09级-弗雷诺-库柏文字.docVIP

PAGE PAGE 3 Philip Freneau ( 1752-1832 ) The most significant poet of the 18th Century America. Firstly, he was "poet of the American Revolution." Secondly, Freneau was the "father of American poetry." Thirdly, Freneau played the transitional role between neoclassicism and romanticism His first poem The House of Night, romantic poem The Wild Honey Suckle anticipated the 19th century use of simple nature imagery The Indian Burying Ground anticipated romantic primitivism and the celebration of the “Noble Savage” Analysis of “The indian Burying Ground” (1788, from Miscellaneous works) 10 stanzas, in iambic tetrameter quatrains, rhymed “abab”. 2 sections: stanza 1-5: description of Indian’s burying the dead in a sitting posture, the decorations, the funerary customs. stanza 6-10:imagining of the primitive Indians (2 images: rock & elm tree, 2 characters: tribal chief, hunter) Stanza 1: At the very beginning of the poem,Freneau, like all Christians, declared his insisting on the belief that the posture of the dead indicates the soul’s eternal sleep. Stanza 2:Freneau learned here how the American indians buried their dead. Freneau made a note in his original manuscript that the North American Indians bury their dead in a sitting posture; decorating the corpse with wampum, the images of birds, quadrupeds,etc: And (if that of a warrior), with bows,arrows, tomahawks, and other military weapons. Stanza 3: The decorations of birds,bowl, vensio and the dress for the journey all suggest that the dead person used to be a hunter, and by nature a very diligent one. Stanza 4: A further descripton of the decorated weapons of the dead warrior and a further indication that when a man iss dead, his soul might live on. Stanza 5: Anyone who comes here should not disturb the dead but just leave them in peace. Stanza 6: This stanza is a description of the petroglyphs on the face of the “lofty rock” . Stanza 7:With the advancing of time, a lot of things w