РефератыИностранный языкReRevelation Through Experience Essay Research Paper In

Revelation Through Experience Essay Research Paper In

Revelation Through Experience Essay, Research Paper


In “The Last Chrysanthemum,” Thomas Hardy asks, “Why should


this flower delay so long / To show its tremulous plumes?” He


might have well have been posing this question to himself. The


British poet wrote most of his greatest verse after the age of


sixty. Hardy proves, that through life’s journey, a metamorphosis


can take place in one’s perspective. Through time and experience,


innocence is lost, only realized after a death or startling


event. Hardy takes three approaches at this theme in “The


Darkling Thrush,” “The Man He Killed,” and “Channel Firing.”


In “The Darkling Thrush,” the speaker is despondent in the


first two stanzas, brooding about the atmosphere. Hardy wrote


this poem at the turn of the century, so it is probable that


these views are reflective of his feelings. Spirituality and the


vivacity of life have recoiled “like strings of broken lyres,”


giving this moment in time a feeling of apathy. The speaker is


tired and suffocated by his circumstances: the desolation of


Winter, the weariness of the last Century, and the pessimism of


change being a long ways away. Yet, he finds his faith redeemed


through “an aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small.” The bird’s


passionate song affects the “growing gloom,” and its faith gives


it the courage to “fling his soul,” paralleling Jesus or the


Kamikaze pilots of World War II who were willing to sacrifice for


the greater good.


“Was out of work” is the best excuse that the speaker of


“The Man He Killed” could find for his sin. With his choice to


enter war and to bear arms, he lost good judgement, morals, and


the ability to feel pain. He is the victim of the war’s society,


where minds have devolved into narrow-mindedness and tunnel


vision. Immediate needs dictate lives, not virtue and reason.


After he kills this man who he might have given “half a crown” in


another life, his actions have caught up to him. The speaker’s


mind whirl

s with hypothetical situations and guilt. He knows that


he had the same chance of being killed, and that he had changed


the course of the world in someway. But in the end, he concedes


that his wrongdoing can’t be reversed.


“Channel Firing” deals with the aspects of innocence beyond


our life on earth. The soldiers of World War I, who are


supposedly fighting for a good cause, only help make “red war yet


redder.” They are blind to see that their convictions are wrong,


and that the effect of their guns on nature is much harsher,


shaking the earth with as much terror as Judgement Day. Again,


indifference is a key factor in losing innocence and purity.


Along with their lack of compassion for life, the soldiers take


religion half-heartedly, doing nothing “for Christes sake.” It


is through this omniscient role that the dead learn the


consequences of man’s free will and man’s abuse of it. God


reveals to them that the soldiers will “have to scour / Hell’s


floor,” hinting that the dead have followed the same pattern of


mistakes, and it is already too late for them to repent.


Hardy incorporates the theme of innocence lost into the


poems, but explores them in three distinct ways. “The Darkling


Thrush” displays a change in perspective through nature and the


power of one. “The Man He Killed” shows a transformation after


fighting an internal war with a split-second decision that the


speaker could not reverse. In “Channel Firing,” the epiphany for


the speakers is through life after death. All of these speakers


were oblivious that they were swept away by the coldness and


triviality, and superficiality of the early 20th Century. The


central message is much like the poetry of William Blake. Only a


state of innocence opens us to a deeper level, and being


receptive and open to nature will lend one divine inspiration. In


the situation of Hardy’s poems, the revelation of innocence is


gathered from one profound incident or a “rude awakening.”


342

Сохранить в соц. сетях:
Обсуждение:
comments powered by Disqus

Название реферата: Revelation Through Experience Essay Research Paper In

Слов:733
Символов:4812
Размер:9.40 Кб.