论托马斯•格雷《墓园挽歌》的主题

论托马斯•格雷《墓园挽歌》的主题

作者：郭启琴

来源：《青年与社会》2011年第11期

摘 要：

关键词：忧郁;同情;生命的短暂;死亡的必然性 Guo qi-

(Foreign Language Department, Yunnan Normal University ,Yunnan, Kunming,650092)

Abstract:Usually an elegy is a poem which laments the dead but Thomas Gray’s Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard is noteworthy in that it mourns the death not of the great, but of the commons. On the one hand it voices the poet’s sincere sympathy for the poverty-stricken, expropriated peasants, on the other hand it explores the theme of life’s transience and the inevitability of death, which both the commons and the high- Ｉ

Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard. is a representative work of the literature of

Sentimentalism, a model of the Graveyard School. Full of gentle melancholy, the poem marks all the early romantic poetry.(Wu,1988:277) In the poem Gray reflects on death, the sorrows and mysteries of life in view of his own personal melancholy as he passes by a churchyard in the countryside. In his contemplation on the significance of the strangers buried in the country graves the poet compares the common folk with those privileged class wondering what the Ordinary people could have achieved had they been given an equal chance. Accordingly the poet shows his deep sympathy for the poor and

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It is said that the poem was written in 1742 shortly after the death of Gray’s close friend Richard West. The poem was first sketched in the Churchyard of Stoke Poges, Buckingham-shire where

Thomas Gray stayed for a short time on his return from the Continent.(Diao,2008:348) From the title of this poem we learn the poem was written in a country churchyard not in an imaginative scene. Hence it is understandable Placing himself in such a gloomy surroundings of the resting place of the poor, the lowly as well as the wealth the poet would naturally compares the destiny of the commons

Throughout the poem there runs the dominant theme that the lives of the rich and the poor “leads but to the grave.”(Su,2006:65)And this theme is gradually unfolded in the poet’s poetic portrayal of a sympathetically idyllic picture of the simple, innocent, contented though little known life of villages in a far-away countryside. (Wang，1983:538) Structurally speaking the poem may be divided into three parts. In the first seven quatrains the poet begins his poem by discussing the joys of life the deceased could no longer experience. In the first stanza the poet observes the signs of a country day drawing to a close; these signs_ the ringing of the evening bell, the mooing herd, and the wearied home-coming plowman are images symbolizing the end of life. Then the poet is left alone to contemplate the isolated rural scene. The first line sets a distinctly somber tone the curfew dose not simply ring; it “knells” at death or a funeral. From the very beginning the poet is meditating the nature of human mortality. In quatrains two and three we can listen to the droning flight of the beetle, to the drowsy tinkling from distant sheepfolds, to the moping owl in an ivy-mantled tower. In the fourth stanza our attention is diverted by the poet as he depicts the tranquil mouldering heap where “The rude

forefathers sleep” in a “lowly bed.” Here once again the poet selects the natural phenomena of the crumbling heap, of the narrow cell, images that are indicative of solitariness and decay, to highlight the predominant atmosphere of gloom and the central feeling of melancholy. Therefore these natural images contribute much to the poet’s lamentation and mediation making the picture of sunset observed by the poet a truly human death knell. In stanza five the poet emphasizes nothing shall arouse the dead men and women. The simple joys of waking up in the morning, wind carrying the pleasant smells of morning, including dewy grass and flowers, a swallow singing perched at straw-built shed, a cock crowing and a fox huntsman blowing a copper horn to which the hounds respond mean nothing to the dead. In the next stanza he laments the joys of a family are gone with people’s

Simply put we may say the natural images appeared in the first part which cast gloom upon the scene all reflect the mood of the poet. (Su,2006;66) In the next part which composed of sixteen quatrains the poet defends the dead poor in their remote churchyard cemetery from the contempt of abstractions like “Ambition and Grandeur”, and he further points out the lives of the rural people have far less harmful effects on society than those of the powerful and the rich for their poverty has kept them from trouble, that although these humble poor people restrained by their economic conditions and social status are denied an equal and fair opportunity to lead the kind of life enjoyed by the upper class, yet they work just as hard and probably harder than the nobles, the privileged to earn themselves

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a living, and consequently they are spared from the temptation of power and the corruption of

Stanza nine contains the theme of this poem. It reads as the following: The boast of heraldry, the pomp of power, And all that beauty, all that wealth e’er gave, Awaits alike the inevitable hour. The paths of glory lead but to the grave.(Wu, 1988:280) Here Gray indicates in death there is no difference between great and common people. Death brings equality to all human beings.(Gu,2000:62)No man can escape death, be he rich or poor. The goal of the great shares the same end as that of the “rude forefathers” when all are approaching their grave. Human achievements diminish from the perspective of the eternal. The monuments erected for the great, the church anthems sung at their funeral, and the

In stanza twelve and thirteen Gray declares if the circumstances were different, if these

unimportant, obscure people were educated with “knowledge’s roll and freed from Chill penury”, they would have achieved as much in politics and poetry. In the following lines the poet further explains this through metaphors. Here Gray compares the humble people to the undiscovered gems in the caves at the bottom of the ocean and to the undiscovered flowers in the desert. The gem may represent an undiscovered poet or philosopher. The flower may likewise stand for a person of great and noble

qualities that are “wasted on the desert.” In the final three stanzas the poet writes in a third person tone an epitaph for himself in which he voices his ideal pattern of life_ a life which seeks neither fame nor wealth, a life which renders the poet

In brief throughout the poem the poet shows his great sympathy for the poor, the lowly and the obscure, while expressing his unmistakable censure upon the privileged , the powerful and the wealthy who always had a contempt for the commons and brought havoc to them.

参考文献

［1］ 吴伟仁.英国文学史及选读［M］.北京:外语教学与研究出版社， ［2］ 刁克利.英美文学经典选读［M］.北京:外语教学与研究出版社， ［3］ 苏煜.英国诗歌赏析［M］.北京:新华出版社，

［4］ 辜正坤.英文篇鉴赏金卷［M］.天津:天津人民出版社，

［5］ 王佐良，李赋宁.英国文学名篇选注［M］.北京:商务印书馆，1983.

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