the girl, if she will love him, that their life will prefect and she can have all
this but only if she loves him. All through this poem we can see that the
poet focusses on nature and that everything he promises her is beautiful
and natural. The poet has done this because he wants to keep with the
rustic background and show her he is offering her all he can.
The poet uses a lot of imagery, he includes lots of adjectives when he is
describing things examples of this are 'craggy' and 'melodious'. These
create a very personal view of how he sees love and helps the reader get
into the way the poet is thinking. By picking out lots of natural things the
poet is showing the love is natural. The view of love in this poem is rather
impractical as the poet only sees the good things and isn't aware of the
problems that they may meet along the way.
However, this is not the view taken when Sir Walter Ralegh replies to this
poem in 'The Nymph's Reply To The Shepherd'. This is the girl replying to the
shepherd. You can see that she has taken a very realistic view love and
tells the shepherd of all the problems they could face if they were
together. Sir Walter Ralegh has taken all the things the shepherd has
promised the girl and shows him how they could fade or die just like their
love could. The poet has choosen negative words in this poem for
example, 'rotten', 'cold' and 'rivers rage'.
This poem is not what most people would call a love poem as it doesn't
share the romanitcized view many of the other poets had around the
time it was written. The girl then goes on to say that if these things could
last she would agree to be with but since they do not she says she can't
love him. Most typical love poems would have the girl say yes but in this
poem it has shown that love is not all sweetness and happiness but that it
can fade or even die in some cases. When you compare this poem to
what it is replying to its seems very negative but infact it is because the
poem written by Christopher Marlowe is very romanticized that is appears
like this.
Moving onto my third and final poem which is 'Bredon Hill' written by
A.E.Housman we see that it is a typical love poem about a young couple
but at the end there is a twist. This poem tells us the story of a young
couple who plan to marry but before they can the young girl dies. The
poet then goes on to say they would lie on Bredon Hill in the summer and
listen to the birds and the church bells ringing while they thought of their
future. In stanza 3 they ignore the bells calling them to church sunday.
Then the poet goes on to say how the bells chiming made him think of
their wedding in the coming spring and how the bells will peal in
celebration on that day. But it is Stanza 5 when the girl dies the poet
expresses this in the metaphor 'My love rose up so early/ And stole out
unbeknown/ And went to church alone'. This time the bell that is calling
him to church is one of great sorrow. The poet starts of very happy but as
you move the end of the poem the mood changes as the poet loses his
lover. A.E.Houman uses the image of the bells to show how even they can
tell a story if you listen closely to them. In stanza 3 they are sounding
happy and are celebrating but in stanza 7 the bells tell a different story,
they no longer are celebrating but mourning a death.
He continues to say that the people are congregated here for a funeral
but infact it should be for their wedding. In stanza 6, the final verse the
poet refers to the bells one last time and this time he replies to them by
saying, 'I hear you I will come'. This reply could mean one of two things.
Firstly that he will go to church on a sunday or more likely that he is going
to take his own life so he can reunitied with his lover in death. This is a
typical love story were one of the young couple dies and the other
partner takes their own life to be with them for example Romeo and
Juillet. In this poem you can sense the pain this young man is feeling and it
is clearly seen. The poet has used simple language but the message they
are trying to convery is converyed clearly.
Now that I have looked at each of the poems inturn and discussed how
they protray love I can see that I have picked three very different poems.
In each of them the view is very different and is effective in their own way.
I feel that both Brendon Hill and The passionate Shepherd to His Love are
typical love poems but The Nymph's Reply To The Shepherd is very realisitc
as it shows that love is not all beautiful and golden but that it can fade
and will be lost. The poet has shown that you dont need to offer
expensive gifts to have love. Each poem has its own way of getting its
point across and I think that each of them did in their own way. The first
two poems I looked at were written around the same period but the third
poem was written some time later. This is seen very clearly as the first two
take a different view on love compared to the last poem. All three poems
are similar in that they tell a love story and show how great love can be
but the second and third poem go futher and say that love isn't always
great and that there will be many problems. One theme which is
common in all three poems is nature. They all talk about nature and the
seasons. Some of them are not very graphic but they have a lot of feeling
and emotion in them.
