Poem Analysis for Christina Rossetti’s Memory
Themes:
Restriction
Denial of love
Loneliness
Summary:
In Rossetti’s ‘memory’, the lyric poem explores the speaker’s renunciation of earthly
love, whilst she fondly looks back to a memory of such love.
Structure:
The poem is structured into 2 parts, the first exercises extreme self-denial of earthly
love, yet her part 2 is increasingly more joyous and seems an earthlier poem with the
use of natural imagery and allows the speaker some comfort that she will have this
love in “paradise”. The first part is structured to fit alternate end rhyme with
masculine rhymes to demonstrate the harshness and disunity of a life lived alone.
However, Rossetti does offer more hope in part 2, with a rhyme scheme of rhyming
couplets to mimic unity the speaker longs for in heaven. In part 2, the initial and final
lines of each stanza ends with the same feminine rhyme- in keeping with the poems
conclusion that the woman’s renunciation of love has ultimately been softened,
perhaps she has come to terms with her choice, and thus has a fond hope of the
reunion of her lover and her beyond the grave.
More A* analysis on page 2!
Imagery:
The poem begins with the line “I nursed it in my bosom” and shifts to “I hid it in my
heart”, this ambiguous “it” being earthly love, which once “lived” yet now is “dead” to
show the speaker’s renunciation of love. The anaphoric repetition of “I” followed by
the possessive pronoun “my” implies the speaker takes full responsibility for allowing
earthly love to compromise her self-denial. Rossetti uses the metaphor of the “shut
door” to reflect the speaker’s decision to block out earthly emotions and focus on
Themes:
Restriction
Denial of love
Loneliness
Summary:
In Rossetti’s ‘memory’, the lyric poem explores the speaker’s renunciation of earthly
love, whilst she fondly looks back to a memory of such love.
Structure:
The poem is structured into 2 parts, the first exercises extreme self-denial of earthly
love, yet her part 2 is increasingly more joyous and seems an earthlier poem with the
use of natural imagery and allows the speaker some comfort that she will have this
love in “paradise”. The first part is structured to fit alternate end rhyme with
masculine rhymes to demonstrate the harshness and disunity of a life lived alone.
However, Rossetti does offer more hope in part 2, with a rhyme scheme of rhyming
couplets to mimic unity the speaker longs for in heaven. In part 2, the initial and final
lines of each stanza ends with the same feminine rhyme- in keeping with the poems
conclusion that the woman’s renunciation of love has ultimately been softened,
perhaps she has come to terms with her choice, and thus has a fond hope of the
reunion of her lover and her beyond the grave.
More A* analysis on page 2!
Imagery:
The poem begins with the line “I nursed it in my bosom” and shifts to “I hid it in my
heart”, this ambiguous “it” being earthly love, which once “lived” yet now is “dead” to
show the speaker’s renunciation of love. The anaphoric repetition of “I” followed by
the possessive pronoun “my” implies the speaker takes full responsibility for allowing
earthly love to compromise her self-denial. Rossetti uses the metaphor of the “shut
door” to reflect the speaker’s decision to block out earthly emotions and focus on
