Stanzas written in Dejection, near Naples- Percy Byshee Shelley Flashcards
When was the poem written and where was the poem written?
-1818
-Italy
What did Shelley try to do before writing this poem?
-Get custody of his and Harriet’s children > denied
What happened when Mary became pregnant in 1818?
-Baby died prematurely
When did Mary give birth to Clara?
1817
What happened to his child Clara in 1818?
She fell ill while traveling in Italy and died
What did Clara’s death cause?
-Mary Shelley fell into a Great Depression > held Shelley partly responsible for Claras death
What are the themes of the poem?
-Solitude
-Nature
-Spirituality
-Sadness/depression
-Life’s pleasure
-Time
What does the sibilance in the poem reflect?
Mimicks the sea spray and waves
How does Shelley build a joyous and lively scene?
-Metaphor > “The waves are dancing fast and bright”
What is significant about “The purple noon’s transparent might, The breath of the moist earth is light,”?
-Asyndeton > makes the thoughts feel rushed and quick > inescapableness of his emotion
-raw emotion
What is significant about the last line of stanza 1?
-Iambic hexameter > lengthens the line > shows true depths and lengths of his loneliness
-Reflects his own loneliness and makes him reflect on it
What does the quiet sibilance of “seaweeds strewn; …… star-showers” reflect?
-reflects the quietness of solitude and how he internalises this emotion
What is significant about “How sweet!Did any heart now share in my emotion.”?
-Last line longer than expected > heightens the speakers solitude > suggests how ongoing this feeling is to him
-“Emotion” ends in a feminine rhyme
-The line ‘falls off’ > unfinished much like the speakers suffering and depression / his motivations
What is significant about the repetition of ‘nor’?
Emphasises what he does not have and how he believes he does not have much in his life > significant due to his obsession with personal love
What is the significance of ending the lines with dashes?
-Suggest the relentlessness of his life > how there is no point going on any more
What is significant about “I could lie down like a tired child,”?
-Simile suggests his vulnerability due to his emotions
-Children > his children are not with him either dead or in England
What is significant about “till death like sleep might steal on me”?
-Death as respite from pain
-Sleep > comfort > find comfort in death but not in living
What is significant about the ideas of the sea in the poem?
-See is eternal and the speaker is transient
What is significant about the last line of the poem?
-Notes beauty will linger > long after the speaker and his troubles are gone > finds consolation in nature
-death means the end of his pain > life’s beauty as eternal gives him comfort
-Daughters memory remains > allows speaker to find enjoyment despite her death > her beauty as eternal like the nature
What type of form is the poem?
Spenserian stanza
What does the iambic hexameter create on the page?
-Longer line jutting out > subtly highlighting the speaker’s alienation from his surroundings.
What meter does the poem use?
-first 8lines of the stanzas > Iambic pentameter
-9th line > iambic hexameter
What is the rhyme scheme in the poem?
ABABBCBCC > tightly constructed rhyme scheme is that the poem feels very controlled and musical. The musicality of the poem itself mirrors the beauty of the natural landscape it describes.
