If you have the time, please start by reading Maud: A Monodrama, linked above. If not, please visit wikipedia for the summary. I know it's finals, so I didn't want to be too unrealistic with asking you all to read another very long poem.
Given that I'm sure not everyone will have time to read Maud in its entirety, I want to focus on comparing a Passage from Maud, to F339. The passage comes from the first few stanzas of the first part of Maud.
Given that I'm sure not everyone will have time to read Maud in its entirety, I want to focus on comparing a Passage from Maud, to F339. The passage comes from the first few stanzas of the first part of Maud.
I hate the dreadful hollow behind the little wood,
It's lips in the field above are dabbled with blood-red heath,
The red-ribbed ledges drip with a silent horror of blood,
And Echo there, whatever is asked her, answer 'Death.'
For there in the ghastly pit long since a body was found,
His who had given me life - O father! O God! was it well? -
Mangled, and flattened, and crushed, and dinted into the ground:
There yet lies the rock that fell with him when he fell.
Did he fling himself down? who knows? for a vast speculation had failed,
And ever he muttered and maddened, and ever wanned with despair,
And out he walked when the wind like a broken worldling wailed,
And the flying gold of the ruined woodlands drove through the air (Tennyson 1-12).
I wasn't entirely sure how to deal with the line breaks of the poem, whether they were to be interpreted as the printer just running out of room or as actual line breaks. Because it appears as if the line breaks merely was due to the printer running out of space, I got rid of them. You are welcome to see how the first three stanzas are printed by clicking the link to the full poem above. Now, let us turn to the Dickinson poem.
F339
I like a look of Agony,
Because I know it's true--
Men do not sham Convulsion,
Nor simulate, a Throe--
The Eyes glaze once—and that is Death--
Impossible to feign
The Beads upon the Forehead
By homely Anguish strung.
If one starts again by turning to the Sedgwick article in order to count the number of conventions Dickinson uses, it seems that only one is quite clear, the reference to death (F339 5). Again, while it is perhaps possible to argue that there are other conventions to be found within this poem, death is the only convention that is obviously listed. With only one gothic convention this poem falls well in line with most of Dickinson's gothic poems, as most have relatively few gothic conventions.
Turning to the poem itself, it is also another death poem. Like poem F341, it is not immediately clear, that this poem is about death. The poem does not become clear, until the second stanza, when the speaker states, "and that is death" (5). Re-reading the first stanza with the knowledge that this poem is about death, reveals that the speaker prefers it when people die with a look of agony (1). This seemingly dark statement is justified by the speaker arguing that death without agony is seemingly less real (2), and that with something like sweat upon the forehead is impossible to fake (6-7).
If one compares the meaning found in Dickinson with the meaning in the first few stanzas of "Maud: A Monodrama", one realizes that Dickinson's version of death presented here is much more different than Tennyson's speaker. The speaker in Tennyson's poem, often described as a madman, is afraid of where the body of his father was found. Not only does Tennyson's speaker describe nature as violent and dark (2-3), but he also personifies nature as some sort of temptress, that beckons him towards death. The speaker views this area with contempt, for it is where his father's mangled body was found (5). Thus for the speaker, death has a personal connection, one that inscribes both pain for he doesn't know whether his father committed suicide or was murder, and one that also is so powerful that it impacts the way the speaker interacts with nature. If one reads the poem in full, this relationship doesn't change, for when the speaker accidentally kills Maud's brother, he does not view this event positively, but instead mourns this act for it cause him to lose his relationship with Maud. It is only towards the end of the poem when the speaker is sent to the Crimea that he begins to change how he feels about death, saying it is better for him "to fight for the good than rail at the ill" (57). Though even this is probably used ironically, to compare the British crimean war with the murder of Maud's brother. Overall, the majority of the poem speaks towards death in a manner that is always fearful of the consequences it brings, something entirely different from how Dickinson speaks about death.
This poem serves to highlight how despite Dickinson's gothic poems only having a few gothic tropes, they still speak towards what Sedgwick identifies, how within the gothic genre, there is a range of possibilities. In comparing Maud to F339, one can see how the madman of Maud fears death, perhaps because it is always something negative to him, something representing his lack of control, while the speaker in Dickinson speaks about death as something that needs to be painful in order to be real. Though the speaker of F339 does not say more than death ought to be agonizing, it implies they are willing to look at death and confront it. This willingness to confront not only death but agonizing death implies the speaker does not fear it, which though the speaker in Maud does not fear death, he also does not embrace it as willingly as the speaker in F339. It is this difference, that again shows the range of possibilities within the gothic genre, despite using similar conventions, gothic works contain startlingly different meanings.
If any of you happened to read the entirety of "Maud: A Monodrama", undoubtedly you came across the famous "Come into the Garden Maud" line. As such, enjoy this lovely song made out of the line where a Madman tries to seduce Maud into coming to see him in the garden, when she arguably had no interest in him.
F339
I like a look of Agony,
Because I know it's true--
Men do not sham Convulsion,
Nor simulate, a Throe--
The Eyes glaze once—and that is Death--
Impossible to feign
The Beads upon the Forehead
By homely Anguish strung.
If one starts again by turning to the Sedgwick article in order to count the number of conventions Dickinson uses, it seems that only one is quite clear, the reference to death (F339 5). Again, while it is perhaps possible to argue that there are other conventions to be found within this poem, death is the only convention that is obviously listed. With only one gothic convention this poem falls well in line with most of Dickinson's gothic poems, as most have relatively few gothic conventions.
Turning to the poem itself, it is also another death poem. Like poem F341, it is not immediately clear, that this poem is about death. The poem does not become clear, until the second stanza, when the speaker states, "and that is death" (5). Re-reading the first stanza with the knowledge that this poem is about death, reveals that the speaker prefers it when people die with a look of agony (1). This seemingly dark statement is justified by the speaker arguing that death without agony is seemingly less real (2), and that with something like sweat upon the forehead is impossible to fake (6-7).
If one compares the meaning found in Dickinson with the meaning in the first few stanzas of "Maud: A Monodrama", one realizes that Dickinson's version of death presented here is much more different than Tennyson's speaker. The speaker in Tennyson's poem, often described as a madman, is afraid of where the body of his father was found. Not only does Tennyson's speaker describe nature as violent and dark (2-3), but he also personifies nature as some sort of temptress, that beckons him towards death. The speaker views this area with contempt, for it is where his father's mangled body was found (5). Thus for the speaker, death has a personal connection, one that inscribes both pain for he doesn't know whether his father committed suicide or was murder, and one that also is so powerful that it impacts the way the speaker interacts with nature. If one reads the poem in full, this relationship doesn't change, for when the speaker accidentally kills Maud's brother, he does not view this event positively, but instead mourns this act for it cause him to lose his relationship with Maud. It is only towards the end of the poem when the speaker is sent to the Crimea that he begins to change how he feels about death, saying it is better for him "to fight for the good than rail at the ill" (57). Though even this is probably used ironically, to compare the British crimean war with the murder of Maud's brother. Overall, the majority of the poem speaks towards death in a manner that is always fearful of the consequences it brings, something entirely different from how Dickinson speaks about death.
This poem serves to highlight how despite Dickinson's gothic poems only having a few gothic tropes, they still speak towards what Sedgwick identifies, how within the gothic genre, there is a range of possibilities. In comparing Maud to F339, one can see how the madman of Maud fears death, perhaps because it is always something negative to him, something representing his lack of control, while the speaker in Dickinson speaks about death as something that needs to be painful in order to be real. Though the speaker of F339 does not say more than death ought to be agonizing, it implies they are willing to look at death and confront it. This willingness to confront not only death but agonizing death implies the speaker does not fear it, which though the speaker in Maud does not fear death, he also does not embrace it as willingly as the speaker in F339. It is this difference, that again shows the range of possibilities within the gothic genre, despite using similar conventions, gothic works contain startlingly different meanings.
If any of you happened to read the entirety of "Maud: A Monodrama", undoubtedly you came across the famous "Come into the Garden Maud" line. As such, enjoy this lovely song made out of the line where a Madman tries to seduce Maud into coming to see him in the garden, when she arguably had no interest in him.