Memory and Nature Wordsworths Tintern Abbey

First published in William Wordsworth and Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s groundbreaking joint collection, Lyrical Ballads (1798), â€Å"Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey† is among the most famous and influential of Wordsworth’s odes. It embodies the crucial concepts Wordsworth set out in his preface to Lyrical Ballads, which served as a manifesto for Romantic poetry. Key Concepts of Romantic Poetry Poems made â€Å"by fitting to metrical arrangement a selection of the real language of men in a state of vivid sensation,† choosing â€Å"incidents and situations from common life ... in a selection of language really used by men.†The language of poetry used to delineate â€Å"the primary laws of our nature ... the essential passions of the heart ... our elementary feelings ... in a state of simplicity.†Poems designed solely to give â€Å"immediate pleasure to a human Being possessed of that information which may be expected from him, not as a lawyer, a physician, a mariner, an astronomer, or a natural philosopher, but as a Man.†Poems illustrating the truth of â€Å"man and nature as essentially adapted to each other, and the mind of man as naturally the mirror of the fairest and most interesting properties of nature.†Good poetry as â€Å"the spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings: it takes its origin from emotion recollected in tranquillity: t he emotion is contemplated till, by a species of reaction, the tranquillity gradually disappears, and an emotion, kindred to that which was before the subject of contemplation, is gradually produced and does itself actually exist in the mind.† Notes on Form â€Å"Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey,† like many of Wordsworth’s early poems, takes the form of a monologue in the first-person voice of the poet, written in blank verse—unrhymed iambic pentameter. Because the rhythm of many of the lines has subtle variations on the fundamental pattern of five iambic feet (da DUM / da DUM / da DUM / da DUM / da DUM) and because there are no strict end-rhymes, the poem must have seemed like prose to its first readers, who were accustomed to the strict metrical and rhyming forms and the elevated poetic diction of 18th-century neo-classical poets like Alexander Pope and Thomas Gray. Instead of an obvious rhyme scheme, Wordsworth worked many more subtle echoes into his line endings: â€Å"springs ... cliffs†Ã¢â‚¬Å"impress ... connect†Ã¢â‚¬Å"trees ... seem†Ã¢â‚¬Å"sweet ... heart†Ã¢â‚¬Å"behold ... world†Ã¢â‚¬Å"world ... mood ... blood†Ã¢â‚¬Å"years ... matured† And in a few places, separated by one or more lines, there are full rhymes and repeated end-words, which create a special emphasis simply because they are so rare in the poem: â€Å"thee ... thee†Ã¢â‚¬Å"hour ... power†Ã¢â‚¬Å"decay ... betray†Ã¢â‚¬Å"lead ... feed†Ã¢â‚¬Å"gleams ... stream† One further note about the poem’s form: In just three places, there is a mid-line break, between the end of one sentence and the beginning of the next. The meter is not interrupted—each of these three lines is five iambs—but the sentence break is signified not only by a period but also by an extra vertical space between the two parts of the line, which is visually arresting and marks an important turn of thought in the poem. Notes on Content Wordsworth announces at the very beginning of â€Å"Lines Composed a Few Miles Above Tintern Abbey† that his subject is memory, that he is returning to walk in a place he has been before, and that his experience of the place is all bound together with his memories of being there in the past. Five years have past; five summers, with the lengthOf five long winters! and again I hearThese waters, rolling from their mountain-springsWith a soft inland murmur. Wordsworth repeats â€Å"again† or â€Å"once again† four times in the poem’s first section description of the â€Å"wild secluded scene,† the landscape all green and pastoral, a fitting place for â€Å"some Hermit’s cave, where by his fire / The Hermit sits alone.† He has walked this lonely path before, and in the second section of the poem, he is moved to appreciate how the memory of its sublime natural beauty has succored him. ...’mid the dinOf towns and cities, I have owed to themIn hours of weariness, sensations sweet,Felt in the blood, and felt along the heart;And passing even into my purer mind,With tranquil restoration... And more than succor, more than simple tranquility, his communion with the beautiful forms of the natural world has brought him to a kind of ecstasy, a higher state of being. Almost suspended, we are laid asleepIn body, and become a living soul:While with an eye made quiet by the powerOf harmony, and the deep power of joy,We see into the life of things. But then another line is broken, another section begins, and the poem turns, its celebration giving way to a tone almost of lament, because he knows he is not the same thoughtless animal child who communed with nature in this place years ago. That time is past,And all its aching joys are now no more,And all its dizzy raptures. He has matured, become a thinking man, the scene is infused with memory, colored with thought, and his sensibility is attuned to the presence of something behind and beyond what his senses perceive in this natural setting. A presence that disturbs me with the joyOf elevated thoughts; a sense sublimeOf something far more deeply interfused,Whose dwelling is the light of setting suns,And the round ocean and the living air,And the blue sky, and in the mind of man;A motion and a spirit, that impelsAll thinking things, all objects of all thought,And rolls through all things. These are the lines that have led many readers to conclude that Wordsworth is proposing a kind of pantheism, in which the divine permeates the natural world, everything is God. Yet it seems almost as if he is trying to convince himself that his layered appreciation of the sublime is really an improvement over the thoughtless ecstasy of the wandering child. Yes, he has healing memories he can carry back to the city, but they also permeate his present experience of the beloved landscape, and it seems that memory in some way stands between his self and the sublime. In the last section of the poem, Wordsworth addresses his companion, his beloved sister Dorothy, who has presumably been walking with him but has not yet been mentioned. He sees his former self in her enjoyment of the scene: in thy voice I catchThe language of my former heart, and readMy former pleasures in the shooting lightsOf thy wild eyes. And he is wistful, not certain, but hoping and praying (even though he uses the word â€Å"knowing†). ... that Nature never did betrayThe heart that loved her; ’tis her privilege,Through all the years of this our life, to leadFrom joy to joy: for she can so informThe mind that is within us, so impressWith quietness and beauty, and so feedWith lofty thoughts, that neither evil tongues,Rash judgments, nor the sneers of selfish men,Nor greetings where no kindness is, nor allThe dreary intercourse of daily life,Shall e’er prevail against us, or disturbOur cheerful faith, that all which we beholdIs full of blessings. Would that it were so. But there is an uncertainty, a hint of mournfulness underneath the poet’s declamations.

The Chilling Torture at Abu Ghraib Prison Essay - 630 Words

When the news of torture at Abu Ghraib prison broke in early 2004 during the â€Å"global war on terror,† much of the public was outraged and did not know how to react. Heavy debate began over the issue and media reporters on the issues took sides. Many books were written about the subject. The conservatives attempted to downsize the issues and take the side that it was simply ‘bored’ and ‘tense’ soldiers trying to blow off a little steam with horseplay. However, the photographs that surface said quite differently. Naked photographs of prisoners engaged in simulated sexual acts, deceased prisoners in sexual poses and prisoners tied up and left for dead tell the chilling story of the terror and torture behind the prison walls. Did the US do†¦show more content†¦I feel as though these are not the isolated actions of a few â€Å"bad apples,† but rather is carefully laid out and systematic torture. This war was kick started to overthrow th e rain and restore democracy in Iraq. This was a war for human rights of Iraqi people. Marxist criminology is just one of the criminological schools. It is very much centered on the work of structural functionalism criminologists and parallels it very closely on the focus of what produces ‘stability and continuity in society.’ However, it is different in the approach in the sense that it looks at a predestined ‘political philosophy.’ Marxists focus on why things change and are quick to identify what disrupts life in industrialized nations. They describe how society is divided up into slices and how slices of the pie include power, wealth, prestige, and the perceptions of the world. Most theories of crime tend to be ‘ahistorical.’ â€Å"They do not treat the question of how the material conditions of society and crime evolve together as relevant to the study of crime† (Chambliss, 1974, page 25). For Marxists this is a problem because ahi storical theories fail to link the phenomenon under investigation – in this case, crime. Ahistorical theories attempt to reason that crime occurs outside of social systems and is something that develops on its own. Two important elements developShow MoreRelatedAnalysis Of The Book The 3303 Words   |  14 Pagesone way or the other. For so long the actions of the United States have been rationalized simply as; the ends justify the means, but the manner in which â€Å"peace† is being achieved is revealed, such as in the My Lai massacre and the tortures within the Abu Ghraib Prison, the country cowardly points its fingers towards the perpetrators. Instead of showing the corruption of the system they plead innocent and hand to us on a silver platter, the executioners of those evil actions. American soldiers haveRead MoreThe Visceral Politics of V for Vendetta: On Politica Affect in Cinema6851 Words   |  28 Pagesthe bombing, and promises the citys dispirited citizens that he will destroy the Houses of Parliament in exactly one year. V then begins to systematically exact revenge against various government officials who had tortured him or authorized his torture during his imprisonment at the Larkhill Medical Research Institute years earlier. A somewhat reluctant ally in these acts of retribution, Evey is c aptured and repeatedly tortured for information about V. But she remains defiant even under the threat

Summary of the Omnivore’s Dilemma Free Essays

Human  Ethology  Bulletin,  October  2007] The Omnivore’s Dilemma: A Natural History of Four Meals By  Michael  Pollan Penguin  Press,  New  York,  NY. 2006,  450pp. ISBN  1? 59420? 082? 3  [Hdbk. We will write a custom essay sample on Summary of the Omnivore’s Dilemma or any similar topic only for you Order Now ,  $26. 95] Reviewed by William F. McKibbin and Todd K. Shackelford Florida Atlantic University, Dept. of Psychology, Davie, FL 33314 USA [E-mail: wmckibbi@fau. edu, tshackel@fau. edu] The  Omnivore’s  Dilemma  is  the  latest  book  by  Michael  Pollan,  best  known  for  his  previous  best? selling  work,  The  Botany  of  Desire. Here,  Pollan  has  crafted  a  well? written  and  enjoyable   exploration  of  humans’  relationship  with  food. The  book  is  written  for  a  lay  audience,  but  is   appreciable  by  all. Pollan  begins  by  focusing  on  a  seemingly  simple  question,  Ã¢â‚¬Å"What  should  we  have  for  dinner? †Ã‚   The  answer,  it  seems,  is  not  so  simple  for  omnivores  like  us. Pollan  guides  the  reader  by   examining  the  three  major  types  of  food  production  and  divides  the  book  into  these  three areas:   Industrial  (focusing  on  the  modern  food  industry’s  reliance  on  corn),  Pastoral  (focusing  on   organic  food  production,  both  Ã¢â‚¬Å"big†Ã‚  and  Ã¢â‚¬Å"small†Ã‚  scale),  and  Personal  (focusing  on  personally   hunting  and  gathering  one’s  food). The  first,  Industrial  section  of  the  book  demonstrates  that  nearly  everything  we  consume  in   Western  society,  particularly  in  America,  is  in  some  way  derived  from  corn. The  processed   foods  that  seem  a  staple  of  modern  living  are  derived  largely  (if  not  wholly)  from  corn. Even   foods  such  as  eggs,  chicken,  fish,  and  beef  are  essentially  derived  from  corn:  cows,  chickens,   and  fish  are  coerced  to  consume  a  food  that  to  them  is  highly  unnatural. If  w How to cite Summary of the Omnivore’s Dilemma, Papers