In order to add a feeling of authenticity and liveliness to their poetry, many poems in the Romantic Period used dialect. Dialect can be defined as the language and speech habits of a specific social class, region, or group. These varying forms of speech can aid a text by establishing the mood, character, and setting. Robert Burns and Joanna Baillie were two poets who broke tradition by using different dialects. Robert Burns wrote his poems with a Scottish accent, and this poetry reflected a long struggle over Scottish identity from the thirteenth century to the sixteenth century. Two of his poems, “To a Mouse” and “To a Louse,” convey meanings and messages that are very interesting. In the two poems “To a Mouse” and “To a Louse” by Robert …show more content…
In the text, Burns discusses an encounter he has with a mouse while he is plowing his field; this encounter quickly turns from something simple to a complicated concept. Burns accidentally destroys the mouse’s home with his plow, and comes to realize that the way of life for a mouse is much different from that of a human. He says, “Still thou art blest, compared wi’ me!/The present only toucheth thee:/But, och! I backward cast my e’e/On prospects drear!/An’ forward, though I canna see,/I guess an’ fear!” (lines 43-48). In these lines, Burns recognizes that the mouse doesn’t worry about the past or the future, it simply lives in the moment. In contrast, humans constantly regret things that happened in the past and fear what will occur in their futures. He believes the mouse is lucky for being able to live this way. According to psychologist Matthew A. Killingsworth in an article by Steve Bradt in the Harvard Gazette, “Many philosophical and religious traditions teach that happiness is to be found by living in the moment, and practitioners are trained to resist mind wandering and to ‘be here now.’” This obviously supports Burns’ belief that living in the present is much better than worrying about the past and
The poems “A Barred Owl” and “The History Teacher” by Richard Wilbur and Billy Collins respectively, depict two different scenarios in which an adult deceives a child/children, which ranges from the sounds of a bird at night, to the history of the world itself. “A Barred Owl” depicts two parents who lie to their daughter about an owl who woke her in the night, while “The History Teacher” involves a man who tries to protect his students by using education as a tool to deceive them. Both poets use diction, imagery, and rhyme to help them convey a certain tone in their poems.
The word “original” is often used to describe paintings that have been manufactured by hand, but it is not clear whether hand-made copies of work are still considered so. When an artist copies another’s art, is his own art original now that it has been tainted by the thoughts’ of others? The poem “To A Mouse” by Robert Burns served as inspiration for John Steinbeck when writing the famed tragedy “Of Mice and Men.” Steinbeck, a Nobel prize-winning author, set many of his books during the Great Depression or the California Dustbowl, times when the future seemed bleak. In Of Mice and Men, man-child Lennie and his “father figure” George form an unsuspecting friendship, and set off into the world with their dreams of one day buying land and settling down. The characteristics of these protagonists are directly taken from the Burns’ poem, which describes similar characters. Is such a close emulation detrimental to the value of originality in the work? Steinbeck believed that “only through imitation do we develop toward originality,” a motif seen in Of Mice and Men. Inspiration is necessary for all art, but by exploiting Burns’ poem, Steinbeck bastardizes the innocence of originality.
As Edgar Allan Poe once stated, “I would define, in brief the poetry of words as the rhythmical creation of beauty.” The two poems, “Birthday,” and “The Secret Life of Books” use different diction, theme, and perspective to give them a unique identity. Each author uses different literary devices to portray a different meaning.
It is not told from the mouse’s perspective, but from the destructive man’s point of view, which becomes apparent when the man refers to himself in one line of the poem, stating, “ But oh! I backward cast my eye.” When a work of literature is told in first person, the reader does not get to see the whole story. The view is very limited.
Robert Burns’ poetry all have similarities with the style of writing and tone. With the poem keeping a rhythmic sound while reading allows the reader maintain interest and continue on. In To a Mouse, the reviving tone allows the reader to recognize the flaws but to also recognize the good side. For example, the farmer realizes the mouse has been the one stealing food but recognizes that the mouse is living in the moment. Survival was key to the mouse. The speaker’s mood throughout the poem would fluctuate from a state of sorrow for destroying the mouse’s winter home to expressing regret.
on: April 10th 1864. He was born in 1809 and died at the age of 83 in
Both these poems are great poems and emphasize on different parts of an animal’s life. The two poems are “The Blessing” and “Predators.” The four topics that will be compared and contrasted are the animals, the speaker’s feelings, the title, and the conclusions.
This novel’s title originates from Robert Burn’s poem “To a Mouse” written in 1785. Steinbeck’s book shows comparisons to this poem. One way it shows this is through the powerless and doomed fate of the mouse that has no control over what could happen to it based on its condition (“Reith”).
"Poetry is the revelation of a feeling that the poet believes to be interior and personal [but] which the reader recognizes as his own." (Salvatore Quasimodo). There is something about the human spirit that causes us to rejoice in shared experience. We can connect on a deep level with our fellow man when we believe that somehow someone else understands us as they relate their own joys and hardships; and perhaps nowhere better is this relationship expressed than in that of the poet and his reader. For the current assignment I had the privilege (and challenge) of writing an imitation of William Shakespeare’s "Sonnet 87". This poem touched a place in my heart because I have actually given this sonnet to someone before as it then communicated my thoughts and feelings far better than I could. For this reason, Sonnet 87 was an easy choice for this project, although not quite so easy an undertaking as I endeavored to match Shakespeare’s structure and bring out his themes through similar word choice.
In this essay I will compare and contrast a collection of different poems by Carol Anne Duffy, Robert Browning, Ben Johnson and Simon Armitage.
Hopelessly Devoted Catullus' Poems, is a popular text that mimics the works of Theocritus's Idylls. His works, although brief, contain a spectrum of emotions about the beautiful disaster that is love. Catullus engagingly depicts the inner lying feelings that he possesses for his mistress Lesbia (also known as Clodia, the wife of a Roman consul). In the Poems, one see's Catullus nearly driven to a point of insanity because of his hopeless devotion to Lesbia thus causing him to feel an array of emotions such as love and hate.
The two poems The Flea and The Sunne Rising capture John Donne’s primary motive to get in bed with women. Donne wrote these poems at an early age, and at that time he was seeking nothing more than a sexual relationship. His poetry depicted clearly how sexist he was at the time and how he used to perceive women as a medium of pleasure. The content of his early poems express an immature and desperate image of Donne, who is dominated by his fixation on the sensuality of women. In The Flea, Donne shows his desperation to have sex by addressing a flea that has sucked the blood of both him and the woman he is persuading. It is quite awkward how the poet uses this obscure image of the flea as a symbol of love and sex to convince the woman that...
The Jabberwocky poem by Lewis Carroll and The Lorax by Dr. Suess are both very different poems with very much in common. How are they alike, and how are they different? These two poems similarities and differences mainly come from the theme of the story, which completely differs, the characters, that pretty evenly distribute similarities as well as differences, and the setting that has more similarities than differences. In conclusion, the Jabberwocky and The Lorax’s characters, themes, and setting have their differences and similarities. However, in the end , the two stories make more sense with each other than being separate.
John Donne, an English poet and clergyman, was one of the greatest metaphysical poets. His poetry was marked by conceits and lush imagery. The Flea is an excellent example of how he was able to establish a parallel between two very different things. In this poem, the speaker tries to seduce a young woman by comparing the consequences of their lovemaking with those of an insignificant fleabite. He uses the flea as an argument to illustrate that the physical relationship he desires is not in itself a significant event, because a similar union has already taken place within the flea. However, if we look beneath the surface level of the poem, Donne uses the presence of the flea as a comparison to the presence of a baby, thus making the sub textual plot about aborting the baby.
The poet, Robert Burns compares and attempts to interpret a relationship between man and mouse in poem by indicating his compassion and benevolence to the mouse and explains that