And I – Am Watching as the Birds Go Flying Home: Siegfried Sassoon Sings

The end of World War One was a glorious time. While there are several endings to the war (the armistice being one in 1918, and the treaty of Versailles in 1919), celebration was ringing in the air. Siegfried Sassoon writes in his poem, “Everyone Sang,” about how wonderful it is for the war to be finally over. There are still pangs of the past in everyone’s ears, but, to Sassoon, they have “[d]rifted away” (9).

Sassoon begins the poem with everyone starting to sing. It is a great image, especially when Sassoon likens the delight that it brings him to the freedom that “prisoned birds must find” (2). At the end of the poem, Sassoon says that “Everyone / Was a bird,” so when the reader looks at the poem as a whole, different parts take on another context (9-10). The prison that these birds were contained in was the war. They were stuck there, fighting, losing each other and dieing. Once this war ended, however, they were released like birds that have been kept in a small holding cell. The imagery is magnificent. The joy expressed by these soldier and their families and the people of the countries they were fighting for are exuberant. The same energy expressed when a bird flies from a cage is put into the sound of this very song. The birds fly “on—on—and out of sight,” never to look back on war again (5). When the poem was written, no one wanted to head to war again. Sassoon wrote of the glorious end to World War I in hopes that there would never be another. The last line states that “the singing will never be done,” but sadly, barely two decades pass before their song is interrupted (10).

Sassoon makes more allusions to the final end of the war throughout the poem. “Everyone’s voice was suddenly lifted,” he says” [a]nd beauty came like the setting sun” (6-7). When the sun sets, it is a beautiful event. Sassoon compares the sun setting to the end of the war. They are both beautiful things. The voices that he hears, the voices of joy and delight, bring so much beauty. Such a beautiful sight that his “heart was shaken with tears,” and even “horror / [d]rifted away” (8-9). Everything is at peace now. The war has ended, and the sunset is beautiful. The song they are singing will go on forever. This poem serves a very hopeful image of the future as well. Sassoon has seen the horrors of this war and knows that no one would want to do that again.

And You May Ask Yourself, Am I Right…Am I Wrong: T. S. Eliot’s Love Song

“The Love Song of Alfred J. Prufrock” is one of T. S. Eliot’s greatest poems and something to be admired. Eliot’s use of imagery throughout the poem is detailed and fascinating. While not as interesting as the rest of the poem, one of the first parts, rhetorically, that catches ones eye is not the rhyme scheme or stanza breaks, but his use of imagery and metaphor in the third stanza. Eliot is able to make the reader believe the fog that settles into the streets is cat like without ever actually calling it a cat. He brilliantly depicts the fog as it “rubs its back on the window-panes” and “rubs its muzzle on the window-panes” (15-16). Giving the fog these animalistic attributes helps to show how lazily it lingers in the streets and eventually settles. The fog didn’t settle though, instead it “curled once about the house, and fell asleep,” much like a cat would do (22). Eliot is able to capture the movement of the cat and metaphorically transpose it to that of the fog.

The next time Eliot gives animal like characteristics to inanimate objects in his poem, is on line 75. Eliot beings the stanza with:

And the afternoon, the evening, sleeps so peacefully!

Smoothed by long fingers,

Asleep … tired … or it malingers,

Stretched on the floor, here beside you and me. (75-78)

Again, Eliot describes the afternoon as if it were a cat or a dog lounging about the house. He continually brings the image of nature to the poem by liking it to an animal. Evening and afternoon are asleep as they are pet by long fingers. It is a creepy image to picture in the readers mind, but important none-the-less. Eliot’s use of giving animalistic attributes to the fog and afternoon show how the day works to his character in the poem. Things don’t just happen around him, they are lazily lulled to sleep and stroke. Nature is manipulated by time that Eliot has created himself. He gives the fog a mind, the mind of a cat. He gives the afternoon a master to help it fall sleep and lounge on the floor. The afternoon doesn’t just turn into evening; it gets tired and decides to lie down.

Eliot goes beyond what is sometimes understandable. His many allusions to classical works make it difficult to understand some of the references, and even once referenced, the reader is lost in his mind. It could be difficult for readers to differentiate between brilliance and insanity, and sometimes that seems to be what is happening in these poems. The book mentions a little bit as to what this poem is about, and I can understand where it is coming from. A lot of what happens in the poem is confusion. The dead ends are reopened and then closed again. Allusions to classical works and questions that run throughout our heads everyday are a plenty in this poem. Prufrock is just an average man who and this is a look inside his head. Like the book says, “Prufrock, like modern European humanity whom he represents, is unable to penetrate the thick husk of habit, custom, and cliché to arrive at something substantial” (1192). The poem is supposed to take the reader on a journey (“let us go then, you and I” (1)), but in the end, Eliot leaves us with Prufrock’s musings on mermaids and such. The poem is hard to penetrate by one look, and even his unique take on nature is not enough to crack open some of the stanzas. There are allusions to parties (“in the room the women come and go / talking of Michelangelo” (13-14, 35-36)) that add to, I would guess, the custom and habit of the modern European. Either a lot is lost on the fact that time has moved on, or there are too many layers present in this poem for the reader to decipher.

But First, I’ll Walk in Circles Round You: William Buttler Yeats Muses on the Second Coming of Helen

William Butler Yeats wrote his poem, “No Second Troy,” about the want for a connection to Maude Gonne that he, or any other man, could never have. Many other men wrote about Gonne including the critic M. L. Rosenthal. Gonne had committed her life to politics instead of love, and it seemed impossible for her to have a relationship build out of love and desire for her mate (1115). Her life was consumed by her fervent patriotism, and declined Yeats offer of marriage and instead married a soldier (1115). Yeats includes in his poem many allusions to her fierce political involvement and also allusions to Helen of Troy. The title of the poem shows Yeats wanting to not start a second Trojan war over this beauty. It would seem to be impossible, considering Yeats was not jealous of another man, but of Gonne’s political fanaticism (1115).

Yeats begins the poem asking “[w]hy should I blame her that she filled my days / [w]ith misery” (1-2). The next few lines include a series of questions heavily focusing on Gonne’s political influence. From the poem, the reader can gather and assume a few things about Gonne. She was, in fact, heavily associated with politics. She also seemed to have talked to people about rising up against others and revolting (“hurled little streets upon the great” (4)), or at least promoting the idea. She had times with the Easter Rising, so she must have been behind the idea in some fashion (1115). This poem was written eight years before the actually event, so she must have been connected to the idea sometime before or been in an activist group. Yeats mentions “[h]ad they but courage equal to desire” in regards to the “little streets,” which shows that maybe she was more of an influence than the reader thinks (4-5). Perhaps Yeats gives her more credit than is due, since he was full of this unrequited love.

Yeats continues with more questions in the second half. He focuses on what could have made this ok for her to do. He asks “[w]hat could have made her peaceful with a mind / [t]hat nobleness made simple as a fire?” (6-7). I will admit that I do not understand what Yeats is asking. Is the same thing that made her peaceful the same thing that made nobleness simple as fire? Her beauty is also a part of the discussion, since she was very beautiful as well. “With beauty like a tightened bow,” Yeats says, “a kind / [t]hat is not natural in an age like this” (8-9). Yeats praises her beauty, almost calling it other worldly. He ends by asking what else could she have done, being so beautiful and easy about the situation. She was absorbed by her patriotism and had to weigh between politics and her relationships. So “[w]as there another Troy for her to burn?” Yeats asks (12). Was it Ireland? Yeats could not launch an attack on politics, so there was nothing he could do except sit back and watch. He tried to act, but was left with nothing except unrequited love.

The Sound of Gunfire Off in the Distance, I’m Getting Used to it Now: Wilfred Owen’s War Poetry

Wilfred Owen’s poetry, comprised during his sixteen month stint at a rehabilitation hospital during World War I, has not only been influential to other poets, but also to the public’s perspective of the world of war (1100). When World War I broke out in 1914, many countries were ready to stand up for what they believed in. Owen enlisted with the Artist’s Rifles in 1915 and was shipped off to France to fight in the Great War the following year as a lieutenant (1100). In his poem, Dulce Et Decorum Est (Sweet and Filling it is), Owen details to happenings of a fox hole and its soldiers during a raid.

Owen begins with a description of his fellow soldiers in the first person plural. His descriptions of the men put horrid images into the reader’s heads as they get a true glimpse into what it means to fight for one’s country. He likens the soldiers to “beggars” and “hags” as they “[curse] through the sludge” (1-2). These conditions are even more awful that anything a beggar or hag, which are two of the lowest forms of living we know, would have. This goes to show just how horrid a condition they were in. Owen says that the “[m]en marched asleep,” as if they were a horde of zombies (5). Owen’s inclusion of words like “limped” and “drunk with fatigue,” are mimicked by the last four lines of the stanza where sentences begin and end in the middle of the line giving the poem a swaggering effect because of its rhyme scheme (6-7).

The next stanza drops the first person plural in favor of first person singular, as Owen describes specific scene that takes place in the bunker. The opening line, “Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!” draws the reader into the fray (9). The alliteration in “fumbling, / [f]itting” helps to add to the scene a certain feeling of immediacy in their need to protect themselves (9-10). The horrible sight that Owen describes next is enough to make cringe in disgust:

But someone still was yelling out and stumbling

And flound’ring like a man in fire or time…

Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light,

As under a green sea, I saw him drowning. (11-14).

When Owen brings the first person singular into the poem, it makes a huge impact. For the first time the reader can feel the pain of Owen as he watches his fellow solider drown in the sea of gas. The passage is so elegantly composed that there seems to be some sort of ironic beauty in the passing of this soldier. It is the next two lines, separated by a break in the poem, that really encompass the whole first person of Owen’s piece.

Since Owen has set up the scene from behind is gas mask, the next two lines bring the image to a complete visionary masterpiece. “In all my dreams,” Owen says, “before my helpless sight, / He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning” (15-16). Owen stands helpless as his fellow soldier passes away in his arms, choking on the gas that was just thrown into their camp. Owen’s first person view takes the reader to a new level of gruesome war imagery. In short, war is hell, and Owen wants to make that clear to his readers.

The last stanza includes the line that the poem gets its title from. Owen begins with “[i]f in some smothering dreams you too could pace…” and then includes more grueling detail that followed the death of the gassed soldier. He sets up the last stanza perfectly, leaving the reader with a sort of haunting last plea to not continue the tradition of praising one’s fatherland when it comes to serving and fighting for war. Owen uses a line for Horace’s Odes: Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori (translates to “sweet and fitting it is to die for your fatherland”). Owen refers to this as “[t]he old lie” (27). This little glimpse into one event in his life is enough to hopefully warrant his readers giving up the old saying. To Owen, nothing is worth what he had to endure. He eventually was killed in battle several months after leaving the rehabilitation hospital. It surprises me that he would go back after these poems he wrote, but I guess he had no choice

I’m Walking a Line—I’m Thinking About Empty Motion: George Bernard Shaw Picks on his Empty Readers

For such a talented writer, Shaw had quite the cynical opinion of his readers. After writing the entirety of Pygmalion, he decided to write the “sequel,” which he believes to be more needed than the preface he writes (1005). Shaw also must have had quite the ego, for it seems he views himself as a “hero” for including an “energetic phonetic enthusiast” as the “hero of a popular play” (1005). While this may be rather egotistic, it is still important. Shaw’s view of his fellow English speakers was not very high, but it goes to show that he does care. He wrote a play about learning the language when he wrote Pygmalion which is a great idea and in his eyes quite helpful to his readers. In a way this was like an instruction guide to the English to get them to think about language. Shaw writes in his into that “[t]he English have no respect for their language, and will not teach their children to speak it” (1005). In order for Shaw to write this play correctly, he had to study the way that people spoke. The character or Liza has to speak poorly, and must be taught to properly speak English by Professor Higgins and Pickering. Shaw did his homework for this, and because it was something that he was interested in, it was easier for him to do. Even though the preface (which he said he didn’t need but I believe to be more important than the sequel) mocks the English for their poor use of their language. What I find interesting though, is that Shaw berates his readers for not having a grasp on their language yet he thinks “the reformer we need most today” is a character from a play (1005). If the audience he is speaking to cannot use the language correctly, how are they supposed to read and understand the point he is trying to make through his play? When he says “it is impossible for an Englishman to open his mouth without making another Englishman despise him,” does he include himself (1005)? Perhaps the audience is not insulted by these accusations, but inspired to change. They will read his work, and they will learn. According to his “sequel,” Shaw sees more problems than just the language.

After the last act of Pygmalion, Shaw writes, what he calls, a sequel. It starts off, much like the preface, with a slight at the people who are reading the play. While his assertion is very valid and I completely agree with him, it just seems a little harsh. He begins by saying that the sequel would “hardly need telling if our imagination s were not so enfeebled by their lazy dependence on the ready-mades and reach-me-downs of the ragshop in which Romance keeps its stock of ‘happy endings’ to misfit stories” (1063). What Shaw said may be true, and possibly truer today than it was when he originally wrote the play. Shaw believes that people have lost their imagination because of diluted Romance tales with silly endings. He is a far superior writer than any riffraff that would be writing such a thing, and he needs to include a nine page sequel to his already complete play. Shaw assumes way too much about his reader. Even if it is true, it is hard to believe that with this attitude, he was able to become one of the greatest modern English writers.

Hope For an Answer Some Day: The Thrush’s Song

Thomas Hardy’s brilliantly composed poem, “The Darkling Thrush,” explores a speaker’s view of a dark, hopeless world that is illuminated by the sweet song of a bird. Despite the harsh outlook that Hardy sets out to make in his poem, there is, for some reason, this thrush that has reason to sing. Hardy starts by illustrating the speaker’s whereabouts:

I lent upon a coppice gate

When Frost was spectre-grey

And Winter’s dregs made desolate

The weakening eye of day. (1-4)

Hardy uses words like “desolate” and “weakening” to describe the surroundings. This rather harsh vocabulary sets a mood that is rather dark and bleak; a land without much hope for the inhabitants. The next four lines contain more images of despair and hopelessness including words like “tangled,” “broken,” and “haunted” (5-7). One of the best images is of “[t]he tangled bine-stems [that] scored the sky / [l]ike strings of broken lyres,” because not only does it describe the scenery he is seeing as bleak, the image itself is of destruction and sadness (5-6). Mankind does not walk around the world, rather they “haunt” the night the night and the only thing that they can seek refuge with are “their household fires” (7-8). All over there is a sense of dreariness that hangs over this world. The next stanza does not present a much better image either.

Even the earth itself is described as a “corpse outleant” with his “crypt the cloudy canopy, / [t]he win his death lament” (9-10).The earth’s landscape is no more than a dead body trying to escape it’s coffin. The speaker’s surroundings are dead. Any sign of growth or life has seemed to vanish from thin air and, according the speaker “every spirit upon earth?” is as “fervourless as I” (15-16). The speaker is not the only one out there to be affected by the pain and death of the earth now. In this time of lifeless dark, however, there is one sign of hope.

The speaker hears the “full-hearted evensong / of joy illimited” from “an aged thrush” (19-21). This thrush, one that is “frail, gaunt and small,” has enough love for this world to sing still (21). The gloom of this trodden world is not enough to keep him down. The speaker does not see any reason why such a song should be sang at this time, but this thrush sees a lot to sing about. While the reader does not hear the song, Hardy’s juxtaposition of the response to the song and the response of the song is enough for the reader to understand just how powerful this song is. Upon hearing this song, the language of the poem drastically changes from that of despair and darkness, to words like “ecstatic,” “happy,” and “blessed” (26, 30-31).

The reader can sense the confusion from the speaker, for he just spent two stanzas describing the bleakness of where he is, yet this thrush is bold enough to sing a song full of hope. It is unclear as to whether or not the thrush’s song is enough to help the speaker, but it certainly starts the speaker wondering about the possibility of hope, even if it is not readily present.

And the Future is Certain, Give Us Time to Work it Out: Gerard Manley Hopkins Speaks of God’s Grandeur

After becoming an ordained Jesuit priest, Gerard Manley Hopkins went on to write religious poetry that would speak to many people, asking important questions and touching upon important details (773). In “God’s Grandeur,” Hopkins begins by addressing God’s magnificent power and how it will enrich our world. Hopkins says that “[t]he world will be charged” with God and his power, which is a proclamation of God being the creator of all (1). On one hand it could mean that the world will be full or Gods grandeur, but it could also mean that it is the Earth job, or the Earth has been given the task of receiving God’s grandeur. This speaks to Hopkins connection with God and his beliefs, saying that God had plans for this Earth. Hopkins explains that “[i]t will flame out, like shining from shook foil,” giving it a powerful lightning like effect on the world, taking it by storm (2). This imagery helps to show that even though the earth is charged with grandeur, it will still be very powerful none-the-less. While line two emphasizes how God’s grandeur will spread out all over the world like lighting or a flame, line three touches on its glorious power as “[i]t gathers to greatness, like the ooze of oil / [c]rushed” (3-4). Hopkins sees all of this power that God has over the world, and he wonders why the people do “not reck his rod?” (4). God can strike the world with grandeur, which encompasses both good and destructiveness. Once Hopkins establishes the connection between God’s grandeur and the people of the charged earth, he takes a look at what they have done in the past and why he has come to this conclusion of them not heeding God’s supreme power.

Hopkins uses some intense diction to prove his point in the second stanza. By using words like “trod,” “seared,” “bleared,” “smeared,” “toil,” “smudge,” and “smell,” Hopkins effectively brings negatives images to mind (5-7). In order for Hopkins point to be made, that is that God is more powerful than all and that nature is going to be pure and ever lasting because God made it, he must present the evil, dirtiness of humans. Humans are tainting the earth, it would seem, and trying to use up nature. They move all around the world, messing up whatever their feet land on and making it unholy. That doesn’t matter though, because God is much bigger than that.

The last stanza begins with the reassurance of God’s awesome power: “And for all this, nature is never spent / There lives the dearest freshness deep down things” (9-10). Despite all of the treading that generations have committed all over the earth that God created, nature will live on as well as God’s love. The last image that Hopkins presents is of the Holy Ghost looming over the world: “Because the Holy Ghost over the bent / World broods with warm breast and with ah! bright wings” (13-14). The last image, while in a way reassuring, is rather dark. The world has the Holy Ghost to watch over it, but it looms over in a very ominous manner. Perhaps this is God showing that he is still on earth, watching and keeping guard, but does not approve of what is happening. Nature will still live on no matter what, and God will watch over us. While the Holy Ghost is brooding, he still has a “warm breast” and “bright wings” to welcome us back (14). Hopkins view of the world here is not terribly bright, but he knows that God is on his side, so no matter how poorly humans may behave and how poorly they take care of the earth, God will be present, waiting to accept us back in his arms.

All Those Beauties in Solid Motion. All Those Beauties, Gonna Swallow You Up: Oscar Wilde the Aesthete

The aesthete movement came at a time of great change in the world. The industrial revolution was going full force, and there were plenty of new and exciting ideas floating about. Cynicism and wit have been around for many ages, but no writer has used either to its full capacity like Oscar Wilde. Being an aesthete himself, Wilde could find anything in nature and see the beauty in it (except for humans, it would seem). In many of Wilde’s writing, he looked into the social lives of the people around him and used them to his satirical advantage. Many of his plays, which are some of his more important and well known writings, contain witty aphorisms and phrases that contain a whole depth of intelligent criticism. On the other side of Wilde, however, was his ability to write poetry. Like some of the writers in the early industrial age, Wilde transported the pastoral beauty of the Romantic Movement, and put it right in the middle of the Victorian era.

In Symphony in Yellow, Wilde finds beauty around the city in a series of yellow objects. The compelling aspects of this poem are the hints of cynicism that lurk below the initial reading. The first stanza turns Wilde’s scene into something that one might find in their garden:

An omnibus across the bridge

Crawls like a yellow butterfly

And, here and there, a passer-by

Shows like a little restless midge. (1-4)

The first lines bring together to opposites and make them one. Wilde compares the omnibus to a lazy butterfly. Upon first glance, this could merely be a joining of the pastoral and industrial, but then again it could also be a comment on state of man. The omnibus was getting more and more popular during Wilde’s time, and when we sees it he compares it to a flighty insect that would normally have no care in the world. A butterfly carelessly meanders from flower to flower eating all day, much like the bus that Wilde sees going from bus stop to bus stop. A powerful steam powered machine is minimized to that of a flower munching insect. The people walking around are then compared to a “little restless midge” (4). Wilde looks at these people and see the chaotic existence of little insects, scrambling about just to make ends meet. So while there is beauty in the joining of the natural insects and busy city life, there is another layer present that speaks to the restless lives that people live. Insects do not live very long lives, and to many people, they are just seen as pointless or at the very least as utilities to eat gnats and other bugs.

Symphony in Yellow is just a glimpse at some of Wilde’s satirical works. Even upon first look, this can be seen as something that is not satirical at all and more of an exercise in Wilde’s aestheticism. The beauty of the world can be seen in so many things. Wilde’s plays contain more of the wit and cynicism that he is famous for, but his poetry gives a special look into a more subtle attack at human nature.

Move a Muscle. Make a Motion: Charles Kingsley Pumps Iron for God

People are always trying to justify their actions. I was speeding because I was late for work. I broke his nose because he took my parking place. I sued him because his burgers made me fat. As human beings, we are all about justifying our actions in ways that make us come out as the good guy. Charles Kingsley wrote, in a letter to his fiancé, about the idea of Masculine Christianity. Apparently, this was a rather popular movement during the Victorian era, while at first a “mocking disparagement for boisterous assertions of bodily strength and energy as the foundation of the pure moral life,” turned into more something that many men aspired to achieve (581). Kingsley begins by addressing the widespread laziness that is affecting the world at his time. He sees the act of laziness as “impious” (581). Kingsley then says that “I could not do half the little good I do do here, if it were not for the strength and activity which some consider coarse and degrading” (581). Kingsley, a clergyman himself, attributes the good he does to the strength he has received from God by doing handiwork and pleasurable things around the country. Kingsley proclaims “how merciful God has been in turning all the strength and hardihood I gained from snipe shooting and hunting, and rowing, and jack-fishing in those magnificent fens to His work! While I was following my own fancies, He was preparing me for His work” (581). Kingsley truly believes that by going out and doing pleasurable things like hunting and rowing, he is more apt at doing God’s work and will. What a fascinating idea! Kingsley justifies his pleasure time by saying that it is making him stronger and therefore more able to be an effective clergyman. It seems that Rev. Kingsley here can bake his cake and eat it too. The first part of his claim sounds a little ridiculous, but it certainly makes sense. The second point he makes is a little more accessible.

Kingsley looks to the work place now. He sees that there does not need to be disconnect between working and the Lord. He says, for instance, “I see no inconsistency…in talking to one man about the points of a horse, and the next moment to another about the mercy of God to sinners” (581). This is a similar tactic that is used today. If a Christian wants to spread the word of the Lord, they will sometimes go about it by approaching someone at work or wherever they may be and striking up a conversation. After making the small talk, they begin to talk to them about their Lord and savior. Kingsley puts it: “I try to catch men by their leading ideas, and so draw them off insensibly to my leading idea” (581). In a way, this idea has made its way to current times and most Christians are exhibiting it now. If we maintain out health and strength, like Kingsley says we should do, we can do God’s work easier. Kingsley also means that one must be good looking and in good health when he says there is “something impious in the neglect of personal health, strength, and beauty” (581). Kingsley wants to reader to take care of him or herself in order to do God’s work. This is, of course, very biblical as well ("Do you not know that your body is a temple of the Holy Spirit, who is in you, whom you have received from God? You are not your own; 20you were bought at a price. Therefore honor God with your body” 1 Corinthians 6:19-20). Kingsley gives some sound advice, while at times a little strange sounding, it all makes sense.

And Now Love is Here C’mon and Try It: Robert Browning’s Love Among the Ruins

For his poem, Love Among the Ruins, Robert Browning invented an entirely new stanza form. The form itself resembles that of a normal stanza with missing pieces, almost like the time-torn ruins of an old poem. The poem seems to chronicle the sites and times of an old forgotten city, presumably the speaker’s “country’s very capitol” (9). Browning begins the poem with a description of the land, telling of the “quiet-colored end of evening” that “smile[‘s], / Miles and miles / on the solitary pastures” and its inhabitants, the sheep (1-3). His elegant drawing of the surrounding land gives the reader, at first, a sense of peace and beauty, yet the land’s past ruler is “wielding far / peace and war” (12). The last line of this part begins a pattern that follows throughout the next few stanzas where the first six to eight lines of each segment concern the painting of scenery, while the last four lines or so describe times of war for this great city.

Part two begins by the speaker going into a deeper discussion of the countryside in his dear city where it “does not even boast a tree” (13). The only thing that disrupted the flowing hills of the countryside is the palace that “shot its spire / up like fires / o’er the hundred-gated circuit of a wall” (19-21). Even the palace has a sort of violent description of warlike proportions when the speakers describes the palace as shooting its spires up like licking flames. Dispersed even in the descriptions of the town are little bits of violent and harmful diction. Browning uses the peacefulness of the countryside to juxtapose the more violent and warlike city. The last line of the stanza paints a picture of the soldiers that are housed within the city walls. But even the soldiers will march on the pleasant and peaceful countryside that was described in the first and second stanza. The scent of war and the city taint the countryside. But the countryside is still there even after the city is gone. There are only ruins of the city where our speaker is talking from. No matter how powerful the palace soldiers were, or however many used to march on the grasses of the countryside, they are all merely ruins now.

Browning’s speakers details the life and times of the great city throughout the seven stanzas of this sequence, but the main focus is the relationship in parts five through seven. Now the speaker is jumping between the present and the past. He says that “a girl with eager eyes and yellow hair / waits me there…when the king looked, where she looks now, breathless, dumb / till I come” (55-60). The girl stands now where the king once stood, one waiting for war, the other waiting for love; both silent in the wake of what is to come. For the king, it is destruction. Fr the girl, however, it is her love. The king “looked upon the city, every side, / far and wide, / all the mountains topped with temples…all the men!” (61-63, 66). The king saw what he loved: the power, the “lust of glory,” and all of his men (33). The girl sees what she loves. The last half of the stanza draws an amazing picture of the speaker and this woman standing on the hill embracing each other as they “extinguish sight and speech” (71). The only thing that remains in these lands now is love. The speaker tells of the downfall of the great city in the last stanza and ends with one simple phrase: “Love is best” (85). The last image is of love among the ruins. These powerful men who fought to gain land and power all were turned into nothing more than ruins, yet love was able to survive. There, on that hill top, where men once fought and worshiped gold, these two lovers lose themselves in each other: love shall conquer all.

When My Love Stands Next To Your Love: Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s Sonnets from the Portuguese

Elizabeth Barrett Browning is one of the most celebrated female authors of the Victorian age, and it is not due to the fact that she was married to Robert Browning (528). Unlike Dorothy Wordsworth, who seems to be included in this book because of her connections with her brother, Barrett Browning was able to make a name for her self because of her fantastic writing. It was her husband, however, that finally convinced her to publish a collection of love sonnets she wrote for him during their courtship under the pseudonym Sonnets from the Portuguese. Sonnet 28 contains many feelings that one who is in the middle of a courtship would have. Barrett Browning begins by addressing the sonnets with quite the negative perspective, saying “[m]y letters! all dead paper, mute and white!” (1). The first line does not make her sound incredibly confident in her writing ability or her relationship that is at hand, yet later on in the sonnet she describes the meeting that Robert Browning has set up. Still, it can easily be understood that her she does not feel that her writings are worth anything while she is writing either to him, or in her personal sonnets she has written. This sonnet tells of the first time that they intend to meet, so she has not seen him for the first 28 sonnets. Her doubts are expressed through her writing. Barrett Browning seems to be afraid when she explains that her letters “seem alive and quivering / [a]gainst my tremulous hands which loose the string / [a]nd let them drop down on my knee to-night.” (2-4). After tonight, her fear for the relationship she is having can rest at ease. As she lets these letters “drop down,” she no longer has anything to worry about. Yet her “tremulous hands” express a certain amount of anxiety or fear. They are not dead, for Barrett Browning feels that they have some enormous amount of power that she is still very aware of.

She doesn’t want to give up these poems (obviously…she ends up writing forty-four altogether). The next four stanzas tell of the planned meeting between the lovers. It is their first meeting and quite an exciting event for Barrett Browning. She says “he wished to have me in his sight / [o]nce as a friend: this fixed a day in spring / to come and touch my hand” (5-7). I can see how, in this time, a letter from a man like that would be something that is very exciting. I suppose now-a-days a letter like that would be very exciting. The reader sees her doubt in her letters turn to an excitement for the future meeting for while it is a “simple thing,” she “wept for it!” (7-8). What an exciting event! When Robert Browning used the phrases “Dead, I love thee” and “I am thine,” Barrett Browning cannot hold in her happiness (9, 11). Her happiness can be found in the fact that she holds onto the letter from him so much that “its ink has paled” (11). Pardon the cliché, but how poetic! The next line seals the deal, when Barrett Browning confesses that the ink has paled “[w]ith lying at my heart that beat too fast” (12). As she clutched onto the letter, she held it close to her breast with happiness and joy. That brings to mind such a wonderful image.

The last two lines of the sonnet are the most cryptic to me. She ends with saying “[a]nd this…O Love, they words have ill availed / [i]f, what this said, I dared repeat at last” (13-14). She speaks of his words as being unhelpful if she is to repeat them. If she acts to excited, perhaps she will feel as if she is overstepping her bounds. She cannot let Robert Browning know of her excitement because that would be too unladylike. Barrett Browning wrote the sonnets without any intention for them to be seen by anyone, including Robert Browning. When she eventually showed him the sonnets, he found them to be amazing (530). She wrote all of these sonnets as a way of expressing her happiness and love for Mr. Browning before they were officially together and married, almost like a diary of their courtship.

He Feels the Power of the Past Behind Him: Tennyson’s The Kraken

Alfred, Lord Tennyson was known for his writing, being named Poet Laureate, deemed a Lord and then a Baron, and making thousands of pounds a year (587). Anyway you look at it, the man had it set for life. Some of his poetry, especially the poetry included in this book, is dark and sad. In his poem, The Kraken, Tennyson illuminates the darkness of the sea for a quick look at the mythical sea beast that leaves the reader more sad than afraid.

Tennyson begins the poem by describing the decent into the darkness. His choice of words alone gives the reader a dark and foreboding chill, as he sends us “[b]elow the thunders of the upper deep; / Far, far beneath the abysmal sea” (1-2). These “thunders” serve as the gates to the deep where the beast sleeps, in a place that is even worse than the “abysmal sea.” So even before we reach our destination, the reader is given a set of words that are uneasy. The creature he is describing lives somewhere buried far from the human eye where we are supposed to fear it. From the beginning, Tennyson gives this creature horrible dwelling place for “[h]is ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep” (3). The Kraken, something that we should fear, lives quite an uninteresting life. Caged in the deep of the ocean, he has a “dreamless” sleep forever. Tennyson has taken this huge mythical beast that is to be feared and has turned it into nothing more than a sad bump on a log “[b]attening upon huge seaworms in his sleep” (12). He has turned a god of the sea into a lowly creature that is destined to sleep on the bottom of the sea and get fat.

Tennyson maintains the creatures sheer power, however, by having the only thing that can kill it the end of time. Tennyson writes that “the latter fire shall heat the deep” (13). The end of days is the only event that can disturb this creature’s slumber and “[t]hen once by man and angels to be seen, / In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die” (14-15). Tennyson makes this creature out to be something that wants nothing from us. The beast is now a being that would never want to harm man, for he is in a hell of his own.

By the end of the poem, Tennyson has described an awful event that leaves the reader wanting to comfort the poor beast rather than run from him. He is destined to sleep in the bowels of the sea in a place far worse than anyone can imagine; a place where the real threats that are even past the “sickly light” will never venture to (7). Tennyson easily sways the reader with powerful words like “thunders,” “abysmal,” “shadowy,” and “sickly,” that slowly degrades the mythical, powerful beast of the sea. The Kraken, a creature known for its power and destruction, is portrayed as a giant nothing. The only time the kraken is to be seen, even by God and the angels, it would seem, is his dying day: the day the earth is destroyed.

Oh... I'm Living in the Future: Fanny Kemble and the Steam Engine

The transition between the natural settings of the Romantic period to the industrial scraps of the Victorian era was not very subtle. With new inventions coming out all the time and the power of steam being used to power trains, people were getting excited and ready for the future. I first assumed that with the sudden growth in the cities and new technologies being discovered, poets and artists of this new industrial Victorian era would lose their beauty and elegance. I was, in fact, wrong! There was still plenty of imagination to go around and keep the writers busy. In Fanny Kemble’s chronicles of her first steam engine ride, contained in her Record of a Girlhood, she describes the beautiful little engine with great imagination and detail (So much that she would need a “foolscap extra” to write about it (490)).

Kemble begins with describing the little engine as a she, “for they make all these curious little fire-horses all mares,” to help personify the steam engine (490). Kemble refers to the engine as a she in order to help solidify the readily available remnants of the Romantic Movement and keep the readers interest. She next lists several of the key components of the engine, including a “barrel containing enough water to prevent her being thirsty for fifteen miles” (490). Again, Kemble gives the steam engine the living quality of thirst. While this is not a new idea, it contains so much importance. With the invention of all these machines, it would make sense that people would lose the pastoral and natural feeling of life and descriptions and soon turn into machines themselves. Thanks to Kemble though, the imaginative tradition is continued and there is no end in site. She does not stop for a second in her description, continuing with the wheels, “which are her feet” (490). In the end, she has constructed not a steam engine, but a horse, including its “upper extremities (the hip-joints, I suppose)”,”[t]he reins, bit, and bridle of this wonderful beast—a small steal handle,” and even “[t]he coals, which are its oats” (490-91). By the end of this, Kemble has constructed for the reader something entirely different than what the title implied. The next step, however, is the best.

Kemble says “I felt as if no fairy tale was ever half so wonderful as what I saw” (491). Here is the fusion, it would seem, between the new and the old. The quaint, magical elements of the Romantic Movement combined with the powerful and growing industrial era. Kemble sees this new, real life experience, as something much more magical than anything that Blake or Coleridge could ever write about, it would seem. The non-fiction of the 19^th century takes on the fiction of the past and wins.

This Ain't No Party, This Ain't No Disco...I Ain't Got Time for that Now: John Keats Explores Death In His Last Few Years of Life

John Keats met an untimely death at the age of 26, cutting his life extremely short and stealing away one of the Romantic Movement’s greatest poets. It is no wonder that Keats, diagnosed with tuberculosis and suffering from other health issues, would write Ode on Melancholy. Our book includes the original opening stanza for the ode, which, although much darker, is in no way as beautifully written as the revision. He starts off, in the original, with “[t]hough you should build a bark of dead men’s bone, / And rear a phantom gibbet with a mast” (1-2). While not as beautiful as the revision, this is still quite the intro to a poem. The imagination (ding ding ding!) taken to write something like this is astronomical. He uses this stanza to open up the ode as if he were on a quest to find the goddess Melancholy (442). The switch to the revision, however, is much more Keatsian. He uses several allusions to Greek mythology with the inclusion of Lethe, the river of forgetfulness, and Proserpine. Keats enjoyed using Greek mythology in his writings because they could greatly support his ideas brought though his poetry. His readers were aware of what these allusions meant, so they were not lost when these poems were first published. For today’s current readers, these anthologies must include side notes in order for us to understand what exactly is going on. The texts are so rich with these mythical allusions that it can be difficult to get a grip on what Keats is saying now-a-days. Keats continues to make these mythical allusions in the first stanza in order to set up his stance on Melancholy.

The revised first stanza is full of images of death and sadness. Keats would seem to be writing to postpone death, yet the ode is to one of deaths major friends, melancholy. The first half of the stanza seems to deal with death coming out for him, fearing his “pale forehead to be kiss’d, / by nightshade, ruby grape of Proserpine” (3-4). These lines continue to describe various ways that life can be taken, until he eventually comes to the conclusion that “shade to shade will come too drowsily, / And drown the wakeful anguish of the soul” (9-10). It does not matter how much you ask death not to come after you, whether it a kiss from nightshades poisoned lips or by being taken to Lethe, in the end, death is eventual and will come, albeit “drowsily.” Perhaps his melancholy is brought on due to the insights made through his poetry. Or maybe these insights he as made have brought on these bouts of melancholy. It could just be his current health just makes him look towards the end. Keats moves on in his next stanza to talk about how and when these melancholies fall.

Keats next stanza pleads with whatever higher power there may be out there to help compose him “when the melancholy fit shall fall, / Sudden from heaven like a weeping cloud” (11-12). When it rains, Keats can feel the sadness of the earth. The flowers droop from the weight of the rain, and the green hills are all shrouded by the April showers. The “weeping cloud,” which too, is sad, acts as another element meant to bring sadness to the world. He asks that he may “glut thy sorrow on a morning rose” (15). His sorrow will overbear the beautiful things in the world like the roses, peonies, and rainbows. He describes the power that melancholy has over his body whenever it strikes or falls on him. But there is nothing that can stop him, for if his mistress rises up with anger because of his beating of beauty, then she will be restrained and her anger cannot affect him as he feeds “upon her peerless eyes” (20).

Keats ends the poem with the goddess of Melancholy eventually taking his life and joining “her cloudy trophies” (30). His look on sadness and the eventual demise of the human body are not very pleasant or uplifting, which lead to this ode on Melancholy. The fear and uncertainty that Keats was feeling around this time due to his illness contributed a lot to this poem. The transition between the stanzas are fascinating. Keats logical journey through melancholy and death serves as a great insight into his life and how he actually felt about dieing. Keats seems to lose interest in life and living for these brief three stanzas. As brief as these stanzas are, so are our lives. He no longer has time to think of the living, especially when he is sad due to his current situations. For a lot of Keats’ poems, he seems to say “so much for pleasure in poetry.”

Buisness and Pleasure: Coleridge Takes on Poets and Poetry!

I find that the mind behind the poetry is very fascinating (which is why I have been primarily writing about the essays and prefaces to many of the writer’s works). How a writer feels about his or her poetry is very important to them. After all, that is why they write a lot of it! It is exciting to see how some of the author’s views differ in and out of the poetic media. For instance, Samuel Coleridge writes in his Philosophic Definitions of a Poem and Poetry that “[a] poem is that species of composition, which is opposed to works of science, by proposing for its immediate object pleasure, not truth” (355). The idea that poetry is immediately for pleasure and not for truth in many ways goes against what many people teach about poetry. We spend hours upon hours searching through stanzas and lines to find truth in poetry, yet Coleridge believes that these verses were written primarily for our pleasure. It is difficult to imagine what other authors of the age would say when approached with this proposal. I think, especially for the romantic writers, it is difficult to separate the two. A lot of them are writing for beauty, which is their truth, and through that truth they find the beauty of poetry and the pleasure of poetry. I can see where Coleridge may be saying that we should approach poetry from a stand point that is primarily of pleasure and then hopefully we may find the truth.

Coleridge goes on to give examples of different poems or poetic writings that may complicate this idea of a separation of pleasure and truth. He writes about the first chapter in Isaiah saying that “it would not be less irrational than strange to assert, that pleasure, and not truth, was the immediate object of the prophet” (355). So then how can a poem be written primarily for pleasure when we have entire books of the bible written in poetic forms? Of course not everyone sees the bible as being “the truth,” so this is how Coleridge starts to define his idea of poetry. He starts with saying that “whatever specific import we attach to the word, poetry, there will be found involved in it, as a necessary consequence, that a poem of any length neither can be, or ought to be, all poetry” (355). This is interesting! The entirety of the poem is not necessarily poetry, eh? Much like my discussion of Wordsworth’s view of poetry yesterday, Coleridge feels that you cannot see why a poet writes about anything until you define what a poem is and in doing so, you unearth the essence of the poet.

In Coleridge’s philosophical discussion of the poem and poet, he gives the poet a lot power that, in the end, seems rather mystical. Coleridge describes the poet as someone who “brings the whole soul of man into activity, with the subordination of its faculties to each other, according to their relative worth and dignity. He diffuses a tone, and spirit of unity, that blends, and (as it were) fuses, each into each, by that synthetic and magical power, to which we have exclusively appropriated the name imagination” (355). Again, we see the importance of imagination in the poet’s world. According to Coleridge, the poet has a lot of power, and in order to function, the perfect poet must affect the reader in many ways by using this combination of influences called imagination. So what do we make of the pleasure vs. truth debate? Coleridge gives his philosophical ideas, but never seems to answer what he was initially talking about. I feel that his conclusion on the poet is still very important, and it is very much in the vein of the romantics to focus so strongly on imagination. I still posit that you cannot have the pleasure without the truth no matter what the reader or the author’s intention was at first.

Now I’m Speaking Out, Speaking About my Friends: Wordsworth and his Poetry

Key parts of the Romantic Movement were the use of imagination and simplicity in the messages and subjects of the writings. William Wordsworth, much like William Blake and his fellow Romantic poets, wrote about everyday life in pastoral settings. In the Preface for his collection of poems in Lyrical Ballads, Wordsworth writes that “[t]he principal object…was to chuse incidents and situations from common life, and to relate or describe them, throughout, as far as was possible, in a selection of language that was used by man” (206). Wordsworth wanted his writings to be accessible by the common man, and he wanted to write what he felt they could relate to. By bringing “a certain colouring of imagination” into his writings he could bring the reader to a new height and also make these ordinary incidents seem more fanciful and interesting (206). That is all nice and dandy, but why does he write about these common incidents? What was so important about them that he needed to be able to tell his readers about them but with more imagination?

Wordsworth does not make his reader wait at all when it comes to answering these questions. “[A]ll good poetry is the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings” says Wordsworth in the next part of his Preface (207). Therefore, he may not care what his reader thinks of his poetry because it was not written to be received by anyone. It was a spark of imagination that hit him and led him to write these poems. These poems do not go without purpose either, that is “to illustrate the manner in which our feelings and ideas are associated in a state of excitement” (207). How amazing is that? Wordsworth obviously takes great care in what he is writing and who he is writing to. Of the authors we have read so far, I think Wordsworth is the one that cares the most about his readers. His poetry explores more than just common events in everyday life. His poems serve as bridges between our minds and our eyes, our motives and the hands that carry them out, and our imagination and the world among other things. Wordsworth’s words are more powerful than we may initially read. He makes his poems very real and close to home for the readers of his time, yet he complicates them with ideas and imagination in order to draw the gap between what we see and how we feel closer and closer (208).

To Wordsworth, a poet is “a man speaking to men” (210). Although that may sound simple, it is true. Wordsworth, especially, is speaking to men about their lives and in terms they can understand. His poems conjure images and ideas that are not foreign to anyone that also show the simplicity of nature while adding layers of language to incorporate his ideas and bring his true purpose to light. Wordsworth is a powerful wordsmith who uses words that any man would use in order to generate emotions from his readers about simple subjects.

Who Needs to Think when Your Feet Just Go: Poetic Genius and the Beat that Carries Us

William Blake was a very spiritual author whose writings carried with them many insights and explorations into the realm of religion and sanctity. In the series of poetic plates entitled All Religions are One, Blake writes of an eternal force that resides in all men: the “Poetic Genius.” He begins by including a passage from the bible in order to place himself in the role of a prophet of sorts for his generation (76). The “Poetic Genius” is, to Blake, an important part of all humans that guides, directs, and dictates their surroundings and appearance. Blake uses the “Poetic Genius” to portray an all inclusive God whose existence helps to bring all living creatures together under one central religion. Blake explains:

… [T]he Poetic Genius is

The true Man, and that

The body or outward form

Of Man is derived from the

Poetic Genius. (Principle 1)

Blake uses this as the beginning principle in his 10 plate series in order to set his argument in motion.

By asserting that the “Poetic Genius” is what creates our appearances and that it is essentially what the “true Man” is, Blake can easily move onto the next principle where he begins to tie together little bits of his idea. “As all men are alike in/ outward form,” he says, “So… all are alike in/ the Poetic Genius” (Principle 2). Since we all look a like, that is, we are all human beings, we are all controlled by the same “Poetic Genius” inside of us. This God figure has created us and, as Blake writes in his third principle, “all sects of/ Philosophy are from the/ Poetic Genius.” Therefore we were all created in his image and from his thoughts so that all our philosophies, or religions, are from the same origin thus, they are one.

Blake covers all of his tracks in order to make this work, explaining that there are an infinite variety of depictions, understandings, and receptions of the “Poetic Genius.” The different nations are all controlled by the same thing, but their interpretations are all different. The source of all is the “Poetic Genius” that made the “true Man” in his image. With that information as an underlying realization, Blake successfully creates and sustains his argument throughout the ten plates. Blake makes a return to the term on plate 12 in The Marriage of Heaven and Hell. While dining with the prophets Ezekiel and Isaiah, Ezekiel refers to Blake’s “Poetic Genius” and helps to solidify the idea of the forming all in the world.

But why refer to this divine being as the “Poetic Genius”? Could it be just another name that Blake chose out of his imagination? Perhaps it is to bring in an underlying love for literature and help show how his poetry is used to get people closer to God, much like John Milton’s Paradise Lost. Milton felt it was his duty to show the people of earth the fall of Lucifer, the story of Adam and Eve, and the fall of man. By naming his God the “Poetic Genius,” Blake draws a parallel between his poetry and his God, as if he felt he were commissioned by God just like Milton.

Here at the Edge of the Stage – Helen Maria Williams Goes to France

Upon the first reading of Helen Maria William’s collection “Letters Written in France, in the Summer of 1790,” the first paragraph really caught my eye. Williams says that she has just witnessed “the most sublime spectacle which, perhaps, was ever represented on the theatre of this earth (37).” Referring to the federation in France in such a way shows a lot about William’s view of the world and the current on going taking place in her surroundings. The use of the word “theatre” to refer to such an important historical event can mean many things. Theatre is a tool used to present truths on stage. Actors learn parts and present them for an audience. So in many ways, what Williams was describing was very much an important theatrical event. She describes several of the main components when she tells of the how the “[h]alf a million people assembled at a spectacle” that “connected the enthusiasm of moral sentiment with the solemn pomp of religious ceremonies (37).” Not only does Williams provide us with the audience for this “spectacle,” but she also describes it as a ceremony. The whole ordeal also takes place in an amphitheatre, solidifying William’s reference to theatre.

These letters are very important, not only because they show the views of Williams, but also because of her presentation of the material. The portrayal of this event as a theatrical performance shows how Williams thinks about the times and actions people are taking.

Williams does a great job at chronicling the events of the day. She shows, with great detail, the people present, delivering depictions of people dancing and kneeling in the streets, almost as if it really were some sort of religious ceremony. Since this was a celebration marking the fall of the Bastille and the new constitution in France, the people had every right to be happy. The French revolution was a very dangerous time, full of oppression in the country and messy political business. Williams brings back to England a great description of their celebration.

News of this was very important for the English people, because, as discussed in the podcast, this was a time of great change and flux. The happenings of the world were important for any person living at the time. To know everything that was going on with their neighbor was very important also because of their relationship. During the later parts of the 1790’s, the two countries would enter a war against each other and see the rise of Napoleon (36). Williams went on to write about the way that France took care of their problems in the mid 1790’s, discussing their revolts and overthrow of the king (44). The destruction of the monarchy in France was an extremely important event for English and France. Williams describes it as something that “finally alienated the minds of Englishmen from the French revolution; rendered popular a war, which otherwise no minister would have dared to undertake; disgusted all wise, and shocked all humane men (44).” Williams plays an important part here as both historian and critic of the events that took place during the 1790’s in France. Her views are important for people of her times and ours.

Perhaps William’s depiction of the theatrical event in the summer of 1790 is more true to her form that she intended. The parties and celebration were all part of nothing more than a performance. A mere three years later, destruction and a loss of hope would enter the scene, followed by war and Napoleon. “[T]he theatre of this earth” had its stage in France, and there, at the end of it, stood a country begging to be set free. 

I Got Wild Imagination. Talkin’ transubstantiation.

The Oxford English Dictionary is a wonderful and amazing creation. One of the most fascinating aspects of the dictionary is its inclusion of each words etymology. The reader can see when the word was first used, its original spelling, and how it has evolved throughout time. So the word Romantic’s first recorded sighting came about in 1659 when Henry More used it in his Immortal Soul II, saying “I speak especially of the Imagination which is most free, such as we use in Romantick Inventions.” Right off we see that the word we use today was spelled a little differently and probably had a different definition. Here, More was using it as an adjective to describe a certain type of invention. The word carried with it the meaning “of the nature or, having the qualities of, romance in respect to form and content” (OED). Well, this makes perfect sense, right? The definition follows pretty closely to how we would think of it now-a-days. It relates to romance in some way, shape, or form. More’s “Romantick Invention” could be a love sonnet or some story that deals with lovers and their romance. Only six years later though, Robert Boyle writes about More and promptly drops the “k” at the end of More’s word. A good move if I do say so myself.

When words were first being spelled and brought over to the English language, there were a lot of spellings that seemed redundant or silly. As time went on, other authors adopted and adapted words to make them sleeker and more easy to use. In 1066, the Norman conquest took place and that changed how we speak today quite a lot. So we went through several transitions in spellings and meanings when we left old English and went to middle and then from middle to early modern and so on. One would think that back then, since printing was not as easy today, they would try to spell words as easily as possible. There are, of course, some words that just got harder to spell as time went on…but that is because people are silly.

I think that the most interesting facet of the definition of romantic is its many meanings that have nothing to do with romance. For instance, the second definition deals with romantic meaning “[o]f a fabulous or fictitious character; having no foundation in fact.” Wow. How cool is that?! We have gone from romantic having a strict tie to romance, to it meaning something that is completely made up. How does that happen (Might I add that the author, Mr. Pepys, spelled the word “romantique.” How does that happen?)? I think it says a lot about how people looked at language back then and how they interpreted words. Perhaps Mr. Pepys here didn’t think that there was such a thing as romance. Or maybe that the idea of romance is so fantastic it could only be made up. Romance is something that is unattainable by human kind. Something only divine could accomplish perhaps? The meaning didn’t stop here though. Four years later, Sir W. Thompson used romantic to mean “[f]antastic, extravagant, quixotic; going beyond what is customary or practical” when talking about building a bridge over the river at Putney.

Romantic has had quite the etymological journey over time. It is so cool to see how this word has changed so much over time, and these are only a few of the stops along the way. I feel that it really enriches our lives to know that there are deeper meanings to words other than what we may read on dictionary.com. We can find out so much more about words by doing a little investigating. Don’t be a stranger!

Notebooks? What good are notebooks?

So. An online course. Cool huh? The fact that we are moving so swiftly into the arms of new technologies is both exciting and kind of scary. Students are now walking around with their Amazon.com Kindles and paying $9.99 for brand new books to download on it instead of forking out the 16 to 20 bucks on paperbacks from Barnes and Noble. Even though these new technologies are slowly replacing the crinkling sound of turning pages and musty smell of used books, there is a glimmer of hope on the horizon with the words “ease,” “convenience,” and “inexpensive” lovingly scrawled upon it. I mean, it is incredibly convenient that I can put my dailies on the computer and chat with my class once a week. My entire library can now be carried on something no bigger than the average notebook (And all of my CDs now fit on something the size of a postage stamp!). We do out with the notebooks and put in their place laptops. So should we miss the warm gentle hum of the florescent lights in our classrooms? Should we lament the death of the tangible text?

            Anyways, my name is Corbin, but I usually go by Corbs. I am an English and Theatre major on the secondary education track. I am going to be a senior next year and I have no clue what I want to do when I graduate. Teaching seems like it would be the way to go, but there are so many other possibilities out there. Graduate school is a possibility, but in our economy today, it seems everyone is headed that way. So with graduate schools filling up and job opportunities disappearing faster than Paul Reubens’ acting opportunities (At least he has plenty of hair, it would seem. Oh, and a criminal record...), I find myself getting a little worried. Everything will be ok though, I hope. I look forward to this class and the readings. The syllabus includes many of my favorite British authors, so I am excited. So yeah, w00t for computers! See y’all later!

~Corbs