Notes Page 2

In her essay, Mother Tongue, Amy Tan contemplates how her background shaped her life, her education, and brought her shame, but ultimately, she learns to embrace her background. Tan describes the way that she was stuck between two worlds. When she is with her mother, she speaks in simple English, but while she is in the public eye, she shifts to an English that is more formal and acceptable; one that English-speaking people accept. Tan relates her story of her mother talking about a gangster that wanted her family in China to adopt him because her family had more status.

Edmund Spenser is the first really commanding figure in the Elizabethan period, and one of the chief of all English poets. He was called a Poet's Poet and was admired by William Wordsworth, John Keats, Lord Byron and Lord Alfred Tennyson, among others. The language of his poetry is purposely archaic, reminiscent of earlier works such as The Canterbury Tales of Geoffrey Chaucer and Il Canzoniere of Francesco Petrarca, whom Spenser greatly admired.

In brief the term 'Metaphysical Poetry' implies the characteristics of complexity, intellectual tone, abundance of subtle wit, fusion of intellect and emotion, colloquial argumentative tone, conceits (always witty and fantastic), scholarly allusions, dramatic tone, and philosophic or reflective element.

A Passage to India is a realistic portrayal of the contemporary Indian society of the colonization period. It gives more or less an accurate picture of life in India in the 1920’s. This novel gives us the fruitful picture of local customs and beliefs, Hindu – Muslim conflict and historically true account of the conflict of the cultures of the East and West which were prevalent in that society.

George Herbert is considered as a religious poet because of the subject matter of his poetry which is fully devotional and religious in nature. By his poetry, he completely surrenders himself to God and his master, Jesus. Although he was associated with the metaphysical group, he was exceptional for his treatment towards religion in his poetry. For his devotion to God, he is known as the saint of the metaphysical group. And his religious thought afterward influenced other metaphysical poets. However, his devotion to God reflects in his poems, and we find a great touch of religion in almost all of his poems.