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crossref-it.info - AS/A2 English Literature Study Guides - texts in context.

 

Poems for study » God's Grandeur » Language and tone in God's Grandeur

Alliteration

The patterning of the language is obviously carefully worked out. The main pattern is alliterative, each line having two or three alliterating words, following the pattern of much medieval English verse, but unusual in a sonnet, which traditionally depends on rhyme for its main patterning. You can probably work out the alliterations in each line, and in doing so, you will notice the growing complexities of the b/br alliterations of the last three lines.

Parallelism

The second pattern is parallelism: the parallel structure of phrases, as in ‘All is seared with trade’ paralleling ‘bleared, smeared with toil’; or ‘And wears man’s smudge’ paralleling ‘and shares man’s smell’. This is poetic structure typical of the Bible, where the ‘and’ has a strong rhetorical force, building up emphasis.

There are also simple repetitive patterns, such as ‘have trod’ repeated three times; or the internal rhymes of ‘seared, bleared, smeared’ adding to the parallelism. Lastly, are the two interjections: ‘Oh’ and ‘ah’. Hopkins’ interjections are always deliberate and force their way into the middle of a sentence to give some extra emotional resonance to the poet’s voice, which might otherwise seem a little too strident, too confident.

Investigating God's Grandeur
  • What effect do the w, b and br alliterations have in the last line?
  • Why does Hopkins repeat ‘have trod’, do you think?
  • What is the effect of the ‘oh’ and ‘ah’ for you? Do you find them unnecessary, even embarrassing?
Alliteration is a device frequently used in poetry or rhetoric (speech-making) whereby words starting with the same consonant are used in close proximity- e.g. 'fast in fires', 'stars, start'.
A sonnet is a poem with a special structure. It has fourteen lines, which are organised in a particular manner, usually characterised by the pattern of rhyming, which changes as the ideas in the poem evolve.
The device, frequently used at the ends of lines in poetry, where words with the same sound are paired, sometimes for contrast ' for example, 'breath' and 'death'.
A linguistic device whereby an idea, image, sentence is paralleled by another in a repeating pattern.
The Christian Bible consists of the Old Testament scriptures inherited from Judaism, together with the New Testament, drawn from writings produced from c.40-125CE, which describe the life of Jesus and the establishment of the Christian church.
A linguistic device whereby an idea, image, sentence is paralleled by another in a repeating pattern.

The world is charged with the grandeur of God.
It will flame out, like shining from shook foil;
It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil
Crushed. Why do men then now not reck his rod?
Generations have trod, have trod, have trod;
And all is seared with trade; bleared, smeared with
toil;
And wears man's smudge and shares man's smell:
the soil
Is bare now, nor can foot feel, being shod.

And for all this, nature is never spent;
There lives the dearest freshness deep down things;
And though the last lights off the black West went
Oh, morning, at the brown brink eastward, springs--
Because the Holy Ghost over the bent
World broods with warm breast and with ah!
bright wings.