Hardy, Thomas. "Neutral Tones".
Summary
- set in a bleak and barren winter landscape with a pond, "white sun", and grey leaves
- the sterile setting = the end of the relationship by meaningless phrases, feelings of bitterness, and expressionless faces ("the smile on your mouth was the deadest thing")
- later: associates the scene of the ending relationship with a larger and more general sense of loss in his life
Analysis
- formally the speaker addresses his former lover x but: actually she is absent, the speaker so pronounces a soliloquy
- enacts the "neutrality" of the title in an overtly negative way, projects sterility both in the colourless setting and the lifeless characters
- suggests that human beings are made to life in fruitful relationships with other people, otherwise they remain both psychically and physically sterile
Basics
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Author
Hardy, Thomas. (1840 – 1928).
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Full Title
"Neutral Tones".
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Form
Poem.
Works Cited
Hardy, Thomas. "Neutral Tones". Collected Poems. Ware: Wordsworth, 2006.