My Heart Leaps Up [Savona]

• Engels
• Middelbare school
• vwo
• Leerjaar 4

My Heart Leaps Up

Literature

What do you know about
Romanticism (il romanticismo)?

Some background information

Industrial Revolution (1760 to 1840)

• first part of industrialization brought wealth and prosperity
• also feeling that this wealth was for the few and bought with poverty of many 
• led to urbanization and the birth of cities > lot of people moved there

French Revolution

• 1789
• huge source of inspiration: structure society needed to be changed
• Ideals of freedom and equality, also among Romantic poets from England

Wordsworth & Coleridge

• two famous Romantic poets
• broke radically with 18th century tradition in terms of literature
• proposed poetry of simplicity

Wordsworth & Coleridge

• poetry was no longer guided by Reason
• showed a deep trust in the forces of intuition, emotion and imagination

Theme 1: Nature is divine

• Nature = life-giving force
• both in man but also the world around him

Theme 2: the simple man should be idealized

• man closest to nature (like farmers) should be idealized

Theme 3: the past should be idealized

• many Romantic poets were disappointed with the present situation they lived in

Theme 4: children are pure

• children were seen as 'pure'
• surpreme example as they were uncorrupted by the world
• closer to God and eternity due to purity

Let's read the text together

Let's listen to Benedict Cumberbatch

Let's continue

By answering the questions

1. What is the speaker's
mood in this poem?

Answer:

Happy ("my heart leaps up") but also serious ("or let me die").

2. What can you say about
the I-person's age?

Answer:

He is probably middle-aged;

• "now that I am a man" 
• "so be it when I grow old"

3. 'So be it' (line 5) means 'let it be this way. What is it that he speaker does not want to change?

Class discussion.

Answer to question 3

The happy feeling he gets when he sees a rainbow;

in other words: his bond with nature.

4. Why would the 'I' rather be dead than change (line 6)?

Class discussion.

Answer to question 4

He thinks it is important to have (strong) feelings 

about nature / natural things.

5. How can a child be father of a man, as said in line 7?

First discuss in pairs or small groups.

After that: class discussion.

Answer to question 5

It means a child is closer to nature, and therefore 

closer to the essence of life, than an adult.

6. Explain the wish expressed
in lines 8-9 in your own words.

Answer to question 6

I want to be close to nature all the days of my life.

7. What is the theme of this poem?

Let's find out what a theme is first.

What is a theme?

1. the main idea a writer in story develops
2. the subject(s) a writer wants to talk about

A theme is often

1. a single word
2. a small phrase
3. a single word or small phrase
4. a small phrase or a sentence

7. What is the theme of this poem?

First discuss in pairs or small groups.

After that: class discussion.

Answer to question 7

Nature and the beauty in it.

8. Find the imagery in this poem.

What kind is it?

Hold on! What is imagery?

Connect the imagery to the correct description

Metaphor

Simile

Personification

A direct comparison, without the words 'like' or 'as'.

A direct comparison, with the words 'like' or 'as'.

Human traits are applied to non-living objects.

8. Find the imagery in this poem.
What kind is it?

Answer to question 8

My heart leaps up = personification

The child is father of the man = metaphor

Explain why

This helps you understand imagery better

Discuss in pairs / small groups

Explanation:

My heart leaps up = personification

• to leap up = to jump, a heart cannot jump
  
  

The child is father of the man = metaphor

• a child cannot be a father of an adult, it is a metaphor to show the purity of children

9. What makes this a Romantic poem?

Answer

• It stresses the importance of nature
• It places a child (intuition / feeling) above an adult (reason)

I think I understand this poem and its message.

Yes

No

Continue

If you have answered yes, focus on your week task.

If you have answered no, please let me know what you do not understand (yet).