Author Question: In part one, how much space would be world enough for the lovers?Exactly how much time would be ... (Read 36 times)

geodog55 · **on:** Jul 20, 2018

In part one, how much space would be world enough for the lovers?Exactly how much time would be enough time?

What will be an ideal response?

Question 2

All this poet does is feed some woman a big line. Theres no time for romance, so he says, Quick, lets hit the bed before we hit the dirt. Discuss this summary. Then try making your own, more accurate one. Suggestion: The poem is divided into three parts, each beginning with an indented line. Take these parts one at a time, putting the speakers main thoughts into your own words.

What will be an ideal response?

chereeb · **Reply #1 on:** Jul 20, 2018

Answer to Question 1

To point out the approximate location of the Humber and the Ganges on a globe (or a simple circle drawn on a blackboard) can drive home the fact that when the poet says world enough, he spells out exactly what he means. A little discussion may be needed to show that in defining enough time, Marvell bounds it by events (the conversion of the Jews), numbers the years, and blocks out his piecemeal adoration. Two hundred years per breast is a delectable statistic Clearly, the lover doesnt take the notion of such slow and infinitely patient devotion seriously.

Answer to Question 2

Theres a grain of truth to this paraphrase, rude though it be. We might question, however, whether Marvells speaker is trying to hoodwink his loved one. Perhaps he only sums up the terrible truth he knows: that time lays waste to youth, that life passes before we know it. He makes no mention of romance, by the waythats the paraphrasers invention. A more nearly accurate paraphrase, taking the three divisions of the poem one by one, might go like this:
Lines 120: If we had all the room in the world and if we were immortal, then our courtship might range across the globe. My love for you could expand till it filled the whole world and I could spend centuries in praising your every feature (saving your heart for last). After all, such treatment is only what you deserve.
Lines 2132: But time runs on. Soon well be dead and gone, all my passion and all your innocence vanished.
Lines 3346: And so, while youre still young and willing, lets seize the day. Lets concentrate our pleasure into the present moment. Although we cant make the sun stand still (like Joshua in the Bible), well do the next best thing: well joyously make time fly.
Now, obviously, any such rewording of this matchless poem must seem a piddling thing. But if students will just work through Marvells argument part by part, they may grasp better the whole of it.