Comparison: 'Death the Leveller' and 'Tombs in Westminster Abbey'.

Comparison: 'Death the Leveller'

And

'Tombs in Westminster Abbey'

Paragraph 1: Main points and similarities and differences.

For two poems of the same nature, (death and royalty), they have many differences, yet very few similarities. For example, ‘Death the Leveller’ and ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ have the same theme, language and tone. Nevertheless, the structure is very different and unique. To describe poems such as these, my personal opinion is morbid and sombre, yet this is only one of my similarities. Both poems have the same impact on me as the student. As I said before, the structure of each poem is unique in its own way, making the poems seem quite similar, but actually, they are very diverse.

Paragraph 2: First poem.

The first poem I will write about is ‘Death the Leveller’. Taking the title as my first point, it seems to me like the title is a secret message. This message says; death will level us out and no matter how royal you are. Like, no matter who or what we are, in death we are all equal. This message fits in well with the whole structure of the poem. The poem uses an AB, AB, CC, AD structure and a regular rhyme sequence can be seen throughout the whole three stanzas. The structure of the each stanza is similar in shape and length, with five to six lines of each, giving emphasises to the main parts. Other details of language used by the poet would be emphasises on personification and alliteration. Such examples of personification are images like death, fate and doom. These three things are effects that we all must face one day, and as the title shows ‘Death the Leveller’, we will all be levelled out in death. Examples of alliteration are words and phrases like victor-victim and harshness of implements used by the poet to highlight the bleakness of burial. The tone of ‘Death the Leveller’ uses slow, eerie, dark, morbid tones that someone might use, say, at a funeral or telling a frightful story.

The tone does not change throughout the first few lines of the poem, but takes a big change on the fifth and sixth line (CC) of each stanza, maybe to excite the tone of the poem. On the last lines of ‘Death the Leveller’ the tone would get softer to give the poem that feeling of ‘death’ it had been gathering from the start. Colons are used before the explanation of something, like on the last line of the last stanza; a colon is used to show a change in tone and structure.

My last point about the structure and ...

This is a preview of the whole essay

My last point about the structure and language parts of ‘Death the Leveller’ is the speakers/poets attitude towards the poem. The attitude is very patriotic. Run-on lines are used in this poem also to give urgency and strength to the argument. The poet seems to have this feeling that upper-class people with a high rank position will last longer and defend themselves from what awaits them, and this is what point the poet was trying to get across. Not only this, but the poet is seen to me as rhetorical, as if a point was needed to get across. “The glories of our blood and state”, this shows the poets argument as a high-class opinion, and that his glorious blood will see him through it all and that death is no match for him and his wealth.

Paragraph 3: Second poem

The second poem I will be writing about is ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’. This poem like ‘Death the Leveller’ is also about death and some miner points about royalty. Yet, both being quite different, they do share a few things in common, for example, they both share the same tone. If describing the tone of ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’, I would call it sombre and pessimistic, while, describing the tone of ‘Death the Leveller’, I would say, that sombre and pessimistic could be used as a comparison. It also has a hint of satirical, like a mocking kind of tone, but is rhetorical to the point it persuades a certain ironic humour. The structure of ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ is different than ‘Death the Leveller’ as ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ is in AA, BB, CC and in ‘Death the Leveller’ the structure is AB, AB, CC, AD. ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’, unlike the other poem uses no stanzas and uses half rhyme. This poem related more about love and death than it did about royal values and cheating death. Yet, they are relatively similar in the way they are expressed and the same words are used, mostly about killing or possessions. For example in ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ and in ‘Death the Leveller’ the words Scythe are used, this simply is a cutting object. Another example of how the poems differ is that ‘Death the Leveller’ was written to make a point and ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ ‘was written for the tombs in Westminster Abbey and all those who were buried in the tombs.

Paragraph 4: Conclusion

This paragraph is what I will use to summarize my main points about ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ and ‘Death the Leveller’. Firstly, I will show the most obvious points of similarities in the two poems.

1. Both of the poems are related to death and royalty, and both are explained above in paragraph’s 2 and 3.

2. My second point of similarity is the language and words used in each poem. For example, the word scythe (explained in point 3) is used in both ‘Death the Leveller’ and ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’.

3. This is my last obvious similarity between the two poems. It is, the tone. Like I explained before, both tones are sombre and morbid. These tones wash over both poems, giving off the distinct feel and sense of fear and apprehension that the poet has successfully tried to invent.

My second big point is the differences in the poems. I will start with the most obvious points.

1. The length of ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ is much longer than ‘Death the Leveller’, more so, because of lack of stanzas and the lines being longer.

2. The structures are completely different. ‘Death the Leveller’ is AB, AB, CC, AD and ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’s’ structure is AA, BB, CC.

3. Rhyme. The flow of even rhyme in ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ is completely different to that of ‘Death the Leveller’. One of the poems uses half rhyme, while the other, chooses to use full rhyme.

In my personal opinion, ‘Death the Leveller’ appeals to me more, only because it is shorter and is easier to understand, whilst ‘The Tombs in Westminster Abbey’ has a more difficult length and words that are harder to remember.