Skip to main content

Posts

Showing posts with the label Poetry

DIGGING BY SEAMUS HEANEY SUMMARY AND ANALYSIS

➥ DIGGING – HEANEY About the Author Seamus Heaney was born to a Catholic family on April 13, 1939, the eldest of nine children, on his family’s ancestral farm in County Derry, Northern Ireland. His poetry was greatly influenced by the landscape and traditions of this region, as well as by the religious strife developing between Catholics and Protestants in nearby Belfast, the capital of Northern Ireland. The landscape of rural County Derry is the setting and inspiration for much of his poetry. At age 12 Heaney received a scholarship to study at St. Columb’s College in Derry, where he learned Latin and Irish. He went on to study Anglo-Saxon at Queen’s University in Belfast. He earned a degree in English language and literature from Queen’s in 1961. He then attended St. Joseph’s Training College, also in Belfast. During this time he became inspired to write poetry, greatly influenced by the work of two contemporaries, English poet Ted Hughes (1930–98) and Irish poet Patrick Kavanagh (190...

ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF W. B. YEATS BY W. H. AUDEN SUMMARY AND ANALYSIS

➥ ELEGY ON THE DEATH OF W. B. YEATS – W. H. AUDEN About the Author Wystan Hugh Auden, known more commonly as W. H. Auden, (February 21, 1907 –September 29, 1973) was an English poet and one of the most influential poets of the twentieth century. Younger than William Butler Yeats and T.S. Eliot, the two titans who had dominated English turn-of-the-century verse, Auden assimilated the techniques of these and the other modernists, becoming a master of poetry that was both rigorously formal and radically new. Auden was a poet of prodigious talent and output, living at a time of immense transition both in the world at large and in the poetic scene in particular. During the decades in which he lived, the ambitious, Modern poetry of Ezra Pound, Eliot, and Yeats would give way to a flood of contemporary poetic schools—from the Confessionalism of Robert Lowell to the formalism of Philip Larkin to the postmodernism of John Ashbery—all of which have competed for dominance in poetry ever since. Au...

ANTHEM FOR DOOMED YOUTH BY WILFRED EDWARD OWEN SUMMARY AND ANALYSIS

 ➥ ANTHEM FOR DOOMED YOUTH – WILFRED OWEN About the Author Wilfred Edward Salter Owen was born on March 18, 1893. Owen was regarded by many as the leading poet of the first world war and was mostly known for his war poetry based on the horrors of trench warfare. Wilfred Owen was influenced early on by such authors as John Keats and the writings of the Bible. Born the oldest of four children, Owen was raised as an Anglican of the evangelical school. After leaving the school, he briefly attended the university of London where he worked as a student-teacher at Wyle Cop School teaching to pay his way for tuition. He was on the Continent teaching until he visited a hospital for the wounded and then decided, in September, 1915, to return to England and enlist. “I came out in order to help these boys– directly by leading them as well as an officer can; indirectly, by watching their sufferings that I may speak of them as well as a pleader can. I have done the first” (October, 1918). Owen w...

THE SOLDIER BY RUPERT BROOKE SUMMARY AND ANALYSIS

➥ “THE SOLDIER” – RUPERT BROOKE About the Author Rupert Brooke’s (1887–1915) most evocative and poignant poems—and an example of the dangers of romanticizing World War I, comforting the survivors but downplaying the grim reality. Written in 1914, the lines are still used in military memorials today. Rupert Brooke had traveled, written, fallen in and out of love, joined great literary movements, and recovered from a mental collapse all before the declaration of war, when he volunteered for the Royal Naval Division. He saw combat action in the fight for Antwerp in 1914, as well as a retreat. As he awaited a new deployment, he wrote the short set of five 1914 War Sonnets, which concluded with one called The Soldier. Soon after he was sent to the Dardanelles, where he refused an offer to be moved away from the front lines—an offer sent because his poetry was so well-loved and good for recruiting—but died on April 23rd, 1915 of blood poisoning from an insect bite that weakened a body alread...

ODE TO A DISTANT PROSPECT OF ETON COLLEGE By THOMAS GRAY SUMMARY AND ANALYSIS

 ➥ODE TO A DISTANT PROSPECT OF ETON COLLEGE – GRAY About the Author Thomas Gray, (born Dec. 26, 1716, London—died July 30, 1771, Cambridge, Cambridgeshire, Eng.), English poet whose “An Elegy Written in a Country Church Yard” is one of the best known of English lyric poems. Although his literary output was slight, he was the dominant poetic figure in the mid-18th century and a precursor of the Romantic movement. Born into a prosperous but unhappy home, Gray was the sole survivor of 12 children of a harsh and violent father and a long-suffering mother, who operated a millinery business to educate him. A delicate and studious boy, he was sent to Eton in 1725 at the age of eight. There he formed a “Quadruple Alliance” with three other boys who liked poetry and classics and disliked rowdy sports and the Hogarthian manners of the period. They were Horace Walpole, the son of the prime minister; the precocious poet Richard West, who was closest to Gray; and Thomas Ashton. The style of lif...

ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHE LINES (150-476) BY JOHN DRYDEN Summary and Analysis

 ➥“ABSALOM AND ACHITOPHEL” LINES (150-476) – DRYDEN About the Author John Dryden, (born Aug. 9, 1631, Aldwinkle, Northamptonshire, Eng.—died May 1, 1700, London), British poet, dramatist, and literary critic. The son of a country gentleman, Dryden was educated at the University of Cambridge. His poetry celebrating the Restoration so pleased Charles II that he was named poet laureate (1668) and, two years later, royal historiographer. Even after losing the laureateship and his court patronage in 1688 with the accession of William III, he succeeded in dominating the literary scene with his numerous works, many attuned to politics and public life. Several of his nearly 30 comedies, tragedies, and dramatic operas—including Marriage A-la-Mode (1672), Aureng-Zebe (1675), and All for Love (1677)—were outstandingly successful. His Of Dramatick Poesie (1668) was the first substantial piece of modern dramatic criticism. Turning away from drama, he became England’s greatest verse satirist, pr...

To His Coy Mistress By Andrew Marvell Summary and Analysis

➥Marvell: "To His Coy Mistress” About the Author Andrew Marvell (March 31, 1621 – August 16, 1678) was an English metaphysical poet, who was largely ignored during his lifetime. He rose to prominence over the centuries and is now considered to be one of the most remarkable poets of the seventeenth century. Marvell’s reputation was overshadowed for a long time by his revolutionary politics, which included a stint as a parliamentarian. Most of his verse, unfortunately, consists of satires written for political ends, and suffers as a result. His lyric poetry, however, unfortunately took no subject but himself. While the result consists of beautiful, effortless, flowing verses that roll off the tongue and through the mind with an ease unequaled among poets of his era, his writings offer little to the beauty of the world in which we live. Summary of the Text Andrew Marvell wrote “To His Coy Mistress” in iambic tetrameter, which means that each line has four iambic feet. Most of the tim...

The Canonization By John Donne Summary and Analysis

 ➥THE CANONIZATION – DONNE About the Author John Donne (24 January 1572 — 31 March 1631) was an English poet, scholar, soldier and secretary. He is considered the most prominent member of the metaphysical poets, with his works noted for their metaphorical and sensual style. His works include sonnets, love poems, religious poems, Latin translations, epigrams, elegies, songs, and satires. Donne became a cleric in the Church of England as well as Dean of St Paul’s Cathedral in London (1621–1631) and is known for his sermons. His poetry work often covers the theme of religion, something about which he often theorised, as well as showing a great knowledge of English society, which he often criticised. Donne married Anne More and had twelve children. Donne and his family lived in poverty for many years, and he was not really celebrated as a writer until the 20th century. Donne died in 1631, at the age of 59. Summary of the Text Introduction:  “The Canonization” makes the case that l...