Seminar Paper
On
PHILOSPHICAL STRAIN IN THE WORKS OF JOESPH ADDISON
Course Code: BHE 402
Course Title: Prose Down the Ages
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Submitted by:
SAMAH RAFIQ
ENROLL. NO. A0706110041
Submitted to:
DR. DIPANKAR SUKUL
LECTURER AT AIESR
AMITY INSTITUTE OF ENGLISH STUDIES AND RESEARCH
AMITY UNIVERSITY UTTAR PRADESH
Joseph Addison is considered to be among the most impactful essayists of all time. His essays mainly appeared in the two famous periodicals The Tatler and The Spectator. He has brought out a number of essays during his lifetime (274 for the The Spectator alone) and has touched upon a wide range of topics and themes through the medium of these essays. In this paper, the philosophical strains in
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He therefore incorporates a lot of philosophical elements in the essay.
In his other essay entitled The Vision of Mirza, Addison takes the pains to translate a highly philosophical Oriental manuscript into English because he believes that every person can greatly benefit from comprehending its underlying philosophy. The essay’s broad subject seems to be the very purpose of life. It is an allegory which has clear connotations of life after death and heaven and hell associated with it. In the essay, Mirza is a Persian who encounters a “genius” on the hills of Baghdad. This “genius” seems to be a representation of a prophet. The essay clearly assumes a contemplative and spiritual tone from the very beginning. The genius is described as one in the habit of a shepherd whose musical instrument yields a music which is exceedingly sweet and makes Mirza wonder whether this is the sound that the “departed souls” of “good men” get to hear upon their “first arrival in paradise.”
Further in the essay, the whole idea is explained through a tide and a bridge. The tide represents time and the bridge represents human life. We find the bridge has about 70 arches which may be taken as symbolic of average life span of an individual. Multitudes of people passing over the bridge are symbolic of the people living their lives. Some people are seen crossing over safely to the other end of the bridge while others fall down into the waters mid-way. All this is again
Initially Mai holds a negative perspective in “Mai closed her eyes and tried to recall her father's stories— but they rang shallow against the dense roaring slabs of water she'd just seen.” The hydrographia personifies the natural elements creating a pathetic fallacy, which reflects Mai’s initially pessimistic attitude as her hope is crushed by the harsh reality of her experiences on the boat. However, this provocative experience catalyses a transformed perception, as upon reaching the shore she thinks: “The boat would land - they would all land.” The epistrophe of “land” and high modality of “would” shows her renewed hopeful perspective, which would not have been possible without physically experiencing the harshness of being on the boat. Thus, the ability for discoveries to be far-reaching and transformative is seen through these provocative and confronting external experiences that transform individual perceptions.
The different groups of people within the poem represent the different stages of life. At the beginning of the poem it talks about a young boy and his dog and swimmers. Several lines down it talks about “young lovers” and then families.
It is possible to understand certain pieces of literature outside its historical context; however, it is more beneficial if the reader has background knowledge. Taha Muhammad Ali was a Palestinian poet that was born in 1931. He grew up in Saffuriya, Galilee which is located in the Middle East. Ali was self-taught through his readings of classical Arabic literature, American fiction, and English poetry. Ali then began to write poems in the 1970s. He wrote a poem entitled “Meeting at an Airport” which is based on his personal experiences. Without knowing his background information and history, it is unclear about what exactly is meant by this poem. This piece of literature elicits the sense of reconnection and the exact same feelings for each other just like the first time they met. In the poem, “Meeting at an Airport” written by Taha Muhammad Ali, historical context is needed to understand this piece because it emphasizes the theme, the purpose of the poem, and establishes credibility (“Poetry Foundation”).
There will always be philosophical interpretations that will create universal truths for many generations to come. In addition, these literary works enriches the audiences’ understanding of these texts as supremely important cultural and historical documents, for audiences who embrace their universal truths. Both generational audiences’ spiritual interpretations seemed to have, collectively, developed a text of extraordinary literary works that are overflowing with philosophical and truth-seeking richness.
“An Occurrence at Owl Creek Bridge” uses symbols that all relate to one thing. The Thing is time and how slowly it moves when you are on your last leg or in your final minutes on earth. The main symbols used are the water and thing in the water and the protagonist’s watch. These symbols use imagery to show how slow everything is moving. “With their greater infrequency
The river represents the period between life and death. Another part of this symbol is the air representing life and under the rocks and waterfall representing death. Just as the transition from life to death is in motion, so is the rushing of the water. Both have a beginning and an ending point, but the part in the middle is constantly moving, swirling and churning. As the girl loses hope for survival and the waterfall is approaching, the narrator states, “[S]he becomes part of the river” (45). The girl now crosses over the borderline of life and death, and she is about to be swallowed up by the falls of death and can never return to life. However, when the diver goes into the river to save her, he comes out saying that “he’d never enter that river again” (47). He encounters the spiritual eccentricity of the edge of death when he looks into lifeless girl’s animated eyes, and he can not fathom that experience. Another symbol that is introduced twice is the gurgle of the aquarium, which symbolizes the attempt to understand nature’s cycle of life. As she floats downstream, the girl remembers “her sixth-grade science class, the gurgle of the aquarium at the back of the room”(45). During this moment, all of her thoughts are puzzled, and she cannot understand the death awaiting her. Later on, after sleepless nights, the diver is in the empty school where “the only sound the gurgle of the aquarium” (48). This moment is the point at which he decides
Wilfred Owen’s poetry is shaped by an intense focus on extraordinary human experiences. In at least 2 poems set for study, explore Owen’s portrayal of suffering and pity.
William Blake’s “London” and Wilfred Owen’s “Dulce et Decorum Est” appear to have little in common. Although at first they may seem different, they have many hidden similarities. Ultimately, Blake and Owen enhance the overall message presented in their poems by allowing the reader to fully gasp the meaning by connecting them through their senses, the overall consequences of the event, and the importance of the issue.
The writer compares his life to water on Rouge River that is heading towards dead end with unknown future. “And my reflection is dominated by water Coming to impasse, the teeter-totter Of decision” from the poem shows the seriousness and thought provoking idea i.e. contemplation probably related to meaning of life and what lies ahead. Moreover, “And plunging in we find a serene cavernous strength, And pressed to run its darkness at full length, We find our all”, reflects tone of believing in ourselves and the best we have in us. This means no matter the situation we can bring the best of us that is life. Tone of the poem helps writer to make the poem more appealing to the readers. It aids the poet to express his feeling more effectively and
Henry Reeds has divided his poem in five six-lined stanzas. Each stanza has followed a particular pattern of alternating. In the stanzas the poet has used imagery and word play as the major poetic devices. His aim which has been achieved quite sufficiently, is to evoke the suggestions made by the instructor and explain the implications of the
The power of the poet is not only to convey an everyday scene into a literary portrait of words, but also to interweave this scene into an underlying theme. The only tool the poet has to wield is the word. Through a careful placement and selection of words, the poet can hopefully make his point clear, but not blatantly obvious. Common themes of poems are life, death, or the conflicting forces thereto. This theme could never possibly be overused because of the endless and limitless ways of portraying life or death through the use of different words.
It can be assumed that if J.S. Mill and Lord Devlin ever coexisted some intoxicating deliberations regarding the role of morality in society would transpire. However, time has a peculiar habit of erecting boundaries amid centuries, allowing us only to presume discourse between the contemporary and the historical. Consequentially, each individual has an obligation to formulate his or her own appraisal established through the logistic unification of the particular instant and one's own conception of idealistic righteousness. But the acquisition of an infallible and tangible philosophy with universal application would be as obstinate to create as it would to fathom. In such regard, the apparatus on
Such a situation warrants Coleridge the title of visionary, and therefore his poem becomes a vision: a Romantically textual utopia whose realisation was challenged by the rational status quo of its historical origin. Due to this, Coleridge’s work will always seek practical affirmation and will therefore constantly be the source of metaphysically-oriented debate, leaving the dualism that rules it to be decided by the reader and the ideologies he or she brings to the text. This conclusion is supported by the words of John Beer:
Some of the recurrent themes and motifs in Hopkins’ poetry include the idea that the world resembles a book written by God, through which he expresses himself in order to provide humans with an opportunity to understand and approach him (Gardner 11). In ‘God’s Grandeur’ Hopkins can be seen to express his concern about the spiritual crisis of the Victorian period. During this time of urbanization and industrialization, Hopkins voiced his distress about human indifference to destruction. This poem is one of the very few which he wrote during the time when he served as a priest.
By imitating writing styles of ancient poets, Ezra Pound exhibited his attitude toward modern civilization, and his famous poem, Hugh Selwyn Mauberley, is the stereotype. In this poem, Pound revealed his disagreement with industrial society. The poem is an imitation of other old poetic styles, or epic style; however, it presents ironic meaning. To fully understand Pound's divergence from modern culture, the ways of presenting his position will be firstly explained. Next, the focus is on the contrast between the elitist and popular culture. Finally, to highlight Pound's attitude, I prefer to make comparison with other literary masterpieces, Odyssey, which have similar poetic style,