Discussion: Spencer's "One Day I wrote her Name"

Amoretti LXXV: One Day I Wrote her Name

By Edmund SpenserOne day I wrote her name upon the strand,
But came the waves and washed it away:
Again I wrote it with a second hand,
But came the tide, and made my pains his prey.
"Vain man," said she, "that dost in vain assay,
A mortal thing so to immortalize;
For I myself shall like to this decay,
And eke my name be wiped out likewise."
"Not so," (quod I) "let baser things devise
To die in dust, but you shall live by fame:
My verse your vertues rare shall eternize,
And in the heavens write your glorious name:
Where whenas death shall all the world subdue,
Our love shall live, and later life renew." 

 Please be aware that in many old poems, words like "washed" (line 2) and "wiped" (line 8) have TWO SYLLABLES:   WA shed,  WI  ped.   Sometimes the poets add the accent mark to let us know that they are two syllables, but sometimes we have to figure that out for ourselves. 

HOMEWORK STUDY QUESTIONS

1. Who was Edmund Spenser? Where and where was he born? When did he die? What is

the most important literary work that he created and in honor of whom?

2. Go through the poem, line by line, paraphrasing what Spenser is saying to the woman he

loves. (He really did write the Amoretti, a collection of sonnets, for the woman in the

poem who became his wife!).

3. Look up all words that you don’t know in the poem, such as “strand,” “eke,” “assay,” and

“whenas.” Write down their meaning.

4. Be aware that two words in this poem, “washed” and “wiped,” should be read as

“wash-ed” and “wi-ped” (with two syllables, not one). This is an old-fashioned poetic

practice that has been adopted by classical writers all the way up to the twentieth century.

By pronouncing the “ed” at the end of the word, the poet gets to add an extra

syllable that is needed to the line!

5. Chart a rhyme scheme for Spencer’s sonnet. I’ll do the first four lines for you (the first

quatrain):

ABAB. You do the rest!

6. Count syllables. All lines should have ten syllables (pentameter), except for one. (See

what I said about “washed” and “wiped” in #4). Which line has 11?

7. Scan the line before the problem line to establish that all lines fall into an iambic pattern.

Break all words apart first into their separate syllables and spread them out with 2 or 3

extra spaces between. Place the u and / beneath the appropriate syllables. Once you’ve

done that, do the same for the line with 11 syllables, and scan it to reveal the problem

word. What word is gumming up the line?

8. Why does Spenser fail to choose another word that would mean the same thing or close

to the main thing as the problem word? A better choice would allow him to stay within

the 10 syllables and iambic pattern of the rest of the poem. Come up with at least one

other word that you think would substitute for the problem word! (I like doing this. I put

my wits up against Spenser, Shakespeare, and Millay all the time to show that if I can

come up with a better word, then surely those geniuses could have done so, but chose

NOT to!)

9. Let’s go through the poem now and note sounds! Let’s start with repetition:

a. Can you find a word that is repeated three times in the sonnet? (That’s A LOT).

List the word and the lines.

b. Can you find a word that is repeated twice? (I’m not thinking of the word

“wrote”). List the word. Then, tell what the word means in each place that you

find it. Its meaning shifts!

c. Can you find a third spot where a word is repeated but becomes part of a bigger

word?

10. This poem is filled with alliteration. List three examples. Choose important examples,

including one that should jump out at you. Give line numbers, too.

11. There is a notable example of consonance in this poem. The end sound, a consonant

sound, of one word is repeated in the middle of another word later on in the same line.

Can you find it?

12. There are several examples of internal rhyme in this poem. I’ll give you the first word of

one of the internal rhymes: “Again” in line 3. Can you find other words that rhyme with

“again”? (Keep in mind that in old poems, “again” is pronounced, “A GAIN,” and really

stresses the long A. List other words that rhyme with “again” and their line numbers.

Bonus: Can you find two other internal rhymes in the poem?

13. Assonance: This poem is CHOCK FULL of words that have the long A sound. I’ll start

you off, then I want you to find and list all other words that have the same long A sound:

“day” and “name.” Keep in mind that words with the long A sound do not have to be in

the same line of poetry! As long as the words are within 4 lines of “day” and “name,” the

long A is creating a pattern of sound!

14. Does this poem have a volta? If so, where is it? Is it in line 9, the start of the third

quatrain, where it should be?

15. Does the poem end in a couplet? It should. If so, what is the couplet saying? (The

couplet is usually boiling down the whole purpose of the sonnet, like a thesis!)

16. Look at that rhyme scheme that you charted. If you did it right, you should notice that

the rhyme scheme is mirroring the message of the poem. What does the rhyme scheme

look like it is doing? In other words, how does the rhyme scheme of this poem mirror or

imitate the message of the poem? (Read the poem out loud one more time. This is the

coolest question that I’m asking).