王玥烁赏析The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls
2013-01-17 14:54阅读：
When I read the poem The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls, it
reminded me the English poet Alexander Pope once said “The Sound
must seem an Echo to the Sense.” That poem is truly brief but
elegant, and we can easily get the sensitivity according to the
echo of the poem. After analysis, we find that the phonetics and
the rhythm of the poem is accord with the ideological content of
the poem perfectly. When we finished reading it, many associative
thoughts come to our mind, and we are amazed by the poet’s artistic
talent.
The Tide Rises, The Tide Falls is written in 1879. It is a
poem that is full of the beauty of simplicity. The poet uses the
simple words, airy style of writing, and beautiful rhythm to draw a
harmonious picture of sea and traveler. The repetitive lines “the
tide rises, the tide falls” bring readers to the poem’s hometown,
the wide seashore in New England, with a unique rhythm. The poet
reposed his comprehension of life in the image of the tide, the sea
-sands and the traveler. The continuous tides push the time to go
forth and wipe off all the rest. From the beginning to the
end, the tides are always there, and they also bring do many things
to reader. Next let us appreciate the poem line by line.
There are three stanzas in this poem, and every stanza consists
five lines rhyming aabba, aacca, aadda. In the poem, “The
tide rises, the tide falls” is repeated for three times, and they
appear at the end of every stanza. I think they play a role in
emphasizing and connecting. There is one long vowel, [ɔ:], and
three diphthongs [ai] in this line. When we pronounce [ai], we open
our mouth lager. It seems like the tide truly rises with our voice,
and when we pronounce [ɔ:], we shrink our mouth. It seems like the
tide truly falls as well. What’ more, because the obvious
difference between the long vowel and the short vowel, the three
[ai] make the rhyme of the line is pretty gentle. We read the
“rise” with a rising intonation，and read the “fall” with a falling
tone. It is also coordinated with the rhythm of tides. So in the
sense of gentleness, a special feeling of ripples exists. In quiet,
it moves, and in move, it quiets. It adds the beauty of the rhythm
to the poem, as if we would hear the sound of the tide beating the
shore.
The plosives [ t ]、[ d ]、[ k ] in the second line
make reader hear the clear, crisp voice of the curlews. The nasal
sounds [ n ] and [ m ] , and the articulations [ l ]、[ r ]
together make readers sense the softness of the sand. The vowels
appear in the order of [ a ]、[ i ]、[ e ]、[ u ]. The different tone
of them makes reader have the feeling like they are walking hard in
the sand with one deep kick after one shallow kick. “Toward” and
“town” in the forth line form an alliteration, and “falls” “calls”
form a rhyme. It strengthens the musical nature of the poem.
When we come to the second stanza of the poem we find that in the
first line, [ s ] appears five times, and in the second line [ s ]
appears four times. It seems that a voice issued from waves
scouring the beach. The third and forth line use personification
and [ t ] , [ s ] , [ l ], [ n ],[ f ] and [ v ] to show the
softness of the waves. In the third line, the repetitive [ s ] not
only form alliteration, but also are onomatopoeia. It sounds like
neighs.
In all, the poem is in the regular rhythm, beautiful and
harmonious, smooth and soft. It is a very beautiful poem, and I
love it very much.
