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Emily Mullins

12/8/07

ENG 310C Watts

Final Paper

Hopkins use of Religion and Nature in Victorian Poetry

The Victorian poet, Gerard Manley Hopkins, uses vibrant religious and natural imagery, as well as

experimental uses of rhythm and innovational structure to contrast an age of largely traditional verse. His

prosodic form and structure uses aspects of inscape and instress to transmit to readers the importance

of each unique physical being represented in his poetry, through a wider context of religion and creation.

By using the .concept of inscape, Hopkins wanted his poetry to have been created out of inspiration from

God and to depict why He created each natural part of the earth. As a devout Jesuit, he found writing poetry

to play a role in an artistic dilemma, as he felt his writing might infringe upon the modesty required by his

religious position. He uses a variety of biblical allusions throughout his poetry and each conjures up a

feeling of Gods hand in each part of His creation. Hopkins poem, The Windhover, explores the

relationship between God and the meditation of a bird in flight, as a natural phenomenon of the God-

created earth expressed through the tone, content and structure of the poem. This poem, along with others

of Hopkins reflects the larger themes of religion, spiritual connection and the beauty of the natural word

within his works.

Hopkins uses an innovational concept of sprung rhythm which was contrary to his fellow poets

conventional ideas of meter and rhyme. Hopkins orders his verses according to the number of accented

syllables (Reviving God). He uses multiple arrangements of stressed and unstressed syllable

combinations, usually with feet containing an inconsistent number of syllables per foot. His poems were

carefully ordered, yet they generally escape the constraints of running measure. Rhyme was very important

because as excessive and reoccurring as it might seem, Hopkins gets his point across while conditioning the

momentum and feeling of the reader. The Windhover uses rhyme and similar sounds in the poem, which

includes, wimpling wing, riding, gliding, hiding and thing (Negri 196). These sounds create a

rhythm and a feeling of movement throughout the birds flight in the poem.

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His imagery can be effortless yet vibrant, as he lays claim to new words of archaic and vernacular

impressions. He also creates compound adjectives, often using hyphens to combine words, as well as

alliteration and assonance to create a rhythm. In the beginning lines of The Windhover the speaker sees

his subject, a dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, soaring through the kingdom of daylights dauphin (Negri

196). The falcon is drawn to the light of the dappled dawn, and in this beautiful light, the speaker sees the

truth and beauty executed by the striding and gliding bird (196). Hopkins inventive language gives

attention to his images which communicates the poets perceptions of the speakers inscape to his reader.

The inscape looks at a moment and pulls something out of it. The speakers strong intense experience upon

looking at the bird in the sky and the mastery of the thing uses alliteration and sound-play to depict

through words his religious views of his relationship with nature, as well as considering natures

magnificence in everyday living subjects (196).

The bird masters the natural forces of air and wind, showing courage and power in an expressed

beauty and danger. In this moment and with this animal, the speaker sees Gods created true beauty and life.

Even a single falcon can summon up a meaningful epiphany in the mind of an observer about the true

meanings of existence and a higher calling for each individual on earth. This poem reflects the glory of

Gods creations, and the majestic moment when one encounters such a striking and commanding creature

interacting with the invisible air, almost like God was underneath it as steady air holding the bird up

(Negri 196). The Windhover itself is the brute beauty and valour and act, yet as compared to Gods

doings, the falcon serves to make readers and observers of nature only see the beauty and grace of the

soaring falcon reflected in Gods wonders (196). The falcon is an example of the role God plays in all

aspects of life and the spiritual connection one can have with God upon looking at a similar scene or

moment.

The role of God plays a large part in Hopkins other poetry including his pieces Gods Grandeur

and The Starlight Night. Hopkins was amazed by the God-created world and every part of its brilliant

beauty and workings. In The Starlight Night, the speaker exclaims, Look at the Stars! Look, look up at

the skies! O look at all the fire-folk sitting in the air! (Negri 195). The speaker is inspired by what he sees

in the night sky and imagines Gods work playing out in the Heavens. Hopkins admired the intricacies of

nature, and found beauty in all aspects of it and no subject was too small. In his poem, Gods Grandeur,

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the world is charged with the grandeur of God and thus it is all Gods doing: the radiance and light of the

earth as well as the parts of life seared with trade; bleared, smeared with toil (Negri 195). Nature will

always rejuvenate itself, even as the Western industrialization is continually spreading and building.

Nothing has escaped mans industrial contempt for nature and Gods majesty, and man has continually

misused the natural beauty before him. Yet divine nature is never spent, as God protects and triumphs

throughout the darkness of the world, a world wrecked by man (Negri 195). Hopkins felt a desire to be

close with God and to have a relationship with the creator, and this moment of clarity is a step to having

that relationship and connection. In Hopkins poem Pied Beauty, Glory be to God for dappled things

and His beauty is past change: Praise him (Negri 197). This poem is an allusion to Creation, and all

things are a part of Gods creation and each must be witnessed and cherished. Theres unification between

all the things in the world and this unity exists to show us the importance of the experience one can have

with nature and God.

Hopkins thought God was present in all living things and throughout his poetry he wanted to

reassure readers of Gods existence in the world. The speakers heart was stirred by the moment he

witnessed, seeing through the movement of the bird, a Christian significance and Christian symbolism. The

bird is symbolic of the powerful natural forces that exist in the world, and that such a small creature can

contain such authority and magnificence. All four of Hopkins poems discussed use wings of a kind of bird

in its lines. Gods Grandeur uses bright wings while The Starlight Night uses Flake-doves, and

Pied Beauty has finches wings, all perhaps to symbolize the bird watching over the Creation (Negri

195, 197). They represent a certain aspect of power. Their beauty, grace and pride remains embedded in the

readers mind. These creatures have a birds eye view of the chaos, white-noise, and the over-indulgence

of man in his own selfish habits. They can see how ugly the world actually is and where reform it required.

The falcon in The Windhover might feel strain and pressure from the tough winds, and it may buckle

under the strenuous winds. And as bold as the birds are, they cannot stand against Gods power.

The Windhover and Hopkins other poetry reflects the relationship between his form of literary

and artistic expression and the social context of the 19 th Century, by depicting a religious atmosphere

surrounding beauty and visible physical beings, seemingly disregarded by the Victorian individual. Hopkins

felt man ignored God and his work in the world. The Victorian people were also highly secluded and cut off

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from nature and other human beings during the Industrial Revolution. Hopkins felt Gods message was

sometimes lost through the ignorance and self-interest of each person in their rule-dictated society. Through

his dedication to God and his religion, he wanted to use the inscape of his words to sell readers on the

importance of nature and religion to life and a spiritual heightening. Although he felt poetry might be too

self-indulgent of a hobby or past-time, he knew that through his poetry he might be able to convince his

fellow Victorian individuals of their need for a connection with God and a relationship with nature. God

was a part of each individual and a reconnection with His Creation would help each become less self-

involved with their material culture and more in tune with the natural world.

The Windhover and Hopkins other works are similar to the Victorian poetic works of Robert

Browning. Writing in mostly dramatic monologues, Browning was also rather experimental in his rhyme

schemes and modern unconventional wording. In his poem, Fra Lippo Lippi the speaker, in a drunken

rambling, talks about trying to paint the human spirit and trying to capture Gods creation in his art, and

deciding how to best represent saints in order to best serve a religious purpose, if that may be the purpose

art must serve. Lippo was to interpret saints in art, as it was his business to paint the souls of men as it

was Gods to construct them (Negri 65). Yet Lippo painted the truth and the harsh reality he saw around

him. He painted flesh, and not what the Church wanted him to depict. The Church felt he should paint the

beauty and the wonder and the power, the shapes of things, their colours, lights and shades, changes,

surprises[all that God made] (Negri 68). The work of God is everywhere and nature is complete

(Negri 68). But the beauty of nature is not always what is true, and real and honest. Browning produced

beautiful and meaningful poetry, which was somewhat misunderstood, as Hopkins might have also been,

had he been published during his lifetime. In this particular poem, Fra Lippo Lippi, the unusual focal

character forces readers to take a deeper look into the good all individuals can have in their lifetime as well

as the need for truth and honesty in life.

Hopkins used his unique form of rhyme, word use and poem structure to reassert Gods presence

in the natural world, as well as to break poetic boundaries. Hopkins use of religion and Gods creation was

intended to create meaning and inspire the Victorian individuals to live a better life by Christs standards

and to elevate ones inner self to an enlightened state of clarity, as well as to allow Gods message to play a

meaningful role in their lives and in their society. Each of Hopkins poems mentioned makes reference to

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Christ through biblical allusions and convoluted symbolism packed with various meanings through

religious scopes. The Windhover dedicated to Christ Our Lord, is a way of communicating to God and

recognizing his importance in all aspects of the world. God is omnipresent, and His beautiful and natural

Creation must be acknowledged, observed, and respected.