Viva La Vida Coldplay Analysis

The “Palace” portion of the poem attempts to provide insight into the general’s decision to kill the migrant workers (Dove). The narrator tells us about the general’s mother and how he is mourning her death. “[W]hen thoughts turn to love and death[,] the general thinks of his mother….”(Dove). The narrator leads us to believe that the general either associates love and death or doesn’t seem to notice a stark difference between the two, which is why he can order the massacre of 20,000 people. The structure of the poem -- being broken up into the two viewpoints of the parties involved -- is an effective way to contrast the two sides and emphasize the socioeconomic issues in the Dominican Republic at the time.

The first stanza foregrounds the importance of love to the lyrical voice. Throughout the stanzas, the lyrical voice will express his/her particular feelings about something that occurred particularly to him/her. It shows the writing through experience. The poem begins by saying that this lover has no riches and, consequently, couldn’t share them with the lyrical voice “No riches from his scanty store/ My lover could impart”. Notice the alliteration on “scanty store”, which gives a soft feel to the first part of the stanza. Then, the lyrical voice states that this lover gave him/her something that he/she values more “He gave a boon I valued more-”: his heart “He gave me all his heart!”. Notice the great emphasis made on the last line and how the lyrical voice accentuates it by using a final dash and creating a pause at the end of the previous line.

The song writer uses Hyperboles, Metaphors, Personification, and especially imagery. Within the first section, it states that “she’s buying a stairway to heaven”, this being a hyperbole, since you cannot literally buy a stairway to heaven. For the next few sections, the writer uses lines like, “In a tree by the brook, there’s a songbird who sings”, “And my spirit is crying for leaving”, and “in my thoughts I have seen the rings of smoke through the trees, and the voices of those who stand looking.” These use Imagery, and personification, to let you see what is happening within the story of the lady. More examples of personification are, “And the forests will echo with laughter”, “Our shadows taller than our soul”. Some examples of hyperboles are the lines, “Your head is humming, and it won’t go”, “All that glitters is gold”, “Our shadows taller than our soul”, and, “everything turns to gold.” The song uses an outstanding amount of literary elements.

Secondly, the speaker of the poem can be described as underprivileged, and this is shown throughout the entire poem. For example, line 1 of the poem it states "some are teethed on a silver spoon” and line 5 it states "some are swaddled in silk and down”. This shows that the speaker is not the same as the person who is teethed on a silver spoon or cared for very carefully. This inclusion also shows that the speaker was not born into a wealthy family and so the speaker must fight for what they need pertaining to themselves and the family.

Evanescence is an American rock band known for song, Bring Me to Life. Bring Me to Life is a song about being lost and in a state of depression until you find that one person to break you out of that sad state. This song was inspired by the lead singer’s, Amy Lee’s, husband. She says that when she first met her husband that he could somehow see inside of her and bring her to life when at the time she was going though a hard time (Edwards, Evanescence’s Amy Lee: how we made Bring Me to Life).

The next verse in the song addresses privileged class in American culture, the wealthiest of Americans. The song states that, “Some folks are born silver spoon in hand, Lord, don’t they help themselves, oh” criticising the rich who live easier life where things are often given to them and the song also calls them greedy by saying that “they help themselves”. Fogerty further criticizes the rich by saying how they do not help the poorer citizens with the lyrics, “But when the tax men come to the door, Lord, the house look a like a rummage sale, yes” showing how the high class “tax men” are coming to take away the belongings and the livelihoods of the common man. Fogerty’s distrust of the rich in this verse stems from the law which stated that active members in a university, be it undergraduate, graduate, of law school,

The second half of the first stanza introduces an extended metaphor describing the motivating factor of human nature, saying, “To conquer every mountain shown” (Keenan). While the word “conquer,” conjures up images of imperialistic warfare, within the context of this song the word has a broader meaning and may be more clearly understood as the “will to power and the will to meaning.” That is, the driving forces of human nature are achievement, which is motivated by personal ambition to reach the highest possible position we may accomplish, and the drive to understand the meaning of our lives. The word mountain represents every type of obstacle that might get in the way of that goal, while the word “I” directly refers to the singer and metaphorically refers to humanity as a collective of individuals motivated by personal self-interest. Taken together with the first half of this stanza, we see the idea that the defining characteristic of human nature is to overcome, or conquer, every obstacle that obstructs the will to power or prevents us from discovering truth. The singer then introduces the controlling metaphor (or main theme) of the song, which is transcendence saying, “But I’ve

How can one separate a mere normal man from a king? And which is more important between men with a passion from a man with a selfish desire? King Louis XVI was an example of a king unfit to rule. We will discuss King Louis’s early life, his reign as king, and the role he played in the French revolution.

The first stanza is addressed to ‘old men’ and how they should not simply slip away and die quietly, they should fight death until the end. Poetic techniques

An idea that interested me in the song “Fix you” by Coldplay was how you will always have someone to lean on no matter what. When Chris sings “lights will guide home” he is using personification in this line because saying the lights will guide them is a human thing to do, as people guide each other which I think Chris is trying to demonstrate when he sings the lyrics “lights will guide you home.” It shows life itself because no matter how big the mistakes you make, no matter how bad life may seem, there will always be someone that will have your back. This reminds me of my friends who are always there for me whether its for when I’m feeling down or if I’ve had a bad day. These lyrics also emphasize that everyone goes through rough patchs in their life and they should let people try to help them. When my dog died this year, I didn’t take it well and I was distraught, but it made me going through the loss easier

Furthermore, the troubled man starts to follow the young boy, who is not bothering him, and steps on the back of his shoe. This startles the young boy, which also surprises the old man. The man becomes so scared of the unknown character that he went looking for, and chokes the song out of the innocent boy. Above all, the word sing is used through connotation and denotation. To illustrate, in the fifth stanza it states, “a Water person of old who grew troubled by the strange singing floating in the dark.” Singing is used as a connotation in this sentence representing life. Life is gentle and born with innocence, however the old man did not like this type of life and assume the young boy was doing a guilty act. No doubt, a hoodie on a rainy day is strange, candy and tea is uncommon partners, and singing a catchy tune by yourself is weird. Therefore, when the young boy turned around to a sudden pressure on the back of his shoe and took him out of his tune, the old man could not see his daughter, son, granddaughter, or grandson in the young boy’s eyes. The young boy was born with the same purity as a white child, but at that moment the old man became the judge, jury, and the

In “Viva La Vida”, the former king shows recognition of his mistakes when he says, “I know Saint Peter won’t call my name” (Coldplay 10). The reader is able to picture Saint Peter denying the speaker’s entrance into heaven because of Cold Play’s use of sight imagery. Readers can visualize the former king standing at the gates of heaven watching others get summoned by Saint Peter. Meanwhile, the former king is thinking back to his mistakes when he was in power. Deep down the man regrets his cruelty and wishes he could go back in time to use his power properly instead of abusing it. Because of his actions, he is alone and powerless in the world; all he has left are his memories of when he used to be in control. Although, the former king is expecting this denial because of the way he used his power when he was a king. He is now mentally tearing himself down due to his mistakes in the past. Similarly, the count in The Count of Monte Cristo damaged himself while damaging those around him. When talking about himself after he recognized how much harm he had done, the count says, “a man who, like Satan, believed himself for an instant to be equal to God” (Dumas 530). In his letter

In the song Viva la Vida, Coldplay uses personification to personify and reveal a loss of power when the lyrics say, “...Sweep the streets I used to own…” (Coldplay). Viva la Vida demonstrates the use of personification and reveals that the speaker is lonely and powerless. This represents his kingship and his kingdom as they fell together and loss of power. This same personification is demonstrated through Scarlet Pimpernel, but in a different way, “Abusive power are shown in the Scarlet Pimpernel, and it leads to others powerlessness, “... you know as well as I do the fate that awaits him at the hands of the Revolutionary Government…” (Orczy 129). The overuse and misuse of power are demonstrated in the Scarlet Pimpernel and, conversely is conveyed by personifying fate and the French government to leave others that are in their way, powerless. Personification is expressed through Viva la Vida and The Scarlet Pimpernel in a similar but different point of view to portray it with misuse and

Yet how they creep through my fingers to the deep, While I weep – while I weep! This is an indirection indication to the main character realizing that he cannot hold onto his loved one anymore. As the poem continues the main character gets even more troubled, when he says in line eight “O god! Can I not clasp them with a tighter clasp? O God! Can I not save One from the pitiless wave?” This is almost a cry for help, almost like him saying “God I tried to save my loved one, why did this happen to me? Why are they leaving me? I tried to save them!” And then in the last two lines of the second stanza, the character becomes overwhelmed with the pain and I feel almost whispers, “Is all that we see or seem but a dream within a dream?” Fundamentally, allowing him to come to the conclusion that his loved one is gone, but that what he went through was just a bad dream, like everything else he had endured throughout his life.

As the power of a song resides completely in its lyrics, it is no longer surprising that music can be healing, inspiring, or even motivating. After introducing this insight to my life, it became very rare for me to listen to any Imagine Dragons’ song without it leaving an impact on my life and my perspectives. Imagine Dragons is a rock band whose music tends to address both personal and social issues. It’s Time, one of their biggest hits and most influential songs, was written by the band’s lead singer Dan Reynolds during a difficult time in his life. “ I was not very happy with who I was, I guess, and I wanted to make some changes” says the singer in an interview with Purevolume , in which he addresses It’s Time as a poem he wrote to express