Closet drama
is a literary composition written in the form of a play, but intended—or
suited—only for reading in a closet rather than for stage performance. Senecan
tragedy is thought to have been written for private recitation, and there
are several important examples of closet drama in English, including Milton's
Samson Agonistes, Byron's Manfred, Shelley's Prometheus Unbound, and Arnold's
Empedocles on Etna.
Showing posts sorted by date for query shelley. Sort by relevance Show all posts
Showing posts sorted by date for query shelley. Sort by relevance Show all posts
01699--catalectic
Catalectic
is lacking the final syllable or syllables expected in the regular pattern of a
metrical verse line. The term is most often used of the common English trochaic
line in which the optional final unstressed syllable is not used. Of these lines from Shelley's To
a Skylark', the second and fourth are catalectic:
In the golden lightning Of the sunken sun,
O'er which clouds are bright'ning,
Thou dost float and run
00317--To a Skylark By Percy Bysshe Shelley
To a Skylark
By Percy Bysshe Shelley
Bird thou never wert,
That from Heaven, or near it,
Pourest thy full heart
In profuse strains of unpremeditated art.
Higher still and higher
From the earth thou springest
Like a cloud of fire;
The blue deep thou wingest,
And singing still dost soar, and soaring ever singest.
In the golden lightning
Of the sunken sun,
O'er which clouds are bright'ning,
Thou dost float and run;
Like an unbodied joy whose race is just begun.
The pale purple even
Melts around thy flight;
Like a star of Heaven,
In the broad day-light
Thou art unseen, but yet I hear thy shrill delight,
Keen as are the arrows
Of that silver sphere,
Whose intense lamp narrows
In the white dawn clear
Until we hardly see, we feel that it is there.
All the earth and air
With thy voice is loud,
As, when night is bare,
From one lonely cloud
The moon rains out her beams, and Heaven is overflow'd.
What thou art we know not;
What is most like thee?
From rainbow clouds there flow not
Drops so bright to see
As from thy presence showers a rain of melody.
Like a Poet hidden
In the light of thought,
Singing hymns unbidden,
Till the world is wrought
To sympathy with hopes and fears it heeded not:
Like a high-born maiden
In a palace-tower,
Soothing her love-laden
Soul in secret hour
With music sweet as love, which overflows her bower:
Like a glow-worm golden
In a dell of dew,
Scattering unbeholden
Its aerial hue
Among the flowers and grass, which screen it from the view:
Like a rose embower'd
In its own green leaves,
By warm winds deflower'd,
Till the scent it gives
Makes faint with too much sweet those heavy-winged thieves:
Sound of vernal showers
On the twinkling grass,
Rain-awaken'd flowers,
All that ever was
Joyous, and clear, and fresh, thy music doth surpass.
Teach us, Sprite or Bird,
What sweet thoughts are thine:
I have never heard
Praise of love or wine
That panted forth a flood of rapture so divine.
Chorus Hymeneal,
Or triumphal chant,
Match'd with thine would be all
But an empty vaunt,
A thing wherein we feel there is some hidden want.
What objects are the fountains
Of thy happy strain?
What fields, or waves, or mountains?
What shapes of sky or plain?
What love of thine own kind? what ignorance of pain?
With thy clear keen joyance
Languor cannot be:
Shadow of annoyance
Never came near thee:
Thou lovest: but ne'er knew love's sad satiety.
Waking or asleep,
Thou of death must deem
Things more true and deep
Than we mortals dream,
Or how could thy notes flow in such a crystal stream?
We look before and after,
And pine for what is not:
Our sincerest laughter
With some pain is fraught;
Our sweetest songs are those that tell of saddest thought.
Yet if we could scorn
Hate, and pride, and fear;
If we were things born
Not to shed a tear,
I know not how thy joy we ever should come near.
Better than all measures
Of delightful sound,
Better than all treasures
That in books are found,
Thy skill to poet were, thou scorner of the ground!
Teach me half the gladness
That thy brain must know,
Such harmonious madness
From my lips would flow
The world should listen then, as I am listening now.
00269--HAROLD BLOOM and his works
HAROLD BLOOM (1930– )
  | 1. Shelley’s Mythmaking
2. The Visionary Company: A Reading of English Romantic Poetry.
3. Blake’s Apocalypse: A Study in Poetic Argument
4. Yeats
5. The Ringers in the Tower: Studies in Romantic Tradition
6. The Anxiety of Influence: A Theory of Poetry
7. A Map of Misreading
8. Kabbalah and Criticism
9. Poetry and Repression: Revisionism from Blake to Stevens
10. Figures of Capable Imagination
11. Wallace Stevens: The Poems of our Climate
12. Agon: Towards a Theory of Revisionism
13.The Breaking of the Vessels
14.The Western Canon: The Books and School of the Ages
15. Shakespeare: The Invention of the Human
16. Where Shall Wisdom Be Found? |
00239--Comment on 'Ozymandias' as a critique of power [Shelley]. [English Literature free notes]
Shelley's Ozymandias is an Italian sonnet that describes the contrast between the past glory and the present decayed condition of a mighty king of ancient Egypt. The sonnet is a poem of 14 lines divided into a octave of the first eight lines and sestet (the next six lines) usually a sonnet is subjective in tone, but in Ozymandias Shelley treats the theme in an objective manner. It is in the form of a report of a traveler from an ancient land. The poet met his and he tells about a gigantic statue of Ozymandias. Trunkless it had only two huge legs which stood in the desert. Nearby lay a broken head with a frown on its face. The lips were wrinkled showing contempt. The sculptor had captured the violent passions of the king on his face most vividly. The king in his lifetime had challenged everyone, even gods. He was so proud. But now nothing remains. All his glory and power are reduced to dust only the vast desolate desert remains.Audio Books
Shelley's sonnet Ozymandias is a bitter commentary on the human vanity and the transitory nature of wealth, power and pomp. Te puny nature of man is contrasted with the immensity of Nature. The King Ozymandias was so proud of his power that he challenged even gods. His statue was huge. The sculptor who made it had captured the frown on his face so vividly. The lips were twisted expressing contempt to all others. The king had asked the sculptor to write on the pedestal of the statue these words.
My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings. Look on my works Ye Mighty, and despair! It was evident that Ozymandias believed that no one could equal his power and glory. The poet now suddenly brings in a terrible contrast 'Nothing beside remains'. Even such a mighty king couldn't survive the ravages of time. He is forgotten. Even the huge statue is ruined only the vast desert lies stretching to the great distance mocking human vanity, glory and pomp. Audio Books
00232--Evolution of thought in the poem 'Ode to the West Wind' [P.B.Shelley] [English Literature free notes]
Shelley's 'Ode to the West Wind' is a perfect lyric which combines in itself lofty thoughts and strong passion. In this poem, 'Shelley's ardent desire for the regeneration of mankind and the establishment of a new world order is vehemently expressed. The West Wind which is a destroyer and preserver sweeps away the old and useless ideas and fosters fresh and modern ones. The West Wind for the poet is not merely a natural phenomenon. It is for him a tempestuous spirit destroying what has to die and preserving the seeds of a new life. The West Wind symbolizes the free spirit of man – "tameless, and swift, and proud". It also symbolizes poetic inspiration and becomes 'the trumpet of a prophecy' ushering in a grand and glorious regeneration of mankind. The West Wind is the very symbol of the Law of Life itself, containing within it the power to destroy and the power to preserve. The poem harmonises and fuses these images to a remarkable degree. Shelley has also been successful in charging his ode with speed, force and energy like the tempestuous wind itself.
The first three stanzas are in the form of a prayer and describe the activities of the West Wind on land, in the sky and in the ocean. The West Wind, which is 'the breath of autumn's being, scatters the dead and sickly leaves ('pestilence-stricken multitudes') like a magician driving away ghosts. The West Wind is not only Destroyer but is also a Preserver. The Wind also carries and scatters the seeds and buries them under the soil, where they lie dormant all through winter. When the warm spring breeze blows, the seeds will sprout, filling the whole earth with a new life.
The powerful West Wind shakes and pushes the thin clouds, which are like leaves of 'the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean'. The fast moving dark clouds herald the approach of a rain-storm. The sky looks fierce like a mad and intoxicated Maenad and the clouds appear to be her streaming hair. The West Wind gathers black clouds and are transformed into the dark solid dome of a tomb from which fire and hail will burst. The lines carry the suggestion of birth and growth along with death. The leaf image is maintained throughout.
The West Wind wakes up the beautiful, blue and clam Mediterranean who is pictured as sleeping, lying by the side a pumice isle in Baiae's bay and dreaming of moss-grown palaces, ruined towers and gardens. The smooth waves of the Atlantic cleave themselves into deep furrows. The plants sense the approach of the West Wind and become pale and shed their leaves.
A strong personal note is struck in the fourth stanza of the poem. He is in dire need of the West Wind as he no more retains his carefree innocence and tamelessness of his boyhood. He has fallen 'on the thorns of life' and he bleeds. He is fettered by the claims and responsibilities and is full of the cares of life. "A heavy weight of hours has chained and bowed. One too like thee: tameless, and swift, and proud" he laments. The poet is in a mood of impotent dejection and appeals to the wind to lift him 'as a wave, a leaf, a cloud to escape from this burden of life. Fortunately, the poem does not end here. The poet in the next stanza recovers his balance and goes beyond his personal sorrows. He wants to identify himself with the fierce spirit of the Wind. He calls upon the Wind to 'drive my dead thoughts over the universe, like withered leaves to quicken a new birth!' He appeals to the Wind to scatter his poems, which are like sparks from a smouldering fire, to kindle a new fire in the hearts and minds of men. He also appeals to the West Wind to inspire him so that his poems, which have been born out of sorrow and hope, will prove to be the bringer of joy of humanity – the new spring time for mankind. The poem closes on a note of ardent hope. He wants the West Wind to blow through his lips the prophecy that a brave new world – a world of love, beauty and goodness – will soon emerge in place of the existing world of misery and suffering. "If Winter comes, can Spring be far behind?" the poem ends with this optimistic question.
00229---Describe the effects of the West Wind on land, in the sky and at sea. [P.B.Shelley] [English Literature free notes]
The West Wind is thought of as a wild and uncontrollable spirit, a tempestuous force destroying what has to die and scattering the seeds of new life. It is in a way the symbol of the Law of Life itself, manifesting itself in the change of seasons, in the cycle of birth, death and regeneration. In the first stanza its effect on land is described. The powerful Wind drives away the dead and sickly leaves ('the pestilence-stricken multitudes') by its unseen presence like a magician driving away ghosts. Thus the Wind acts as a Destroyer. The Wind at the same time scatters the seeds and buries them in the soil, where they lie dormant all through the Winter. When the warm Spring breeze blows, the seeds will sprout, filling the whole earth with new life, colours and fragrance. Thus it acts as a preserver and brings about a regeneration. The dual aspects of the West Wind are maintained and reinforced throughout the poem.
The West Wind's effect in the sky is as tumultuous as its effect on land. In the second stanza, with the help of three images, the poet splendidly describes the terrible impact of the West Wind on the clouds. The Wind is pictured as a great river and the clouds are like leaves. Just as the Wind drives away the leaves on land, it shakes 'the tangled boughs of Heaven and Ocean' and scatters the thin, loose clouds. Heaven and ocean together constitute a great tree, from whose tangled branches the clouds are shaken and pushed away. The scattered clouds herald the approach of a rain-storm. The second image is that of a fierce Maenad (a female devotee of the god Dionysus). The sky looks terrible like a fierce Maenad, drunk and intoxicated, with the thin clouds spread out behind her like wild, uplifted hair. The third image is related to death and tomb. The sound of the wind is the 'dirge of the dying year'. The black clouds are transformed into the dark solid dome of a tomb from which rain, lightning and hail will burst with a frightening energy. The wind here again carries the suggestion of birth and growth along with decay and death.
In the third stanza poet describes the effect of the powerful Wind on the Mediterranean and the Atlantic. The Wind wakes up the calm Mediterranean from its summer slumber. The poet imagines the Mediterranean lying by the side of the pumice isle in Baiae's bay, dreaming of old palaces, and ruined towers with gardens full of bright flowers on its shores, which are reflected on the crystal-clear waters. The smooth waves of the Atlantic cleave themselves into deep furrows by the impact of the mighty West Wind. The vegetation in the sea-bed becomes pale with fear, tremble and shed their leaves. In all the first three stanzas the metaphor of leaf is maintained. The Wind scattered the decayed and dead leaves on land; the clouds are like leaves shed by the Wind. The undersea plants too 'despoil themselves' at the very sound of the Wind. All these stanzas also indicate the two aspects of the West Wind, viz., as a destroyer and as a preserver. It destroys what is sick and useless and preserves the seeds of life to bring about regeneration. Each stanza gives an account of the powers and attributes of the Wind and the three stanzas taken together are cast in the mould of a prayer.
00220--Satanic School of Poetry [English Literature free notes]
Robert Southey, the poet laureate, applied this term in the preface to his Vision of Judgement brought out in 1822. This name, Satanic School of Poetry refers to poets like Lord Byron, P.B.Shelley, and their imitators. Southey writes, "Immoral writers who have rebelled against the holiest ordinances of human society." In 1822, Lord Byron and Leigh Hunt joined in the production of "Liberal Magazine". The first issue of the magazine contained Lord Byron's The Vision of Judgement came as the outcome of his feud with Southey. Byron's poetry was much criticised on moral grounds, but was greatly popular at home, and abroad. Southey's next target was P.B.Shelley on the ground of rebellion spirit.
00218--Comment on the imagery of the poem "Ode to the West Wind" by P.B.Shelley. [English Literature free notes]
Imagery is the employment of images of word pictures by poets and writers. A poet uses them to signify all the objects and qualities of sense perception referred to in his poem. Shelley is a great master in the use of images. His imagination is such that it takes us away from the common world into an unsubstantial fairyland of colours and light and sound. Images pour in rich profusion from his mind. In his essay called "The Defence of Poetry" Shelley describes poetry as a glowing coal with the winds of imagination blowing over it. His images, at any rate, glow and alter like palpitating coal. A peculiar kind of imaginary that we find in Shelley is the use of figurative language (simile, metaphor, etc) Myth also forms part of his imagery. "Ode to the West Wind" is an excellent example of Shelley's skill in creating myths.
Right at the opening the poet compares the West Wind to the breath of autumn's being. The leaves are imagined as a crowd of 'pestilence-stricken multitudes' which are scattered by the West Wind like ghosts driven away by an enchanter. The leaf-image is maintained throughout the poem. Assigning the West Wind the roles of Destroyer and Preserve is a striking example of his imagery. The Wind is like a chariot which carries all the winged seeds to their wintry bed. Here, through a metaphor, the seeds are compared to dead bodies.
The arrival of the spring is described as the sounding of a clarion, when the seeds sprout out into the air just as a flock of sheep move forward, driven by s shepherd. Then comes the description of the rain clouds gathered in the evening sky. This is a brilliant piece of imagery wrought by the ethereal imagination of Shelley. Images merge into one another and one may find it a little difficult to logically disentangle the meaning. The rain clouds tumbling about in the sky are first described as leaves shaken down from branches of Heaven and Ocean. Then suddenly they are described as the uplifted hair of a frenzied Maenad. The sharp howling of West Wind is described as the funeral song for the dying year (as autumn signifies the death of the year) and the dark, overcast sky is called the vaulted tomb in which the dying year is going to be buried. One thing to note about Shelley's imagery is its scientific correctness. In the next stanza Shelley describes the effect of the West Wind on the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Here again powerful and evocative images are employed.
The arrival of the spring is described as the sounding of a clarion, when the seeds sprout out into the air just as a flock of sheep move forward, driven by s shepherd. Then comes the description of the rain clouds gathered in the evening sky. This is a brilliant piece of imagery wrought by the ethereal imagination of Shelley. Images merge into one another and one may find it a little difficult to logically disentangle the meaning. The rain clouds tumbling about in the sky are first described as leaves shaken down from branches of Heaven and Ocean. Then suddenly they are described as the uplifted hair of a frenzied Maenad. The sharp howling of West Wind is described as the funeral song for the dying year (as autumn signifies the death of the year) and the dark, overcast sky is called the vaulted tomb in which the dying year is going to be buried. One thing to note about Shelley's imagery is its scientific correctness. In the next stanza Shelley describes the effect of the West Wind on the Mediterranean Sea and the Atlantic Ocean. Here again powerful and evocative images are employed.
The whole poem is a series of myths worked into an all enclosing myth by which the West Wind becomes the Spirit of Freedom encouraging human society to change, as nature does from autumn to spring, from an old order to a new one.
00189--UGC-NET, English Literature Objective Type Question Answers 51 to 60
51) Marlowe's tragedies are:
A. tragedies of noble men
B. love tragedies
C. one-man tragedies
D. revenge plays
Answer: …………………………….
52) Who coined the phrase, "Marlowe's mighty line"?
A. Ben Jonson
B. Samuel Johnson
C. R.L. Stevenson
D. Richard Steele
Answer: ………………………………..
53) Out of the four chief dialects that flourished in the pre-Chaucerian period, the one that became the standard English in Chaucer's time is:
A. the Northern
B. the East-Midland
C. the West-Midland
D. the Southern
Answer: ……………………..
54) Which of the following statements is incorrect regarding medieval literature?
A. Allegory was frequent and usual
B. The dream-vision convention was prevalent
C. Chaucer exploited the dream-vision convention in The Canterbury Tales.
D. There was often an undercurrent of moral and dialectic strain.
Answer: …………………………………..
55) In Prologue and Canterbury Tales Chaucer employed the
A. Ottawa Rhyme
B. Rhyme Royal
C. Heroic Couplet
D. Both A and C
Answer: …………………………………………..
56) Chaucer has been criticized for presenting an incomplete picture of his times, because
A. he overemphasizes the rights of the lower class
B. he exaggerates the courtly benevolence
C. he writes for the court and cultivated classes and neglects the suffering of the poor
D. he supports the Lolland and the Peasant Revolution too fervently
Answer: …………………………………………..
57) Which of the following are correctly matched?
a. Captain Singleton 1. a sailor
b. Moll Flanders 2. a prostitute
c. Colonel Jack 3. a valiant solider
d. Cavalier 4. a prince
A. Only a-1 and b-2
B. Only b-2
C. Only c-3 and d-4
D. Only d-4
Answer: ………………….
58) " Lunatics, lovers, and poets all are ruled by their overactive imaginations. " These words of Shakespeare are taken from:
A. Love's Labor Lost
B. Hamlet
C. Henry IV
D. Midsummer Night's Dream
Answer:……………………………………
59) An author sums up the human condition thus, "human life is everywhere a state, in which much is to be endured and little to be enjoyed." Who said this and where?
A. Alexander Pope - Essay on Man
B. Oliver Goldsmith - The Vicar of Wakefield
C. Albert Camus - The Stranger
D. Dr. Johnson – Rasselas
Answer: …………………………..
60) “Yet
if the only form of tradition, of handing down, consisted in following the ways
of the immediate generation before us in a blind or timid adherence to its
successes, ''tradition" should positively be discouraged. We have seen many
such simple currents soon lo.st in the sand; and novelty is better than repetition.
Tradition is a matter of much wider significance. Ii cannot be inherited, and
if you want it you must obtain it by
great labor.”
A.
T.S.Eliot
B.
Alexander Pope
C.
P.B.Shelley
D.
Matthew Arnold
Answer:
…………………………………………
51- C
52- A
53- B
54- C
55- C
56- C
57-A
58-D
59-D
60-A
00185--UGC-NET, English Literature Objective Type Question Answers 11 to 20
11) That moment she was mine, mine, fair,
Perfectly pure and good: I found
A thing to do, and all her hair
In one long yellow string I wound
Three times her little throat around,
And strangled her. No pain felt she;
I am quite sure she felt no pain.
These lines stand for the speaker’s:
A. true love
B. dilemma
C. pride
D. abnormal psychology
Answer: ………………………………………
12) But oh! that deep romantic chasm which slanted
Down
the green hill athwart a cedarn cover!
A
savage place! as holy and enchanted
As
e'er beneath a waning moon was haunted
By
woman wailing for her demon lover!
These line
are taken from:
A. Christabel
B. Dejection: An Ode
C. The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner
D. Kubla Khan
Answer:
……………………………
13) In his story
Sarrasine Balzac, describing a castrato disguised as a woman, writes the
following sentence: 'This was woman herself, with her sudden fears, her
irrational whims, her instinctive worries, her impetuous boldness, her
fussings, and her delicious sensibility.' Who is speaking thus? Is it the hero
of the story bent on remaining ignorant of the castrato hidden beneath the
woman? Is it Balzac the individual, furnished by his personal experience with a
philosophy of Woman? Is it Balzac the author professing 'literary' ideas on
femininity? Is it universal wisdom? Romantic psychology? We shall never know,
for the good reason that writing is the destruction of every voice, of every
point of origin. Writing is that neutral, composite, oblique space where our
subject slips away, the negative where all identity is lost, starting with the
very identity of the body writing.
This paragraph advocates:
A.
Structuralism
B.
Post-structuralism
C.
Formalism
D.
Expressionism
Answer: ………………………………………………………….
14)
Match A with B
A B
a. Eugenius 1.Speaks
for the French drama
b. Crites 2.
Speaks for the English drama
c. Lisideius 3.
Speaks for the ancient drama
d. Neander 4.
Speaks for the modern drama
A. a-4, b-2, c-1, d-3
B. a-1, b-2, c-4, d-3
C. a-4, b-3, c-1, d-2
D. a-2, b-3, c-4, d-1
Answer: ………………………………..
15)
Match A with B
A B
a. Surrealism 1. Lord Byron
b. Stream of Consciousness 2. T.S. Eliot
c. Romanticism 3. Dylan Thomas
d. Modernism 4. James Joyce
A. a-1, b-3, c-4, d-2
B. a-3, b-4, c-2, d-1
C. a-3, b-4, c-1, d-2
D. a-1, b-2, c-3, d-4
Answer: ………………………………
16)
“
Hence all original religions are allegorical, or susceptible of allegory. and,
like Janus, have a double face of false and true. Poets, according to the
circumstances of the age and nation in which they appeared, were called, in the
earlier epochs of the world, legislators, or prophets: a poet essentially
comprises and unites both these characters.”
This
is from:
A.
Art of Poetry
B.
An Apology for Poetry
C.
An Essay on Criticism
D.
A Defense of Poetry
Answer:
……………………………..
17) Match the lines with the authors.
a.
The curfew tolls the knell of
parting day.
The
lowing herd winds slowly o'er the lea,
The
ploughman homeward plods his weary way,
And
leaves the world to darkness and to me.
b.
The vale funereal, the sad cypress
gloom;
The
land of apparitions, empty shades!
c.
Wild shrieks have issued from the
hollow tombs;
Dead
men have come again, and walked about;
And
the great bell has tolled, unrung and untouched.
d.
"When men my scythe and darts
supply
How
great a King of Fears am I!"
1.
Robert Blair 2. Thomas Parnell
3.
Thomas Grey 4.Edward Young
A.
a-3, b-1, c-2, d-4
B.
a-3, b-4, c-1. d-2
C.
a-3, b-1, c-2, d-4
D.
a-1, b-2, c-4, d-3
Answer: …………………..
18)
“But
though it is in terms of structure that we must describe poetry, the term structure is
certainly not altogether satisfactory as a term. One means by it something far
more internal than the metrical pattern, say, or than the sequence of images.
The structure meant is certainly notform in the conventional sense in which we
think of form as a kind of envelope which "contains" the
"content." The structure obviously is everywhere conditioned by the
nature of the material which goes into the poem.”
The
author is:
A.
John Crowe Ransome
B.
William Empson
C.
Cleanth Brooks
D.
I.A.Richards
Answer:
…………………………….
19) It will be convenient at this point to
introduce two definitions. In a full critical statement which states not only
that an experience is valuable in certain ways, but also that it is caused by
certain features in a contemplated object, the part which describes the value
of the experience we shall call the critical part. That which
describes the object we shall call the technical part.
This
is taken from:
A.
Seven Types of Ambiguity B. The Heresy of Paraphrase
C. The Principles of Literary Criticism D. The New Criticism
Answer:
……………………………
20) The
loveliest and the last,
The bloom, whose petals nipped before they blew
Died on the promise of the fruit.
The bloom, whose petals nipped before they blew
Died on the promise of the fruit.
The context is:
A.
The death of Edward Young
B.
The death of Mary Shelley
C.
The death of Fanny Brawne
D.
The death of Keats
Answer: ………………………………
ANSWERS:
11-D
12-D
13-B
14-C
15-C
16-D
17-B
18-C
19-C
20-D