is a conscious strategy, employed in the poem to ensure an air of impersonality and
intellectual withdrawal from the emotive issue/ situation. Therefore when the poet pleads the soul not to
abandon him, he is aware of his being garrulous: my garrulous face . In fact in many ways, Ramanujans
entire attitude towards dharma is marked by this garrulity which acts like a double-edged weapon in his poetry.
The poetry becomes a plea for and against the self, the metaphor of essential dharma. The poet somehow
believes that garrulity would save him from the impending death. In this context, garrulity is a response of a
persona who is utterly nervous at the very idea of leaving the body behind, after the death.
The ending of the poem reveals unmistakably the poets desire to experience physically the much-fantasized
spiritual fullness. This is an unusual desire, for spiritual fullness is not possible by being aware of the body at the
205 A.K. Ramanujan
same time. The poet pleads: let me go with you and feel the weight/ of honey-hives in my branching / and the
burlap weave of weaver-birds/ in my hair . Honey-hives and burlap weave are signifiers of souls refulgence.
There is an underlying metaphor of human-body-as-tree holding honey-hives and nests of weaver-birds. The
poet-as-pleader would not mind losing the human face or his unkissed/ alien mind in the process of death, but
he is not ready to part away with his sensory perceptions. The poem, once again, brings into focus, the
metaphysical vagueness in-built in Hinduism. As a self-reflexive modernist, Ramanujan fails to reconcile with
the so-called grand spiritual course of the soul. There is no attempt to absolutize either dharma to the total
exclusion of modern imperatives and vice versa.
Love Poem for a Wife I
Love acquires an ambivalent semantic association in modern poetry. It does no longer stand for effusive
romantic response, it is not a signifier of unbridled passion. Love ironically enough stands for its absence, its
loss and its uselessness. It is through its negation or absence, that the modern poets underline the necessity of
love, its perennial value in human relationships. Love poems are written in memory of estranged relations. In
modern love poems, the thrust is towards an intellectual understanding of the emotion of love. More often than
not, these poems are post-marital, as against much of the pre-marital love poetry. Instead of beloved, it is
wife or an ex-girlfriend who is the focus of attention. In such love poems, love as an emotion is scrutinized post
facto.
Love Poem for a Wife 1 is a poem in which the poet-persona dwells on the possible cultural factors that in
a way fore-ordained his unhappy marital life. Right in the beginning the poet questions the very theory and
practice of adult-marriage. Here adult-marriage is used as binary opposite to child-marriage a practice much
castigated by the reformers. Almost throwing a gauntlet to the so-called reformers, the poet-persona challenges
the votaries of adult marriage on many counts. In adult-marriage, two grown up individuals from different
families vow together to remain as life partners till eternity. Ramanujan wonders how two different individuals
with different histories can enter a bond as demanding as marriage.
The emphasis of the poet is on the shared childhood as the primary condition of life long stable relationship.
So he accounts for his marital debacle in terms of unshared childhood : Really what kept us apart/ at the end
of years is unshared/ childhood. As adults husband and wife may spend any number of years together, but
that cannot make up for unshared childhood. The poet seems to privilege childhood over and above any other
phase of human life. It is in this phase that individuals do not hide their selves from each other. Children do not
have the sense of the private; whereas adults are very possessive about their private spaces. Relations formed
during childhood are lasting, relations formed during adulthood are at best transactional.
As adults, husband and wife cannot appreciate and understand each others past. In his usual half-comic, half-
serious tone, the persona presumably addressing his wife says: You cannot, for instance, meet my father. He
is some years/ dead. Father in Ramanujans poetry is a functional presence for he is a shaping force. The
dead father stands for the invisible past, which is dead yet it continues to live through the body of his children.
Similarly the poet-persona as husband cannot appreciate the shifting moods of his father-in-law : he has lately
lost his temper/ and mellowed . In-laws always invite a comic treatment in Ramanujans patriarchal universe.
The mellowing down of his otherwise aggressive father-in-law is rather melodramatic and hence funny.
In the next stanza, the poet-persona goes deeper into the ambience of family network where each one grows
anxious to know about the past of another. In the cordial familial set up, when relations meet and gossip
through the night among brandy fumes, cashews and Absences/ of grandparents , the wife as an outsider
suddenly grow[s] nostalgic for my [husbands] past . In Ramanujans poetry, presence and absence together
constitute the frame of the real. Absent grandparents are presences of a type which run through the family
genetically as well as culturally. The poet as inheritor of family code, is always conscious of the presence of his
forefathers in his blood and veins.
Poetry 206
The poet-persona is not an arrogant exclusive male one who is utterly indifferent to the wifes past. As a
sensitive and inquisitive individual he seeks to share every bit of his self with his life-partner. He is equally
envious of his wifes rich cultural background: . . . and I/ envy you your village dog-ride/ and the mythology
of the seven crazy aunts . It is the feverishness to know each other inside out that comes in the way of
husband-wife relationship. Knowing is a pre-condition to possessing.
The task of knowing anyone in terms of ones past can at best be speculative. The wife begins to recognize
her husband. The process is arduous. First she goes back to his ghostly past, then she looks at his real self,
that is, the self in the time present. Finally she once again lapses into images of his familys past in albums and
anecdotes and family-rumours. The reconstruction of past is always selective and therefore very arbitrary. In
Ramanujans poetry history is valid if it is self-experienced, its reconstruction through sources as flimsy as
albums and family rumours is bound to be tentative and therefore hardly sustainable.
The wife looks forward to some of the familiar sources, tapped usually to construct husbands past. One of
these sources is the photo, preferably the wedding photo of the husbands parents. In the traditional wedding
photograph, the father is in a turban, while the mother stands on her bare/ splayed feet, [with] silver rings on
her second toes . The wife tends to locate the persona of the husband in the photo, thus reducing his entire
career/ of my [his] recent unique self to a set pattern. The emphasis is singularly on the my recent unique
self . It is this unique self which is compromised in an arranged adult marriage. The poem is a plea for the
preservation of the unique self, which both husband and wife as two individuals enjoy separately before marriage.
Ramanujan is always skeptical about his wifes antecedents. He would imagine his father-in-law pacing up and
down the balcony fuming and fretting at his daughters (the poet-personas wife) pre-marital flirtations with a
Muslim friend. But after marriage, the father-in-law would feign ignorance about any affair that his daughter
ever have had: He will acknowledge the wickedness/ of no reminiscence: no, not/ the burning end of the
cigarette in the balcony . The wife would underplay her affair as an innocent/ date with a nice Muslim friend/
who only hinted at touches . The way the poet-persona makes an issue of the exclusive communal identity of
her wifes ex-boyfriend, does point towards the subtle operation of the deep-seated communal consciousness
in his cultural make-up.
The poet-persona as husband defines himself as a total outsider among his in-laws. When his wife and his
brother-in-law start a discussion on the topography of their ancestral house in Aleppey, he finds himself totally
at sea. He and his sister just become mute witnesses or what he terms as blank cut-outs in the serious
dispute ( drag-out fights ) his wife and her brother have on the position of bathroom in their ancestral house.
Bathroom is strategic sight in Ramanujans poetry. It is the inner most private chamber of ones cultural
backyard. As a poet of the interior landscape, Ramanujan is not interested in drawing room politics, or even
bedrooms.
The fight over where the bathroom was is significant for one who knows its position in the ancestral house
can claim to have an inside view of what cultural landscape one has inherited. The controversy is so serious
that both the wife and her brother get down to the floor to draw/ blueprints of a house from memory . The
wife is carried away by the fight so much that she wagers heirlooms and husbands earnings on what/ the
Uncle in Kuwait would say about the Bathroom . The helplessness of the poet-persona is expressed in terms
of his total ignorance about a controversy in which his earnings are being put to stakes. The poet deliberately
puts spells bathroom with capital B for in the drag-out fight it is no less than a sanctum sanctorum.
The location of wifes uncle in Kuwait who would act as a possible arbiter of dispute between his wife and
brother-in-law adds yet another third axis to the husband-wife relationship. India and America are the two
cultural binaries within which the poetry of Ramanujan normally operates, the opening of the Arab world adds
to the complexity of the situation. The poet-persona could have possibly negotiated with the wife, but this uncle
in Kuwait is beyond his cultural landscape.
The point, which the poet-persona makes rather painstakingly, is that husband and wife despite their avowed
intimacy and togetherness cannot know each other on issues, which may appear trivial and flippant, yet have
207 A.K. Ramanujan
serious bearings on their relationships. It is not a question of bathroom or any other room, the issue is of the
degree of identification which adult individuals can have after marriage. The poet-persona does not want to
enter into any relationship which does not lend him an inside perspective of the partner. Adult marriage does
not provide the space for total identification. It is an institution based on an impossible premise that two
individuals, having strong well-evolved consciousness can enter into a life long intimate partnership.
As an alternative to arranged adult marriage across families, Ramanujan takes the moral risk of endorsing the
Egyptian practice of marrying within the family. In Egyptian society, royal families in particular, the marriage
among cousins, half-brothers, half-sisters is not uncommon. Sisters become queens, and thus carry childhood
incests into the acceptable fold of marriage. Marriages among brothers and sisters ensure lesser cultural
estrangement that afflicts adult marriage across families. Such a practice of marriage mitigates sufferings/ or
misunderstandings that otherwise rock the conventional adult marriage on account of unshared childhood.
Before entering into a marital bond as husband and wife, the two have the experience of living together as
brother and sister. The issue of marriage, according to Ramanujan, should not be approached with moral
hangovers. Incest as an acceptable form of marriage is better bet than the so-called adult marriage outside the
family fold.
There is yet another option which the poet-persona puts forth. This option might sound retrogressive and even
primitive, but to Ramanujan, it is the viability of marital bond that is of utmost importance. Being primitive or
archaic is not necessarily anti-modern or outdated. Having suffered at the modernized version of marriage, the
poet likes to revive the old Indian practice of child-marriage, even marriage before births of prospective bride
and bridegroom. The poet pleads for betrothing before birth. Instead of cross-checking the horoscope to
ensure compatibility of the bride with the bridegroom, the poet would like to emphasize the necessity of having
shared childhood as a pre-condition to successful marital life. He makes a fervent plea thus: wed us in the oral
cradle/ and carry marriage back into/ the namelessness of childhoods . The namelessness suggests the total
annihilation of modern individuated ego, in favour of a life-long partnership called marriage. Only during childhood
can an individual rise above names. Therefore childhood is the most appropriate phase of tying the nuptial knot.
The poem on the whole contests the notion of love after marriage. Love demands total negation of ego. Only
child-marriage or incestuous marriage within family can possibly ensure love right from beginning, that is
before the formation of stable uncompromising egoes.
Ramanujan as an Indian Poet
Indianness, enigmatically enough, remains an unresolved issue for the checkered Indian present and past
precludes the possibility of its essentialization. A poet as multivalent as Ramanujan does not fit in any given
stereotypes of Indianness. His poetry is poetry of plural belongings. His locations keep shifting in time and
space, deferring his placement in any narrow provincial bounds. In order to understand the dynamics of
Ramanujans location in a cultural set up, it is necessary to approach the poet without any a priori notion of
Indianness. Not only poetry as a genre secularizes and de-provincializes responses, the poet as spokesman and
participant of history cannot betray narrow parochial interests.
Ramanujans Indianness can be measured in terms of the poets attitude towards his religion, i.e. Hinduism, his
family relations and finally in terms of his attitude towards his native landscape. As a poet of the Indo-American
diaspora, Ramanujan does not evince easy linear approach towards any of the three co-ordinates of his cultural
make up. Ambivalence is perhaps the only sure way to negotiate the ever-confounding Indianness. As a poet,
he could have taken a lyrical, passionate and even panegyric view of Indian past, present and future, but
Ramanujan is not a court poet, nor is he a poet laureate. He is a poet in the intellectual mould, his responses are
therefore measured and well-modulated.
I
The Hindu forbearings of A.K.Ramanujan as a poet have hitherto been taken for granted. Such an uncritical
(even communal) stance not only under-values the critical potential of poetry as a genre in secularizing or de-
Poetry 208
communalizing religion, it also tends to underplay the impact of other counter-canonical impulses that operate
in his poetic world as potential impulses of contestation and dis-belief. First, there is the impulse of native folk
experience that runs counter to the standard marga beliefs. As a poet rooted in local desi traditions, Ramanujan
does not subscribe to any sanskritic notion of Hinduism. He has his own will and a subjectivity to question
and interrogate his Hindu background. In his interviews, prose essays, afterwords etc, he insists on a pluralist
frame of Indian society wherein the hegemony of the canonical is always contested by various local sub-
cultures.
Though Ramanujan, avoids being labeled, yet given a choice, he would prefer to be identified more as Tamil or
a Kannada of deep South India than simply as a Hindu Brahmin. The counter-canonical thrust stems from the
fact that Ramanujan as expatriate Indian responds to his Hindu background in a way that is highly skeptical, if
not utterly irreverential. Cultural displacement does accentuate nostalgia for nation, and in some cases might
breed a sense of communal consciousness. This nostalgia or invocation, both of nation and dharma, in
Ramanujans poetry is not salutary or panegyric. In fact, displacement provides a critical distance too, a
perspective very different to see through the granted construct of dharma. A nostalgic pull is invariably
counter-balanced by the critical pull. The religious credo of Ramanujans poetry therefore has to be seen in
terms of his re-interpretation and re-contextualization of Hinduism in the light of his high modernist surroundings,
and the overtly nativist leanings of the poet.
Religious identity is central to Ramanujans poetic output for two reasons primarily one, he is a Brahmin of
the Deep South, another, he is intellectually aware of Hindu mythos and rituals. He inherits the relatively
untainted form of South Indian brahminism. As a translator of Shiva and Vishnu hymns and Sangam poetry of
love and war, along with a compiler of Indian folk-tales from the oral tradition, his portfolio of being an extra-
ordinary Hindu becomes almost complete and impeccable. But religion is never an unqualified or absolute
metaphor of realization, nor is it an emptied or exhausted signifier of ritual. Local cultural factors pull down its
canonicity. Modernism likewise, too makes a visible dent in the poetic universe of the poet, but never is it
heralded as an inevitable and exclusive credo of self-emancipation.
To begin with, there are poems wherein some Hindu belief or philosophic ideal forms the main subject matter.
In poems like Conventions of Despair , A Devotees Complaint , Guru , A Meditation , Pleasure and
Second Sight , the tension between religion on one hand and modernity on the other hand generates the
necessary creative impetus. In Conventions of Despair modernism, hitherto privileged for its open-endedness,
becomes a credo of ritualism, no less closed than the so-called institutionalized religion. Consequently both
modernism and religion as frames of conventions become the target of the poets critical despair. Modernism,
despite its promises of freedom and choice is not free from the tyranny of rituals. In day-to-day practice
modernism, boils down to some set practices which ossify later on into standard rituals. In the poem Ramanujan
catalogues a number of stylized responses that construct and at the same time de-construct the discourse of
modernism thus:
Marry again. See strippers at the Tease.
Touch Africa. Go to movies.
Impale a six-inch spider
under a lens. Join the Test-
ban, or become The Outsider
Or pay to shake my fist
(or whatever-you-call-it) at a psychoanalyst.
Modernism is a fetish, a stereotypical way of life. The eight-nine images reveal beyond doubt the fetishism in-
built within the so-called emancipating and progressive project of modernism. If divorces, live-in relationships,
re-marriage etc. are symptomatic of unstable modern family life, striptease is the modern hedonistic way of
209 A.K. Ramanujan
releasing libidinal energies. Africa, with its exotica and innocence, is the new destination of rapacious colonial
modern mindset. It is fashionable to be the flag-bearer of some pro-environment or anti-nuclear weapons or
anti-apartheid movement.
The conventions of religiousity are not easy to forsake in order to give way to the conventions of modernism:
But sorry, I cannot unlearn/ conventions of despair. Relgion, deep seated as it is, cannot be unlearnt despite
its so-called obscurantism and orthodoxy. The association of despair with conventions is quite significant. At
one level, it stands for Hindu ideal of forsaking of material gains or earthly joy, at another level it stands for
poets disenchantment with abstract spiritualism intrinsic to Hindu world-view. The grand Hindu metaphysics
of rising above the worldly pleasures is ironically summed up thus: weep/ iron tears for winning what I should
have lost . The poets religious background only brings back the archaic despair , yet it is not obsolete or
defunct to be relinquished once for all.
Is reason, an alternative to religious faith? Ramanujan does not approve of modern rationality as the ultimate
answer to spiritual sickness. Reason is too brittle to withstand the pressures of the outside world: Reason,
locked out of the chicken coop/ fearful of eagles it cannot see . The archetypal fears overtake the rational
mind. In his moments of belief in unbelief the poets seeks a crumb of faith to sustain his mortal self. He,
who is otherwise committed to enlightenment ideals of reason and secularism, gravitates towards the gypsy
tents of witchcraft . The zodiac, he thinks, circulates my [his] blood . Ramanujan inherits this duality between
science on one hand and astrology on the other from his father. In a poem Real Estate , the poet-persona
caricaturizes his rationalist architect cousin who would calculate stress and strain on wood/ and steel to
utmost perfection to design his buildings.. The indisciplined poet-persona instead would know/ windows
without walls . Reason despite its glass-like apparent transparency does not enamour the poet.
Meditation is an exercise of knowing ones own self through concentration. It is an act of internalizing the
external. Ramanujan, once again, as an egoistic bhakta, does not seek a meditation that denies the devotee his
humanity, or that reduces the devotee into a blank entity, forgetful of the mundane and even excremental
realities of life. In the poem A Meditation , the poet is apprehensive of losing the normal human touch in the
process of meditation: In the course of a meditation/ I thought all day I was a black/ walnut tree . It is not only
the fear of rigidity that meditation might breed in him, it is the fear of insensitivity that troubles him all the more:
as I stood waiting for the traffic
light, [the golden retriever] lifted its hind leg
and honoured me
with its warm piss.
The traffic lights are suggestive of hectic modern life, where any exclusive meditation amounts to resignation
or easy escapism. The poet is not against meditation, provided it does not de-humanize the bhakta mentally as
well as physically. The dogs warm piss is a befitting reminder of lifes ordinariness.
In Ramanujans poetry, there is no such anxiety to hitch on to the bandwagon of mach-fancied Indian spirituality.
There is no such urge to underplay sensual pleasure in favour of a long celibacy. In the poem Pleasure , the
poet describes rather vividly how a Jaina monk is torn asunder by his oath of long celibacy and the sensuous
spring/ fever :
lusting now as never before
for the reek and sight
of a mango bud, now tight and now
loosening into petal
stamen and butterfly,
his several mouths
Poetry 210
thirsting for breast,
buttocks, smells of finger,
long hair, short hair, . . .
The more the monk tries to suppress his sensual/sexual desires, the more they come forth. The carnal desires
become irrepressible if they are denied unnaturally. It really needs Ramanujans intellectual audacity to suggest
that celibacy too is a kind of perversion. A point comes when celibacy itself becomes a kind of perverted
pleasure:
skin roused even by
whips, self touching self,
all philosophy slimed
by its own saliva,
cool Ganges turning
sensual on him,
Ramanujan apparently does not idealize celibacy, nor is he in favour of abnegation of sensual pleasure. The
sensual is not detrimental to the spiritual, rather it is the medium through which the spiritual is to be realized.
The self-styled spiritual leaders of Hindu dharma, the saffronized saints that occupy the dharma-bazaar are
targeted in the poem The Guru . Ramanujan is not an uncritical worshipper whose devotion to the guru would
remain unflinching forever. Gurus message to forgive the weasel his tooth , the tiger his claw is well taken,
but the latter part of message do not give woman her freedom/ nor man his midday meal till he begs - is
plain hypocrisy. After hearing the sacred sermons of the guru, he leaves the luxurious guru to clean his own
shoe/ for I [he] remembered I [he] was a man born of woman . To Ramanujan worshipping is not an act of
total surrender, it is not boot-licking. The dignity of the self is paramont to the modern worshipper who would
not let his guru go unaccountable.
In Ramanujans Hindoo Poems, the high Hindu ideals of disinterestedness, third eye, souls upward march
after death etc. come under severe critical scrutiny. These poems offer insights into this interface between
religion on one hand and modern skeptical thinking on the other. In Hinduism, at the level of philosophy, the
body-soul conflict is settled invariably in favour of the soul. It is believed that after death, the imperishable soul
- the so-called essence of life leaves the physical frame and rises upwards the sky. Ramanujan caricaturizes
the body-soul fissure created in all religious discourses, including Hinduism through a very non-religious, if not
irreverent and heathen, invocation to dear body that brought me [him]/ curled in womb and memory . In his
A Hindu to His Body , the poet inverts the traditional Hindu focus by asserting the participation of the
physical in the spiritual. Without physical attestation, the experience of the so-called ecstatic spiritual is nothing
more than a rarefied rumour. Body is a metaphor of the poets tangible being for it empowers him to clutch/
at grace, at malice; and ruffle/ someone elses hair . Self-caricaturization is an important strategy to engender
an air of impersonality and intellectual withdrawal from the emotive issue/ situation. Therefore when the poet
pleads the soul not to abandon him, he is aware of his being garrulous: my garrulous face . In fact in many
ways, Ramanujans entire attitude towards dharma is marked by this garrulity which acts like a double-edged
weapon in his poetry. The poetry becomes a plea for and against the so-called moral and the metaphysical.
The ending of the poem reveals unmistakably the poets desire to experience physically the spiritual fullness.
This is an unusual desire, for spiritual fullness is not possible by being aware of the body at the same time. The
poet pleads: let me go with you and feel the weight/ of honey-hives in my branching / and the burlap weave of
weaver-birds/ in my hair . Honey-hives and burlap weave are signifiers of souls refulgence. There is an
underlying metaphor of human-body-as-tree holding honey-hives and nests of weaver-birds. The poet-as-
pleader would not mind losing the human face or his unkissed/ alien mind in the process of death, but he is not
211 A.K. Ramanujan
ready to part away with his sensory perceptions. The poem, once again, brings into focus, the metaphysical
vagueness in-built in Hinduism. As a self-reflexive modernist, Ramanujan fails to reconcile with the so-called
grand spiritual course of the soul. There is no attempt to absolutize either dharma to the total exclusion of
modern imperatives and vice versa.
Disinterestedness as a principle of objectivity and equipoise is central to Hindu metaphysics. In his poem THE
HINDOO: he reads his GITA and is calm at all events , Ramanujan deflates this high metaphysical doctrine
first through overstatement and then through understatement. On the plane of existence, disinterestedness
may well be mistaken for indifference and apathy. The poets uses of semantic equivalents unstuck and
stand apart which de-mythicize the concept of non-attachment implicit in disinterestedness. In philosophical
terms, withdrawal does not imply non-participation; rather it marks a higher stage of awareness that involves
itself in human action and yet has the capacity to be impartial and dispassionate. In lines quoted below the poet
brings forth the existential dimensions of the metaphysical doctrine thus:
. . . ., I do not marvel
When I see good and evil: I just walk
Over the iriidescence
Of horsepiss after rain. Knives, bombs, scandal,
And cowdung fall on women in wedding lace:
Disinterestedness as a principle of self-denial stands transformed into an existential precept of survival. Dharma
as concept takes on a rather mundane form on the level of praxis. In the face of all-round violence and chaos,
the poets preferred response is that of careful and calculated silence: I say nothing, I take care not to gloat.
The unreality of disinterestedness is suggested through another telling reversal towards the end of the poem.
The impossibility of rising above the genealogical past is brought forth thus: Yet when I meet on a little boys
face/ The prehistoric yellow eyes of a goat/ I choke, for ancient hands are at my throat . Inheritance is an
inescapable aspect of life that no intellectual or meditational endeavour can wish away. One may choose to
overlook the outer violence, but the inner violence, i.e., violence caused by the tyrannical genetic code is
impossible to get rid of. The Darwinian dictum that man is a descendent of monkey belittles mans grand claims
to metaphysics. The pre-historic and the archaic is eternally present in us to checkmate and, as the poet says,
even choke our high designs. Built around the dialectics of cohesive dharma on one hand and amorphous
existence, on the other, the poem brings forth the diverse pulls within the poets Hindu self. Not satisfied at the
rarefied abstractions of dharma, Ramanujan seeks dharma at the level of praxis.
Violence is negation of life. Non-violence therefore constitutes the core of Hindu metaphysics for it not only
fits into the non-dual frame of advait; it also facilitates a stable and relatively quiet social order. In his poem
THE HINDOO: he doesnt hurt a fly or a spider either , Ramanujan traces the roots of non-violence in him
from the impotency and cowardice of his Great Grandfather who could not save his great swinging grandfather
from the fisherman lover who waylaid her/ on the ropes in the Madras harbour . The high principle of non-
violence has deliberately been equated with non-action or some latent weakness in character. The poet as a
descendent of his still and mute Great Grandfather bears not only his name , he inherits his spirit too.
Indirectly, the poet does acknowledge the inescapable hold of dharma on his mental being, but not without
exposing its politics. The postmodern strategy of misreading history does enable the poet in understanding the
politics of dharma.
The asceticism in-built in Hinduism has emerged as a perfect metaphor for a creative postmodernist revision in
Ramanujans religion-centred poems. True that life is a bottomless/ enterprise but it needs to be lived fully.
Instead of being bogged by cold morality, the poet advises us to keep the hearts simple given beat/ through a
neighbours striptease or a friends suicide ( THE HINDOO: the only risk ). The neighbours striptease
and friends suicide are symptomatic of volatile postmodern life style. The poet subverts the Hindu ideal of
fasting or abstaining from food when he says: Always and everywhere, to eat/ three square meals at regular
Poetry 212
hours. The petty and petulant, the dirty and murky realities must be faced head on with a sense of challenge.
The ascetic-moral frame if stretched to its extremes, can breed in an element of heartlessness in an orthodox
Hindu. The postmodern misreading of asceticism within Hinduism does enable the poet to critique it.
In his treatment of Hindu myths, Ramanujan once again reveals his predicament of being a product of hyper-
real constructs of religion on one hand and (post-)modernity on the other. Myths as grand fables do attract him,
but their grandeur does not remain intact. The archetypal hold of mythology on the poets religious mindset and
the enticements of postmodernism inherent in the Chicago milieu generate a unique poetic mix in which nothing
remains insular or unmixed.
In Mythologies I , the divine becomes Terror with a baby face . But the irony is that it is this Terror only
that redeems him; it suck[s] me [him] dry. Drink[s] my [his] venom/ Renew[s] my [his] breath . The poet
identifies himself with a demon full of poison and milk . The acceptance of mythology is typically playful. The
seemingly contradictory combination of poison and milk and Terror with a baby face once again point out
a mixed character of Ramanujans poetic universe. It is this playfulness that lends a distinct creative edge in
Ramanujans poetry. He does not rationalize myths, nor does he sulk under them as a helpless spell-bound,
submissive conservative. Ramanujans poetry does neither valorize, nor rationalize any of the constructs of
either canonical dharma or high modernism or loud nativism, it is more a poetry of negotiation between these
opposite cultural pulls.
Mythologies 2 is a creative reflection on famous Hiranyakshyapa-myth where Vishnu taking the shape of
half- man, half-lion, i.e., Narasimha disembowels the pride of arrogant and clever King Hiranyakashyapa
who earlier through the perfect boon of not to be slain by demon, god, or by/ beast, not by day nor by night,/
by no manufactured weapon etc. had ensured immortality for himself. Instead of seeking the perfect insularity
from death, the poet as devotee seeks his ordinary vision to be re-adjusted to see all things double . Such a
vision is more useful than the impossible immortality. Immortality is blindness. Seeing things double is not
doubt or lack of sight, it is rather seeing the ambivalence of things clearly.
In Mythologies 3 , the fashionable binary of the sensuous and the spiritual has once again been invoked to
underline their complimentarity and inclusiveness in the making of the self. The groom of Shivas worshipper
Akka encounters unprecedented situation, a unique experience which is neither sensuous, nor spiritual, a
caress like nothing on earth as Akka becomes death-/ly cold to [his] mortal touch but remains hot for
Gods/ first move . But soon as the groom continues to hover around her, she after initial indifference, throws
away her modesty, as the rods/ and cones of her eyes gave [give] the world a new birth . It is through the
groom that Akka sees Him then, unborn, form of forms , the Rider .
In Ramanujans prayer-poems , the double-edgedness of Hindoo poems becomes all the more sharp and
acute as the divine is invoked and deflated at the same time. The invocation is not unconditional and unqualified.
The poets Prayers to Lord Murugan present a rather non-conformist version of Tirumurugattrupadai [ A
Guide to the Holy Murugan] in which fifth century Tamil poet Nakkirar sings the praises of Lord Murugan, the
ancient Dravidian god of fertility, joy, youth, beauty, war and love. In this original Tamil Guide, Murugan is
valorized as the war god of the Dravidians, and the patron deity of the kuravas or hunting tribes of the
dravidian country . The ironic subversion begins right at the outset. In the original Tamil prayers, Lord Murugan
shows his presence at all festivals/ that are with much pomp held on holidys . The rejoicing followers herald
his arrival and presence with the flag that bears/ the image of cock . In Prayer -1 , the sceptic persona of
Ramanujans prayers does not herald His arrival as simply an arrival of goodwill and harmony among the
worshipping tribal; rivalries too appear with his arrival. The image of cock as symbol of victory in war reveals
the rivalries within the tribes. Therefore the intellectual persona sees in His arrival, the arrival of both love and
hate: lovers and rivals/ arrive/ at once with cockfight and banner-/dance . The wishfulness in-built in the
religious psalms, hymns and prayers is undone by the intervention of self-reflexive persona of the modern
poetry.
213 A.K. Ramanujan
In Prayer-2 , the poet expresses his sense of bewilderment at the six faces of Lord Murugan: Twelve etched
arrowheads/ for eyes and six unforeseen /faces and you are were not/embarrassed . More than simply
deprecating the supernatural divine, the poet deprecates his own shaky and tentative self. The poet wonders
how twelve eyes and six faces of the divine make love to one woman when he with his only one human face
and two eyes finds it difficult to do so. It is at once an admission of the fallible human love and a dig at divines
extra-ordinary indulgence.
In Prayers 3,4,5 the poet juxtaposes the mythical with the existential. As a denizen of a modern city Chicago,
the poet asks the red god Murugan:
will the red flower ever
come to the branches
of the blueprint
city?
The mythical red is set in contrast with the modern blue. The colour red in the original prayers is suggestive of
vibrant tribal life. The red robes made up of red flowers and leaves of asoka symbolize healthy fearless life.
The poet questions the relevance of red when Our blood is brown;/ our collars white . The colours brown and
white represent the cold and corrupt urban sensibility. Questioning the divine is not non-religious or irreligious,
it may well be a strategy of self-criticism.
The crisis of retaining and preserving the average human face needs to be addressed first and foremost:
Lord
of faces
find us the face
we lost early
early this morning
Only gods can afford the luxury of having six faces while the poet struggles to save his one and only face. His
plea for the preservation of his only human face may be taken as a hearty laugh at the multi-faced god, but it
also is a naughty dig at the unfaithful and dishonest worshipper. The poet true to his radical re-visionary
leanings does not want god to be in the headlines, at the same time he does not want god to be absolutely
absent: Lord of headlines,/ Help us read / The small print . The very idea of being endowed with a rarefied
sixth sense is fanciful and remote to his human experience: Lord of the sixth sense/ Give us/ Our five senses .
The poet seeks intuitive as well as empirical knowledge for both together sustain human life. Only sixth
sense is not enough to sustain it, the ordinary five senses must respond first; the sixth is to be achieved
through first five.
Ramanujan as worshipper seeks dissolution but without any risk of drowning: Lord of solutions/ Teach us to
dissolve/And not to drown . To G.N.Devy, the prayers in a way mark the limited range of Ramanujans plunge
into the unknown infinite: To belong is to drown oneself in ones particular context. Ramanujan would be
willng to drown himself only eye-deep . . . he would altogether resist drowning . In fact, Ramanujans
religious poetry is neither a total denial of self, nor an unabashed assertion of it. It is poetry of a man-in the
process as against man as product. It is a poetry of a critical devotee in the process of dissolution as against
the non-critical worshipper who is already drowned. In Prayer - 9 , the poet caught in the discourse of
absences and aporias seeks a deliverance from them: Deliver us O presence/ From proxies/And absences
Being needs to be defined both in terms of the presence and the absence. The poet does never think in terms
of abandoning the religion altogether, but he does not want to live in the world of the absent or the non-
material perpetually. Mrs. S. Sengupta rightly sums up the poetic credo of Ramanujans religious poems thus:
[his poetry] seems to be engaged in wresting existential meanings in God and religion through down to earth
mocking images . More than the criticism of the divine, the prayers are petitions for self-appraisal.
Poetry 214
Bhakti saint-poetry definitely forms the sphere of influence in Ramanujans poetry. Here an extended analysis
of Fear No Fall a poem written on Arunagiri, a Tamil saint-poet provides us important clues about
Ramanujans approach towards bhakti poetry and paradigms in general. Arunagiri, rich and spoiled , was a
womanizer too. He spent his youth whoring after woman till one of them sucked him dry/ of all his juices,/
gave him syphilitic sores/ in all the wrong places/ / and threw him out,. . . / on the garbage heap . Unhoused
Arunagiri roams till an Old Man implores him to sing of Murugan as the only remedy of his despair deeper
than his wounds . Arunagiri, illiterate, one who didn t have an alphabet/ in his past nor ever a tune in his
head suddenly begins to form new lines and songs from the first line given to him by the Old Man. Arunagiris
songs now can be seen twining around trees, ensnaring/ passerby, unlocking cages/ even for mynahs and
parrots.
Against the divine experience of illiterate but enlightened Arunagiri, the poet evaluates his own pursuit of
knowledge. He finds himself overtaken by the load of books: I was tottering without a foothold/ on a ramshackle
pyramid/ of all my books piled . . . He fears fall, till voice both within and without comes, Fall, fall/ youll
never fear a fall again . Clearly the poet accepts the fallibility of man, and it is in this fallibility that he seeks
a room for redemption. In canonical dharma, fall is irrevocable; it is a condition of no-return. In bhakti poetry,
there is always a scope for return. Academic knowledge is no substitute for wisdom or spiritual awareness.
Overtly the poet seems to endorse the bhakti cult for its being eclectic.
The pertinent question that needs to be addressed is: Can Ramanujan be placed in the bhakti tradition of poets
or poetry for his being eclectic and unconventional towards the canonical dharma? Most often by critics and
Indian English poets themselves, the contemporary Indian English poetry is placed in the protest discourses of
say Kabir or Tukaram or any other bhakti saint. True that in respect of negotiating and even subverting the
religious paradigms, its orthodox practices and rituals, Indian English poets seem to carry forward the bhakti
tradition of iconoclasm. But their claims to bhakti tradition cannot be stretched beyond a point. In bhakti
poetry, the divine is never ridiculed, questioned or lampooned, its the brahmanical order, the institutionalized
and monopolized religion that comes under fire. The bhakti poets, even in their moments of vehement protest,
remain essentialist or spiritual or sacred.
The Indian English poets including Ramanujan approach the divine with humanistic considerations - considerations
which do not necessarily lionize the human as an alternate centre of universe, but as one who is corruptible and
fallible. In other words, the protest in bhakti poetry stems from a deep conviction of the spiritual and the
sacred, whereas in the poetry of Ramanujan the protest stems from a deep awareness of the devotee being an
ordinary vulnerable human being who cannot live on mere abstract ideals. Secondly in terms of language too,
the bhakti poetry used the native idiom, the local dialects; Ramanujans medium is not only alien, it is colonial
too. Bhakti movement was a social protest, a peoples movement; Indian English poetry is at best an elite
intellectual response from outside.
Ramanujans poetry, therefore is neither a substitute of dharma; nor just a trick to blow up the established
images/ icons upside-down. It does neither rise up to the quasi-religious expectations of Arnold; nor does it end
up as a playful discourse of utter irreverence. It is poetry neither of the counter-sublime, nor of a minor
corrective swerve. It does not tread any middle path either. Dharma, in its canonical form, proves to be an
unrealistic proposition; and postmodernism, with all its irresponsible playfulness, an utterly non-viable credo.
This poetry therefore is a double-edged discourse which does not throw any easy alternatives. Even in poems
where postmodern poetics of subversion and caricaturization operate overtly, dharma as an underlying impulse
of order counterbalances the parodic drift. This inner drama of sublime and the subliminal generates a poetry
of process in which there is a constant re-defining of the granted and the trendy, the inherited and the prevalent,
the past and the present, the native and the foreign.
In the crossfire of the two grand-narratives of dharma and postmodernism what ultimately stands out is the
poets kavi-karma. Ramanujans kavi-karma lies in his being creatively responsive to the reality, inherited as
well as adopted, context-specific as well as context-free . This responsiveness, as shown above, at times
215 A.K. Ramanujan
might lend a partly non-reverential edge to his poetry, but it does vindicate his dharma of being a poet. The
dharma of poetry consists in being skeptic about and interrogative towards the received notions of dharma
per se.
With the kind critical revisionism in-built in Ramanujans creative responses, question of his placement in the
stereotypical matrices of tradition versus modernity, nativism versus globalism, regional versus universalist etc.
becomes quite complex. Is Ramanujan a critical traditionalist or a critical modernist or both? Or, in other
words, is he a critical insider or a critical outsider or both? His Hindu background makes him a critical insider;
his location in Chicago makes him a critical outsider. In fact the very binary of insider and outsider becomes
redundant in case of expatriate Indian poets like A.K.Ramanujan. Since critical traditionalists as well as critical
modernists do not believe in the absolutization of either tradition or modernity, Ramanujan can be placed
anywhere between these two hybridized categories.
II
If religion provides a larger frame of identity, the family as social institution acts as micro-level site of the poets
cultural moorings. Among family relations, one relation that occupies the central stage in Ramanujans family-
scape is understandably that of mother. What lifts this relationship beyond ordinary son-mother oedipal pull is
the expatriate status of the author. Displacement as a condition of culture, on one hand triggers off a deeper
sense of nostalgia for home as motherland, on the other it provides a necessary distance to critically examine
it. The fact that Ramanujan has written five-six poems on his relationship with his mother is an indication
enough of the feverish pitch with which he as a displaced subject re-invokes the old metaphor of mother as
motherland. But the crucial question is: does Ramanujan engender new significations in the stereotypical trope
or does he merely work within the earlier nationalist poetics and politics of deifying the mother as insular,
incorruptible, sacred, timeless motherland?
Deployment of mother as motherland has been a regular feature in nationalist rhetoric right from colonial times,
but it gains a renewed urgency in the postmodern phase of cross-national nomadism. In the wishful nationalist
accounts, India is often invoked as bharat mata, pure, pious and spiritual to the core. From Bankims famous
Vande Matram, to Ananda Coomaraswamys short narrative Mata Bharata , to Nehrus famous explication
of what constitutes Bharat Mata to villagers in his Discovery of India, one can count any number of
references to the myth of mother in nationalist discourse. Of course Mahboob Khans famous blockbuster
Mother India in fifties contributed a lot to the consolidation of the construction of mother in terms of moral
and spiritual motherhood. Ramanujan, as a post-nationalist, not strictly in terms of credo, but in terms of his
location between two cultures, does revive the myth of mother but with qualifications and a measure of
reflexivity and re-vision. The simultaneous play of home and return in his poetry generates a perspective of
mother (as motherland), which may not be as cataclysmic as to overturn the received notions of motherhood,
but is critical enough to unravel the politics of mothers sublimation into an essential being one who is cut off
from the material and historical conditions of life.
To begin with, Ramanujan despite his playful and subversive tendencies does not discount the pull of the
umbilical chord. Rather, it is so strong that at every possible chance of its being snapped or severed off, the
poet-persona cherishes its intimate hold, all the more. The chord is a kind of hanger that engenders in him a
sense of belongingness and attachment right from the embryonic stage onwards: A foetus in an acrobats
womb/ . . . . / hanger-on in terror of the fall/ while the mother-world turns somersaults ( Alien ). But what
distinguishes Ramanujan from erstwhile nationalist accounts of mother is that his mother is extremely unstable,
turbulent and mobile. A pregnant mother as an acrobat taking somersaults unsettles the usual connotations of
stable and measured motherhood and maternity. Also in the poem, instead of using mother as metaphor of
nation, with its distinct cartographic and cultural co-ordinates, the poet-persona employs mother as signifier of
world, thus extending its frontiers beyond narrow nationalistic bounds.
Womans body is seen analogous with nature , and mother is often projected as a flowering tree . In his
commentary on a very famous folk-tale entitled A Flowering Tree , Ramanujan dwells on the relationship of
Poetry 216
flowering with mothering in the Indian context thus: A tree that has come to flower or fruit will not be cut
down; it is treated as a mother, a woman who has given birth. Thus the metaphoric connections between a tree
and a woman are many and varied in the culture. A relevant one here is that words for flowering and
menstruation are the same in languages like Sanskrit and Tamil. In Sanskrit, a menstruating woman is called
a puspavati, a woman in flower and in Tamil, puttal ( flowering ) means menstruation . Menstruation itself
is a form and a metaphor for a womans special creativity. Thus a womans biological and other kinds of
creativity are symbolized by flowering.

(A Flowering Tree) In his poem Of Mothers, among other things , the
poet-persona revives the image of mother as tree I smell upon this twisted/ blackbone tree . . . . ; but the
tree is all dried up: Her sarees/ do not cling: they hang, loose . . . . The diligence of mother is appreciated
much in the traditional vein: and I see my mother run back/ from rain to the crying cradles , but once again she
is rather crippled and overworked:
But her hands are a wet eagles
two black pink-crinkled feet,
one talon crippled in a garden-
trap set for a mouse. . .
In this poem, the mother remains confined to the inner domain of domesticity. But far from providing her a
sense of fulfillment, it is a domain of her constant entropy and attrition. The silver and youth/ petal of my [his]
mothers youth dwindles down to loose/ feather of a onetime wing . The poem as a whole could be seen as
a parody of Bankims Vande Matram, where the mother is eulogized in terms as romantic as these:
Mother I bow to thee!
Rich with thy hurrying streams,
Bright with thy orchard gleams,
Cool with thy winds of delight
Dark fields waving, mother of might
Mother free
Glory of moonlight dreams
The association of mother with nature is not as easy and mutually conducive as is made out in the spiritualized
nationalist historiography. ( Ecology ). As the poet-persona comes back after the seasons first rain, from a
distance he spots our [their] three Red Champak Trees . The flowering tree makes him utterly unhappy
because it gives her Mother/ her first blinding migraine/ of the season . The street-long heavy-hung/ yellow
pollen despite all measures to block it, enters through the porous door to cause the allergic ache. Mother
deeply religious as she is, would not let the poet-persona cut down a flowering tree . She has a life-long
association with the tree, seeded, she said, by a passing birds/ providential droppings . If the flowering tree
gave her gods and her daughters/ and daughters daughter basketfuls of annual flower , it also bequeathed
one line of cousins/ a dower of migraines in season. In the phallocentric nationalist discourse nature is seen
as the very hub of womans blossoming, but it requires Ramanujan to undo the myth of flowering tree as an
unquestionably benign presence in the family courtyard. Questioning the newfangled credo of ecofeminism,
the poet-persona locates the cause of Mothers sickness in the flowering of the tree.
The extraordinary relationship with the mother(-land) comes to fore in a poem entitled Farewells . Going
away from mother is no easy rupture, it transcends all formulaic farewells. The poet catalogues a number of
farewells that are farewells without , i.e., farewells without any real inner involvement. First, there is a usual
farewell drama at railway stations, when standing at the window of your friend , [you] wait for the delayed
train to come on the platform. Then there is that recurring farewell/ to the lady president/ of the cooperative
society when colleagues present her a silver medal but forget to get inscribed her name over it. There is yet
another type of a dramatic farewell: farewell/ of the dying patriarch/ among all his clan . The death of the
grandfather in a family also has its typical setting:
217 A.K. Ramanujan
mother crying into her sari, father busy on the phone
trying to locate brothers
on trains that do not arrive
according to the time changes in April.
It is only mothers farewell where sentiments flow without verbalization, without tears even. Mother only takes
a long look/ that moved on your body/ from top to toe . The possessive maternal gaze is counter-poised with
the moment of his farewell. She bids her son farewell with the advice that you should/ not forget your oil bath/
every Tuesday/ when you go to America . While acknowledging the sincerity of mothers emotions, the poet-
persona as the departing son, also ridicules her for being too fastidious on things like oil bath/ every Tuesday
etc. In Ramanujans poetry, very much in consonance with nationalist ideal of motherhood, motherhood stands
for purity of response; but this purity is too much for the persona to bear. Rather than idealizing his mothers
purity, it is her navety that the poet-persona is concerned with. The humour of mother advising her expatriating
son to observe daily rituals cannot be missed. Unlike the serious nationalists, Ramanujan takes the liberty of
being playful and naughty. Mothers crying into sari is more melodramatic than just sombre.
Mother (as an embodiment of home) is a lingering presence, but her immortality is no cause for celebration.
After her death she makes a comeback in the form of a toothache which the poet-persona suffers in his left
jaw. This ache reminds him of the same kind of pain which his mother had suffered just before her death: . ..;
its mother again/ complaining of the large tooth/ in her left jaw/ the week before she died ( Tooth ). Mother
is both a pain and a fond remembrance. Though she is ignorant, yet in moments of pain she is a healer. In a
poem entitled Pain , the poet-persona invokes his mother to kiss away my [his] pain/ as she has always
done .
In the poem Returning , the home-mother symbiotic relationship is exploited to underline the poets increasing
longing and at the same time alienation from his intrinsic cultural self. In the opening stanza of the poem, the
poet-persona wary of outer blaze seeks to return to his home, to be precise, his mothers comforting lap, but
she is no longer there:
Returning home one blazing afternoon,
He looked for his mother everywhere.
She wasnt in the kitchen, she wasnt
In the backyard, she wasnt anywhere.
Kitchen and backyard are two culturally less-exposed space-segments of a conventional house where emotions
flourish without make-up. The exterior domain is blazing , by implication the interior is cozy and comforting.
The poet goes inward as he looks even under the beds only to find old shoes and dustballs . The seriousness
of the enterprise is sufficiently punctured by the presence of old shoes and dustballs . The inner space in
absence of mother is all stinky and dust-ridden. He rushes out, this time more frantically, but the effort goes in
vain:
Where are you? I m home! I m hungry!
But there was no answer, not even an echo
In the deserted street blazing with sunshine.
Suddenly he realizes the impossibility of his enterprise. The home is not simply retrievable. With the death of
the mother long back, he had lost contact with his motherland irrevocably: Suddenly he remembered he was
now sixty-one/ and he hadn t had a mother for forty years ( Returning ). The exterior world is deserted ;
inner too is desolate and answer-less. In Ramanujans poetry, the eternity and essential purity of motherland is
never taken for granted.
Ramanujans mother is a hard-task master and motherhood therefore in his poetry is not a soft cushion to rest
on. Well-meaning mothers teach bitter lessons to their children: Mother smear bitter neem/ paste on their
nipples/ to wean greedy babies ( A Taste ). Intelligent mothers, Ramanujan would conclude thus, give them
Poetry 218
[their children] an inexplicable taste for bitter gourd/ late in life . Clearly good motherhood is not just pampering
the child, it is disciplining him as well. Mother thus is a giver of both sweet milk and bitter neem; she is a
remembrance, recuperative as well as painful, if her touch can heal the wound, her toothaches can re-surface
in the teeth of the poet-persona at a later stage. Mother stands for both freedom and bondage, reinforcing thus
the double-edgedness of experience in Ramanujans poetic vision.
Father is no less an important relation, and in the nationalist construction of patriarchy, he stands for outer
material world, reformatory colonial influences, scientific Western education and authority. Ramanujan as son
and later on a father himself, while working very much within the rubric of nationalist division of domains
inner and outer between mother and father respectively, makes his own adjustments and critical alterations.
Despite all his disagreements, he could be seen grateful to the father for enabling him to understand the tyranny
of fatherhood/ colonialism. In A Wobbly Top , Ramanujan describes his relationship with his father as two
perfect concentric circles on the fast moving wobbly top. Interestingly it is father who gifts the top to the son.
In other words, it is the father who provides his son, the occasion, the medium and the tools necessary for
disagreement with his son. This kind of dialogic relationship with the father ensures that in Ramanujans poetry
colonialism or Western education is not utterly undesirable. Colonial education provides tools for its critique.
In Obituary , the dead father is invoked in a rather unceremonious manner thus: Father when he passed on,
/ left dust/ on a table full of papers/ left debts and daughters . The poem could be read as an obituary on the
demise of colonialism in India. By the time British left India, it was thoroughly impoverished, effete and debt-
ridden. The caricature of father is drawn in terms which are not innocuously humourous: Being the burning
type,/ he burned properly/ at the cremation . Such is the sense of outrage against colonial excesses, that the
caricature fails to camouflage the anger. More than just the psychology of oedipal aggression which a son
evinces against the father, it is the politics of colonialism that is at work in such descriptions. The place and
manner of fathers birth and death are mentioned in terms that are more derisive than mere descriptive: his
caesarian birth/ in a brahmin ghetto/ and his death by heart-/ failure in the fruit market . But despite all his ire
against his father, the persona realizes the irrevocability of history: And he left us/ a changed mother/ and
more than/ one annual ritual . Father and mother do not constitute neat exclusive binary, the outer domain does
influence and change the inner. The annual ritual here stands for elaborate Independence Day celebrations
that the nation is obliged to observe every year.
Unlike the nationalists, Ramanujans persona does not look upon his father as utterly oblivious of Indian traditions
and value-system. The father is a strange bundle of contradictions, traditional to the core, yet very modern in
terms of his intellectual make up, a learned astronomer who believes in astrology. This is how the poet-persona
portrays him: Sky-man in a manhole/ with astronomy for dream,/ astrology for nightmare ( Astronomer ).
Ghetto , fruit-market and manhole are obviously not very enchanting locations for the father to live and
survive. The so-called outer domain assigned to patriarchy is also ghettoized in the sense that it also tends to be
exclusive and arrogant.
The post-colonial self bastardized to the core by the colonial past is rendered permanently disabled into having
any sustained relationship. Marriage, especially adult marriage, instead of mitigating alienation compounds it,
for according to Ramanujan it is at best a contractual or arranged relationship between two evolved individuals
with totally different cultural histories. The wife as an outsider is an unwanted presence in Ramanujans
genealogical space mapped out in Extended Family . In the poem, right from grand-father to unborn
great great-grand-son , every one bequeaths a legacy to the making or unmaking of the poet-persona, the
conspicuously missing link space is wife. It is not that the poet-persona constructs his home in exclusive
patriarchal terms only; mother, daughter and even sister are acknowledged as significant contributors to the
making of his self.
In Love Poem for Wife, 1 , the poet-persona contests the very efficacy of adult marriage with its in-built flaw
of unshared/ childhood . His wife, he finds, is much closer to her brother, whereas he and his sister-in-law are
mere blank cut outs in their [wife and her brother] old drag-out fights/ about where the bathroom was/ in the
219 A.K. Ramanujan
backyard . The poet-persona is so thoroughly disgusted with the hypocrisy of adult marriage that he would
much like to continue the incests/ of childhood into marriage . He endorses the old Egyptian practice of
marriage within family. Another suggestion to mitigate the trauma of adult marriage is equally retrogressive.
Ramanujan as a failed husband, would much prefer child marriage as a possible way out of overcoming the
problem of unshared childhood built in adult marriage:
betroth us before birth,
forestalling separate horoscopes
and mothers first periods,
and wed us in the oral cradle
and carry marriage back into
the namelessness of childhoods.
Orality as culture of the yore is Ramanujans ideal of a harmonious familial past. If marriage is to approximate
high Hindu ideal of marriage as union of two souls at all, then wife and husband must grow together right
from childhood, even before their births. Wife as a relation thus could be seen as the very site of expatriation
which fails to wean the poet-persona away from the mothers pull. Had the poet-persona gone to US much
before his birth, he could have shown interest in American history and culture. A late entry when he had
already acquired a definite cultural make-up entails an element of alienation that he eventually suffers. Marriage
in this context becomes a trope of exile .
In another Love Poem for a Wife 2 once again the distinct cultural background of the wife is narrated with
such an enviable passion that any possibility of emotional union with her looks remote and distant. The wife
blessed as she is with her inheritance in all its richness does not pay much attention to the poet-personas
passionate overtures. The wifes cultural past is recounted in terms of her vehement foregrounding in mythos,
history and natural bountifulness of Kerala, the region she belongs to. Her changing syriac face has to do
with chameleon/ emerald/ wilderness of Kerela . Her mythic/ regional consciousness is highlighted through a
playful relationship thus: a small cousin to tall/ mythic men, rubberplant / and peppervine . The print patterns
on her dresses have been copied locally/ from the dotted/ butterfly . . . full of the colour schemes/ of kraits and
gartersnakes .
One reason that Ramanujan distrusts his wife is her prurient permissive past. In Any Cows Horn Can Do It .
The wife is shown growing cold at remembering how was she belted by father/ standing on a doorstep/ with
a long strip of cowhide/ and the family idiom/ the day he caught her/ in the hotel lobby . In Love Poem for
Wife 1 , the poet-persona as husband doubts her integrity; he makes an issue of what his wife just dismissed
as an innocent/ date with a nice Muslim friend/ who only hinted at touches . As against the insular and
impeccable Hindu past of the mother, the wifes past is impure and adulterated.
In Ramanujans exclusive family, the wife is more a rival to the mother and the daughter, than a positive
relationship. In Love Poem for a Wife and Her Trees , the mother-fixated persona at once compares wifes
love with mothers warmth: youre not Mother/ certified dead but living on, /. . . ./ You remind of the difference .
America as the exiled poet-personas abode, despite all material promises is no match to the emotional comforts
that his motherland, left behind years ago, would have provided. Unborn daughter pre-occupies his mind even
though he posts letters to the wife:
Dear woman, you remind me again
in unlikely places like post offices
where I lick
your stamps, that I must remember
you re not my Daughter, unborn maybe
but always present: . . .
Poetry 220
Both dead mother and unborn daughter outlive the live wife in terms of their hold on the consciousness of
the poet-persona. Wife despite all her efforts to play mama/ sob-sister/ daughter who needs help with arithmetic/
even the sexpot nextdoor remains an Another, the faraway/ stranger whos nearby . The poet-persona is as
much an Another as his wife is. Another could as well be a signifier of Alien-nation. The irony implicit in
the expression stranger yet nearby sums up the predicament of an expatriate in an alien location, his temporary
abode.
The relationship with children daughter and son becomes very challenging in the twin context of fathers
postcolonial past and his expatriated present. With so many cultural inheritances to manage, locked as they
are in a dissenting relationship, the attitude towards children could be at best tentative and full of apprehensions.
As a father to his daughter, Ramanujan is very apprehensive about her future. In a poem, On the Very
Possible Jaundice of an Unborn Daughter written before his departure to US, the poet-persona fears a
diseased future of his unborn daughter, inherit as she would, the jaundiced legacy of his parental home. As
his father sits with the sunflower at the window/ deep in the yellow of a revolving chair and as that daffodil
too flaps all morning/ in grandmas hands , the yellowness all around his ancestral home, the poet-persona
worries, might cause jaundice to the unborn daughter congenitally. The colonial past has invalidated the present
in a manner that third-world paternity as an able, healthy and benign legacy/ practice becomes impossible.
The state of confusion that the little turtles collected by the daughter in her jar experience, reveals the inner
unease of the daughter in an alien landscape. Very much like the turtles, the daughter has to bear the cross of
many cultures as she views life from the narrow window of a Chicago apartment: grounded here, carrying a
daily cross/ of window bars, an ordinary square/ of sun, glowing and dimming with each cloud/ up there
( Some Relations: nursery turtles ). Far from their natural habitat, as these turtles try to hibernate in the jar,
they are confused by the heat of this Chicagos winter . Ramanujan appreciates that his daughter is up
against a highly disjointed present.
With so many irregularities around, Ramanujan seems to be wary of the very idea of fatherhood. Paternity is
one challenge which he would avoid to take: So beware, I say to my children/ unborn lest they choose to be
born ( Warning ,). The maverick poet-persona as father simply does not have the patience to be a vigilant
father. To love children is to possess and control them: Ill love my children/ without end,/ and do them infinite
harm ( Entries for a Catalogue of Fears ). Fatherhood is exercising authority in the name of tradition and
family-values; it is staying on the roof,/ a peeping-tom ghost/ looking for all sorts of proof/ for the present of
the past . Children are victims of paternal structures, which they suffer endlessly. The tragedy is compounded
by the fact that as they grow older they analyze its tyranny through tools and terms bequeathed to them by their
father only:
they ll serve a sentence
without any term
and know it only dimly
long afterwards
through borrowed words
and wrong analyses.
Father is perceived as a colonial master who supervises his progenies as nave natives to be civilized and taught
language and syntax ( sentence ) that would imprison them perennially.
The conscious decision to abdicate fatherly prerogatives lends an unprecedented freedom to both the father
and his children. The approach between the two does not betray hierarchy of relationship. No wonder when
the daughter approaches the father to announce her love affair with a man much older, he takes it rather
sportingly. He cites his own obsession of looking at all the women/ [that] I ve [he has] ever loved as
eighteen [years old] forever ( Love 4: what he said, to his daughter ). Another example he gives is that of
Pierre Bonnard who always painted his wife/ as thirty six/ getting in and out/ of bathtubs . . . Such playfulness
in relations seems to be the only feasible working principle among Ramanujans family-relations.
221 A.K. Ramanujan
In Ramanujans poetry, affection towards the daughter is always counter-posed with hatred towards the wife,
once again pointing towards the poet-personas unqualified disliking for the outsider in his inner space. The
daily routine of the poet-persona begins with a walk before dark with my [his] daughter , and ends with a
bed time story/ of dog, bone and shadow. A bullock cart/ in an Eskimo dream ( A Routine Day Sonnet ).
The image of bullock cart in an Eskimo dream in a very succinct and telling way sums up the bi-cultural mind-
scape of the daughter. The bedtime story is marker of native inputs that go into the making of the girl-child.
The bonhomie and playfulness during the day that the persona enjoys in the company of his daughter proves to
be short-lived. Night however is the period of acrimony, as the poet-persona as husband wake[s] with a start/
to hear my [his] wife cry her heart/ out as if from a crater in hell . The routine day sonnet comes to a violent
and brazen end: she hates me, I hate her,/ I m a filthy rat and a satyr . In another poem, Eyes, Ears, Noses,
and a Thing about Touch , the days bought flowers/ [are] crushed into a wifes night/ grouses .
On the whole, it is true that the mother is the most favoured relation, but it does not mean that Ramanujan
idealizes his mother as the granted source of comfort and warmth. This kind of dialogic approach towards
mother(land) is further complicated by the fact that other relations also keep walking in and out of his life. The
way poet-persona relates himself with them albeit reluctantly or critically proves beyond doubt the uneasiness
built in the nation-space.
III
Though not primarily a poet of landscapes, yet Ramanujan, in his effort to dig out the personal and the private,
searches for the co-ordinates of his inner experience in the concrete landscape outside. The inner is located in
the local landscape with an eye that looks as much inward as it stares outside. The in-scapes (what Ramanujan
would prefer to describe as poetry of the interior landscape) are images of the outer landscape, interiorized.
Landscape, as compulsive logic of cultural mainstay, thus stands thoroughly scrutinized by the searching poetic
eye, foreclosing the possibilities of its unqualified idealization or downright infernalization. In his earlier poetry
most of which was written prior to his departure to US, Ramanujan gives an insiders perspective of his native
landscape. In such poems, Chicago, as an adopted abode of the poet, is missing altogether. These poems offer
a perspective of home from within.
Poona Train Window is one poem that can be described exclusively as a poem of the outer landscape. It is
the ever-present window in Ramanujans crowded and claustrophobic inner landscape that makes his contact
howsoever circumscribed with the outer world possible. Looking out is no intimate act of survival, it is not
acquiring third eye. It is a hole through which the poet-persona peeps at the human carnival. Window in a
moving train provides a full length peep show to the inquisitive persona. The first image that scrolls across his
mobile window screen is that of a man defecating between two rocks, and a crow . At once one is reminded
of illustrious Indian-baiters like Naipaul and Chaudhary who run down India as a huge latrine. But Ramanujan
looks beyond as he spots a whole range of scenery outside: the blinding noise/ and the afterhush of one train
passing , a rush of children , white hair in a red turban , Six gulls/ sitting still etc. The image of
Three women with baskets
on their heads, climbing
slowly against the slope
of a hill, one of them
lop-sided, balancing
between the slope and
the basket on the head
a late pregnancy.
unfolds the adverse terrain of activity in countryside India. On one hand the image reinforces the grit and
stamina of rural woman, on the other it ridicules their capacity to produce children without much ado. The rural
women are burdened three-fold. First they walk up the hilly pathways to collect fuel and fodder; second they
Poetry 222
carry all their collection on their heads; and third, they have to manage the pull of pregnancy along with other
burdens.
There is an unsparing critique of the native landscape because it happens to be the possessive space of the
poet, and its degeneration worries him all the more. What really redeems Ramanujans approach towards his
home is this simultaneous play of love and hate, emotional intimacy and intellectual withdrawal, reification and
criticism. Indian culture is basically riverine. More than just a romantic symbol of refulgent life, the river forms
the very hub of local culture. Its invocation in poetry brings into play the dynamics of culture that thrives along
its banks. Ramanujan draws vignettes of rivers that run through the native landscape in shades not very
different form another expatriate Indian English poet R. Parthasarathy. In Ramanujans native landscape
every summer/ a river dries to a trickle in the sand,/ baring the sand ribs ( A River ). If there is
eaglewood in her [Parthasarathys river] hair/ and stale flowers , Ramanujans river too is clogged by straw
and womens hair/ . . . at the rusty bars ( A River ,). If in Parthasarathys poetry the river represents
decadence, in Ramanujans discourse, it becomes destructive too. When once in a year the river has water
enough to be poetic , it carries away/ in the first half-hour/ three village houses,/ a couple of cows/ named
Gopi and Brinda/ and one pregnant woman/ expecting identical twins . . . ( A River ). River as a trope of
nativity and nation does no longer sustain life; during summers, it stinks, and during rainy season it overflows
ominously to swallow the whole range of life on and around its shores.
In a number of poems Indian landscape has been portrayed in terms which smack of colonial arrogance, but on
a close reading one finds more than contempt it is concern that informs the fundamental response of Ramanujans
persona. At times Ramanujan does portray home as a typical Third World space, either it is too banal to offer
any respite, or too chaotic to soothe the sophisticated self: Its a dogfight/ all over. Noises, noises . The
poets Smalltown, South India is crowded with cows and buffaloes: Temple employees have whiskered
nipples./ The street cows have trapezium faces./ Buffaloes shake off flies with a twitch of ripples . In fact
Buffaloes swatting flies/ with their tails ( Poona Train Window ) is one of those many stock images that
appear in the poetry of both the poets as signifier of passive Indian mindset. In Parthasarathys Rough Passage,
instead of buffaloes, it is the bull that is surrounded with the fleas of Kodambakkam . Bulls and buffaloes,
the prime movers of agrarian Indian society are looked down upon as beasts of idleness. The Bulls and
bulldozers/ block each other/ on the road to Chidambaram ( Bulls ). By clubbing together the bulls with the
bulldozers, the poet associates the attributes of destruction with the holy bull. Home is presented as a space of
rituals where Every evening . . . bells roll in the forehead of temples . Ramanujan would like to define these
rituals/ cultural practices as conventions of despair (CP, Conventions of Despair , 35).
In his later poetry, one finds the simultaneous presence of landscapes from both Chicago and India, in a
relationship which is at best contrapunctal. In a contrapunctal, relationship, the effort is to draw out, extend,
give emphasis and voice to what is silent or marginally present or ideologically represented in one standpoint
from a reference which is external. Both Chicago and deep Indian South act as external standpoints for each
other; one brings out the strengths and weaknesses of the other.
In Chicago Zen Himalayan river and Lake Michigan are locked against each other. Chicago traffic with a
deluge of orange headlights gives the poet-persona a vision of forest fires , which in turn reminds him of the
rapid river back home:
you fall into vision of forest fires,
enter a frothing Himalayan river
rapid silent
On the 14
th
floor
Lake Michigan crawls and crawls
in the window. . . .
223 A.K. Ramanujan
Once in America, the poet-persona negotiates his estrangement through two ways one by way of imagining
Indian equivalents among things/ situations foreign, and two by way of juxtaposing them with alien landscape.
Chicago traffic lights are likened to a rapid Himalayan river which is then contrasted with the calm and still
Lake Michigan. Such equivalences or contrasts, overarching as they are, while bringing the two cultures in one
frame, serve more importantly as reference points for their mutual critiquing. It becomes very difficult to
conclude as to what is redeemed and what is ridiculed in such a frame of juxtaposition.
In Extended Family , the contrapunctal inter-locking of the alien with the native is terse and pointed:
the dry chlorine water
my only Ganges
the naked Chicago bulb
a cousin of the Vedic sun
In such a dialogic frame, while the poet-persona seems to make his adjustments in alien landscape through the
strategy of equivalences, he is also hinting at the limitations of such an enterprise. The naked Chicago bulb
is his working equivalent of Vedic sun , yet it is too facile an object to be compared with Vedic sun .
Similarly, the Ganges is discovered in the dry chlorine water , yet the equivalence is absurd and remote. The
poet-persona not only belittles the mechanical Chicago life, he also ridicules the obsessive brahmanical life-
style back home. It is not that Ramanujan cannot think independently about his cultural landscape, he is employing
Chicago not to assert any fundamentalist or rank nationalist association with his home. Both the landscapes
are juxtaposed, and yet none is redeemed. This in a way belies Jamesons exaggerated account of the encounter
of third-world-cultures with the first world capitalism, wherein he says: none of these cultures can be conceived
as anthropologically independent or autonomous, rather they are all in various distinct ways locked in a life-
and-death struggle with first-world cultural imperialism .
Straddling between two rich cultures, Ramanujan does not think in exclusive terms as one culture becomes a
ready critical frame for the other. In Take Care , the poet presumably concentrates on life in Chicago, but at
the back of his mind his native landscape works as the reference point. Here in Chicago, the native Kannada
peppergrinders or salt shakers take on the look/ of meat grinders,/ cement shakers . The black/ and
white squares/ of kitchen cloth appear as boxes against boxes/ in the grilled/ city . If the native landscape
provided time enough to stare , in Chicago there is no time/ to stand and stare . A comparative frame is so
inseparably inter-locked in the entire fabric of the poem, that while being a poem on Chicago, Take Care
becomes as much a poem on native landscape.
Through his oft-quoted poem Small-Scale Reflections on a Great House , Ramanujan gives an extended
account of the history of home/nation in terms which are ambivalent and self-critical. He looks back at
home/ nation as a trope of cultural recuperation and dissipation both. It is a matter of concern as
well as contempt. Its present state of inertia is a matter of deep concern. If the poet describes it as a
perfect breeding ground for insects, he does so with a sense of loss. In the sleepy space of this human
habitation, in the absence of real human activity in the form of frequent family get-togethers, only insects lend
life and momentum:
Unread library books
usually mature in two weeks
and begin to lay a row
of little eggs in the ledgers
for fines, as silverfish
in the old mans office roombreed dynasties among long legal words
in the succulence of
Victorian parchment.
Poetry 224
Here Unread library books in the old mans office room become the poets chosen tropes for the decrepit
home. Home a traditional referent of stability and security at once stands inverted as a referent of stagnation
and unhealthy stasis.
Home, hitherto regarded as the dynamic centre of culture, is underplayed as hub of routine life. As against the
challenges of exiled living, it offers a course of life well-laid out by family-traditions and customs. In Ramanujans
world-view too, home is domain where women who come as wives/ from houses open on one side/ to rising
suns, on another/ to the setting become accustomed to wait and to yield to monsoons . . . . The poet-persona
has utmost disregard for women as wives, as they easily fit into the scheme of the great house. At the same
time, the persona could be seen as a sympathizer of women as wives, as they are compelled to bear the
tyranny of the great house offering little space for the assertion of their individuality.
To Ramanujan home at one level is a kind of a prison or just a ghetto one is eternally a captive of, at another
level, it is a meeting ground of distant relatives. On the one hand, the poet-persona berates the
tyrannical centripetal pull of home that does not allow an individual any independent and free thinking space,
on the other, he acknowledges home as the site of realizing the communitarian self. It is as much an
institution of self-fulfilment and self-recovery, as it is an institution of self-curtailment and self-erosion. To
Ramanujan it is a kind of blackhole that swallows all the (p)articles that fly around it: Sometimes I think that
nothing/ that ever comes into this house/ goes out. Things come in every day/ to lose themselves among other
things/ lost long ago among/ other things lost long ago . Homes invitational pull yields joy and regret at the
same time.
Home is as much a refuse as it is a refuge. Nothing stays out: daughters/ get married to short-lived idiots;/
sons who run away come back . . . Even the songs of the beggars keep on re-visiting this home: A beggar
once came with a violin/ to creak out a prostitute song/ that our voiceless cook sang/ all the time in our
backyard . Here the word prostitute has serious semantic connotations. It at once relates home to
some kind of a brothel visited and re-visited by its clients namely the family-relations to get a emotional
kick now and then. Home, is thus the site of both permanent ever-lasting emotional bonds and ephemeral
one-night relationships. This prostitutional value of home ruptures the noble notion of home as the sacred
space.
Home is as much a cultural junkyard as it is a place of roots. It is a place where ideas . . ./ once casually
mentioned somewhere/ . . . come back to the door as prodigies and where Letters mailed/ . . . [find] their
way back/ with many re-directions to wrong/ addresses and red inkmarks/ earned in Tiruvella and Sialkot . Its
seminal functional value is that it provides one a permanent address. It is a rarefied confession box where the
poets can easily shed off their sins without any fear of backlash or accountability. They tend to take home as
an innocent space a space too inane and sentimental to counter-argue, to lay its own demands on its
inhabitants. There is a tendency to take home for granted. To Ramanujan, home perhaps stands for abstention
as well as inescapable participation in life. When high modernism of West impinges upon Ramanujan, he
prefers to retreat back to his particular hell only in my [his] hindu mind ( Conventions of Despair ) not for
cultural recuperation or cultural assertion as such, but for temporary relief and respite.
In Ramanujans double-edged poetic discourse, home is thus raised and erased simultaneously; it is desired
and shunned in the same breath.. It turns towards the nation, as much as it turns away from it. In his topsy-
turvy vision, stability is also a synonym of stagnation; security is as much a semantic equivalent of complacency;
tradition could well be an excuse of not-to-change. Never does the poet show the nationalist anxiety of a
persona-in-exile, for no space to him is absolute and perfect. In terms of the poetics of home, Ramanujans
poetry is poetry of understatement and critical nostalgia, very much distinguishable from the rabid and overstated
poetry of exile.
225 A.K. Ramanujan
Poet of the Dispersed Self
I
Those who hold a rather orientalized or exotic view of Indian self as an abstract grand construct would find
it difficult to approach Ramanujan as poet of the self at all. The self in his poetry is not that rarefied metaphysical
entity which seeks expansion across time and space. Ramanujans self is grossly human, it admits faults and
lapses in its making. It is not mindlessly selfless; it claims no purity or unbroken continuity. It is neither original
nor pristine, it is professedly derivative and mimetic. Yet if one were to sum up Ramanuujans poetry in one
phrase, it is poetry of the self a self highly dispersed and fragmented, reflexive and critical. The poet does not
lament the loss of pristine and essential self, rather he celebrates its disintegration in and across many cultures
and time frames.
Ramanujans poetry is a celebration of a self that loves to be eternally lost and utterly decentered. The focus
always shifts from evolution of self from an arbitrary origin to its dissipation in different directions with no
visible continuities. The poet accounts for his descent in terms of various fragmentary experiences that compose
and decompose his self perpetually: . . . and even as I add, / I lose, decompose/ into my elements ( Elements
of Composition ). The evolution is traced in terms of those motley and countless forgettable experiences that
foreclose the possibility of his predictable linear growth. The self of Ramanujan evolves, as it dissolves. Far
from being a simple product of fathers seed and mothers egg, the poets self is composed of scary dreams,
the look/ of panic on sisters face/ an hour before / her wedding , the sight of the lepers of Madurai and a
host of other impressions that normally go unaccounted for or even sidelined as minor aberrations in the growth
of the self. The self is not selectively constructed in terms of the sublime or the serious.
Ramanujans self does not flaunt any foundational unity or a centrality of vision, cracks and fissures within it
are its highlights. The self is a site of a carnival a cocophony of experiences; it undergoes perpetual disintegration,
constantly becoming and unbecoming in one go. The poem Extended Family concludes on a note of the
poets disintegrating credo thus: My future/ Dependent/ On several/ People/ Yet/ To come . The self is no
longer defined in terms of heritage or a possession that grows and solidifies, rather it is seen as unstable
assemblage of faults, fissures, and heterogeneous layers that threaten the fragile inheritor from within or from
underneath. The self is not just a product of past and present, it is also the site of future.
Ramanujans poetry becomes an unending mirroring process through which the self is continually reviewed
and re-visualized. There is always an unfamiliarity with the reflected self, pointing to a deep divide within. The
reflected self happens to be an uncomfortable parodic version of the poets real self :
I resemble everyone
But myself, and sometimes see in
Shop-windows,
Despite the well-known laws
Of optics,
The portrait of a stranger,
Date unknown. ( Self-portrait)
The reflected self keeps splintering in Ramanujans poetry till it multiplies into several selves. Mirrors in a
mirror shop/ break me [him] upto how I [he] was/ show me [him] in profile, that is a collage of different
people: whose head I have whose nose. Instead of any metaphysical organic flowing within, the poets self
experiences a thoroughly pastiched lineage.
The self is spread over different spaces and times; it is like clocks in the clockshop/quartz digital grandfather
and mickey/mouse each showing a different/time all at one ( Not Knowing ). Grandfather and mickey/
mouse are signifiers of distinct cultural sensibilities of India and Chicago respectively. Grandfather represents
time past and traditional authority; mickey mouse stands for virtual time and playfulness. As an Indo-American
poet, Ramanujan keeps hopping between the two.
Poetry 226
In A Meditation, the poet grows all the more aware of the multiple bodies and centres of consciousness into
which he has been split, processed, and distributed. This also goes against the very grain of meditation, which
should ideally integrate the self. Meditation in the poem leads to disintegration. The multiple centers, that the
body is divided into, inter-act with and reflect upon each other in ways that undermine the granted integrity of
the self. The living hands of the poet communicate with a dead one , firm imagined body works with the
transience/of the breathless/real bodies . This communication of the dead with the living or of imaginary with
the real provides the basic excuse for parodic self-reflexivity. Meditation thus involves an unpacking of the self,
its re-vision from within, even if it entails its undoing.
Ramanujan is more a poet of becoming than a poet of being . The self in his poetry is not a product; it is a
process. The becoming is not an easy upward movement of self-realization, it is more a movement of self-
splintering. The self-in-process is always vulnerable, liable to be distracted and allured by material matrices of
life. In traditional poetics of the self, the role and value of the material is underplayed and even despised.
Ramanujan as a this-worldly poet would reflect on the material foregrounding of the self. He knows that the
contemporary forces of commercialization intervene and highjack mans desire of becoming, the entire credo
of becoming lapses into a project of its commodification:
. . . Men and women run
races in faraway places like Seoul
and Munich, make four-minute miles
beat their own records, to become videos
and photographs that sell shoes.
The lines take a hard look at contemporary athletes and Olympians who rise to stardom overnight and are
easily seduced by the media managers for blatantly consumerist purposes. In the same poem, the poet invokes
a series of images that show how pre-mature and catastrophic the end is:
On the grass of sloping hills
a scatter of white sheep,
unravelling already like the balls
of wool they are going to be.
Balls of wool is what the grand project of becoming ultimately degenerates into. The sudden transformation
or snowballing of a living being into a commercial product is one of the predicaments of self-growth in modern
times. Instead of going higher, man recedes into a product and thus becomes his own caricature.
Ramanujans self is never definite; it has its own doubts. It comes into existence in the presence of the other
only. This is how Ramanujan would express the predicament of human self:
This body I sometimes call me,
sometimes mine
as if I m someone else
owning and informing this body
that affects me most when it affects
another by look . . .
( One More on a Deathless Theme)
The poet imagines himself to be a modern incarnation of mythic man with two backs , a mix of mammal and
a quadruped , a four-armed androgyne . The self is twosome; it is mix of two beings with their back to each
other, a creature part animal and part man, half-man and half-woman. These polarities or hybrid formations
reduce the rarefied self into a mimic man.
Death is regarded as the finale of selfs journey into eternity, a leap towards ultimate realization. Even death is
not a state of unconditional release of the soul into a higher stage of evolution. The life-after-death scenario is
227 A.K. Ramanujan
a hotchpotch of conflicting time frames, a play of various subjective times. Death idealized as an impermanent
and perishable aspect of eternal living, or as gate-way to divine revelation in Hindu metaphysics, takes on an
altogether different shape, puncturing all stereotypical notions surrounding it. In the scheme of Ramanujans
poetry death is not the marker of selfs plunge into soul. It is neither a full stop, nor a continuum; it is a small
change. The transplantation of organs after ones death to other human beings generates a distinct paradigm
of continuity very different from much lionized immortality.
In Death and Good Citizen selfs disintegration undergoes postmodern mutation. Disintegration does not lead
to total demise or absence of life, it creates its own avenues of re-integration, The selfs life-span is extended
as parts of body are donated to other human beings of other races/ tribes. Like ordinary unthinking mortals
the poet-persona refuses to decompose after his death, he would rather prefer the dismantling of his body
and the transplantation of spare parts taken out from his dead corpse to other needy beings. Instead of
disintegration into anonymity or nothingness, the poet would much like to dismantle his self. Dismantling ensures
a re-connection. The bodily-time is challenged as he donates his Eyes in an eye bank/ to blink some day for a
strangers brain , and his heart seeks to make connection/ with alien veins .
The poet questions different ways of disposing of the dead body in different communities as each method
forecloses any possibility of the post-death self. The Hindu way of cremating the dead is detrimental to the
growth of self after life: they ll cremate/ me in Sanskrit and sandalwood,/ to a scatter of ash . The poet
regrets that he would not be available to even worms after his death. The Christian way of burying the dead
also is no less harmful to the interests of the self. It too keeps the dead poet-persona out of nature: theyll lay
me out in a funeral/ parlour, embalm me in pesticide, bury me in a steel trap, lock me out of nature/ till I m
oxidized by left/-over air, withered by my own/ vapours into grin and bone . Tissue-grafting holds the potential
of extending physicality into the self after the death. What Ramanujan visualizes is a scenario of checkered
and pastiched post-death, rather than a vision of deathlessness or immortality of the spirit.
Butchers Tao is also a poem on the post-death disposal of the physical self into various forms. As a Chinese
butcher dismantles the body parts of a bull with a clinical finesse, they are processed into different usable
commodities. Bulls horns go into the making of combs,/ sandals for the pedestrian/ peasant ; its thong and
head are used as kettledrums to scare away/ eclipses from the sun . Bulls blood is used for sprinkling/ on
children with polio . Such a multiple usage of bulls remains ensures a meaningful posterity for the dead a
concern that runs through the poetry of Ramanujan. Recycling of body parts for the benefit of community
guarantees the usability of the self beyond life.
In another poem, Birthdays Ramanujan is not very sure of death as gateway to another life: There is no
evidence as far/ as I can see, which isnt/ very far, to say that death/ throes are birth pangs . On the other
hand, he is very sure of birth as a definite beginning of life: Birth seems quite special/ every time a mayfly is
born/ into the many miracles/ of day, night and twilight . Death is a big unresolved question: but death? . The
poem ends on an interrogative note revealing the poets rather ambivalent attitude towards death:
.. Is it a dispersal
of gathered energies
back into their elements,
earth, air, water, and fire,
a reworking into other moulds,
grass, worm, bacterial glow
lights, and mother-matter
for other off-spring with names
and forms clocked into seasons?
Death is not moksha or a state of perfect resolution, it is a dispersal of gathered energies . In Ramanujans
poetry, death is an opening not of one possibility, but many. It marks liberation from ones narrow personal
physical frame to its possible merger into many elemental forms.
Poetry 228
In Ramanujans poetry death has not been romanticized as a pre-condition for salvation or as a happy leap
towards the liberation of soul the essential time. The poet-persona wants to realize the essence in the
existence, timelessness in time and vice-versa. This simultaneity of two extreme time-frames generates very
unconventional time-structures where their exclusiveness or even hierarchy becomes simply unsustainable. In
his A Hindu to His Body , the poet does not want to relinquish the physical time in favour of eternal time.
After his death, the persona would like to carry his sensuous self in the realm of eternity: let me go with you
and feel the weight/ of honey-hives in my branching/ and the burlap weave of weaver-birds/ in my hair .
Ramanujans poetry is held together by this kind of tension between the claims of death and life, between an
impossible eternity and an actual transience.
Death annihilates the physical self, what happens to mind after death is a question of speculation. Ramanujan
draws a distinction between mind and matter. Mind is timeless and imperishable, matter is mortal and time-
bound. In a poem Postmortem the poet depicts the decay of a female statistician in terms of her physical
degeneration: She could not bear/ the touch of clothes on her skin/ in the last year of her life . At the time of
her death, her mind was full of numbers: A statistician/ Lived alone with numbers/ . . ./ numbers and graphs,
not/ even a cat . After her death her attorney sells off her furniture, TV, VCR etc., but the poet marvels at the
fate of numbers that she had in her mind at the time of her death:
. . . .Her body
went to Science, her attorney said,
the proceeds of her posthumous sale
would go to the University, her rugs
lie in my bedroom
and where did the numbers go?
For Ramanujan post-death phenomenon is highly cataclysmic. Mind as consciousness or even memory survives
the death of the physical self, and it is this deathlessness of mind that adds complexity to the poets idea of
human time. Death is more a state of confusion as it disembodies the incoherent consciousness into the open
space. Death unleashes a carnival of time-frames; it bursts its back/ and gives birth/ to numerous dying
things . These things termed terrifying, intricate beauties are interlocked to eat, grow, sting, multiply .
The word sting is very significant as it reveals the duality in-built in the post-death scenario. In Ramanujans
poetry, self does not move in one direction, it grows into many sides; it splinters as it moves down from one
generation to another.
II
As a poet more of dissolution than solution, Ramanujan cannot operate within the paradigms of the predictable.
In his poetry, life is not a cause-effect tale, rather it holds surprises, shocks and scandals; it is a story of hits and
misses; it is too complex to be defined in terms of simple Euclidian geometry. This is how the poet would like
to define the self: Not geometric as the parabolas/ of hope, it has loose ends/ with a knot at the top/ thats me .
It can find no metaphor . Self is so checkered and polysemic that it cannot be contained in any horizontal or
homological frame of representation. Ramanujan as a modern poet does not aspire to bridge the gap between
self and its representation; rather he dwells on the fissures between the signifier and the signified.
Foundlings in the Yukon is a poem in which paradigms of evolution work unpredictably. The Pleistocene
times come into life now by an accident . Accident is not very uncommon in Ramanujans poetry;
rather accident is normal condition of existence. Accidents make strange things happen past distant and
forgotten comes back as immediate present, present may appear the moment of antiquity. In the poem, some
seeds/ in a burrow/ sealed off by a landslide are re-sown after a lapse of ten thousand/ years . The seeds
sprout within forty-eight hours as though, as the poet puts it, long deep/ burial made them hasty/ for birth and
season . The inordinate slowness implicit in long deep/ burial is juxtaposed with the extraordinary speed with
which seeds crave for immediate sprouting in the new soil.
229 A.K. Ramanujan
The candelabra of eight small leaves drinks up the sun and unfurls much early than the usual gestation span
of three years. The sprouting of the seed into a candelabra is marker of the self bursting into many-branched
tree. The buried past like a pent-up/ centenarians lust can grow on ones self in no time if it gets congenial
environment, a conducive opening or an outlet. The infants, older than the oldest/ things alive skip million
falls/ and the registry of tree-rings . The linear genealogical constructions of the self are playfully done away
with. An accidental displacement of the fossilized native self, and its subsequent settlement in a different time-
space matrix can result into its rather-too-quick re-birth. The linearity is not exactly reversed but it has definitely
been undermined by the accident of flowering .
The poem KMnO
4
in Grandfathers Shaving Glass can also be read as a poem of the self. It takes on a
structure in which the linearity of self is not radically reversed, but it is definitely mediated by non-linear
vectors. One drop of KMnO
4
in a glass of water unleashes a riot of purple-coloured fine strands: It descends/
slow-motioned by the element,/ unravelled into a loosening skein/ of unravelling strands/ of loose vein,/ trees,/
and filament . The words loosening and unravelling are significant for they stand for the diffusion of the
self. The roots as well as the branches of the tree branch out into all directions, revealing selfs manifold
division both below the surface and in the air. If stem gives the impression of stable firmly anchored self, the
roots and branches stand for its widespread expansion. After creating almost a mini, multi-hued storm in the
glass, the drop pales into transparency/ till it leaves again a watercolumn of clarity . The transparency is
slightly blued/ by a past sensation . One drop is enough to bring about a revolution, to triggers off a huge
spectrum of possibilities, to generate an array of colours, till subsumed by the water in the glass. Every subsequent
drop of KMno
4
unpacks its knots/ of darkness till water is brewed/ to winedark . The poem has a linear
evolution as one drop after another of KMno
4
adds hue on hue in the transparent water. But with each such
addition, an unpacking of drop-knots takes place. It is this unpacking of knots [the complexes of the self] that
explains the dynamics of self in Ramanujans poetry.
In Ramanujans poetry the self always branches out into non-linear frames and its eventual dispersal into space
creates a situation that helps the poet-persona to experience life in all its heterogeneity. In the poem PAIN:
trying to find a metaphor , this is how the poet-persona describes the branching out of pain in the body:
a nerve in the vice of a cyst
in the bone: a growth like a bonsai tree
spreading like smoke in the mist of an X-ray
vague as a face in a corridor on fire.
First the nerve splinters into a bonsai tree, then it spreads out like smoke on a X-ray film creating a vagueness
about a man behind the flames of fire. Pain thus is shooting forth of local physical malfunctioning of cells into
entire system of the body, it is a burning sensation with definite origin, which with the passage of time engulfs
the whole being. As a matter of pattern, in Ramanujans poetry, the so-called unitary self branches out, instead
of rising upwards vertically.
III
The physical purity or continuity of the self is under relentless scrutiny in Ramanujans poetry. Not only does
the self disperse and diffuse into myriad directions, its biological composition itself has many pasts and parentages.
Genetically the self is a site of utter confusion and atavistic reversals. Contesting the notion of self as a
genetically predictable construct, he chooses to dwell on the stray and the most poorly understood genetic
disorder called atavism. This dramatic genetic flaw operates in Ramanujans poetry as double-edged metaphor
if on one hand it underlines the genetic superstructure of family which one is an inescapable part of, on the
other it disrupts the notion of predictable genetic descent. In this very special way, genes therefore, connect the
poet as much as they alienate him. The mutant is not uncommon, it is the very structure of the self in Ramanujans
poetry.
Poetry 230
In his On the Very Possible Jaundice of an Unborn Daughter , Ramanujan rather mischievously apprehends
his unborn daughter suffering from jaundice. The pre-occupation of his ancestors with things yellow, he believes,
could be reason of jaundice in his unborn daughter. The apprehensions of the poet are really amusing as they
are far-fetched: the cats tiptoeing from the sulphur mines of the sun/ into the shadow of our house , father
sitting with the sunflower at the window/ deep in the yellow of a revolving chair , daffodil that flaps all
morning in grandmas hands . The yellow-images might cause yellowness in the while of her eyes a
symptom of jaundice. In such poems, the poet does bring out the irrevocability of the family-fold in the making
up of the self, but more important than this is the way he asserts it. There is definitely an element of petty
malice in recounting the evolution of self. The self in Ramanujans poetry has a genetic history that predates its
birth in the physical form. The unborn is not wished away in Ramanujans poetry. The self is located between
the dead (past) and the unborn (future).
Heredity or descent is never romanticized in the geneological construction of the self. It is seen as source of all
physical and psychological aberrations in the descendent. The insurmountable grip of heredity is source of
perpetual evil:
Even Accident woos
Only the accident-prone.
Even gambling dues
Are bred in an ancestors bone.
The poet is not very possessive about heritage as it influences his unconscious in most negative ways. Quite
possibly, the poet has in mind the famous gambling episode of Mahabharata in which Draupadi, the wife of
Pandavas is put at stake. Gambling is therefore a part of his collective unconscious, the samskaras. Such is the
sense of bondage to heritage, that the poet would like his children to remain unborn:
Poverty is not easy to bear.
The body is not easy to wear.
So beware, I say to my children
Unborn, lest they choose to be born.
The legacies are not necessarily very cherishable. The poet as poor father does not want to bequeath his sick
legacies to his progenies. The genetic code is a sentence/ without any term which children suffer. The poet-
persona as father is reluctant to hand over this sentence to his children. The self in Ramanujans poetry defies
structures and syntax. A structured self is a doomed self. The social, the psychological and the mythical
combine with the biological (i.e. genetics) to determine the limits as well as possibilities of the poets self. The
rhetoric of genetics being the holistic science of human descent, does not seem to work in the poetic universe
of Ramanujan..
Drafts , yet another poem on the genetic make-up of the poets self, underlines how deeply the poet-persona
has been programmed by the DNA-code: The DNA leaves copies in me and mine/ of grandfathers violins,
and programmes/ of much older music . To lend sweetness to the tyranny of DNA code, the poet-persona in
his familiar tongue-in-cheek style compares it with sonorous music compositions scripted by his ancestors long
back. What was music then, re-appears in the form of epilepsies and other neurotic convulsions in later
generations: The epilepsies go to an uncle/ to fill him with hymns and twitches,/ by passing me for now . The
music of the past is all noise to the modern poet-persona. The poet-persona deliberately keeps himself away
from the legacy of grandfathers violin strings, only to be trapped by some other funny habits of his forefathers.
There are so many codes that operate on the physical self of the individual, if he escapes one, he is likely to be
caught by the another. Mother has also something to bequeath, once again not as much to him, as to his
daughter:
mothers migraines translate, I guess,
into allergies, a fear of black cats,
and a daughters passion
for bitter gourd and Dostoevsky; . . .
231 A.K. Ramanujan
The daughters passion for bitter gourd has mischievously been combined with her passion for Dostoevsky, a
Russian novelist of The Crime and Punishment fame. People of ordinary tastes cannot appreciate the
psychological depth of Dostoevskys fiction. Migraines, allergies, taste for bitter gourd and fascination for
Dostoevsky, fear of black cats are mutually co-extensive phenomena/ or traits of a personality. In Ramanujans
poetry, allergy is not different from passion. Allergy from one thing leads to love towards another. A fear of
black cats in father induces in his daughter a love for Dostoevsky.
In the same poem while conceding a major role to atavism in the genetic reconstruction of human self, Ramanujan
is careful enough to deny absolute value to the genetic code. The genetic forbearings of the typical greenish
eyes of the son are speculated thus; mothers almond eyes mix with my wifes/ ancestral haze/ to give my son
green flecks . . . But very playfully Ramanujan is quick to add: but the troubled look is all his own . Thus the
human self becomes a unique combination of subjective will and inherited physical appearance. This combination
is hardly ever harmonious, it rather generates a caricaturized picture of the persona.
Ecology is another poem based on the principle of atavism. The mother of the poet-persona is allergic to the
flowers of Red Champak trees . But still the mother would not let the persona-as-son to cut down these
flowering trees. True these trees gave her gods and her daughters/ and daughters daughters basketfuls/ of
annual flower , but they also bequeathed for one line of cousins/ a dower of migraines in season . The
inclusion of maternity in the genealogical construction of the human self is significant. One line of cousins
stands for cousins from the maternal side a side usually overlooked in the construction of heritage.
In another mini-poem Tooth , the poet-persona once again locates the source of his toothache in the pain that
his mother had in her tooth right before her death:
The large tooth in my left jaw
aches: its mother again
complaining of the large tooth
in her left jaw
the week before she died.
It is not only the shape of the tooth that persona inherits from ones forefathers, the pain that any tooth causes
to him is also a part of inherited genetic code. In most of the poems, the poet holds his genes responsible for his
present dis-eases. Mother is the source of pain in fingers as well:
The two fingers you learned to pop
on your sixth birthday
crook and ache now,
like mothers on her sixtieth. (Saturdays)
What pained mother in her old age troubles the poet right from his childhood. More than the umbilical-chord it
is the thread of maternal genes that informs the persona from within. The descent through disease is almost
uninterrupted. Diseases are reminders of relationships. They lend a distinct family stamp on the individual self
of the poet-persona, even though they may be utterly undesirable. Undesirable is very much an integral part of
Ramanujans poetic make up.
In some of the poems, Ramanujan questions the purity of genes that one so proudly inherits. The purity of the
lineage is ridiculed. The notion of a well-defined family-tree has been challenged in A Poem on Particulars .
Through the metaphor of an orange, the poet dismisses the idea that the fruit belongs to a particular tree.
Rather, it belongs to a family of trees even the dead and the unborn trees of the family. He says:
I have heard it said
among planters:
you can sometimes count
every orange
Poetry 232
on a tree
but never
all the trees
in a single
orange.
The self in Ramanujans poetry is a site of many beings, multiple parentages, real as well as phantom. One
orange subsumes the history of not just one tree, but many trees of the same family. It is a fruit of long
genealogical struggle spanned over time and space.
In his poem The Hindoo: he doesn t hurt a fly or a spider either , the poet observes the presence of a
perpetual outsider in his self. The poet recounts how once his great swinging grandmother was waylaid by
fisherman lover in the Madras harbour and how his Great Grandfather kept mum over the entire episode. It is
the unrecorded presence of the unofficial other that makes the self in Ramanujans poetry so impure and
tentative. The use of metaphor timeless eye for great grand-father has serious cultural connotations. It
stands for Indias non-violent metaphysical past which did not permit even hurt[ing] a fly or a spider either .
The aggressive other has taken advantage of Indias passivity. The solemnities of the origin or purity of
descent is de-mythicized in the poem.
In his poem Lines , genes they become construct of time and space. The genes of the parent do not add up
to making of the self of the poet-persona: His or is it her, parts of yours, but they do not add up/ to who you
are . In a different time-space matrix, genes undergo alteration:
Clones subtly gone wrong
make you wrong unmake your sense,
change your toilet habits
as if you re in a different time
zone, . . . (Lines)
As an Indian living in America, the poet seems to accord greater value to the immediate cultural environment
than to the genes one inherits from the forefathers. Of course, when the genetic code is overtaken by the
cultural code, it is violence to the self:
. . . , you develop knots
in your fingers and you feel
sudden streaks of orange heat
across your chest.
The root of the poets physical unease lies in his genes going wrong in a different time zone. This rupture in the
body pre-empts the possibility of a linear physical growth of the poet-persona.
The dead as living presences possess the consciousness of the poet. There is no way he can ignore them. It is
genetics as well as religious beliefs that combine together to yield space to the dead in the present of the family.
The Hindu belief of another life after death makes him search the lost ones in his immediate present all the
more. In Some People , the poet while attending a conference/ on Delhi milk and China soyabean , is
suddenly overtaken by the image of dead wife . Suddenly he sees your [his] wife from another life/ wed
and left behind in childhood,/ now six weeks dead, yet standing there/ in raw-silk and in sandalwood footwear .
Elements of Composition offers an exhaustive checklist of elements that go into the making of the atavistic
self of the poet-persona. Besides the usual stuff of fathers seed and mothers egg , the poets self is a site of
so many atavistic presences. Inputs as varied and distant in both space and time as Millennia of fossil
records/ of insects , body prints of mayflies , a legend half-heard/ in a train , twisted lives of epileptic
saints go into the constitution of the poets self. The persona links our biological heritage back to non-human
primate insects and flies. In another poem he brings reptiles into the heritage-fold as well: . . . all over me are
greenish/ soft underbellies of ancestral/ crocodiles and tortoises/ the silent thud of their bloodbeat ( in rem
time ). The family tree takes on epic dimensions as it penetrates beyond three four knowable generations
into a past that goes back to pre-recorded times, to fossilized history. It is this act of ancestral remembrance
233 A.K. Ramanujan
and acceptance that keeps the poets self, dynamic as well as unstable: and even as I add/ lose, decompose/
into my elements .
Ramanujan as a Poet of Love
Love as a romantic sentiment is an anomaly in modern reflective poetry, yet it continues to figure as its seminal
trope that lends momentum, albeit dialectically, to its own growth. One might even describe modern poetry as
a parody of erstwhile love poetry, a dialogic engagement with its rosy, purple, sensuous vision of pastoral life,
a playful reversal of its unproblematic idealizations. No longer just a signifier of intimacy and warmth, it
emerges more as a perversion, a kind of morbidity, a behavioral flaw, an aberration in the personality, an
eccentric desire, a weird emotion that splinters the self into a disorder and asymmetry. The use of phrase
reverse romanticism is therefore quite pertinent as it sums up the subtle reversal of ideals in Ramanujans
poetry.
Let us consider love poems addressed to the estranged wife directly. There are three love poems for a wife .
In Love Poem for Wife, 1 , the poet-persona contests the very efficacy of adult marriage with its in-built flaw
of unshared/ childhood . His wife, he finds, is much closer to her brother, whereas he and his sister-in-law are
mere blank cut outs in their [wife and her brother] old drag-out fights/ about where the bathroom was/ in the
backyard . The poet-persona is so thoroughly disgusted with the hypocrisy of adult marriage that he would
much like to continue the incests/ of childhood into marriage . He endorses the old Egyptian practice of
marriage within family. Another suggestion to mitigate the trauma of adult marriage is equally retrogressive.
Ramanujan as a failed husband, would much prefer child marriage as a possible way out of overcoming the
problem of unshared childhood built in adult marriage:
betroth us before birth,
forestalling separate horoscopes
and mothers first periods,
and wed us in the oral cradle
and carry marriage back into
the namelessness of childhoods.
Orality as culture of the yore is Ramanujans ideal of a harmonious familial past. If marriage is to approximate
high Hindu ideal of marriage as union of two souls at all, then wife and husband must grow together right
from childhood, even before their births. Wife as a relation thus could be seen as the very site of expatriation
which fails to wean the poet-persona away from the mothers pull. Had the poet-persona gone to US much
before his birth, he could have shown interest in American history and culture, a late entry when he had already
acquired a definite cultural make-up entails an element of alienation that he eventually suffers. Marriage in this
context becomes a trope of exile .
In another Love Poem for a Wife 2 , once again the distinct cultural background of the wife is narrated with
such an enviable passion that any possibility of emotional union with her looks remote and distant. The wife
blessed as she is with her inheritance in all its richness does not pay much attention to the poet-personas
passionate overtures. The wifes cultural past is recounted in terms of her vehement foregrounding in mythos,
history and natural bountifulness of Kerala, the region she belongs to. Her changing syriac face has to do
with chameleon/ emerald/ wilderness of Kerela . Her mythic/ regional consciousness is highlighted through a
playful relationship thus: a small cousin to tall/ mythic men, rubberplant / and peppervine . The print patterns
on her dresses have been copied locally/ from the dotted/ butterfly . . . full of the colour schemes/ of kraits and
gartersnakes .
One reason that Ramanujan distrusts his wife is her prurient permissive past. In Any Cows Horn Can Do It .
The wife is shown growing cold at remembering how was she belted by father/ standing on a doorstep/ with
a long strip of cowhide/ and the family idiom/ the day he caught her/ in the hotel lobby . In Love Poem for
Wife 1 , the poet-persona as husband doubts her integrity; he makes an issue what his wife just dismissed as
an innocent/ date with a nice Muslim friend/ who only hinted at touches . As against the insular and impeccable
Hindu past of the mother, the wifes past is impure and adulterated.
Poetry 234
In Ramanujans exclusive family, the wife is more a rival to the mother and the daughter, than a positive
relationship. In Love Poem for a Wife and Her Trees , the mother-fixated persona at once compares wifes
love with mothers warmth: youre not Mother/ certified dead but living on, /. . . ./ You remind of the difference .
America as the exiled poet-personas abode, despite all material promises is no match to the emotional comforts
that his motherland, left behind years ago, would have provided. Unborn daughter pre-occupies his mind even
though he posts letters to the wife:
Dear woman, you remind me again
in unlikely places like post offices
where I lick
your stamps, that I must remember
you re not my Daughter, unborn maybe
but always
present: . . .
Both dead mother and unborn daughter outlive the live wife in terms of their hold on the consciousness of
the poet-persona. Wife despite all her efforts to play mama/ sob-sister/ daughter who needs help with arithmetic/
even the sexpot nextdoor remains an Another, the faraway/ stranger whos nearby . The poet-persona is as
much an Another as her wife is. Another could as well be a signifier of Alien-nation. The irony implicit in
the expression stranger yet nearby sums up the predicament of an expatriate in an alien location, his temporary
abode.
In the poem the poet-persona addresses his beloved as Dear woman , which itself is a very impersonal way
of addressing a relation as close as that of wife. As a woman, she reminds him of all woman-relations around
him, including the mother and the daughter. She reminds him of the continual presence of certified dead, but
living on mother, as well as unborn may be/ but always/ present daughter in his male self. The impressions
that the persona inherits and the legacies that he might pass over to his progenies impinge upon his present
marital life. As a son to a Mother , and a father to an unborn Daughter , he is unable to identify his wifes
position vis- -vis himself. In moments of awareness, he discovers a stranger in his wife: I forget at night and
remember at dawn/ youre not me but Another, the faraway/ stranger whos nearby . Wife/beloved is seen in
terms of differences she has vis- -vis the personas dead mother and unborn daughter. Genes help the
poet-persona relate himself, albeit inconveniently to his family, but they also happen to be the major stumbling
block in his marital life. The family trees of both husband and wife are different, hence their marriage as
solemn pledge to life-long bonding is unreal and impossible. After instinctual honeymoon, in the daylight of
realities the distinctness of the two individuals becomes all too clear.
In other two love poems for his wife, the persona is torn between the pulls of biological code on the one hand
and demands of cultural codes on the other hand. In Love Poem for Wife I , he goes on to suggest marriage
of brother and sister as a possible solution of his dilemmas. At least brother and sister belong to the same family
tree both genetically and culturally:
. . . . Probably
only the Egyptians had it right:
their kings had sisters for queens
to continue the incests
of childhood into marriage.
Genes serve as befitting paradigms of postmodernity as they root and uproot the poet-persona simultaneously.
Ramanujan as father to a young daughter evinces enough maturity to talk about the love affairs of his daughter.
Most of the love-poems deal with the love-longings of the daughter. Her free and frank exchange of ideas on
issues pertaining to love engenders boldness in the poetic idiom of the poet. The approach between the two
does not betray hierarchy of relationship. No wonder when the daughter approaches the father to announce
her love affair with a man much older, he takes it rather sportingly. He cites his own obsession of looking at all
235 A.K. Ramanujan
the women/ [that] I ve [he has] ever loved as eighteen [years old] forever . Another example he gives is
that of Pierre Bonnard who always painted his wife/ as thirty six/ getting in and out/ of bathtubs . . . Such
playfulness in relations seems to be the only feasible working principle among Ramanujans family-relations.
In Ramanujans poetry, affection towards the daughter is always counter-posed with hatred towards the wife,
once again pointing towards the poet-personas unqualified disliking for the outsider in his inner space. The
daily routine of the poet-persona begins with a walk before dark with my [his] daughter , and ends with a
bed time story/ of dog, bone and shadow. A bullock cart/ in an Eskimo dream ( A Routine Day Sonnet ). The
image of bullock cart in an Eskimo dream in a very succinct and telling way sums up the bi-cultural mind-
scape of the daughter. The bedtime story is marker of native inputs that go into the making of the girl-child.
The bonhomie and playfulness during the day that the persona enjoys in the company of his daughter proves to
be short-lived. Night however is the period of acrimony, as the poet-persona as husband wake[s] with a start/
to hear my [his] wife cry her heart/ out as if from a crater in hell . The routine day sonnet comes to a violent
and brazen end: she hates me, I hate her,/ I m a filthy rat and a satyr . In another poem, Eyes, Ears, Noses,
and a Thing about Touch , the days bought flowers/ [are] crushed into a wifes night/ grouses .
In Ramanujans poetry, incest as relation is not looked down upon. The poet does give enough suggestions
about his incestuous relationship with sisters and cousins. Though there are not exclusive poems on the relation
of sister, yet she does feature in some poems as an ancillary character. The incestuous overtones of Ramanujans
persona cannot be brushed aside as mere suggestive. The gaze on sisters braids in the following lines from the
poem Snakes is not just brotherly, it is pure and plain male voyeurism:
Sister ties her braids
with a knot of tassel.
But the weave of her knee-long braid has scales,
their gleaming held by a score of clean new pins,
I look till I see her hair again
The braids remind the persona of glossy snakes that crowd his unconscious as archetypal images of deadly
sensuality and surreptitious sexual motives. In women-centric folk tales, snakes are often lovers or husbands.
On the occasion of sisters wedding, Ramanujan remembers his moments of intimacy with her. When he hears
a single summer woodpecker/ peck-peck-Peck-pecking away at that tree/ behind the kitchen right before
his sisters marriage, both he and his sister wish[ed] a tree could shriek or at least writhe/ like that other snake
we [they] saw under the beak of the crow . Woodpecker could be seen as sisters husband pecking furiously
the sister as tree, which the brother as lover (of her sister) cannot bear. The sudden use of capital P for peck
implies the usage of the word peck in a specific context. The woodpeckers peck attains sexual connotations.
Crow is another metaphor for the would-be brother-in-law holding her sister as a helpless snake in his
beak.
Looking for a Cousin on a Swing is not a poem on the relation of sister, but the cousin here is female one. The
poet-personas relationship with his female cousin is once again overtly incestuous:
When she was four or five
she sat on a village swing
and her cousin, six or seven,
sat himself against her;
with every lunge of the swing
she felt him
in the lunging pits of her feeling;
and afterwards
we climbed a tree, she said.
The relationship is very much in keeping with Ramanujans ideal of continue[ing] the incests of childhood/ into
marriage an ideal articulated without any moral hangover in Love Poem for a Wife 1 .
Poetry 236
Then there are poems which are not love poems as such because they do not involve a female character.
These are poems on love as an emotion. The attitude of the poet is intellectual. In his Two Styles in Love ,
the two approaches to love have been juxtaposed with each other. The first style of love is akin to the potboiler
stuff of fairy-tales wherein the heroic lovers despite all odds manage to love . There is the anxiety of losing
the lover, if the moment of love is stretched too far : . . and night will be sudden:/ Your one face, found in a rush
of nettles, will be lost . The second style of love is that of patient passion: Love is no hurry, love is no burning;/
it is no fairytale of bitter and sweet . Further he sermonizes: No, no love is sudden/ Coupling hands take time
to kill the frost/ Even leaping Beast shall wait to be bidden/ by Beauty. The poet does not express his
preferred style of love in categorical form, but the second part of the poem seems to be after his heart. He
admires the second style of love more than the first one which is effusive and sudden.
In the poem Still Life , the poets preference for love as patient flowering comes to the fore. Here instead of
jumping into passionate kissing or passionate love overtures, the poet watches patiently, rather too intently on
the half-eaten sandwich, left in the plate, of his beloved: . . . and I saw the half-eaten/ sandwich/ bread,/
lettuce and salami,/ all carrying the shape/ of her bite . The love is moment arrested or frozen in time, it is not
a liquid impulse. It is not to be frittered away in a hasty impulse, it is to be slowly internalized. Love calls for
patient eye-to-eye to dialogue than feverish physical gestures.
In another poem Love 10 , the poet once again refers to the death of spontaneous love as a theme of love-
poetry. Love as a sentiment has exhausted itself. It cannot be verbalized afresh for words have also lost the
connotative charge which they were once imbued with. Ramanujan as a poet of love poems expresses his
helplessness in not being able to restore glory to love: Love poems, he says, are not easy to write/ because
theyve all been written before./ Words play dead./ The seasons are trite . The poet deliberately uses the third
person he to distance himself away from the urgency of love. The possibilities of love have already been
speculated over and again in the past, and there is little left unsaid about it. Neither the times are such as to
arouse new sensations of love, nor the language is such as to arrest its finer nuances. Mere verbiage does not
constitute love poetry.
Lover is more an object of rivalry than possession. Love poetry presupposes an unqualified lyrical adoration of
the lover a gesture no longer possible in critical times such as ours. Therefore the poet as lover recognizes
the impossibility of love as subject of poems any longer thus: Love poems are not easy to write/ for anyone
present: their lips are sore,/ hearts elsewhere, or just full of spite. Love-in-separation is supposed to be more
fervent and effusive than love-in-meeting, but in Ramanujans poetry neither meeting nor separation inspires
love. The absent beloved(s) is (are) easily forgettable. The lover fails to remember any more/ the colour of
their eyes . Dead beloved also slips away from memory. After the initial sting of sorrow , there are ironies
of relief , which make the lover oblivious of his dead beloved(s).
Beloved present, absent or even dead none is capable of generating a true and sustaining impulse of love in
the poet-persona, If there is still Love, unwritten , it cataracts his [the poets] sight . Lover has turned totally
insensitive to the feeling of love. The sense of exhaustion which the poet suffers partly stems from the fact that
as a translator of ancient Tamil love poems, the poet realizes his effort of writing love verses does not match
the vivacity and vividness of the original love poetry of the yore.
Despite his strong advocacy for patient love, the poet is always aware of dark side of beastly passions inside
the physical self. In The Day Went Dark , such dark passions do overpower him. The woman as beloved has
always invited weird responses from the poet-as-lover. Ensnared by the turquoise eyes and whirlpool-like
naval of his beloved, the poet simply lapses into the zone of dark, primitive and beastly desires: and the day
went dark/ my hands were lizards,/ my heart turned into a hound . Once again the delicacy and subtlety of
romance is undone by way of invoking images of lizard and hound.
Patient love is not denial of love as an emotion. Being not in love is a state of loss and confusion. Love 2: what
he said, groping is a poem about the state of mind of a lover who loves someone/ not in love . It is a state of
groping under water/ You no longer see/ eye to eye , Lights loom, [like] dead/ oranges in a fog . It is a state
of blurred vision, it is losing ones glasses, it is a sensation of estrangement from familiar places/ faces. The
senses are benumbed as they fail to feel the fuzz/ on a beach/ or a familiar cheek . The bright and sunny day
is at best semi-lit: All day its late/ afternoon .
237 A.K. Ramanujan
Suggested Questions
1. Give a critical estimate of A.K.Ramanujans poetry in terms of its thematic richness.
2. Discuss at length A.K.Ramanujan as an Indo-Amrican poet?
3. What are the stylistic features of Ramanujans poetry? To what an extent does he depend upon his
poet-predecessors?
4. Discuss Ramanujan as a poet of distinct religious sensibility? Does he advocate a narrow sectarian
perspective of life?
5. Give an extended critique of Love Poem for Wife 1? In what sense can the poem be approached as
love poem?
6. A.K.Ramanujan is poet of this world. of reality around him. What is his attitude towards Hindu
metaphysics?
7. Discuss A.K.Ramanujan as an Indian Poet. To what an extent does the poet abide by the so-called
Indian values?
8. The self is the poetry of A.K.Ramanujan is not linear, nor does it evolve in one direction. Comment
and illustrate from the poems prescribed in the syllabus.
9. Ramanujans poetry borders on the comic. Cite examples from his poems where the serious is
articulated in non-serious terms.
10. A.K.Ramanujan has written a number of poems on family-relations? Would you consider him a poet
of family values?
11. In what ways does Ramanujan break free from conventional Indian way of life? Would you consider
him a poet beyond nationalistic boundaries?
12. Ramanujans poetry is poetry of remote fears and fanciful apprehensions. Do you agree?
13. The concerns of A.K.Ramanujan the poet are the concerns of ordinary man. Do you agree? Argue
and illustrate.
14. Discuss A.K.Ramanujan as a post-colonial poet. How does the poet subvert the colonial paradigms
of knowledge?
15. Ramanujans poetry is essentially autobiographical. Discuss and illustrate?
16. Indian English poetry as a whole evinces little political consciousness. Would you consider Ramanujan
as poet of well-laid out political choices?
Suggested Readings
1. A.K.Ramanujan The Collected Essays of A.K.Ramanujan, Delhi:OUP, 1999.
2. Special Issue of Indian Literature (162, July-Aug, 1994) on A.K.Ramanujan
3. A.N Dwivedi The Poetic Art of A.K.Ramanujan, Delhi: B.R.Publishers, 1995.
4. Ramazani Jahan, The Hybrid Muse, Chicago & London: University of Chicago Press, 2001
5. Bruce King Three Indian Poets, Delhi:OUP, 1991
6. Surya Nath Pandey (ed) Millennium Perspectives on A.K.Ramanujan, Delhi:Atlantic, 2001
7. M.K.Bhatnagar (ed) The Poetry of A.K.Ramanujan, Delhi: Atlantic, 2002
8. Rama Nair, Of Variegated Hues: The Poetry and Translations of A.K.Ramanujan, Delhi: Prestige,
2002
Poetry 238
WALLACE STEVENS
Domination of Black
Sunday Morning
Idea of Order at Key West
Study of Two Pears
Of Modern Poetry
Peter Quince at the Clavier
Contrary Theses
Holiday in Reality
(from Oxford Book of American Verse)
239 Wallace Stevens
1. The Writer and His Age
Wallace Stevens was born in a small town Reading in the East of Pennsylvania on October 2, 1879. His
father Garret Stevens was an attorney of Dutch origin and his mother Margaret Catherine who was a school
teacher before her marriage was also a keen musician and a piano player. She also sang religious hymns to
her children every night. While the father was a successful attorney concentrating on providing the best of
education to his three sons, the mother was a deeply religious woman. Later on, Wallace Stevens confessed
that he inherited his imagination and love of arts from his mother and his pragmatism from his father. The
early life of the poet was spent in Reading and he not only graduated from Reading Boys High School in
1897 with merit but also explored on foot and on bicycle the lovely countryside around Reading. George
Silencing has pointed out in his excellent book Wallace Stevens : A Poets Growth (Louisiana State University
Press, Baton Rouge and London, 1986, P.4) Mount Penn, Mount Neversink, the fields of Oley, the Sehuyllcill,
Perkiomen, and Tuepehocken rivers-place names often reflecting the settlers, German and Dutch heritage
became for Stevens a personal arcadia, an inexhaustible pastoral landscape for the intrepid explorer and
future poet. It is from this world, surrounding his family, church and school, that Wallace Stevens origins as
a poet spring. Later on, Wallace Stevens confessed to his wife Elsie that the early years of his life spent in
and around Reading were the most happy phase of life spend in natures midst. There was a touch of the
great Romantic poet Wordsworth in Wallace Stevens. His most famous poem Sunday Morning is a vivid
portrayal of the sublime in nature.
From 1897-1900 Wallace Stevens was a student at Harvard, the most famous and perhaps the oldest of the
educational institution of America. At Harvard, the young man came in contact with Russell Loines who was
a keen lover of poetry. He was also editing a literary magazine called The Shadow. Wallace Stevens
interest in poetry made him join a literary club named the Signet. In his second year at Harvard, he joined the
OK. which was a literary group led by George Santayana, a famous Spanish philosopher who had joined the
faculty at Harvard. The contact with a distinguished teacher and philosopher like George Santayana stimulated
the imagination of the young poet. He seriously began to dream of becoming a poet and one of his juvenile
poems beginning with the line Cathedrals are not built along the sea provoked George Santayana into
writing a poem as a rejoinder to the young poets poem. Later on, George Santayanas famous literary study
Interpretations of Poetry and Religion was published during the young poets last year at Harvard. It left
an impact on the mind of the young poet who wanted to live a life of dreams. Consequently, young Wallace
Stevens was slowly getting alienated from his home and his family.
While at Harvard, the young poet got a number of letters from his father Garret Stevens who urged him to
become practical and follow an occupation which might provide him economic security and social status. On
November 13, 1898 his father wrote to him Our young folks would of course all prefer to be born like
English noblemen with Entailed estates, income guaranteed and in choosing a profession they would simply
say How shall I amuse myself but young America understands that the question is starting with nothing
how shall I sustain myself and perhaps a wife and family and send my boys to college and live comfortably
in my old age. (Ibid, p. 19). As a young American of Dutch origin, Wallace Stevens knew that he did not
have the advantage which an English nobles son had and he decided to leave Harvard after three years
without taking a degree. He went to New York and tried to become a journalist. He had an illusion that he
could be both a successful journalist and a dedicated poet. He had a modest success as a journalist but the
profession didnt provide him adequate social and economic security. He also fell in love with a young woman
named Elsie of Reading but due to his struggling career in New York he had to postpone his marriage with
Unit-9
Wallace Stevens
Poetry 240
her for five years. He longed to roam the countryside in and around Reading in Elsies company but economic
necessity kept him grinding and working like a machine in New York.
He also began to feel that he could not lead a life of dreams and speculation, as his mentor George Santayana
had inspired him at Harvard, and he had to live a practical life, a life of deeds which may provide him
adequate economic security and high social status. He grew more and more alienated from his family and it
was not a wonder, that when he married Elsie at Reading in 1909 no member of his family was present. It
showed how deeply Wallace Stevens was alienated from his family. He got married and Elsie stayed with
him in New York but they did not have a social life which could make the young bride relish her stay in a
mega city like New York. While the young bride missed her life in a small town like Reading, her husband
complained to her, and promptly at nine Oclock tomorrow the stale round of the office will commence all
over again and I must grind for six days before I can get back to the sun. (Ibid, p. 43). In spite of being a
married man, Wallace Stevens led a sort of mechanical life which made him prefer solitude to company. Like
many great American writers Nathaniel Hawthorne, Emily Dickinson, and Herman Melville, Wallace Stevens
too lived a life of isolation and brooding and his journal is a proof of his introspection and brooding. Dissatisfaction
with journalism as a career forced Wallace Stevens to join New York Law School and after his professional
education he was admitted to the bar on June 29, 1904. Initially, he didnt like the profession of law but his
becoming an attorney fulfilled his fathers dream that his son must follow his fathers profession. The profession
of law prepared young Wallace Stevens to live a life of deeds, a practical life that could provide him adequate
social and economic security.
He worked for some time as an attorney in New York but it was in 1916 that he joined Hartford Accident and
Indemnity company in Connecticut, New England. His work involved a lot of travelling to the Midwest and to
the South, including Florida. His visit to Florida opened his eyes to the lush greenery of the warm and bracing
beauty of the state. He also became the vice-President of the company which marked the climax of his life
of deeds. His life of dreams had been postponed but not stifled completely. As is well known, he kept on
plodding during the day but at night he kept on writing poems. Harriet Monroe had started publishing Poetry
in the year 1902. It is a journal that has celebrated its centenary last year. Some of the war poems of Wallace
Stevens were published in November 1914 issue of Poetry. The publication of, his poems in a prestigious
journal like Poetry gave some recognition to the poet. He sent some more poems to Poetry but Harriet
Monroe returned them because she found the poems recondite, erudite, provocatively obscure. (Ibid, 247).
Many critics are of the view that the poems of Wallace Stevens are not only Romantic but obscure and
difficult as well. His first anthology of poems Harmonium was published in the year 1923 when he was forty
four years old. With this publication his life of dreams started and it came to an end with his collected Poems
in 1954. He died of cancer in the year 1955 after being recognized as a major American poet of the twentieth
century. He wrote at a time when Robert Frost, Carl Sandburg and William Carlos Williams were writing in
America. T.S. Eliot had settled in England and published The Wasteland in 1922. While Wallace Stevens had
a Romantic streak, he developed as a modern poet in America. His preoccupation with imagination was
strengthened by his friendship with William Carlos Williams who was preoccupied with objective reality, that
is the reality that exists outside the human mind. Ezra Pound, the most daring inventor and editor of modern
poetry was a friend of William Carlos Williams. He was also one of the Pioneers of Imagism in which the
stress is on the hard, concrete and sometimes starting and shocking images. The impact of imagism is most
clearly visible in Wallace Stevens famous poem Thirteen ways of looking at a Blackbird .
How a native of Reading of a Dutch origin became a great modern American poet is a fascinating story. If
you want to know more about it, kindly read George S. Lensings Wallace Stevens: A Poets Growth .
2. Major Themes and Works
Harmonium (1923) was the first major work published by Wallace Stevens in which there are poems like
Domination of Black, Sunday Morning and Peter Quince at the Clavier. These are the three poems prescribed
241 Wallace Stevens
for your study. Harold Bloom has described these poems as a celebration of the sublime in nature, an
awareness of change and mortality and a quest for transcendence amid the flux of life. There are also
influences of nineteenth century poets like William Wordsworth, John Keats and Walter Peter. From Wordsworth
Wallace Stevens derived the quest for the sublime in nature, from Keats a preoccupation with beauty and the
death of gods, and from Walter Peter a preoccupation with beauty in life and nature, beauty that was momentary
and short-lived. Like John Keats, Wallace Stevens also felt, what the imagination seizes as beauty must be
true whether it existed before or not. .
The first poem in Harmonium is Earthy Anecdote . It is a fascinating poem in which a dramatic encounter
between the bucks and a fire cat has been graphically delineated in distant Oklahoma. While the bucks went
clattering , the fire cat bristled in the way. The bucks which were making a noise turned to the right, and
turned to the left, the fire cat leaped and confronted the bucks. In this romantic encounter, the fire cat
seemed to have an upper hand. According to Prof. V.Y. Kantak the fire cat with its leap stands for the
imagination of the poet which is able to confront successfully the bucks which stand for the mundane reality
and the hurly burly of human life. In other words, Earthy Anecdote is a picture of the interaction between the
imagination and humdrum reality. This is the major thematic concern that is present in nearly all the poems of
Wallace Stevens. It is no wonder that the chapter four of The Poetry of Wallace Stevens by Robert Rehder
(St. Martin Press, New York, 1988) has the title, My Reality-Imagination Complex.
Le Monocle de Mon Uncle is another important poem in which the cooling of passionate love has been
described by the narrator, Mon Uncle. He is like a rabbi who ironically castigates his erotic passionate self,
Le Monocle, for forcing himself on a reluctant woman whom he describes as the radiant bubble. The
narrator is a foolish and romantic lover who has the illusion that the intensity of sexual love would never
decline. The ironical and sarcastic stand of the narrator is an index of the fact that the Romantic poet that
Wallace Stevens was slowly transforming himself into a modern poet who is keen to face the most unpleasant
reality of human life. The mask of the rabbi that the narrator puts on is another indicator of the poets
objectivity and self-criticism. Mortality affects not only human life in general but the erotic impulse as well.
Thirteen ways of looking at a Blackbird is another significant poem in which, with the perception of a
modern painter the blackbird has been described. Harold Bloom is of the view that the blackbird is a symbol
of mans fate in the modern world. To know the blackbird is to know ones own self in the modern age of Two
World Wars and Hiroshima (1945). The Emperor of Ice-cream is another well-known poem from the poets
first anthology. The title of the first anthology of poems by Wallace Stevens is also an index of his preoccupation
with music, something he had imbibed from his piano playing mother, and also for his quest for harmony
between the individual and the community, the heavenly and the earthly, the reality and the imagination.
Ideas of Order was the second anthology of poem published by the poet in 1935. It was a critical time in
post-war America and the economic crisis that began in 1929, The Great Crash, led to the failure of the
banks and the corporate institutions, the pauperization of a section of the middle class, the working class and
the rural poor and the rise of radicalism and anger among major writers like Ernest Hemingway, John Steinbeck
and Eugene O Neill. Wallace Stevens, however, continued to write poems from the point of view of an
aesthete, that is a lover of beauty. You will study in detail The Idea of order at Key West which is one of
the major poems of his second anthology. It is again a poem that reminds us of William Wordsworths The
Solitary Reaper in which the great Romantic poet had celebrated the moving song of an unknown young
woman in Scotland. What Wallace Stevens does is to Juxta Pose the song of an unknown woman against the
roar of the sea near Key West, a low-lying island near the state of Florida famous for its natural beauty.
There is no other poet except Walt Whitman who has celebrated the beauty, the varied beauty of America as
exuberantly as Wallace Stevens has done. Farewell To Florida and Lions in Sweden are two other important
poems in this anthology. While Farewell To Florida is a poem in which the warm beauty of the state is
contrasted with the cold leaflessness of his native town Hartford in New England, Lions in Sweden is a
fanciful projection of mans craving to negotiate the far-off frontier. In the poems of Wallace Stevens lions
Poetry 242
are a symbol of the distant ideal. There seems to be a grain of truth in the charge of radical and progressive
literary critics that much of Wallace Stevens poems in this anthology, in particular, are poems of escape. As
an aesthete he keeps on dreaming of lions while America was suffering from the Great Crash of 1929. His
poem Mozart, 1935 also shows his preoccupation with the transcendental genius of Mozart, the greatest
musician of Europe, and the narrator urges his contemporaries, poets and artists, to rise above the temporal
and achieve the perfection that Mozart had achieved in his life time. Wallace Stevens pays a moving tribute
to Mozart in the last paragraph of the poem:
We may return to Mozart,
He was young, and we,
We are old.
The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens, Thomson Press (India) Limited, 1974, p. 132.
The Man With The Blue Guitar (1937) was the third anthology of poems published by Wallace Stevens. The
poem The Man With The Blue Guitar is the longest poem celebrating the man who plays on the blue
guitar. The blue guitar is a symbol of a poet or artist of imagination. Robert Rehder is of the view that the blue
guitar is, perhaps, inspired by a painting of Pablo Picasso, the greatest painter of the modern age. In that
famous painting, The Picture , in haunting and melancholy shades of blue, shows an old man sitting
cross-legged on a window seat, playing a six-stringed guitar. (The Poetry of Wallace Stevens, by Robert
Rehder, p. 311). The man is old and emaciated but the blue guitar enables him to present things as they
appear to a sensitive artist or poet. The following four lines convey beautifully the stand of Wallace Stevens:
They said, you have a blue guitar, you do not play things as they are? The man replied, things as they are ,
Are Changed upon the blue guitar.
The Collected Poems, p. 165
In other words, modern poetry and modern art, do not portray things as they are. They portray reality as
perceived by the mind of a sensitive poet or an artist. Far from being a mirror of the surface aspects of reality,
the blue guitar enables the poet or an artist to illuminate the hidden and the far from obvious aspects of reality.
The function of poetry is to be a lamp that illumines darkness than be a simple mirror. There is no wonder that
The Man With The Blue Guitar is one of the most memorable poem written by Wallace Stevens.
As the second world war was going on 1939-45 the poets next anthology of poems Parts of A World was
published in 1942. You will study a number of poems from this anthology like Study of Two Peers, of Modern
Poetry, Contrary Theses (I) and Contrary Theses (II). While Study of Two Peers is an authentic portrait of
two peers as seen by a sensitive painter, of Modern Poetry is an attempt to present the modern poet as an
actor on a new-fangled stage and a metaphysician in the dark, twanging an instrument, twanging a wiry
string ..
The Collected Poems, p. 240.
Contrary Theses (I) and (II) are short poems in which an attempt has been made to present the paradox of
the modern age. In Contrary Theses (I) the grapes, plush upon vines, have been juxtaposed against a soldier
walking before the narrators door. The luxuriance of nature has been described along with a soldier who
stalks before my door. Ibid, p. 267. This is the modern world in all its starkness, nature is bountiful but man
is ready to stalk and be a killer. The killer is not very far from the narrators door. Keeping in mind the mood
of the time, the last poem in the anthology is aptly titled Examination of the Hero In a Time of War. There
is a quest for a new kind of man, a superman as conceived by Nietzsche and Bernard Shaw who could save
the modern world from anarchy and violence.
Transport to summer (1947) was the next anthology of poems published by Wallace Stevens. The last poem
that has been prescribed for your study Holiday in Reality belongs to this anthology and is preoccupied with
the January sun . A sun in an almost colorless, cold heaven. (Ibid, p. 312). In such a bleak and cold
243 Wallace Stevens
world, Spring is the truth of spring or nothing, a waste, a fake. (Ibid, p. 313). It is the juxtaposition of the
January sun and spring that brings out the strange nature of the reality in this world. What seems to be real
to the ordinary, conventional people of the world, has a touch of the unreal for the narrator of the poem.
Esthetique Du Mal is another important poem in which the tragedy of father-son relationship has been most
trenchantly expressed. The life of the son becomes a punishment because the father is stern and unforgiving.
Both the father and the son stick to their way, their dream, their aspiration and the result is that both of them
are utterly exhausted and alienated. One cannot help remembering the stormy relationship between Wallace
Stevens and his father Garrett Stevens.When Wallace Stevens had been courting Elsie at Reading and
sometimes visited his home along with her, his father curtly told him, If youre going to consider our home
just a hotel, just a place to bring your laundry, you might as well not come at all. We come to know from
Georges. Lensing that this was the last he saw of his father. (Wallace Stevens: A Poets Growth, p.44).
Notes toward a supreme Fiction is another long, rambling poem in this anthology. In this poem there is
ephebe, a young Greek citizen, who is initiated into the mystery of life and literature. In the fourth section of
the poem there is an elaborate evocation of the mystery of life. What appear as opposites, man and woman,
day and night, the imagined and the real, winter and spring, music and silence, north and south are an intrinsic
couple. They are opposites and yet interdependent. The captain and his men, the sailor and the sea, the sun
and rain are also plural like two lovers. Reality is so large and comprehensive that it embraces and encompasses
all of these contraries. One is reminded of the great English Romantic poet William Blake who has a more or
less similar grasp and appreciation of the phenomena of life. There is no wonder that Notes towards a
Supreme Fiction, along with The man With The Blue Guitar, is counted as one of the most profound and
moving poem written by Wallace Stevens. It is governed by the reality-imagination complex of the poet. This
anthology also contains Sketch of the Ultimate Politician in which there is a trenchant and satiric portrait of
the ultimate politician of the modern age. The ultimate politician has been pictured thus :
He is the final builder of the total buildings,
the final dreamer of the total dream,
or will be.
Building and dream are one.
The Collected Poems, p. 335
The Auroras of Autumn (1950) is the next anthology of poems by Wallace Stevens. Robert Rehder is of the
view, This is the work that establishes him as a great poet. (p. 54). Harold Bloom is also of the view, In his
later sixties, Stevens began to write with an uncanny clairvoyance that critics have been slow to apprehend.
(Wallace Stevens : The Poems of our climate, p. 253). Among the striking poems of this anthology are The
Auroras of Autumn, The Woman in Sunshine, What We See Is What We Think and An Ordinary Evening.
There is a precision of images and economy of means in these poems that is lacking in the poems of Harmonium.
For example, in The Auroras of Autumn there is a vivid description of the movement of the wind :
A wind will spread its windy
grandeurs round
And knock like a rifle-butt
against the door.
The Collected Poems, p. 414
The image of a rifle-butt shows the deadly ferocity of the wind. The image is neither vague nor romantic. It
is an image that shows that in spite of his Romantic sensibility and Keatslike belief in the sanctity of the
imagination, Wallace Stevens had learned from the imagists like Ezra Pound and achieved a hard precision in
the use of words and images. One is reminded of another great modern poet William Butler Yeats who
retained his Romantic sensibility and belief in the primacy of the imagination but learned to use startling and
Poetry 244
hard images from the French symbolists like Charles Baudelaire and the Imagists like Ezra Pound. There is
no wonder that till the age of seventy Wallace Stevens continued to grow as a poet. Robert Rehder is of the
view that Stevens resembles Yeats, Valery and Rilke in that they all composed most of their best poems
after the age of forth, and, in the case of Stevens and Yeats, the bulk of their best work was done when they
were over forty. Theirs is the poetry of maturity. (p. 44)
Nowhere is this maturity of thought and expression better expressed than in his poem An Ordinary Evening
in New Haven. This is the last of his great poems and shows the poets preoccupation with the nature of
poetry. The poet does see through his imagination but he cannot escape the phenomena of life. The poet
affirms, we seek / Nothing beyond reality. The Collected Works, p. 471. It is the poets capacity to negotiate
with the hidden and the deeper aspects of reality that helps him in producing poetry that is not only a mirror
but also a lamp, a lamp that illumines the dark corners of the poets mind. New Haven stands as a symbol of
the deep and mysterious aspects of reality which a poet has to negotiate through his words and images.
Reality is a house that has many rooms. It is physical, it is solid but it is equally more than physical. The poets
mind in perception is as real as the object or the idea that it perceives.
It was in 1954 that The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens was published to mark the completion of
seventy five years of his life.
Wallace Stevens wanted to call his collected poems The Whole of Harmonium . (Robert Rehder, p. 302).
He felt that all his poems were preoccupied with the reality-imagination complex and together they amounted
to one single, individual attempt to explore reality in all its depth. Later on, he changed his mind and did not
insist on retaining the title, The Whole of Harmonium. The poems under the section, The Rock were also
included in this definitive anthology. Three of the most remarkable poems under the section, The Rock are To
an old Philosopher in Rome, The World as Meditation and Final Soliloquy of the Interior Paramour. The
first poem is a moving account of the death of his Harvard teacher George Santayana in Rome. The process
of the gradual decay of the man who inspired him to live a life of dreams and be a poet has been described
poignantly as the majestic movement / of men growing small in the distance of space. (The Collected
Poems, p. 508). Rome was far away from Wallace Stevens, but in spite of the distance, he could feel its
solemnity and majesty as if the death was occurring in a neighbourhood. The World as Meditation and Final
Soliloquy of the Interior Paramour are two other fascinating poems in which the interior landscape of the
poets mind has been graphically depicted. While in the first poem, Penelope has been waiting for Ulysses, in
the second poem there is a paramour, a woman within the poets mind that has been evoked. The paramour
does exist in flesh and blood but the poets imagination makes her more real, more tangible than any other
object in the world. There is no wonder that God and the Imagination are one (The Collected Poems,
p. 524).
Wallace Stevens , suggestion that his collected poems constitute The Whole of Harmonium was not
accepted but it has a grain of truth. Whether it is an early poem like Sunday Morning or a late poem like Final
Soliloquy of the Interior Paramour, the voice of the imagined woman is always audible in Wallace Stevens,
poetry. That woman has been visualized as the interior paramour. It is the dialogue between the poet and his
interior paramour that makes his poetry so resonant and appealing. Psychologists tell us that there is a
woman within every man and there is a man within every woman. A genius is bisexual. It encompasses both
the male and the female. There is no doubt that Wallace Stevens was a genius.
[If you want to know more about it, kindly read the chapter two, The Woman Won, The Woman Lost in
Wallace Stevens : A Mythology of Self, by Milton J. Bates, (University of California Press, Berkeley, Los
Angeles, London, 1985)].
3. Placing the Writer in the Literary Tradition, bringing out his Contribution
As a reaction to decadent Romanticism that prevailed in the early decades of the twentieth century, T.S. Eliot
said that while there may be a place for Romanticism in life, in poetry and in literature there was no room for
245 Wallace Stevens
Romanticism. He had in mind the decadent Romanticism that flourished in England towards the end of the
nineteenth century and the early decades of the twentieth century. There was Oscar Wilde who led the life
of an aesthete and a dandy and denied the social utility of poetry and literature. There was Dante Gabriel
Rossetti who made a cult, a religion of beauty, and did not see anything in life except beauty, beauty as
perceived by the senses. There was Walter Peter who said that a Romantic hungered for beauty that was
singular and strange. One can understand that the cult of beauty that flourished both in life and poetry
towards the end of the nineteenth century was a reaction to the didactic poetry that was written in the
Victorian England by poets like Tennyson, Browning and Matthew Arnold. The decadent Romantics lived in
an ivory tower and did not understand that nations like England and Germany were involved in a cut-throat
competition for oversea markets and power to derive the maximum advantage from the growth of capitalism
as a global system. There is no wonder that the crisis of capitalism led to the First World War (1914-1919)
which led eventually to the growth of modernism in poetry and literature. Modernism as practiced by T.S.
Eliot and Ezra Pound was a reaction to decadent Romanticism.
It was towards the end of the eighteenth century, after the French Revolution of 1789, that Romanticism
developed in England. It asserted the right of the individual to defy authority and live a life of freedom- liberty,
equality and fraternity were the ringing slogans behind the French Revolution which led to the abolition of
feudalism and monarchy in France. A Republic was established in France which alarmed the vested interests
and monarchs all over Europe. The common people of England felt that a new dawn, an era of liberty,
equality and fraternity would be ushered in and decadent monarchy would be abolished. Historically speaking,
Romanticism was a radical shift in the history of Europe and involved a transition from feudalism and monarchy
towards a Republic in which the rights of men and women were guaranteed by law. The liberating influence
of the French Revolution has been described by the great poet William Wordsworth in his famous poem The
Prelude :
Bliss was in that down to be alive,
To be young was Heaven.
As a literary movement, Romanticism began with the publication of The Lyrical Ballads by William
Wordsworth in the year 1978. There was a radical note in the poetry of William Wordsworth who described
the life of the beggars, the maid servant and the leech-gatherer. He also celebrated the sublime beauty of
nature and attacked vehemently the greed of the rich. He also affirmed that he would like to be a pagan who
believed in old god and goddesses rather than be a hypocritical Christian. The note of social protest and the
individuals right to revolt against corrupt authority was also visible in the poetry of the second generation of
Romantics like Lord Byron and P.B. Shelly. It is true that John Keats, the last of the great Romantics, began
as an aesthete and a lover of beauty and paganism, but even his quest for beauty also involved a confrontation
with pain and suffering. He did not live in an ivory tower as most of the decadent Romantics lived towards
the end of the nineteenth century. The Romantics were, however, in their preoccupation with the imagination,
the sanctity of the individual, the hunger for a life of the senses, the love of nature, the love between a man
and a woman, more or less united and they were both lovers and critics of the life of their time. Like Robert
Frost of America, a contemporary of Wallace Stevens, they would have also affirmed that they had a lovers
quarrel with the world.
After the First World War (1917-19), Modernism developed both in poetry and literature and also in other
arts, notably painting. T.S. Eliot and Ezra Pound were the pioneers of the movement and the Imagists stood
for a new kind of poetry, new both in sensibility and style. According to a note in The Oxford Companion to
American Literature, (Oxford University Press, New York, 1968, p. 401), Imagism, poetic movement of
England and the United States, flourished from 1909 to 1917. Its credo, expressed in Some Imagist Poets
(1915), included the use of the language of common speech, precision, the creation of new rhythms, absolute
freedom in the choice of subject matter, the evocation of images in hard, clear poetry, and concentration.
One can see that Modernism and Imagism were a reaction against the sentimentalism, utopian thinking and
Poetry 246
vague images found in the decadent Romantic poets of the nineties. While Ezra Pound concentrated on the
hard, clear-cut, shocking images, T.S. Eliot said that the modern poet is one who is able to encompass the
squalor, boredom and beauty of urban life. While the Romantics were preoccupied with the beauty of the
pastoral countryside, the modern were preoccupied with the squalor, boredom and beauty of urban life. If
Charles Praudelaire was preoccupied with the boredom, pain, and nausea of Paris, T.S. Eliot mirrored the
seediness, squalour and boredom of London.
In the realm of painting modernism led to the growth of Impressionists who rejected realism in which an
object was presented as it appeared to a man of normal sight. There were painters in France like Degas,
Monet, Manet, and Renoir. They distorted the hard outline of an object and depicted it as it appeared to the
imagination of a painter of unusual sensibility. As a group, the Impressionists, were more concerned with
moods and sensations rather than with the mere observation of details. They were also preoccupied with the
subtle effects of light and shade of an object. There was in France, Paul Cezanne (1839-1906) who went
beyond Impressionism into the structural analysis of an object in nature and with his extraordinary insight
could see the cube, the cone, and the cylinder in nature. Robert Rehder is of the view that the influence of
Paul Cezannes landscape is perceptible in Wallace Stevens Study of Two Pears (p. 206). As we all know,
Pablo Picasso (1881-1973) of Spain was perhaps, the greatest modern painter of the world. He was also the
painter who is supposed to be the master of cubism and modern art.
Where does Wallace Stevens fit in this scenario? There is a native American tradition of Romanticism in
which we have poets like R.W. Emerson, Walt Whitman and Emily Dickinson. While Emerson was a
Transcendentalist who believed like the English Romantics that the individual had immense possibilities of
growth, Walt Whitman was a poet who celebrated the landscape and the common people of America with a
Romantic ecstasy. Emily Dickinson was an intensely solitary poet who peopled her solitude with her
overwhelming imagination. Robert Frost was a lover of nature who had a lovers quarrel with the world. Carl
Sandburg was a poet who celebrated the city, Chicago, and the burly-shouldered workers who had built the
city. When we look at the early poems of Wallace Stevens, especially Sunday Morning and Peter Quince at
the Clavier he looks like a cross, a hybrid of a nature-loving Wordsworth and beauty-obsessed Keats. There
is also a tinge of Walter Pater in his stress on the transitoriness of beauty in this world. But when we look at
his later poetry, The Man With the Blue Guitar, Notes toward a Supreme Fiction, An ordinary Evening in
New Haven and To an old Philosopher in Rome we find that there is a hard precision in the use of concrete
images, a sustained intensity of vision, and firm tone which is entirely his own. Like W.B. Yeats, another poet
with a Romantic streak, Wallace Stevens could be described as a neo-Romantic poet of the modern age who
had learnt precision in the use of images from the Imagists, and a subtle perception of reality from the
Impressionist painters of France. [If you want to know more about Wallace Stevens, a modern poet, you
could read the first chapter I was the world in which I walked (p.1-55) from Robert Rehders excellent study
The Poetry of Wallace Stevens (St. Martins Press, New York, 1988)].
4. The Text and its Detailed Critical Summary and Glossary
Domination of Black
Summary:
It is a poem in three unequal paragraphs, the second one being the largest consisting of eighteen lines. The
first and the last paragraph consist of ten and eight lines. In all, the picture is that of a dark night in the
countryside. The title Domination of Black seems to imply the preponderance of darkness over the plants and
the animal Kingdom.
The narrator visualizes the countryside at night. The colour of the bushes, the fallen leaves and the colour of
the hemlocks are dark. Darkness seems to become deeper and makes one turn in ones room and also
surrender turn in to the wind. In other words, the narrator withdraws from the comfort and security of
247 Wallace Stevens
a room and surrenders to the wind in the countryside. The narrator has used the phrase turn in both in the
sense of to withdraw and also in the sense of to surrender to a larger force. Nothing, however, is darker than
the hemlocks which are large and heavy. The darkness of the hemlocks invades and dominates the countryside.
Their darkness is so overwhelming that the narrator suddenly remembers the cry of the peacocks in the
countryside. Is it a cry of life, a cry of hope against all-pervading darkness in the countryside at night?
With this question in the mind, the contrast between the darkness of the hemlocks and the cry of the peacocks,
it is possible to read the rest of the poem. The tails of the peacocks are as dark as the leaves of the bushes
in the countryside. They are also turning in the wind, that is they are feeling the full impact of the wind. The
peacocks fly from the branches of the hemlocks and their cry seems to sweep over the room. The narrator
hears the cry of the peacocks again and again. He also wonders if the peacocks cry is against the darkness
of the hemlocks.
In the last paragraph we come to know that the narrator is inside the room. From the window, he can gather
how the planets gather and orbit around the earth. From the countryside, the narrators gaze shifts to the
cosmos, that is the planets orbiting around the earth. When the narrator thinks of the globe and the planets
orbiting around the globe, again he is reminded of the overwhelming darkness of the hemlocks and the cry of
the peacocks.
If the hemlocks symbolize the force of annihilation in a dark mysterious universe, the cry of the peacocks
symbolize a kind of protest against the dark and sinister force operating in the universe. The peacocks are a
ray of hope for the narrator and their cry is, perhaps, a cry of life, an affirmation of life instinct. It is a ray of
hope in a universe where the domination of the black is nearly absolute.
Harold Bloom is of the view that the hemlocks stand for mortality, for death and the peacocks stand for life
in the midst of death.
Glossary:
1. Hemlocks: plant with finely divided leaves and small flowers from which poison is made. It stands for
death in the context of the poem.
2. Turned in: (colloquial): go to bed, withdraw from contact, surrender to the police; fold or slant in; give
back to those in authority.
Sunday Morning
Summary :
According to Harold Bloom, Wallace Stevens: The Poems of Our Climate, p. 27 Sunday Morning
remains Stevens most famous single poem, an eminence achieved at the expense of even stronger poems in
Harmonium. What makes the poem so good and compelling for readers? How are readers supposed to
approach Sunday Morning which consists of eight free verse paragraphs of fifteen lines each?
In the first paragraph of Sunday Morning, the narrator has created the picture of a woman who has put on
a loose robe, a kind of bathrobe. The woman has a kind of dream, day-dream to be precise, and her imagination
makes her travel to Palestine, the holy land, the land dominated by the holy tomb and also the holy blood. She
is also able to feel the dark encroachment of that old catastrophe. (The Collected Poems, p. 27) Needless
to add that the tomb is that of Jesus and the blood is that of the Son of God. The old Catastrophe refers to
the crucifixion of Jesus.
The second paragraph shows the response of the narrator to the situation why should the woman be still
devoted to the dead, that is the son of God who has been crucified long ago? Why should divinity be ascribed
to the silent shadows (and memories) in our mind? Would not the woman find greater comfort and solace in
the sun, the fruit and the green wings seen on the earth? There is no need to look for divinity outside the earth,
the passion of rain or the mood at the falling of snow. The womans soul has a spark of the divine and in the
Poetry 248
words of the narrator, Divinity must life within herself. (Ibid, p.67). The celebration of the varied phenomena
occurring on the earth reminds a careful reader of John Keats, a great nineteenth century Romantic poet,
who had affirmed, The poetry of the earth is never dead.
The narrator has referred to the Roman God Jove in the third Section of the poem. The ancient God had his
mysterious (Inhuman birth) and he was neither breast fed by a mother nor was be brought up in a pleasant
land. He moved among human beings at that time as a muttering king would move among his hinds (that is
workers and attendants). From the fourth paragraph onwards there is a sudden shift in narration. The woman
begins to narrate her own experience of living in the world, the world that is discovered through the senses.
She also says that as long as she can see lively birds fly across the misty fields and hear their warbling, she
senses that she is in paradise. Once the birds go away, not to return, the earth does not seem like a paradise.
It is the beating of the swallows wings in the June evening and the lush greenery of the earth in April that
makes Natures beauty so tangible and patpable. As a pagan, like words worths Lucy, she celebrates the
beauty of nature. A paradise is crated on the earth as long as her hunger for beauty is satisfied.
In the fifth paragraph, however, the woman says that her hunger is for beauty that is imperishable, that is
lasting and eternal. The difficulty, however, arises from the fact that the beauty that she can see in nature is
subject to change. This idea of the mutability of nature has been expressed through an extremely striking line,
Death is the mother of beauty. (Ibid, p 68). What she is trying to say is that death is a universal phenomena
and after the triumph of lush greenery in April there occurs the littering of leaves. (Ibid, p.69). That is, after
the end of Spring, the earth is littered with dead leaves. Women who have a passion for littering leaves stray
and lose communion with companions. Natures beauty is indeed sublime but it is a kind of sublime that is
subject to decay and degeneration. It is far from imperishable. Mortality is something that deeply offends the
womans paganism and passionate love of nature.
The sixth paragraph starts with a speculation, Is there no change of death in paradise? (Ibid, P.69). If the
paradise on the earth is far from perfect, is the paradise in heaven different from it? Whatever be the reality
of the paradise in heaven, the earthy paradise is subject to deeay and degeneration. There is resplendent
beauty on the earth but there is death as well. This is the strange reality pertaining to the earthly paradise.
The striking line, Death is the mother of beauty, mystical, recurs in this paragraph as well. The mystery of
the sublime and death co-existing on the earth is hard to explain.
The Seventh paragraph is a magnificent recreation of the triumph of nature in summer. A ring of men (why
not women?) gather and chant to the glory of the sun. Those men are, Not as a god, but as a might be.
(Ibid, p.70). They have a savage vitality and their chanting, their sun worship, is a kind of boisterous orgy, that
is a kind of Romantic frenzy and madness. They would also be able to know from where they came and
where they would go. There is a touch of Walt Whitman who believed in the perfectibility of man and also
a touch of William wordsworths Immortality ode in this sustained paragraph where man is celebrated as a
Godlike creature, a kind of superman with inexhaustible power.
In the eighth and the last paragraph, the voice of the woman is heard again. She hears a voice that tells her
that the tomb of the son of God in Palestine is neither vital nor relevant as far as living men and women
(spirits lingering) are concerned. Jesus, the son of God, lies buried in his grave. We, the men and the women,
of the modern world live in an old chaos of the sun. (Ibid. p.70). The chaos of the sun is a striking phrase
which, perhaps, refers to the modern world in which God does not seem to operate and figure prominently
and our chaotic life is governed by ill-organized, way ward impulses. There is the sublime on the earth which
transports and lifts us out of our petty self but even the sublime in nature is subject to the law of mutability and
death. Towards the end, there is a vivid picture of a deer walking upon mountains and the quail whistling
spontaneously. Sweet berries ripen in the wilderness and lastly a flock of pigeons undulate (move) ambiguously
in the vast sky and eventually after a flight they sink, downward to darkness, on extended wings, (Ibid,
p.70). The flight of the flock of pigeons in the vast sky and Their sinking down to darkness seems to echo
the ups and downs, the rise and the fall of mans life upon the earth.
249 Wallace Stevens
It is not an accident that the black is dominant not only in domination of Black but is Sunday Morning as
well. In this context, the black is not beautiful, the black is sobering, if not absolutely frightening. The black
is inseparable from the earthly paradise visualized so eloquently by Wallace Stevens. It stands for mortality,
for death.
Glossary:
1. Peignor: A womans loose robe, a kind of bathrobe.
2. Cockatoo: A crested colourful parrot
3. Sepulchre: Tomb in this context the tomb of Jesus, the son of God, in Patesline.
4. hinds: old sense : Workers or attendants
5. Multterign: one who is grumbling, always complaining
6. Seraphin: Seraphism, angels of the highest order and rank
Peter Quince at the Clavier
Summary:
Peter Quinee at the Clavier is a poem in which there are four paragraphs of unequal length. The title of
the poem is derived from a character, Peter Quince, a carpenter in Shakespears Midsummer Nights
Dream. In the poem, Peter Quince is a worker who tries to play music on the Clavier with his fingers. He
has a keen hunger for music (an art that is subtle) but his fingers are not nimble enough for the task. The
narrator in the first paragraph, consisting of fifteen lines in all, speaks in the first person (I). He admits that his
fingers work on the keyboard and product music. It is audible. There i silos music that he can hear with his
spirit, that is his auditory imagination. Real music does not lie in sounds that we hear. Real music lies in
melody, in harmony that we can hear (and feel) without imagination. One is reminded of a famous remark by
the great English Romantic poet John Keats, Heard melodies are sweet, those unheard are sweeter . There
is no doubt that Wallace Stevens is a Romantic poet who is attracted by what he sees and hears but he wants
to go deep and see and hear what lies beyond our senses. He wants to appreciate the unheard melodies.
The narrator points out in the latter part of the first paragraph that he is full of desire for his paramour. Music
is more than sound. It releases our strong feelings, our desires. When he thinks of her, he also thinks of the
music of the blue-shadowed silk put on by his paramour. In this context, the music of silk makes him feel the
soft exterior of his paramour. She arouses the same passionate music within the narrator as is aroused by
Susanna among the elders. The elders are saintly men whose eyes turn red with passion as they have a
glimpse of Susanna. When the elders have a glimpse of Susanna having a bath in her garden, their basic
instinct and lust for her is aroused fully. They may not have much blood in their veins (their thin blood) but he
naked glory of Susanna makes their blood tingle and sing.
The first paragraph of the poem is able of juxtapose the nudity of Susanna against the lust of the saintly
elders. It also creates a suspense for an alert reader. What is going to happen? Are the saintly elders going
to retain their purity and piety? Is Susanna, in all her nudity and naked glory, destined to be inviolable, and un-
ravished? The second paragraph is the largest of all paragraphs and draws attention to Susanna lying in
water that is green, clear and warm. There is so much melody for her that all her emotions are stimulated
enormously. When she comes out of water and walks upon the grass, there is quavering all over her flesh.
There is at that evitical moment a breath upon her hand and the night becomes mute. In silence, she is able
to hear the ample sound of a cymbal and also the roaring of horns. The music of a cymbal and that of the
horns simply overwhelms her, and enters her flesh. The last two lines of the second paragraph, with the
overwhelming sound of cymbal and the horns, perhaps, mark the climax of the human drama engulfing the
innocent, youthful Susanna and the red-eyed lustful elders.
The third paragraph is relatively brief and consists of ten lines. The attendants of Susanna come to the spot
at night. They wonder why Susanna has let out a cry against the elders by her side. They have lamps in their
Poetry 250
hands and the light of the lamps reveals the shame of Susanna. In other words, Susanna has been ravished
and violated by the white-haired, lustful elders. Her dream of love has led to an orgy perpetrated by the
saintly elders. The attendants have a silly smile on their faces and they go away as quickly as they had come.
The last paragraph is a kind of the narrators response to the stark human tragedy. Susanna has lost her
innocence and purity and the white-haired elders have lost their saintliness. There is no wonder that Susanna
has let out a cry at her defilement by crooked age.
The voice that we hear in the last paragraph is not that of a moralist. It is the voice of an aesthete, that is a
lover of beauty and a lover of music. Where does beauty really lie? Is it fleeting, only of a brief moment, or
does it transcend and rise above the law of mutability operating in nature and in human life as well? The
narrator seems to be of the view that beauty is not objective, existing outside the mind of the perceiver.
Beauty is entirely subjective and it is perceived only for a brief moment by the human mind. In other words,
beauty is fleeting and short-lived. The narrator is able to see a paradox in the world that we perceive through
the senses. The paradox is, The body dies; the bodys beauty lives. (Ibid, p.92). As far as an individual is
concerned, the law of mutability operates. Beauty can glow for a moment, as that of Susanna, and it can also
be disfigured and utterly humiliated. Instead of being a glory, it can also become a cause of shame. In the
same way an evening vanishes and disappears. Gardens are also denuded in winter. Young maidens die and
Susannas exceeding beauty provokes a brutal lust among the saintly, white-haired elders. Finally, death is
inexorable and the most lovely object is rendered worthless and worn-out. In what sense does the beauty of
the body transcend and rise above its decay and degeneration? The narrators response is the response of an
aesthete and a dandy. The individual objects and persons die, but their memory lingers on in the human mind.
It is only in memory, in the celebration of A maidens choral and the celebration of the aurora, the goddess
of the dawn, that beauty is immortal and transcends natures law of mutability.
Beauty in its sensory aspect either dies or is disfigured, by the idea of beauty, an abstraction, ligners on. It is
on this Platonic note of an archetypal beauty transcending the law of mutability that the poem Peter Quince
at the Clavier comes to an end. One may forget the lust of the white-haired, saintly elders, the retreat of the
attendants from the shameful scene, but the image of Susanna in water that was transparent and warm
remains in the mind firmly.
The narrator looks at the episode pertaining to Susanna and the lustful elders with the eye of an aesthete and
a dandy. He doesnt respond to the episode as a moralist and a humanist. The moral dimension is missing in
this fascinating poem.
Glossary:
1. Basses: lowest part in music, low in tone, deep-rooted.
2. Pizzication: music played by plucking the strings (of a violin) instead of using the bow.
3. Quavering: Shaking or trembling
4. Scarves: a piece of cloth that covers a womans hair
5. Cymbal: a pair of round brass plates struck together to make a sharp, clanging sound.
6. Horns: Wind instruments
7. Tambourines: Small, shallow drums
8. By zantines: citizen of the East Roman empire: in this context, Susannas attendants
9. Willow: trees and shrubs with thin, easily bent branches in this context, it stands for Susanna.
10. Simpering: giving a silly kind of smile.
11. Momentary: lasting for a moment; short-lived.
12. Portal: doorway an imposing one of a large building.
251 Wallace Stevens
13. Cowls: long, loose gown with a hood that can be pulled over the head; the hood itself.
14. Auroral: pertaining to Aurora the Roman goddess of the dawn.
15. Choral: Sung together in a choir.
16. Bawdy: vulgar, lustful; in this context refers to the white-haired elders.
17. Scraping: Throwing away an useless or worn-out
18. Viol: Stringed instrument of the middle Ages from which the modern violin was developed.
19. Sacrament: Solemn religious ceremony in the Christian Church, for example Baptism, Confirmation and
matrimony.
20. Susanna: A woman of Babylon against whom a charge of adultery was brought by two elders which
was false and she was exonerated by Daniel, a Judge, famous for probity.
21. Hosanna: a shout of adoration of God in the Church in this context, the beauty of Susanna is something
Godlike, irresistible for the lusty elders.
The Idea of Order at Key West
Summary:
The Idea of order at Key West is a poem which consists of seven sections of unequal length The first
section consists of seven lines and the second section too has seven lines. The narrator discovers a young
woman singing near the sea at key West in Florida. Key west is a low-lying island near the mainland and is
famous for its beaches. The water of the sea makes a constant cry and it doesnt fuse in the young womans
song. The narrators, however, feels strongly that She sang beyond the genius of the sea. (The Collected
Poem, p.128). Neither the sea nor the young woman has any mask or pretence. The young womans song
is uttered, word by word, and the grinding water and the gasping wind at key west are also audible. The
narrator is most keenly responsive to the young womans song. He makes an honest confession. But it was
she and not the sea we heard. (Ibid, p.129). it is clear that the poet is not alone. He has a companion who too
listens to the young womans song. It is her song that enters the depths of their being.
The third section of the poem consists of six lines. The narrator says that the sea seems to wrap up (ever-
hooded) the young woman but in reality she is the maker of the song she sang. He also wonders whose spirit
has animated the young woman. He wants to find out that spirit which is behind her exuberant and resonant
song. The fourth section of the poem consists of thirteen lines in which the narrator speculates if the young
womans voice has been shaped by the waves of the sea. He also speculates if the summer, the air, and the
clouds have shaped her melody. He is of the view that there is more than the sum total of all that in her
singing. The movement of the sea and the wind sometimes appear meaningless and incomprehensible but
her song speaks to us in a way that nothing else does. It has an irresistible human appeal.
In the fifth section of the poem, consisting of ten lines, the narrator has pinpointed the unique nature of the
young womans song. It is her voice, so human and direct, that makes us aware of the skys capacity to
absorb and assimilate it. Further, the solitude of Key West is also measured by her ringing voice. The narrator
says, She was the single artificer of the world. (Ibid, p.129). In other words, without her rolling, ringing
voice the world doesn t seem to exist. The solitude makes her song. So exquisite and compelling. The
narrator sees her alone, striding hear the sea, heaving her heart out in full-throated ease. She becomes a
symbol of a Romantic poet whose poetry is a spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings. There is a touch of
William words worth about her solitary genius.
It is in the sixth section of the poem that we come to know that the narrator has been at Key West, Florida
with a companion. This section consists of eight lines and shows the narrators response to the classical ideal
of poetry of his companion Ramon Fernadez, a French literary critic. As a critic of poetry his companion
believes that great poetry, like music and painting is a product of order, self control and formal perfection. It
Poetry 252
is not a spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings, as Wordsworth argued in the Preface to the Lyrical
Ballads. Great poetry is the result of meditation, prolonged thinking and a highly literary style imitating the
great poets of ancient Greece and Rome. Imitation was the core of great poetry, not passion and imagination
as Romantic poets argued. The narrators stand is different from that of a classicists like Ramon Fernadez
and is closer to that of a Romantic Poet.
The Narrator tells his companion that when the young womans singing comes to an end, they go towards the
town. Night, however, comes to the sea-shore, and light in the fishing boats illumines darkness and an enchanting
scene is crated near the sea. In the seventh and the last section of the poem, Ramon Fernadez, the classicist,
has been addressed by the narrator. The French literary critic looks pale and his pre-occupation with the
virtue of order, self-control and propriety, fail to see any harmony between the passion and the rage of the
maker the young woman and the wild roar of the sea. Something of the roar of the sea also infuses the young
woman. But there is also a subtle difference between the genius of the sea, and the genius of the young
woman. While the roar of the sea is far from human, the young womans song is passionate and overwhelming.
It speaks directly to our own self. Her song is both human and also mysterious . It is not distant and forbidding
like the seas constant roar. Ramon Fernadez has such a rage for order and self-control that he would like to
tame the voice of the sea. The word Order is the key word in this poem and it shows the futility of Ramon
Fernadezs passion for Order which cant either explain the sea or the spontaneous song of the young
woman.
Glossary:
1. Genius: guardian spirit; except ional natural ability.
2. Veritable: real, rightly so called
3. Mask: Covering for the face
4. Grinding: crushing to small par ticks oppressing
5. Gasping: Convulsive catching of breath
6. Dark: deep or somber colour
7. Coral: hard substance built up by marine polyps. Red or pink
8. heaving: rising
9. Plungings: enter into forcefully, diving.
10. Acutest: most keen (in a positive sense)
11. Artificer: Craftsman, maker
12. Striding: waling firmly
13. Descended: Sloped down sank
14. Portioned: divided
15. Portals: doorways
16. Ghostlier: looking more like apparition of a dead person starting shapes.
17. Demarcations: marking boundaries
18. Key west: a low- lying island near the mainland in florid; a popular tourist resort.
Note : Wallace Stevens wrote this poem during his second visit to Key West in 1934.
Study of Two Pears
Summary:
If Peter Quince at the Clavier and The Idea of order at key West are poems steeped in music, and
melody, Study of Two Pears is a poem visualized by one who has the eye of a painter, a French impressionist
253 Wallace Stevens
painter to be precise, who can respond to the outline, curves and colours of a commonplace object like pears.
The Study of two Pears has largely a visual appeal. The poem consists of six stanzas of four unrhymed
lines each. The narrators gaze is focused on two pears which constitute a single scene. The pears are two
small objects but eh narrator has used two rare Latin words, Opusculum, paedagogum to begin the poem
which mean two small minor objects. These Latin words impart a sort of dignity to two small pears. They
introduce somewhat indirectly two pears to the reader.
They have also been defined in terms of a series of negations. They are neither viols, a music instrument nor
nudes, that is painting of a nude model. They are also not bottles. They are in terms of shape, unique objects.
They do not resemble any other object in the world. In the second stanza, the narrator brings out the yellow
tinge of the two pears. They also have curves and towards the base they have a bulge. There is also a touch
of red that they have. Yellow seems to be their natural colour but they have a touch of red, perhaps near the
bottom.
In the third stanza, the narrator says that the surface of the two pears is to flat. There are curves and on the
whole they are round, three-dimensional. They taper towards the top. In the next stanza, the narrator is also
able to discern bits of blue over the pears. There is also a hard dry leaf that hang from the stem and it covers
the pears. The yellow found over the pears glistens, shines brightly. There are so many shades of yellow that
gleam over the pears. There is also a tinge of citrons (Lemon-like Fruits), oranges and green over the skin of
the two pears. This is the narrators contention in the fifth stanza.
The last stanza of the poem refers to the shadow of the two pears over the green cloth that is beneath them.
The shadow is like a small drop or a spot on the green cloth. The narrator also points out that the two pears
are not seen as the observer wills are expects. They have an independent existence of their own and the
observer cannot but discern gradually their various tints, shades and curves. With the eye of an expressionist
French painter like Paul Cezanne the narrator has gradually visualized a commonplace object like two pears,
drawing attention to their specific unique features of shapes, curves and colours.
The variegated reality of the two pears has been graphically described by Wallace Stevens in his compact
and modern poem Study of Two Pears. There are no traces of morbid sentiment-ability and vague imagery
as found in decadent Romantic poets. There is a precision in the use of words and phrases which is the
distinguishing feature of a modern poet.
According to Robert Rehder, This poem .. demonstrates how much Stevens learned about vision from
French painting, in this case especially Cezanne . (The Poetry of Wallace Stevens , p.206).
Glossary:
1. Opusculum (Latin): a minor work or object
2. Paedagogum (Latin): art or process of teaching learning.
3. Viols: violins
4. Bulging: becoming thick
5. Tapering: becoming narro
6. Glistens: shines
7. Citrons: lemon like fruits
8. Blobs: drops of spots
9. Observer: one who notices reality
10. Impressionism: A school of nineteenth century painters in France among whom Paul Cezanne, Roussean,
and Renior were not important. Of these Cezanne had the greatest influence on Wallace Steven. According
to Paul Cezanne. The great truth is that we believe in the existence of things not through their
surface textures, their light and shadow, their perspective, but through the ideas we bring to them,
through our memories and knowledge of their weight, depth, volume, and substance.
Art and Society, by Sidney Finkelstein, (New york, International Publishers, 1947, p. 234-235).
Poetry 254
Of Modern Poetry
Summary:
Of Modern Poetry is, according to Harold Bloom, a weak poem . It is also a poem that has been misread
as a a Typical modernist manifesto against Romanticism. (Wallace Stevens, The Poem of our climate
by Harold Bloom, Cornell University Press, Ithaca and London, 1977, p.149).
Before one passes any judgment on the poem, it would be fair to look at the poem steadily and see it whole.
The poem consists for the first paragraph of four lines, second paragraph of twenty lines and the third and the
last paragraph of four lines. If the first and the last paragraph are taken as the prologue and the epilogue of
the poem, the second paragraph is certainly the main body of the text. The whole poem, perhaps, hinges on
the elaborate central section of the poem.
The prologue states that in creating a poem, the activity of the mind is paramount. It is the mind which tells
the creator what will suffice in a poem. There was a time, however, when the mind was not so active in
creation. The poetry then followed a set pattern, repeated the established harm and was bound by the script,
that is the established and standardized norms and cannons of writing poetry. Everything was conventional
and followed the beaten track.
Suddenly, the narrator points out that the Theatre was changed. It changed beyond recognition. The past
could be a reminder of the days gone by. Time had changed much. The poetry of the modern age had to be
relevant the changed time. In the words of the narrator, It has to face the men of the time. (The Collected
Poem p.240). It has also to create a new stage, a new voice for the poetry of our time. The word Stage
in this context refers to the setting of a poem in the modern age. The men and women of our time have to act
and gesture in a mode appropriate for them.
The protagonists of the poetry of the modern era have to mount the new stage and speak what they want to
communicate in the most delicate mode that can be imagined and crated. The audience of the modern age
responds to the insatiable actors words and gestures without any hesitation. The actor and the audience
have the same emotion and operate at the same wavelength. They become one, inseparable. The actor of the
modern stage had also been visualized as a metaphysician in the dark, as a musician who plays with vigour
on an instrument that produces the right and the appropriate music. The phrase Metaphysician in the dark
refers to the poet of the modern age who endeavors hard to come to terms with the complex reality of the
changed time. He keeps to the appropriate level, to what will suffice-neither more, nor less, with no need of
either rising too high or stooping too low.
The satisfaction that is provided by modern poetry is nearly the same that a man gets through skating, a
woman through dancing and also through combing her hair. When a poem is the product of an act of
the mind, when The metaphysician in the dark tries his utmost to reveal the mystery of existence,
when he cultivates a mode and a voice appropriate to the changed time, there is no doubt that modern poetry
is crated.
The key word or phrase in this poem occurs in the prologue, What will suffice. The idea of appropriateness,
both of matter and manner, content and form has also been suggested in the last few liens of the second
paragraph. In the epilogue, as well, the satisfaction derived from modern poetry has been communicated
through various human activities like skating, dancing and combing ones hair. These activities are of a nature
to provide a kind of aesthetic satisfaction to the doer. The reader of a modern poem also gets ample aesthetic
satisfaction. Far from being a weak poem, of Modern Poetry is a poem that pinpoints the intense mental
activity and also innovation in the use of words and gestures that precedes the writing of poetry appropriate
to the changed time. The poet who dares to dabble in modern poetry is neither a versifier nor a rhyster. He
is a metaphysician in the dark . He has the courage and the stamina to grapple with the mystery and secrets
of the existence on the earth.
255 Wallace Stevens
Glossary:
1. Souvenir: gift, a reminder of the past.
2. Insatiable: that cannot be satisfied
3. Twanging: sound of a tight string or wire being pulled and released
4. Wiry: lean and with strong sinews
5. Metaphysician: One concerned with ultimate reality
Contrary Theses (I)
Summary:
Contrary Theses (I) consists of six couplets in which the paradox of life has been presented. On the one
hand, we have nature in all its luxury and bounty, and on the other hand, we have a soldier walking before the
door of the narrator. There are grapes in abundance upon the vines. The hives are heavy with comb, that is
honeycomb, wax secreted by bees. There are seraphs gathering near the domes of he churches and saints
look radiant in fresh cloaks. Just before the narrators door, the shadows look smaller on the walls. A sharp
sunlight fills the halls of his bare house. The oaks are smeared with blood and soldier pursues the victim
before, just before his door. While nature is luxurious and abundant, the soldier is on the prowl. He is after the
victim. There are both natures bounty and fecundity and human destruction going on simultaneously. The
soldier stalks the victim just before the narrators door. In other words, the narrator has sharply juxtaposed
the bounty of nature against the violence that is embedded in social order, the violence is brutal and not very
far from the narrators door. The word we live in is full of the contraries of destruction and creativity. This is
the paradox of life that has been trenchantly presented in the poem .
Glossary :
1. Plush: Luxurious and rich
2. Seraphs: The highest of the nine orders of angels
3. Cluster: bunch or group
4. cloaks : loose sleeveless garments
5. Acid: sour, biting, sharp
6. Smears: daub or mark with grease, smudge, defame in this context blood
7. Stalks: pursues stealthily hunts.
Contrary Theses (Ii)
Summary:
Contrary Theses (II) is a short poem consisting of six stanzas of three lines each. It is mid-Autumn. In the
afternoon, the earth and the sky are near. They have also been visualized as grand mechanics who want to
design something new. In autumn, the leaves, that is the wings of the locusts look yellow. There is a man who
walks with his one-year old boy on his shoulder. The sun shines and the dog barks. The baby sleeps. While
the leaves of the Locust are yellow, the Locust itself looks green.
The man wants and looks for a final refuge, a shelter from the extravagant and wild touch of winter. He does
not want to become a martyr and lose his life. The winter is far off. Autumn is present everywhere. The man
walks towards an abstract, a configuration, a complex consisting of the sun, the dog and the boy. The abstract
is, perhaps, the winter which is away. As it is mid-Autumn, there is still a touch of chill. Swans that are
moving in the sky widely have been chilled. The leaves fall from the trees as copiously as notes fall from the
piano. The abstract, the winter is not very far-off but for the moment the winter vanishes from the mind. It is
Poetry 256
mid-Autumn in reality. Negroes are playing football in the park. In spite of a little chill of mid-Autumn, it is on
the whole a pleasant time. Winter, severe winter, is only an idea, an abstraction, as deadly and destructive as
locusts can be.
As we all know, locusts are deadly grasshoppers that destroy plants and crops. They are a symbol of death.
If locusts are equated with the deadly winter, the flies and the bees are stimulated by the odor of chrysanthemum
in mid-Autumn.
We do not know if the man with the boy on his shoulder can really find a refuge from the extravagant chill of
winter. We also do not know if there is any link between the man with the boy and the Negroes playing
football in the park. These are the gaps and the silences in the text.
We, however, have a certainty that locusts can be as destructive as the winter. The poem is largely a picture
of mid-Autumn with a touch of chill. The swans are chilled even in mid-Autumn. The winter is far off, it is an
abstraction in the mind. Mid-Autumn is, however, not an abstraction. It is concrete. It is real. But the process
of change, mutability, is on. Autumn would not last long. Winter would come in triumphantly.
If there are contraries in this poem, if there is any paradox, it is between mid-Autumn and the extravagant
chill of winter. On the whole, mid-Autumn is pleasant but the seeds of winter are present in it. The sun, the
dog and the man with the boy on his shoulder would certainly have a harrowing time in winter. Then winter
would not be abstract. It would be concrete and burst in all its fury. Then, perhaps, Negroes would not be
playing football in the park.
All this, however, is a matter of speculation. What is real is mid-Autumn and the winter as deadly as locusts.
Glossary:
1. Mechanics: one who handles machines
2. Bombastic: pompous, extravagant
3. Contours: outlines
4. Chilling: unpleasantly cold
5. Premises: previous statement from which another is inferred.
6. Verve: energy, vigour
7. Chrysanthemum: a garden plant flowering in autumn
8. Locusts: grasshoppers that devour all crops in the field
Holiday in Reality
Summary:
Holiday in Reality is a poem that consists of two paragraphs of fourteen and twelve lines. In the first
paragraph, the narrator has visualized a scene in which the sun is almost colourless. The sky is cold and there
is no vibrancy, no brightness, no hear in the sun. A touch of yellow can make the sun warm and natural. It is
only the January sun that looks so pale and colourless. It shows the prevalence of severe winter. In that
severe climate, men have been isolated and there is no bond between man and nature There is no bond
between man and man. As a social being, man doesnt exist in such a severe winter. He can exist only if he
can find his earth, his sky, his sea. (The Collected Works, p. 312). Since man is alienated from nature, he
is also alienated from man. A community composed of such isolated men can not live and breathe freely.
They can go to Durand Ruel and still feel utterly lonely and alienated. The January sun is a symbol of the
utterly isolated men who cant live a humane and full life.
In the second paragraph of the poem, there is an invocation of the spring. There are flowers (Judas) and
violets growing everywhere. The spring is loudly visible. It also seems to be real and lasting, not fake. The
trees and their dark-spiced branches grow out, full of vitality and verve. There are buds, there is gold that
257 Wallace Stevens
falls down (golden leaves), and there is the catbird that gobbles leftovers in the morning. She is half-awake,
not fully conscious. All these objects seem to be real. They are real because the narrator perceives them. If
he doesn t do so, at any point of time, they would cease to exist. The narrator is also of the view that
intangible arrows (Sensations) move and stick to his skin. What is real, spring everywhere, in reality appears
unreal to him. That is, it is like a shadow that may vanish any moment. Spring that initially appears real to him
has also a touch of unreal. It may not last long.
What does the title Holiday in Reality imply? It implies that reality is fluid. In winter, the sun is cold and
devoid of brightness. In spring, one gets a feeling that the sensation derived from spring would not last. It is
fleeting, short lived. Mutability is so prevalent that even the real has a touch of unreal. Both winter and spring
are real and due to mutability (change) they also seem to be unreal. If reality is fluid and utterly subjective, it
doesnt exist outside the human mind. It keeps on changing and teasing men and women. In such a situation,
man can never be comfortable with ever-changing reality. He can never have a holiday, a comfortable
existence as long as reality eludes his grasp.
The central idea of the poem is condensed in this line, Spring is umbilical or else it is not spring. (The
Collected Poems, p. 313). The word umbilical brings to our mind the cord which attaches the fort us to
placenta and the cord is cut after the birth of a child. The word also humanizes spring and we can visualize
its birth and growth. In other words, spring is a part of the cycle of seasons and it is real when we perceive
it and the cycle leads to winter when spring is not real. It is just an idea. That is the dilemma of man. He is
never comfortable with reality. He never feels at home either with spring or with winter. He is ever restless,
disturbed and agitated. The subtle shifts of reality make him a stranger in an ever shifting world.
Glossary:
1. Vibrancy: resonance and brightness
2. Umbilical: cord like structure attaching the fortus to the placenta during the fortus growth in mothers
womb; also suggests the idea of springs birth, growth and death
3. Argentines: silver or silvery shrubs and plants
4. Gobble: eat leftovers hurriedly
5. Intangible: something that canot be touched or mentally grasped
6. Aix: a city of provence in Southern France. It was the home of the great French painter Paul Cezanne.
He was a painter who painted still life and landscapes in bright animated yellow colour.
7. Stockholm: the capital of Sweden. Famous for its artists and painters
8. Judas: a tree with purple flowers
9. Palabra: La Palabra was a famous orchestra in Hollywood. La Palabra also means the word.
5. Important Questions and their Answers.
1. The poem of Harmonium celebrate the earth. Discuss with reference to the poems you have read.
Harmonium (1923) was the first anthology of poems published by Wallace Stevens. A second edition of
the anthology was published in 1931. This time was a period of social ferment and religious crisis and
T.S. Eliots The Wasteland was published in 1922 in which the civilization of Europe was described as
sterile and degenerate. W.B. Yeats published his great poem The Second Coming in 1921 in which he
drew a frightening portrait of a post-Christian era in which a savage animal would rule the world and the
Christian values of piety and fellow-feeling would be subverted by naked savagery of the new ruling
class. As compared to these great modern poets who emerged after the First World War (1914-1919),
Wallace Stevens in his first anthology appears to be an aesthete, a lover of beauty in life and nature and
as a sort of a Romantic poet preoccupied with mortality and the survival of the individual. The three
Poetry 258
poems prescribed for study are Domination of Black, Sunday Morning and Peter Quince at the
Clavier. The first poem is a vivid portrayal of mortality and our attention is drawn to the fallen leaves in
the countryside, the dark colour of hemlocks and the spontaneous cry of the peacocks. While the dark
shade of the hemlocks is a symbol of poison and death, the cry of the peacocks is a symbol of life and
vitality. The tail of the peacocks is colourful and a sharp contrast to the darkness of the heavy hemlocks.
(The Collected Poems, p. 9). The title of the poem is also apt and signifies the domination of the black,
which is a negation of life. Although mortality and death are so pronounced, yet the narrator remembers
the lusty cry of the peacocks. The life on the earth is subject to mortality and death doesnt spare anyone
but the cry of the peacocks also can not be overlooked. The theme of mortality and death is also prominent
in Sunday Morning which is one of the most widely read poems by Wallace Stevens. The narrator of
the poem refers to the tomb of Jesus, the son of God, in Palestine and points out that his tomb and his
blood, that is his crucification, does not seem to matter much to the men and women of the modern age.
The idea that mortality and death govern the life on the earth is repeated again and again. The narrator
says, Death is the mother of beauty. (Ibid, p. 68). This is the mystery of life that beauty, the most
luminous beauty, is not able to escape death. In other words, beauty and death are an integral part of
human life. In spite of the dark shadow of death that hovers over us, the sublime in nature has been
memorably evoked in the seventh stanza of the poem. Men gather in a ring and worship the sun which
shines in the sky. They worship the sun the source of life upon the earth with so much fervor that for
a moment they seem to transcend mortality and death. They feel a moment of transcendence and they
behave Not as God, but as a might be. (Ibid, p. 70). It is during such moments of transcendence that
the earth looks like a paradise. Walt Whitman, in the nineteenth century, affirmed man as a God-like
creature and Wallace Stevens does the same in Sunday Morning.
Peter Quince at the Clavier is also a poem in which human life has been presented from the point of
view of an aesthete, a, lover of beauty. There is a beautiful young woman Susanna who has been bathing
in her garden in water that is clear and warm. Her beauty arouses the lust of two white-haired elders.
Their eyes become red due to lust and they make an attempt to rape her. Susannas attendants come to
the garden with lamps and although it is dark at night Susanna and her shame are revealed. The entire
episode takes place near the garden and the surpassing beauty of the young maiden arouses the lust of
white-hair elders. The narrator makes a point from the point of view of an aesthete and says, Beauty is
momentary in the mind. (Ibid, p. 91). Susanna has been disfigured and humiliated and her transparent
beauty has been defiled. Only the memory of her beauty will linger. Her beauty is also subject to mortality
and death.
Wallace Stevens emerges before us as a Romantic poet like Keats who is primarily an aesthete, that is
a lover of beauty in all its forms. Death is another of his preoccupations and the stern law of mortality
(birth, growth and decam) give to his poems in Harmonium a note of elegy. He does celebrate the
beauty and bounty of the earth and is simultaneously aware of mortality and death. Domination of
Black is a subtle lyric in which life and death are symbolized by the peacocks cry and the hemlocks.
The word hemlock again reminds us of John Keats famous poem The Nightingale in which it has
been pointedly mentioned. While the nightingale saves John Keats from the effect of the hemlock, the
narrator in Domination of Black is comforted by the lusty cry of the peacocks. The juxtaposition of the
darkness of the hemlocks and the lust cry of the peacocks shows to us that life exists in the midst of
death. The earth is beautiful indeed and Wallace Stevens is an aesthete, a lover of beauty.
2. There is no poet except Walt Whitman who has celebrated American landscape as Wallace Stevens has
done.
Wallace Stevens was born at a small town Reading in the east of the state of Pennsylvania. The first
twenty years of his life were spent in Reading and later on he confessed to his wife that they were the
most happy years of his life. He was a good student but not a bookworm. He loved to explore the
259 Wallace Stevens
countryside around and the valley, mountains and rivers which thrilled him enormously. Later on, he spent
three years at Harvard and more time in New York as a journalist and also as an attorney. Destiny,
however, took him to Hartford, Connecticut in New England. The relatively bare landscape of the region
also excited him. As a professional, he had to go to the Mid-West and also to Florida, the Southern most
tip of the country. The warm and bracing climate of Florida and the lush greenery and the lovely beaches
made an everlasting impression on the mind of the poet. There is no wonder that the variegated landscape
of the American continent figures so prominently in the poetry of Wallace Stevens.
There is a short poem The Snow Man in which the landscape is bare but the pine-trees are crusted with
snow. (The Collected Poems, p. 9). Perhaps, it is a scene of Hartford, Connectient. In his famous
poem Sunday Morning there is a vivid portrayal of April 9 green which is enduring and the birds fly
over the misty fields. When the birds go away from the warm fields, paradise seems to vanish from the
earth. In the month of June, the summer is consummated by the swallows that wing across the sky. (Ibid,
p. 68). Again, it is on a summer morning that men stand in a ring in the open countryside and chant
boisterously a hymn to the sun. They worship the sun because it is the source of life on the earth which
looks like a paradise. As sun-worshippers they realize that they are Not as a God, but as a god might
be. (Ibid, p. 70). Walt Whitman is the only other American poet who has celebrated man as a God-like
creature with a boundless capacity for fulfillment and joy. As a Romantic poet Wallace Stevens also
believes that man can reach the most distant stars.
There is also a vivid portrayal of the garden and the clear, warm water in the poem Peter Quince at the
Clavier. Susanna has been bathing like Venus at a place that looks like Eden and like Eve she is not
aware of the hidden serpent. We all know that the two white-haired elders are the serpent which stung
her viciously. The landscape that is pictured is not only beautiful but is also a symbol of the youthful purity
and innocence of a virgin like Susanna. After his visit to the warm climate of Florida, Wallace Stevens
wrote a remarkable poem Farewell to Florida in which there is an unforgettable picture of Key West
which is a low-lying island near the mainland. As Wallace Stevens left Key West, its vanishing beauty
gripped him. The poet has pictured the scene in these poignant words:
Key West sank down ward under massive clouds
And silvers and greens spread over the sea.
The Collected Poems, p. 117
In the last section of the poem, there is a reference to the relatively bare landscape of the north, that is
Hartford in connectient, New England. The poet says with a touch of pathos :
My North is leafless and lies in a wintry slime
Both of men and clouds, a slime of men in crowds. (Ibid, p. 118)
Slime is the key word here. The idea is that the men and the landscape of the North is equally slime.
That filled with disgusting mud and filth. One can detect a not of stark realism in Wallace Stevens who in
spite of his innate Romantic streak has also been able to confront the unpleasant reality of his time. There
is also a touch of incredible pathos because he would not be able to be in Florida again. The poet says :
Farewell and to know that the land is forever gone
And that she will not follow in any word or look, nor ever again in thought. (Ibid, p. 118)
The poet makes it clear that the North is the land of prolonged snow, leaflessness and gloom. He has to
leave the warm, bracing and sunny Florida.
Desting, however, took Wallace Stevens again to Key West, Florida and it was after his second visit that
he wrote one of his major poems. The Idea of Order at Key West. The focus in this poem is on a
young woman who has been singing on the sea-shore. Her song is far more human than the seas roar.
There is, however, a vivid and graphic portrayal of the sea and its continual roar. It is in the context of the
Poetry 260
sea and its roar that the young womans song acquires its strange majesty. It incorporates the verve and
vigour of the sea. If the young woman were in a room, her song would not be that romantic and fascinating.
The sun also figures again and again in the poems of Wallace Stevens and both in The Brave Man and
in A Fading of the Sun the focus is on the suns capacity to sustain the life on the earth. (Ibid, p. 138 and
139). There is a poem Winter Bells in which the poet describes the Jews rage against chaos, the chaos
of modern life. (Ibid, p. 141). In the same poem, towards the end, the poet has expressed a desire, To go
to Florida one of these days. (Ibid, p. 141).
In other words, Florida becomes for the poet a symbol of a life of adventure and fulfillment. The landscape
that figures so prominently in the poetry of Wallace Stevens is more than a geographical entity. It becomes
a symbol of hope and fulfillment. There is also a short poem of Hartford In A Purple Light in which a
strange, purple light has been pictured which is usually seen in a country like Norway which is near the
North Pole. There is another poem The Auroras of Autumn in which the strange medley of colours
seen in the sky near the Arctic at night has been graphically delineated in these words :
As light changes yellow into gold and gold
To its opal elements and fires delight. (Ibid, p. 416)
We have come to know from critics like Robert Rehder and Milton J. Bates that Impressist painters like
Paul Cezanne and others had a powerful impact on the poetry of Wallace Stevens. Nowhere else can
this impact be felt better than in the poets portrayal of the American landscape in all its variety.
3. Mortality is the dominant theme in Domination of Black and Sunday Morning. Do you agree with the
statement ?
For a Romantic poet like Wallace Stevens the individual was primary and so was his imagination. The
individual also had the right to pursue life and liberty and happiness. The individual could develop so much
that he could become a God like creature. In secular terms, he could become a Superman who could
control the elements and realize all his dreams. In the poem Sunday Morning, especially in the seventh
section there is a graphic portrayal of men who worship the sun with vigour and fervour. They behave
Not as a God, but as a god might be. (Ibid, p. 70). It becomes difficult for a Romantic poet who
believes in the divinity of man to accept the fact of mortality. The protagonist in Sunday Morning admits
that the old gods have died. Jesus, the son of God lies buried in his grave in Palestine and he does not
seem to mean much to the men and women of our time. Jove, the Roman God, has also vanished and
become a part of classical mythology. The sun, the fruit, the birds give more solace and comfort than
these obsolete gods and angels.
The protagonist in Sunday Morning says that Death is the mother of beauty. (Ibid, p. 68). In other
words, even the most beautiful objects are subject to mortality, that is death. Immortality is only a longing
of man to transcend the horror of death. It cannot easily come to terms with the phenomena of death. If
the mountains, the rivers and the sea seem to transcend mortality, why cant he? This is the feeling that
disturbs men and women in the modern age. The paradise on the earth is subject to mortality and the
protagonist of the poem wonders if the life in heavenly paradise is also subject to mortality. If it is, how is
the heavenly paradise different from the earthly paradise? These are the questions that keep on disturbing
the protagonist in Sunday Morning. Towards the end of the poem, the protagonist again draws a
graphic portrait of the life upon the earth :
Deer walk upon our mountains, and the quail
Whistle about us their spontaneous cries;
Sweet berries ripen in the wilderness;
And, in the isolation of the sky,
At evening, casual flocks of pigeons make
Ambiguous undulations as they sink,
Downward to darkness, on extended wings. (Ibid, p. 70)
261 Wallace Stevens
While the deer and the quail symbolize the positive aspect of life, the flocks of pigeons are ambiguous.
Their wings are extended in the sky but as darkness deepens they begin to sink and come down to the
earth. The ambiguity of the pigeons flight lies in their sinking in spite of their extended wings. Their
extended wings cannot prevent them from sinking, from ending their flight. The pigeons sinking seems to
imply mortality and death which is inseparable from life. In other words, the image of the pigeons sinking
in darkness is a stern reminder of the phenomenon of mortality.
Domination of Black is also a short lyric in which the darkness of the hemlocks has been contrasted
with the peacocks cry. It is night and the narrator has from his room a glimpse of the fallen leaves, the
bushes in the space outside. He also has a glimpse of leaves turning in the dark and the dark colour of the
hemlocks which is a plant from which poison can be made. All these objects undergo change every
moment and they cannot escape the curse of mortality. The key metaphor is that of the hemlocks which
is associated with poison and death. The title Domination of Black is most appropriate and signifies the
preponderance of mortality and the ultimate triumph of death. It is at this moment of dark despair that the
narrator is able to hear the cry of the peacocks. It is a cry that simply startles and astonishes the narrator.
The peacocks have multi-coloured tails which also undergo a change, like the leaves. The peacocks fly
over the room from the branches of the hemlocks. At that moment, the narrator again hears the cry of
the peacocks. The narrator wonders if the cry of the peacocks is against the darkness of the hemlocks.
He also worders if the lusty cry of the peacocks is an affirmation or a denial of the darkness of the
hemlocks. It is evident that the hemlocks stand for death and for mortality. The has a fear of mortality
and death. He describes his ear in these words :
I saw how the night came,
Came striding. Like the color of the heavy hemlocks
I felt afraid.
And I remembered the cry of the peacocks. (Ibid, p. 9)
This is the climax of the poem Domination of Black. Both the hemlocks and the night striding are a
symbol of mortality and death. Striding in this context means walking briskly with firm steps. It shows
the inevitable triumph of death and the sternness of mortality. Naturally, the narrator has a fear of death
and also a fear of mortality. It is more than an ordinary fear. It is a kind of terror at the inevitability of
death. Suddenly, the narrator remembers the cry of the peacocks. One can guess that it must be the call
of the peacock during the mating season. It seems to be a call for life, an affirmation of the existence on
the earth. Even if there is domination, and utter sway of death, and mortality, it is difficult to forget the cry
of the peacocks. There is mortality, there is inevitable death but the lust cry of the peacocks cannot be
forgotten. Life continues to flicker and flame strongly in spite of the gloom and darkness of the hemlocks.
4. Sunday Morning is the most widely read of all the poems of Wallace Stevens. Attempt its critical
evaluation.
Harold Bloom is of the view, Sunday Morning remains Stevens most famous single poem, an eminence
achieved at the expense of even stronger poems in Harmonium. But Sunday Morning is a wonderful
poem by any standards. (Wallace Stevens The Poems of Our Climate, Cornell University Press,
Ithaea and London, 1977, p. 27). The poem consists of eight regular stanzas of fifteen lines each and the
narrator is a woman who is sitting in her room on a sunny chair. It is the morning on Sunday on the
woman has a dream, a day-dream to be precise. In her imagination she undertakes a journey to Palestine,
the holy land across wide water. She reaches the holy land where there is Dominion of the blood and
sepulcher. (The Collected Poems), p. 67. One wonders if her journey is a pilgrimage of a devout
Christian. In the second stanza there is, however, a touch of skepticism and the narrator wonders why
she must be a devoted Christian. Jesus, the son of God is dead and his blood, that is crucifixion and
resurrection, do not seem to matter much to the men and women of the modern age.
Poetry 262
What matters to them is the sun, the fruit, green wings of birds and the beauty of the earth. The narrator
also points out that Divinity must live within herself; (Ibid, p. 67). The narrator is also thrilled by the
fury of rain, the falling of snow and blooms in forests. In other words, it is the sublime in nature that
transports the narrator out of herself and makes her feel that the divine is within her.
The narrator is more of a pagan, a pantheist rather than a devout Christian. She also muses about the
Roman God Jove (or Jupiter) and realizes that the ancient God doesnt really rule the modern world. He
has become just a memory of the ancient past. As a pagan and a lover of nature the narrator affirms her
passionate love for nature. She says, I am content when wakened birds, / Before they fly, test the reality
/ of misty fields; by their sweet questionings; but when the birds are gone, and their warm fields / Return
no more, where, then, is paradise ? (Ibid, p. 68). A common perception is that Wallace Stevens is a
difficult poet who often uses rare and recondite words but when he is at his best, for example in the
extract from Sunday Morning that has been just quoted, he has the bare simplicity and pathos of a great
poet like William Wordsworth. As long as there are birds in the warm fields, as long as Aprils green
endures, as long as the swallows wings beat in the sky, the earth becomes lovely like paradise. The
narrator in moments of transcendence feels that the bliss on the earth is imperishable. The Romantic
ecstasy, however, doesnt last long. There is the fall of leaves in autumn and the narrator is painfully
made aware of mortality and death. She also begins to wonder if mortality also governs life in the
heavenly paradise. If it does, where is the difference between the earthly paradise and the paradise in
heaven ?
Sunday Morning is a powerful poem because it is more than a monologue. It is a dialogic masterpiece
and the dialogue is between the narrators skeptic self as a Christian and her pagan self as a lover of the
sublime in nature. If the skeptic self is expressed powerfully in the sixth stanza of the poem, the pagan
and aesthetic self has been memorably expressed in the seventh stanza of the poem. The narrator says
in the seventh stanza :
Supple and turbulent, a ring of men shall chant in orgy on a summer morn their boisterous devotion to the
sun, Not as a god, but as a god might be, (Ibid, p. 69-70). These sun-worshipping pagans are full of
vigour and verve and they also remind us of the ancient Greeks who worshipped Apollo, the sun god.
These pagans and sun-worshipping people constitute a strong and healthy community fired by a common
vision. They experience not only moments of ecstasy but also cognition of a high order. They have an
awareness of the origin of life upon the earth and also its end. In other words, they know the deepest
secrets of birth and death.
In the last stanza of the poem Sunday Morning the narrator sums up her vision of life. She has a
realization that Christianity and its ritual and creed belong to the past. In the modern age :
The tomb in Palestine
Is not the porch of spirits lingering.
It is the grave of Jesus,
Where he lay. (Ibid, p. 70)
The key phrase in this extract is spirits lingering. It refer, not to the dead, but men and women who are
alive in the modern age, the age that began with the First World War (1914-1919). The great German
philosopher Nietzsche had said in the nineteenth century, God is dead. He also affirmed the need of
producing a new race of Superman. The narrator in Sunday Morning also seems to be of the opinion
that Zesus, the son of God is dead. His tomb in Palestine does not seem to mean much to the men and
women of our time. They live in a topsy-turvy world and their dilemma is expressed in a beautiful line
which is not easy to understand :
We live in an old chaos of the sun, Ibid, p. 70
Is it a chaos, a disorder made by the sun or under the canopy of the sun? Whatever be the ultimate reality,
there is a split in the modern men and women, a split between paganism and religions skepticism. This
split creates anguish and anxiety which warps the human personality.
263 Wallace Stevens
Wallace Stevens rounds up the dialogic masterpiece Sunday Morning with a picture that is hard to
forget. Nature continues to be sublime. Deers walk upon the mountains and the quail whistles
spontaneously. Berries ripen in the wilderness. All these images are positive and they are an affirmation
of life, of vitality and hope. There is an impression of stability and order in the universe. The final image
in the poem is of a different timber. The sky is isolated and in the evening a flock of pigeons fly in the sky
on extended wings. As evening leads to darkness, the flock of pigeons sink Downward to darkness,
(Ibid, p. 70). One can safely conclude that the flock of pigeons sinking down to darkness is a metaphor
that negates the affirmation of life earlier. In other words, life and death seem to be juxtaposed through
the positive images of deers and the quail and the stark negative image of the pigeons sinking in darkness.
There is a kind of rounded perfection and finish in the poem Sunday Morning and in spite of echoes of
William Wordsworth who wrote Tintern Abbey and The Immortality Ode, it is an authentic poem by
Wallace Stevens. The diction has a kind of simplicity and transparency that is rare in Wallace Stevens
Poems.
5. Discuss Peter Quince At the Clavier as an erotic poem. Do you agree with the aesthetic approach of
Wallace Stevens?
Peter Quince At the Clavier is a poem in which beauty and eroticism have been presented with the
help of images drawn from literature and music. Peter Quince is a minor character in Shakespears
romance Mid summer Nights Dream. He is a carpenter who pretends to be a stage manager and
allots the various parts to the actors in a play within the play Pyramus and Thisbe. In the context of
Wallace Stevens poem, Peter Quince is a musician who plays on the Clavier, a stringed instrument and
his fingers produce music on the keyboard. The music that is audible leads to another kind of music,
music that is not heard with ears but is deeply felt. In other words, the narrators desire, his lust for his
beloved is aroused. Like Charles Baudelaire, the greatest symbolist poet of France in the last decades of
the nineteenth century, Wallace Stevens also felt that music and feelings and colours were connected in
a subtle way. The narrator is also able to visualize his beloved wrapped in a blue-shadowed silk garment,
the softness and the colour of her blue apparel stirs lust within the mind of the narrator. It has to be
remembered that blue is the colour of imagination and passion in Wallace Stevens poetry.
The narrator, Peter Quince, says that his lust for his lady love is similar to the lust that Susannas naked
beauty had aroused in the mind of the white-haired elders. The tale of Susanna is found in a book of
Apcrypha in the Greek Version of the old Testament. According to the tale a false accusation of adultery
was brought against Susanna, a woman of Babylon, by two elders of the Church. She was condemned
for adultery and finally she was exonerated by a wise judge named Daniel. (The Oxford Encyclopedic
English Dictionary, Clarenden Press, Oxford, 1991, p. 1457). The focus in the Biblical tale of Susanna
is on the youth innocence and purity of Susanna and the crooked and vindictive conscience and brutal lust
of the two white-haired elders. Wallace Stevens has, however, recreated the tale of Susanna from the
point of view of an aesthete and a dandy. In the poem, Susanna has been described as a voluptuous
young woman who is bathing in a garden where the water is clear and warm and the evening is green. In
such a romantic atmosphere the naked, glistering flesh of Susanna arouses lust in the mind of white-
haired elders of the Church. Their eyes turn red due to passion. The narrator has described the elders
lust in images derived from music:
The basses of their beings throb
In witching chords, and their thin blood
Pulse pizzieati of Itosanna.
(The Collected Poems, p. 90)
The point of the narrator is that the thin blood of the elders begins to beat fast in the veins and the deep
chord of their musical instrument, that is their lust begins to throb wildly.
Susanna comes out of the water in the garden and stands on the bank. Her emotions spent , she walks
upon the grass in all her naked glory. Her flesh is still tingling and the winds are like her maids. They tickle
Poetry 264
her scarves and she feels on top of the world. It is at this critical moment that the breath of the elders
reaches her. Like a good story-teller, the narrator does not tell us explicitly what happens to her. The
narrator simply points out that the night becomes mute, Susanna turns to see who is near her and then
again there is a preponderance of images drawn from music:
A cymbal crashed,
And roaring horns. (Ibid, p. 91)
The crashing of the cymbal and the roaring of the horns, perhaps, suggest masculine violence against an
innocent but exceedingly beautiful young woman. In the next paragraph, the narrator tells us that Susannas
attendants, Byzantines, come towards their mistress. They wonder why Susanna has let out such a cry.
Since night has descended, the attendants come with lamps in their hands. They discover that Susanna
has been seized by the elders of the Church, the white haired respected elders. The narrator has again
described the tragic scene in few words:
They wondered why Susanna cried
Against the elders by her side;
And as they whispered, the refrain
Was like a willow swept by rain.
Anon, their lamps, uplifted flame
Revealed Susanna and her shame. (Ibid, p. 91)
Some critics are of the view that Susanna has only been molested. She has not been raped. From the
violence of the images, cymbals crashing, horns roaring, a willow swept by rain, it is clear that Susanna
has been raped by the elders. She has become a victim of male lust, especially the lust of the elders who
are supposed to be gentle and protective. Her shame is so abounding that the attendants simper foolishly
and flee away from the scene of her shame. It is at this point that the action in the tale is over. The ethical
dimension of Susannas rape by the elders of the church has been trenchantly expressed in the boot of
Apocrypha. The elders lust, brutal lust has been juxtaposed against Susannas innocence and helplessness.
The crookedness of the elders charge of adultery has also been exposed in the Biblical tale of Susanna.
The narrator in Wallace Stevens, poem, however, is primarily an aesthete and also something of a dandy.
The ethical aspect of Susannas rage is something that just doesnt enter his mind. The question of the
punishment of the guilty, the elders, has also not been pinpointed by the narrator.
The last section of the poem begins with a striking line, Beauty is momentary in the mind. (Ibid, p.91).
The narrator is preoccupied with beauty, and in this context it is Susannas beauty. There is beauty that
is an attribute of the body. There is also beauty that is an idea, an archetype. The body undergoes a
change, Susanna who is lovely like Venus has been defiled and disfigured. She has lost her innocence and
her purity. She will grow old and die but the glimpse of beauty associated with her body would live in the
narrators memory. The rest of the poem is concerned with mortality, that is change and death. Evenings
die, so does a wave. Gardens also die and decay in winter. Many maidens also die and their death is
mourned in a solemn mass, prayer. Along with their death, aurora, the goddess of dawn is also celebrated.
It is fact that Susannas music touched the bawdy strings / of those white elders; (Ibid, p. 92). Susanna
could survive the white-haired elders lust but she couldnt escape Deaths ironic scraping. (Ibid, p.
92). Her beauty may have seemed immortal to the onlookers, but she could not escape scraping, that is
ruthess destruction at the hands of death. Her memory, however, lingers long in the mind. True, but so
does the brutal lust of the white-haired elders. And also the fact that the narrator doesn t think of
retribution; of justice to Susanna and adequate punishment to the elders. At the moral level, the poem is
not fully satisfactory. It is devoid of the ethical dimensions.
6. Compare and contrast Sunday Morning and the idea of order at Key West as Romantic poems.
Sunday Morning and The Idea of order At Key West are two of the most famous poems written by
Wallace Stevens. While Sunday Morning is included in his first anthology of poems, The Idea of
265 Wallace Stevens
Order At Key West is included in his second anthology The Idea of Order. While Harmonium was
published in 923, Ideas of Order was published in 1936 when the Depression had brought on a great
economic crisis and millions of men and women were struggling for sheer survival. There was a radical
temper that animated writers like John Steinbeck who wrote his famous protest novel The Grapes of
Wrath and showed the terrible life of the dispossessed farmers of California. Wallace Stevens, however,
was preoccupied with the transcendental issues of life like mortality and the death of gods, the worship
of the sun as a pagan god, the solitary genius singing by the sea, and the urge for order shown by a
Classical literary critic like Ramon Fernandez. Some critics are of the view that Wallace Stevens was a
decadent Romantic like Oscar Wilde, Walter Pater and Edgar Allan Poe who lived in an ivory tower and
kept on dreaming dreams which had little or no bearing on the issues that agitated men and women in the
era of Depression. In other words, they accuse Wallace Stevens of being an escapist and a votary of art
for arts sake. His poems are the poems of escape and they do not help us in confronting the dilemma of
living in a society that was disintegrating due to economic inequality, social stratification and a cynical
pursuit of acquiring wealth and status through any means fair and foul.
Before the charge of being an escapist is refuted , it would be better to look at the two poems, Sunday
Morning and The Idea of Order at Key West steadily and objectively. Sunday Morning is a poem
consisting / of eight stanzas of fifteen lines each. The Idea of Order at Key West is a poem consisting
of two paragraphs of seven lines, two paragraphs of six and thirteen lines, two paragraphs of ten and
eight lines, and one and the last paragraph of five lines. In terms of structure, there is a kind of regularity
and harmony in Sunday Morning but The Idea of Order at Key West is a poem that is irregular and
somewhat sporadic and lacks a definite focus. While Sunday Morning is largely preoccupied with the
issue of mortality and transcendence, The Idea of Order at Key West fails to show the exact relationship
between the genius of the young woman who was singing a solitary song and the sea that was roaring in
all its majesty and splendour. There is no wonder that Sunday Morning appeals deeply to our craving
for immortality but The Idea of Order at Key West doesnt have that universal appeal for ordinary
men and women. It is concerned with purely a literary problem, the passion of a solitary genius, and the
indifference of the sea to the plight of the genius. As pointed out earlier, the narrative that is unfolded
lacks a clear focus.
As opposed to The Idea of Order at Key West, that is structurally disjointed. Sunday Morning is a
structurally cohesive poem with a woman as the narrator. The woman is sitting comfortably in a chair
dreaming, day dreaming to be precise. Her imagination takes her to the holy land of Palestine where
Jesus, the son of God has been buried in the grave. She has a realization that Jesus is like gods who lived
once but vanished from the world. Jove, the God of the Romans, also has vanished and become a part of
classical mythology. The narrator wonders if there is death and mortality in the heavenly paradise. If
there is, how does the earthy paradise differ from the heavenly paradise? In section seven of the poem
Sunday Morning there is a marvelous description of a group of men worshipping the sun, a pagan God
with a deep religious fervour. They are chanting and celebrating the sun as the source of life and vitality
upon the earth. They are in such a frenzy that they are able to understand the mystery of life, they are
able to understand where they came from and where they are destined to go. Reading this poem, we are
reminded of Wordsworths great poem The World Is Too Much With Us where he says that he would
prefer to be a pagan wh believes in old gods and goddesses rather than be a hypocritical Christian in
nineteenth century England obsessed with making money through any means fair and foul.
It is true that even in Sunday Morning Wallace Stevens does not have the sharp vision that Wordsworth
had at his best. He doesnt understand the crisis that destroyed traditional religious faith and his Romanticism
is somewhat limited by his purely aesthetic approach. It would, however, be unfair to regard as a poem
written by a decadent Romantic like Walter Pater. It would also be unfair to regard Sunday Morning as
a poem of escape. It doesn t deal with the socio-economic problem of the depression but it does deal
with mans universal craving to achieve transcendence and immortality in a world governed by mortality
and death. Sunday Morning affirms, like another great Romantic John Keats, that transcendence and
immortality can only be attained by a courageous acceptance of mortality and death which are inseperable
Poetry 266
from life. The magnificent image of the flight of flocks of pigeons and their sinking Downward to
darkness (Ibid, p. 70) at the end of the poem signifies that life upon the earth exists along with death.
The phrase Downward to darkness is a poetic evocation of the phenomenon of death. It is a plea for
a courageous acceptance of mortality and death.
To sum up, Sunday Morning and The Idea of Order at Key West are Romantic poems in the sense
that they affirm the right of the individual to live an independent life and to achieve fulfillment and
transcendence. There is also an unforgettable image of the sublime in nature that turns men into God-like
figures. It will not be fair to equate Wallace Stevens with decadent Romantic poets like Walter Pater and
Oscar Wilde who were primarily aesthetes and lovers of beauty. He belongs to the noble tradition of
great Romantic poets like Wordsworth and John keats. Sunday Morning, however, is a far more universal
poem than The Idea of Order at Ken West. It is compact and deals with a universal problem. It is not
a poem of escape.
Compare and Contrast Contrary Theses (I) and (II). Evaluate Wallace Stevens philosophy of life as
expressed in these companion poems.
Contrary Theses I and II are two companion poems that belong to Wallace Stevens fourth anthology of
poem Parts of the World (1942). The Second World War began in 1939 and lasted till 1945. Talking
about his growth as a Romantic poet Wallace Stevens says, While, of course, I come down from the
past, the past is my own and not something marked by Coleridge, Wordsworth, etc. I know of no one who
has been particularly important to me. My reality-imagination complex I entirely my own even though I
see it in others. The Poetry of Wallace Stevens, Robert Redher (St. Martins Press, New York, p.
133). As a child and as a young man, Wallace Stevens lived in a world of fantasy. His imagination, his
world of make believe, was far more important to him than humdrum reality. There has been a prolonged
conflict between his imagination and his sense of reality. Sunday Morning and The Idea of Order At
Kay West have been poems in which the imagination seems to have an upper hand. Study of Pears is
a poem that marks a turning point in Wallace Stevens growth as a poet. As a result of his friendship with
William Carlo Williams who believed in Objectivism and also due to the impact of the French impressionist
painter Paul Cezanne who painted wonderful landscape transformed and made strangely luminous by
the interplay of light and shade, Wallace Stevens grip on reality became firm and formidable. It does not
mean that the imagination became dormant in the poetry of Wallace Stevens. The imagination was in a
tussle and conflict with reality. His first famous poem Earthly Anecdote shows the protracted and
complex interaction between reality and imagination. It is this complex interaction which gives a strange,
singular quality to the poets vision. Contrary Theses (I) and (II) are short poems but they are able to
perceive and recreate the paradox of the life of the men and women of our time. Irony and paradox
become more prominent in Wallace Stevens later poetry. Like W.B. Yeats, a great Romantic poet, he
was transformed into a great modern poet. He portrayed the contradiction of modern life with a penetrating
insight.
7. Contrary Theses
Contrary theses (I) is a short poem consisting of six stanzas of two lines each. In the very first stanza
we have two contrary images. On the one hand, there are luxuriant and juicy grapes on the vines and on
the other hand there is a soldier walking before the narrators door. There are also bee hives full of wax
and honey just before the narrators door. They are very, very near. There are also seraphs, that is angels
gathering near the poems of the church. There are also saints who took brilliant in fresh cloaks, that is
long, flowing robes. In the fourth stanza, the narrator says that just before his door, the shadows get
smaller on the walls. They must be the walls of the narrators hours. In the fifth stanza, the narrator says
that the house is bare. The halls of the hours are full of sharp sunlight. Acid Sunlight is a key phrase
suggesting the sharp cutting edge of sunlight. The climax comes in the last stanza. After a string of
images suggesting the bounty of nature, the august presence of the seraphs, and the saints, the narrator
refers to an image suggesting violence and disorder. The oaks in the neighbourhood are smeared with
blood which implies that a lot of bloodshed has occurred. The narrator rounds up the sixth and the last line
267 Wallace Stevens
with a simple but startling image: A Soldier stalks before my door. The Collected Poems p.267.
The narrator is of the view that the soldier has been stalking, pursuing the victim. He is on the prowl
looking for the enemy.
The thrust of Contrary theses (I) is to portray the contradiction between the bounty of nature and the
piety of religion, and the simultaneous bloodshed and violence perpetrated by the soldier. While nature
and religion are full of life-affirming urges, the soldier is full of vengeance and life-denial. There is no
wonder that the shock at the mass slaughter and destruction during the second world war (1939) has a
strong impact on the imagination of wallace stevens who has been largely a Romantic poet and aesthete
in his early poems. The plea, the insistence, that A Soldier stalks before my door is an index of the fact
that violence and disorder are so close to the life of the men and the women in the modern world which
has been a witness to the World War I and the World War II. The unpleasant and frightening reality of
the modern age is as much present in the poem as the Romantic dream of the bounty of the nature and
the piety of religion. The imagination of Wallace Stevens is that of a humanist who is deeply hurt at the
violence and bloodshed which have been inevitable due to the crisis of the Western civilization in the
twentieth century. The aesthete has become a humanist who can face the contradiction of the age. The
images that he has used are also precise and sometimes hard, concrete and startling, for example, the
image of a soldier stalking the victim and the image of oaks smeared with blood. His friendship with
William Carlos Williams and the impact of the Imagists turned him into a modern poet who could explore
the irony and the paradox of the life of the age. Contrary Theses (II) is a companion poem in which the
contradiction between mid-autumn and winter has been presented. While mid-autumn is real, winter is
abstract, it is simply an idea in the mind. The narrator has visualised an evening in mid-autuin when the
earth and the sky are one and they have also been imagined as grand mechanics who may perform some
chemical action. The image of the green locusts which have yellow wings reminds one of the image of a
soldier stalking his victim. Both these images connote violence and destructive impulses which has become
dominant in the modern age. Mid-autumn may seen relatively mild but winter would be formidable. In
winter the chill would be so much that the swans moving in the wide sky would be nearly frozen. The
leaves would fall copiously, like falling notes from a piano. The trees would become bare and nude and
the sun that shines during mid-autumn would also cease to shine and warm. While natures bounty has
been emphasized in Contrary Theses (I), it is winters severity and chill that has been emphasized in
Contrary Theses (II). The image of the locusts appears again and again in the second poem. It is evident
that reality, unpleasant reality of civilization and nature, has become more prominent in both these poems.
If the civilization is bristling with violence and bloodshed, nature will lead to winter and the narrator can
visualise winter as clearly as he can see the locusts. Both these poems show how Wallace Stevens can
confront the crisis of civilization and the challenge of a harsh winter.
8. Bring out the full significance of the thematic and structural cohesion of Holiday in Reality. Do you think
the poet has been successful in this poem?
Holiday in Reality is a poem that figures in Wallace Stevens fifth anthology of poem Transport to
Summer (1947). The second world war was over and the poet was nearly sixty eight years old. The
horror and the anguish of the second world war was behind him and approaching the seventy years of his
life, slowly and gradually, the poet was over the subtle relationship between the real and the imagined. As
an adolescent when he was meditating by his father to be practical and refrain from indulging in leaps of
imagination, he felt that the real was humdrum and monotonous and frightening and it stifled his imagination
and the flowering of poetry. He also felt that what appeared real and practical to his father was a
negation of his imagination. Later on, he postponed the writing of poetry and qualified as an attorney.
When he settled as an attorney and achieved both economic security and status, at the age of 44 he
published his first anthology, Harmonium. The title of the poem shows the poets imperative need to
achieve harmony and equilibrium between his private self and the competitive world around him. In other
words, he wanted to have order and harmony between his soaring imagination and reality that constricted
his freedom.
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Holiday in Reality is a poem that consists of two paragraphs of fourteen and twelve lines each. While in
the first paragraph the focus is on the January sun, in the second paragraph our attention is drawn to
spring that is unbilical or else it is not spring. The image of the January sun, pale, cold and colourless
brings to our mind the severity of winter. The image of spring being umbilical brings to our mind the
navel cord and also the idea of birth. In other words, spring takes birth and in course of time it also
vanishes and dies. While winter seems to be prolonged and almost unending, spring seems to be short-
lived and fleeting. In the first paragraph there is also a pointed reference to the people who are utterly
alienated and do not have a common speech which may create a durable and healthy community. Such
people exist as shadows and they fail to find their earth, their sky and their heaven. They are alienated
from nature, from community and their life is so constricted that they also do not have the compensation
of possessing a particular woman and her touch. Ibid, p.312. They are so alienated and atomised that
even if they go to a comfortable place like Durand-Ruels, they are not able to breathe and live like
healthy, fully integrated human beings. The thrust of the first paragraph is that their life is summed up by
a sharp white, that is the sharp white of the January sun. While white in this context seems to imply a
cold and colourless life, yellow implies colour, vitality and nature bathed in summer suns glow. As a poet,
Wallace Stevens shows a keen sense of colour. While white is a negation of life, yellow is an affirmation
of a lust for life and vitality. There is a reference to Aix in the first half of the poem where Paul Cezanne,
one of the most remarkable painter of France was born and in his landscapes the luminuous sunlight
casts an unearthly glow on trees and shrubs.
Inspired by the painting of Paul Cezanne and the dark, gloomy but colourful poetry of Charles Baudelaire,
Holiday in Reality has a remarkable glow and resonance. In the second and the last section of the poem,
it is spring that is portrayed in all its diversity. There are Judas (a flower) that grows in spring. There are
also violets every where and the landscape is a green leaf. (Ibid, p. 132). This is the concentrated
effect produced in spring. Greenery is luminous, radiant everywhere. One may get an impression that
Spring is as lasting as the January sun in winter. It is, however, not true. There is a striking line in the
second half of the poem, Spring is umbilical or else it is not spring. (p. 313). It is not easy to paraphrase
this line. The word Umbilical means navel and by association it also brings to mind umbilical cord
which binds the foetus to the placenta. After childbirth, umbilical cord comes out along with the baby. In
other words, spring is born and after sometime it vanishes. Spring is beautiful beyond words but it is real
only for a little while. Spring is the time when apples bud and bloom, gold is spangled everywhere and the
catbird gobbles left-overs in the morning. As long as the narrator is able to perceive spring and also the
objects mentioned, they seem real. The narrator takes an extremely subjective stand. He says that they
are real as long as we perceive them. When we do not perceive them they, at least to the perceiver, do
not exist. The point is that spring is real, if we think of the moment, the specific context, but as a result of
the law of mutability spring vanishes and therefore in a philosophical sense, spring is real and it is also
unreal. The narrator has expressed this strange idea at the end of the poem in these words:
Intangible arrows quiver and stick in the skin
And I taste at the root of the tongue of what is real. Ibid, p.313
What he wants to say is that winter seems to be unending but spring, short-lived and fleeting, is both real
and unreal. In this complex situation, what does the title Holiday in Reality imply? The men and women
in this world are utterly alienated and they do not constitute a healthy and integrated community. They
are alienated from nature also alienated from each other, words do not lead to communication and fellow
feeling. The result is that they are also alienated from the reality which is far from pleasant. In the
context of the poem, men and women are not comfortable with the reality of estrangement and alienation
in the modern world. They are not in a position to confront the terrible reality and still be comfortable and
enjoy a pleasant holiday, or vacation. In other words, the acceptance of the terrible reality of the time is
a negation of the concept of a pleasant holiday. The reality of an unending winter and a fleeting spring is
so stark that one cannot enjoy and be cheerful. Far from being a holiday, life turns into a nightmare. While
as a Romantic poet, the early poetry of Wallave Stevens celebrates the sublime in nature, in his later
poetry he faces the paradox of life with courage and candour. He becomes a great modern poet pre
269 Wallace Stevens
occupied with death and mutability. Holiday in Reality is a poem in which Wallace Stevens is able to
express trenchantly the paradox of modern life. Shelley had said, If winter comes, can spring be far
behind? Wallace Stevens seems to revise Shelley and say, If spring goes, winter cant be far away.
This is the grim vision of life that Wallace Stevens has communicated successfully in the poem.
9. Comment critically on the reality-imagination complex in the major poems of Wallace Stevens.
Wallace Stevens admitted that the reality imagination complex has been the dominant theme of his major
poetry. When his definite anthology the Complete Poems of Wallace Stevens was published in 1954,
he had suggested the Whole of Harmonium as the title, implying that a common thread ran through
nearly all his poems. The reality-imagination complex was the common thread. The first poem in his the
Complete Poems was Earthly Anecdote. It is a short but extremely beautiful and fascinating poems
portraying a dramatic confrontation between the bucks that went clattering and a fire cat that bristled in
the way. While the bucks that were making a loud noise stood for the humdrum reality of life, the firecat
with bright, sparkling life stood for the imagination. The bucks swerved to the right, swerved to the left
but the cat leapt to the right, leapt to the left and confronted the ducks boldly. The point of the poem was
that the reality was quite complicated and circular but the imagination was equally determined and
bristled in the way. It was the interaction between the bucks and the firecat that was the dominant theme
of the play. The interaction led to the creation of a strange world which was both lifelike and fantastic.
The truth embedded in poetry illumined the obscure and dark corners of humdrum reality. It enabled us
to have an entirely fresh and original perception of reality. Poetry was more than a simple mirror,
reflecting the superficial aspects of reality. It was a lamp that illumined the dark secrets of reality.
Sunday Morning is another important poem in which the interaction between the reality and the imagination
has been portrayed in the context of a woman dreaming, daydreaming to be precise. Her daydreaming
takes her to the holy land of Palestine where she is able to find the tomb of Jesus, the son of God. She
also has a realization that the old gods have died and mortality doesn t spare anyone, neither human
beings nor gods. This is the aspect of reality, the truth of life that possesses the woman and she begins to
dream of transcending the iron law of mortality. This dream shows how her imagination wants to transcend
the limitation of mortality and achieve immortality. It is the leap of her imagination that makes her visualise
men in a ring, chanting and celebrating the sun. They are in a frenzy and feel that they have become God-
like in the intensity of their devotion to the sun. They also have such a profound experience of the
mystery of life that/they know whence they came and whither they shall go. Mortality is stern and cant
be escaped but the sun worshippers and able to transcend it. That is the leap of Wallace Stevens
imaginating in the context of his most widely read poem I taste Sunday Morning.
The Man With The Blue Guitar is one of the longest and also one of the three best poems of wallace
Stevens. The reality imagination complex is present right in the first section of the poem.
The man bent over his guitar,
A shearsman of sorts the day was green.
They said, You have a blue guitar,
You do not play things as they are.
The man replied, Things as they are
Are changed upon the blue guitar.
(The Collected Poems, p. 165). The blue guitar stands for the poets imagination which does portray
things as they are. They portray things as they appear to the poets imagination. The humdrum reality is
transformed by the imagination. This fact is expressed again and again in this poem which has been
inspired by a famous painting of Pablo Picasso in which an old man plays upon a blue guitar. It is the blue
star that stands for the imagination which perceives humdrum reality in a most original and fresh manner.
The poets original perception of humdrum reality is of such a nature that it stris the chord of millions of
readers and listeners. It becomes universal and ceases to be personal universal and ceases to be personal
like a diary maintained by an individual. Study of Two Pears is a poem in which a common place object
Poetry 270
like two pears has been presented through the eyes of an impressionist painter and we become slowly
and slowly aware of the shape, curves and colours of the two ordinary pears. It is the eye of a painter
that makes us perceive the two pears as extraordinary objects.
There is another poem A Dish of Peaches in Russia in which simple and commonplace objects like
peaches have been presented through the poets imagination in these words:
I see them as a lover sees,
As a young lover sees the first buds of spring
And as the black Spaniard plays his guitar. (Ibid, p. 224)
We can easily see that the imagination has transformed the reality perceived by the poet. Of Modern
Poetry is a poem in which the modern poet has been pictured as an actor, an actor who is a metaphysician
in the dark. (Ibid, p. 240). While the Romantic poet Wordsworth described the poet as a man speaking
to men, Wallace Stevens has described the modern poet as a metaphysician in the dark. In other words,
the modern poet is a metaphysician who is pre occupied with the dark and hidden dimensions of reality.
Contrary Theses (I) is a poem in which the bounty of nature and the piety of religion has been juxtaposed
against the grim reality of a soldier stalking, that is pursuing his helpless victim. Thus we find that the
interaction of the imagination and the reality has been shown in innumerable context. The/reality is not
disregarded but the imagination is also not slighted. Their dramatic encounter is shown in different,
exciting contexts.
Holiday in Reality is, perhaps, the poem in which the reality-imagination complex has been portrayed
with a rare insight. On the one hand, we have a picture of winter, of the January sun which seems to be
unending and on the other hand, we have a glimpse of spring that also seems to be real and eternal. The
poem makes us discover that spring may seem to be real and eternal. But in reality, it is subject to
mutability. Spring is real and simultaneously it is not real. In the long run, it is fleeting, and short-lived.
Winter is prolonged and seems to be unending. In a situation like this, reality is no comfort to the men and
women of our time. It is not a holiday. It is more of a nightmare with spring, fleeting, short-lived, and
winter unending in its vigour. This is the shape that the reality imagination encounter takes in Holiday in
Reality. For a moment, grim reality seems to be paramound. We are reminded of the poem Domination
of Black. Thanatos seems to triumph over Eros.
10. Discuss critically the image of the woman in the poetry of Wallace Stevens. Do you think he idealises
women too much?
Wallace Stevens admitted that he derived his practical sense and worldly wisdom from his father and his
imagination from his mother who played on the piano and sang hymus to her children everynight. It is
from his mother that he derived emotional warmth and, after his three years stay at Harvard and getting
initiated into the mystery of French and English literature from his mentor George Santayana, he got
completely alienated from his father. There is no wonder that the image of the woman is present in most
of his poems. Le Monocle De Mon Uncal is one of his famous poems in which there is a kind of a
dialogue between Mon Uncal (Wallace Stevens) and Le Monocle (his erotic self), lamenting the loss of
the passion of love. While the lover is still ardent, the lady love has become rather cool and aloof: The
frustration of Mon Oncle has been portrayed graphically in the following lines:
No spring can follow past meridian Yet you persist with anacdotal bliss to make believe a starry
connaissance. (The Collected Poems, p. 13).
Mon Oncle is telling his erotic self the phase of abounding passion is over and spring is not likely to come
again. In the context, spring connotes the phase when the thrill of love, both physical and emotional, is at
its peak. He also tells his erotic self, (you) that you persist in snatching physical proximity and union
which does not always approximate to the frenzy of the first union - the beloved has been visualised as
a radiant bubble, that is a beautiful but somewhat cold and frigid woman. There is no wonder that the
narrator in the poem keeps on dreaming of A damsel heightened by eternal bloom. (Ibid, p. 15)
Sunday Morning is one of the most widely read poems of Wallace Stevens in which the narrator is a
271 Wallace Stevens
woman. She is a comfortable woman of the middle class and after having coffee and sitting in a sunny
chair she has a dream, a daydream to be precise. Her imagination takes a leap and she is able to reach
the holy land of Palestine. She seems to be a devout Christian who, however, has also a streak of
scepticism. She wonders why she should be still devoted to the dead. In the context of the poem, the
dead refers to Jesus, the Son of God.
She is also of the view that divinity does not lie either in Jesus, the son of or in his tomb. As a Romantic
she believes that Divinity must live within herself. (Ibid, p. 67) The sight of the birds flying, Aprils
enduring greenery and the beating of the Swallows wings in June fill her with ecstacy and the sublime in
nature makes her captive. She begins to thing that the earthly paradise is for more real than the heavenly
paradise. If the woman in Le Monocle De Mon Oncle is something is a prude and an inhibited woman,
the woman in Sunday Morning is a sceptic as a Christian and a pagan who celebrates the people who
worship the sun as a pagan god. The sun is Not as a god, but as a god might be. (Ibid, p. 70)
Peter Quince At The Clavier is another erotic poem in which the beauty of a young woman, Susanna,
who figures in the old Testament has been graphically portrayed in her naked glory. There is something
fatal about her beauty which provokes the lust of two white-haired elders of the church. Eventually, her
fatal beauty leads to her rape and shame. Susanna has been portrayed by Wallace Stevens from the point
of view of an aesthete and a lover of beauty. The ethical dimension of her rape is missing in the poem
and there is no condemnation of the white-haired elders brutal rape. The image of the woman that is
presented in this poem is that of an object to be manipulated and used by men she is all flesh and the
other dimension of her personality, her individuality, her resistance to being manipulated by men, is nearly
missing from the poem.
The Idea of Order at Key West is another important poem by Wallace Stevens in which the woman
plays a crucial role. The narrator, along with his companion, is near the sea-shore at Key West, a low-
lying island and popular resort near Florida. The narrator discovers a woman near the sea-shore. In the
words of the narrator, She sang beyond the genius of the sea. (Ibid, p. 128). The sea has been roaring
and it made a cry that the narrator is not able to understand. It was the womans song that has an appeal
and it stirs a chord in the narrators heart. The final impression that the narrator has of that woman is we
beheld her striding there alone. (Irid, p. 129)
The woman is not a soft, sentimental woman, leaning for support on others. She is a bold, independent,
tough woman walking alone on the sea-shore, singing for her own satisfaction. The image of the woman
in The Idea of Order At Key West makes one remember the ideal of a Romantic Poet who stands
alone in the world for his own satisfaction. She is such a bold contrast to the doomed young woman in
Peter Quince At The Clavier.
There are two short poems Another Weeping Woman and Woman Looking At a Vase of Flowers
In Another Weeping Woman , woman has been presented first as a conventional who is weeping
because of her too bitter heart (Ibid, p. 25) and in the other poem the woman is presented as the form
and the fragrance of things/without clairvoyance, close to her. Ibid, p. 247. the point of the latter poem
is that the woman is fuller and better formed than the objects she has been watching. Wallace Stevens
has recreated the figure of Penelope as a woman waiting for her mate and companion in his famous
poem The World As Meditation. Penelope is the eternal female waiting for ulysses, the eternal male.
Their union has been pictured beautifully in the poem His arms would be her necklace/And her belt,
the final fortune of their desire. (Ibid, p. 521) There words, so simple, so appropriate, so complete show
how Wallace Stevens had matured as a modern poet. The pent-up passion of Penelope has been compressed
in a really beautiful line: The barbarous strength within her would never fail. (Ibid, p. 521)
Final Soliloquy of The Interior Paramour is one of the most fascinating poem in which the woman is
the interior paramour, the ideal woman that sits within every man and chats with him all the time. In this
poem occurs a strange line, We say God and the imagination is certainly stimulated by the woman, the
ideal woman, the eternal woman, sitting within the mind of every man. There is no wonder that the
woman in Wallace Stevens poetry is sometimes a prude, sometimes a doomed woman, sometimes a
Poetry 272
solitary Romantic genius and sometimes the interior paramour . The woman is always, nearly always
present in his poetry.
11. Attempt a critical evaluation of the imagery and style in Wallace Stevens poems that you have read.
Wallace Stevens published his first anthology of poems in 1923 under the title Harmonium. T.S. Eliot,
the most influential poet of England had published The Wasterland in 1922 after the first World War.
While the poems of Harmonium remind one of the poems of the great Romantic poets like Words
Worth and John Keats in their imaginative perception of the beauty of nature, The Waste land of T.S.
Eliot is a modern poem in which the crisis of the western civilization has been portrayed in a rich, highly
allusive style, full of hard, clear cut and startling and shocking images. While the poems of Harmonium
are predominantly Romantic in theme and imagery, The Waste land is starkly realistic, sometime
surrealistic poem, in which the nightmare of the urban metropolis has been recreated with a chilling
insight and candour. In his Romantic streak and the celebration of the sublime of American landscape
Wallace Stevens is closer to W.B. Yeats rather than T.S. Eliot. The early poetry of W.B. Yeats is
romantic in its preoccupation with Irish landscape, beauty of women and the valour of the Irish heroes of
the past and the present. So is the early poetry of Wallace Stevens in its preoccupation with the hemlocks,
the sun and the beauty of Susanna in all its naked glory.
Domination of Black is a short but significant poem in which the darkness of the hemlocks has been
juxtaposed against the cry of the peacocks. While the darkness of the hemlocks stands for mortality and
death, the cry of the peacocks stands for life and procreation. When these objects are seen in the context
of the gathering of the planets in the sky, they seem to assume a cosmic dimension. The point of the richly
symbolical poem is that the domination of black, that is mortality, loss of bloom and eventual death and
annihilation is the law that operates in the cosmos. The style of Wallace Stevens is supposed to be full of
abstract, recondite and rare words and phrases but the style in Domination of Black is plain and
trenchant that of wordsworth and Keats at their best the crucial word the hemlocks does appear in
John Keatss famous Romantic poem, Ode To Nightingale. Sunday Morning is another poem of
Wallace Stevens that reminds us of Wordsworth who wrote Tintern Abbey and Ode on the Intimations
of Immortality. The sublime in nature has been graphically depicted in Sunday Morning especially in
the famous seventh section of the poem. The images drawn from nature and the transparent use of
words remind one of Wordsworth at his best. A few lines could be quoted to substantiate the point:
Supple and turbulent, a ring of men shall chant in orgy on a summer morn their boisterous devotion to the
sun, Not as a god, but as God might be.
The Collected Poems, p.70
Perhaps, it is from his next poem Peter Quince At the Clavier that Wallace Stevens develops his
unique style. He is indeed a Romantic poet but a Romantic poet of the twentieth century who had lived
through the First World War. He had also imbibed the impact of the Imagists who laid stress on precise,
clear-cut and startling images. These poets also rejected excessive sentimentality of the decadent Romantic
poets who emerged towards the end of the nineteenth century. Decadent Romantic poets like Walter
Pater, Oscar Wilde and others were also guilty of vague, amorphous and rare images. Wallace Stevens
portrays the triumphs and despair of Susanna, a youthful woman of Babylon figuring in the Old
Testaement with a sense of detachment, objectivity and candour. There is a preponderance of images
derived from music. Susannas rape at the hand of the white-haired elders of the church described in
these words:
She turned-
A cymbal crashed,
And roaring horns. (Ibid, p. 91)
The violence of the verbs that have been used, crashed, and roaring is a precise indication of the
sexual violence inflicted on an unsuspecting Susanna. The objectivity and detachment, and lack of emotional
involvement, on the part of the poet is an index of his maturing as a modern poet. Instead of ranting
273 Wallace Stevens
against the high handedness of the white-haired elders who had raped Susanna, Wallace Stevens allows
the situation to be recreated with utmost objectivity and candour. The poets voice is not audible, it is the
situation that speaks loudly enough. There is no need for the poet to comment like a moralist.
Poems like Contrary Theses (I) and (II) and Holiday in Reality show that Wallace Stevens has
matured as a great modern poet. In Contrary Theses (I) the paradox between the bounty of nature and
the latent violence of a soldier stalking his victim has been recreated with a degree of precision that is
found in a great modern poet. In Contrary Theses (II) the paradox between the mid-autumn and the
savage fury of winter has been forcefully communicated. Holiday in Reality is a poem in which the
paradox between th January sun and the fleeting spring has been depicted graphically. Above all, there is
a poem Study of Two Pears, in which a commonplace object like two pears has been presented through
the eyes of an impressionist painter. The poet has suggested artistically the size, shape and colours of two
pears. The poets precision in the use of words is evident in this evocation of the tints of the two pears:
The yellows glisters,
It glistens with various yellows,
Citrons, oranges and greens
Flowering over the skin. (Ibid, p. 196)
In sum up, the early poems of Wallace Stevens show traces of Wordsworth and Keats but his later
poetry shows that he became more objective, precise and perceptive in his portrayal of reality. While his
imagination seems to run riot in his earlier poems like Domination of Black and Sunday Morning, his
later poems like Contrary Theses (I) and (II), Study of Two Pears and Holiday in Reality show that
his powerful imagination is kept in check by his objectivity and critical sense. He has also profiled much
from the objectivity and colloquial language used by his friend William Carlos Williams who had
been a friend of Ezra Pound and learnt precision and self-control from the Imagist poets of the modern
age.
Short Questions and Answers:
1. Harold Bloom said that Of Modern Poetry is a weak poem. Do you agree with the statement?
Before one reacts to the point made by Harold Bloom in Wallace Stevens: The Poems of Our
Climate, Cornell University Press, Ithaca and London, 1977, it would be proper to look at the poem
steadily and see it whole. Of Modern Poetry is a poem that consists of three paragraphs. The first
paragraph has four lines, the second has twenty lines and the third and the last paragraph has four
lines.If the first paragraph is the prologue, the last one is its epilogue. In the nineteenth century wordsworth,
the pioneer of Romanticism, described poetry as the Spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings. As
opposed to it, the narrator in Of Modern Poetry lays stress on the mental and intellectual activity of the
poet. The modern poet is not swayed by emotions. For him the writing of portray is preceded by intense
mental activity. In the past, poetry was conventional and followed the old beatend track the poet repeated,
somewhat mechanically, what was done by the ancestors. The Modern poetry was, however, written for
a different kind of audience. The narrator is of the view:
It has to face the men of the time and to meet
the woman of the time. It has to think about war
And it has to find what will suffice.
The Collected Poems, p. 240
Therefore, modern poetry is more than a spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings. The modern poet is
something of an actor and he puts on the mask of a dandy, an aesthete or a rabbi. The actor is not simply
an entertainer; he is metaphysician in the dark. (Ibid, p. 240) In other words, the modern poet is a
metaphysician, that is a thinker who wants to probe into the dark, hidden secrets of reality. Therefore
modern poetry is primarily intellectual and the modern poet is a seeker. Modern Poetry gives the reader
or the listener as much satisfaction as a man gets through skating and a woman gets through dancing. A
Poetry 274
poem is the product of an intense activity of the mind. It is difficult to agree with Harold Blooms
judgement that Of Modern Poetry is a weak poem. It is a deeply satisfying poem and sheds light on the
specific nature of modern poetry.
2. Attempt a critical appreciation of Study of Two Peers.
Study of Two Peers is a poem that consists of six stanzas of four lines each. It does not have rhyme but
it is regular in the sense that all stanzas have four, unrhymed lines. The focus in the poem is on two pears
that are visible to the narrator who has the keen eyes of a painter. Gradually, the narrator discovers the
shape and colours of the two pears. They are ordinary, common place objects but the narrators contention
is that even from small, minor objects one can learn much. The two latin words, Opusculum paedagogum
simply means that from small, minor objects (Opusculum) one can learn adequately. The narrator then
makes use of a series of negations. They are neither viols (a music instrument) nor are they nudes. They
are also not bottles. They are unique because they do not resemble any other object. The narrator notices
the shape and the colours of the pears. They bulge towards the base and also have curves. There is a
touch of red towards the base. They are not flat. They are three-dimensional and they taper towards the
top. There are also bits of blue over them and a hard dry leaf hang from the stem. The yellow has many
shades, reminding one of Citrons, oranges and greens/Flowering over the skin. (Ibid, p. 197). Finally,
the narrator makes a discovery that the two pears are placed on a green cloth and there are shadows of
the pears over the green cloth. These shadows are connoted by the word blobs. This is how an
ordinary and commonplace object like two pears has been perceived and pictured by Wallace Stevens.
Robert Rehder is of the view that the poet had learnt much from Paul Cezanne, a famous impressionist
painter in nineteenth century France. He was famous for his landscapes in which ordinary objects become
extraordinary and luminous due to interplay of sunlight and shade. The point of Study of Two Pears is
that they are ordinary objects but they are also extraordinary. They are unique and nothing else resembles
them. From a perusal of this poem we understand how carefully the poet had perceived ordinary objects
like two pears. He could see their size, their shape and their colours. He had the eyes of a painter like
Paul Cezanne.
3. As a Romantic poet, Wallace Stevens was obsessed with death and immortality. Do you agree?
It is true that Wallace Stevens was a Romantic poet in his afirmation of the dignity and sanctity of the life
of the individual. The sublime in nature thrilled him and it also seemed to be immortal. It made him feel as
if he was a God-like creature, destined to live for ever. That was, perhaps, the dream of a young man
who felt that death and mortality were only some kind of illusion. This youthful dream of immortality, the
hope of transcending death and mortality, got a rude shock as he grew up and matured. Domination of
Black Harmonium in which mortality is suggested by the leaves, the fallen leaves. Death is very
powerfully suggested by the hemlocks which are a plant from which poison can be made. In other words,
the colour of the heavy hemlocks, signifies death. The image of the hemlocks is repeated again and again
and the title Domination of Black suggests the inevitability and sway of death on the earth. Sunday
Morning is another important poem in which the narrator has questioned divinity of Jesus. The son of
God, Jesus, died and his tomb in Palestine is only a tomb. It shows the triumph of death. Even a Roman
God like Jove Vanished from the earth and neither Jesus nor Jove means much to the men and women of
our time. The sun-worshippers seem to transcend mortality and death but the final image of a flock of
pigeons, sinking into darkness, is a powerful symbol of mortality and death. The lovely Susanna who has
been pictured in all her voluptuousness in Peter Quince At the Clavier is also a victim of lust and
finally she too dies. Her memory remains in the mind of the narrator but even a glorious, radiant woman
like Susanna cannot escape mortality and death. In Contrary Theses) (I) also the bounty of nature and
the piecy of religion has been sharply negated by the stak image of a soldier stalking his victim. Howsoever,
sublime and eternal nature (mountains, rivers and valleys) be, human beings cant escape mortality and
death. Immortality was a youthful dream but mortality was a stern reality.
4. Discuss the contribution of Wallace Stevens to modern American poetry.
Wallace Stevens published Harmonium in the year 1923 after the first world war. T.S. Eliot, the most
275 Wallace Stevens
influential poet of the modern age, had published his great poem the Waste land in 1922. The literary
climate of that time was anti-Romantic and Romanticism had become sickly and decadent. The word
Romanticism had a negative connotation of escapism, excessive emotionalism and a morbid preoccupation
with death. The poetry of decadent Romantic poets like Walter Pater, Osear Wilde and Swineburne gave
Romanticism a bad name. It was the unique achievement of Wallace Stevens, like that of W.B. Yeats, to
assimilate the best of Romanticism from great poets like Wordsworth and Keats, and synthesize it with
modevnity and Imagism laying stress on particularity, hard, clear cut and shocking images. He became a
Romantic poet of the twentieth century who had also learnt discipline, self-control, and realism from
poets like Ezra Pound, T.S. Eliot and W.B. Yeats. The landscape in the continent of America, from
Hartford, connectinent to key west in Florida, has also been celebrated as no one else, except Walt
Whitman, did in the modern age. In his later poems like Study of Two Pears, Wallace Stevens looks at
commonplace, ordinary objects like two pears with the eyes of an accomplished painter. From his friend
William Carlos Williams, Wallace Stevens had learned Objectivism, that is, the focus was on the object
outside the human mind. The emotional response of the poet, the perceiver, is also present in the poem
but the poet has also the objectivity to look at an object steadily and see it whole. There is no wonder that
in his later poems Wallace Stevens has the maturity and penetrating insight of a great modern poet. He
was nearly seventy when he wrote a great poem like The World As Meditation in which Penelops
longing for ulysses has been portrayed with a rare insight and candour. He was a poet who never
became senile and sick. To an Old Philosopher in Rome is an unforgettable poem portraying how an
old man encounters death with equanimity courage. It is said that Wallace Stevens also faced with the
stoic courage of an old man. In other words, he could anticipate his own death.
5. Comment on the image of the sun in Wallace Stevens poetry.
There are so many poem of Wallace Stevens in which the sun figures prominently. There is a poem the
Brave Man in the narrator has celebrated the sun in these words:
The sun, that brave man,
Comes through boughs that lie in wait,
That brave man.
The Collected Poems, p. 138
The Sun has been humanized by the narrator of the poem and it is his presence that makes gloom, good
stars and fears of life and death run away. The phrase That man shows that as a person the sun is not
far away. He is in our midst, working miracles, protecting life and hope. There is another poem A Fading
of the Sun in which the sun has been visualised as the sustainer of life. Without the sun, everyone grows
suddenly cold. The narrator says that at that time, The tea is bad, bread sad. (Ibid, p. 139). It is the sun
which is the pillar of life. Then, everything is transformed. In the words of the narrator, The wine is
good, the bread/the meat is sweet. (Ibid, p. 139). As long as the sun is there the people feel, And they
will not die. (Ibid p. 139) The most remarkable and extended picture of the sun occurs in Wallace
Stevens famous poet Sunday Morning. While the old gods have become obsolete and inert, the sun is
worshipped by a ring of men who are supple and turbulent and they, in the narratorss words, Shall chant
in orgy on a summer morn/their boisterous devotion to the sun,/Not as a god, but as a god might be.
(Ibid, p. 69-70). It has to be remembered that the sun was worshipped, as Apollo, in ancient Greece and
is also worshipped in India today as Surya. The sun-worshippers are in a frenzy and they worship the sun
with such a mighty passion that they transcend mortality and death and feel the surge of immortality in
their veins. The sun is more than a human being, more than a planet in the solar system. The sun is a god
who sustains life and sustains hope. In the later poetry of Wallace Stevens, the sun almost becomes a
synonym for life and hope..
6. Do you think that Wallace Stevens was only an aesthete that is a lover of beauty?
Wallace Stevens confessed to his wife Elsie that the first twenty years of his life spent in and around the
small town of Reading in east Pennsylvania were the most happy years of his life. He was a good student
Poetry 276
in the local school and graduated with merit. He was an equally keen lover of nature and explored the
countryside, the mountains, the rivers and the valleys, around Reading some times on a bicycle ad
sometimes on foot. The years of his struggle in New York were particularly unpleasant to him because
he was grinding in offices from 9 A.M. to 5 P.M. and that kept him away from The Sun! For Wallace
Stevens the sun stands for natures beauty and resonance. In other words, he was primarily an aesthete,
that is a lover of sensuous beauty. He was also an aesthete because he celebrated the beauty of nature
and also the beauty of a woman in his poetry. Sunday Morning is a poem in which the sublime in nature
has been portrayed most graphically. The earth becomes a sort of paradise in those moments of ecstasy.
Peter Quince At The Clavier is another famous poem in which Wallace Stevens appears to be an
aesthete or a hedonist. The beauty of Susanna, a young woman from Babylon, has been presented in all
its naked glory. She is bathing in a pool in a garden where the water is clear as well as warm. The sight
of Susanna provokes the lust of the white haired elders of the church. Susanna is raped by the elders and
the incident has been presented as if she alone is fully responsible for her rape. The red-eyed elders, full
of lust, are not subjected to any criticism. The ethical dimension of the rape is completed overlooked by
the poet. It is the sensuous, beauty of Susanna, her youth and sex appeal, that seduces the elders into the
act of rape. There is something fatal about her beauty. This is the point of view, the point of view of an
aesthete that governs the unfolding of the situation. The last section of the poem is preoccupied with the
poets meditation over beauty. The aesthete is of the view that Susanna has been disfigured and she will
not be able to escape death. The memory of her incredible beauty and sex appeal would, however, linger
long. In his earlier poems, Wallace Stevens is largely an aesthete.
7. The sea in the major poems of Wallace Stevens.
The American landscape figures prominently in Wallace Stevens poetry. The sea which is a part of the
landscape figures in a number of poems. There is a poem Sea Surface Full of Clouds in which the
strange beauty of the sea has been described in these words:
Then the sea
And heaven rolled as one and from two
Came fresh transfigurings of freshest blue.
The Collected Poems, p. 102
One has to note that blue is the colour of the sea and the sky mingled. It is a sight that cannot be
described in words. There is also a vivid portrayal of Key West, low-lying island near the mainland of
Florida in another poem Farewell To Florida:
Key West sank downward under massive clouds
And silvers and greens spread over the sea. (Ibid, p. 117)
The most elaborate and detailed picture of the sea is found in a well-known poem The Idea of Order at
key West. The narrator has made an affirmation that, She sang beyond the genius of the sea. (Ibid, p.
128). That means that the sea had a cry, a constant cry, a kind of repetition which, however did not have
the human appeal of the young womans song. The narrator was able to hear the grinding water and the
gasping wind near the seashore. The sound of the sea was full but the narrator found that it was she
and not the sea we heard. (Ibid, p. 129). It was because the seas roar was somewhat mechanical and
repetitive but the young woman was the maker of the song she sang. Her song had the stamp of her
personality. Her song had a strange human appeal. The sea had its music, its cry, but it was encompassed
by her human song:
And when she sang, the sea,
Whatever self it had, became the self
That was her song, for she was the maker. (Ibid, p. 129).
The young woman was striding near the seashore, along. She stood for an artist who alone and illuminated
the world. At night, the sea looked enchanting with blazing light and the beauty of the sea looked like that
277 Wallace Stevens
of a fairland. It looked enchanting as well. The young womans song was human and personal therefore
it had a strange appeal for human beings. The sea had its own genius but it was not human. It was
impersonal and somewhat mechanical and repetitive. The sea, however, ws the backdrop against which
the genius of the woman was pictured.
8. Irony and Paradox in Contrary Theses (I) and Contrary Theses (II).
While Romanticism sings of the Godlike and the divine in man in a subjective and lyrical mode, Modernity
portrays the irony and paradox of life in a largely objective and satiric mode. While Romantic art is
largely subjective, personal and impassioned, Modern art and poetry is somewhat detached and objective
presentation of the irony and paradox inherent in the life of the time. Contrary Theses (I) is a short
poem consisting of six unrhymed stanzas of two lines. On the one hand, there is the frightening image of
a soldier who stalks a victim just before the narrators door. The bounty of nature is intensified by the
grapes plush upon the vines and bee hives full of wax and honey (the combs). The piety of religion is
indicated by the seraphs who cluster on the domes and the saints looking brilliant in fresh cloaks.
(The Collected Poems, p. 266). Above all there is the startling, imagistic image of Blood smears the
oaks. (Ibid, p. 267). The age that had seen The World War I (1914-1919) and The World War II (1939-
1945) is depicted by the blood that smears the oaks. The bounty of nature and the piety of religion are
effectively juxaposed against the soldier stalking his victim with a shocking, frightening determination.
The violence of man and the bounty of nature are just before the door of the narrator. Contrary Theses
(II) is a companion poem in which mid-autumn and The Bombastic intimations of Winter (Ibid , p. 270)
have been juxtaposed sharply. While mid-autumn is an affirmation of life (a man walking with his year
old boy on his shoulder, the sunshine and the dog barking), winter is an idea, an abstraction. When winter
will break in all its fury, even swans moving in the wide sky will be chilled. The paradox of mid-autumn
and a remote winter has been recreated in all its particularity. Nature also encompasses both life and
death. Mid-autumn is mild and winter will be severe. Mortality in irreversible. Man who lives in the midst
of nature also cannot escape mortality and death. As we all know, mid-autumn shows nature is its glory
but the fall also begins in autumn. In other words, life contains the seed of death. It is inherent in the very
process of life.
9. Holiday in Reality : a critique
Holiday in Reality is a poem that is difficult to interpret and explain in simple and plain words. Wallace
Stevens is at times a difficult and obscure poet and no poem of his is as difficult and obscure as this
poem. It consists of two sections of fourteen and twelve lines. In the first section the life of the people in
the modern age has been portrayed with candour and insight. The people are alienated from each other
and they are also alienated from nature. White is the colour of their life, white which is different and yet
sharp as The January sun. (Ibid, p. 312). The image of the pale, colourless, cold sun is a symbol of
death. The people are so alienated from each other that they do not have (Palabra), that is words to
convey their self. They do not feel kinship with his earth, his sky, his sea. (Ibid, p. 312). They are their
own and yet they are alienated. They also do not know that each had a woman and her touch. (Ibid, p.
312). The world (including but they fail to respond to colour and beauty). They are so impoverished in
spirit, that even at an attractive place like Durand-Ruels they are not able to live and breathe with elan.
While the first section of the alienation from which the people (they) suffer, the second section of the
poem is a rather too involved and convoluted musing on spring. There is a line that is indeed difficult to
explain. The narrator says, Spring is umbilical or else it is not spring. (Ibid, p. 313). The word umbilical
reminds us of umbilical cord which binds the foetus to the placenta and which comes out after the birth
of the child. We can guess that spring is in some way associated with child-birth. As a child is born and
it grows old and finally dies, perhaps spring is also governed by mortality. To an onlooker spring may
seem to be real but it has also a touch of unreal in the sense that it will vanish and winter will have a
prolonged sway. The core and the heart of the poem seems to be a real and unreal spring and winter
indicated by the January sun. The pale, colourless January sun is the most powerful image in the poem
that is the ultimate reality, the holiday for the man of our time.
Poetry 278
Additional questions (long and short)
1. The poetry of Wallace Stevens is a poetry of escape. (long)
2. Domination of Black is a deeply pessimistic poem. Do you agree? (long)
3. The narrator in Sunday Morning is an atheist. Do you agree with the statement? (long)
4. The earthly paradise in the poem Sunday Morning. (short)
5. The sun worship in the poem Sunday Morning. (short)
6. The elders of the church in Pater Quince At The Clavier. (short)
7. Beauty and mortality in Peter Quinee At the Clavier. (short)
8. The young woman in the poem The Idea of Order At Key West. (short)
9. Ramon Fernadez in The Idea of Order At Key West. (short)
10. The Man With the Blue Guitar. (short)
11. Paul Cezanne and his influence on Wallace Stevens. (short)
12. The Hero in United Dames of America. (short)
13. A metaphysician in the dark. (short)
14. The stalking soldier. (short)
15. Spring is real yet unreal. (short)
16. The January sun. (short)
17. Nature as depicted in the poem Holiday in Reality. (long)
18. Startling images in Wallace Stevens. (short)
Suggested Reading
1. Wallace Stevens: A Poets Growth
by George S. Lensing (Louisiana State University Press, Baton Rouge and London, 1986).
It is a perceptive biography of the poet.
2. Wallace Stevens : A Mythology of Self
by Milton J. Bates (University of California Press, Berkeley, Los Angels, London, 1985).
It also lays stress on the complex personality, the aesthete and the rabbi, found in the poet.
3. Wallace Stevens : Poems of Our Climate
by Harold Bloom (Cornell University Press, Ithaca and London, 1977).
It is a provocative study of the major poems. Also traces the influence of British Romantic poets on
Wallace Stevens.
4. The Poetry of Wallace Stevens
by Robert Rehder (St. Martin Press, New York, 1988).
It is a perceptive study of the poems of Wallace Stevens.
5. The Dome And The Rock
by James Baird (The John Hopkins, Press, Baltimore, 1968).
It is also a fine study of the images in the poet.
6. Parts of A World : An Oral Biography
by Peter Brazeau (Random House, New York, 1983).
It contains a lot of information about the life of the poet.
7. The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens
279 Wallace Stevens
(Alfred A. Knoph, New York, 1993).
The definitive edition of his poems.
8. The Oxford Companion to American Literature
(the latest edition)
(New York, Oxford University Press).
9. The Oxford Encyclopedia English Dictionary
edited by Joyce M. Hawkins and Robert Allen
(Clarendon Press, Oxford, 1991)
Glossary :
1. Abbey Theatre, a theatre in Abbey Street, Dublin, first opened in 1904, staging chiefly Irish plays. W.B.
Yeats, the great Irish poet, was associated with it.
2. Abstract: exiting in thought rather than matter, or in theory than practice.
3. Acute: C of sensation or senses) keen, penetrating
4. Aesthetic movement: a literary and artistic movement devoted to art for arts sake which blossomed in
the 1880s, heavily influenced by the Pre-Raphaelites, Ruskin and Walter Pater, in which the adoption of
the ideal of beauty was carried to extravagant lengths and often accomplished by affectation of speech
and manner and eccentricity of dress. Oscar Wilde was its chief follower.
Wallace Stevens was also an aesthete, especially in his earlier poetry. Beauty was his obsession.
5. Aphrodite: the Greek goddess of beauty, fertility, and sexual love, born of the sea-foam, identified by the
Romans with Venus.
6. Apocryphia: the Biblical books received by the early church as part of the Greek version of the Old
Testament, but not included in the Hebrew Bible. The tale of Susanna occurs in them.
7. Apollonian: related to Apollo, the Greek and Roman sun-god, patron of music and poetry.
8. Apotheosis: elevation to divine status; deification.
9. Archetype: a recurrent symbol or motif in literature.
10. Argentine: silvery in colour
11. Arianism: a doctrine that Jesus, the son of God was not divine
12. Atheism: the theory or belief that God does not exist.
13. Autumn: the third season of the year, when crops and fruits are gathered, in the northern hemisphere
September to November. Leaves also start falling in autumn.
Autumn is very important in the poetry of Wallace Stevens.
14. Autumnal: past the prime of life containing the seeds of decay and death.
15. Babylon: the capital of Babylonia, first prominent under Hammurabi. The city (now in ruins) lay on the
Euphrates in modern Iraq (179) and was noted for its luxury and for the Hanging Gardens, one of the
seven wonders of the world.
16. Bass: the lowest adult male singing voice.
17. Charles Baudelaire (1821-67): the greatest French symbolist poet whose Less Fleurs Du Mal (1857)
is one of the seminal works of Modernism. In English translation the anthology is Flowers of Evil. His
poetry is the poetry of isolation, exile, boredom, melancholy and fascination with evil. He had an enormous
impact on T.S. Eliot, Ezra Pound and Wallace Stevens.
18. Bawdy: indecent and vulgar
19. Byzantine: of Byzantium or the Eastern Roman Empire. Also a citizen of Byzantium or the Eastern
Roman Empire.
Poetry 280
20. Byzantium: an ancient Greek city on the European side of the south end of the Bosporus, founded in the
7
th
century BC and re-founded as Constantinople by Constantine.
21. Catastrophe: disaster or ruin
22. Cloudburst: violent rainstorm
23. Coleridge, Samuel (1772-1834), pioneer of English Romanticism along with William Wordsworth. They
produced Lyrical Ballads in 1798, marking the start of the Romantic movement in English Literature.
While Wordsworth loved nature, Coleridge was preoccupied with the supernatural.
24. Keats, John (1795-1821), the youngest of the second generation of poets in England. He wrote Hyperion
where the death of old gods has been graphically portrayed. Along with Wordsworth, he too influenced
Wallace Stevens who too was an aesthete, a lover of beauty. He is also famous for his preoccupation
with beauty. His other famous poems are Ode to Melancholy, and Ode to Autumn.
25. Pater, Walter (1839-94), English essayist and critic, greatly influenced by the Pre-Raphelites. Among his
friends were Swimburne and Rossetti. His celebrated evocation of the beauty of Mona Lisa reads like
poetry. He turned beauty and its appreciation into a kind of religion. He also made art for arts sake
popular.
26. Pedagogue: School-Master or teacher
27. Penelope: the wife of Odysseus or Ulysses in Homers great romance Odyssey. She waited for husband
for a long time.
28. Phanta-Smgoria: a shifting series of real or imaginary figures as seen in a dream.
29. Phantom: a ghost, a spectre
30. Philistine: a person who is hostile or indifferent to culture.
31. Philomel: the daughter of a legendary king of Athens. She was turned into a swallow and her sister
Procne into a nightingale.
32. Picasso, Pablo (1881-1973). A Spanish painter, Perhaps, the greatest painter of the modern age who
worked in the monumental enterprise of cubism which challenged for the first time since the whole
function of painting, replacing mimesis with a new self-sufficient pictorial order distinct from everyday
perception. Gurenica is his most celebrated painting.
33. Pizzicato: plucking the strings of a violin with the finger.
34. Plushy: stylish and luxurious
35. Polyphony: Counterpoint, contrasted sounds in music.
36. Poseidon: the sea-god
37. Post-impressionism a movement in French painting whose members sought to reveal the subjects structural
form without strict fidelity to its natural appearance. Gaugin, Van Gogh and Cezanne were the luminaries
of the autumn exhibition of French painting in London in 1910.
38. Wordsworth, William (1770-1850), English poet, a keen lover of nature and its sublime beauty. Along
with Coleridge, the creator of the English Romantic movement. Radical in his youth, he was made poet
laureate in 1843. He defined poetry as a spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings; which takes its
origin from emotions recollected in tranquility. Tintern Abbey and the Immortality Ode are two of his
most famous poem.
40. Zephyr: mild gentle wind or breeze
41. Zeus, the supreme God in Greek mythology. He was the son of eronus whom he dethroned. The Romans
identified him with Jupiter. They also used the word Jove to connote the supreme God.