The Theme of Love in Poetry

The Theme of Love in Poetry

For this essay I am going to read and analyse three poems on the theme

of love: "Cousin Kate" by Christina Rossetti, "Goodbye" by Anna

Landucci, and "The Library of Love" by John Citizen. The three poems

are set in different times and show the difference of attitude of love

between time periods. In Victorian time the topic of love was very

private and was not shown in public. Today's' society is totally

different where people will show their love to one another anywhere

and freely talk about it to their friends. Although love in society

has changed, love has always been discussed in arts such as literature

and poems emphasising how important love is to mankind.

"Cousin Kate" by Christina Rossetti.

This poem is the oldest of the three being discussed. It was written

in 1862. The poem is about a poor cottage maiden who was in love with

the local Lord, became pregnant to him but was cast aside when he

married her cousin Kate instead. Her love for the Lord was full of joy

at first but when he rejected her all sorts of emotions were released.

Hurt, anger, jealousy, regret, shame, and finally pride are all

expressed in this poem. The whole poem is written as a reflection of

the girl's life. Love changed her life completely. As it was written

in 1862 it had more of an effect on her life than if the same thing

happened today. She would have been sneered upon for having had sex

outside marriage and been sure that no other man would marry her.

The girl in the poem sees how she was influenced by the Lord's power.

She saw him as a very special man as in, "Why did a Great Lord find me

out?" The word "great" suggests she saw him as a superior person. If

he were a commoner without the Lord's wealth and power I think the

circumstances would have been different.

As the poem goes on it shows that she had become aware of the fact

that the Lord took advantage of her. This can be shown in, ""He lured

me to his palace home." The verb "lured" suggests she was led into a

trap like an animal and "palace home" indicates the seduction of

wealth again. The use of alliteration and repetition in the text, "To

lead a shameless, shameful life," emphasises that the Lord gets away

with a lot because of his sex, wealth and power.

The girl realises her mistakes. She realises that the Lord was just

using her and had no permanent relationship on his mind.