Samuel Taylor Coleridge
Samuel Taylor Coleridge’s Work Without Hope captures the desolation of man’s inner feelings. Many times, even present day, people go about working without feeling they have a true meaning or purpose for their labors. In this piece, Coleridge uses contradictory imagery to emphasize the empty feeling the man has inside. His surroundings are all positive and happy, and place where most people would feel content he feels out of place….
All Nature seems at work. Slugs leave their lair—
The bees are stirring—birds are on the wing—
And winter slumbering in the open air,
Wears on his slumbering face a dream of Spring!
All the description and imagery in this section of the poem are of the environment. Then the man’s true feelings are revealed…
And I, the while, the sole unbusy thing
Nor honey make, nor pair, nor build, nor sing.
He is out of place and does not know what to do about it. This poem also reminds me of my earlier years in college. I didn’t really know what I wanted to study and I was a little discouraged because all of my classmates knew what they wanted to major in and what they wanted to do with their careers. At some point in everyone’s life I’m sure they feel out of place or uncertain of what their role is, but we must work with hope for…
Work without hope draws nectar to a sieve,
And Hope without an object cannot live.
5 comments:
LaDonna,
Good focus, and good inclusion and sharing of your college experiences as a way to connect to the poem. We all bring our experiences along when we read a poem.
Good take on the poem. I liked how you related it to your own experience in college. I kind of know how you felt because when I came to college I had no idea what I wanted to do and in some ways I still don't know what I want to do. It seems that the speaker of the poem is unhappy because everything around him is doing work except for him. He feels out of place and longs to be a part of everything going on around him. Nice use of quotes in your analysis. I enjoyed reading your post.
Good interpretation. Keep Hope Alive!
Good interpretation of Coleridge's "Work without hope." Way to bring in your own experience into the interpretation. It made it nice to read your post and allowed me to even see my own self in your post.
The point of being lost does hit home here I can't remember if you went to the minority retreat with me when we first got to college, but I know if it was not for that I would not have spoken to anyone. The reason was I thought i did not belong there and had nothing in common with these people. Man was I wrong. Maybe when your lost about yourself you are really just scared to do something new.
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