God’s Grandeur Analysis
The poem “God’s Grandeur” by Gerard Manley Hopkins, written in 1866, takes some deep thinking skills to decode piece by piece. Hopkins follows the basic form of an Italian sonnet. An Italian sonnet has fourteen lines, eight in the first section and 6 in the last section. The poem also follows the rhyme scheme of the traditional Italian sonnet that goes ABBAABBA and then CDCDCD. What I found was easier is to not take Hopkins too seriously and to try to imagine each part as if he’s telling a story. I believe that Hopkins’ chose the best descriptive words and placed them in the best order to give us a detailed description of what he’s trying to portray to us in the poem.
The title of this poem I feel plays an important part in the story. ‘God’s Grandeur’ in other words, Gods splendor, is a dramatic title and sets the scene of the poem. The poem starts off with a claim right off the bat, “The world is charged with the grandeur of God” (1). What it sounds like he is saying is that the earth is full God’s special power, God’s vitality but the earth is ultimately temporary. The word "charged" implies a caretaker, or protector, or even guardian role. The world is responsible for taking care of this force of nature.”It will flame out, like shining from shook foil/ It gathers to a greatness, like the ooze of oil/ Crushed.”(2,3) The first four lines describe a natural world through which Gods presence runs like an electric current. The words, ‘charged’, ‘flame out’ and ‘shook foil’ all create this imagery of electricity.
The speaker states that the natural world is inseparable from God, but at the same time temporary.”Why do men then now not reck his rod?” (4) The speaker wants to know why don’t people don't take better care of the natural world. Why don’t they recognize and respect the power of God that is running through our environment? He says that people have been endlessly tromping and trudging through the world for so long...