Thomas Gray, who is known as the morning star of English Romanticism, is now remembered chiefly for his ‘Elegy’. It is one of the most memorable of English poems. An Elegy is a poem of mourning. Usually an elegy mourns the death of a particular person. But Gray’s poem is different. It mourns the passing away of a whole generation. He tries to glorify ‘the short and simple annals of the poor’. The poem ends with a remarkable piece of self-portraiture. He sums up his own life in a few memorable lines at the end of the poem. Gray took four years to complete the poem. In fact, Gray’s poetic fame rests chiefly on this poem. That’s why Gray’s Elegy has been described as a first-rate poem by a second-rate poet.
The Elegy is remarkable for many things. It fully reveals Gray’s description of an evening in a village. The church bell announces the end of the daytime. The herd of cattle and sheep return home. The farmer returns from the field. There is silence and growing darkness everywhere. However, the silence is broken by the droning of beetles, the tinkling sounds made by the little bells hanging from the neck of cattle and sheep and the hooting of the owl. After presenting beautiful visual and auditory images of the evening, Gray plunges into the central theme. He refers to the ‘narrow cells’ in which ‘The rude forefathers of the hamlet sleep’. It is a sleep from which there is no waking up. Even the cock’s clarion cannot wake them up.
Then the poet refers to the useful work the poor used to do when they were alive. They used to plough and reap. Men of ambition may mock at the humble toil. The short and simple annuals of the poor may not impress men of grandeur. But such men must remember one thing. The paths of glory lead, but to the grave. The poor villagers have no monuments over their graves. But can urns and busts bring the dead back to life? So long as they cannot, they are useless. Here Gray points out that there might have been talented men among these dead villagers. There might have been Hamptons, Miltons and Cromwells among them. There might have been even gifted musicians among them. Poverty froze their talents. Somehow they were lucky. As they could not do great deeds, so they did not commit great crimes. So they could die with clean hearts.
Gray refers here to the common weaknesses of all men. Even the poor are not free from it. They too wish to be loved in life and remembered after death. After their death, they want at least some crude stones to mark their graves. The stones may carry just the names and dates. However, Gray’s poem ends with a self-portrait. Here he visualizes the scene of his own death. When he is dead, someone may enquire about him. He may come to know about the poet as a man who never missed a glorious sunrise from the top of the hill. Gray refers to his love of nature and his lonely wanderings. Fame and fortune had never smiled on him. Melancholy had adopted him as her son. His bounty was large, and his soul sincere. He gave to misery all that he had, his tears. God, in his recompense, sent him a true friend. And that was all he wanted in life. Gray’s self-portrait is a very honest account. They also tell us that he had only one true friend, whose name was Richard West.
The Elegy
is remarkable for its simplicity of expression.
The poet gives a perfect expression of his feelings and sentiments. It contains neo classical qualities like
allusiveness, alliteration, and personification. It also foreshadows the romantic poetry of
Burns, Wordsworth and Shelley. Thus, Elegy
makes a shift from neo-classism to romanticism.
The verse of the poem is musical and has a haunting quality. The reflections on life and death make the
poem a philosophical poem, but it is also a sort of dramatic monologue in which
the speaker has addressed imaginary readers or listeners. Different factors may be said to be responsible
for its greatness. Its universal appeal,
its humanity and broader concern with the human condition are as much contributive
to its greatness as its poetic merits. To
conclude, it may suffice to quote Douglas Bush, who sums up its greatness by
saying, “One obvious reason is the power of style which makes almost every line
an example of ‘what opt was thought but never so well expressed”.
-----Thulasidharan V