Elegy essay
Elegy
Elegy is a mourning poem lamenting for the dead. Death
became a predominant theme for an Elegy. It was written in the elegiac measure,
a couplet composed of a dactylic hexameter followed by dactylic pentameter. Poem
written in this metre is ranked as elegy.
At modern times theme is given utmost importance and not metre.
Elegiac measure is not followed in English verse. The theme of elegy is mournful
and sad. Elegy is less spontaneous than the lyric. Dr. Johnson remarked “Where
there is leisure for fiction there is little grief”.
Examples for Elegy
Milton’s Lycidas – mourns at the death of Edward King.
Tennyson’s In Memoriam – laments at the death of Arthur
Henry Hallam.
Shelley’s Adonias – death of Keats
The Pastoral Elegy
A new kind of elegy was introduced in English poetry. In this
kind the poet represented himself as a Shepherd bewailing the loss of a companion.
Milton’s Lycidas and Mathew Arnold’s Thyrisis are pastoral elegies.Theocritus
poems Idyll and Epigrams were written in pastoral manner. Further it was perfected
by Latin poet Virgil.
Comments
Post a Comment