The eagle Tennyson

The eagle He clasps the crag with crooked hands, Close to the sun in lonely lands, Ring’d with the azure world,he stands. The wrinkled sea beneath him crawls, He watched from his mountain walls, And like a thunderbolt,he falls.

Part 1 1 An introduction to the poet Tennyson is a moralist,a great poet of nature,a real artist,linking visual pictures with musical expressions,an excellent choice and taste of words.His poetry is rich in poetic images and melodious language.Tennyson’s poetry,natural descriptions provide a series of metaphors on the changing state of the poet’s mind.

2 The meaning of “eagle”

Eagle,the popular name for any of several large birds of prey that belong to the hawk family.It is remarkable for strength、size、graceful figure、keenness of vision、and extraordinary flight.

2 The main idea of the poem It used only some words to describes the eagle stands firmly on the crag and then falls down on the sea.The first stanza describes grand posture of the eagle, topward the heaven and backward the sky .It is stationary.While in the second stanza,it describes the eagle rushes to the sea quickly .It is dynamic.

Part 2 Analysis of the poem Tennyson can be said to be a conventional poet in that he does not often breach the rule of the English language.This being the case,one may still find much foregrounding in his poem.Even in this short poem,we can notice some significant foregrounded features.More interestingly,these features seem to work together to convey the aggressive,powerfulness and the unyielding character of the eagle. 1)The first feature that strikes us in this poem is Tennyson’s employment of sounds.The most suggestive line in terms of its sound effect is line one.It can be easily noticed that there is a dominance of plosive consonants in the line. /k/ occurs four times, /g/, /p/and /t/ respectively once.As we all know,plosives are a class of sounds which when pronounced require greater muscular strength.The plosive in this poem therefore,may suggest the powerfulness of the eagle, thus reinforcing the meaning expressed by the wording of the line.This is further supported by the occurrence of /a/ in three of the four stressed syllables.The articulation of /a/ requires more muscular tension and strength than that of most vowels in English.

Both the high proportion of plosives and the repeated occurrence of the vowel /a/ in this poem create a strong onomatopoeic effect. 2)Another feature to note in this poem is the humanization of the eagle.The poet has used the masculine third-person pronoun to refer to the eagle throughout the text.The subjective case he occurs four times and the objective case him once.He also uses the masculine third-person possessive pronoun his once.We can also see that the eagle is important,for it reminds us of the wisdom and strength which typically characterize man.What is more significant is the choice of the masculine third-person pronouns as opposed to the feminine.It matter-of-factly bestows great masculinity upon the eagle.Had the feminine pronoun been used,readers would naturally associate femininity to the eagle and the powerful image of the eagle would be completely altered.

3)A further feature which is worth commenting is that the closing line of the first and that of the second stanza run parallel to each other.Each of the lines begins with an adverbial followed by the subject and the ends with a monosyllabic verb.This syntactic arrangement functions to knit the text closely together.But more significantly,it draws attention to the two lines.When the reader carefully examines the two lines,he may find that the adverbial is the longest element of each clause and is placed in the initial position.It suggests that once the eagle falls,the prey cannot avoid being caught and eaten up.The placing of focus on the word stands in line three forcefully emphasizes the strong and unyielding character of the eagle. 4)Then,it may be of some interest to point out that the verb falls may have a double meaning in the poem.It can be either mean ‘to descend from a highaltitude’ or ‘to drop down dead’.Thus the placing of the adverbial in the initial position may also express the unexpectedness of the death of the poet’s friend,Arthur Hallam in whose memory this poem is wtitten.

5)Finally,let us consider the figure of speech which are used in this poem.After reading the whole poem,we can easily find that each sentence is ended with a consonant /s/ at the end of the rhyme.In the two stanzas,the first three sentences and the last three sentences respectively have the same rhyme as /ands/ and /ls/.Besides,from the first sentence,alliteration is used,as clasps,crag,crooked.These three words shows the strengthfulness of the eagle.Also,from the third sentence,there is an omission,the poet uses Wing’d instead of Winged. In the last sentence,there used the figure of speech of simile and overstatement.The eagle is regarded as a thunderbolt,of cause it exaggerates the speed of the eagle,but it vividly shows the eagle’s keenness and graceful figure. Last,the whole poem used seven syllables of /k/ ,as clasps, crag, crooked, close, wrinked, crawls. /kl/ and /kr/ also show the strengthfulness of the eagle.