critically appreciate the poem "Immortality" by Methew Arnold.
Answers
Answer:
here goes your answer
Explanation:
TPCASTT
Title – Immortality – Given the title,
this poem seems fairly straightforward in that it would be about life after
death, and the existence of it. Maybe he’s writing about this because he’s close
to dying, or someone he cares about is close to dying. In either case he could
be writing this to console either himself or someone else. Most of Arnold’s
poems encompass a central human theme or ideology in the title which is
discussed in his poetry.
Paraphrase –
Thwarted by our friends, sad, tired,
We escape the harsh world to part its way
And, Wait! In another existence, we say
The world will be pushed down, and we will be resurrected.
Then, will the resurrected people not have contempt for
The world’s sad, scared departure? Or will they,
Who weren’t able to survive the heat of day,
Support the passion of heaven’s new day?
No, no! the passion of life can
Still be there after death, but it can not begin;
And those who didn’t’ blame the world,
From strength to strength moving on – only them,
Whose morals are good, and their conflicts resolved,
Go with confidence, but barely any at that, to eternal life.
Connotations –
End Rhyme
The rhyme scheme ABBA ABBA CDE CDE,
makes Immortality a Petrarchan sonnet. The rhyming words connect together the
ideas of the poem. As the scheme switches from ABBA to CDE, the poem also shifts
in tone and content.
Asyndeton (Line 1)
Arnold lists the emotions of “foil’d..,
depress’d, outworn”, without use of conjunctions to show that there’s a much
longer list of emotions we’ll have looking back on our life, which extends
farther than the three listed.
Alliteration (Line 1)
The alliteration of f “foil’d by our
fellow-men” enhances the defeated feeling the reader gets as he reads the first
line of the poem.
Parallelism (Line 4)
The parallel clauses in line 4 of "the world shall be thrust down, and we up-borne" helps
portray an idea of the separation of man from world after death, as the world is
thrust down, and man is up-born.
Rhetorical Questions (Lines 5-8)
The rhetorical questioning in the second
paragraph helps set the tone of the first part of the poem. Arnold contemplates
how humans will react to leaving the world behind. He poses two questions for
the reader to ponder if they’ll have contempt for the world or if they’ll just
be glad about heaven.
Syntax
Arnold’s complex syntax in the poem, and
use of many commas, breaks, and subclauses show the complexity of his human
ideology.
Attitude – Arnold’s tone in the first two
stanzas of the poem is contemplative. He muses the idea of how we’ll feel after
we die, and are reborn. He asks if we’ll scorn the world in its poor state, or
be glad to leave its troubles behind. However in the next two stanzas he refutes
either of these and says the energy and strength of our worldly life, if it’s
appropriate, will be kept with us through resurrection, creating a didactic
tone.
Shifts – The Shift occurs between the
2nd and 3rdstanzas.
It transitions from a contemplative tone where he asks questions about
immortality, to a didactic tone where he teaches us just how it will
be.
Theme – Only those whose energies and
strengths are worthy to the mortal world will continue to
immortality.
Title Revisited – After reading the
poem, our original idea of the poem being about immortality was surprisingly
correct. However it discussed more on the idea of our feelings toward the world
and its mortality, and those who will rise to
immortality.
POV
Matthew Arnold uses first person plural in his poem, Immortality. He talks to humans as a whole, in which he is included. He takes the role as the teacher, to teach us about immortality, and those of us who will obtain it.
CRITICAL PERSPECTIVES
Historical – Arnold wrote his poems during
the Victorian Era, in which social reformation and change in human ideology took
place. Arnold is sometimes noted as among the three greatest or most influential
poets of the Victorian Era. The majority of his works discuss human life and
theology. His poem Immortality is a key example. The discussion of immortality
helped shape the religious aspect of the Victorian Era.
Biographical – Sometime early in his life, Arnold abandoned Christianity, and became Agonistic ("Matthew Arnold: A Biography"). Reading Immortality, one would think Arnold was basing it on Christian values. But in his poems we get a look
into his Agonistic ideology and his views on certain Christian-based ideas,
which likely sprout from his Christian childhood.
hope it is helpful