In life there is suffering. There has always been suffering and there will always be suffering; it is part of what makes us human. This is something that has been known for much longer than any of us have even been a part of the human experience. It is something that both Dante Alighieri and William Shakespeare took note of hundreds of years ago and something that both of them thought was a topic important enough to explore through their respective writings Dante’s Inferno and King Lear. With…
William Blake’s five-stanza poem “The fly” tries to see humanity in a fly. It narrates the poet’s act of thoughtlessness in brushing away a fly which leads to the contemplation of the act and its implications, which further reveals the essence of life as “thought is life” and the lack of it, death. As the stanzas proceed from observation,contemplation, and conclusion to revelation and liberation, I get an understanding of Blake’s philosophical system. In my essay, I will argue that Blake uses a…
The Poet’s Revelation Countless of people have a constant fear of the limitations of life and not being able to reach their maximum potential because the thought of dying dictates them. And in John Keats’s English sonnet, When I Have Fears, he expresses the anxiety of not having time to reach the pinnacle of his writing career and not being able to experience love. However, Keats also remarks the human insignificance with time and it enables for him to cease from the fear that seems to have a…
POETIC ANALYSIS OF “Out, Out-” BY ROBERT FROST In Robert Frost’s poem “Out, Out-” Frost uses literary devices to portray the fact that life should be valued. The boy that Robert Frost creates is a hard worker. The boy tries to do the best he can, but because of his age and lack of experience, he is unskilled. His unskilled hands are only trained for work that leads to his painful death. Frost mimics the story of Shakespeare's Lady Macbeth through the boy, and the specific way he dies. The…
According to Furniss & Bath, ‘literacy criticism in the Twentieth Century has come to regard ambiguity in poetry as one of its most characteristic and valuable features’, as shown in Michael Drayton’s sonnet ‘The Parting’, Lord Byron’s poem ‘When we two parted’ and Letitia Elizabeth Landon’s poem ‘Love’s Last Lesson’ (Furniss & Bath, 1996: 207). The symbolism used in these poems portray the ambiguous representation of love/death elegies, love symbolizing hope and death symbolizing loss.…
In the poem, “Fish Fossil,” by Ai Qing, the speaker dramatizes the meaning of life, to live life to the fullest and do not let anything get in your way. In the title, the speaker uses the word “fossil” to symbolize past memories of his life. The entire poem is an allegory where every line portrays a deeper meaning to it rather than the words the speaker uses. The speaker begins the poem by referring to how energetic and successful he felt, “With such agility in your movements”(1). Also, as he…
What makes you ‘you’? Perhaps the answer to the question varies from group to group; Perhaps, we are a collection of our physical, mental, and spiritual components, all unique and different. The Birthmark is a short story written by Nathaniel Hawthorne in 1843. The audience is introduced to a brilliant scientist, Aylmer, whose life revolved around his experiments and quest for scientific perfection. While controversial, Aylmer abandons his laboratory to marry Georgiana, a beautiful woman that…
Adam Sparks Chris Pappas ENC 1102 December 10, 2017 An Ephemeral Account of Cut-Up Poetry “Cut-Up” by definition, means divided into pieces by cutting. (Random House, Inc) In poetry, it is a rarely used form of writing. This method is used by taking a completely written section of text and separating it into pieces with very little or single words on each piece. The resulting pieces are then rearranged into a new text. Cut-up writing is often difficult or at times incomprehensible and…
“Icarus in Catechism Class,” a poem written by Dominador Ilio, revolves around the persona wanting to escape the catechism class that he is in. On the other hand, “Musée des Beaux Arts,” a poem written by WH Auden, shows how the “Old Masters” understand suffering as depicted in several artworks, especially Brueghel’s painting of the fall of Icarus, as seen by the persona in a mueseum. This close reading will focus on the importance of Icarus and how suffering is depicted in the poems. Making…
Noor Saket Prof. Abid Vali ENGL 221 19 Apr. 2017 The Unromantic Side of Innocence According to Merriam Webster Dictionary, the word “innocence” is defined in three different ways: “freedom from guilt or sin through being unacquainted with evil,” “lack of knowledge,” and “lack of worldly experience or sophistication” (“Innocence”). These three definitions apply to the persona of William Blake’s poem “The Chimney Sweeper,” which was featured in his poem collection Songs of Innocence. The chimney…