Harlot' s house

We caught the tread of dancing feet,

We loitered down the moonlit street,

And stopped beneath the harlot's house.

Inside,above the din and fray,

We heard the loud musicians play

The "Treues Leben Herz" of Strauss.

Like strange mechanical grotesques,

Making fantastic arabesques,

The shadows raised across the blind.

We watched the ghostly dancers spin To sound of horn and violin,

Like black leaves wheeling in the wind.

Like wire-pulled automatons,

Slim silhouetted skeletons

Went sliding through the slow quadrille.

They took each other by the hand,

And danced a stately saraband; Their laughter echoed thin and shrill.

Sometimes a clockwork puppet pressed

A phantom lover to her breast,

Sometimes they seemed to try to sing.

Sometimes a horrible marionette

Came out,and smoked its cigarette

Upon the steps like a live thing.

Then,turning to my love,I said,

"The dead are dancing with the dead,

The dust is whirling with the dust."

But she - she heard the violin,

And left my side,and entered in;

Love passed into the house of lust.

Then suddenly the tune went false,

The dancers wearied of the waltz,

The shadows ceased to wheel and whirl.

And down the long and silent street,

The dawn,with silver-sandalled feet,

Crept like a frightened girl.

QUESTIONS AND TASKS

1.The metaphor may be reversible - the tenor and the vehicle can change places(e.g.eyes like stars and stars like eyes). How is it used in Wilde's poem?

2.Do you think the metaphor in the last stanza to be a good one?Does it create a concrete image or it mostly has emotional or similar connotations?

3.Define the rhyme and metre of the poem.

4.Study the lexical layers of the text(borrowings,barbarisms,etc.)

5. Describe the development of imagery.What is the climax and the message of the poem?

Coleridge's poem tells about some sinister and fantastic adventures of a sailor who has killed an albatross. This bird has been tamed by the crew who think the bird brings them luck.The character breaks the spell only after he comes to love every living creature. Now he tells his own story to a stranger.

Samuel Taylor Coleridge

The rime of the ancient mariner

All in a hot and copper sky,

The bloody Sun,at noon,

Right up above the mast did stand,

No bigger than the moon.

Day after day,day after day,

We stuck,nor breath nor motion;

As idle as a painted ship

Upon a painted ocean.

The Sun now rose upon the right: Out of the sea came he,

Still hid in mist,and on the left

Went down into the sea.

And the good south wind still blew behind,

But no sweet bird did follow,

Nor any day for food or play

Come to the mariner's hollo!

And I had done a hellish thing,

And it would work 'em woe,

For all averred,I had killed the bird

That made the breeze to blow!

...............................

The fair breeze blew,the white foam flew,

The furrow followed free;

We were the first that ever burst