The anthology, Nineteenth-Century Literature Criticism, provides that Landon produced six volumes of poetry, four essays and tons of shorter works. She was majorly influenced by the great poets of the Romantic era, such as Wordsworth, Byron and Shelly. Her poetry much resembled the works of Lord Byron because she too adopted the Byronic hero. However, rather than being a men, she created female versions, which resembled Byron’s Don Juan (p. 231).
According to the website; Columbia Granger's World of Poetry, Letitia Elizabeth Landon, known to most literature enthusiasts by her pen name; L.E.L, was born on August 14, in Chelsea, England in 1803. Her parents were by no means wealthy; however, the family was able to live quite comfortably until Landon’s father’s company, which supplied resources to the army, began losing money due to the end of the war of 1812. In turn, Landon’s family was forced to leave their previous way of life for a more frugal one. Landon received most of her education at home. She was quite a shy girl but enjoyed reading and writing poetry from a very young age. Luckily Landon discovered her talent for writing poetry because when her father lost his job, she had to find a way to contribute monetarily.
LANDON’S BIG BREAK:
With the help from family connections to Editor William Jergan, she was able to showcase her work in the Literary Gazette. Knowing she would face critizism, at the time, for being a female writer, at the age of seventeen she published he first poem, “Rome,” in 1818, under the name “L.” She then went on to produce a number of other works, now under her new name “L.E.L,” that failed to bring her much income but made readers curious as to who the person behind the pseudonym was. When her father...
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... to 49 the speaker is sad and thinking about the different ways society has treated her and how she is forced to have a fake personality in order to please people and fit in.
2. From lines 49 to 68 the speaker is positive that there is more to life than what she has been living. She’s empowered by this thought and is confident that she is special.
3. However, from lines 69 to 84 she “comes back down to earth” and commences to put herself down again. The speaker even refers to herself as worthless.
4. In lines 85 to the end of the poem is where we can find the true meaning of the piece. After what seems to be a very bi-polar first part, the speaker finally settles with being one of a kind. She claims that “song has touched her lips with fire/ and made her heart a shrine;” and feels as if she has this special gift (poetry) that she hopes will be remembered forever.
She alludes to the idea that as people we must look deeper into our lives and see were we may have been given unearned privilege whether is be from race, gender, or sexuality.
The first stanza describes the depth of despair that the speaker is feeling, without further explanation on its causes. The short length of the lines add a sense of incompleteness and hesitance the speaker feels towards his/ her emotions. This is successful in sparking the interest of the readers, as it makes the readers wonder about the events that lead to these emotions. The second and third stanza describe the agony the speaker is in, and the long lines work to add a sense of longing and the outpouring emotion the speaker is struggling with. The last stanza, again structured with short lines, finally reveals the speaker 's innermost desire to "make love" to the person the speaker is in love
...resents her failure of recognizing herself as an individual. Her actions of comparing herself as a son in her family, failing to recognize the importance of hard work, and discovering her own happiness symbolizes a person who fails to acknowledge that perfection is not as important than being satisfied with her accomplishments of attending to college, passing all her classes, and receiving family support. To emphasize, if the speaker had realized that getting a perfect grade point average is not what defines her as a person, then she would have comprehended that grades are just a progress to motivate her to not forfeit on herself. Therefore, if the speaker desires to find her personal satisfaction, she should look at all the hard work that she had achieved in her classes and comprehend that life is not all about getting a perfect grade point average and perfection.
The poem begins with a young woman (the dancer), she craves attention and has big dreams of ultimately becoming famous. She is young, full of life, talented and gorgeous. However, the attention she craves is only fulfilled through performing on stage. This limits her, in all aspects of her life, because this uncontrollable desire could lead to her ultimately destruction. As a result, Barnes wrote, “Life had taken her and given her. One place to sing.” (Barnes). The dancer is trapped in this life not only by the opportunities life had given her but also for her own selfish desires. Yet, the thing she desires more than fame is love. Although her life is busy, with performing and partying she is in search for love. Barnes explained the dancers quest for love, “looked between the lights and wine. For one fine face…. found life only passion wide” was an unsuccessful one instead she only found lust. In other words, although she is looking for love she is looking for it in the wrong places, because she is trying looking in between the “lights” she letting her desire for fame interfere with her definition of love. She should look for someone who yearns to care for her spiritually, mentally and physically. Yet, what she aspires is for someone to love her that has status and wealth. To obtain what she wants she is
she tries to change her life to make it better, that she wants her own happiness.
Gwendolyn Brooks is one of the most respected and established poets of all time. Gwendolyn Brooks was born in Topeka, Kansas, on June 7, 1917. Shortly after her birth her family moved to Chicago, Illinois where she was raised. Gwendolyn Brooks’ parents were very supportive of their daughter’s passion for reading and writing. Gwendolyn Brooks had a true gift from God and it was writing. Gwendolyn Brooks’ mother discovered her talent for writing when she was seven. When she was thirteen she published her poem, “Eventide” which appeared in American Childhood. (Bio.com)
The fact that Wheatley’s poetry was read in her time is another impressive factor. She was black and a female, yet she received a decent amount of readership. In addition, she was respected for her art. However, the controversy and power existed not only within the time period Wheatley lived in, but they also existed within the content of her poetry.
The poem says that "since feeling is first" (line 1) the one who pays attention to the meaning of things will never truly embrace. The poem states that it is better to be a fool, or to live by emotions while one is young. The narrator declares that his "blood approves" (line 7) showing that his heart approves of living by feeling, and that the fate of feeling enjoyment is better than one of "wisdom" (line 9) or learning. He tells his "lady" (line 10) not to cry, showing that he is speaking to her. He believes that she can make him feel better than anything he could think of, because her "eyelids" (line 12) say that they are "for each other" (line 13). Then, after all she's said and thought, his "lady" forgets the seriousness of thought and leans into the narrator's arms because life is not a "paragraph" (line 15), meaning that life is brief. The last line in the poem is a statement which means that death is no small thi...
At this point of the story it is reflective of a teenager. A teenager is at a time in life where boundaries and knowledge is merely a challenging thing to test and in some instances hurdled. Where even though you may realize the responsibilities and resources you have, there is still a longing for the more sunny feelings of youth.
...izes the chance for happiness. Janie is comfortable knowing that she can live for herself, for she has become the subject of her own life. Janie is a complete woman because her inner and outer self unites; she transforms her social role into an organic role. Being comfortable in one's own skin and self, because of and not in spite of, is the true source of joy.
Margaret Lucas Cavendish was born into a wealthy family located near Colchester, England. Margaret was the youngest child of eight children and was loved just as dearly as the rest. She like most her siblings took on education with a governess and learned what they needed to get by in the world. Unlike her other siblings Margaret showed signs of admiration towards reading and writing, but more towards her writings. While in her youth she managed to write sixteen of what she called her “Baby Books”, the shortest of which consisted of 50-75 pages of written work. It was at this point that she found her passion for the written word.
Browning, Elizabeth Barrett. “Aurora Leigh”. 1856. Correspondence Course Notes: ENGL 205*S Selected Women Writers I, Spring-Summer 2003, pp. 26, 27.
Emma Lazarus was born in New York City on July 22, 1849, and is the fourth child of Moses Lazarus, and Esther Lazarus. Moses Lazarus was a wealthy sugar merchant and his wife, Esther Lazarus was well known for her side of the family, which was a family whose members were very influential in New York legal circles. Emma and her siblings were raised in New York and were spoiled by their parents. Emma was very weak as a child and could not leave the house often so all of the Lazarus children were educated at home by private tutors. Lazarus’ first literary achievement happened because of her un-paralleled knack for languages. (7)
To begin, the episodic shifts in scenes in this ballad enhance the speaker’s emotional confusion. Almost every stanza has its own time and place in the speaker’s memory, which sparks different emotions with each. For example, the first stanza is her memory of herself at her house and it has a mocking, carefree mood. She says, “I cut my lungs with laughter,” meaning that...
Her tone in this song is at first mellow, but when she comes to the stanza of this song, she deliberately raises her voice to emphasize her genuine feelings. The tone describes her want and need for her thoughts to be truly heard. She wants the listener to capture her essence and the view of herself. In this specific stanza, she explains that s...