Stop All The Clocks And Mirror

The idea of loss is prevalent in both “Stop all the Clocks” by W.H Auden and “Mirror” by Sylvia Plath. Auden employs the narrative voice of a distraught partner to reveal the travesty of death and the consuming emotions which accompany the devastation of physical a loss, whereas, Plath depicts the symbolic loss of identity through the inevitable process of ageing as told from the narration of a mirror.
The initial stanza of Auden’s “Stop all the Clocks” introduces the idea of loss by allowing readers empathize with the grief and sorrow evoked by death. Overwhelmingly consumed by the anguish of grief, Auden’s narrator demands “Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone.” With each sound surrounding him torturing his mind he simply cannot function when he is so …show more content…
Auden’s narrator can no longer see the beauty in the world, where he declares “The stars are not wanted now” and for this reason they should metaphorically “put out every one”. By eradicating every beauty, Auden is emphasizing the magnitude of his loss due to his bereavement, where he surmises that “nothing now can ever come to any good”. Although Plath’s poem also reveals a lack of acceptance in its final verses, the reality remains that in the mirror’s reflection, the woman “has drowned a young girl”. In the mirror, “an old woman/ Rises toward her” as she contests the reality of ageing. Regardless of how the woman combats its reality, she is still aged, making a comparison to “a terrible fish” as where a fish floats to the surface once faced with death, so too does the woman reflected in the mirror.
“Stop all the Clocks” by W.H Auden and “Mirror” by Sylvia Plath explore loss as an emotion but analyse it through diverse contexts. Where Auden uses the physical loss of a loved one to articulate the profundity of grief, Plath focuses upon the inevitable process of ageing. Irrespective of the circumstances, the desolation loss inflicts is