O Captain My Captain Essay

Explication of “O Captain! My Captain!” “O Captain! My Captain!” is one of the most popular poems ever written by Walt Whitman. Upon the initial reading of this poem, one may perceive the poem to be about a loyal captain who leads his crew on a treacherous, but successful, voyage which ends in devastation. If interpreted literally this is the poem’s only meaning, but for those who look further there is an underlying story behind the words of Whitman. Whitman uses multiple literary elements throughout

attitude, tone and message. In the book On the Rainy River O’Brien expresses his thoughts about going to war. “At some point in mid-July I began thinking seriously about Canada. The border lay a few hundred miles north, and eight hour drive. Both my conscience and my instincts were telling me to make a break for it, just take off and run like hell and never stop” (O'Brien 173). Tim’s tone of anger shows he is against going to war, saying that he was close to making a break for Canada. Tim O’Brien’s writing

views led him to idolize Abraham Lincoln. “O Captain, My Captain!” was written by Whitman shortly after Lincoln’s death. “In O Captain, My Captain!”, Whitman uses the poem as an elegy to honor Lincoln’s passing and achievements, and document Whitman’s personal reaction to his death. The first signs of the theme are found in the first stanza. The first stanza starts off with a relived tone and sets the mood for the poem. The poet is exulting to “my Captain!” that the “fearful trip is done”. In the

Few poems are more well known by Americans other than “O Captain! My Captain!,” especially after the dramatic scene in A Dead Poets Society in which students stand on their desk and profess “O Captain! My Captain!” to protest the decision the headmaster makes to fire their professor. Its basic metaphors can be easily understood by the masses, and it clearly conveys ideas shared by many across the country at the end of the Civil War. However, at a closer inspection, the poem reveals a deeper connection

affected the society can inflect a person's emotions. )One way to by writing any huh) The two poems “In memory of W.B Yeats” by Wystan Hugh Auden and “O' Captain My, Captain”, by Walt Whitman, both mourns the death of a loved on. “In memory of W.B Yeats” is written about an Irish poet named Walter Butler that died in a hotel room, while “O'Captain My, Captain” is about Abraham Lincoln who was assassinated on Friday, April 14, 1895. The poem by Auden was written in 1940, a year after the poet W.B died,

Whitman’s “O Captain! My Captain!” was written about the assassination of Abraham Lincoln which gives the poem a strong sense of historical context. The context of the poem gives it the emotional connection and remembrance that so many Americans know and honor each year. When it comes to remembering and honoring him, Walt Whitman was a very good poet that wrote very good poems about Lincoln. Walt Whitman was alive when Abe was assassinated so that gives Whitman a real time view of the effects of

In Walt Whitman’s “O Captain! My Captain!,” a sailor walks the deck where the body of his fallen captain lies, while the battered ship returns from a harrowing voyage and approaches a dock where people are celebrating the ship’s victory. The ship represents the Union, its voyage the Civil War. The dead captain represents Abraham Lincoln, the beloved leader of the Union, while the sailor who mourns him is Whitman. Through poetic devices, imagery, and diction, Whitman conveys his torment over the death

poems “O Captain, My Captain” and “Shiloh: A Requiem” many literary aspects are used. Some of these include repetition, imagery, extended metaphors, and personification. Although the poems “O Captain, My Captain” and “Shiloh: A Requiem” have very different literary elements, they have some in common as well. There are many similarities to compare in the poems “O Captain, My Captain” and “Shiloh: A Requiem”. One similarity is that both poems clearly use repetition throughout them. In the poem “O Captain

something every person has experienced in someway, and Auden managed to strongly capture that feeling in Elegy for JFK. Whitman tries to convey his theme of loss through a story of a sailor that lost his captain, the feeling of loss is certainly conveyed well but feel like it's giving

Poetic Comparison of “O Captain! My Captain!” and “Cool Tombs” “O Captain! My Captain!” by Walt Whitman and “Cool Tombs” by Carl Sandburg depict the death of President Lincoln, which reflects the willingness of Civil-War era Americans to sacrifice the safety of their president and the lives of soldiers for the greater socioeconomic purpose. In “O Captain! My Captain!” Whitman employs a metaphor of President Lincoln as a captain of a ship to illustrate the price of modernization, characterizing the