Letteratura Inglese I prima annualità

Letteratura inglese

Prof. De Andrea

Appunti di Alessandra Passarino

Table of contents

• How thought accompanied the traveller (not in the program!)……………………..………..…….1
• W. Blake - The Garden of Love………………………………………………………………………….2
• J. Donne - The Flea…………………………………………………………………………………….4
• J. Donne - A Valediction: Forbidding Mourning……………………………………………………..5
• John Milton - Paradise lost………………………………………………………………………………6
• Oroonoko - Aphra Behn…………………………………………………………………………8
• Blackness in a Gobineau and Behn: Oroonoko and Racial Pseudo-science – Derek Hughes…………………………………………………………………………..15
• Joseph Andrews - Henry Fielding………………………………………………………….…..16
• Joseph Andrews and the Control of the Poor - Christopher Parkes…………………………..27
• The Rape of the Lock - Alexander Pope………………………………………………………..28
• The Lady’s Dressing Room - Jonathan Swift…………………………………………………..31
• The Task - William Cowper……………………………………………………………………33
• The Life and Opinions of Tristram Shandy, Gentleman - Laurence Sterne……………………35
• Tristram Shandy and the Reader’s Imagination - Howard Anderson………………………….45
• Astrophil and Stella, Sonnet n° 1 - Philip Sidney………………………………………….…..48
• From Amoretti, Sonnet n° 64 - Edmund Spenser………………………………………………50
• Sonnet n° 130 - William Shakespeare…………………………………………………………52
• Sonnet n° 1 - William Shakespeare……………………………………………………………53
• The Merchant of Venice - William Shakespeare……………………………………………….56
• The Triumph of the Golden Fleece: Women, Money, Religion and Power in Shakespeare’s The Merchant of Venice - Robin Russin……………………………………………………………..700

03/02/20

How thought accompanied the traveller

A poem to start the course (not in the program), by Moniza Alvi, British contemporary author, with Pakistani roots. Free verse

How Thought Accompanied the Traveller

Thought tried to go everywhere with the traveller, across the treacherous borders, into remote villages where strangers were scarcely seen. It could be brazen, pushing itself into nightclubs and brothels, struggling with unwelcoming places, taking a deep breath and squeezing itself in. And thought could become as capacious as a country which opens its doors hospitably to the adventurous, and the destitute.

It could shrink to the size of a quiet town, then without warning trek off into the outback. So there was tension between the traveller and itinerant thought, although often they appeared to be the perfect companions.

First stanza

Treacherous insidiosi. The first line is a personification, “thought” is abstract, but here it is defined like a human being. Alliteration, the repetition of the initial sound of two or more than two words that are very close to one another (“t” in traveller, treacherous, thought, also in the “s” sound for the third line “strangers were scarcely seen”). The try of the thought to go everywhere, the effort, is emphasized, reenforced by these phonetic repetitions. “Remote villages” = “s” a sound of silence, a sibilant sound.

Second stanza

Brazen sfacciato, brothels bordelli. Personification is an extended metaphor, a metaphor that is carried long through many lines in the poem, from the beginning to the end of the poem, is the focus of it. Thought is really making an effort, he is going to places that are not pleasant. These places are conceived with an alliteration of a harsh sound (“brazen”, “brothels”, “breath”, these words are key words in this stanza). In the third line there is an assonance, the repetition of vowel sounds (not necessarily at the beginning of the word), here we have long vowel sounds and open (deep, breath, squeezing) and then shorter ones (“i” in squeezing itself in). The image is that the thought has to shape itself to enter, so the vowels replicate the image described in the line. The use of sounds replicate the image and the message in the verse.

Third stanza

Capacious spazioso, destitute emarginati. There is another important parallel, the ethical drive of literature, the ability of literature to make you face a different reality, make you encounter the Other. Thought opens up our horizons, there is an alliteration for this (“c” in “could, become, country”). The repetition of a sound which is not necessarily at the beginning of a word is the consonance (consonant sounds), also with “d” in “doors, adventurous, destitute”.

Fourth stanza

These union between thought and the traveller sometimes has moments of disagreement, sometimes thought goes on his way.

W. Blake “The Garden of Love”

Blake is sometimes considered as one of the first romantic poets, coming from the first generation of that movement (other manuals consider him as pre-romantic poet, someone who anticipated the characteristics of romantic poetry). We are talking about the late 18th century, a process of democratization of poetry. It’s a very simple poem in terms of language.

First stanza

In the midst in centro. The idea of childhood is recurrent, it’s a state of bliss, the child is still very close to supernatural qualities. The contrast also between childhood and experience, how it usually destroys this state of bliss. The poet describes himself as someone who once used to play in the garden, now there is a new element, the chapel.

Second stanza

“Writ” is the archaic form of “written” this is the essence of Blake’s poetry, an anti-authoritative poetry. He was a deeply religious poet, he said that he had religious vision. Religion and religious feelings were something individual, authorities had a bad influence in it. The chapel is now at the center of a place that used to be a place of love. The religious building is described as the complete opposite of this heavenly, paradise-like, state. The gates are closed, this place is not welcoming like one time when he used to play there. Then also the “thou shalt not” is not very positive. The line is written in archaic language the language of the authority, it is negative because since there is no continuation (“thou shalt not …” what?), everything is prohibited, an absolute prohibition. We are in the age of revolutions, where the utopian ideas rise against the old authority (antico regime in France). It is a period characterized in politics and literary by universal equality utopia. This democratization of the poetry can be seen also in the language used by Blake. He is one of the first romantic poets also because of the simplicity of his language. Poetry used to be more complex before the romantic period, it uses basic vocabulary, most of the words are monosyllable, very limited number of polysyllabic words and most of them are from Germanic words. It made this poetry more accessible to common people, less elitist kind of people. In terms of grammatical structure, it is a SVO structure and the lines are really short. There is a rhyme pattern (A, B, C, B), this is known as the ballad rhyme. The ballad, was a popular (of the people coming from the lowest strata of society) song, very simple, romantic poets used it to establish a deeper relation with what’s simple for common people, they were transmitted orally, not in written form, usually dealing with everyday topics, like love, death, adventure of famous heroes, supernatural events. The most important ballad was the «Rhyme of the Ancient Mariner» by Samuel Coleridge.

05/02/20

Every poet used different strategies in order to make their poetry more understandable to common people. 1794 is regarded as the start of the romantic period, also an age of revolutions, of equality between people. Blake is sometimes considered as a pre-romantic and sometimes as one of the first romantic poets. He used simple language, simple words and monosyllabic ones. Blake uses features of the ballad songs, like a rhyme scheme, short words and lines. This is a literary ballad, not a popular ballad (=song transmitted orally). What’s the message of this short poem? He is complaining about the fact that there was a garden where he used to play as a child, now he goes back to this place and find it all changed, it became a religious place, with a religious building. The notice on the chapel’s gate, which is closed, then the notice on the door which says “thou shalt not”. This is a universal prohibition, there is no verb, it’s a total prohibition. This prohibition is related to institutions, in this case religious institutions. Blake was a very radical anti-institutional man and writer. Thomas Paine was a very radical political thinker who was involved in the American revolution and the French Revolution, he spent some time in England. He was preoccupied for his friend William Blake for the development of a possible revolution also in England. Mary Wollstonecraft was possibly the first feminist writer in English literature, who was also the mother of Shelley (?).

Third stanza

This garden has also been turned in a cemetery, filled with graves. Briars rovi, binding legare. There is no rhyme scheme here, different from a standard ballad that had a complete rhyme scheme. It’s such a variation that had a purpose, there are two internal rhymes instead (inside the same line): “gowns” and “rounds”, “briars” and “desires”. There are both an assonance and a consonance in these words. Every single line starts with a conjunction, there is the repetition of the same word, also in the second stanza with “and”, it’s an anaphora. “Black, binding, briars” is an alliteration. Elements like internal rhymes or anaphoras were quite typical in popular ballads, because they were supposed to be transmitted orally, remembered by heart, the more you had a repetitive structure, the easier it was for people to remember the text of a ballad. There is a relation between the structure features and the message of the stanza. These features can be connected to the image of the priests walking around the garden, the repetition of “and” can be seen as the repetition and paralysis of a situation, the action “binding with briars” is connected to the priest through “black gowns”. This bad image is made stronger through these structures. He emphasized this image through the alliteration, if he had chosen the word “dark” it would have meant the same thing, but wouldn’t give the same emphasis.

J. Donne “The Flea” (1633)

17th century poetry. English civil war is a very important historical event (1642-1660). 1660 is the year of the Restoration. England became a republic, the king Charles I was executed, then in 1660 the Restoration brought back the monarchy. “The Flea” was published in 1633.

First stanza

Mark osserva, flea pulce. “Thou deniest” tu neghi, thou is more formal than “you”. “Thee” is the object version of “thou”, mingled mescolati. He is important because he renovated, changed, went against many conventions of love poetry. Here he is speaking to his beloved woman, the woman he wants to conquer, the woman he wants to have sex with, he is trying to convince her, but not by using elevated lyrical sophisticated images typical of conventional love poetry, he uses a low, if not rude or disgusting image, the flea. For the poetry of that time it was a very unusual image for love. He is said to be the most important poet of the metaphysical poets, they are called like this because they expressed their feelings but at the same time they were very intellectual, they combined the sacred and the profane, the high and the low, they tried to combine opposites.

Why don’t you want to mix our bodies in sexual terms? We are already connected through blood. This is a typical example of conceit, it is a metaphor, an image that is very unexpected, unusual, surprising, a metaphor uniting to elements that are usually not imagined to be related.

Then he becomes more and more explicit. Maidenhead verginità, to woo corteggiare, pampered piena, sweel s’ingrandisce, alas ahimè. Suck, enjoy, blood, sweels are all polysemous words, they can be connected to sex. Donne is also famous of his religious poems, religious meditations (“no man is an island”), but this is juvenile poem. the rhyme scheme is (A-A-B-B-C-C-D-D-D), three couplets and 3 lines rhymed together.

Second stanza

Spare risparmia (risparmia tre vite in una pulce), nay anzi (per intensificare, non contrario), he is becoming blasphemous here, the religious institution in connected to a disgusting flea. This insect is the marriage, the marriage bed is the marriage temple. The blasphemy is emphasized through the repetition of “married, marriage”. Grudge complain, (nonostante i tuoi genitori si stiano lamentando, e tu anche), jet dark block (body of the flea), cloister chiostro, cortile interno di un edificio religioso, use abitudine, make you apt ti rende pronta.

What are the key-words? Sacrilege, sin, self-murder. The woman firstly says no because they would sin, also it is a sin to just talk about this, then he says that she is committing these sins, not only one, but three sins, he blames her for this. There is chiasmus, a mirror structure, one structure repeated in the inverted order (“three sins in killing three”), there is also an assonance between “sins” and “killing”.

Third stanza

Wherein in cui, hast hai. Rhyme scheme: A-A-B-B-C-C-B-B-B. Quanto crudele, così velocemente hai macchiato la tua unghia con il sangue della zecca? L’unico peccato che ha commesso la zecca è stato quello di succhiarti il sangue? Hai vinto e ribadisci il fatto che non siamo stati danneggiati dalla sua morte, ma non hai niente di cui aver paura comunque, solo il tuo onore dovresti donarmi...

She has “purpled” her finger with the flea's blood by the opening of the third stanza. It is a “sudden” but perhaps inevitable betrayal of an innocent being. The woman claims triumph over the lover's argument, responding that neither she nor the man is weaker for her having killed the flea. In this way she attempts to unravel the speaker’s argument that the flea represents a sacred bond between them; the flea is simple to kill and nothing has been lost, and the single drop of blood will not be missed. Thus, there is no reason to have sex. The poet, however, is quick-witted enough to turn her argument back against her: if the death of the flea is virtually no problem, then any fear she might have about her loss of honor is equally a “false” fear. The act of physical union would cause virtually no serious harm to her reputation. He thus returns to his original argument from the first stanza: the flea’s intimate contact with the woman has caused her no harm, so a physical encounter with the poet will cause no harm either. There is an alliteration in “that..thou”, “this..true”, “false..fears”, “will… waste”. A hyperbole in the first two