When the light is broken,
Its light goes out in the dust;
When the sky clears up,
The brilliance of the rainbow disappeared at once.
If the pipa breaks its string,
Beautiful music fell into silence;
If you're done,
The charm of love is soon forgotten.
2
Like music and bright light.
Will coexist with pipa and lamp,
The mind can't sing.
If essence has been depressed:
No songs, only mourning,
Like the wind blowing through a corner of the wasteland,
Like a wailing wave
Ring the death knell for the dead sailors.
three
Once two hearts are together,
Love left the delicate nest,
What about the weaker one?
Will suffer for what it has.
Oh, love! You are sighing.
How can you see that things are impermanent?
Looking for the most fragile heart
Be your cradle, bedroom, coffin?
four
It fills you with enthusiasm,
Like a storm shaking a flying crow;
Reason will laugh at you,
Like the sun in the winter sky.
Rafts in your nest
It will rot, and when the cold wind blows,
The leaves have fallen, your beautiful house.
You will be laughed at.
(translated by Cha Liang Zheng)
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Most of Shelley's poems express his philosophical thoughts, that is, his concern for human love and rationality, his belief in the power generated by the combination of the two, and his confidence in the perfection and ultimate progress of human beings. When a lamp is broken deals with such a theme. This poem is quite meaningful in structure. The first two sections are all descriptions of images, and the last two sections enter the theme that the poet wants to express. In the first section of the poem, several groups of philosophical images are introduced: lamp-light, cloud-rainbow, pipa-music, text-emotion. The former in each group of images is always the carrier of the latter, and the image of the latter depends on the former. The last group of images gradually approaches the theme of love: "If you finish your words, the charm of love will soon be forgotten." Through this dependence and bearing relationship, what Shelley wants to say is that when the ideal communication between two individuals is established, there is always a dependence and bearing relationship between the heart and the expression of love. Of course, they said the word "Hua" with their lips here, but the original English word in the poem is "accent", which originally meant the accent difference between people. This accent difference implies the difference between two individuals, and the difference between two individuals is mainly the difference of "heart" in Shelley's view.
The second part further explains the relationship between these image groups. Just like music, strong light, pipa, lights, and singing are all about mood. If the mind is "suppressed", singing will become mourning. Poetry gradually moves closer to the theme of inner love it wants to express. In the third section, the dependence and bearing relationship of each group of images in front of me is from the final gathering to the relationship between "love" and "heart" Love lives in a nest, which is the knot of two hearts. When two hearts are tied together, love leaves this nest. Love only follows the perfection of the heart. The two hearts involved in love "the weaker one" refers to the weak heart. Shelley assumes that individuals have different degrees and abilities in self-expression and love, and weak hearts are not good at expressing love. The poet thinks that love should be preserved more carefully. In Searching for the Weakest Soul and the "cradle, room and coffin" of love, the poet expresses the situation that the fragile soul is often unbearable for the load of love.
In the fourth section, the poet described that the mind can't bear love, and the heart "subverts" love with enthusiasm, making love like a "flying crow swaying" in a storm. The poet, in the form of a tangible image and a shallow but absurd metaphor, shows the entanglement between soul and love, bringing readers a very novel aesthetic feeling. In the following poem, the author introduces another theme related to love-reason. Rationality is usually called "bright" in romantic poems, and it is also "bright rationality" in Shelley's original English poems. Shelley used a dichotomy expression here, and once again emphasized the light of rational enlightenment in the next sentence "Like the sun in the winter sky". The poet tells his own view on the contradiction between love and reason in a poetic way: love is romantic and beautiful, but it also has a fragile side, which cannot be understood in reality and needs rational examination. While expressing this meaning, Shelley may also imply that love is also dependent and needs some realistic support. This poem naturally mentions the "beautiful house" of love. Love, like a bird, occupies a "nest". "Beautiful house" is an idea, which may mean that love is often carried by a strong heart.
Throughout the poem, the poet is lamenting the fragility of love. The fragility of love stems from the fragility of the heart, and the fragile heart wants to pin something on it. Poetry vaguely shows the interdependence between heart and love-without love, the heart can't be strong, and without heart, love is useless. Shelley uses ingenious ideas to connect different images, making them form internal relations, and at the same time, with the help of the leap of poetry, keeping certain discontinuity between images, thus creating as much imagination space as possible and giving readers an elusive reading feeling. Isn't love just for human feelings? Shelley's lyric poems show eternal charm because of their extraordinary beauty, magnificence and language skills. Critics in the 20th century believed that his wisdom and talent were possessed by saints, and it produced an influence that only politicians and thinkers could have. This poetic style is also fully reflected in When a Lamp is Broken.
(Yu Chao)