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A thrush is a bird; plump, soft-plumaged, small to medium-sized, often inhabiting wooded areas. They feed on the ground or eat small fruit – but aren’t famed for their songs. Examples include a robin. ‘Darkling’ is an archaic word for ‘a creature of darkness’ or ‘in the dark’. Hardy uses it in its latter sense – the bird appears in a very gloomy scene, at the end of the day, at the end of the year (and century, for that matter).
It also has negative connotations as well, however – for obvious reasons.
Potential other implications: ‘darkling’ is perhaps used to create a diminutive form of the thrush (like a ‘duckling’). Other critics have identified the title as explaining, or preparing the reader for the unexpected advent of the bird half way through the poem, appearing into the scene from nowhere. Perhaps Hardy was attempting to use an antiquitated word to further demonstrate the bird is bringing joy to a dark land, and that there exists an enormous time difference between the new century and the old?
Hardy uses four regular eight line iambic stanzas; in either ‘tetrameter’ or ‘trimeter’, depending on the length of the line.
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This meter creates a poetic lilt, with alternate stressed feet. It seems very out of place in such a depressing poem - we must question why this is. Does it reflect the hope expressed at the end of the poem, or prepares us for it? Or does it tell of an oddity within the persona; is his negative manner actually genuine – perhaps we shouldn't accept the persona’s judgment/emotions to the same extent as he'd like us to? His choice of rhyme scheme and meter along with the harsh subject fail to match up.
Time (passing of century), Isolation, Man and the Natural World.
‘Darkling’ – discussed above.
‘Illimited’ is an archaic form of ‘unlimited’.
As usual, Hardy presents us with an image, this time of a landscape – a depressing one, at that. This poem was published at the end of the century – 31st December 1900 (Hardy was one of those people who believe that a century is complete when the hundredth year is over.) It is very cold and frosty and the day is growing to a close. It really is the end of a century.
And Hardy presents us with a very clear image of death – he later personifies the Century itself as being dead. The first two stanzas are full of death-language:
The second stanza contains an extended metaphor involving the dead century, but we need to examine the first stanza more before moving on.
Hardy’s persona is leaning upon a coppice gate – a gate into a small woods or ‘coppice’. It is a highly ambiguous persona (another thing to explore), but he leans nevertheless. The scene is wintry, indeed, along with Frost, Winter is personified equally – “Winter’s dregs made desolate/ The weakening eye of day.” The dregs of the season indicate a very cold atmosphere; one without much colour. Clearly this has emptied the scene of any colourful sight upon which the “eye of day” weakens. The day is ending; thus dusk darkens the scene.
“Tangled bine-stems scored the sky/ Like strings of broken lyres”. As before mentioned, the persona is standing in woodland, thus “Bine-stems” are tree branches. Hardy’s comparison of them to broken lyres is interesting. Lyres are a) harmonious in Classical literature and b) belong only in Classical literature. Hardy is clearly stating that the scene is not ‘harmonious’ or perhaps the ‘death-lament’ later mentioned isn’t. Or is it also a reference Hardy’s romantic passion for the past, that it was somehow better than the day in which he writes?
The first four lines of this stanza deal explicitly with Hardy’s ‘dead Century’ metaphor. He imagines the land before him as “the Century’s corpse outleant.” Quite what ‘outleant’ means, I have no idea, (The OED has confirmed that ‘outleant’ is not, nor ever has been a word) but “his crypt [becomes] the cloudy canopy” (the cloudy sky) and “the wind his death-lament”. One need not explain it in any more detail; the implications are quite explicit. Hardy’s persona clearly didn’t approve of the past century, but had yet to indicate an emotional reflection on the future. He imagines England as a rotting corpse, essentially. However, note the use of the verb ‘seems’ – is all as it seems?
However, Hardy goes on to write even more damningly of his persona’s scene. ‘The ancient pulse of germ and birth’ – the regenerative power of life, following Winter’s onslaught – ‘was shrunken dry and hard’. Nothing appears to be growing back – is this another indication of the end of the world, or certainly of an era. Hardy appears to be making the simple change of an arbitrary number into something quite different, and more serious. A degeneration of life itself. Indeed, “every spirit upon earth/ Seemed fervourless than I.” Very negative.
Observe how silent the description is up to this point in the poem. There is an implied sound in both the death-lament and of broken lyres, but otherwise, the sound is non-existent. That changes soon.
Here comes the VOLTA.
“At once a voice arose among
The bleak twigs overhead
In a full-hearted evensong
Of Joy illimited;”
Hardy emphasizes a sudden change with the words “At once” – indeed, there are multiple changes which create this volta:
There are perhaps religious connotations with ‘evensong’. Much as Hardy may simply be again referring to the mundane fact that the bird is singing a ‘song’ and ‘eve’, we pray that the man is capable of higher minded comparisons. These vaguely religious nuances are maintained throughout the poem.
The crucial fact is that the mood has changed, perhaps. “Of Joy illimited” suggests a pleasant image, which stands in stark contrast to the surrounding gloom.
“An aged thrush, frail, gaunt, and small,
In blast-beruffled plume,”
Yet the mood is suddenly plunged back into the red with Hardy’s following lines. The thrush, which is, admittedly, a very odd bird to chose (not famed for their song), is an elderly figure in a storm – hence the ‘blast-beruffled plume’. In this otherwise grim situation, the reader’s immediate concern is whether the bird itself is going to survive at all! The use of “frail, gaunt, and small” mirrors the ghoulish imagery used in the first two stanzas – the thrush is alive, for certain, but perhaps the persona questions for how much longer?
Note how the thrush is NOT personified. Every other element of the natural world takes an animated form, but not the bird! Why does Hardy do this?
“Had chosen thus to fling his soul
Upon the growing gloom.”
Perhaps desperation is the key word in this stanza, but also hope. There is a powerful message in the face of this ghoulish bird; that, in spite of all the darkness and death, the thrush maintains his song.
“So little cause for carolings
Of such ecstatic sound
Was written on terrestrial things
Afar or nigh around,”
Once again, Hardy’s use of enjambment allows for the lines to ‘bleed’ into each other – in a direct contrast to the poem’s former rigidity. Perhaps he is now gathering momentum for a change in mood? Yet, in terms of sense, Hardy appears to be doing the opposite. He states that the bird has no reason to be singing a joyful song amongst so much desolation. However, perhaps, by even considering such a fact, the persona’s own deep-rooted pessimism is beginning to shift away?
“That I could think there trembled through
His happy good-night air
Some blessed Hope, whereof he knew
And I was unaware.”
It is a rather ambiguous ending upon which Hardy chooses to conclude, but he achieves a sense of dramatic effect through it. The persona realises the presence of (a perhaps religious) hope, in the fact of utter desperation, but it is unintelligible to him. In an odd way, the reader is forced to consider whether the persona is being entirely accurate:
Extended commentary of 'The Darkling Thrush' by Thomas Hardy. (2017, Oct 15). Retrieved from https://studymoose.com/extended-commentary-of-the-darkling-thrush-by-thomas-hardy-essay
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