Studies in English Language and Literature

Question: Discuss Donne’s  The Anniversary  as a metaphysical love poem. / Write a critical appreciation of  The Anniversary . / Attempt a critical analysis of the poem. Answer: At the outset, let us have a clear concept of metaphysical love poem.  A metaphysical love poem is distinguished by the preponderance of the intellectual over the emotional element, and it is expected to make use of some conceits that are brilliant. In John Donne’s metaphysical poem named The Anniversary , we find that all these conditions are fructified complacently.  The poem gives an account of a couple celebrating their first year in a relationship. The fundamental conceit of the entire poem is the metaphor of royalty. Simultaneously, imagery of divinity and death permeate the poem. The vital interest lies in the manner in which Donne uses royal imagery to convey the thought of a love.  The opening lines imminently proclaim that not only Kings, but also ...

Question: The Prince by Machiavelli is a handbook of an ambitious Renaissance man. – Discuss. / Machiavelli’s The Prince is pragmatic; it is a practical and amoral handbook for the modern politicians. – Discuss. / Discuss the value of The Prince as a handbook for modern political rulers. / Point out the modernity in Machiavelli’s discourses on the eligibility of an efficient ruler or prince. Answer : Machiavelli, the Italian statesman and dramatist, is widely known as “the first realist in politics”. Niccolo Machiavelli's  The Prince is a treatise on politics and it is based upon his first-hand experience as an emissary of the Florentine Republic to the courts of Europe. In fact, Machiavelli added a dimension to one of the major philosophical and political issues of his time, especially the relationship between public deeds and private morality. His book gives us a detailed picture of the true nature of power, no matter in what age or by whom it is ex...

Examine Keats’ treatment of brightness and fulfilment in To Autumn . Ans. To Autumn  records the poet’s meditations on maturity. It encapsulates his efforts to achieve it issuing into a disciplined poetic art. The complete maturity exemplifies Keatsian virtues of sensuousness and pictorial beauty, felicity of diction, perfectness of form and splendid vividness of imagery. This impersonal  ode celebrated the season of autumn as a time of natural fulfilment and as a part of the living process of nature. The season of ripeness and abundance is a reminder of the mortality of things, a herald to the approaching desolation of winter.  In Stanza I, we come to know autumn as a ‘season of mists and mellow fruitfulness’. The sun matures the earth, ripening the grapes, the apples, the gourds and the hazelnuts etc.  Stanza II describes the imagery of arrested motion. It echoes the upcoming winter. The reaper is the messenger of death so, ‘the last drop ...

       Discuss sensuousness and pictorial qualities in Keats’ poetry with reference to Ode to a Nightingale and To Autumn . A thorough study of Keats’ poems like Ode to a Nightingale and To Autumn   justifies how Keats lived for ‘a life of sensations’. Opening up with a keen sensation of agony,   Ode to a Nightingale soon gives place to ‘a drowsy numbness. Keats’ poetry excels in vividly sensuous images in the lines full of sensuousness and the visual picture of a drinking vessel. In the closing stanza of   Ode to Autumn , a fantastic reconstruction of the dying autumnal twilight suggests the magnificent perfection of Keats’ poetic sensibility. Ode to a Nightingale   seems to be suffused with pictures, mostly visual, but occasionally manifested with the aural, the tactile and the olfactory portraits. To Autumn   is also full of sensuous pictures. Stanza I depicts the fruits of autumn. Stanza II of the ode a...

Question: Examine Shelley’s imagery in relation to his theme in Ode to the West Wind . The term ‘imagery’ refers to a collection of images to signify the objects and qualities of sense perception, whether by literal description, by allusion or in the analogies used in its similes and metaphors.  Perhaps the most beautifully imaginative of the English Romantic poets was Shelley. He was particularly excellent in his ability to convey sensations in terms of imagery, predominantly visual. he was a poet of profound idealism and prophetic passion. Shelley invariably aspired to the infinite and the eternal. The method in many of Shelley’s poetry was to find in natural objects symbols for his emotional and imaginative patterns. In Ode to the West Wind , Shelley found, in the central and pervading image of the all-powerful West Wind, a dualistic role of destruction and preservation. At the very outset of  the poem, the West Wind is presented as an enormously powerful agency....

Some explanations from Eliot’s The Waste Land with reference to context   I sat upon the shore Fishing, with the arid plain behind me Shall I at least set my lands in order? Answer : This excerpt has been taken from the last section of T.S. Eliot’s poem The Waste Land . The excerpt reminds is of the speaker persona’s fishing experience in a nasty canal in lines 189 – 192 of the same poem. We are reminded of the Fisher King in the Grail Legends and the Arthurian Romances. The speaker is surrounded by an ‘arid plain’ or a ‘waste land’ where there is no symptom of rebirth and regeneration. The European civilisation, in the wake of World War I, became as ‘arid’ and shattered as a wasteland where there is no question of life and hope. Everything is shallow and numb. The utmost crisis led to nothingness, disillusionment etc. the speaker wonders and questions himself whether he will ever be able to “set” his “lands in order”. Here the poet has ...

Question: Comment on the symbolism of the skylark in Shelley’s ode "To A Skylark". One of the legacies of the Romantic period is the heightened concern in literature. It is full of the types of psychological experiences outside the usual limit of consciousness. What seems to take place is a sudden jump or transference of consciousness to another realm, or alternatively, an invasion from the transcendent into human life, and his poetry attempts to describe such an experience. So does Shelly speak of in To a Skylark . As the poem begins, the poet addresses the song-bird. The skylark seems to be no bird at all, but rather a disembodied Spirit of joy. The skylark is an emblem of the celestial permanence to which men aspire, and are invariably associated with images of light, fire, stars, the sun and the moon in keeping with the Platonic implications. The ode is a striking example of what was common poetic procedure with Shelley and Keats. Thus, the skylark symbolises a cele...