the world Flashcards
structure
14 line Petrarchan sonnet (contrasts chaos, suggesting beneath the facade of the orderly of the world there is sin and evil)
division between octave and sestet shows world in two contrasting lights (day and night)
when was the poem written
1854
volta
portrays the naked truth of the world compared to its beautiful facade depicted in octave
By day she woos ne, soft, exceeding fair but at nightso changeth she
choice of female pronoun,
connotations of the ‘day’ as seductive and manipulative (idea of the femme fatale), day accentuated temporal delights and people yeild to temptation
night unmasks the truths and is honest whilst the light of day conceals the truth of the night
use of me- adds personal intimacy, alludes to rossetti’s personal journey through religion and her beliefs and difficulties
soft exceeding fair are ‘feminine adjectives (idea of the gentle, beautiful facade of this temptation)
moon- contextual link to the moon and the idea that women are controlled by the moon (alludes to the inconsistent nature of women like the changes of the moon)
‘subtle serpants gliding in her hair’
sibilance- lurid atmosphere
allusion to medusa- punishment for temptation
hair-as in babylon, is a promiscious image in victorian society
loathesome and foul
binary opposites to previosu feminine adjectives to describe the day, shows the sinister nature of temptation
‘hideous leprosy’ biblical reference
biblical reference to lepracy as punishment for sin (reference to highgate, punishment for sin e.g sexual disease)
suggets when temptation is revealed in the night its sinister ugliness is revealed, shows callousness and corruption of sin e.g sex ending up in studs
‘by day she woos me to the outer air,
Ripe fruits, sweet flowers and full satiety
sweet and rich imagrey of temporal delights and sexual and romantic imagrey
fruit=tempation (reference to adam and eve in genesis)
connotations of these luxuries as sinister rejects pre raphelite attitudes and aestheticism
‘But through the night, a beast she grins at me’
satan and sin illusion, darkness = hell, temptation revealed as a beast, the devil (idea that temptation leads yo to satan)
with night comes the fall of man
‘a very monster void of love and prayer’
monster- devil, temptation lures you yto the devil and becomes most apparent at night
By day she stands a lie: by night she stands In all the naked horror of the truth
naked- could reference rossetti personal experience with prostitutes at highgate
‘with pushing horns and clawed and clutching hands’
blatant satanic imagrey of horns and claws, shows danger and fate of temptation
how does this subvert the petrachan sonnet
-crude imagrey of sin and the fate of temptation subverts the petrachan sonnet
‘till my feet cloven too, take hold on hell’
again blatant satanic imagrey, of the cloven hooves of satan, alludes to the biblical view that sin gives disfigurements and illnesses
could refer to sexual disease rossetti saw in the highgate home for fallen women
could also be a reference to incubbi and succubi mythological figures who yeilded to temptation and were sexually sinful
contextual link of the moon
idea that women are physically controlled by the moon
symbolism of night
night is temptation- e.g prositution link?
fruit imagrey significance
sweet and rich imagery- allusion to temporal delights
fruit- temptation (Adam and Eve)
devil imagrey
balant satanic imagrey shows fate- sin leads you to satan (subverts devotion of love of a Petrarchan sonnet)
anaphora of ‘woos’
difficulty to resist
‘my feet, cloven too’
link to satan cloven hooves- biblical idea that evil things give you disfigurements/illness (link to olunteer work in highgate)
also a reference to incubi and succubi (mythological figures who are sexually sinful)
who could the “She” in the poem refer to
-a specific woman
-representation of women in a wider sense - female temptress
-(sexual) desires or temptations
-female as the embodiment of temptation - becomes an eve figure
