Poetry Topics.

 

Write a paper with a clear argument, using the techniques we have discussed as tools to provide evidence.  Do not simply summarize a poem or explain its literal meaning; instead, work to develop an idea that an intelligent, knowledgeable reader might not come to on her own.  You can use these questions, modify them, change them, as you please.

 

Cite poems correctly: use line numbers, not page numbers.  Put titles in quotation marks instead of italics.  Mark line breaks.  If you do not know how to punctuate something, look it up or ask someone.  In short, take pride in your work.

 

1. When poems analyze other art forms, they may discuss general principles that apply also to poetry.  Discuss the aesthetic standards set in at least one such poem.  (You might consider “Delight in Disorder,” “The Mower Against Gardens,” “Sailing to Byzantium,” “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” or “The Shield of Achilles”).
2. Consider poems that draw extensively on others (“The Rape of the Lock,” the answers to “The Passionate Shepherd to his Love”).  When there are multiple poetic voices in a poem, where does the final authority reside?  How does one tell?
3. “La Belle Dame sans Merci” and “Ode on a Grecian Urn” consider desire – perpetually almost satisfied in the urn, always escaping with the belle Dame.  How do the poets represent desire?  How do their poems unfold through time, and how does it relate to their subjects?
4. What is the role of the beadsman in “The Eve of St. Agnes”?
5. What are the differences in the speakers’ attitudes in “The Description of Cooke-ham” and “To Penshurst”?
6. What are the differences between pastoral poetry (“The Passionate Shepherd to his Love,” the Mower poems, et cetera) and romantic nature poetry (“The West Wind,” “The Cloud,” “Tintern Abbey”)?