General Feedback: Approaching the named poem 1. ALWAYS ALWAYS ALWAYS start with a one sentence summary of what is going on(or at the very least what you think is going on) in the poem. Without this, your analysis are just random comments on random quotes floating around The opening summary anchors your comments and quotes in meaning – what is being said.
In ‘Echo’, Rossetti uses a speaker who seems to be grieving for, and longing for reunion with, a lost love whom the reader assumes has died.
In ‘Whatsoever is Right’ the speaker expresses a celebration of and longing for death and union with God, as sanctity from a world of torment. This is undercut by a sense of personal doubt that she has done ‘enough’ to achieve it.
General Feedback: Approaching the named poem 2. Also anchor your points in meaning – I refer to this as using quotes in context “The speaker longs for her loved one to come back with ‘eyes as bright as sunlight on a stream’ to suggest the youthfulness and vitality of her lost love, or at least the vitality of how they appear to her in her dreams.
Rossetti uses the imagery of “sunlight on a stream” to create an image of vitality and youthfulness
Meaning is key
What is imagery? Visual – used by the poets to create visual images in our imagination Aural – the use of sounds in the poem to create feelings / moods / atmospheres / emotions Simile – eyes as bright as ‘sunlight on a stream’ Sibilant alliteration Metaphor – the entrance to heaven is described with the metaphor ‘that slow door’ Plosive alliteration Personification Aspirant alliteration Connotations Onomatopoeia Caesura Assonance Rhyme
What are form and structure? Organisation of stanzas Repetition Anaphora Metre and stresses Foregrounding End focus
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope.
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. Christina Rossetti begins her poem "De Profundis" by questioning the arrangement of the universe, observing that Earth feels isolated from the stars.
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. . The narrator goes on to complain that even the monotonously revolving moon is out of her reach.
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. Whenever she looks at the stars and sun she has the one same thought, aware that it is in vain she has a strong desire to escape her human, Earth-bound state. Although she is aware of the futility of her wish to attain the "joy and beauty" of the universe, she still strains her heart towards the stars and tenuously holds onto the hope that she can reach them.
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. She has a strong desire to escape her human, Earth-bound state. Although she is aware of the futility of her wish to attain the "joy and beauty" of the universe, she still strains her heart towards the stars and tenuously holds onto the hope that she can reach them.
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. Anaphora apostrophe ‘built / set’
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. ABAB pronoun "she personification disparaging jealousy
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. But – ‘without my heart feeling one desire’ Colon
De Profundis (Out of the depths) Oh why is heaven built so far, Oh why is earth set so remote? I cannot reach the nearest star That hangs afloat. I would not care to reach the moon, One round monotonous of change; Yet even she repeats her tune Beyond my range. I never watch the scatter'd fire Of stars, or sun's far-trailing train, But all my heart is one desire, And all in vain: For I am bound with fleshly bands, Joy, beauty, lie beyond my scope; I strain my heart, I stretch my hands, And catch at hope. Metaphor of a bound prisoner. Parallelism
Despair Frustration Trapped Oppressed Constricted Restricted Determined Longing Aspiration What impression do you get of the speaker’s state of mind in ‘De Profundis’?