The student paper written by Delys Waite titled, Imagery, Meter, and Sound in Donne’s Holy Sonnet 7, takes a formalist approach to critiquing the poem. Waite focuses only on a few literary devices to look at how those devices influence the form of the poem. Waite goes into detail describing sound by showing how groups of words have similar sounds that makes the reader say the words slower with more pauses. He addresses these words and how they sound to help emphasize different ideas the poet is trying to get across. Waite does this in a detailed manner by using accents over the letters that create these sounds and by deeply explaining the sound in each word. In the paper, he also discusses imagery and how the images that the poet is creating show how the poet feels about God. …show more content…
Looking at the poem in a formalist approach allowed me to ascertain the meaning of the poem in different ways.
The paper discusses the sound of the poem and how those certain words, said aloud, help to emphasize the meaning. Looking at the form of a poem in this way gave me a new way of looking at the text and finding the meaning. Personally, I have not had much familiarity looking at the sound of a text, but now see how the sound can be valuable when looking for the meaning of a text. I like to look at the imagery that is utilized in a text because I believe it works well in giving the reader a look into the text and bringing the text to life. What I have discovered reading about the formalist approach is to look at the overall form and how the text itself affects the meaning. Looking at the imagery and symbols helps me personally find the meaning in a text, so learning that the form of the text also can contribute to the meaning was
enlightening. The formalist approach has some aspects that I already like to utilize, however I also like to look at different features aside from the text. I like to know when the book takes place and seeing what historically is happening at the time. Looking at the culture or socially what is going on with the book, I believe, is also essential when looking at a text. While I enjoy looking at the literary devices of a text, and I appreciate looking at the form of a text, I believe the reader needs to bring in some outside facts and knowledge to fully appreciate the text. While the formalistic approach is advantageous because there is not much personal bias, I believe the great thing about studying different texts is producing an idea of what the text means and the feeling that is formed and being able to debate over those elements.
Without the use of stereotypical behaviours or even language is known universally, the naming of certain places in, but not really known to, Australia in ‘Drifters’ and ‘Reverie of a Swimmer’ convoluted with the overall message of the poems. The story of ‘Drifters’ looks at a family that moves around so much, that they feel as though they don’t belong. By utilising metaphors of planting in a ‘“vegetable-patch”, Dawe is referring to the family making roots, or settling down somewhere, which the audience assumes doesn’t occur, as the “green tomatoes are picked by off the vine”. The idea of feeling secure and settling down can be applied to any country and isn’t a stereotypical Australian behaviour - unless it is, in fact, referring to the continental
Donne, John. “Holy Sonnet 5, Holy Sonnet 6, Holy Sonnet 10.” John Donne’s Poetry: A Norton Critical Edition. Ed. Donald R. Dickson. W.W. Norton & Company. New York, London. 2004. (Handout)
John Donne uses poetry to explore his own identity, express his feelings, and most of all, he uses it to deal with the personal experiences occurring in his life. Donne's poetry is a confrontation or struggle to find a place in this world, or rather, a role to play in a society from which he often finds himself detached or withdrawn. This essay will discuss Donne's states of mind, his views on love, women, religion, his relationship with God; and finally how the use of poetic form plays a part in his exploration for an identity and salvation.
In order to appreciate a poem properly, care must be taken to analyze and understand many different facets of the work. Poems are often very complex and require a great deal of thought in order to arrive at the intended meaning. At the very least, three particular items of information must be uncovered during the reading of poetry. An experienced reader of poetry will always determine the identity of the speaker, the occasion of the speech, and the central idea of the poem.
Formal analysis identifies the initial elements of a work and determines their significance in relation to what remains. By selecting such a title as an "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard," the author is providing the reader with an indication for what will follow. Amazingly, the poem is exactly what the title states. It is an "elegy," expressing grief and lamentation for the humble unknown villagers who hav...
For most students, poetry is a complex subject that we all wish to avoid. Much effort is needed to understand the vague imagery and complicated word play to comprehend the overall message the poet is trying to portray. Ultimately, in the end, we fail to actually enjoy the piece because we are too focus on analyzing everything in the poem. Billy Collins “Introduction to Poetry,” criticized this need to torture a poem for its meaning when in fact it should be a slow but enjoyable process to go through. Due to this, he illustrates way in which poetry should be tackled. He was able to convey his idea through the usage of metaphor and imagery as we all as the structure of the poem .
Formal analysis of poetry helps to unfold the underlying meaning of a poem. This technique does not focus on the author of the poem, or what was happening in history during the time when the poem was written, but instead puts emphasis on the actual mean of the work. Formal analysis breaths life into the literary work and allows the poem to speak for itself. For example, in Thomas Grays' poem "Ode on the Death of a Favorite Cat, Drowned in a Tub of Gold Fishes," paying close attention to word choice, structure, and rhyme scheme illuminates the actions of the prowling cat.
Holy Sonnet XV deals with the question of reciprocal love that runs throughout Donne’s religious poetry. The Sonnet is an address of the speaker’s mind to the speaker’s soul; it is a meditation on the Trinity and man’s relationship to God. The poem’s form and the multi-layered conflation throughout expound upon the nature of the Trinity. The theme of humility in reciprocal religious love or receiving and understanding God’s glory (as Donne understood it) runs throughout the poem. This allows the speaker’s soul to understand his own need for humility in order to love god fully. Donne uses the Sonnet form cunningly in this poem; the formal divisions of the Sonnet reflect the trinity, with three four-line sections, while the inner workings of the poem expound upon God’s love for mankind and the need for humility. The poem’s rhyme scheme is abba/abba/cddc/ee. This formally divides the poem into three four part sections that move from the spiritual to the physical downward through the Trinity, increasing tangibility with regard to the physical and allowing the speaker to achieve a closer relationship with God through Christ.
John Donne who is considered to be one of the wittiest poets of the seventeenth century writes the metaphysical poem "The Flea" and the religious poem "Holy Sonnet 14". In both poems, Donne explores the two opposing themes of physical and sacred love; in his love poem "The Flea," he depicts the speaker as an immoral human being who is solely concerned with pleasing himself, where as in his sacred poem "Holy Sonnet 14" Donne portrays the speaker as a noble human being because he is anxious to please God. In the book The Divine Poems, writer Helen Gardner supports this fact as she argues, "His Maker is more powerfully present to the imagination in his divine poems than any mistress is in his love poems" (Pg-2). Overall, it seems that both these poems operate on many different levels as the rhyme scheme in both poems varies from iambic tetrameter and pentameter to the Petrarchan sonnet form. Donne employs wit as well as complex paradoxes, which are symbolic of the strong opposing drives at play in his poetry, and abstract conceits to further complicate the subject matter in both his poems. This is evident to the reader as in "The Flea" Donne presents the notion of carnal love through religious expressions, where as in "Holy Sonnet 14" he depicts the notion of divine love through sexual expressions. Hence, Donne does an excellent job in revealing the fact that in "The Flea," the speaker appears to be arrogant, selfish, and disrespectful towards women. He is self absorbed and only cares about fulfilling his sexual fancy, while the speaker in "Holy Sonnet 14" comes across as a humble human being, who is worried about pleasing God.
Death is a very complicated subject that people view very differently in different situations. In John Donne’s Holy Sonnets, he writes about death in Meditations X and XVII. Both meditations use many similar rhetorical devices and appeals, but the tones of the meditations are very disparate. Donne’s different messages in Meditations X and XVII convey tones of defiance and acquiescence towards death, respectively. His apparent change of attitude towards death could be accounted for by his differing life situations while he was writing the meditations: mid-life, and near-death.
First of all, the author demonstrates how every man is a slave through the use of specific form in the poem. For instance, Donne utilizes the Petrarchan sonnet format consisting of fourteen lines with two quatrains and one sestet. Throughout the history of the sonnet, they have been used to express a romantic love for another human, but this poem is about a love and desire for God. The author
Qualities of destruction and rebirth are evident in the first quatrain, as the speaker asks that God “Batter my heart”. We hear the suddenness of violence which is followed by strong verbs “knock, breathe, shine” ringing like blows of a hammer as Donne an impure metal yearns to be reshaped by God. Although Donne longs to be rescued from his sinfulness, he knows himself that minor inducements cannot cause spiritual reformation. Instead Donne’s use of strong language indicates his desperation for God’s force to “break, blow, burn and make me new again”, a conceit for what will destroy and cause his rebirth. The repeated use of three consecutive verbs allows the reader to hear the nature of the Holy Trinity. The initial sense of violence from the first quatrain is undercut by the speaker’s apologetic tone as he is unable to resist sin. The speaker refers to himself as “an usurped town to another due” as suggestion of his soul has been captured and that although the speaker may “may labour admit you” it is to “no end”. The image of the besieged further flows through the sonnet as it further demonstrates the state of the author. The desperation of Donne can be heard by the as the author begs that God “Reason, your viceroy in me, me should defend”. The viceroy is reference to the speaker’s rationality and intelligence that should save him, although does not, due to its feeble nature to give into
Even though John Donne lived during the sixteenth century he still experienced everyday emotional responses as we do, and is still an inspiration to many of us in the modern world today. Donne’s life experiences were the main reason for his poetry. During his time religion was a very big part of society; and it is one of the main themes in his poetry. From Donne’s early life mistakes to his later in life religious standpoint, he wrote many poems; he mostly wrote romance and religious poems; using metaphysical poetry, subtle arguments, and paradoxes. John Donne was born during an anti-Catholic period in England to a Catholic family.
The formalistic approach to an open text allows the reader to devour the poem or story and break down all the characteristics that make it unique. The reader is able to hear the text rather than read it, and can eventually derive a general understanding or gist of the text. "According to the Handbook of Critical Approaches to Literature "when all the words, phrases, metaphors, images, and symbols are examined in terms of each other and of the whole, any literary text worth our efforts will display its own internal logic" (Geurin 75)." When utilizing the formalistic approach, the reader must search in and out of the lines for point of view, form, imagery, structure, symbolism, style, texture, and so on. Using the general theme of time, it is important to focus on structure, style, and imagery found in Andrew Marvell's poem "To His Coy Mistress".
No poem of John Donne's is more widely read or more directly associated with Donne than the tenth of the Holy Sonnets,"Death, be not proud." Donne's reputation as a morbid preacher was well-known. He had a portrait of himself made while posed in a winding-sheet so that he could contemplate a personalized memento of death. Donne draws upon a popular subject in medieval and Renaissance art, Le roi mort or King Death. His fascination with death reaches another plateau with this poem. He almost welcomes it and denounces the process as being neither horrifying nor the "end-all be-all." In a contextual point of view, he works to rupture habitual thinking and bring attention to the intensity and depth of a situation by creating doubt or offering a new aspect of his subject. Donne takes this poem and pours forth an array of visions that directly connects to the contextualist in a look at death, the pa...