First Love by John Clare

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First Love by John Clare

How do different poets convey the idea of Love?

“First Love” by John Clare was written in the 19th century. It is a

poem about how the poet had fallen in love but it turned out it was

unrequited. Whereas “Song” by W.H.Auden written in the 20th century,

is a poem about how someone has been in love but then lost them to

death. They are both quite similar in the fact that they are both

about loving someone but not being able to have them. However they are

different because “Song” is about two people having been in love and

then losing it, rather than “First Love” in which the love is

unrequited, and not being fulfilled.

In the poem “First Love” by John Clare the poet writes about what

seems to be a very overwhelming feeling.

The poem is written in three stanzas and in each one the feelings

develop. It has a rhyme structure of AB,AB, CD, CD etc. The first

stanza has eight syllables in each line and the other two have a

pattern of 8,6,8,6,8,6,8,6. I think it may be written like this

because in the first stanza the feeling are simpler and then they get

more complex as the poem progresses- like the syllable patterns.

In stanza one the crush begins. He sees her and is suddenly struck by

her beauty-

“Her face it bloomed like a sweet flower.”

This simile is saying that her face opened up and revealed something

beautiful just like a flower does. It brings the image of spring to

mind because flowers blooming are associated with it.

The poet describes never having felt this way before- hence the title

“First Love”.

“I ne’er was struck before that hour

With love so sudden and so sweet.”

It suggests that he was surprised that it happened so quickly. It

seems that it w...

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...in “Song” the poet writes about the man he loved but can’t have

because he died. They are both quite sad poems.

The main differences are the love in “Song” can’t occur because

someone has died, whereas in “First Love” both people are alive it is

just either one sided love, or not allowed. From looking into John

Clare’s history I found out that he was not allowed to marry the girl

he loved, because she was a better class that him. Also “Song”

concentrates very much on the bad bits, whereas “First Love” reflects

on some of the good feelings the poet has had because of love.

Personally I preferred “Song” by W.H.Auden because it felt more

meaningful. Although I did like “First Love” it didn’t touch me as

much. I think I learnt a lot from both poems, it taught me that love

can be very painful and everyone suffers because of it at some time in

their life.

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