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Influences of Victorian literature
Influences of Victorian literature
Themes in Victorian poetry
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AURA REQUIMEN 12EAD “Texts reflect the values / perspectives of different times and contexts.” Texts are representations of the composers' responses to changing societal norms and values of their epoch. Conservative Victorian sensibilities are challenged in the poetic collection “Sonnets from the Portuguese – Aurora Leigh and Other Poems” (1845-46) [SFTP] by Elizabeth Barrett Browning. On a similar note, F. Scott Fitzgerald recreates the post-war moral scarcity and hedonism of the Jazz Age in his 1925 novel “The Great Gatsby” [TGG]. The comparative study of both texts and their relationship with the composers' historical and biological contexts expose their themes of love, romance, and religion through the retrospection of gender representation …show more content…
The composer incorporates several biblical allusions throughout the poems in conjunction with the synecdoches for hope and sex to further the relationship between Catholicism and love. In Sonnet XXII, for instance, the object correlative“to drop some golden orb” carries sexual connotations as a spiritual experience. The composer depicts sex as akin to purification or transcending heaven in the allusive metaphor “isolate pure spirits” to further accentuate the Victorian ideal of romantic love as a religious experience. These references coincide with hope as the primary theme and developing force in the sonnets through “silver” as an extended metaphor, manifesting as a “silver answer” in Sonnet I to illustrate the potential of Browning’s love and addressed as a “silver iterance” of the Beloved’s confession to the persona. Love, depicted as a sustaining and transformative force, impacts the composer’s growth shown in her direct, passionate tone in Sonnet XLIII. The anaphora of “I love thee” is a metaphor for her newfound confidence and explicit defiance of her society’s standards as a result of the change spurred by the spirituality of her romantic experiences. The composer, therefore, not only defines the influence of religion on the Victorian era but also portrays its standards as oppressive and challenges the norm through the
This section will compare the quantity of musical qualities used in Arcadelt, Marenso and Gesialdo’s music to demonstrate how the complexity of word painting grew throughout the sixteenth century. Often times the lyrics of pieces affected the madrigalists’ choice of musical qualities they used to convey the text in a piece. Word painting in Arcadelt’s Il bianco e dolce cigno is demonstrated through his use tonality. In mm. 1-15 the text says,“The white and gentle swan dies singing, and I, weeping, approach the end of my life.” Immediately at the beginning of the piece we experience the major feeling key that portrays the euphemism of the swans death, which signifies climaxed love. This is emphasized even further in measure m. 15 with the strong V-I cadence of the four voices in F major, setting the piece in a happy tone. This compares to Solo e pensoso in that they both use tonality as a musical quality but Marenzo uses the contrast between major and minor
The study of F. Scott Fitzgerald’s novel, The Great Gatsby, in conjunction with Elizabeth Barrett Browning’s suite of poetry, Sonnets of the Portuguese, display how oppressive societal expectations and imposed roles constrict individual freedom. Both composers assert this in regard to the role of women within society, as well as the impact of expectations upon the individual. Browning writes sonnets therefore subverting the traditional male form of poetry, rebelling against the patriarchal expectations within Victorian England in order to break through the strict gender roles of the time. Furthermore, through her revelation regarding ideal love, displays how she is able to break the expectations laid upon her by herself and others, and therefore
Elizabeth Barrett-Browning’s ‘Sonnets from the Portuguese’ and F. Scott Fitzgerald’s ‘The Great Gatsby’ reflect the values, attitudes, and ideas of their context. This is explored in Browning’s collection of poems from the Victorian era where she transforms her attitude towards love and conforms to the Christian ideologies of death, prominent in the Victorian epoch. Moreover, Fitzgerald’s 1920s modernist novel portrays the Jazz Age’s sexist values through Gatsby’s relationship with Daisy, while also highlighting the materialistic nature of the time through their perspective of death. Thus, composers manifest the context of their time through their texts in order to comment on their social and personal concerns.
The sonnet opens with a seemingly joyous and innocent tribute to the young friend who is vital to the poet's emotional well being. However, the poet quickly establishes the negative aspect of his dependence on his beloved, and the complimentary metaphor that the friend is food for his soul decays into ugly imagery of the poet alternating between starving and gorging himself on that food. The poet is disgusted and frightened by his dependence on the young friend. He is consumed by guilt over his passion. Words with implicit sexual meanings permeate the sonnet -- "enjoyer", "treasure", "pursuing", "possessing", "had" -- as do allusions to five of the seven "deadly" sins -- avarice (4), gluttony (9, 14), pride (5), lust (12), and envy (6).
John Donne an English metaphysical poet and 16th century preacher made his name through his poems on love and his technique of creating opposing imagery through allegory and language (Ribes, 2007). Once Donne renounced his catholic faith and made a commitment to the Church of England in 1615, he wrote a series of religious poems, hymns, and sermons (Hodgson, 1999). The most well-known of his religious poetry is a series of nineteen Holy Sonnets spanning over the early 16th century, the most famous of these is Holy Sonnet XIV also known as ‘Batter My Heart’. Holy Sonnet XIV’s prominence in modern literature is due to the debate surrounding the intended meaning of the poem and the parallel the writer draws between the act of religious enlightenment and the pleasure derived from sexual activity. The Cambridge Companion to John Donne describes the poem as “best known literary text in English that figures spiritual redemption as a purifying sexual act” (Gibbory, 2006). This essay will link in to the description given by The Cambridge Companion and will apply a feminist reading by drawing on the writing of Judith Butler, Helene Cixous, and Sigmund Freud the theorised reading will be achieved by firstly examining the dominant or received reading of the for-mentioned poem.
T.S. Eliot’s “The Love Song of J Alfred Prufrock” and Mina Loy’s “Songs to Joannes” were considered the traditional love songs in two different spheres. Despite the traditional scope of “Prufrock”, Loy’s “love Song” ignores poetic convention and respecting for form and rhyme. Regarding the Futurist focus on new ideas and rejection of traditional principles, Loy began using Futurist aesthetics to explore her preferred, but socially taboo, subjects: female sexuality. Through this poem, Loy struggles to expose social truths through new ideas, new ways of thinking, and new poetic forms. Readers of Loy’s “Songs” can embrace both her sexual and linguistic passion.
I also used the musical material to suggest that the piece models a Marian Allegory of the Song of Songs. In this piece, as well as countless others, the relationship between G-d and the Virgin Mary painted Mary in many lights, which include an eroticized beauty, a humble saintly figure and as a maternal figure. She took on all these personas so that churchgoers could identify with her more. This essay
Sonnets Sonnets are as the dictionary confirms poems with set rhythmic patterns and Shakespeare's' were no exception. NEARLY ALL SHAKESPEARE'S SONNETS ARE WRITTEN IN THE SAME FORM AND HAVE THE SAME RHYME SCHEME All his sonnets were 14 lines long and these 14 lines were then broken down to three quatrains (four line verse) and one Couplet (two line verse). Within each verse there was a set rhythm and the rhythm that Shakespeare used was known as an iambic pentameter. EACH LINE is HAS 10 syllables. EACH line and divided into 5 'feet' EACH ONE OF TWO SYLLABLES.
In the poem "Sonnet 43", Elizabeth Barrett Browning use literary tools to portray her thoughts on love and its endless possibilities. Her poem is full of figurative language, repetition, and parallelism. In addition, she uses anaphorics to symbolize love and despair. Most people believe love is war, because it always ends on the floor, but with a little love you can go a very long way. Love and admiration is powerful and pure.
In Elizabeth Browning’s poem ‘Sonnet 43’, Browning explores the concept of love through her sonnet in a first person narrative, revealing the intense love she feels for her beloved, a love which she does not posses in a materialistic manner, rather she takes it as a eternal feeling, which she values dearly, through listing the different ways she loves her beloved.
In “Sonnet XVII,” the text begins by expressing the ways in which the narrator does not love, superficially. The narrator is captivated by his object of affection, and her inner beauty is of the upmost significance. The poem shows the narrator’s utter helplessness and vulnerability because it is characterized by raw emotions rather than logic. It then sculpts the image that the love created is so personal that the narrator is alone in his enchantment. Therefore, he is ultimately isolated because no one can fathom the love he is encountering. The narrator unveils his private thoughts, leaving him exposed and susceptible to ridicule and speculation. However, as the sonnet advances toward an end, it displays the true heartfelt description of love and finally shows how two people unite as one in an overwhelming intimacy.
In “Sonnet 43,” Browning wrote a deeply committed poem describing her love for her husband, fellow poet Robert Browning. Here, she writes in a Petrarchan sonnet, traditionally about an unattainable love following the styles of Francesco Petrarca. This may be partly true in Browning’s case; at the time she wrote Sonnets from the Portuguese, Browning was in courtship with Robert and the love had not yet been consummated into marriage. But nevertheless, the sonnet serves as an excellent ...
Transformative power of love can cause a relationship to deepen and develop. Through the manipulation of her sonnets, EBB channels the contextual perspective of love being spiritually transformative. Within the Victorian era, women prior to marriage were considered ‘property’ of their fathers. Social expectation saw women obey their father’s rules and obligation. However, the introduction of her “lover” Robert Browning saw a decrease in the relationship with her father to the point he disowned her. Whilst a decay in her family relationships were present, a growth and development was seen through her love based relationship. The progression of EBB’s sonnets exemplifies her transforming perspective on love, further allowing her to understand and accept her emerging emotions. In sonnet I, the repetition “Spring” signifies her rebirth from a “melancholy past”. The symbolism season further represents the transformative nature of love as their relationships deepens. Within Sonnet XXXII, EBB utilizes an extended metaphor comparing herself to a debased musical instrument which can still play a beautiful tune if the musician is skillful “More like an out of tune worn viol… for perfect strains may float ‘neath master hands.” The changing tone is evident within the Volta, where EBB has progressed from
Much has been made (by those who have chosen to notice) of the fact that in Shakespeare's sonnets, the beloved is a young man. It is remarkable, from a historical point of view, and raises intriguing, though unanswerable, questions about the nature of Shakespeare's relationship to the young man who inspired these sonnets. Given 16th-Century England's censorious attitudes towards homosexuality, it might seem surprising that Will's beloved is male. However, in terms of the conventions of the poetry of idealized, courtly love, it makes surprisingly little difference whether Will's beloved is male or female; to put the matter more strongly, in some ways it makes more sense for the beloved to be male.
During the course of Edmund Spencer’s Amoretti, the “Petrarchan beloved certainly underwent a transformation” (Lever 98); the speaker depicts the beloved as merciless and is not content with being an “unrequited lover” (Roche 1) as present in a Petrarchan sonnet. Throughout Sonnet 37 and Sonnet 54, the speaker provides insight into the beloved not seen within the Petrarchan sonnets; though the speaker does present his uncontrollable love for the beloved, he does so through his dissatisfaction with his position and lack of control. In Sonnet 37, the speaker describes the beloved as an enchantress who artfully captures the lover in her “golden snare” (Spencer, 6) and attempts to warn men of the beloved’s nature. Sonnet 54, the speaker is anguished by the beloved’s ignorance towards his pain and finally denies her humanity. Spencer allows the speaker to display the adversarial nature of his relationship with the beloved through the speaker’s negative description of the beloved, the presentation of hope of escaping from this love, and his discontent with his powerlessness. Spencer presents a power struggle and inverted gender roles between the lover and the beloved causing ultimate frustration for the speaker during his fight for control.