Notesale: Turn your study into money

Document Preview

Extracts from the notes are below, to see the PDF you'll receive please use the links above

---

Poems
Love
Among The
Ruins

Form
It is a closed
poem
...

Up at a Villa A mixture of
– Down in
rhyming couplets
the City
and triplets leads
to confusion and
creates a chaotic
feel
...
– It
gives
contemplations
from the
speakers
perspective
...
– Depicts
undesirable life in
the old city
...
– Final
Conflict

Themes
Love Conquers All –
‘Lust of Glory’

Context
The love
between Robert
Browning and
Elizabeth
Barrett
Browning

Links
– Up at a Villa –
Down in the
City (Bustle of
the city)
...


The poem is
written in first
person – makes
it feel as though
narrator is
speaking directly
to reader
...


It describes the
two settings (the
countryside and
the city)
...
–
‘Houses in four
straight lines, not
a single front
awry’ describes
the city
...
–
Hyperbolic
...
–
Browning
creates a
character that
can be laughed
at because he
is so funny, but
his views are
so extreme
...
–
Browning criticizing
materialism, greed for
things we don’t have,
lust and frivolity
...


‘As
Distinguished by
an Italian
Person of
Quality’ – We
can assume that
the poem is set
in Italy, as most
of Browning’s
poems are
...


– Love Among
the Ruins
(Comparison of
a city to the
country –
opposite points
of view)
...




Poems
A Woman’s
Last Word

Form
Ten, four line
stanza’s –
constant length
allows the
reader to
become more
comfortable
with the poem
as they read it
...

– Symbolism – ‘the
apple reddens’ –
red is associated
with passion, and
fire, exactly what
the narrator
craves
...
–
Rhyme =
ABABA, -
Enjambment is
used, which
weakens the
rhyme
somewhat
...
Only thing
constant in life is
change
...
–
Links to the
‘original lovers’,
Adam and Eve,
and the
paradise they
lived in
...
–
Browning often
called his wife,
Eve
...


Tone
Desperate –
speaker wants
to curl up with
her lover and
she craves his
attention
...


Themes
Love – anger
(argument) –
Affair /
unrequited
love – A woman
speaking out
against the
expectations of
society –
Browning’s
own
experiences
...
– Links to this
could be him suggesting
that she inspired aspects
of the persona taken on
...

– The Lost Leader
(Infidelity / desertion)
– Apparent Failure
(Vulnerability)
– Pictor Ignotus /
Soliloquy of a Spanish
Cloister (Jealousy)

Depression
caused by the
poet’s
acceptance that
he can never
get a perfect
relationship
...
– The
dramatic
persona seeks
the intensity of
physical and
spiritual
‘togetherness’

Examines the
relationship Browning
had with his wife
...
–
The poem destroys the
perfect ‘bubble’ the
public had concerning
their relationship
...

– Love Among the Ruins
(Being a couple)
...

– The Lost Leader
(Alienation)
...
–
This could mean
that their lives are
as fragmented and
disjointed as the
rhyme scheme is
...
–
The poem also fits
the romantic
themes of strong
emotion and past
experience
...
– This creates the effect of used to create needs to find her – timeless concept
gives the poem a
his heart beating
the
‘though shalt find of man’s pursuit of
comfortable feel
faster as he comes impression of her’
...
– ‘Cat and
as it is repetitive
closer to finding his a house when angry – ‘She goes mouse’ game
and continuous
...
–
actually an
out as I enter’ – He throughout one’s
This could also
Enjambment after ‘I extended
refuses to imagine life
...

perusal
...

frustrates him
...


Love in a
Life



Language
Alliteration –
‘scarce succeed’,
‘dust and dark’
...
/ Simile –
‘It seemed too much
life fate indeed’
...


Tone
Instead of seeing
love as something
good, he portrays
it as a burden
...


Links
– Love Among the Ruins
(Desertion and
isolation)
...


Robert Browning
pursued his wife
despite the
objections of
herself and her
father and he
eventually
managed to win
her over before
the two eloped to
Italy
...

– Love Among the Ruins
(Desertion and
isolation
...

– Apparent Failure
(Misplacement and
disorientation
...


Prospice

Rhyme Scheme:
simple AB
structure
...
–
Parodied by his
love for her,
which was
always steady
...
–
Consonants of the
‘s’ – soft effect,
speaking casually
...

‘Prospice’ – To ‘look
forward’ – Even
though she is dead,
he did not allow
himself to forget
her as she had been
and he believed he
would be with her
in the afterlife
...
–
This compares to
the ‘ultimate
betrayal’ that
Browning believed
Wordsworth
committed
...

‘Fog in my throat’ –
‘Mist in my face’ –
‘Power of the night,
the press of the
storm
...
–
Protective
...


Tone
Angry at
Wordsworth
’s ‘betrayal’ –
Disappointe
d at
Wordsworth
’s chosen
path when
Browning
had looked
up to him in
his earlier
life
...
–
The poem
refers to
Browning’s
disgust at
Wordsworth’s
desertion of
the ‘liberal
cause’
...
– He
was a first
generation
romantic poet
whom inspired
Browning in much
of his work
...


Links
– Prospice (The idea of
battles, oppositions, death
etc
...

– Up at a Villa – Down in
the City (Use of
oppositions)
...
– He
and how Browning
will not
has come to terms
allow it to
with it
...


– The Lost Leader (The
idea of battles,
oppositions, death etc
...

– The Grammarian’s
Funeral (Mountainous
setting as backdrop to
monumental event)
...
– ½
rhymes could
signify
uncertainty
...


Language
Dramatic Irony in
the structure –
Painter is revealing
why he chose not
to paint in this
style yet at the
same time we feel
judgmental to the
speaker
...
– He
must ask questions
...

– ‘Cold faces
that begun to
press on me
and judge me’
– They are
very ‘cold’
and unfeeling
and he feels
that they are
judging him
...
–
Continued an
idealized style of
painting rather
than resort to the
new / bolder style
favoured in the
Victorian Era
...


Themes
Failure – He does
not fully use the
gifts he was
blessed with
...
– Speaker
provides three
reasons why he
was able to be
successful was a
youth
...


Context
Suggested that
when the
monologue was
written, he was
thinking of the
painter
Bartolommeo
...
– It
could link to
Browning’s own
life
...

– Toccata of
Galuppi’s (frivolous
nature of the public,
materialistic
judgment)
...

– Up at a Villa –
Down in the City
(Materialistic values
of the speaker
compared to the
public perception)
...


Language
Monologue –
Reveals
something about
the characters
who speak them
...
–
Reader is left to
question the
nature of a
supposedly
religious Monk
...


Tone
Jealous – The
narrator is a
friar watching
another friar,
who is doing
everything
correctly
...

– Sarcastic –
‘Oh, those
melons!’ –
Anger ––
Hostile –
Hyperbolic
...
– Rhyme
Scheme: AAA,
AABBCCDDE
...
–
mature and
‘undimmed’ –
young and
‘without a thorn’

Women
compared to
roses due to
beauty and
‘thorns’
...


Dreamlike /
reflective
...




Themes
Hate – ‘Gr-r-r—
there go, my
heart’s
abhorrence!’ ––
Hypocrisy –
‘Steeping tresses
in the tank’ –
‘Blue-black,
lustrous, thick
like horsehairs’
...
-
Pride

Context
7 deadly sins – Faust
(1650) can be
compared with what
happens in Stanza
eight – Faust was a
scholar who is highly
successful and yet
dissatisfied with his
life so he makes a
pact with the Devil
...
–
Also, the Seven
Deadly Sins can be
applied to the poem
...
– inspiration
...
– Love – as Robert Browning
Male control
– channeling male
over women
...


Links
– The Bishop Orders His
Tomb (Depiction of a
religious figure, tone
comparison, appearance vs
...

– Pictor Ignotus (Depiction of
a figure, tone comparison)
...


– A Woman’s Last Word
(Derogatory undertones in
how women are depicted)
...

– Soliloquy of a Spanish
Cloister (Women as objects)
...
–
The form shows
that the Bishop is
an earthly,
business-like
man who does
not try to
aestheticize his
speech
...
–
Ironic (Bishops
meant to be holy
and grateful)
...
– ‘As if the
corpse they keep
were oozing
through
...
– ‘Clavichord’ frivolous and
syllables or
= old-fashioned
indulgent
...
–
‘’Were you
lines) – Trochaic Enjambment used to happy?” --- “Yes
...
–
taking place
...

Struggles of music
They are
echo struggles of
sickening in
life
...


Tone
Jealous –
Materialistic /
vain
...
If he
was a true
Christian, the
thought of eternal
life in Heaven
after his death
would preclude
his tomb-building
efforts
...
–
Immortality
(instructs his
‘nephews’ on the
materials needed to
outshine Gandolf’s
tomb
...
– Saint
Praxed’s Church
refers to an actual
place in Rome,
which is dedicated
to a martyred
Roman virgin
...

– The Bishop Orders
his Tomb
(Monologue, tone)
...
–
Sarcastic – ‘Brave
Galuppi’ =
Ignorant –
Mocking shallow,
materialistic
things
...
’ – Evokes
melancholy feel
within the reader
...


‘Shylock’s bridge’ –
Rialto due to what
Shylock asks in
Shakespeare’s The
Merchant of Venice
...


– Pictor Ignotus
(Galuppi is being
ignored just like
Pictor Ignotus)
...

– Love Among the
Ruins (Decay and
loss of culture)
...
– Stanza
2 = 43
...
– The
stanzas get longer
as the poem
continues
...


Language
Alliteration –
“Loftily lying’ –
‘loftily’ = high
up, his ideas are
elevated and,
therefore, he
must be left
somewhere that
suits him
...


Imagery
‘Meteors shoot’
‘Clouds form’
‘lightnings are
loosed’ ‘break
with the storm’ –
Implies that it is
a dusty, unsafe
place, which
contradicts the
life he has led
thus far, which
was very safe
...
–
Hopeful
because, even
though he is
dead, his life’s
work still lives
on
...
‘That
low man goes on
adding one to
one’ ‘This high
man, aiming at a
million
...
– Many
believed that
Browning had
wasted his talents on
poetry, many
believed the
Grammarian had
wasted his life on
learning grammar
...

– Prospice
(Mountainous
setting as backdrop
to monumental
event)

---