Shodhganga

According to critics of the genre, "There are two possible definitions of the elegy...: one in its traditional
sense and the other in 28 its broader, unconventional sense". The word elegy is derived from the Greek
elegeia, which means lament. "In the traditional meaning, the elegy refers to an elaborately formal lyric
poem lamenting the death of a friend or public figure. It is characterised by a powerful intertwining of
emotion and rhetoric, of loss and figuration, and above all by the movement from mourning to
consolation. A few examples of the unconventional elegy as identified by critics like M. H. Abrams are,
Thomas Gray's "Elegy Written Ln a Country Churchyard", Mathew Arnold's "Memorial Verses" and
"Scholar-Gipsy", and Maria Rainer Rilke's "Duino Elegies". These elegies "may be said to occupy a
position somewhere between the traditional and the modem elegy [as] their movement is always from
praise to lament and then, to an attempt at consolation" by replacing sorrow with the hope of renewal
although the attempt is not always completely successful. It is, therefore, understood that while the
unconventional elegy still makes use of various conventions of the traditional elegy it does not always
adhere to them entirely. Such variation from the traditional conventions is seen in the choice of themes,
which these poets employ. For instance, Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" mourns the
passing away of the -forefathers into obscurity and the possible early death of the poet himself. To
elaborate on the nature of the unconventional elegy, a brief discussion of Gray's "Elegy Written in a
Country Churchyard" will be done. As mentioned earlier, this poem does not mourn the death of any
particular person. However, after critically assessing the poem, Sacks agrees that "Gray's poem is, of
course a poem of mourning [and it] 41 mourns a particular death over and above those of the obscure
villagers". It is important to understand that "particular death" here refers to the poet's vision of his own
death, "a projection that includes a local swain's account of the poet's life and burial, together with a
presentation of the epitaph written by the poet himself .^"^ The poem itself opens with the poet's
"solitary courting of prophetic vision" of a rustic landscape at dusk and progresses into a reflection of
the "rude forefathers of the hamlet" and their traditional pastoral life, away from the "ignoble strife" of
a rich materialistic society. In contemplating the passing of the age, the poet is roused with moral ideas
about "the way in which the villagers are deprived of the opportunity of greatness; and by contrast, with
the crimes inextricably involved in success as the 'thoughtless world' knows it, from which the villagers
are protected". As a result, the poet confrasts the life of the poor and the rich, their virtues and their
vices and forbids the mockery of their simple rustic lives as wealth, power and arrogance beconie
useless because in the end "The paths of glory lead but to the grave". From here the poem then turns to
a contemplation of life and death and "a preoccupation with the desire to be remembered after death, a
concern which draws together both rich and poor, making the splendid monuments and the "frail
memorial" pathetic". Lament in the poem arises from the poet's sensibilities about the loss of a way of
life, which the forefathers would not be able to experience anymore since they are "forever laid" in the
country churchyard and which the poet will not be able to see anymore because they remain in
obscurity only in the "short and simple annals of the poor". While grieving over the loss of pastoral life,
the poet finds consolation in the very obscurity that his forefathers have been left to repose. According
to Hough, a renowned critic, obscurity has its own advantages, in which "the narrow lot of the villagers
circumscribed not only potential virtues, but also potential crimes — forbade them the brutality of a
conqueror or the venality of a court poet". Hence, the poet finds consolation for the "madding crowd's
ignoble strife" ki the obscure life of the villagers. In a way this also acts.as a defence .against the
alteration to life caused by death. Sacks elaborates on this by saying that "Gray marshals a defence of
Shodhganga

obscurity at large [by] revealing it as the necessary condition of the dead. His praise seems to extend,
therefore, to those who live in such a way — obscure and silent — as to suffer the least alteration by
death. Hence, too, "they kept the noiseless tenor of their way".^*^ As to the poet's own "sense of waste
and frustration, which no longer appears as personal uiadequacy, but as part of what must inevitably
happen in all human life and all nature", ^' the reflection of 43 his personal anguish — his death and the
waste that his poetic talent will succumb to — as an inevitable natural event enables him "to bear his
own disappointments by seeing them in the wider setting of which they are a part". However, this effort
in looking for consolation in the poet's own protracted anguish is not complete since humans will still
have to resign themselves to the possibility of waste and death. The real consolation comes with a
realisation that the final solution to such uiequities and problems lay outside the realm of human
contemplation. According to Gray himself, this force is God who, alone makes the final judgement and
who can also make right all the wrong, either committed by humans or a result of natural injustice.
Subsequently, the poet wishes to be left tn peace on the lap of mother earth and in the hands of his God
as the Epitaph writes: No fiuther seek his merits to disclose. Or draw his frailties from their dread abode,
(There they alike in trembling hope repose,) The bosom of his Father and his God. ("Elegy Written in a
Country Churchyard") It is also in the epitaph that Gray's desire to be remembered is fulfilled. But the
final resolution does not rest so much in erecting a tombstone as in the script inscribed on it. This means
that for the poet language is the only guarantee of remembrance and one that can assure the 44
immortality of his identity. From the above discussion it may be reiterated that the poem, although
lacking the characteristic of a traditional elegy, is primarily elegiac in nature as it mourns the death of an
age and the poet's own sense of waste and death. The poem, however, has adapted well to the
conventions of pastoral imagery, the deliberation on grief and the movement from such grief to
consolation and remembrance, in spite of its marked departure from the traditional elegy in its
freatment of the theme.

Bostonteachwell

Gray’s “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” is one of the most

popular elegies in English Literature. An elegy is a poem of sorrow,
written on the death of someone. Thomas Gray in this poem laments
the lot of the poor villagers who lie buried in the country churchyard. It
has, therefore, a universal appeal. There is a fusion of classicism and
romanticism in this poem. As a matter of fact, the poem has the
characteristics of the Graveyard School of Poetry. The poem can rather
be called a sort of bridge between classicism and romanticism. It is a
good specimen of Pre-Romantic poetry.

Dr. Johnson remarks,

Shodhganga

“The Elegy abounds with images which find a mirror in every mind and
with sentiments to which every bosom returns an echo.”

In this remarkable elegy, we find the romantic spirit manifesting itself in

lyricism, the treatment of nature, its melancholy mood. These are the
traits of the romantic poetry. Other features of romanticism found in
the poem are love of nature and rustic life, subjectivity, humanism and
democratic spirit. Its emotional and imaginative touch is an additional
characteristic, which reminds us of the romantic poets of the
19thcentury.

It is a transitional poem which reveals a growing democratic sentiment

and romantic mood of the poet. The poet describes the evening scene.
The evening bell has rung in the Church. The cattle and farmers are
moving homeward from the pastures. Darkness is spreading fast. The
atmosphere is filled with deep silence. The poet mentions the humming
of the beetle, the tinkling sound of the bells round the necks of the
sheep and the hooting of an owl also.

There are some elm and yew trees in country churchyard. In the shade
of these trees are the graves of the dead forefathers of the villagers.
The poet says that these dead villagers will never rise to enjoy the fresh
air of the morning. They will not be able to listen to the twittering of
swallows or the crowing of the cocks in the morning. The dead villagers
will never come back to life to enjoy the simple joys of life.

These villagers used to plough their fields. They used to reap the
harvest with their sickles. They joyfully drove their cattle to the field.
The proud ambitious people should not make fun of the useful work
done by these poor villagers. They led an unknown life and enjoyed
simple pleasures. The poet remarks that nobody can escape death.
Death is a great leveler. It puts an end to those people who are proud
of their power and position. Grand monuments cannot bring the dead
back to life.
Shodhganga

The poet says that the dead villagers could have become great. But they
could not get proper opportunities. So they remained uneducated and
ignorant. Gray says that a large number of precious stones lie hidden in
the dark depths of the ocean. Their value and beauty remain unknown.
Many flowers bloom in the wilderness. Their beauty and fragrance
remain unnoticed. In the same ay, the poor villagers loved in a lonely
place. Their qualities remained undisturbed and undeveloped.

The dead villagers could not get an opportunity to win fame. The fate of
these poor villagers prevented them from becoming great orators,
heroes or martyrs. They could not bring prosperity to their country.
They could not become prominent politicians and makers of the history
of their nation. The circumstances checked the development of their
good qualities. These also prevented them from committing great
crimes they did not shed blood to rise to power. Hunger for power
never made them cruel. The simple villagers remained hones and
truthful. They lived far away from the city people who remained madly
busy in the mean pursuits of life.

Though there are no grand monuments over the graves of these poor
villagers, yet their relatives have built some simple memorials near the
graves. These memorial stones ask the passers-by to heave a sigh as a
mark of respect to the memory of the dead villagers.  Some verses from
the Bible are written on these memorial stones. These verses give some
spiritual consolation to the villagers and teach them to face death
bravely and peacefully.

The poet says that it is a natural desire in man to be remembered after

death. A dying person hopes that some near and dear one would
remember him after death. Now the poet thinks of his own death. He
will also be dead and buried one day. He hopes that some loving man
will visit the churchyard alone in a thoughtful mood.  He will come near
the grave of the poet. He will make inquiries about the poet. Then some
old villager will tell the man certain things about the poet. The old
Shodhganga

villager will ask the man to go near the grave and read the epitaph
written on the poet’s grave under the old Hawthorn tree.

Graham Hough remarks, “Gray finds the complete expression of his

private despairs and frustrations, yet the whole is perfectly and
unobtrusively placed in a wider field of reference.”

In this elegy, we find a shifting attitude from new classical poetry of the
Augustan age towards the romantic poetry of the coming age. It bears a
stamp of classicism when we examine its style and sobriety. It is also
classical in form as well as in its moral tone and earnestness. The poem
is steeped in moral touches. Path of glory leads to the grave and it is
fully applicable to all. The poem conveys the idea that one should not
feel proud of riches, power and glory as these are transitory things. The
poet hints at the futility of all human ambitions and aspirations.

The Elegy is remarkable for the simplicity of its expression. There is in it

what I.A. Richards calls, “The triumph of an exquisitely adjusted tone.”
The poem has the new classical qualities as well like allusiveness, use of
alliteration, personification and a dignified manner. It has fine and
evocative images also. The poet tries to express “what oft was thought,
but never so well-expressed.”

Oliver Elton says, “Its stateliness of measure, its perfect style and diction
and expression, all are admired by all. It speaks to every one for it
expresses to perfection what everyone feels.” In short, there is fine
fusion of classicism and romanticism in the poem.

Enotes

This "Elegy" consists of 32 stanzas. Each stanza consists of four iambic pentameter lines for which they are
called heroic quatrains. In the first three quatrains the poet has created a suitable atmosphere required for
mourning the death of near and dear ones. Gray selects evening for the time of mourning. This gives him the
advantage of suggesting both the ends of a day and the end of life. The evening also suggests the oncoming
darkness and night in nature, and grief and melancholy in human mind.
Shodhganga

The melancholic atmosphere of the evening has been intensified by a reference to the grief-stricken silence. It
is further enhanced by the sound of the curfew bell, the droning of the beetle, the occasional hooting of the owl
and the dying sound coming from the tinkling of the bells fastened round the necks of the sheep in the distant
folds. Gray very carefully creates the setting of the poem in order to set the mood of mourning the first three
stanzas. It is needless to say that the evening, the approaching night and its darkness, prevailing stillness and
the fading sounds contribute to his melancholic mood.

In the next four stanzas, the poet passes from particular to general and refers to universal laws of nature. Pride
in ancestral history, worldly power, physical beauty and wealth cannot save one from death. Death is the
leveler of the poor and the rich, the beautiful and the ugly, the powerless and the powerful. So, there is nothing
to be proud of worldly privileges. In these lines, there is a criticism of those who generally think that they are
successful in this world. The generalization also has a moral tone.

The analysis of the structure shows that the "Elegy" has wide variety of moods and tones. Though a mood of
melancholy runs throughout the poem, it is not always the same. In the beginning, a gloomy mood has been
created and it has been associated with a subjective melancholic tone by a reference to "me" in the fourth line.
But the tone soon becomes objective and pitiful as the cause of lamentation is revealed. Again the tone
changes when the tone refers to the universal laws of life and death.

The poem is a famous elegy. Usually a poet writes an elegy on the death of his dear friend. Traditionally it is
imagined that the dead person was a shepherd and his fellow shepherd, often the poet, sings sorrowfully in his
praise. An elegy gradually passes from a sad state of mind to a state of hope as the poem ends. But this elegy
is not written on the death of a single person. It is written to mourn the death of all the death villagers.

Bachelorandmaster

Gray's Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard is composed in quatrains, where the first line
rhymes with the third, and the second with the fourth. Elegiac poetry is mostly written in
abab form. The last three stanzas of the poem have been written in italic type and given the
title "The Epitaph".
Shodhganga

 
Thomas Gray (1716-1771)

The first three stanzas (lines 1 to 12) provide the scene for private and quiet meditations.
He is in search of a country churchyard at a rural scene. The scene is beautiful, but the life
is not blissful, and Gray reveals that this day also passes away as usual, as the plowman
plods wearily home. The speaker creates the melancholic scene by stating that the stillness
and peaceful environment of the churchyard is disturbed by the tinkling of the cattle who
have returned home, the drone of the beetle, and the sound of an owl from the church
tower.

In the next four stanzas (lines 13 to 28), some important images and symbols are
presented: the strength of the elms, the graves as death, and the comfort provided by the
yews shading bodies that sleep. Here the speaker reveals the simple life of the lower class
people who wakes up at the song of birds and enjoys hard work. For them the death means
the end of the simple pleasures of the life.

In the next four stanzas (lines 29 to 44), the speaker tells the upper class people who are
ambitious, have majesty, supremacy, aristocracy, and pride, not to mock at the poor people
for their simplicity. He put his idea of death so easily and convincingly that ultimately it does
not matter what splendor they attain or how decorative a gravestone they will have, they will
die just like the poor.

The lines from 45 to 76 offers the fundamental message of the poem: all the people, even
the poor are born with the equal natural capacities. If they are given suitable opportunity
and encouragement, then they too can prove themselves as better as the upper class.
Shodhganga

Full many a gem of purest ray serene, The dark unfathomed caves of ocean bear: Full
many a flower is born to blush unseen, And waste its sweetness on the desert air.

In lines 77 to 92, the speaker is touched by the shared humanity of the poor people. He
shows the beauty in the misspelled inscriptions in the tombstone, some unpolished and
consoling biblical verses and poorly decorated shapeless sculpture.

Lines 93-116 are transition to the next six stanzas where it seems that Gray is addressing
himself when he writes:  For thee, who mindful of the unhonoured dead, Dost in these lines
their artless tale relate, If chance, by lonely contemplation led, Some kindred spirit shall
inquire thy fate.

In lines 98 to 116 Gray visualizes an old farmer, who is termed as a “hoary-headed swain,”
The farmer’s story describes Gray as a man who does not fit both in the upper class and in
the lower class. He is a wanderer who rests below the tree and watches the brook. He is
like a depressed lover or a madman. He meets all the qualities that the contemporaries of
the Gray’s thought a poet should have. The farmer says he had seen the funeral of the poet
in the same churchyard where the poem is set, but he cannot read the epitaph which is at
the end of the poem.

The last three stanzas is the epitaph (lines 117 to 128) of the poem. Here, the poet declares
his grave is upon the lap of earth. He justifies his life as worthwhile as he was generous and
sincere.  He concludes his epitaph by stating the reader not to ask anything more about the
poet’s vice and virtues but leave it to God.

Gray's 'Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard' is the culmination of the literature of

melancholy as well as of the Churchyard school. With its pensive mood and love of twilight
it is in the Penseroso vein; in its meditation on death and the grave, it belongs more
properly to the school of Blair and Young. The Elegy is the best-known poem of Gray. Gray
made it exceedingly fashionable, and swarms of imitations of his churchyard poem poured
from the press. Its influence was felt immediately, not only in England, but all over Europe.
The Elegy is one of the most quoted in English. The perfect fitting of the language to the
generalities has caused some of the lines and phrases to have an almost proverbial
familiarity.
Shodhganga

The poet reflects in the village cemetery on the graves of the humble and poor in its
generalizing treatment of traditional themes and in the representative images evoking the
country scene. The verse is beautifully adapted to this generalizing manner which
consequently does not attract the charge of insincerity sometimes made against 18th
century poems of this kind.

The simple and slow-moving stanza form is here handled with great skill. The poem opens
effectively by gradually emptying the landscape of both sights and sounds as dusk
descends, and the elegiac, meditative tone is sustained throughout a variety of turns in the
thought. It is in the tradition of graveyard contemplation, but here the handling of the setting
and of the development of the meditation is done with high art. The poem moves with ease
from a contemplation of the landscape to a consideration of 'the short and simple annals of
the poor' to suggest moral ideas which arise from this consideration. The alternation
between generalized abstractions and individual examples is adroitly done, and the whole
poem gives a sense of personal emotion universalized by form. There was in fact a deeply
personal feeling behind it, and it was not all written at one time, which accounts for the
somewhat unexpected turn the poem takes as it moves to its conclusion. The poet turns to
address himself in the twenty-fourth stanza and to move the poem round until it reveals his
own epitaph, and this involves a certain break in the continuity which is never wholly
justified by the development in the tone or the structure.
Among the most powerful and finest elegies in English Literatures 'Elegy Written in a Country
Chruchyard' remains the immoral. 'Elegy written in a country churchyard’ was penned down by Thomas
Gray and was completed in around seven years. The poem was contemplated upon in the village of
Stokes Poges after the death of Gray’s school friend Richard West and hence the Gray-West persona
the obscure young man who died with his ambition unfulfilled.

The poem opens with Gray creating a mood of despondency and sets the tone of melanchonic
reflection by creating atmosphere of the churchyard by describing how after a long and tiring day
‘ploughman plods his weary way’ and ‘leaves the world to darkness and to me.’

In such an ambience, he plunges to deliberate upon the lives of modest forefathers of the hamlet
which makes him understand the irrevocable nature of death : ‘Each in his narrow cell forever laid/ the
rude forefather’s of the hamlet sleep’

It is a fact that neither any customary sounds of the morning like ‘The cock shrill clarion’ nor
housewife’s ‘evening care’ shall arose these forefathers from their ‘lowly bed’ He recognises the
simple life of those who lived colse to the soil sympathising over their fate with humanitarian
enthusiasm.
Shodhganga

The poet moves on with a tone of moralising advising the rich,high and the haughty not to mock at the
simple joys of these men or belittle their unspectacular labour for death is the greatest leveller : 'The
paths of glory lead but to the grave'.

No monuments or memorials were raised for these dead men, but what purpose do they serve? The
‘storied urn’ or ‘the animated bust’ cannot call the ‘fleeting breath'. The dead are unaffected by any
exaggerated words of flattery.

Gray now expresses another convincing idea of the caliber of these village forefathers to prove their
worth as groat administrators, musicians and orators which was suppressed owing to extreme poverty
and lack of education : ‘ chill penury repressed their noble rage/And froze the genial current of the
soul’.

However he does understand the distinct advantages of poverty and illuminates the brighter side of
oblivion. Gray highlights the fact that the simple life of these men prevented them from committing
crime and bloodshed which often accompany an individuals quest for power : 'Forbade to wade
thossugh slaughter to a throne/And shut the gates of Mercy on mankind'.

The tombstones of these men carry awkwardly executed inscriptions of their names and ages. The idea
of the natural desire of a human to be remembered after death is also discussed as a dying man largely
relies on the love qnd sympathy of someone left living behind : ‘On some fond breast the parting soul
relies/some pious drops the closing eye requires'.

The last few stanzas contain the self potrait of Gray and the technique of dramatic persona. We learn
that how the poet used to greet sunshine from the top of the hill and that at noon time he used to
stretch himself beneath a beech tree in a contemplative mood. He describes how someday he shall lie
burried in same churchyard and some kindered soul shall inquire his fate.

The poem closes with the self written epitaph of Gray who reflects himself as a ‘Melancholy’ and
scholarly person with a sympathetic and generous heart who shall with full confidence rest in 'The
bosom of his father and his God’.

Gray’s ‘Elegy’ is deservedly popular, mainly owing to its universal appeal which finds an echo in every
heart.

Take for instance take the initial idea of the poem of the irrevocability of death. The teaching stands
true for all humans and the beauty of verse is enhanced by the vivid description of day to day
happenings.

Consider again the obvious idea of death being no respects of birth or status. ‘The paths of glory lead
but to the grave’ is a line on which a thoughtful reader lingers for several minutes for it embodies an
universal truth.

A very striking idea is expressed in the following four lines which account for the moral of the elegy :
‘Full many a gem of purest ray serene/ The dark unfatham’d caves of the ocean bear/ Full many a
flower is born to blush unseen/ And waste its sweetness upon the desert air’.
Shodhganga

Thus, Dr. Johnson rightfully remarks about it : ‘(The Elegy) abounds in images which find a mirror in
every heart and sentiments to which every bosom returns an echo’.