LITS2002 POETRY II

TERM PAPER SEMESTER II, 2008-2009

The term paper is based on Module One; answer ONE (1) of the following questions.  To answer any of these questions, you may also draw upon the theoretical essays which we studied.

1.    Comparing the views expressed in Pope's "Essay on Criticism" with those in Wordsworth's Preface to the Lyrical Ballads, say in what ways Romantic poetry might be considered as a "revolutionary departure" from the norms of Neoclassical poetry.

2.    Much early Romantic poetry is devoted to exploring, in one way or another, the claim that

The power which . . . Nature thus
Thrusts forth upon the senses, is . . . a genuine counterpart
And brother of that glorious faculty
Which higher minds bear with them as their own.  (Wordsworth, The Thirteen Book Prelude, Book XIII [Book XIV in other editions])

To put this another way:

I may not hope from outward forms to win
The passion and the life, whose fountains are within.  (Coleridge, "Dejection: an Ode")." 

Discuss with reference to at least one poem by Wordsworth and at least one poem by Coleridge.

3.    The symbol, Coleridge argues, is "characterised by the translucence of the eternal through and in the temporal" (The Statesman’s Manual), whereas allegory is merely a "translation of abstract notions into a picture language, which is itself nothing but an abstraction from objects of the senses."  With reference to at least one poem by Wordsworth and at least one poem by Coleridge, discuss the distinction which Coleridge draws between what he terms 'allegory' and 'symbolism.'

4.    Would you agree that Romantic poetry "oscillates between sublime joy and profound depression"?  Discuss with reference to at least one poem by Wordsworth and at least one poem by Coleridge.

5.    Through close reference to at least one poem by Wordsworth and at least one poem by Coleridge, outline some of the formal and thematic characteristics of what M. H. Abrams has termed the ‘greater Romantic lyric.’

6.    "Escapist poetry, poetry that retreats from socio-political realities and flees towards mysticism."  Do you agree with this assessment of Romantic poetry?  Discuss with reference to at least one poem by Wordsworth and at least one poem by Coleridge. 

DEADLINE: 5 pm, Thursday April 2, 2009

LENGTH: 7 pages maximum (typewritten, double-spaced)

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