Love By Philip Rossetti Essay

Love plays an important role in most physical and emotional relationships. Love is a word that can prove difficult to define or even compare to other emotions. This is due to the diversity of meaning and the complexity of the emotion itself. Everyone has been in love at least once before and has gotten a taste of all the good and bad things that come with it. Christina Rossetti’s “Song” presents some of the good parts of love while Philip Larkin’s “Talking in Bed” shows us some of the bad parts of love. Larkin’s poem presents a failing relationship where communication has failed between a couple and things are getting more and more difficult. Rossetti’s poem presents a wholly different view on love; it is told from the viewpoint of someone talking to his or her lover about what said lover should do after the speaker dies. The love between them seems better, more powerful and good. The two poems also present wholly different attitudes towards “The End,” whether that is the end of life or the end of the relationship. Larkin presents the end as something dark and sad, difficult to cope with. Rossetti, on the other hand, talks about the end as just another beginning, a chance to start over in a new world. Finally, the two poems represent remembrance in different ways. Larkin’s presents memory as something extremely important while Rossetti implies that it does not matter whether we remember or not.

Before discussion of these poems can truly begin, some background information of each other is necessary to understand why they have written their respective poems and maybe shed some light onto why they have taken certain positions on each of the three topics. Considered one of the greatest English poets of all time, Philip Larkin gradua...

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...erstand the way life is for her. She wants people to understand the present threat of death lingers around her. She wants it to be known how she has been hurt in the past. She also wants people to know not to dwell on the past, to look to the future, and to keep moving forward. Larkin, on the other hand, wants people to understand that getting hurt is a part of life; it should be expected and dealt with. He wants to convey how important memory can be, it defines whom we are and should never be forgotten. While these two authors have conflicting ideas about life and how the various aspects of it should be felt, they both agree that these things should be dealt with in one way or another. They want everyone to know that it may hurt sometimes, but life keeps going. Do not let a problem define a person, instead let the way that person copes with the problem define them.