著者

林 茂子

出版者

東京女子大学

雑誌

英米文学評論 (ISSN:04227808)

巻号頁・発行日

vol.8, no.1, pp.83-101, 1960

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Hopkins' so-called "terrible sonnets" are utterly different from his earlier pieces, especially the poems of nature, in point of tone and imagery. Instead of brightness, happiness and harmony, here are darkness, desolation, a sense of disconnectedness, and a biting agony. Hopkins' nature poems describe beautiful things of nature, and at the back of them there is a firm sense of relation with God; in the terrible sonnets that sense is totally lacking, and the poet desperately seeks for it. The tension that gives beauty to the poems of nature is a natural, exhilarating kind of tension that springs out when a creature expresses its "self" to the full in conformity with the Creator's aim; the tension we find in the terrible sonnets is a terrible, twisted, unnatural, but no less beautiful, kind of tension that arises when the sorrow and anguish of man's self separated from God is opposed by the Christian faith and the energy of recovery. The poet, who is extremely sensitive to individuation or 'selving,' now in these sonnets painfully tastes the bitter taste of his own self, and the spiritual world the poet lives in is a fearful, dark night that seems to be endless. What these sonnets so vividly present before us is the tragedy of man's absolute self that takes place when the self is cut off from God and is left by itself. He can feel nothing but his own self with the sureness of the senses, and that self is as bitter as gall with the curse which is self-existent within it. Man, cut off from God, is in itself curse and sin, and the sorrow and anguish he suffers is a scourge for it. Individuation is good when it is in relation to God, but individuation without such a relation-to be 'selved' absolutely-is a damnation. Thus compelled to face the sin, worthlessness, and helplessness of his absolute self, the poet eventually learns to give up the pursuit of self with which he has been obsessed; he knows he is powerless and that he can do nothing but rely on God. He gradually learns the virtue of patience, a virtue that requires selflessness and the firm faith to obey God. The concluding parts of the sonnets, "Patience, hard thing..." and "My own heart let me more have pity on," suggest that the poet is beginning to perceive a light, a hope that he might get out of the terrible world and recover the sense of relation with God. Now Hopkins, even when he is in the depth of desolation and agony, never doubts the existence and righteousness of God. The trouble with him is not that he does not believe in God, but that he does believe in God and cannot feel the relation with Him with all his senses. The terrible sonnets are in a sense the poet's desperate effort to seek for the confirmation of this relationship. It is because of his faith that he suffers, and it is because of his faith, too, that he recovers. The terrible sonnets of Hopkins are beyond doubt a touching experience of a Christian soul that is extraordinarily sensetive. These, however, are also appealing, considered as an experience of a modern man who acutely feels a sense of uncertainty and disconnectedness in this world and looks for certainty and a solid relationship. The terrible sonnets are more directly the poems of personal experience than other works of his, as the style indicates; they are strongly emotional, at times even sentimental and almost hysterical. Nevertheless, they are excellent, creative works of art, and we must remember that it is only after writing these sonnets that the poet could compose "That Nature is a Heraclitean Fire and of the comfort of the Resurrection," a poem of an objective, inclusive vision and an intense but calm feeling.