Poetry analysis is the process of investigating a poem's form, content, and history in an informed way, with the aim of heightening one's own and others' understanding and appreciation of the work.

The words poem and poetry derive from the Greek poiēma (to make) and poieo (to create). That is, a poem is a made thing: a creation; an artifact. One might think of a poem as, in the words of William Carlos Williams, a "machine made of words". Machines produce some effect, or do some work. They do whatever they are designed to do. The work done by this "machine made of words" — a poem — is the effect it produces in the reader's mind. A reader analyzing a poem is akin to a mechanic taking apart a machine in order to figure out how it works.

Like poetry itself, poetry analysis can take many forms, and be undertaken for many different reasons. A teacher might analyze a poem in order to gain a more conscious understanding of how the poem achieves its effects, in order to communicate this to his or her students. A writer learning the craft of poetry might use the tools of poetry analysis to expand and strengthen his or her own mastery. And (perhaps the best use of poetry analysis), a reader might use the tools and techniques of poetry analysis in order to discern all that the work has to offer, and thereby gain a fuller, more rewarding appreciation of the poem.

This article begins with an Overview that demonstrates the nature, method, and value of poetry analysis through close reading of three poems. Subsequent sections provide readers with terms and methods that will help them analyze poems on their own.

Overview

"Another", by Robert Herrick

Returning to the mechanical metaphor introduced earlier, some machines — ballpoint pens, flashlights — can be taken apart by hand or with only the simplest tools. Similarly, some poems reward careful reading, and respond to analysis, but do not require of the reader an extensive set of critical terms, such as this short poem written by Robert Herrick in the 17th century.

Here a pretty baby lies

Sung asleep with lullabies:

Pray be silent and not stir

Th' easy earth that covers her.

In the first three lines, the reader understands the speaker to be describing a sleeping baby. At the fourth line, this understanding is shaken. The baby is covered, not by a blanket, but by earth. That is, the baby has been buried. The baby is dead.

This realization can produce a sharp emotional reaction, an almost physical pang. And this reaction, this effect on the reader, is the "work" that this "machine of words" is designed to do. Although this poem is not humorous, its "mechanism" is akin to that of most jokes: a sudden alteration of perspective produces an immediate and visceral response.

There are these two fish in a tank. The first fish looks over at the second fish and says, "Hey, do you know how to drive this thing?"

At the outset of the joke, the listener imagines the fish to be in a fish tank. For the listener who "gets it" (and who cares for this sort of joke), there is an immediate and visceral reaction (pleasure, perhaps laughter) when this perspective is suddenly altered. The fish are not in a fish tank: they are in a military tank, a tracked, armored, combat vehicle.

Just as one needs no critical terminology or tools to "get" the joke, one does not really need critical terminology or tools to appreciate Herrick's poem. One needs only to read attentively and thoughtfully (it is crucial to recognize the incongruence and significance of the phrase "Th'easy earth"). Critical terminology, though, becomes useful when one attempts to articulate one's reaction to the poem in order to share it with others. A simile is a figure of speech in which one thing is compared to another, typically using the words like or as: "My love is like a red, red rose." A metaphor is a figure of speech in which the comparison is implicit, with one thing replacing another: "My love is a red, red rose" or "The red, red rose of my love." Constructions such as similes and metaphors are known as figurative speech.

This terminology becomes useful when one attempts to articulate how Herrick's poem works. Because the poem begins with natural language, and a common, easily imagined scene, and because it does not include "like" or "as", a reader first understands lines 1-3 to be literal (nonfigurative). The revelation that this "sleeping" baby is covered not by a blanket, but instead by earth, causes a sudden and dramatic shift in perspective, and in how the reader understands what he or she has just read. The effect of the poem traces to an almost instantaneous reversal of the reader's own understanding. The preceding lines are not literal, they are instead a sustained metaphor in which an unbearable reality (the baby is dead) is replaced by something else (the comforting but unsustainable fantasy that the baby is merely sleeping).

"The Destruction of Sennacherib", by Lord Byron

Similarly, one can derive pleasure from two of the most fundamental tools in the poet's toolbox — meter and rhyme — without necessarily knowing a lot of terminology, as in this, the first stanza of Byron's "The Destruction of Sennacherib":

The Assyrian came down like the wolf on the fold,

And his cohorts were gleaming in purple and gold;

And the sheen of their spears was like stars on the sea,

When the blue wave rolls nightly on deep Galilee.

Byron's use of meter and rhyme is especially evident and rewarding when one reads the lines out loud. The lines have a powerful, rolling, and very evident rhythm, and they rhyme in a way that is impossible to ignore. In other words, the physicality of the language — how it sounds and feels — accounts for a large measure of the poem's effect. The poem does not have a deep, hidden, symbolic meaning. Rather, it is simply pleasurable to read, say, and hear.

Critical terminology becomes useful when one attempts to account for why the language is pleasurable, and how Byron achieved this effect. The lines are not simply rhythmic: the rhythm is regular, it is the same in each line. A poem having a regular rhythm (not all poems do) is said to follow a certain meter. In "The Destruction of Sennacherib", each line has the basic pattern of two unstressed syllables followed by a third stressed syllable, with each of these basic patterns being repeated four times in a line. Those basic patterns are called feet, and this particular pattern (weak weak STRONG) is called an anapest. A line with four feet is said to be in tetrameter (tetra-, from the Greek for four). This poem has a pleasurable and appropriate rhythm, and that rhythm has a name: this poem is written in anapestic tetrameter. (This process of analyzing a poem's rhythms is called scansion.) The poem also rhymes (not all poems do), and the rhymes follow a pattern (they do not have to). In this case, the rhymes come right next to each other, which emphasizes them, and therefore emphasizes the sound, the physical nature, of the language. The effect of the poem's language derives in part from Byron's choice of an appropriate pattern of rhyme (or rhyme scheme): these adjacent, rhyming lines are called couplets. The sound, the physical nature, of the language is also emphasized by alliteration, as in the repetition of s sounds in the third line.

"The Silken Tent", by Robert Frost

In these two examples, analytic terms are not needed to appreciate the poem; they are only needed to explain or describe the poem's effect. Sometimes, though, the reader needs a certain skill in analyzing poetry in order to appreciate the poem. If a listener doesn't know what fish tanks and military tanks are, he or she will not "get the joke" about the two fish. Similarly, sometimes a poem cannot work, cannot produce its intended effect, and cannot do what it was designed to do, unless the reader brings a certain level of analytic skill to the experience of reading it. One such poem is Robert Frost's "The Silken Tent".

She is as in a field a silken tent

At midday when the sunny summer breeze

Has dried the dew and all its ropes relent,

So that in guys it gently sways at ease,

And its supporting central cedar pole,

That is its pinnacle to heavenward

And signifies the sureness of the soul,

Seems to owe naught to any single cord,

But strictly held by none, is loosely bound

By countless silken ties of love and thought

To everything on earth the compass round,

And only by one's going slightly taut

In the capriciousness of summer air

Is of the slightest bondage made aware.

Often, a good way to begin analyzing a poem is to reword it, putting it in one's own words, or into ordinary speech, in order to get a good grasp of the poem's content. (This is called doing a prose paraphrase.) Like Shakespeare's "Shall I Compare Thee to a Summer's Day", this poem uses a sustained image to describe another person. Frost draws out an extended comparison between a woman and a silken tent in order to make some essential aspect of the woman's character real and available to the reader. The comparison is not to just any tent, but to a tent imagined in a very specific way. Ropes or cords draw up, become taut, when wet. In this case, the tent is imagined at midday. Any morning dew which would have soaked the tent's guy-lines has evaporated, and the ropes are now somewhat slack. The tent sways slightly in response to the wind. This imagery conveys — at a subconscious but very real and effective level — a sense that the woman being described is not tense or nervous, but is instead genial, relaxed, comfortable to be around. This does not mean, though, that she is wishy washy, someone who is blown about by every gust of fad and fashion. The tent's pole — its upright nature, its strength — conveys a sense of backbone, character, and firmness in the woman being described. In this woman's case, firmness of character does not lead to her becoming dogmatic or insistent. Rather, her character derives in part at least from her deep investment in friends, family, and community, from "countless silken ties of love and thought". Some people would experience numerous relationships — and the obligations they entail — as something entangling, binding, or limiting. This woman does not seem to. She seems to be very much at ease in this situation, so much so that she and those around her are only likely to be aware of their bounds and limits in unusual circumstances.

When one reads this poem aloud, rhythm and meter are much less evident, much less emphatically presented than in "The Destruction of Sennacherib". In fact, most people who hear the poem read aloud for the first time will say that it does not rhyme and it does not have any particular rhythm. Closer examination reveals that the poem does rhyme though. In fact, it rhymes in a specific pattern: ABAB CDCD EFEF GG (that is, the first line rhymes with the third line (the A's), the second line rhymes with the fourth line (the B's), and so forth). But, the rhymes are much less forceful, much less emphatic and noticeable, than in Byron's poem. This is in part because Byron arranged the words such that each line ending (and therefore each rhyme) corresponds a natural pause in speech. That is, the lines end at the same places where one would pause if the lines were set as prose and one were reading the words aloud. Such lines are said to be end stopped. End stopping makes rhyme more noticeable. Frost, though, arranged at least some of the lines in "The Silken Tent" such that the line endings do not coincide with natural pauses (such as the end of line 2: someone reading the words "a sunny, summer breeze has dried the dew" would not necessarily pause after "breeze"). This technique is called enjambment. Enjambment de-emphasizes rhyming lines.

And, there is a rhythm, albeit a rather subtle or muted one. Each line has ten syllables, and (with slight and pleasant variations) they follow a pattern of weak syllables followed by strong syllables:

has DRIED the DEW and ALL its ROPES reLENT

This pattern (weak STRONG) is called an iamb. There are five iambs to the line here: these are pentameter lines (penta- is from the Greek for "five"). The poem does have a meter: it is called iambic pentameter. Frost employs the meter with a very light touch, though, and — rather like a good jazz musician — feels free to "play around with it", briefly departing from the regular pattern as appropriate.

Interestingly, the whole poem is a single sentence:a single, rather long, but nonetheless conversational sounding sentence that covers fourteen lines.

So, this poem, which at first seems rather formless, in fact has a very specific structure: fourteen lines of iambic pentameter rhyming ABAB CDCD EFEF GG. There is a term for this structure: it is called the Shakespearean sonnet, and it is regarded as one of the stricter, more difficult forms. Frost is not writing a shapeless poem; he is writing within very strict rules, and in fact has raised the bar by making himself do it all in one sentence. The poem is single, long, graceful sentence that unfolds — in very relaxed, natural sounding way — within the strict boundaries of the Shakespearean sonnet form.

And — going back to the prose paraphrase — it describes a woman whose life unfolds in a very relaxed, natural way, within numerous strict boundaries. In the woman's character, as in the poem's form, one is not really aware that the boundaries are even there. The woman, like the poem, exists comfortably, naturally, easily within numerous limits and boundaries.

And this is the poem's great accomplishment: the form enacts the content; the language of the poem does what the language itself says. Though this analysis proceeded by temporarily separating form and content, the result of the analysis is the realization that in "The Silken Tent", form and content are truly inseparable: they are exact complements to each other. The effect of this poem, the work it is designed to do, is to create a sharp sense of pleasure and appreciation when one recognizes how skillfully and appropriately the poet has used the words.

In this case, a certain amount of critical terminology and analytic skill is necessary in order to appreciate the poem. If the reader does not know what a sonnet is, much less more subtle aspects of form such as enjambment, he or she will have no way to see what the poem does. He or she will have no way to "get the joke". In this case, poetry enjoyment is enabled by poetry analysis.

Approaches to poetry analysis

Schools of poetry

There are many different 'schools' of poetry: oral, classical, romantic, modernist, etc and they each vary in their use of the elements described above.

The Imagists were (predominantly young) poets working in England and America in the early 20th century, including F. S. Flint, T. E. Hulme, and Hilda Doolittle (known primarily by her initials, H.D.). They rejected Romantic and Victorian conventions, favoring precise imagery and clear, non-elevated language. Ezra Pound formulated and promoted many precepts and ideas of Imagism. His "In a Station of the Metro" (Roberts & Jacobs, 717), written in 1916, is often used as an example of Imagist poetry:

The apparition of these faces in the crowd;

Petals on a wet, black bough.

Schools of criticism

Poetry analysis is almost as old as poetry itself, with distinguished practitioners going back to figures such as Plato. At various times and places, groups of like-minded readers and scholars have developed, shared, and promoted specific approaches to poetry analysis.

The New Criticism dominated English and American literary criticism from the 1920s to the early 1960s. The New Critical approach insists on the value of close reading and rejects extra-textual sources. The New Critics also rejected the idea that the work of a critic or analyst is to determine what author's intended meaning (a view formalized by W.K. Wimsatt and Monroe Beardsley as the intentional fallacy). The New Critics prized ambiguity, and tended to favor works that lend themselves to multiple interpretations.

Reader Response developed in Germany and the United States as a reaction to New Criticism. It emphasises the reader's role in the development of meaning.

Reception aesthetics is a development of Reader Response that considers the public response to a literary work and suggests that this can inform analysis of cultural ideology at the time of the response.

Reading poetry aloud

Poems may be read silently to oneself, or may be read aloud solo or to other people. Although reading aloud to oneself raises eyebrows in many circles, few people find it surprising in the case of poetry.

In fact, many poems reveal themselves fully only when they are read aloud. The characteristics of such poems include (but are not limited to) a strong narrative, regular poetic meter, simple content and simple form. At the same time, many poems that read well aloud have none of these characteristics (for example, T. S. Eliot's "Journey of the Magi"). Poems that read aloud well include:

"The Frog", by Hillaire Belloc
"One Art", by Elizabeth Bishop
"Tyger", by William Blake
"Meeting at Night", by Robert Browning
"She Walks in Beauty", by Byron
"The Song of the Western Men", by Robert Stephen Hawker
"November in England", by Thomas Hood
"Dream Variations", by Langston Hughes
"The Jackdaw of Rheims", by Thomas Ingoldsby
"To put one brick upon another", by Philip Larkin
"Paul Revere's Ride", by Henry Wadsworth Longfellow
"Adventures of Isabel", by Ogden Nash
"Nothing but Death", by Pablo Neruda translated by Robert Bly
"A Small Elegy", by Jirí Orten translated by Lynn Coffin
"Ozymandias", by Percy Bysshe Shelley
"Sea Surface Full of Clouds", by Wallace Stevens
"Silver", by Walter de la Mare
"How to Tell a Story", by Robert Penn Warren
"On Westminster Bridge", by William Wordsworth

Poetry in different cultures

This article is focussed on poetry written in English and reflects anglophone culture. Other cultures have other poetic forms and differ in their attitudes towards poetry.

Further reading

• Olderr, Steven. Symbolism: A Comprehensive Dictionary (Jefferson NC: McFarland, 1986) ISBN 0786421274
• Olderr, Steven. Reverse Symbolism Dictionary: Symbols Listed by Subject (Jefferson NC: McFarland, 1992) ISBN 0786421258

References

• Auden, W.H. and Norman Holmes (Eds.) Restoration and Augustan Poets: Milton to Goldsmith. (New York: Viking Press, 1950) ISBN 670010510
• Cummings, E. E. Complete Poems: 1913 — 1962. (New York: Harcouth Brace Jovanovich, 1968). ISBN 0151210608
• Harrison, G. B. (Ed.). Shakespeare: The Complete Works. (New York: Harcourt Brace Jovanovich, 1968) ISBN 0155805304
• Hirsch, Edward. How to Read a Poem and Fall in Love with Poetry. (New York: Harcourt Brace, 1999) ISBN 0151004196
• Kennedy, X. J. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Drama, and Poetry. (4th ed.) (Boston: Little, Brown, & Co. 1987) ISBN 0673392252
• Roberts, Edgar V. & Henry Jacobs (Eds.). Literature: An Introduction to Reading and Writing 6th edition. (Upper Saddle Creek, NJ: Prentice Hall, 2000) ISBN 0130184012
• Wallace, Robert. Writing Poems. (Boston: Little, Brown, & Co., 1982) ISBN 0316919969

Link

• Glossary of Poetry Terms

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