Village Life
Looking at 'Village Life' - a main theme in John Clare's poems. Some poems and their quotations with analysis.
- Created by: R_S_E
- Created on: 29-03-14 16:13
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- Village Life
- THE COTTAGER
- Faithful Depiction of Village Life
- "True as the church clock hand the hour pursues / He plods about his toils and reads the news"
- Alliteration: emphasises the simplicity of life
- Simile: Regularity of village life, not working against time
- Personification: Reflecting the idea of changing times
- Monosyllabic nouns reflecting the hard work & simplicity of The Cottager's life & slow down the pace
- 'news' not expanded upon suggesting that the outside world is unimportant
- Enjambment highlights 'pursues' which is anaesthetised with 'plods' suggesting that while the outside world is moving forwards The Cottager's life remains the same
- "Content is helpmate to the day's employ"
- Personification: more tangible - Cottager is happy
- "And care ne'er comes to steal a single joy"
- Personification: He is free and happy, simple life
- "True as the church clock hand the hour pursues / He plods about his toils and reads the news"
- Tradition vs. Modernity
- "O'er steam's almighty tales he wondering looks / As witchcraft gleaned from old black letter books."
- Antithesis of God connotations and 'witchcraft' - new technology takes the place of God / battle of change
- 'wondering' reflects his ignorance of new processes
- Sibilance: lasting time and building fear
- Simile shows that he sees change as a crime/sin
- Personifies steam showing his ignorance at the world
- "To talk of 'Lunun' as a foreign land"
- Country dialect separating him from development
- Sees progress as foreign
- "He views knowledge with suspicious eyes / And thinks it blasphemy to be so wise"
- Progress is sacrilidge
- "O'er steam's almighty tales he wondering looks / As witchcraft gleaned from old black letter books."
- Form / Structure
- Cottager is given no name or identity, he is defined by his rural residence
- Rhyming couplets to reflect the order and regularity in The Cottager's life
- Harmony with nature
- "Rests with the lamb and rises with the lark"
- At one with nature, works alongside it - stressed by the alliteration which emphasises the structure nature puts into his life
- "Time scarcely noticed turns his hair to grey / Yet leaves him happy as a child at play"
- Simile emphasising his simplicity / innocence
- Doesn't fight with time, at peace - follows nature's cycles
- "Thinks the angler mad"
- Strong sense of empathy with the natural world
- "Rests with the lamb and rises with the lark"
- Faithful Depiction of Village Life
- SONNET: 'THE BARN DOOR IS OPEN'
- Simplicity of Village Life
- 'The...'
- Repetition / Parallel Phrasing - linking the village and the community together
- Simple life
- 'Who takes the hot dinner and hurries away'
- Alliteration conveying a feeling of business and unity (everything has its place / purpose
- Community working with each other
- 'The barn door is open and ready to winnow'
- Imagery, no depth = simplicity
- 'The...'
- Harmony with nature
- 'The maid's in the meadow and a-making the hay; / The ducks are a feeding and running about'
- Alliteration showing the repetitive and simple action
- Work closely with nature
- Parallel phrasing conveying how humans and animals can live in close proximity
- "The hen's in the dust and the hog's in the dirt, / The mower is busy and stripped in his shirt'
- Rhyming couplet emphasising the harmony between nature and humans
- Alliteration emphasising the natural and uninterrupted environment
- 'The maid's in the meadow and a-making the hay; / The ducks are a feeding and running about'
- Form / Structure
- Sonnet - love of nature
- Rhyming couplets - unity with nature
- Each line has 11 syllables reflecting the simplicity and regularity of village life
- Simplicity of Village Life
- SONNET 'I DREADED WALKING WHERE THERE WAS NO PATH'
- Individual harmony with nature
- "Yet everything about where I had gone / Appeared so beautiful I ventured on"
- 'everything' outweighs 'always'
- Freedom of ventured emphasised by the enjambment - conveys his movement
- "beautiful" repeated
- Love of nature hasn't changed from childhood to adult hood
- "Yet everything about where I had gone / Appeared so beautiful I ventured on"
- Social ideal of equality
- "How beautiful if such a place were mine"
- Envy of the land, disapproval of enclosure
- "But having nought I never feel alone / And cannot use another's as my own"
- not having anything makes him feel part of the community
- Final couplet consoles him - free from his desire to be free (paradox)
- "kinder look"
- Irony of being accused by kind looks, emphasises his anxiety
- "How beautiful if such a place were mine"
- Childhood
- Caesuras line 11 and 13 separate adult's moral point of view with childhood experience
- "And always..."
- Parallel phrasing conveying the sense that though anxious he cannot quell the instinct to trespass
- Individual harmony with nature
- DECEMBER
- Childhood
- "I met thee [day] in my boyish days"
- Personifies Christmas ad a friend suggesting a greater bond with the natural world
- "In fancy's infant ecstasy"
- Personification of 'fancy' suggests that children have a greater imagination = inspiration
- "I met thee [day] in my boyish days"
- Tradition
- "Old customs, O I love that sound"
- Caesura emphasises the sound, passed down generations providing a link between past and present
- "Which fashion yearly fades away"
- Tradition is being eroded by the new times
- "And soon the poet's song will be / The only refuge they can find"
- Customs going to fade until only poetry remembers them (Decay)
- "Old customs, O I love that sound"
- Relationship with natural world
- "ivy's veining bough" "ash trees"
- Nature brought into the house, part of their customs
- "Old winter wipes his icles by / And warms his fingers till he smiles"
- Winter personified as a kind old man seeking warmth = communal, cosy imagery
- "As though sundried martins nest / Instead of ides hung the eves"
- happiness / joy of the people has the power to transform winter into feelings of Spring
- "ivy's veining bough" "ash trees"
- Childhood
- St. MARTIN'S EVE
- Nature (conflict / unity)
- "Huge-seeming rocks and deserts now enshroud"
- Mixed metaphor of the clouds as rocks and desert enshrouding the sky, death? Nature is dangerous
- "Winter's imprisonment is all begun"
- Metaphor for entrapment indoors from harsh nature - nature can control the actions of people
- "Rude winds... ill forsee... Who clingeth now to hope like shipwrecked folks at sea"
- Nature didn't anticipate the wind damaging the landscape - power surprised itself
- Simile of nature as shipwrecked at sea - winter is a harsh and powerful time that is a danger even to nature
- "desolate", "enshroud", "threatening", "imprisonment", "bellowing", "din", "blustering"
- Harshness of nature emphasising the power it has over people
- "Huge-seeming rocks and deserts now enshroud"
- Community
- "Even the very rafters groaned and bent"
- Hyperbolic personification of the rafters joining in the revelry, antithesis with the roaring tempest outside
- Community unite in their merry making
- "Old men as wild as boys"
- Simile portraying how age does not matter in this community - the generations mix together
- "Old women whom no cares of life destroys / Dance with the girls"
- "Old men as wild as boys"
- Simile portraying how age does not matter in this community - the generations mix together
- "Old women whom no cares of life destroys / Dance with the girls"
- "Old women whom no cares of life destroys / Dance with the girls"
- Simile portraying how age does not matter in this community - the generations mix together
- "Old men as wild as boys"
- "Old women whom no cares of life destroys / Dance with the girls"
- Simile portraying how age does not matter in this community - the generations mix together
- "And, that like to sunshine warming falls, / Being all the solace to her withering mind"
- Simile of hopes being like sunshine juxtaposed with withering mind - not growing through sun but drying up and dying
- Sense of community does not help this fallen woman
- "Even the very rafters groaned and bent"
- Traditional Life - Simple View of Reality
- "But beneath her pillow lays an onion red"
- Traditional superstition of red onion to win husband - simple beliefs / lifestyle
- "Where ignorance is bliss 'tis folly to be so wise"
- Antithesis of 'ignorance' and wisdom
- Irony about their deluded joyfulness in enjoying noise as music - don't care as long as they have friends to share it with
- "Brought up all the sports their memory could devise"
- Communal traditions passed on through memory
- "But beneath her pillow lays an onion red"
- Structure
- Regular 9 line stanzas with rhyme scheme ABABBCBCC = regular, fast paced rhythm with enjambment to present lively atmosphere of games and storytelling
- Nature (conflict / unity)
- THE COTTAGER
- "And when I gained the road where all are free"
- Childhood
- Caesuras line 11 and 13 separate adult's moral point of view with childhood experience
- "And always..."
- Parallel phrasing conveying the sense that though anxious he cannot quell the instinct to trespass
- Childhood
- Traditional Life - Simple View of Reality
- "But beneath her pillow lays an onion red"
- Traditional superstition of red onion to win husband - simple beliefs / lifestyle
- "Where ignorance is bliss 'tis folly to be so wise"
- Antithesis of 'ignorance' and wisdom
- Irony about their deluded joyfulness in enjoying noise as music - don't care as long as they have friends to share it with
- "Brought up all the sports their memory could devise"
- Communal traditions passed on through memory
- "But beneath her pillow lays an onion red"
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