Arms and the Man-G.B. Shaw

Discuss the dramatic significance of the 1^st act of the drama “Arms and the Man”

Answer: Like most of the Shaw’s works, “Arms and the Man” was a commentary on “the state of things” as he saw it. The playwright’s desire to use his writings as a catalyst for political discussion was natural; his stark learning’s towards socialism drove his art. To discuss the dramatic significance of the act 1, first we need to go through the short summary of act 1.

The play begins in Raina's bedroom. It is an odd mix of the expensively grand and tastelessly cheap. Raina stands out on her balcony enjoying the idea that she makes the

lovely evening even more so. She wears a fur dressing gown worth three times the room's furniture. Catherine, her mother, enters and tells Raina that there has been a

great battle. The war between Bulgaria and Servia may have been decided by this great

victory. Leading the daring charge was Raina's fiancée: Major Sergius Saranoff. The

routed forces of the enemy are being hunted through the streets of the city.

Their maid servant, Louka, enters and informs the rejoicing mother and daughter of

orders that the windows must be kept shuttered and barred, lest escaping soldiers or

errant bullets get in. Raina's window does not bolt, but she closes the shutter and hides

from the gunfire under her covers. It is then that a bedraggled-looking Servian officer

climbs in her window.

Raina is not about to be intimidated and the two talk for quite a while. An officer of the

Bulgarian army requests to search the room, as some people reported seeing a man

climb in. Raina hides the Servian officer and convinces the other soldiers that there is

nobody there.

The Servian officer reveals that his gun has no cartridges and that, in fact, he generally carries

chocolates where they should be. He is a professional soldier and knows that

chocolates and food are more important in the long run than bullets. Raina

contemptuously gives him the last of her chocolate creams and he gratefully eats them.

Rather than allowing him to take the chance of capture and execution, Raina convinces

the Officer (he isn't hard to convince) to rely upon her and her mother's good will. She

leaves to enlist the help of her mother and when Raina and Catherine return to the

room, the Officer has fallen asleep from stress and exhaustion. They wake him, dress

him in an old coat of the Major's, and sneak him out safely.

Shaw revealed some of his key characters of the play in act 1. In order of appearance they are as follows-

Raina Petkoff- She is the young heroine of the play, the only daughter of one of the wealthiest families in Bulgaria.

Her father is a major in the Bulgarian army. She is young and beautiful and intensely conscious of that fact. She is highly spirited idealistic girl who initially has romantic notion of love and war but changes her views as a result of events of the play.

Catherine Petkoff: Raina's mother, who has a powerful and commanding presence

that even her husband respects. She is  smart, good looking and wishes to impress everyone with her social standing and a capable woman

over forty, who is determined to be a Viennese lady. To that end,

she wears a fashionable tea gown on all occasions.

Louka is a maidservant in the Petkoff household. She is handsome,

but proud. She is so defiant that her servility to Raina is almost

insolent. She is afraid of Catherine, but even with her goes as far as

she dares. Very ambitious, she has the greatest contempt for those

who serve willingly

Captain Bluntschli: A professional soldier from Switzerland. He is roughly 35 years

old. He is working as an officer for the Servian military fighting for

hire against the Bulgarian army. When his line was broken and his

forces scattered by a Bulgarian cavalry charge, he took refuge in

Raina's room. He is worldly, cool-headed, and pragmatic, well trained and of “undistinguished appearance” with a

sense of humor about his situation and the world. He feels that it is better to be armed with chocolates than with ammunition in the battlefield.

George Bernard Shaw’s executions of many literary devices are clearly visible to the readers at ease, which adds up to the dramatic significance of the current act.

Shaw employs irony in the title of his play, taken from the opening line of the epic poem “The Aeneid” written by roman poet Virgil- “Of arms and the man I sing….” In which Virgil glorifies war. Shaw’s purpose in this play, however, is to attack romantic idea of war. The conflict in “Arms and the Man” is between opposing beliefs and ideas; the romantic notions of war and love which are held by Raina and the realistic picture of the war drawn by Captain Bluntschli. Still “Arms and the Man” is not an anti-war drama, but rather a satirical assault on those who would glorify the horrors of war. Shaw also uses metaphor and simile throughout the act using Raina and Bluntschli as his mouthpiece and the characters seems to fit them perfectly. The comedy of the play depends on contrasts of characters, unexpected turns of events, mistaken identities, surprising opinions, irony, wit and satire. Shaw seems to utilize them at utmost level in 1^st act. Although Shaw set the play in an exotic corner of southeast Europe, his characters have recognizable British traits. Like all of Shaw’s plays, “Arms and the Man” offers social criticism tempered by fine comedy. His depiction of the plot for the play was pretty much alive here in act 1.

Act 1 from “Arms and the Man” is a perfect start for the play, as Shaw draws the attention of its readers very subtly. Sublime start, decent development of the plot and dialogues from key characters clinches the full admiration of the readers thus making the plot dramatically significant enough to make the act 1 a successful one.

One of Shaw's intentions in writing Arms and the Man was to show the

foolishness of war. He intended to present audiences with the reality behind their

foolish ideas of clean, pretty, honorable war. Unfortunately, his message was largely

lost on his audience. They enjoyed the comedy, but soon after plunged into the first

World War. The message, however, remains current as ever.

Romantic Literature-William Blake

Q: Write a critical appreciation of the poem “London” by William Blake

Answer: William Blake is the precursor of “Romanticism”. English engraver, artist, poet, and visionary, author of exquisite lyrics in Songs of Innocence (1789) and Songs of Experience (1794) and profound and difficult “Prophecies” He was the greatest visionary poet in English, was born in 1757 and he was the second son of James Blake. We get the expression of his sublime thoughts and ideas in his poems. As he was a boy of a poor family, he could realize the sufferings of the poor people. So, we can see that, he writes against the social tyranny, child labor, war, harlotry and other social discrimination with his mighty pen. Blake divided his poems into two series- (i) Songs of Innocence and (ii) Songs of Experience. Both series of poems take on deeper resonance when read in conjunction. Innocence and Experience, “the two contrary states of the human soul” are contrasted in such companion pieces as “The Lamb” and “The Tyger”. Blake’s subsequent poetry develops the implication that true innocence is impossible without experience, transformed by the creative force of the human imagination. Our above-mentioned poem “London” is under the part of “Songs of Experience”. In “London” Blake outlined three great evils of the London city like callousness, adversity of war and miseries of harlot.

 

 Now, we will discuss about the critical appreciation of the poem “London”. In “London”, Blake decries the three great evils of society—

(i) Callousness of the society, as exemplified by the chimneysweepers miserable life, (ii) The adversity of war as expressed in the case of the soldier and

(iii) Lust represented in the malpractice of harlotry that looms large as a threat to purity of marriage and the happiness of the offspring. Blake is not the only poet who laments the collapse of humanity in London. Later Wordsworth in his “London 1802” wishes Milton were living in that period to redeem England from the deterioration it has undergone. In this century, T.S Eliot has portrayed the cultural collapse of London as well as the whole world in his “The Waste Land”. In “London” Blake attacks the hollowness of society and the helplessness of the church. Through this poem Blake gives a step through all the streets of London and along the streets, which stands by river Thames that flows freely. Like the Thames River every streets of London is free for the people for enjoying freedom. Though the city people enjoying so much freedom but Blake finds the faces of Londoners sad and pale. He starts his poem stating—

“I wander thro’ each chartered street,

Near where the chartered Thames does flow,

And mark in every face I meet

Marks of weakness, marks of woe”

In London city the poet hears not only the crying of every man but also the children. The poet hears the sound of chains which men of money and power impose. He expresses them through—

“In every cry of every man,

In every infants cry of fear,

In every voice, in every ban,

The mind-forged manacles I hear”

“The mind-forged manacles” indicates that, the chains they have forged for themselves fetter the city peoples; it is they who have invented the society, which now oppresses them. Nothing absolutely nothing has escaped the curse man has bought upon himself. In this poem Blake refers to the miserable life of the chimney-sweeper’s. He hears the cries of the chimney-sweepers which appal the helpless church. They are deprived from their fatherly and motherly love. The chimney-sweepers have to work hard for their livelihood from the very tender age. It is worth mentioning that, the chimney-sweepers are very little in age as they are very little they can’t utter the word “sweep”, they say “weep, weep, weep”. The chimney-sweeper’s cry seems to have blackened every church and made it appalling. Everybody knows that, church is the place where one hopes that he will get the justice, which he deserves. But, the church never hears the cries of the chimney-sweepers. The idea is that, the pitilessness shown to the chimney-sweepers blackens the souls of those who are its cause and it is this cruelty which is shocking to the church. According to another interpretation, the church is not “appalled”, but is “made appalling”. Again it is also held that, it is the smoke of industrial London, which blackens the church since the poet means a continuous process of staining by his phrase “blackening”. He also realizes the actual meaning of the sigh of the helpless and dying soldiers. They fight to protect the king and palace and the blood flows down the royal palace. They have to kill many people to protect the palace against their wish. They feel sorrow for the lives but cant do anything as they wish because they are bound to do their cruelty. Really it is very tragic. In the last stanza the poet describes the worst situation of the harlots as he notices when he walks through the midnight streets of London city. The harlot may be the curse of the harlotry that spread in the city or may be the misfortune of the harlot. The sight of harlots in the streets of London convinces the poet of the derangement of it causes in the married life of the people. But, harlot is made by man himself. The dead institution of the loveless marriage which causes man to seek physical pleasure elsewhere in effect brings the harlot into being and so the curses the marriage hearse. The newborn infant, who is the product of that marriage or harlot, is made wither as soon as he is born. This new baby adds the misery of the harlot and this baby also has some physical problem and suffers from many other diseases. The baby deprives from the happiness of the world by born. The man can gave birth babies but fearful to take the responsibility. Note, the use of “hearse” in combination with marriage to imply the hollowness of institutions as it is practiced. He ends the poem with the following lines—

“Blasts the new born infant’s fear

And blights with plagues the marriage hearse”

 

Blake’s tragic appreciation of the restriction, which imprisons and kills the living spirit, was no purely personal thing. It was his criticism of the society and the whole trend of contemporary civilization. Many of the poems of Blake are static when each of them is taken as an entity in itself. Whether in “Infant Sorrow” or “The School Boy” or “The garden of Love” the poet deals with a state of things but in his “London” though we may take the poem as an isolated specimen, we can sense a progression on terms of both thought and feelings. It moves from the chartered streets to the Thames that flows according to its own “sweet will” there on to the midnight streets. Blake has already given birth of “Londoners” in “Infant Sorrow” and struggles in vain to escape from this world. But, eventually, he has come to his full size in this poem where the vices of society welcome him. The use of symbols is one of the most striking features of Blake’s poetry. In the poem “London”, oppression and tyranny are symbolized by the king (who is responsible for the blood being shed), social institutions like lovers marriage. In the same poem, we have found the off quoted phrase mind-forged manacles which conveys the restriction that society imposes upon its members. Rather than a poem of protest “London” is also a psychological testament of the inhabitants of London. The poem reveals that The London society is corrupt and it is the corruption of civilization whose self-imposed manacles have restricted every spontaneous joy. The street cries of the puny chimney-sweepers loudly accuse the church and the death sighs of the soldier stain the State. Love itself the—fundamental human virtue—is negated and his negation degenerates the holly marriage-bed—the very institution basic to the Society—into a blighted hearse.

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Q: How does William Blake describe innocence and experience as “the two contrary states of human soul”?

Or Illustrate Blake’s idea, “Without contraries, there is no progression”.

Answer: William Blake (1757-1827), English poet, painter, and engraver, who created an unusual form of illustrated verse; his poetry, inspired by mystical vision, is among the most original lyric, and prophetic in the language. He stands as a bridge between the institutional religion of the past and the tendency to seek the celestial power within the soul. He tries to seek the psychological truth of life. In his poetry he combines the imaginative genius of the poet with the psychological insight of modern mankind. Blake’s “Songs of Innocence” and “Songs of Experience” portrays the psychological reality of life. He observes that in human souls there are two contrary states. He believes that attraction and repulsion, reason and energy, live and hate, are necessary to human existence. Blake represents a picture of the contrary qualities of human soul in his poems under the titles of “Songs of Innocence” and “Songs of Experience”. The tittles themselves show the contraries of human soul. The essence of Blake’s poetry is that if is possible for the contraries of innocence and experience to co-exist within a human being. The poet as the two contrasting states of the human soul uses “Innocence” and “Experience”. With the word “Innocence” Blake seems to mean some soft and gentle qualities of human life and with the word “Experience” he means so extreme qualities.

In the “Introduction” to the first series Blake represents a laughing child as his inspiration to his poems. And in the poems that follow in this series, Blake gives us his vision of the world as it appears to the child or as if it affects the child. And this is one of purity, joy, and security. The children are themselves pure, whether their skin is black or white. They are compared to the lambs “whose innocent call” they hear. Both “Child” and “Lamb” serve as symbol of God. Like the Piper in the earlier “Introduction”, the Bard in “Songs of Experience” is a poet, but the Bards poetry is prophetic and brings a message. His inspiration comes from the divinity. He speaks with authority and like God he can see “Present, past and future”. He speaks to a fallen earth and so speaks in the manner of a seer, with weighty things to utter. In Songs of Innocence” the prevailing symbol in the lamb, which is an innocent creature of God and which also, symbolizes the child Christ. In the “Songs of Experience” the chief symbol is the tiger “burning bright in the forests of the night”. The tiger burns in metaphorically with rage and quickly becomes for some a symbol of anger and passion. The poet asks a crucial question here, “Did God who made the lamb also made the tiger? The lamb, innocent and pretty, seems the work of a kindly, comprehensible creator.

The tiger represents the universe in its violent and terrifying aspects. It also symbolizes violent and terrifying forces within individual man. Thus the two poems the “Lamb” and the “Tiger” do, indeed, represent two-century stables of the human soul. “The Chimney-Sweeper” in the first series of poems depicts the contentment and sense of security of a soot-covered boy. An angel comes and tells Tom that, if he would be a good boy, he would have God for his father and that he would never lack joy. But, in the second group, the poem with the same title emphasizes the misery of the chimney sweepers and the cruelty not only of priests and kings but also his parents. The wretched chimney sweeper here is clothed in “the clothes of death”, while in the first poem the chimney sweeper went leaping and laughing to bath in a river.

“Nurse’s Songs” in “Songs of Innocence and in Songs of Experience” express two contrary modes of mind. The nurse in the first poem is inclined to let the children play in the field even after evening as they as they appeal to her and adopt and easy going manner towards them; while the other has reason to be protective and fearful. The nurse in the second part thinks play to be a waste of time. She speaks of the “dews of might” which will soon arrive; and she speaks of the coming natural years of the children as a shame and deceit. The most fearful thing about experience is that if breaks the tree life of the imagination and gives a deadly blow to the cheerful human spirit.

On the wings of vision Blake hovers in the world of human psychology and explores the eternal truths. Blake wants to say that human soul in the combination of some contrary qualities that should be recognized for the usual course of life. Any attempt to destroy the contrary elements of soul in the name of religious decorum and social and political orders will destroy the normally of human existence. In portraying contrary states of soul, Blake wants to defy the conventional religious, social and political authority that controls the spontaneous forces of human soul. Blake seems to say that the juxtaposition of good and evil in human law should be accepted as the divine law demands and there should not be any grudge adjusts the evils of the human soul.

Romantic Literature-P.B. Shelley

Q: The sublimity of Shelley’s poetry lies in its wonderful lyrical intensity; discuss. Or Write an essay on the greatness of Shelley as a lyric poet.

Answer: Percy Bysshe Shelley is one of the greatest lyric poets in the field of English literature. Shelley is intense lyricist as Alexander Pope is an intense satirist. He converts forms as diverse as drama, prose-essay, romance, satire etc into lyric. Even the narrative poems of Shelley are stamped by his lyricism. On this regard Prof. Elton says, “Shelley’s genius was essentially lyrical. All his poetry is really lyrical, for his lyrical impulse penetrates through even his unlyrical verse.” Shelley combines his passion and simplicity with other remarkable qualities, namely the quality of music and the art of combining the outward rhythm of the verse with an inner rhythm of thought and imagery. The most outstanding quality of Shelley’s lyricism is its spontaneity. His lyrics move so flowingly because they come straight from his heart. Shelley is swept forward by a rush of poetic energy and goes on producing image after image, all inspired by the original thought. The imagery in these lyrics, therefore, give the impression of being the product of no laborious thought but of a spontaneous growth of poetic impulse. Here is an example of his spontaneous writing:

“Teach me half the gladness

That thy brain must know,

Such harmonious madness

From my lips would flow

The world should listen them—as I am listening now”

Shelley’s lyrics almost always express an intensity of feeling or a deep passion. There is, too, a note of desire and longing in most of his lyrics. No wonder, therefore, that a note of sadness runs through most of his lyrics. In the poem “To a Skylark” we have the following stanza expressive of human sadness:

“We look before and after

And plea for what is not:

Our sincerest laughter

With some pain is fraught

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought”

Many of Shelley’s lyrics have an abstract quality and some of the best known is ethereal. His poems seem to have been written by a man living not on earth but in the aerial regions above. The “Ode to the West Wind” and “The Cloud” especially illustrates this quality. Such poems seem to justify to some extent. Mathew Arnold’s criticism of Shelley as “an ineffectual angel, beating in the void his luminous wings in vain”

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Q: Write a critical appreciation of the poem “Ode to the West Wind”.

Answer: The English romantic poet Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote the following ode on a blustery day in 1819, while in a forest near Florence, Italy. In it he addresses an autumn wind known in the region as Ausonius. In the final stanza—which ends with the now famous line “If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?”—Shelley appeals to the wind to help him spread the moral and political messages of his work

Percy Bysshe Shelley is one of the subtlest and profounder thinkers among poets. He is the rebel poet of the Romantic Revival. He was as much revolutionized as Byron. From his boyhood days he was rebel and he was a radical nonconformist in every aspect of his life and thoughts. Shelley’s classmates called him “Mad Shelley” and “Eton Atheist” for his nonconformist and revolutionary attitudes. French Revolution inspired him to be rebel. He hated and condemned the tyranny of state. Religion and society which stand for a heavenly blissful life. He longs for a golden age. He writes many poems to make the people aware. By awareness of people he can build up a society which will be free from oppression, precaution and exploitation. “Ode to the West Wind” is one of the greatest poems of Shelley. In this poem, he uses a natural symbol as a vehicle of his revolutionary belief in the regeneration of the world. The poem “Ode to the West Wind” has five sections each of which is an integral part of the total design of the poem. The theme of regeneration dealt with the three different levels- natural, personal and universal. The poem is remarkable for its theme, range of thought, spontaneity, poetic beauty, lyrical quality and quick movement. This poem is replete with symbolism, imagery, myth making and his technical excellences.

 

Now we will discuss about the critical appreciation of the poem “Ode to the West Wind”. The poem was written in the autumn of 1819 in the beautiful Cascine Gardens outside Florence and was published with Prometheus Unbound in 1920. Shelley’s own quotation is so important about the composition of the poem—

“This poem was conceived and chiefly written in a wood that skirts the Arno, near Florence, and on a day when that tempestuous wind, whose temperature is at once wild and animating, was collecting the vapors, which pour down the autumnal rains. They began, as I foresaw, at sunset with a violent tempest of hail and rain, attended by that magnificent thunder and lightning peculiar to the Cinalpine regions.”

This poem along with “The Cloud” and “The Skylark” an abiding monument to Shelley’s passion for the sky. Shelley himself writes—

“I take great delight in watching the change in the atmosphere”.

In the first stanza of this poem Shelley describes the manner in which the “West Wind” affects the earth. He addresses it as the very spirit of autumn. He presents it as a tremendous force or power, which drives leaves before it leaves rush away from it just as ghosts run away from a magician or enchanter. So, he starts his poem by addressing the West Wind like that— “O wild West Wind, thou breath of Autumn’s being,

Thou, from whose unseen presence the leaves the dead

Are driven, like ghosts from an enchanter fleeing”.

Shelley uses the wind as a power that carries the seeds to their beds, where they lie in their beds. Just as dead bodies’ lie in graves. But when spring comes, they grew into flowers of different colors and fragrance. The west wind destroys dead leaves and preserves useful seeds. He says—

“Wild Spirit, which art moving everywhere;

Destroyer and preserver; hear, oh, hear!”

In the second stanza the poet describes the influence of the west wind upon the air and the sky. The surface of the west wind is covered with pieces of cloud that fall upon it. Just as leaves fall from the trees and cover the earth. The west wind scatters the clouds in the sky. The clouds seem like leaves of the intertwined branches of the trees of Heaven and Ocean. The stormy sea and the sky seem to be meeting. The clouds floating on the surface of the west wind are compared to the frenzied flowers of Baccus with disheveled hair. These clouds are the signals of the coming storm and the sound of the wind is like the funeral song of the year. The year is dying. The last night is like the dome of the grave of the dying year. The members of the funeral procession are vapor, hail, rain and lightning. In the third stanza, Shelley turns to the effect of the west wind on the seas and oceans. The west wind wakes up the blue Mediterranean, which sleeps calmly in summer. It was put to sleep by the soothing music of its dear stream and its sleep it had dreamt of old palaces and towers reflected in it water. The west wind creates furrows on the smooth waters of the Atlantic Ocean. At the bottom of the Atlantic grow plants and vegetation. These plants are dry, without sap though they live in water. When the west wind blows in autumn, the plants on the land wither the plants that grow at the bottom of the sea. He can imagine the effect of the west wind upon them. Besides, he has personified the Mediterranean Sea and Ocean. In the fourth stanza the poet creates bond between the personality of west wind and his own personality. From this point onwards, the poem takes on an autobiographical note. He wishes that he himself were dead leaves and the clouds. He remembers his own boyhood when he was as fast and tempestuous as the west wind. So, the poet to appeal to the wind to save him from his present plight:

“Oh lift me as a wave, a leaf, a cloud!

I fall upon the thorns of life! I bleed!”

 

Another pessimistic quotation:

“A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed

One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud”

The last stanza turns personal to universal. He appeals to the west wind to treat him as its lyre. Again, we find a natural fact turned into a poetic form. The wind blows through the jungle and produces music out to the dead leaves. Shelley requests it to create music out of his heart and to inspire him to write great poetry, which may create a revolution in hearts of men. He wants the west wind to be his guiding spirit and to help him in the propagation of his thoughts through the universe:

“Drive my dead thoughts over the universe

Like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!

And, by the incantation of this verse”

Thus he wants to the west wind scatters his revolutionary message in the world just as it scatters ashes and sparks from a burning fire. His thoughts may not be as fiery as they once were, but they still have the power to inspire man. Before finishing the poem he tells the west wind to take the following message to the sleeping world—

“The trumpet of a poetry! O, Wind

If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?”

 

Symbolism: Most of Shelley’s poetry is symbolic. Shelley makes use of symbolism by means of his normal use of images including the personified force of nature and filled in it various symbolic meanings to suit the purpose of the poem. The “West Wind” appears to him as a symbol of change of the old destroyer and the preserver of the new. The wind also symbolizes Shelley’s own personality. When he was a boy was one like the wind “tameless and swift, and proud”. He still possesses these qualities but they lie suppressed under “a heavy weight of hours”. At this hour of distress the poet can look upon the wind as a competent savior, a symbol of aid and relief. Finally, the west wind is treated by the poet as representing the forces that can help bring about the golden millennium when the miseries and agonies of mankind will be replaced by all round happiness.

Imagery: In the poem “Ode to the West Wind” the image of the west wind, its appearance and action, has been shown through three vivid images:

(i)  Vapor rising from the Ocean to form clouds,

(ii) The stormy wind in the image of the dancing Maenad in intoxication and

(iii)The image of the dome formed out of Clouds.

Myth-making:  Shelley holds a unique place in English Literature by virtue of his power of making myths out of the objects and forces of Nature. Shelley’s myth-making power as revealed in the “Ode to the West Wind”.

Technical excellence: Technically this poem is one of the most perfect of Shelley’s lyrics. It is nearer to music than to painting, and yet it gives us a more vivid sense of experience than we could get from any pictorial description. The metre, which is terza rima devided into short periods is managed with complete mastery. The verse pattern each stanza of “Ode to the West Wind” is joined to the one following by a common rhyme: aba, bcb, cdc, ded, ee. Shelley has made the heroic lines move swiftly so as to give the impression of the irresistible and fast movement of the wind. Idealism is a part and parcel of Shelley’s temperament. He is not only a rebel but also a reformer. He wants to reconstitute society in keeping with his ideals of good, truth and beauty. According to Compton Rickett- “To renovate the world, to bring about utopia, is his constant aim, and for this reason we may regard Shelley as emphatically the poet of egar, sensitive youth; not the animal youth of Byron, but the spiritual youth of the visionary and reformer”. Shelley is pessimistic about the present, but optimistic about the future. In “Ode to the West Wind”, his prophetic note is present, and present the greatest intensity of expression:

“If winter comes, can Spring be far behind?”

 

After the whole analysis of the poem “Ode to the West Wind”, now we can come to the conclusion. This is universally accepted as one of the best poems of Shelley. Shelley, it has become clear greatly expended the metrical and stanzaic resources of English versification. He uses West Wind here as a symbol of very spirit. As the West Wind scatters and destroys the dead leaves, the poet wants to expel useless customs and conventions; as the Wind helps the growth of new flowers in spring, the poet too wishes to bring about a new order beneficial to mankind. He believes that regeneration always follows destruction and that a new and utopian order is certain to come when the present degenerate system is ended.

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Q: Write a critical appreciation of the poem “To a Skylark”

 

Answer: Percy Bysshe Shelley is the highly intellectual poet of the Romantic Revival. He was a dreamer and visionary. He had a great passion for reforming the world by the power of his writing. His idealism is best reflected in his poem “To a Skylark”. Shelley’s “To a Skylark” is a remarkable masterpiece. If Shelley had died composing it only, he might have been regarded as a great poet in English Literature. Skylark is an imagery bird, which is invisible in the sky. It is a source of poetic inspiration. This poetry stands as a distinguished achievement because of some particular characteristics such as spontaneity, lyrical quality, audibility or music, series of imagery, personification and idealism etc.

 

“To a Skylark” perhaps the most famous Shelley’s poem was written in July 1820 and published with “Prometheus Unbound” in the same year. At the time of its composition

The Shelleys were staying in Grisbornes house who was on a visit to England. The idea of the skylark singing in the sky to represent a spiritual power that can spread its influence through the world may have come from Plato. The skylark is not a earthly bird, it is the embodied spirit of ecstasy of absolute delight, joyous. Wordsworth’s poem on the same describes the skylark as

“Ethereal minstrel! pilgrim of the sky!

Dost thou despise the earth where cares abound?”

The poet starts his poem with an address or apostrophe like—

“Hail to thee, blithe spirit!”

It is the endless source of pleasure. The song of skylark is heard from the lost point of vision. The poet refers to the spontaneous flow of music, which comes from the skylark. The music overflows profusely from the heart of skylark; there is nothing artificial. The skylark flies higher and higher. It never backs to this world. Like a club of fire it rises. The singing and soaring of the bird are simultaneous. In it for him a joyful spirit that begins its upward flight at sunrise and become at evening an invisible song just like star in the day light. The poet describes the overflow of the skylark’s song over the earth and in the heaven. He says in his poem—

“All the earth and air

With thy voice is loud,

As, when night in bare

From one lonely cloud

The moon rains out her beams and heavens over flowed.”

The poet is at loss to know what the bird really is! Its song may be compared to the bright rain droops from rainbowed clouds. The bird lost in the sunlight may be compared to a poet like—

“Like a poet hidden

In the light of thought,

Singing hymns unbidden,

Till the world’s wrought

To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not”

The poet’s world is secret world of thoughts and fancies, which is hidden from men. The poet’s song flows out from his heart with great spontaneity. The poet’s unbidden songs move the world to sympathy and hopes, which it would not otherwise have known. Next, the poet compared the skylark to a highborn maiden who is imprisoned in lonely tower. She sings sweet love song to soothe her love-laden heart and her sweet music overflows her bower. Now, the skylark is compared to a glow-worm. The glow-worm is hidden in a valley scatters its light without being. The light which is shed by the glow-worm in soft and elusive. The glow-worm is hidden and screened from view by the flowers and grass among which it lies. The skylark is also compared to the rose which sheds its fragrance abroad, though it is hidden from view. The warm wind scatters the petal of the rose, and spreads its fragrance everywhere. The song of the skylark is an idealism of Shelley. It remains ever fresh and ever perfect. No earthy dirt and filth can touch it. The sound vernal shower cannot even surpass it. When we recite this poem we feel that the skylark itself is singing. But again Shelley is not sure whether the skylark is a spirit or bird. The poet wonders from where the skylark got its inspiration for its harmony. So he raises his voice like—

“Teach us, Spirit or Bird,

What sweet thoughts are thine:

I have never heard

Praise of love or wine

That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine.”

The poet says that skylark’s songs do not stand any comparison with things that we know. When it is compared with all gay; clear and fresh things pale into insignificance. Marriage and triumphed songs dwindle into nothingness in comparison with the skylark’s song. The poet wonders about the unknown source of inspiration of the bird’s song.

“What objects are the fountains

Of thy happy strain?

What fields, or waves or mountains?

What shapes of sky or plain?

What love of thine own kind? What ignorance of pain?”

The skylark’s song is full of joy. Its love knows no satiety. On earth love becomes after some time insipid and cloying. Skylark knows more of life and death than we mortals can ever know. We can’t imagine how could the skylark pour forth such a clear stream of music. The source of the songs of skylark is not known to us because we are crude. Men never know any moment of un allowed joy. Sorrow is ever present in human life and the most beautiful songs are those inspired by some sadness. So the poet introduces us with universal truth:

“We look before and after

And pine for what is not;

Our sincerest laughter

With some pain is fought:

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought”

Sorrow is mingled with the very best of human joys. Even if men are free from hate, pride, fear and sorrow, they can’t think of attaining such joy as that of the skylark. Our knowledge is saturated with pangs and our joy is never a match with that of the skylark. The poet wants to experience half the gaiety of the bird—

“Teach me half the gladness

That thy brain must know,

Such harmonious madness

From my lips would flow

The world should listen then-as I am listening now”

 

Theme: In “To a Skylark” Shelley records the thoughts evoked in him by a singing skylark.

He finds a contrast between the skylark’s easy movement and fluent song and man’s clumsiness in these spheres. The poet is led to feel that the skylark’s superiority over man lies in his superhuman talents. Despond King-Hele writes,

“The theme is thus a conceit, not an eternal truth; but Shelley contrives the faction so persuasively that we gladly suspend disbelief.”

“The keen joyance” of the skylark is contrasted with the pains and agonies of mankind. Like the Ode, this poem too ends on a not of yearning, this time not for energy and intellectual powerful, but for pure rapture and unbounded joy.

 

Spontaneity: “To a Skylark” like Shelley’s other lyrics, shows spontaneity typical of the poet. The flow of the poem is as effortless as that of a stream. The emotion that has inspired the poet is genuine and has come from first hand experience. The joyful singing of the skylark has indeed inspired in the poets mind an over flowing yearning for ecstasy. This intensity of passion has added considerably to the lyric spender of the poem. The poem is melodious because it is not just a poem but the skylark’s song itself translated the poet into stanzas.

 

Symbolism: Most of Shelley’s poetry is symbolic. The poem “To a Skylark” bears strong testimony of the poet’s use of symbolism. The poet employs skylark as a symbol of musical ecstasy. Skylark is an invisible bird, source of music symbolizing the romantic poet, Shelley’s poetic soul. Again, the skylark symbolizes perfect or ideal happiness. Here, the happiness of the bird is contrasted with the sorrows and sufferings of mankind. The abundance of symbols makes the poem obscure. A common reader will find it difficult to understand the theme of the poem. Shelley’s symbols are vague. In some cases, the reader should go beyond the surface level to find out the meaning of the symbols clearly.

 

Lyricism: Shelley is one of the greatest lyric poets in the field of English literature. The most outstanding quality of Shelley’s lyricism is its spontaneity. Shelley’s lyrics come straight from his heart. Here is an example of his spontaneous writing—

“Teach me half the gladness

That thy brain must know,

Such harmonious madness

From my lips would flow

The world should listen then-as I am listening now”

Shelley’s lyrics always express an intensity of feeling, or a deep passion. There is too a note of desire and longing also sadness through most of his lyrics. In the poem “To a Skylark” we have the following stanza expressive of human sadness:

“We look before and after

And pine for what is not;

Our sincerest laughter

With some pain is fought:

Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought”

Shelley’s lyrics are surprising musical and sweet. Some of Shelly’s lyric are highly embellished composition. They have a glittering quality because of the ornamental imagery in which they abound. The most striking example of this quality is “To a Skylark” the striking phrases are: “The golden lightening of sunken sun”, “A star of heaven”, “Rainbow cloud”. Melancholy is found to be the dominant note in most of Shelley’s lyrics. Shelley’s melancholy is never depressing. Shelley never allows morbidity to overcome the enjoyment in his lyric. He has deep faith in future.

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Imagery and Figures of Speech: The poem contains series of images and figures of speech that have added to the beauty and charm of the poem. The skylark is described as a “blithe spirit” that pours its heart “from heaven or near it”. It is linked to “a cloud of fire” and it “singing still dost soar and soaring ever singest” the skylark floats and runs like an embodied joy whose race is just begun. It remains unseen “Like a star of Heaven. In the broad daylight”.  The bird is then compared to a poet hidden in the light of thought, a high born maiden in a palace tower, a golden glow worm scattering its “aerial hue” unseen among the flowers and grass and an unseen rose giving out its sweet smell. Each figure of speech used in the poem is a picture in itself and contributes to the charming sensuousness of the poem. Shelley’s pessimism as well as optimism is exposed in this poem. With reference to the song the poet laments over the crude and impure emotions of human beings. Corrupted society can never give us pure pleasure. So, the poet is keening over the present condition of human life. But, he talks of the future he becomes joyous. Thus he turns into a optimist.