Questions. Herbert’s Virtue

Questions

1) Do you find the poem dramatic? What makes you think so? Is there any dialectics in the mood? How can you define it? Is it possible to divide the poem into several logical parts or it is rather a piece of ecstatic “flow of consciousness”? Give your reasons pro et contra.

2) Distinguish the conflicting images and explain their use. What is the uniting motif of the poem?

Find out the religious meanings for harvest, thorn, fruit, wine and flower.

3) Consider the formal structure and the stylistic peculiarities of the poem. What are they for? Are the rhyming and metrical schemes of any order?

4) What does Child mean? What else can be considered as childish? Do you find any clash in meaning?

5) Is there any ambiguity in treating the symbol of Collar? Give your proofs.

6) Does the formal structure of the last four lines correspond to the climax of the dramatic involvement?

Herbert’s Virtue

Sweet day, so cool, so calm, so bright,

The bridal of the earth and sky:

The dew shall weep thy fall tonight;

For thou must die.

Sweet rose, whose hue angry and brave

Bids the rash gazer wipe his eye:

Thy root is ever in its grave,

And thou must die.

Sweet spring, full of sweet days and roses,

A box where sweets compacted lie:

My music shows ye have your closes,

And all must die.

Only a sweet and virtuous soul,

Like seasoned timber, never gives;

But though the whole world turn to coal,

Then chiefly lives.

Find out the repetitive argumentation and the most vivid examples of metaphysical conceit. Give precise implications for:

- bridal (2)

- weep (3)

- angry and brave (5)

- the rash gazer wipe (6)

- sweets (10)

- music (11)

- closes (11)

- seasoned timber (14)

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