Love's Philosophy (1819) - Poetry - English.

Facts about the poet (Percy Bysshe Shelley)

• He was a romantic poet

• He was born into a wealthy family

• He attended Eton and Oxford but was expelled for contributing for a pamphlet about Atheism.

• He was married to Mary Shelley

• The romantic movement encouraged a focus on the natural world and human passions over rationality and logic.

Summary of the poem

• The poem is written in the first person as if Shelley is able to speak from his own experience.

• It follows the persuasive point of view of the narrator as he expresses why there should be love in everyone.

Structure of the poem

• The narrator is addressing his lover in a two part argument.

• He firstly presents love as connecting all parts if the Earth and the universe.

• He then applies the philosophy of connectivity to kisses. He believes that kissing is the only natural cause of action.

Structure and form of the poem

• Simple structure

(The poem follows a short and simplistic structure - fitting with the narrator’s belief that what he is trying to argue is simple and natural.)

• Structured argument

(Shelley uses the stanzas to develop the weight of evidence and ends with a rhetorical question to further emphasise the apparent inevitability of their relationship.)

Examples of presentation or desire for physicality

• Personification

(The narrator [personifies the “sunlight”, “moonbeams”, “earth” and the “sea” as lovers as he tries to present physical union with his lover as the next logical and natural step.)

• Pathetic fallacy

(The whole poem becomes an extended exploration of pathetic fallacy, as he attempts to convince his lover that a physical relationship is just part of the natural course of life.)

• Repetion

(Repetition of words like “mingle”, “kiss” and “clasp” highlight the poets desire for a physical relationship with his lover and the overwhelming feeling of the unity that the narrator feels he has none of in his real life relationships.)

Quotes related to religious imagery

• “Winds of Heaven“ and “law divine”

(We see love as the “sweet emotion” that mixes with the “winds of Heaven” - According to “law divine”, nothing is “single”)

• “No sister flower would be forgiven if it disdain’d its brother”.

(There are also hints of sin against the natural order of things. He tries to argue that his lour is breaking all of God’s wonders by not kissing hem in his final stab of persuasion.)

Presentation of scale and love’s influence

• Imagery

• (Shelley creates a vast sense of scale in the poem by creating an expansion of size from the fountain going into the river, the river going into the ocean, then expanding out into the Heavens.

• Through this list, he creates sense of growth as the poetic voice is trying to express the sheer scale of what he claims is love’s influence over the universe.)