In Sir Philip Sidney’s sonnet, ‘Thou Blind Man’s Mark,’ he has a philosophy of desire that one might find to be filled with complexities. To convey this complex philosophy, Sidney employs a variety of poetic devices such as apostrophe, personification, metaphors, anaphora, and a paradox. In the first quatrain, Sir Sidney explicates a rather enraged attitude toward the concept of desire. In this quatrain, the apostrophe is the primary poetic device that’s used to convey his emotions. Sir Sidney’s attempt to vilify desire is seen when he tells desire that it is the “band of all evils.” Not only does apostrophe make desire tangible like a person, but it also makes it a demonic figure. Another poetic device Sir Sidney employed in the first …show more content…
quatrain were metaphors, and they were used to a similar effect. Sir Sidney compares desire to a spider, but instead of a web of silk, desire sews a “web of will.” Similar to how a spider mercilessly wraps its prey in its web, so too does desire wrap up its victims, in this case Sir Sidney, in its web before it ultimately kills them. This adds to desire’s demonic persona. The combination of these poetic devices and others in the first quatrain makes desire out to be a monster and shows a very angry, disgusted, and hate filled attitude towards desire. In the second quatrain, Sir Sidney presents the reader with an overall attitude of guilt.
To achieve this overall sense of regret he once again utilizes the poetic device of apostrophe. He addresses desire and personifies it as a devil figure whom he struck a deal with and ultimately paid the “price of [a] mangled mind.” This not only ties into the vilification present in the first quatrain, but it also creates the atmosphere of guilt and regret. He feels guilty for falling victim to desire and regrets it because the price was too high. Sir Sidney also employs a metaphor, which ties into the apostrophe used in this stanza, once more. He compares he mental pain and anguish he feels for his actions to the purchase of something that was not worth it at the cost of something valuable to him, in this case …show more content…
himself. The third quatrain has a slightly different tone than the first two quatrains as Sir Sidney shifts into developing a more hopeful and defiant attitude.
A significant poetic device in this specific stanza is anaphora. The word “vain” is repeated multiple times in the stanza and two definitions are used. The main definition for vain in this quatrain is futile. Sir Sidney’s constant use of this definition solidifies that the attempts to draw him into desire have all failed and that Sir Sidney believed he saved himself from the “ruin [desire] sought” for him. Through this device he exclaims that desire will not break him and that he can escape its clutches. Sir Sidney holds a fleeting glimpse of a hope that makes him believe he is able to defeat
desire. In the last stanza, which is also the sonnet’s couplet, there is a shift back to negative emotions as Sir Sidney expresses an attitude of hopelessness towards desire. To present this attitude he utilizes a paradox that sets him into a never ending spiral in which he can never escape. Sir Sidney expresses a desire “to kill desire” which entraps him in a, as stated early in the first stanza, a “self-chosen snare.” The paradox traps him in a loop with him perpetrating the very concept he wishes to kill. He can never leave this trap, and he is set to pursue a hopeless crusade that will never end. Sir Philip Sidney conveys a complex attitude towards the abstract concept of desire, and to accomplish this, Sir Sidney employs a variety of poetic devices to distinguish and lay out the various shifts in his views of desire, which first began as very disgusted and hate filled, then it shifted to a sense of guilt, then to a more defiant and hopeful tone, and then ultimately to a sense of hopelessness and despair.
In the first quatrain, Sidney describes to the speaker the he was overwhelmed by his own desires, throwing himself into a trap of quarantine. This is shown in Sidney’s choice of using the words “snare” and “web” (1-4). The speaker foolishly trapped himself through the entanglement of desires with no end and will never be achieved. Much like a “labyrinth of desire,” trapped and searching for a way out (Brennan). Calling desire themselves “band of all evils” and that they are worthless “scum.”
Harper begins the poem by detailing the start of the speaker’s relationship with a man, developing it through the use of metaphor and concrete diction. From the first few lines of the poem, the reader learns that the relationship was destined to be futile through Harper’s use of metaphor: “If when standing all alone/ I cried for bread a careless world/ pressed
On the surface the poem seems to be a meditation on past events and actions, a contemplative reflection about what has gone on before. Research into the poem informs us that the poem is written with a sense of irony
An ultimate use of power is shown through the relationship between a master and his slave. A master is nothing without his slave, and similarly a slave is insignificant without his master as we understand the two "go hand in hand"(1). Using the term "But"(5), the poem shifts and introduces the relationship between the poet as a slave to the sonnet. Unlike any slave, "the sonnet-slave must understand/ The mission of his bondage"(5-6). The power of writing the ideal sonnet is being held over the poet, and as a result the poet experiences the bondage to his slavery. If the poet is unable to express the "perfect word"(8) and complete his mission, he will have wasted all previous efforts, and all will be lost. The dominance of the sonnet over the poet is evident through the extended metaphor comparing the relationship to the imperial power of a master over a slave.
The imposition of the British aggressor is even made apparent through the structure of the work, the two sonnet form stanzas not only highlight the inadequacy of the loveless union, but with their Shakespearean rhyme scheme also imply the cultural dominance of English tradition. The use of half rhymes, such as ‘pulse’ and ‘burst’ or ‘pain’ and ‘within’ leaves the stanzas feel...
"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.
The speaker uses metaphors to describe his mistress’ eyes to being like the sun; her lips being red as coral; cheeks like roses; breast white as snow; and her voices sounding like music. In the first few lines of the sonnet, the speaker view and tells of his mistress as being ugly, as if he was not attracted to her. He give...
speaker of the poem uses reason in the same manner as those that he claims to abhor. In doing this, Rochester widens the perimeter of his criticism. to encompass the speaker as well as those he admonishes, a movement that magnifies the satire of the saga. Considering this, the anti-reason cadences of the poem become exaggerated so greatly that the speaker's words must be taken. lightly.
Literal and figurative imagery help decipher the speaker’s tone, and how it evolves from the first octave to the last octave. The first stanza contains examples of figurative imagery such as “That he hath been in love an hour, / Yet not that love so soon decays, / But that it can ten in less space devour;” (2-4). The figurative image describes love as a devourer who can decay ten hearts within an hour, thus demonstrating the speaker’s view point toward brutal love. The imagery in the last two stanzas changes with the shift in attitude that develops later on in the poem. Language in the third stanza creates another figurative image through personification: “Mine would have taught thine heart to show / More pity unto me: but Love, alas, / At one first blow did shiver it as glass” (22-24). These lines give the reader a tactile experience which aids in the comprehension of the speaker’s broken concept of love. However, the fourth stanza contains both literal and figurative imagery when describing the broken looking glass. The poet relates the glass heart to a mirror “as broken glasses show / a hundred lesser faces, so / My rags of heart can like, wish and adore” (29-31). Just like the glass, the speaker’s attitude has been broken down from its original hostility to a submissive sob. Throughout the poem, imagery helps the reader sense and identify the emotions going on within the
This is what happens when people allow their desires to get in the way of what is truly important in life. The speaker in the poem personalizes his hatred toward desire by expressing that he himself has been caught in desire’s “cradle of causeless care.” Furthermore, he claims that desire has “too long asleep thou hast me brought” which symbolizes that he was metaphorically sleepwalking toward what he thought he needed, but when he “woke up,” he realized what he was chasing after was not worth the pain and destruction it caused therefore throwing him into a cycle of never-ending desire that he cannot escape.
In sonnet 66, Shakespeare creates a paradoxical difficulty for himself as a poet. As Helen Vendler points out, the censorship described in line 9 necessitates an absence of art from the poem (309-10), yet coevally Shakespeare must keep the reader interested. He straddles this problem by speeding the tempo, creating questions in the reader’s mind, and representing intense emotions-- all through apparently artless techniques.
Lines 9-11 also share the same scheme as 12-14. This allows the reader to acknowledge the shift of writing style in the poem. He begins his “in vain” statements in line nine, his diction shows the strict control desire tangles its victim into. Instead of having a life spent in the moment, desire will encompass someone up and consume their life, not allowing them to live freely. Sidney utilizes the rhyme scheme to illustrate his overcoming of desire.
In the poem "Thou Blind Man's Mark" by Sir Philip Sidney, the poet develops the speakers hateful and elitist attitude through the use of negative imagery to emphasize the speaker's disdain towards desire, as well as employing a poetic shift to illustrate the speaker's personal history with desire. Overall, these poetic devices create a speaker who is aggressive towards desire because of personal experience. Throughout the poem, the speaker employs imagery in a very negative and hostile way. Most notably would be the moment when he says "Thou blind man's mark, thou fool's self-chosen snare,..."
For the reader to grasp the concept that this sonnet is about writer’s block Sidney has to cement the idea that Astrophil is a writer. In this duality, being both the star lover and writer, we begin to see Stella as a metaphor for a writer’s work and audience. Opening the sonnet with a profession of love for Stella, the object of Astrophil’s affection, he is hurt that he does not have her love. In the view of a passionate writer it is as if some critic has said that you are or your work is inadequate and without their approval. In order to gain the critics or Stella’s love he w...
The sonnet presents an abundance of imagery throughout, for example quatrains 1, 5, 8 and 9 create pictures for the reader to allow visuals of beauty, and the Dark Lady. The sonnet is ironic because of the idea that beauty can be achieved by the power of one’s own hand, rather than given by nature. The enhanced beauty mocks nature because it simulates ...