Spring and Fall

Gerard Manley Hopkins

Page 428

1880 (published 1918)

By Joseph Primiani and Lisa Maldonado

  • The Victorian Era, Welsh poetry & Anglo-saxon literature (such as Beowulf)

  • Participation with the Church allowed him to compose music which evolved into his unique rhythmic style

  • Religious upbringing and priesthood almost prevented any desires to publish. His faith conflicted with his artistic vision

Poetry is "to be heard for its own sake and interest even over and above its interest of meaning"

Influences

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Márgarét, áre you gríeving
Óver Góldengróve unléaving?
Leáves, líke the thíngs of mán, you
Wíth your frésh thoughts cáre for, cán you?
Áh! ás the héart grows ólder
Ít will cóme to such síghts cólder
Bý and bý, nor spáre a sígh
Though wórlds of wánwood léafmeal líe;
And yét you wíll weep and knów whý.
Nów nó matter, chíld, the náme:
Sórrow's spríngs áre the sáme.
Nor móuth had, nó nor mínd, expréssed
What héart héard of, ghóst guéssed:
It ís the blíght mán was bórn for,
It ís Márgarét you móurn for

Reading

to a young child

EPIGRAPH

  • The epigraph addresses a child
  • The epigraph suggests that the speaker is trying to address a more youthful, naive audience

Observation

Inference

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Márgarét, áre you gríeving
Óver Góldengróve unléaving?

  • Rhyme scheme AA and a youthful musicality

  • "Margaret" is a grieving because a tree lost it's leaves

  • Strange choice of word to describe leaves falling (unleaving)

  • The epigraph, being directed at young children, suggests the Margaret is a stand in name

  • The use of "unleaving" & sprung rhythm emphasizes the word grieving  

  • ​Child is conscious of seasonal change and death

  • Falling leaves symbolize the beginning of Fall  

Observation

Inference

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Leáves líke the thíngs of mán, you
Wíth your frésh thoughts cáre for, cán you?

  • The speaker asks the child a rhetorical question

  • The child feels strongly for an unimportant leaf falling equally as she would with things pertaining to humanity

  • "fresh thoughts" implies the childlike naivety; innocence; Spring

  • The speaker compares leaves to humanity (simile); alluding to the Illiad 

Observation

Inference

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  • Imagery: Visions of coldness
  • Exclamation point used to symbolize the speaker recalling his experience
  • Alliteration with "such," "sights," "by," "spare" and "sigh"

Áh! ás the héart grows ólder
Ít will cóme to such síghts cólder
Bý and bý, nor spáre a sígh

  • As the speaker ages, she too will become desensitized to the little details of life such as leaves falling from a tree
  • The loss of things other than one's self will become insignificant

Observation

Inference

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Though wórlds of wánwood léafmeal líe;
And yét you wíll weep and knów why.

  •  The speaker will still experience sadness, but with different causes

  • Age will determine a new perspective and shed light on new things to consider crying over

  • A cycle of death is suggested (akin to the seasons) 

Observation

Inference

  • Alliteration with "worlds," "wanwood," "will," "weep," and "why"

  • Unordinary words provide imagery for death: "wanwood" and "leafmeal"

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  • Alliteration with "sorrow's," "springs" and "same"
  • Emphasis on "name" and "same"
  • Metaphor: sorrow is referred to as a water spring

Nów nó matter, chíld, the náme:
Sórrow's spríngs áre the sáme.

  • The feeling of sadness is natural
  • The use of the colon suggests the speaker wishes to emphasize this piece of advice
  • The child will still cry over a range of things as she matures, but it they will all lead back to death

Observation

Inference

J

  • Alliteration with "mouth"      "mind", "heart"      "heard",  "ghost"      "guessed"
  • Stresses on the most important words
  • Senses are unable to express true emotion
  • Unusual use of the word "ghost" (alludes to religion)

Nor móuth had, nó nor mínd, expréssed
What héart héard of, ghóst guéssed:

  • Because of Margaret's current innocence, she is unable to consciously express or understand the sorrow

  • "ghost guessed" suggests that the subconscious mind; soul is able to understand suffering and death

Observation

Inference

J

  • Blight: infection specific to plants, leading to its death; critics says this refers to original sin

  • Ironic rhyme with the words "born" and "mourn"

  • Those words are also emphasized by the stresses

It ís the blíght mán was bórn for,
Ít is Márgarét you móurn for.

  • Speaker suggests that suffering and death is the "blight" human experience; people are born, exist and then die

  • The speaker knows that the child has unconscious foresight into this and states that it is for herself that she mourns for

Observation

Inference

J

  • One line longer than a sonnet

  • Three lines rhyme (Lines 7 - 9)

  • Six double rhymes (Lines 1 - 6 / 10 - 15)

  • Makes use of Old English stress patterns (four stresses per line) and alliteration for sprung rhythm

  • The title is a metaphor for life & death

  • Calm, soothing sounding poem for subject matter (paradox)

  • Old English stress patterns makes a chilling poem sound calm and nursery rhyme like
  • Margaret believes she is crying over the leaves dying, she unknowingly has insight into human struggle, and is truly crying over her own mortality

Observation

Inference

L

Sprung Rhythm

  • Constructed from feet in which the first syllable is stressed and may be followed by a variable number of unstressed syllables.
  • Hopkins was very careful to keep the number of feet per line consistent across each individual work, a trait that free verse does not share.
  • Classified as a form of accented verse, due to its being stress-timed, rather than syllable-timed

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Criticism

  • "...Hopkins tells us that youth has an intuitive... knowledge of the sad transiency of all things due to original sin" - John Pick (1942)

  • "...the speaker of the poem is considered to be Hopkins..." - Paul Doherty (1967)

  • Instead of reading: "And yét you wíll weep and knów why." William Epson suggested ambiguity: "And yet you shall (later) weep and know why (later)." & "And yet you insist on weeping (now) and insist on knowing why (now)." (1959)

  • The poem has experience and innocence: "the Goldengrove is "unleaving" (not leaving, not going away) because it will grow again in the spring; man also will live again because of the Redemption." - Paul Doherty (1967)

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Hopkins Inspired

  • He is known to have influenced free verse poetry

  • Published in 1918, many years after his death

  • He influenced T.S. Eliot, Dylan Thomas, W.H. Auden, and other modern poets.

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Why We Like This Poem

  •  Sing-song like rhythm when read out loud is pleasing to the ear

  • Conveys the idea that sadness is present throughout life and sourced from different means in the different stages of life

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Works Cited

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