what is the main idea of the poem the scholar
Answers
Robert Southey had great interest in books. He made his own library which had a of books. 'The Scholar' in one of the shorter pieces of Robert Southey on which the poet's fame largely rests today. In the poem, the poet assumes the personality of a scholar and in that capacity gives an account of a scholar's like and dislikes, aspirations and dreams. The entire life of the scholar is spent in reading books, usually by the writers of the past. Since books cannot be separated from their authors, the scholar , in a sense, lives in the company of the dead writers 'the mighty minds of old'. The classics, in which the scholar is engrossed all the time, are his true companions and he shares his joy and sorrow with them. Therefore, the scholar is naturally indebted to those books for those books for their help in the understanding of the world and in his cultivation of sensibility. He loves the virtues of the authors and condemns their vices and learns a lot from their examples. He hopes that he would travel till enternity with those writers and leave his name behind, which is posterity would love to cherish.