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Thomas Hardy's view of life
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Eric Plaisance
Mrs. Truman
English 1302
28 March 2014
“Hap”
While using irony, personification, symbolism and assonance, Thomas Hardy illustrates his anger at God and wants God to look down at him and laugh at his disregard to him and his powerful miracles.
Hap is categorized as an Altered Sonnet poem written by Thomas Hardy with fourteen lines, organized into three stanzas using personification, irony, symbolism, and assonance written in 1866, but not published until 1898. The meter is iambic pentameter. The rhyme scheme is ABAB CDCD EFEFFE. Hap is Hardy’s attempt to fight with the philosophical question that God truly exists and the purpose his existence. Throughout the poem it is clear that Hardy’s reason in writing the poem, “surely was to explore and explain the reasons for his own suffering” (Singleton) theme is unavoidability of misfortune in the fate of humans. As the poem begins, a negative tone is present from where Hardy talks about “a vengeful god”, (line 1) the evident lack of a capital “G” hinting at a lack of faith. He wants to know that there is some order to the way that his life is playing out and would welcome the fact that there is a being controlled by a being of the great strength, who enjoys the power that makes Hardy miserable. We discover that Hardy’s life is compounded by “suffering”, “sorrow” and “love’s loss”. (Lines 2,3,4) Hardy wishes that god exist, but cannot make him self believe so. Because all good and bad things that happen to humans aren't based or assigned by a powerful being at all. It all depends on luck or Hap.
Thomas Hardy was an English novelist and poet that wrote and published m...
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...attempt to fight with the philosophical question that God truly exists and the purpose his existence. In the first stanza Hardy asks that difficult question of which is God real or not and why he has placed so much pain in his path and in the second stanza he states that if such a god existed then Hardy would be prepared to coil up and die. In the third stanza however, he says the random highs and lows in life are all the result of chance. It is simply‚ Crass Casualty/dicing Time or the purblind Doomsters‛ (Lines 11,12, 13) that decide whether to toss blessings or pain into our path as we walk through life. For Hardy it is evident of whether he believes there is a God or not. God watches everything humans do for his own amusement. Therefore, I believe any Christian would agree Hardy is a nut case for his silly beliefs that everything is controlled by luck or chance.
The use of imagery in the poem gives Hardy a place to start to form his attitude toward the sinking of the Titanic. The abrasive descriptions of the objects in the poem show that Hardy has
...r the new century to come. As it turns out, he was mainly right when just fourteen years later, the Great War erupts in Europe when Austria declares war on Serbia, Russia declares war on Austria, Germany declares war on Russia, then tries to invade France through Belgium, which is allies with England, all in all the big mess of the Great War proves that Hardy’s loss of hope was right. The final text of “Ah are you Digging in my Grave?” mainly focuses on the loss of a loved one, which no one remembers. This is the poem I can connect with the most, because I know one day I will die, hopefully not any time soon, but several decades after my death, people will most likely forget about me and who I was. This is a scary thought.
God and the suffering He seems to allow is the paradoxical question posed since the start of religion. Philosophy and literature alike have long struggled with the issue, and poet Countee Cullen takes yet another crack at it in the poem “Yet Do I Marvel”. Cullen uses rhyme, classical allusion, and Shakespearean sonnet form in “Yet Do I Marvel” to exhibit God’s paradoxical nature and purpose the true marvel is in the miracles of life.
With that being said, Hardy is pointing out that we should read between the lines. Everything within this poem is an unsaid message. For example, the wife's reaction, the knowledge of John Wayward, the coffin, even Wayward's name is an unsaid message. Those messages clearly point out that the wife cheated on the husband. They also point out the husband knew of the adulterous relationship between his wife and John Wayward and may have had something to do with Wayward's death.
As in all art, each masterpiece has a distinct mark from their specific artist. The literary arts are no exception, with each author leaving a prominent rhythm, style and language. Thomas Hardy is known for his poems of separation. Thomas found love when he was 30 years old, but his relationship went sour when his marriage to Emma Gifford became estranged. Emma later died leaving her husband an outcast. It was not until 1914 when Thomas Hardy married his second wife, Florence, that he understood how much he missed his first wife. In his poems, Hardy focuses on withering love and the being miserable after a loss. Also, he uses rhyme scheme, multiple cesuras and end stops and symbolism to conceal a deeper meaning of the poem. The two poems that connect the two aspects of Thomas Hardy’s style are Your Last Drive and The Workbox.
The way that God has been viewed by society has either been for the better or the worse. The such idea of a “God” could exist brings curiosity in the mind that generators all types of emotions and feelings; to fear, to love, to happiness, and to anger. The two readings that could interestingly enough to connect to this topic is Nathaniel Hawthorne’s The Minister’s Black Veil and Jonathan Edward’s message of “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry God.” Both have depicted a nineteenth century view of God and a message of preachment. Although Natalie Hawthorne creates a calm tone throughout “The minister’s Black Veil” (which it’s message of God is also indirect) it is very different from the way Jonathan Edward’s “Sinners in the Hands of an Angry
Edward Taylor’s Upon Wedlock, and Death of Children and Upon a Wasp Chilled with Cold are similar in their approach with the illustration of how beautiful and magnificent God’s creations are to humankind. However, each poem presents tragic misfortune, such as the death of his own children in Upon Wedlock, and Death of Children and the cold, enigmatic nature of human soul in Upon a Wasp Chilled with Cold. Taylor’s poems create an element of how cruel reality can be, as well as manifest an errant correlation between earthly life and spiritual salvation, which is how you react to the problems you face on earth determines the salvation that God has in store for you.
"We stood by a pond that winter day," (1) This line indicates a still quietness, with lack of the movement of life. There is a vast difference in appearance and movement around a pond in winter and a pond in the midst of summer. This indicates no leaves, and no visible signs of life. The poet is painting a stark and lifeless scene.
The Themes of Loss and Loneliness in Hardy's Poetry Introduction = == == == ==
Hardy uses imagery throughout the novel in order to explicitly define the ways in which life is unjust. This injustice is first displayed at Prince?s death, then again at his burial. Hardy chooses specific words to enable the reader to see exactly what is happing. He describes the mail-cart to be ?speeding along?like an arrow.? He explains that the mail-cart had ?driven into her slow and unlighted equipage,? and now the horse?s ?life?s blood was spouting in a stream and falling with a hiss into the road.? (Hardy 22). The descriptive words, such as ?speeding,? ?arrow,? ?driven,? ?unlighted,? ?spouting,? and ?hiss? allow the reader?s senses to capture the enormity of the situation. This quote also helps the reader to envision the misery of the situation. Tess is only attempting to help her family by bringing the hives to market to draw some income them. Her desire to help her family backfires with Prince?s accidental death, as he was their only form of income. The desperation induced by Prince?s death is shown when Hardy explains that Mr. Durbeyfield worked harder than ever before in digging a grave for Prince. Hardy states that the young girls ?discharged their griefs in loud blares,? and that when Prince was ?tumbled in? the family gathered around the grave (Hardy 24). Hard...
Despite Dylan Thomas’ often obscure images, he expresses a clear message of religious devotion in many of his poems. He creates images that reflect God’s connection with the earth and body. In “And death shall have no dominion,'; Thomas portrays the redemption of the soul in death, and the soul’s liberation into harmony with nature and God. Thomas best depicts his beliefs, though abstract and complicated, to the reader with the use of analogies and images of God’s presence in nature. Appreciating the virtue of humility in “Shall gods be said to thump the clouds,'; Thomas associates God with thunder, rainbows, and night only to remind us that He is even more present in a simple stone as He is in other great entities. In “The force that through the green fuse drives the flower,'; Thomas again makes the connection of body and earth, implying that there is only one holy force that has created all motion and life on this planet. This force, because it is so pure and boundless, is present in the shadows and poverty of our world, as depicted in “Light breaks where no sun shines.'; God’s sacred presence in the body and earth is the ultimate theme within these chosen poems.
Francis Thompson lived in London at the end of the nineteenth century. He led a life that was often out of accord with the will of God, but repented near the end of his life and found God. He wrote an autobiographical poem, "The Hound of Heaven", based on his experiences. By analyzing this poem and Thompson's message, we can learn the truth of the statement "God's greatest attribute is His mercy."
The final stanza of the poem concludes that God’s compassion for the human being, his creation, has the power to rid us of our suffering. God will not desert us, and will in fact “sit by us and moan” when we suffer.
Clarke, R. (n.d.). The Poetry of Thomas Hardy. rlwclarke. Retrieved February 1, 2014, from http://www.rlwclarke.net/Courses/LITS2002/2008-2009/12AHardy'sPoetry.pdf
George Herbert’s struggle to be humble enough to fully accept God’s undying love can be located within each of his poems. The way in which Herbert conveys this conflict is by utilizing structure as well as metaphysical techniques. This combination of literary devices creates a physical reality that allows Herbert, or the poetic speaker, to “make his feelings immediately present” (245). These devices, at first, appear to be artificial and contradictory to the poet’s goal of making God’s word visible. Instead, literary techniques, for Herbert, help to emphasize how God controls everything from daily life to literature. Therefore, Herbert believes he is not the sole author of his writing; rather, he is an instrument of God chosen to write down poetry praising Him. Herbert battles with this idea as he must refuse the pride that comes with being the author of such beautiful devotional and metaphysical poetry. If Herbert were to give into this “temptation of success” (243), he would be giving himself up to sin and thus rejecting God’s love. This process of rejecting and accepting, or of “conflict and resolution” (243), is done throughout “The Temple,” which leads Herbert to an ultimate acceptance of God and to an “achieved character of humility, tenderness, moral sensitiveness” (249).