Live like it,
No matter how old or young you are,
Like that oak tree,
Spring is full of vitality;
Bright gold;
Summer is lush,
Then,
Autumn is ripe,
The color is simple,
Like gold again.
All its leaves,
Eventually dispersed,
Look, it's standing,
Only the trunk and branches are left,
The power of old baldness.
Alfred Tennyson (1809-1892) was a famous English poet in the 9th century, and also a poet laureate. His poems "Ulysses" and "Broken, Broken, Broken" are well known to readers in China. His poems are famous for their cadence and euphemism. The poet Auden said Tennyson "has the most sensitive hearing among English poets". At the same time, Tennyson's lyric poems are concise and philosophical.
The poem Oak describes the growth of this tree. In a year's time, one glory and one decline, one green and one yellow. But whether it is brilliant or withered, green or yellow, it has its own distinctive characteristics. Oak is "vibrant" in spring, "lush" in summer, "mature" in autumn, "naked" in winter, and tall and straight all year round. No matter what the environment is, no matter whether the situation is good or bad, it is full of energy and infinite vitality. Tennyson thinks this optimistic spirit is worth learning.
Tennyson suffered a blow all his life and spent 1 7 years in pain. His memorial poem recorded this sad experience. In this group of poems, he described a "yew tree". This kind of tree is often planted in the churchyard. Its color remains unchanged all year round, always gloomy and deep, giving people a feeling of depression and gloom. Tennyson used this metaphor to describe his sadness as the color of yew, dark and permanent.
The "oak" in the poem "Oak" is in sharp contrast with the "yew" in the poem "Memorial Poetry". It is not sadness and despair, nor gloom and depression. It shows a spirit of optimism. "No matter you are old or young," Tennyson warned us, you should live like an oak tree: give your best color and vitality to the world and show the precious quality like "gold" to the world. This kind of information is of great significance for sad poets to get out of the shadows and cheer up their spirits.
This poem describes the changes of time in the four seasons, just like life is flying. The process of life is like the passage of time. It starts and ends. The poem also describes the growth of the oak tree: it is a living plant, with a process of growth, birth and death. So it is very appropriate and beautiful to compare life with time and trees.
Tennyson's Oak embodies a positive spirit, which is a bit like the Poplar written by China writer Mao Dun. I believe that readers have read it in middle school: "It is a tree that strives for the upper reaches, with straight stems and branches"; "all its branches are upward ... don't run sideways"; "This is a tree that stands tenaciously despite the oppression of heavy snow in the north"; "It is striving to develop upwards, reaching a height of two feet, towering and unyielding, facing the northwest wind." Tennyson's poem "Oak Tree" just wants us to learn this spirit and maintain a "naked power" even in adversity.
Extended content
Appreciation skills of modern poetry
First, grasp the image and draw the artistic conception
Image is an objective image that entrusts the author's subjective feelings. Only by grasping the characteristics of poetic images can we better understand the ideological content of poetry. This requires candidates to capture the main images of modern poetry and explore the characteristics of the images themselves. Only by grasping the characteristics of images can we further understand the ideological content of poetry. For example, Ai Qing's "I Love This Land" selects four images as the objects of birds' singing. "Storm-hit Land" is devastated and bullied; "The river that always surges with our grief and indignation" is surging and filled with indignation; "Angry Wind Blows Endlessly" is an irreversible call for land grabbing; "The gentle dawn in the forest" is the dawn of freedom. From these four images, we can understand the great changes of the motherland and the unyielding struggle of the people under the specific background.
The so-called artistic conception is the realm created by the author by mobilizing the accumulation of life, using artistic expression techniques, synthesizing various images, and integrating subjective thoughts and feelings with objective images. To appreciate the artistic conception of modern poetry, we must first associate and imagine the intuitive image and picture of poetry. Secondly, we should start with the taste of poetic language and gradually realize the beauty of meaning and rhyme of poetry.
Problem-solving skills of images and artistic conception in modern poetry;
(1) Grasp the main scenery in the poem and summarize the atmosphere of the scenery.
(2) Analyze the author's thoughts and feelings.
Such as: fireflies and stars swimming among water lilies/Who doesn't like spring/birds covered with branches/stars all over the sky/flickering sounds from afar/white clouds and lilacs hazy (variations of stars)
What kind of artistic conception does this poem depict?
Candidates can answer the questions according to the steps.
Step 1: fireflies and stars, water lilies, clouds of white lilacs. A few words create a peaceful, calm, soft and warm night scene.
Step 2: In this artistic conception, we can feel the poet's inner leisure and freedom, and feel his yearning for the bright world.
Second, understand the technology and analyze the function.
In poetry appreciation, the imagery and lyricism of poetry should be expressed through various artistic techniques, so candidates should understand some common artistic techniques.
1. Rhetoric. Mainly includes: metaphor, analogy, rhetorical question, rhetorical question, metonymy, duality, exaggeration, repetition, parallelism, pun and so on.
Techniques of solving problems by rhetorical means in modern poetry;
(1) What skills are revealed;
(2) Expression analysis.
Open your window/door/let me in, let me in/into your cabin (Ai Qing)
What techniques are used in this poem? What's the role?
Candidates can answer according to the steps:
Step (1) Use personification rhetoric in the whole poem.
Step (2) It is convenient to express feelings by means of dialogue and address, making the tone more cordial and easier to get close to readers.
2. Expression techniques. It mainly includes: rendering and contrast, contrast and contrast, dynamic and static combination, virtual and real combination, front and side combination, point and surface combination, sound and color combination, detail description and so on.
The skills of solving problems through expression in modern poetry;
(1) What technique is pointed out;
(2) Expounding the expressive function.
For example, "I forgot which city and garden I found it in Jiangnan and Jiangbei" (a leaf of Sophora japonica in Jixian). What's the role?
Candidates can answer according to the steps:
Step (1) combination of reality and reality.
Step (2) Fake the yearning for the motherland, and the real poet affirms that this locust tree leaf comes from the old country. This leaf does not represent a specific place, but many places in the motherland. If it is found somewhere, it will concretize what he missed and narrow down the scope. The poet misses not only Jiangnan or Jiangbei, but both Jiangnan and Jiangbei. Greatly expanded the scope of homesickness-every city, every village and every inch of land in the mainland is worth remembering.
3. Text structure. Including the first sentence leads to the following, cut to the chase, transfer to the chase, echo before and after, show great plans, go deep into layers, take care of the transition, pave the way, make the finishing point and so on.
Problem-solving skills in the text structure of modern poetry;
(1) Point out the structure of this poem.
(2) Elaborate the content of the poem.
For example, this is the most beautiful/rare and precious piece in the world/the saddest and most tearful piece/a thin, dry, grayish yellow Sophora japonica leaf. ..... The season when Sophora japonica flowers are fragrant ... (Ji Xian's "Sophora japonica Leaves")
What does the last sentence of this poem mean?
Candidates can answer this question: The last sentence echoes the first sentence. Sophora leaves are rewritten visually, which strengthens the appeal of the poem, completes the central image and overall structure of the whole poem, and is meaningful, leaving readers with sufficient imagination space.
Third, product language, interpretation meaning.
Poetry is the art of language. Modern poetry is concise in language, vivid in image and full of musical beauty. Language is the carrier of poetry expression, and the taste of language is the basis in poetry appreciation or teaching. Candidates should contact the theme of the whole poem, chew the taste repeatedly, and experience the profound meaning and meaningful words of the poem.
1. The expressive power of taste words. Pay attention to the usage of verbs or adjectives in poetry and analyze them in combination with the context.
Problem-solving skills of modern poetry appreciation words;
(1) Explain the meaning of words;
(2) Explain the function of this word in poetry.
I won't lie to you, I'm not a poet, even though I love the firmness of Baishi/Song Hai, and the sunset/dusk crow carries the wings of a bat. (Confessions of Wen Yiduo)
The poem does not say that crows fly in the sunset, but that "crows carry the sunset on their backs", not that bats fly in the dusk, but that "the dusk is full of bat wings". Please appreciate the beauty of the application of "Tuo" and "Weave".
Candidates can answer according to the steps:
Step (1) "carrying" means carrying, and "weaving" means weaving.
Step (2) Verbs are used strangely, but vividly, which makes the picture of the poem very dynamic.
2. Analysis of the language style of modern poetry. Language is the carrier of poetry, and analyzing language is an important link in literary appreciation. Only by accurately understanding the language of the work can we further evaluate and appreciate the work.
Problem-solving skills in modern poetry language style;
(1) indicates which language style;
(2) what is the role.
Such as: the afternoon sun lit up the tree-lined Woods/gray pigeons and white pigeons jumped on the green lawn/I wrote an inscription on the poem page/I listened to your whisper (Cindy's "Handshake on the Generation Gap")
Analyze the linguistic features of poetry.
Candidates can answer according to the steps:
The poetic language of Step (1) is simple and natural.
Step (2) enables readers to taste a quiet and sweet charm and be infected by beautiful feelings.
Fourth, feel poetry and analyze love and hate.
Lyricity is one of the main features of poetry. To understand the feelings of poetry, we should do the following two things: 1. Taste the words and experience the rich feelings contained in the words. For example, the words "grasping" and "sticking" in He Jingzhi's Back to Yan 'an clearly show the poet's deep affection for Yan 'an, and the words "grasping" and "sticking" further push this feeling to a higher level, showing the poet's deep love and attachment to Yan 'an. 2. Analyze the ways of expressing feelings in poetry and various rhetorical devices used. Poets often express their feelings by choosing typical scenes, the most exciting moments or scenes in their lives and relying on concrete and vivid images. For example, Ai Qing's "Reef" is an image of "the reef stands upright", which means that the poet praises the indomitable struggle spirit of the oppressed people against the violence of the old world.
Techniques for solving ideological and emotional problems in modern poetry;
(1) Point out what feelings the poet expressed;
(2) Analyze the content of the poem.
The crescent moon is curved/like a boat/I go home by boat/cross Qian Shan/smell the flowers. The night is warm. /My hometown is spring. /Are you asleep? I landed in your dream. (He Qifang's "New Moon")
What kind of feelings does this poem express?
Candidates can answer in steps:
Step (1) expresses the homesickness of the wanderer.
Step (2) The poet developed rich imagination and association, compared the new moon to a boat, and returned to his hometown after a long separation.
Poetry and songs use the words "fragrant flowers, warm night" to vividly describe the characteristics of spring in my hometown, which makes people feel warm. Expressed the poet's yearning and pursuit for a warm hometown.