Summary
Summary English Home Language - funeral blues
- Course
- Institution
Sufficient summaries to ace funeral blues in the exam.
[Show more]
Seller
Follow
talithajvv
Content preview
Funeral Blues SummaryAn unnamed speaker laments the death of someone close to him. (The
speaker's gender is never given, but we'll refer to "him" from now on for
convenience.) The speaker asks for quiet. He wants to stop all clocks and
telephones and to silence barking dogs and pianos. He says to bring out
the coffin of the dead beloved, and for the mourners to come.
He continues on in a similar vein; and asks the aeroplanes to write "He Is
Dead" across the sky. He says that doves should wear white ribbons and
that policemen should wear black gloves to commemorate the death.
Then things take a turn for the personal. He says that the dead man was
everything to him—all points of a compass, every day of the week, every
time of the day. And the worst part is that this experience has taught him
that love won't last forever, as he once thought.
That's when he starts to really despair. He doesn't want to see the stars,
the moon, or the sun. He doesn't want to see the ocean or the forest. Now
that the dead man is gone, there is no good left in the world. None at all.
Lines 1-2
Stop all the clocks, cut off the telephone,
Prevent the dog from barking with a juicy bone,
The poem begins with a series of harsh commands: stop the clocks! Cut
off the telephones!
We don't know quite who our speaker is yet, but he sounds forceful, even
angry.
And actually, we'll never find out too much about the speaker himself. For
the sake of convenience, we'll refer to the speaker as a "he," but "he"
could just as easily be "she."
Whoever he is, he sounds angry, and issues harsh commands. In the first
line, he wants to stop the clocks and the telephone. These seem like
physical representations of time and communication to us. He wants
everything to just stop.
In the next line, he asks for silence. He wants dogs to stop barking, too.
But we have to ask: what dogs? Whose dogs? To whom does the speaker
address these lines (and the poem in general)? His noisy, dog-loving
neighbour? Dog-lovers in general?
There's no one answer to these questions, but since the poem is called
"Funeral Blues," it would be pretty legitimate to propose that the speaker
is addressing an audience of mourners as a funeral. So this is a public
poem, in a way—a poem meant for lots of people to hear.
And finally, we noticed that these lines are similar in length. Line 1 has ten
syllables, which is a sure as shootin' sign that we're reading iambic
pentameter. Line 2, though, has twelve, and the rhythm is off in both
lines, so Auden's keeping us on our toes for now.
Lines 3-4
Silence the pianos and with muffled drum
Bring out the coffin, let the mourners come.
, Whatever's going on here, this is not a time for pianos. It's a time for
muffled drums. Now that he's asked the dog and the phone to hush, he
has no problem extending that request to musical instruments.
Except he's not opposed to the drum. Which fits the title. If this is a
funeral we're dealing with, drums are much more solemn and fitting for
the occasion than a joyful, jazzy piano.
In the next line, he wants the coffin to be brought out and for mourners to
come see it. Maybe the "muffled drum," then, is the sound of mourners
walking, or of pallbearers carrying a coffin. Or maybe it is a slow and
stately drumming that the speaker wants, the kind of drumming that
happens at military funerals.
The interesting thing about these two lines, and the first two as well, is
that they are all commands, also known as imperatives. The speaker is
making a big pronouncement to the world: someone has died, and we
must acknowledge it in dramatic ways.
These lines might even seem a little exaggerated to you. Should we really
stop the clocks just because someone has died? Probably not. But the
speaker's using a bit of hyperbole or exaggeration to convey just how
important all this mourning business is.
But of course when someone's being so over-the-top, it raises the
question, how serious is the speaker? Is he exaggerating to create drama,
or does he really feel this deeply about all this?
Line 3 has eleven syllables, and line 4 has ten. Shmoop thinks it's safe to
call this one iambic pentameter.
And by the end of stanza 1, we've also got a clear rhyme scheme at work.
"Telephone" rhymes with "bone," and "drum" rhymes with "come." A little
AABB action for you.
Here's a tip for you budding Shmoopoets: whenever you see a four-line
stanza, or quatrain that has an AABB rhyme scheme in a poem about a
funeral, you're reading an elegiac stanza. Check out our "Form and Meter"
section for more on that fancy term.
Lines 5-6
Let aeroplanes circle moaning overhead
Scribbling on the sky the message He is Dead,
Now things are getting really dramatic. As if stopping the clocks weren't
enough, the speaker would like an aeroplane to write "He is Dead" in
skywriting to commemorate his grief. If a funeral is a public
acknowledgment of death, well then this is a super public
acknowledgement of death. You don't get much more in-your-face than
skywriting.
While earlier he asked for quiet, and for people to cut off their telephones
(which are private communication devices), he wants the whole world to
know that "He Is Dead."
And it's interesting here that the speaker doesn't provide a name. He
could have written, for example, "John Is Dead." Or "Tommy Is Dead." But
he leaves the dead man's name anonymous. Maybe he wants more
privacy after all. Or maybe he assumes that everyone already knows "his"
The benefits of buying summaries with Stuvia:
Guaranteed quality through customer reviews
Stuvia customers have reviewed more than 700,000 summaries. This how you know that you are buying the best documents.
Quick and easy check-out
You can quickly pay through credit card or Stuvia-credit for the summaries. There is no membership needed.
Focus on what matters
Your fellow students write the study notes themselves, which is why the documents are always reliable and up-to-date. This ensures you quickly get to the core!
Frequently asked questions
What do I get when I buy this document?
You get a PDF, available immediately after your purchase. The purchased document is accessible anytime, anywhere and indefinitely through your profile.
Satisfaction guarantee: how does it work?
Our satisfaction guarantee ensures that you always find a study document that suits you well. You fill out a form, and our customer service team takes care of the rest.
Who am I buying these notes from?
Stuvia is a marketplace, so you are not buying this document from us, but from seller talithajvv. Stuvia facilitates payment to the seller.
Will I be stuck with a subscription?
No, you only buy these notes for $7.95. You're not tied to anything after your purchase.
Can Stuvia be trusted?
4.6 stars on Google & Trustpilot (+1000 reviews)
77254 documents were sold in the last 30 days
Founded in 2010, the go-to place to buy study notes for 14 years now