Sonnet Analysis: Thomas Gray

I would call this post "Thomas Gray I," except Mr. Gray only ever published one sonnet: On the Death of Richard West. So, unsurprisingly, that is the sonnet I will be looking at today.

In vain to me the smiling mornings shine,
And reddening Phoebus lifts his golden fire;
The birds in vain their amorous descants join,
Or cheerful fields resume their green attire;
These ears, alas! for other notes repine,
A different object do these eyes require.
My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine;
And in my breast the imperfect joys expire.
Yet morning smiles the busy race to cheer,
And new-born pleasure brings to happier men:
The fields to all their wonted tribute bear;
To warm their little loves the birds complain.
I fruitless mourn to him that cannot hear,
And weep the more because I weep in vain.

Triumphs:
Let us begin with an absolutely beautiful line: "My lonely anguish melts no heart but mine" is a wonderful pentameter, and (as you can tell) it hits the main theme of the octave pretty much straight on. I am also a great fan of "a different object do these eyes require," even though it somewhat violates my sensibilities by inserting a "do" that is only metrically, not grammatically or logically, necessary. The reason for this is that the rest of the line flows sufficiently well, the line itself locks into the rhyme scheme extremely well, and the sentiment is well-expressed (and better, I believe, than in the previous line). The line "And in my breast the imperfect joys expire" seems weak until you realize that the hiccup in the verse where "the" has to be elided only serves to emphasize the imperfection of the imperfect joys. That realization makes it a very enjoyable line instead. The last line is also beautiful; archaic, alas, but beautiful. Also, the rhyme scheme is itself interesting; instead of choosing between the Italian and English sonnets, Gray blends them together to give us an ABABABABCDCDCD rhyme scheme, lacking the chiasmus of ABBA Italian octave but also the couplet of the English sonnet. It's an interesting system, and I'll say more about it below.

Imperfections:
I am usually somewhat reluctant to criticize earlier poets, more famous poets, more successful poets, and what must be admitted to be better poets; and Gray is all of the above, as are almost all the poets I will treat here (basically all but...myself). But here I find Gray using a lot of crutches in his verse: particularly the "do" in line six and the "alas!" in line five, which are really there to add a bit to an otherwise halting line. The line "and new-born pleasure brings to happier men" seems oddly divorced from the "morning" in the previous line that is the subject of the sentence, which is a direct result of inverting "new-born pleasure brings" from "brings new-born pleasure" - the inversion hits the meter, but it also makes pleasure seem like the subject of "brings," when it is actually its object.

Archaisms:
There are a lot of archaisms in this verse that I almost want to call imperfections. The way "in vain" is treated in the first 3 lines, moving around to suit the verse, is definitely unusual in modern English; appeals to "reddening Phoebus," while once beyond acceptable towards being almost standard, are now quite out; the "fruitless" in line thirteen is oddly placed for modern ears, primarily because it is in apposition to "I" rather than truly acting like the adverb that would seem appropriate (since I fruitlessly mourn); even "the more" in the last line is strange-sounding, although it is not fully out of the language. But most archaic are the rhymes; the rhyme scheme only works if one takes "join" rhyming with "shine," and "men" with "vain." Some of that change is vowel alteration since the poem was written; some of it is slant-rhyming verging on true rhyme; and some of it is dialect. All together it doesn't quite work anymore, even though it did when it was written.