A Prayer for my Daughter' by W.B.Yeats

A Prayer for my Daughter' by W.B.Yeats

      This is a poem in which Yeats prays for the happiness and well-being of his daughter, who has just been born.  The poet is slightly upset as he thinks with apprehension about the collapse of modern civilization.  While the poet's mind is stormy with this fear the child is calmly sleeping in the cradle.  The thought about the dangers awaiting the child frightens him.  The poet listens to the ominous howling of the storm in his mind as he thinks of the dangers his daughter may be exposed to. The gloomy poet walks up and down and prays for his daughter.  As he listens to the stormy wind he thinks the prophetic vision described in his poem "The second Coming" is at hand.

          

  Then there follows a skillful description of the kind of beauty that is not desirable in a woman – beauty that makes a stranger crazy or that makes a woman exult at her reflection in the mirror.  The poet prays that his daughter may have beauty, but not excessive beauty.  He knows that too much beauty in a woman will land her in danger.  He knows that fabulous beauty goes with an empty mind.  The poet makes suggestive allusions to Helen who had "much trouble from a fool" and Venus who chose "a bandy-legged smith" as her husband.  From both these stories the poet draws a realistic and at the same time entertaining moral:

                        It's certain that fine women eat

                        A crazy salad with their meat

                        Whereby the Horn of Plenty is undone.

           

 So the poet wishes and prays that his daughter may be granted moderate beauty. Yeats's next prayer is that his daughter should grow up like a laurel tree with linnets singing on its branches.  The laurel tree represents luxuriant growth and peace and harmony.  While the birds stand for joy.  She should bring joy to those around her just as the birds provide joy to people.  The poet wants her daughter to become free from hatred.  The poet knows that intellectual hatred is great evil and can make the mind hollow.  The soul is the fountain of joy and peace and so if she can attune her will to the will of God, she need not have any fear about anything.  As the radical innocence of the soul is the highest form of spiritual development, Yeasts asks his daughter to recover it.  It is a gift from heaven and no earthly temptations can subdue her.

            Yeats's next wish is that his daughter should not become a political fanatic.  Fanaticism will create hatred and ill will and a woman with these vices will become incapable of using the gifts conferred on her.  No doubt, the poet is referring to Maud Gonne, the talented and beautiful lady whom Yeats loved.  She rejected him and married John Macbride, another political fanatic.  According to the poet, she wrecked her life and caused misery to her friends and relatives.  It was vanity and hatred that threw her life into confusion.  It is Yeats's wish that his daughter should not devote herself to any impersonal cause, sacrificing all other values in life.

      Yeats prays that her daughter be endowed with courtesy which he considers as the queen of all virtues.  Courteous behaviour can win over hearts.  Ceremoniousness is another quality that the poet wishes her daughter to possess.  According to him ceremony alone will engender innocence and beauty.  The poet makes references to Maud Gonne in several places in the poem.  This shows the poet's inordinate love foe her.  She rejected his love and chose to dedicate herself to the cause of Irish Independence.  Later though she married another political fanatic, John Macbride, she did not have a happy married life.  It is the poet's prayer that his daughter should not have similar experiences.

            The poem contains many heart-warming lines expressive of affection, humanity, generosity, optimism, good cheer, amiability etc.  Besides, we find several examples of the felicity of word and phrase: "the murderous innocence of the sea", "an old bellows full of angry wind", "rooted in one dear perpetual place" etc. are examples.  We also get a bit of moralizing which has its own appeal:  "an intellectual hatred is the worst."

                        "Ceremony's s the name for the rich horn

                        And custom for the spreading laurel tree."

            "A prayer for my Daughter" is a poem full of practical wisdom, moral philosophy and beauty.                        

CHURCH GOING- Philip Larkin

CHURCH GOING- Philip Larkin

            “Church Going” is one of the best of Philip Larkin’s poems.  The title itself is puzzling. It gives us two different meanings. One meaning is that it is a regular visit to a church. The other shows the decline of the institution because people lost faith in God and religion. His greatest virtues are clarity and close observation of social life, perfect control over feeling and tone. The language is always simple and lucid and the idiom has great variety. Through his poetry Larkin advises us not to be deceived by illusions or ideals.  He asks us to have a better awareness of man’s weaknesses. Larkin is called a sceptic poet. He enters the church as a sceptic who does not have any faith in the church. But he slowly realizes the truth that church fulfils a deeply felt human need and that it is “a serious house on a serious earth it is”.

            Making sure that nothing is going on inside, the speaker of the poem enters the church and closes the door behind him. He finds that it is just like any other church.  He also notices the furniture, furnishings such as the plate, the pyx, prayer books, the Bible, flowers cut for Sunday holy Mass, matting, seats, the baptismal font and the organ. There are no worshippers in the church and the silence tensed him. He looks around him with contempt and he feels a bad smell when he stands staring at the altar where the church services are conducted. Having observed these details, the speaker takes off his cycle-clips in an act of mock-reverence. He did not wear a hat.

            The speaker then moves forward and touches the baptismal font with his hands. He notices that the roof looks almost new but he does not know whether it has been cleaned or restored because he is not a regular church-goer. Then he mounts the lectern and began to read out a few verses from the Bible.  After that he comes back to the door and signs the visitor’s book and donates an Irish six pence which has no value in England. Thus all his activities and manners inside the church show that he is a sceptic who has no faith in the church service. Finally he thinks that his time is wasted, because the place is not worth visiting at all.

            But the speaker could not avoid the church. Over and again he visited the church and each time his skeptical attitude grew less and less. This time he stood inside the churching thinking about its future. As science and technology began to develop, people lost faith in the institution of church. In future, churches will become empty and completely out of use.  A few cathedrals may be preserved as museums for future generation because of its great art and architectural value. Their parchment, the plate and the pyx may be kept in locked cases. But other church buildings will become sheltering centers for sheep and other animals and poor people during rainy time. Sometime people may avoid such places as unlucky because of its graveyard. The speaker of the poem thinks that perhaps the church will become the centre of superstitions in the coming years. But if faith disappeared, naturally superstition will also be disappeared because both are connected with each other. Finally the church buildings will tumble down and only its concrete pillars would be standing as silent witness of the past glory of the church. The church path will be over grown with grass, weeds and creepers. It will become a deserted place. In course of time future generation will forget even the shape of the churches.

            Now the speaker of the poem reflects who will be the last person to visit the church for its purpose. It may be a lover of antiquity who is eager to see very old things or some Christmas-addict who visits church only on important occasions such as the Easter or Christmas and he wants to enjoy the smell of myrrh burnt, the flowers, the choir music, the dress worn by the choir and the priest and the music of the organ.

            Finally the speaker realizes that the church is a serious house on a serious earth. A church is a symbol of man’s sincere search for the ultimate meaning of life. Science and technology cannot solve his spiritual needs. That is why the speaker himself comes to the church again and again when he is tired of the problems of life. A church is equipped with baptismal fond, flowers and the graveyard where “all human glories are buried” with his bones. Thus the ceremonies of most important events in man’s life such as birth, marriage and death are conducted in the church. In this sense we can say that this is a religious poem. Thus the first meaning of the title “Church Going” is affirmed. The poem underlines the truth that the power and the glory of God cannot be destroyed by the advancement of science and technology. On the other hand the church will continue to be the centre focusing universal love and peace and giving spiritual solace to man’s problems and sufferings in his life.

Strange Meeting- Wilfred Owen

Strange Meeting- Wilfred Owen

                 Wilfred Owen is a war poet. His poems express the pity and anger he felt towards war. His poem, "Strange Meeting" is also a record of war. According to George Sampson, "Strange Meeting is the most memorable poem of the period of the first world war." "My subject is war", Owen wrote, "and the pity of war. The poetry is in the pity." Indeed, Owen discusses war as a tragic and pitiful experience. His approach is realistic and he stresses the waste and devastation caused by war.

           

In Strange Meeting, the narrator, after his death, meets one of the enemy soldiers he had killed in the war, in the hell or in the underworld. The miserable experiences in the war helps him to understand the naked truth that the enemy in war is one-self. The soldiers are the victims of the war. This knowledge makes the narrator and the stranger he met, friends.

            The opening line is a reflection of the idea that death is but an escape for a soldier from his miserable life. The escape is to the underworld, described as a long tunnel. The tunnel is full of sleepers. While probing along the sleepers, suddenly, one of them springs up. He looks at the poet in sympathy. For, it is the German soldier, whom the poet has killed on the previous day. The poet wonders, why there are marks of sorrow on the face of the soldier.

            According to the apparition, his distress is due to the loss of chance to warn the world about the truth of war. The consequence of each war is deterioration. It will tuck a nation from progress. The speaker wishes to rush to the battle field and to wash the clogged wheels of the chariot with the pure water of brother hood.

            However, the speaker realizes that human beings will only continue the course. They will either be satisfied or adjusted with the ruins made by the war; or they may be discontented. If discontented, they will turn into greater violence. The speaker had courage, knowledge, wisdom and ability, yet could not stop the course. Wilfred Owen speaks with a prophetic vision, when he says; there is no escape for men from modern war. The speaker, after his death wants to reveal this truth to the human world. For that, he wishes to pour his spirit. He wants to avoid wounds and cess of war. Owen here represents himself as a pacifist.

            To conclude, through the poem, Owen gives stress to the need for peace. Each nation fails to realize the fact that they are marching backwards while indulging in war. The real service of an individual to his nation will be his retreat from the battle. The soldiers are also warned that they are their own enemies so long as they fight.

The Scholar-Gipsy

"The Scholar-Gipsy"

            

The speaker of "The Scholar-Gipsy" describes a beautiful rural setting in the pastures, with the town of Oxford lying in the distance. He watches the shepherd and reapers working amongst the field, and then tells the shepherd that he will remain out there until sundown, enjoying the scenery and studying the towers of Oxford. All the while, he will keep his book beside him.

            His book tells the famous story by Joseph Glanvill, about an impoverished Oxford student who leaves his studies to join a band of gypsies. Once he was immersed within their community, he learned the secrets of their trade.

            After a while, two of the Scholar-Gipsy's Oxford associates found him, and he told them about the traditional gypsy style of learning, which emphasizes powerful imagination. His plan was to remain with the gypsies until he learned everything he could, and then to tell their secrets to the world.

Regularly interjecting his own wonder into the telling, the speaker continues the scholar-gipsy's story. Every once in a while, people would claim to have seen him in the Berkshire moors. The speaker imagines him as a shadowy figure who is waiting for the "spark from heaven," just like everyone else on Earth is. The speaker even claims to have seen the scholar-gipsy himself once, even though it has been over two hundred years since his story first resonated through the halls of Oxford.

            Despite that length of time, the speaker does not believe the scholar-gipsy could have died, since he had renounced the life of mortal man, including those things that wear men out to death: "repeated shocks, again, again/exhaust the energy of strongest souls." Having chosen to repudiate this style of life, the scholar-gipsy does not suffer from such "shocks," but instead is "free from the sick fatigue, the languid doubt." He has escaped the perils of modern life, which are slowly creeping up and destroying men like a "strange disease."

            The speaker finishes by imploring that the scholar-gipsy avoids everyone who suffers from this "disease," lest he become infected as well.

Joseph Andrews by Henry Fielding

 Joseph Andrews

     Joseph Andrews is the main character of the novel Joseph Andrews written by Henry Fielding. He is shown as son of Gaffar and Gammer Andrews in the expository part of the novel. Pamela stands to be her sister who is married with Mr. Booby because of her resoluteness with the sanctity of her chastity. Excellent cudgel player, Joseph Andrews was an apprentice with Sir Thomas Booby on his shire. He was bird keeper there. His voice was so musical ‘that it rather allured the birds than terrified them.’ He was soon shifter to the dog-kennel.

    Soon he was deputed on stable where he worked with honesty and dedication that he becomes apple of everyone’s eyes. His coming to London with Booby family makes him fashionable enough with respect to hair cut, costumes and manners. He had already ‘learnt to read and write by the goodness of his father.’ He is well versed in Bible. He becomes an accomplished youth. Joseph Andrews, a bird keeper, then a dog keeper and then a horse keeper gets notable position in the heart of Lady Booby who acquires him as her pageboy from Sir Thomas Booby. 

     To lady Booby,’ Joe was the handsomest and genteelest footman in the kingdom’. ‘She would now walk out with him into Hyde Park in a morning, and when tired, which happened almost every minute, would lean on his arm, and converse with him in great familiarity. Whenever she stepped out of her coach, she would take him by the hand, and sometimes, for fear of stumbling, press it very hard.’ Despite all the favours, these ‘innocent freedoms’ had no effect on Joseph Andrews who was a paragon of male chastity. 

     After the death of Sir Thomas Booby, Lady Booby spends only six days in reclusion. On seventh day, Lady Booby calls Joseph Andrews in her bedroom and shows advances towards him. Joseph Andrews, who believes that chastity in man is as important as in woman, shows his indifference to those advances. Failing in her advances towards Joe, Lady Booby turns him out of her mansion. He leaves Booby House and sets out on journey to his country home.

     In the way, he is robbed off. He hardly escapes from death in a cold ditch. He reaches an inn where there is Parson Adam, an old acquaintance of him. Betty, a maid servant showers her loves on him but he declines all of them gently. Mr. Two Wouse tries to entrap her but is caught red handed. Parson Adam comes to know that his wife didn’t pack the sermons in his belongings, so he also returns to countryside along-with Joseph Andrews.  

     The whole way they face a series of hardships, adventures and exploits. Fanny, found by Parson, joins them in the second inn where they meet after a storm. In the way, they also meet Mr. Wilson who becomes a source of salvation as well as an agent of reversal in the action. Finally they reach their country side and again face maneuverings of Lady Booby who joins them later. When she comes to know that Fanny and Joseph are going to be married, she knits a plot to sabotage their marriage but fails. Mr. Booby and Pamela’s appearance escorts the couple honourably but the uncovering of the theft of a baby girl from Andrews by Peddler turns out to be an alarming havoc of incest marriage. Soon we find that Joseph Andrews was not the son of Andrews but son of Mr. Wilson who had lost him when he was just an infant.

     In this way, Joseph Andrews’ resoluteness in his Christian virtues and male chastity results into a happy ending. Once driven away from the Booby’s House as a dejected and rejected pageboy, Joseph Andrews turns out to be the brother of Pamela who is wife of Mr. Booby, a rich landlord, and latterly the son of Mr. Wilson, a well respected man in society.

    Joseph Andrews will always be remembered for his piety, purity, perseverance and unflinching faith in religious values. Henry Fielding was true in saying: ‘Examples work more forcibly on the mind than precepts. 

Work and Play

Work and Play

            The poem Work and Play by Ted Hughes is about a comparison between a swallow and human beings that are on a day trip. The swallow, is at work in the poem and is feeling content. The humans, however, are supposed to be relaxing and having fun, but they feel miserable instead.

            The writer is being biased in his poem. He tends to be in favour of the swallow. The poem is describing the people as 'polluting' the environment. The message of the poem is that we shouldn't destroy our environment and our health by 'baking' ourselves under the sun. The poem talks about the tourists arriving and then leaving unhappily. The writer is also describing the swallow's day, what it does to entertain itself and returning to its home at night. The poem is split into four, unequal stanzas.

             The first three stanzas start off with a description of the swallow and then humans. The last stanza, however, starts off with a description of the humans and then the swallow. This makes us stop, think and more eager to finish the poem, as it's a change of pattern. The writer perhaps wants to leave the reader with a positive and happy image rather than a negative and discomforting image.

            The writer uses a lot of alliteration and metaphor. He uses the word 'seamstress' to describe the swallow, meaning a dressmaker. This metaphor is used to show how she sews something using the sky and water as her material, which makes it now an extended metaphor. The writer then uses 'But' again and brings back the negative image. The humans are described as " ...laid out like wounded" the metaphor is showing their pain in sunburn, laid out in rows, endangering themselves, like a line of wounded soldiers. The metaphor, “Flat as in ovens” and “Roasting and basting” give us the impression they are being cooked. They're being compared to cooking meat. The word 'basting' is describing the humans putting on sun cream and there's a bit of irony between the way we cook meat. The word 'torment' shows us their agony and the word 'blue' gives us an impression of the heat, as hot as a blue flame and the sun's harmful rays.

            The three metaphors he provided us with a powerful image of the swallow. The swallow is rejoicing because, everyone has left, her day is over and now she can relax with happiness. The irony of the poem, makes think that a swallow who works hard can still be so happy with its life and there's us, who laze about and is feeling unhappy. The writer has used a lot of good descriptive metaphors and similes in his poem.

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