Summary
Summary Rossetti Froth on the Face of the Deep Analysis
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In-depth analysis of Rossetti's language, structure, form and meaning
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Rossetti – MemoryInitial Responses Development of ideas and interpretations
(red)
Meaning / Ideas / Themes constructed and explored Meaning / Ideas / Themes constructed and
by the poet explored by the poet
- love, death, transgression, violence, God, memory - deals with her rejection of love, voluntary
renunciation of love- the memory of love
- expresses the extremes of emotion during heartbreak relinquished in this lifetime, but to be
consummated in an afterlife of fufillemt
- tension between earthly love and devotional love
- striking testimony to a womens conscious
- ruth= pity
rejection of love in her life
- one section displays hopelessness- the other hope
(although language of vulnerability is still used through
the lens of hope in the second section)
- idea that if earthly love is merely a memory- it is
compatible with faith in God
- speaker is grappling with the idea of idoltary
- struggle between earthly love and heavenly devotion →
earthly desires are never truly conquered or vanquished
from her mind (buried, not yet dead)
Use of form Use of form
- dactylic trimeter- final line of first stanza- emphasis on - second section- contains internal rhyme-
alone → tone of isolation and silence perhaps suggesating the speaker has found
inner faith where her ‘life centres’
- written in ambic pentameter
- change in rhythm- first to second section - ABAB →
ABBA- reflects the shift/ transformation
Use of structural devices (include key terms) Use of structural devices
- masculine rhyme ‘lived’ ‘dead’ ‘grieved’ ‘said’- - continual repetition mirrors her mind as she is
deadening effect fixated on her pain and loneliness
- assonance throughout first stanza ‘alone’ ‘dead’ - shift in pace between the two sections- first
‘grieved’ ‘lived’ ‘heart’- creates a tone of misery part= dominatedby heavy pauses → second part
shifts to enjambment- reflects the shift in mood
- repetition of ‘alone’ echoes throughout every stanza
(anaphora in second stanza) - at first- tone in strong and definite → builds up
to an intense, fierce stanza at end of part one
- repetition of ‘weighed’ in third stanza shows the
difficulty of the decision to sacrifice earthly love for - poem begins in past tense- as the poet looks
devotional love back on her love → second part shift to present
tense- contemplating the present and future
- caesura in third stanza = mimetic of a scale ‘Weighed,
found it wanting: not a word I’ - second section- mood of peace and resignation-
expressed in terms of the inevitable cycle of the
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