Joe Breddy
NEUTRAL TONES
Hardy uses various methods to tell the story in neutral tones which is written in the form of a poem. Neutral Tones tells the story of disappointment in love and life between two lovers and focuses on a theme of death.
The setting of the poem is on a “winter day”, this is significantly important as Hardy uses this to convey a sense of sadness; the “winter” connotes cold which is seen to be lonely and death-like. Also, the winter could be a metaphor for the frosty nature of the two lovers’ relationship? This negativity is empathised because it appears so early in the poem “we stood by a pond that winter day”. This sets a bitter tone for the first stanza which intensifies as the emotive language becomes more blatant.