Song Flashcards
1
Q
Summary of Song
A
- a mourning poem
- tells what the speaker wont do
- talking about what wont happen/ what not to do
2
Q
What poem is it similar to?
A
Shakespeare poem -> Sonnet 130
- alternative version of this
- Series of statements of what his mistress isnt like
- Rossetti made this poem to shadow out alternative poem + negating it
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3
Q
What examples are there to show Rossetti negating through this poem?
A
- “Plant thou no roses”
- “Sing no sad songs for me”
- “i shall not see the shadows”
4
Q
How is it structured?
A
- 2x - 8 line stanzas
- 4x quatrains
- ABCB rhyme pattern
- Odd numbered lines done rhyme
- Complicates it -> Line 5 “tree” rhymes with “me” line 6
- Does it between stanzas “wet” and “forget” “set and forget”
- Lets you hear sounds of the verse
5
Q
What word is repeated?
A
- Forget
- “if thou wilt forget”
- “Haply i may forget”
- You forget, i forget
- Pivots from first stanza -> what person should/shouldnt do
- Second stanza -> what speaker will do/not do
6
Q
what is the world represented as
A
- Pain and difficulty
- Dead speaker
- Rainy weather + shadows
- Moody weather
- Rossetti could be picking up lament from Shakespeares play Cymbeline
- “fear no more the hear of the sun, nor the furious winters rages”
7
Q
“nightingale”
A
- picks up tradition of speaking on nightingales as songbirds
- Figures for the poet / images
- Reference to Philomela - Ovid’s Metamorphoses - transformed into nightingale + sings it
- Tradition that it sings with breast pressed against a thorn -> pain produces song
8
Q
What did Rossetti engage with?
A
- Debate about doctrine Soul Sleep
- Emerges to solve a problem
- People die everyday - Christians hope to be resurrected when time comes to an end into perfect union with God
- People be judged
- Problem - between that period of time
- Came up with idea - state of Limbo waiting for second coming of christ
9
Q
“Dreaming through the twilight Thatcher doth not rise nor set”
A
- This references her believe of Soul Sleep
- “Rise” - Twilight in the middle - Like the soul rising on the last day
10
Q
What ideas does the poem balance?
A
- possibility of addressee remembering or forgetting speaker
- Speaker remembering or forgetting the addressee
- Will we look back
11
Q
What question does the poem end on?
A
- Will we after death look back on the world?
- with what emotions? affection? pity? sympathy?
- or will we leave world behind to state of soul sleep or blessed resurrection
