Elizabeth Barrette Browning, Essay Example

How do I love thee? This writing falls in the genre of traditional Victorian love poems. It is a fourteen line descriptive sonnet. The person in love expresses to his/her partner the magnitude of sentiments felt in the relationship. This is done in a way to confirm a feeling already shared between them. As in any love affair, saying how much and deep the love shared between two people can never be too much.

Comprehensively, the quality of affection related in this love poetry goes beyond this present life time, which is very commendable. This means that the love is unending and unconditional. Precisely, it travels from the depths of the soul into an outward definition of its nature.

Importantly, the author offers a rather vivid description of love from that personal perspective and incorporates as many literary devices in grasping and holding the reader’s attention towards an understanding of the concept of love nurtured.

The theme is quite obvious from a literary sense. Love, is communicated in octet style. From the tone through which this theme is delivered, Browning appeared to be projecting the quality of love distinct from the quantity. Within this literary interactive paradigm, powerfully the accent of this theme is forcefully blended into the poem.

The theme is carried throughout this writing by sequentially rehearsing aspects of the volume of love for emphasis. Hyperbole and exaggerations were utilized liberally to facilitate descriptions for vivid interpretations by the reading community.

However, in the excitement to express these feeling in poetry the author consciously or unconsciously leaves the reader with some measure of ambiguity. For example, ‘the ends of being’ and ‘ideal grace” leaves room for clarity (4). Does ‘ends of being’ and ‘ideal grace’ refer to the same virtue? If it does then, ideal grace’ (4) and ‘ends of being’ (4) are the same concepts communicated to create some degree of confusion in the mind of the reader.

The same can be said of, “I love thee purely’ (8) and “I love thee freely’ (7). What is the difference in the meaning of ‘purely’ (8) and ‘freely (7)?’ Purity could denote freeness and free could reference pure as well. Hence, the ambiguity in these statements. Do they mean the same? But they appear to convey similar concepts when, perhaps, they were intended to convey two distinct levels of love.

Browning, in her opening remarks encourages the reader to count how she actually loves. She mentioned six ways in this 14 line poem. From a literary perspective it is a commendable design of expressing plenty using very few dynamic phrases. Likewise, ‘I love thee’ used five times to emphasize the intensity of the sentiments held by the writer.

Conclusively, Browning does not keep a contemporary rhythmic flow. In some cases it appears haphazard.  ‘Ways’ (1) in line one does not rhyme with ‘days’ (5) until line five. Height, sight and grace (2, 3, 4,) seem unconventional.

Works cited

Browning Elizabeth. “How do I love thee?” The Norton Introduction to Literature, p 811: 2010.Print