Read the following poem by Ernest Dowson (1867–1900) carefully before choosing your answer.
Villanelle of Sunset
Come hither, Child! and lay your hand on mine, (1)
And let us talk of many things:
Of the white road and the dim evening line. (3)
We have no care; we need no more design;
The day is finished with the buzz of wings:
Come hither, Child! and lay your hand on mine. (6)
The shadow gathers on the darkling vine,
And through the trees a sudden whisper rings:
Of the white road and the dim evening line. (9)
A little while, and then the stars will shine,
And we shall hear the nightingales of kings:
Come hither, Child! and lay your hand on mine. (12)
Wait not, nor weep: the night is very fine,
And in the darkness some sweet singer sings:
Of the white road and the dim evening line. (15)
Now is the hour when all things must resign
Their separate lives into the night that brings:
Come hither, Child! and lay your hand on mine: (18)
Of the white road and the dim evening line. (19)
Which of the following best describes how the structural constraints of the villanelle form, specifically the repetition of the alternating refrain lines, contribute to the poem's theme?
- AThey disrupt the syntactic flow of the sentences by forcing the reader to pause at the end of each line, thereby undermining the poem's narrative coherence.
- BThey serve primarily to demonstrate the author's technical mastery of iambic pentameter and a complex aba rhyme scheme without affecting the poem's meaning.
- CThey allow the poet, Ernest Dowson, to directly express his personal grief and biographical anxiety regarding his own impending death to a literal child.
- They create a cyclical, hypnotic cadence that mirrors the natural progression from day to night, reinforcing the speaker's reassuring stance on the inevitability of change and mortality.Answer
- EThey underscore a static, unchanging mood of despair and fear that persists without variation from the opening stanza to the final quatrain.