Do you believe that the young should always outlive the old? Do you think that it is typical for such to occur? Also, if death came to “greet” you in your final moments of life, what do you think it would look like? Would it be male or female? Perhaps it would resemble a human, or an animal. Do you think it would speak, or would it be muted by the secrets and final wishes of innumerable collections of souls, trapped in the limbo realm between life and death? Would it be friendly, or harsh and wicked? For hundreds of years humans from all around the world have tried to answer these questions, wondering how Death itself would appear if greeting a dying man, or why it seems so natural for each new generation to outlive the last. One man, named Donald Justice, offered his own spin on the subject with his poem Incident in a Rose Garden, in which he used figurative language devices such as personification, imagery, metaphor, and simile, to enhance the text and communicate a theme that not only gives Death itself a character, but also tries to disprove the common idea that the young outlive the old.
Justice tries to answer these questions using literary devices called figurative language, and the usage of personification, metaphor, imagery, and simile enhance the text so that it is easier to visualize, thus revealing a clearer theme as the piece draws to a close. Now, although we cannot actually see death, nor can we completely change a common belief, we can at least consider the possibilities of such, using the theme of Incident in a Rose Garden—a theme that sets fire to the idea of a young man outliving an elderly man merely because he is young. An example of this theme idea can be found in lines forty-five through fifty, where Death...
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...onnect with the poem on a deep level, he made Death into a man who could talk and interact with other characters. Personification is required to give him these qualities.
To conclude, Donald Justice uses Incident in a Rose Garden to break two common ideas: one, that the young always outlive the old; and two, that Death’s personified form would be frightening and poorly dressed, his voice scratchy and raw. The use of figurative language elements throughout the poem not only assist in the murder of these common ideas, but enhance the text as well, making it easier for the reader(s) to visualize what is being written. As a whole, I enjoyed Incident in a Rose Garden, and I think the overall theme of it is to be careful, because you never know when Death could beckon you.
Works Cited
"Incident in a Rose Garden" by Donald Justice, p. 147-148; The Language of Literature
The presence of death in the novel looms over the characters, making each of them reflect on the
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