The Windhover by Gerard Manley Hopkins Summary & Analysis

The Windhover Summary & Analysis

The Windhover by Gerard Manley Hopkins may be a semi-romantic, religious poem dedicated to Christ. it’s a usual Hopkinsian sonnet that begins with a description of nature and ends in meditation about God and Christ and his beauty, greatness, and beauty. The poem also uses his usual “sprung rhythm”, Anglo-Saxon diction, alliteration, internal rhyming, new compound metaphors, elliptical grammar, and sophisticated threads of connotation.

Hopkins has mixed his romantic fascination with the character together with his religious favor of gratitude towards God for giving us a gorgeous nature. the sweetness of nature is here illustrated by an exquisite bird flying within the air. He describes a bird which he saw flying within the sky that morning. Like during a romantic poem, he remembers the experience to precise his feelings. That morning, the speaker had been out at dawn. From the excited description within the poem, we will infer that the speaker was probably within the field. His attention was suddenly drawn by the scene of a bird flying within the sky.

The first stanza of the poem may be a description of the various tricks of the bird’s flight. within the second the speaker remembers the sweetness of Christ and says that he’s a billion times loveliest. So, claiming that nature’s beauty is not any wonder, he concludes within the last stanza that everything he looks at reminds him of the pain and suffering of Christ which has made human life so beautiful and given this chance to enjoy it. to the present devotee of Christ, everything brings the image of Christ and his wounds and pain and sacrifice. this means that he always remembers and becomes thankful to Christ. because the subtitle suggests, the poem may be a thanksgiving to Christ.

The Windhover maybe a sonnet whose octave describes the flight of a kestrel (windhover) that he saw that morning. The sestet is split into two parts: the primary three lines are about the bird and therefore the comparison of the bird with Christ who is ‘a billion times lovelier’, and therefore the last three lines express his memories and appreciation of Christ. But the poem is quite difficult because the poet has used odd Old English words, only implications, and Christian symbols to suggest the pain (gall), wound (gash), blood (vermillion), sacrifice, then the greatness of Christ. The bottom-line of the difficult ideas during this poem is that ‘it is due to the sacrifice of Christ that we’ve such a life, and that we can enjoy the majestic great thing about the nature: so we should always thank him.

The speaker compares the bird with Christ, “my chevalier”, who may be a billion times lovelier, more brute (wild), and dangerous (consuming) in his beauty. the hearth or brilliance of Christ is dazzling this bird is not any wonder. “No wonder”, says the poet about the bird because the important wonder of the planet is another supreme gift of God, his son, the Christ. His steps on the soil make a semblance (shape) of a wound (gash) when the blood-red (vermilion) and golden light of the sun is sew it. The flight of the bird reminds the speaker of his Christ’s crucifixion; his blood falls on us for redemption: his suffering (gall) is additionally another thing to recollect.

The last stanza associatively brings together unrelated words, each telling something about Christ and his suffering and sacrifice for the citizenry. the outline of the primary stanza and therefore the comparison of the second stanza are all forgotten when the poet deeply meditates and exalts within the sacrifice and greatness of Christ within the last three-line stanza. The red ember-like the sunshine of the morning sun on the horizon of the blue-bleak sky and he’s lost in contemplation.

The poem is nearly impossible to know without a good background about Hopkins’s ideas and his odd words. There are many words of the Anglo-Saxon origin like rung (past tense of ‘ring’ meaning go-round), minion, dauphin, chevalier (prince), etc. There also are unusual combinations like “dapple-dawn-drawn”, which is a picture of the bird. The last stanza is especially complex due to the associatively linked words associated with Christ and his sacrifice. Finally, the grammar is additionally odd; actually the poem doesn’t follow any traditional grammar and structure. In short, the poem are often discussed as a sonnet because it’s a number of the features of the standard sonnet, but it must be called a modified sonnet adapted to a special quite subject, word-game, and music.

By implication, the poem is therefore a poem of thanksgiving to Christ. it’s a hymn that’s romantic in form but religious in theme. When the poet sees the gorgeous bird, he’s reminded of Christ and becomes thankful and appreciative of him. The poem’s theme is therefore associated with the poet’s praise of Christ instead of being about the bird.