Colourful, complete poem analysis. Compiled by using previous test/ exam papers for 2025, and:
ESSAY
Give a brief account of the poem, “Shipwreck” indicating the reactions of the community to the tragic loss of the sailors as well as towards those who had survived.
‘The Shipwreck’ by Emily Dickinson
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POET – DYLAN THOMAS
1 Glee! The great storm is over! Emily Dickenson was born in the United
2 Four have recovered the land; States of America in 1830. She died in 1886.
3 Forty gone down together She wrote close to 2000 poems but only 10
4 Into the boiling sand.
were published in her lifetime. She is
5 Ring, for the scant salvation! deemed one of America’s most important
6 Toll, for the bonnie souls, -- and influential poets. References to storms
7 Neighbour and friend and bridegroom, and shipwrecks appear in quite a few of
8 Spinning upon the shoals!
Emily Dickinson’s poems as ships were not as
9 How they will tell the shipwreck sturdy as they are today, and storm warning
10 When winter shakes the door, equipment did not exist.
11 Till the children ask, ‘But the forty?
12 Did they come back no more?’ This is not surprising as news of shipwrecks, a
common occurrence in those days, would
13 Then a silence suffuses the story,
have reached even those living far from the
14 And a softness the teller's eye;
15 And the children no further question, ocean. Also, classical poetry and literature is
16 And only the waves reply. steeped in stories of shipwrecks – some
which Dickinson herself would have read or
heard as a child.
THE TITLE
The – tells the reader that this poem is Glee - delight, happiness
about a specific shipwreck. Shipwreck scant - limited, barely sufficient
– implies a tragedy, usually involving the salvation - saving or protecting from harm
loss of lives, grief and mourning. This sets toll - slow ring of the bell
the tone for the poem. bonnie - good, beautiful
shoals - places where the water is shallow
@Juffrou_Ansie
suffuses - gradually spread through or over
, 2
SUMMARY:
1 Glee! The great storm is over!
2 Four have recovered the land; This poem is about an actual shipwreck in which 40 people lost their
3 Forty gone down together
lives. The poem contrasts the joy at the survival of four people and
4 Into the boiling sand.
the sorrow that 40 people died. It is this sorrow/loss that us the focus
5 Ring, for the scant salvation!
6 Toll, for the bonnie souls, -- of stanzas three and four. The tale is told to children on a cold winter
7 Neighbour and friend and bridegroom, night. The speaker’s sorrow is clear and there is no empty cliché
8 Spinning upon the shoals!
offered as “only the waves reply”.
9 How they will tell the shipwreck
10 When winter shakes the door,
11 Till the children ask, ‘But the forty?
12 Did they come back no more?’ FORM/STRUCTURE:
13 Then a silence suffuses the story, This poem has 4 stanzas of 4 lines each. It follows a strict rhyme
14 And a softness the teller's eye;
15 And the children no further question, pattern: abcb defe ghih jklk. It is close in form to a ballad but does
16 And only the waves reply. not have the prerequisite refrain characteristic of this form. The first
two stanzas focus on the positive news of the survival of four people.
THEMES The last two stanzas focus on the grief of the loss of 40 lives.
• Contrasts evident throughout:
• Joy vs Grief • Celebration vs
TONE
Mourning • Saved vs Lost • Living
• Grief • Mourning • Death • Stanza 3 and 4: sombre mood as focus - on
vs Death • The response to the
the loss
loss of life.
@Juffrou_Ansie
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