And Hardy presents us with a very clear image of death – he later personifies the Century itself as being dead. The first two stanzas are full of death-language:
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“When Frost was spectre-gray”. A clear example of ghost imagery (‘a spectre’). This line is of interest on its own, due to the obvious personification of ‘Frost’. This is a good place to make a key note about the poem itself. Throughout, we discover a distinct Hardy-esque style; the environment is unpleasant and it demonstrates his usual antics in animism. Hardy develops complex (and often deeply personal) symbolic systems which deal almost exclusively with the natural world. The reader is made personal with non-human entities like frost and birds but avoids people – even the persona is a subject avoided in great detail.
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Back with the ‘death imagery’, “The weakening eye of day”; a comment on the darkening sky – the day is dying.
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“All mankind that haunted nigh” – haunted is clearly a reference to death and ghosts. Hardy is commenting on the lack of human life in his scene; they “had sought their household fires”. A further indication of the low temperature. Is it a hint that the world is ending? Or is that just a little extreme? In any case, note how the rest of humanity are seeking light in an otherwise dark environment.
The second stanza contains an extended metaphor involving the dead century, but we need to examine the first stanza more before moving on.
Hardy’s persona is leaning upon a coppice gate – a gate into a small woods or ‘coppice’. It is a highly ambiguous persona (another thing to explore), but he leans nevertheless. The scene is wintry, indeed, along with Frost, Winter is personified equally – “Winter’s dregs made desolate/ The weakening eye of day.” The dregs of the season indicate a very cold atmosphere; one without much colour. Clearly this has emptied the scene of any colourful sight upon which the “eye of day” weakens. The day is ending; thus dusk darkens the scene.
“Tangled bine-stems scored the sky/ Like strings of broken lyres”. As before mentioned, the persona is standing in woodland, thus “Bine-stems” are tree branches. Hardy’s comparison of them to broken lyres is interesting. Lyres are a) harmonious in Classical literature and b) belong only in Classical literature. Hardy is clearly stating that the scene is not ‘harmonious’ or perhaps the ‘death-lament’ later mentioned isn’t. Or is it also a reference Hardy’s romantic passion for the past, that it was somehow better than the day in which he writes?
Second Stanza Notes: The first four lines of this stanza deal explicitly with Hardy’s ‘dead Century’ metaphor. He imagines the land before him as “the Century’s corpse outleant.” Quite what ‘outleant’ means, I have no idea, (The OED has confirmed that ‘outleant’ is not, nor ever has been a word) but “his crypt [becomes] the cloudy canopy” (the cloudy sky) and “the wind his death-lament”. One need not explain it in any more detail; the implications are quite explicit. Hardy’s persona clearly didn’t approve of the past century, but had yet to indicate an emotional reflection on the future. He imagines England as a rotting corpse, essentially. However, note the use of the verb ‘seems’ – is all as it seems?
However, Hardy goes on to write even more damningly of his persona’s scene. ‘The ancient pulse of germ and birth’ – the regenerative power of life, following Winter’s onslaught – ‘was shrunken dry and hard’. Nothing appears to be growing back – is this another indication of the end of the world, or certainly of an era. Hardy appears to be making the simple change of an arbitrary number into something quite different, and more serious. A degeneration of life itself. Indeed, “every spirit upon earth/ Seemed fervourless than I.” Very negative.
Observe how silent the description is up to this point in the poem. There is an implied sound in both the death-lament and of broken lyres, but otherwise, the sound is non-existent. That changes soon.
Here comes the VOLTA.
Third Stanza Notes:
“At once a voice arose among
The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
Of Joy illimited;”
Hardy emphasizes a sudden change with the words “At once” – indeed, there are multiple changes which create this volta:
- Note the sudden inclusion of sound – the thrush is singing! This breaks the poetic still (of death) which has held the poem so far.
- The length of ‘sentence’ also changes. Note the semicolon at the end of these four lines above. Previously, each quatrain had completed with a full stop. Perhaps Hardy is opening up his poetic form to mirror the sudden movement in the lines themselves. The use of enjambment accentuates this.
There are perhaps religious connotations with ‘evensong’. Much as Hardy may simply be again referring to the mundane fact that the bird is singing a ‘song’ and ‘eve’, we pray that the man is capable of higher minded comparisons. These vaguely religious nuances are maintained throughout the poem.
The crucial fact is that the mood has changed, perhaps. “Of Joy illimited” suggests a pleasant image, which stands in stark contrast to the surrounding gloom.
“An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
In blast-beruffled plume,”
Yet the mood is suddenly plunged back into the red with Hardy’s following lines. The thrush, which is, admittedly, a very odd bird to chose (not famed for their song), is an elderly figure in a storm – hence the ‘blast-beruffled plume’. In this otherwise grim situation, the reader’s immediate concern is whether the bird itself is going to survive at all! The use of “frail, gaunt, and small” mirrors the ghoulish imagery used in the first two stanzas – the thrush is alive, for certain, but perhaps the persona questions for how much longer?
Note how the thrush is NOT personified. Every other element of the natural world takes an animated form, but not the bird! Why does Hardy do this?
“Had chosen thus to fling his soul
Upon the growing gloom.”
Perhaps desperation is the key word in this stanza, but also hope. There is a powerful message in the face of this ghoulish bird; that, in spite of all the darkness and death, the thrush maintains his song.
Stanza Four Notes:
“So little cause for carolings
Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
Afar or nigh around,”
Once again, Hardy’s use of enjambment allows for the lines to ‘bleed’ into each other – in a direct contrast to the poem’s former rigidity. Perhaps he is now gathering momentum for a change in mood? Yet, in terms of sense, Hardy appears to be doing the opposite. He states that the bird has no reason to be singing a joyful song amongst so much desolation. However, perhaps, by even considering such a fact, the persona’s own deep-rooted pessimism is beginning to shift away?
On some key language points:
- Note more religious emphasis: ‘carolings’ typically sing hymns at Christmas time. Hymns are definitely religious!
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Perhaps there is an equally religious connotation which Hardy applies to his comments on the ‘terrestrial things’. If there is not any cause for singing about things on Earth, then perhaps, reciprocally, there is cause for celebrating the sky, or heaven?
“That I could think there trembled through
His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
And I was unaware.”
It is a rather ambiguous ending upon which Hardy chooses to conclude, but he achieves a sense of dramatic effect through it. The persona realises the presence of (a perhaps religious) hope, in the fact of utter desperation, but it is unintelligible to him. In an odd way, the reader is forced to consider whether the persona is being entirely accurate:
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Can one be unaware of something, yet still able to write about it?
- Does this tell us that the persona, as a Modernist, is able to perceive such an uplifting messages but unable to interpret them in such a way as to ‘release’ himself from the ‘dark’? Hardy himself was a modernist and therefore dwells upon an odd lot of ideas. Amongst them was ‘searching for hope/meaning to darkness and cruelty’. Despite being a realist, he was deeply influenced by Romantic notions (look them up) – perhaps this exploration is one of them?
- The use of ‘blessed’ again implies a deified presence within the thrush’s message. Is the persona experiencing some divine inspiration?
