The Darkling Thrush

What metaphors are used in The Darkling Thrush by Thomas Hardy?

Asked by
Last updated by Cat
1 Answers
Log in to answer

In stanza 2, the speaker uses metaphor to describe the barren landscape as the corpse of the nineteenth century. The now personified century is entombed in the sky ("the cloudy canopy"), and the wind is its "death lament." Lines 13-14 refer to the seeds of spring, which are now "shrunken hard and dry." The description literally depicts what happens to seeds during winter, but figuratively the speaker implies that the very processes of nature are at a standstill and that the next spring might not come. In the last two lines, the speaker compares himself with "every spirit upon earth," projecting his despondency onto the world.