Elegy Written in a Country Churchard ppy

1、Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard famous poet of the graveyard school. 18 poets whose writings frequently touched on themes of death, mortality, religion, and melancholy. part I: 1-7 Opening with a death-bell sounding, a knell. The lowing of cattle, the droning of a beetle in flight, the tinklin

2、g of sheep-bells, and the owls hooting mourn the passing of a day, And then suitably the narrators eye shifts to a human graveyard. Stanzas 8-11 The goals of the great share the same end as the rude forefathers, the grave. Stanzas 12-21: through the contrastive comparison between the humble lot of p

3、oor people and the great mens fortune the poet considers how the same lot that forbade humble people to carry out big enterprises prevented them, in the meantime, from committing crimes and links this second part to the first one Stanzas 22-29: the poets attention is shifted on himself, thus giving

4、the Elegy a more intimate and personal tone, when he considers his supposed death and subsequent burial in the same churchyard Type of Work Elegy was usually used in classical times for love poetry written with a specific meter However, since the 16th century it has come to mean a formal poem of lam

5、ent and consolation concerning a particular persons death, or reflection on death in general. Meter and Rhyme Gray wrote the poem in four-line stanzas (quatrains). Each line is in iambic pentameter, meaning the following: 1. Each line has five pairs of syllables for a total of ten syllables. 2. In e

6、ach pair, the first syllable is unstressed, and the second is stressed , The CUR few TOLLS the KNELL of PART ing DAY The LOW ing HERD wind SLOW ly OER the LEA In each stanza, the first line rhymes with the third and the second line rhymes with the fourth (abab), as follows: The curfew tolls the knel

7、l of parting day, The lowing herd wind slowly oer the lea, The plowman homeward plods his weary way, And leaves the world to darkness and to me.Stanza Form Heroic Quatrain英雄体四行诗 A stanza with the above-mentioned characteristics four lines, iambic pentameter, and an abab rhyme scheme is often referre

8、d to as a heroic quatrain. Themes Death: the Great Equalizer Pity for missed Opportunities 3）VirtueFigures of Speech Alliteration Anaphora 首语重复法 Metaphor Personification Alliteration The plowman homeward plods his weary way (line 3) The cocks shrill clarion, or the echoing horn (line 19) Nor cast on

9、e longing, lingring look behind? (line 88) Anaphora repetition of a word, phrase, or clause at the beginning of word groups occurring one after the other And all that beauty, all that wealth eer gave (line 34) Their name, their years, spelt by th unletterd muse (line 81) Metaphor Full many a gem of

10、purest ray serene, The dark unfathomd caves of ocean bear: Full many a flowr is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air. (lines 53-56) Gem : undiscovered poets, musician. Flower: of great and noble qualities that are wasted on the desert airPersonification Let not Ambition mo