Relationship between Form and content in Poems

Theme:

Over the course of our first unit, we’ve been examining a range of different kinds of poems—sonnets from medieval Italy, elegies from Renaissance England, visual poems from the present. As we’ve moved across these very different poems, we’ve observed a consistent dynamic, a pattern that links them together—indeed, that makes all these different things poems. Poetry, we’ve learned, is marked by a strong relationship between form and content. The form of a poem echoes, reinforces, complicates, challenges, undermines, the content of a poem. It’s hard to say in advance how form and content are related to each other—but when you’re looking at a poem you know that they will be related to each other. And you know that, in order to interpret the poem, you can’t just think about what it says. You have to consider carefully how it says it.

For this paper, I want you to carefully analyze the relationship between form and content in one of the poems we’ve studied together. You might think about the way the volta shapes the reading experience of a poem like “Whoso List to Hunt”—underscoring the speaker’s obsession with the woman he’s pursuing. Or you might think about the way Alyssa Moore uses the screenshot to capture the sense of fragmented attention in an internet age. Or you might think about the way the use of heroic couplets in Gunn’s “Lament” creates a sense of claustrophobia, the form of the poem mimicking the medical experience of AIDS treatment.

Whatever you pick, I expect you to make an original and debatable claim about your poem. In other words, don’t just summarize the poem or offer a common-sense, indisputable argument about it. Say something new; say something that someone might disagree with. Then back up you claim with specific evidence from the poem. Analyze it carefully. Explain how the form and the content of the poem relate to each by examining the poem itself in detail. Finally, you should close your paper with a conclusion that summarizes your argument and raises questions for further research and analysis.

Requirements:

• Your paper must be at least three full double spaced pages. (Two and half pages doesn’t count—even if it’s technically on the third page!). 12 pt font and normal margins please.

• Your paper must have an argumentative thesis statement (see thesis statement checklist).

• Your paper must have an introduction, conclusion, and at least two body paragraphs, each of which analyzes a different aspect of the poem in question.

• Your paper must analyze the poem you chose to write about. You should quote directly from the poem. You should discuss the poem’s form and explain how the form relates to or echoes its content. Explain the relationship between the two. A good paper will rely heavily on evidence from the poem, carefully analyzed and explained.