Week 3: Poetic Language

This Week's Classes

For Monday please read Shakespeare's "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day" from page 374 and  William Wordsworth's sonnet "Nuns Fret Not", found on page 3940 of our text book, as well as McMahan's advice on writing about poetic language on pages 370-381.

For Wednesday, please read McMahan's advice on writing about persona and tone, as found on pages 352-364, and come to class prepared to discuss the persona and tone of Roethke's "My Papa's Waltz" (354) and Parker's "One Perfect Rose" (357).

On Friday the 25th we will be writing our first essay in class.  If you want to talk to me about it before then--to prepare an outline or to talk to me about your ideas--please come by my office or send me an email.

Journal Activity

As you write this week, please continue to think about form and its relationship to content and meaning, but add to that a consideration of poetic language, tone, and persona.  Remember that all you need to do to get full marks is to try. Nothing will help you to understand the sonnet as a form like writing one.

1. Write an original sonnet. Keep in mind the rules of the form (iambic pentameter, 14 lines, a b a b, c d c d, e f e f, g g rhyme scheme).

2. Write a brief reflection on your sonnet. Do you think the form had an influence on your subject matter, mood, tone, or language? Why or why not? Did you deliberately use poetic language? Why or why not?

Example

Here is a sonnet written by me, about my daughters.

When Guinevere was born, the sun broke through
the clouds that had been raining all that night.
She opened wide her eyes, so small and new;
The sunshine bathed her perfect face with light.
I thought that must be how all babies are.
The world takes note, because the world has changed.
But Margaret went unnoticed by the stars
And I thought that it was strange.
She is as much a miracle, and as rare
As beautiful, as lovely, as adored
As was her sister. Why should the sky not care?
Why should her birth by nature be ignored?
"Because she is herself" the answer came
"she's not her sister. Don't force them to be the same."

As I wrote this sonnet, the constraint of the form definitely affected my content.  I wrote the first line first, and didn't know where to go from there, but the form of a sonnet--not just the meter and the rhyme but also the volta in the last two lines helped me choose a direction for the poem.  I knew I needed to change the thrust of the poem in the last two lines, so I decided to use them to answer a question I would raise in the rest of the poem.  I was probably also influenced by Shakespeare's Sonnet 18, in which he both uses and also undermines natural symbolism.  I tried to make the sun breaking through the clouds a symbol of my love for my daughters, but also to say that it's just the sun and clouds and the rain.

Looking Ahead to Next Week
For next week we'll be talking more about persona and tone, and about how poets create a voice.  Please come to class each day ready to think and to talk about the tone and poetic voice of each assigned poem and how the poet has achieved that tone and voice.