Cold in the Earth - Emily Bronte

Description

IGCSE English Literature Mind Map on Cold in the Earth - Emily Bronte, created by Lucy Klein on 17/10/2017.
Lucy Klein
Mind Map by Lucy Klein, updated more than 1 year ago
Lucy Klein
Created by Lucy Klein over 6 years ago
26
2

Resource summary

Cold in the Earth - Emily Bronte
  1. Form and structure
    1. Tightly structured ABAB rhyming scheme
      1. Causes poem to feel like a lament, a mourning song
      2. Little enjambment, most lines end with some punctuation that creates a pause (a caesura)
        1. Suggests ordered, controlled exploration of narrator's state of mind
          1. Supports idea she is justifying her emotions to her dead lover
          2. Only few occasions does emotion spill over from one line to the next
            1. Exclamative in third stanza ('Faithful indeed is the spirit that remembers/ After such years of change and suffering!'
              1. Penultimate line where she talks about suicidal thoughts in exclamative - 'Sternly denied its burning wish to hasten/Down to the tomb already more than mine!'
              2. Structured around the progress of her emotions
                1. Fifth stanza represents climax of poem
                  1. Anaphora - 'No other.. No other... All my life's bliss... All my life's bliss'
                    1. Intensity of mood
                      1. She proves her fidelity: she is the 'faithful...spirit' of stanza 3 but now has to let herself live this new life and cherish 'existence'
                      2. Ends with rhetorical question
                        1. 'dare not let it languish/Dare not indulge' -repetition conveys her determination
                          1. Question doesn't reflect doubt: though the world is 'empty' it's where she has to live
                        2. Themes
                          1. Death
                            1. Grief
                              1. Time
                                1. Relationships
                                2. Voice and tone
                                  1. Voice is strong but full of emotion
                                    1. Questions herself in opening two stanzas acknowledging that time has brought healing, but feeling guilty.
                                      1. Conflicted- guilty for not grieving but acknowledges that she could still become overwhelmed with grief if she allows herself.
                                        1. Self-justificatory (stanza 4); passionate (stanza 5); rational (stanza 6); self-aware (stanza 7) and resolved (stanza 8)
                                        2. Language
                                          1. Repeated references to 'Cold' build heavy/chilly/sombre atmosphere - 'deep snow piled', 'cold in the dreary grave', 'fifteen wild Decembers' etc.
                                            1. Cold is sterile and numbing.
                                              1. 'wild' has connotations of savage, untamed and unrestrained
                                                1. Snow piled on grave reflects how time has distanced narrator from her lover's death
                                                2. Imagery sharply contrasted to 'days of golden dreams', the Sun which 'lightened up my heaven' and the Star that 'shone for me' -imagery of intense light and positivity associated with lover.
                                                  1. Sun symbolic of warmth and life
                                                    1. Stars symbolise guiding force
                                                      1. These life forces have been extinguished
                                                      2. Time
                                                        1. Capitalised to indicate importance
                                                          1. Described in two metaphors: 'all-wearing wave' and 'World's tide' Metaphors introduce idea of natural flow, that emotions change over time. World's tide 'bearing [her] along' suggests things are happening beyond her control, she passively rides them out supported by time.
                                                          2. Youth
                                                            1. Two references in poem: 'Sweet love of youth' and later her own 'young soul'. Suggests a process of maturation.
                                                              1. Uses oxymorons to describe new life: 'sterner desires' and 'darker hopes'. It's more serious, she's grown up.
                                                              2. Narrator refers to Memory's 'rapturous pain' and the 'divinest anguish'. Captures bittersweet moment of recalling a loved one.
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