Echo by Christina Rosseti

Echo by Christina Rossetti

At first glance, Christina Rossetti's poem, 'Echo' may not seem Gothic, only mournful and gloomy. However, when you look deeper into what the author is trying to get across, you realize that this poem has many Gothic elements. The necromancy, death, nightmares,entrapment, and mystery all lend themselves to the creation of an eerie, haunting tone.

"Echo" as a Gothic Poem

Summary

Literary Devices

'Echo' by Christina Rossetti is a haunting lyric poem that delves deep into the narrator's innermost feelings. The entire poem is a plea to her dead lover to come back and make life sweet again once more, "Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as bright as sunlight on a stream". While the reader doesn't know exactly who this loved one is or how he died, he/she can definitely tell that the narrator is suffering from the loss, and is longing to have her love restored to her.

To try to ease the pain of her sorrow, the narrator wants to get lost in dreams about her love. She feels dead without him and desires to feel his love as she did before. The narrator knows that this wishful dreaming will only give her momentary joy, and that in the end it will cause her much more anguish. "Yet come to me in dreams, that I may live my very life again though cold in death"." The narrator desires so profusely to be reunited with her love that she is willing to deal with this pain.

Rossetti also makes the narrator seem to feel cheated that her love died. She talks about how life should have been, "Whose wakening should have been in Paradise, where souls brim-full of love abide and meet;" The narrator feels cheated out of enjoying life with her love. She should have been allowed to stay with her love forever and not have to desire anything more, but death took this chance away from her.

More Literary Devices

In the poem “Echo” by Christina Rossetti, there is grieving and longing over a loved one that has died. Many Gothic stories and poems deal with the dead and with sorrow. The elements that Rossetti uses in 'Echo' characterize this poem as being Gothic.

Nightmares/Dreaming - "O dream how sweet, too sweet, too bitter-sweet" Rossetti uses the idea of dreams to take her poem out of reality. In the poem, she is talking about how her dreaming is causing her pain, but she wants more. The way that the narrator talks about the dream makes it sound as if it were becoming a nightmare "too bittersweet". This nightmare is pleasant, but painful.

Entrapment- The narrator is being kept out of Paradise "Where thirsting longing eyes watch the slow door that opening, letting in, lets out no more." Instead of being trapped inside something, Rossetti uses this Gothic element to show that she is being trapped outside of Paradise. She wants to come in, but is kept outside.

Necromancy- The entire poem is directed to the narrator's dead loved one. She speaks to him and tells him to come back. Necromancy, or speaking to the dead, is a Gothic element that adds a supernatural feel to the poem. When the narrator talks to her dead loved one, the reader feels a little less secure, adding to the supernatural tone of the poem.

Mystery- While the reader knows that the narrator is mourning over the loss of a loved one, he/she can only assume that it is lover. It could just as easily be a friend or a child. This mystery keeps an eerie edge to the poem. Instead of knowing exactly who it is the narrator is talking to, the reader is kept guessing and being unsure. This contributes the the poem's Gothicism.

Theme

Alliteration- Rossetti uses alliteration to stress the beauty of what she is saying.

"sunlight on a stream"

"speaking silence"

Repetition- Many words and phrases are continuously used throughout the poem, such as, "come back to me", "dream" "eyes" "breath for breath" "pulse for pulse". All of these words suggest energy and meaning- repeating them emphasizes their importance and urgency even more.

Simile- Rossetti uses similes to compare the narrator's love to beautiful things commonly found, allowing the reader to better picture her love and to connect more with the narraror ("eyes as bright as sunlight on a stream")

While a person may die, the love they carried with them remains.

Imagery- "soft rounded cheeks" brings to mind an angelic image, which shows how fondly the narrator thinks of her love.

'Echo'

Christina Rossetti

In 'Echo', the narrator is feeling the passion she once felt for her loved one. Though he is dead, she stills feels his love and wants to be reunited with him. The narrator wishes to be freed from death's restraints, and to not let death affect her love.

The author of the poem 'Echo', Christina Rossetti, uses many different literary devices devices to convey her anguish and grief, but also to show the joy of her love.

One of the many literary devices she uses is rhyme. She uses an 'ababcc' rhyme scheme, which allows her poem to flow. It is important that this poem flows because the narrator's emotions are not stagnant- she is overwhelmed with new passions. Rossetti allows the reader to feel some of this passion by using the rhyme scheme to make the poem flow.

Come to me in the silence of the night;

Come in the speaking silence of a dream;

Come with soft rounded cheeks and eyes as bright

As sunlight on a stream;

Come back in tears,

O memory, hope and love of finished years.

O dream how sweet, too sweet, too bitter-sweet,

Whose wakening should have been in Paradise,

Where souls brim-full of love abide and meet;

Where thirsting longing eyes

Watch the slow door

That opening, letting in, lets out no more.

Yet come to me in dreams, that I may live

My very life again though cold in death;

Come back to me in dreams, that I may give

Pulse for pulse, breath for breath:

Speak low, lean low,

As long ago, my love, how long ago.

Vocabulary

abide: accept or act in accordance with a rule, decision, or recommendation; to live.

bitter-sweet: sweet with bitter aftertaste.

brim-full: filled with something to the point of overflowing.

The Echo

An Echo

This painting show the poet, Christina Rossetti waiting,and looking very ponderous. Many of the poems Rossetti wrote ,including 'Echo,' were thought- provoking and full of the truths of human emotion. This painting is actually entitled 'The Echo', and reflects what he narrator might be thinking about. In the poem, she is waiting for her love to come back to her in her dreams. This painting shows the depth of her love for the dead lover, and shows her deep despair at losing him.

This drawing shows a woman an man in wisps and swirls. These swirls create the dream-like feeling found in the poem. It also shows that while the dream of being reunited with her love once more was beautiful, it is fleeting, just as the wisps and clouds are. There are also hearts throughout the drawing, showing the dream-like love the poet imagines, and the Paradise "where souls brim-full of love abide and meet." While not painted specifically for this poem, it displays it beautifully.

From: preraphaelitepaintings.blogspot.com

From: patrickmurraymusic.net

Visuals for the Poem

The Prezi Template

This template shows a burst of blurry light in a surrounding darkness. This is like an echo in a hazy dream. The burst of light also symbolizes the narrator's dream. In the midst of all her sorrow and mourning, the dream and thought of her deceased loved one brings a little light into her life. Once that is over, just like the background, the darkness and pain resume.

This image describes the narrator's desire throughout the poem. She wants to be reunited with her love in Heaven, where love overflows and no one has to leave.

This image shows the Gothicism in the poem. This picture implies a connection between the living and the dead, which supports the poem. All throughout the poem, the narrator is talking to her dead love one, telling him to come back to life and back to her.