Abstract

Elegy written for a dead man in the first sense should be about mourning. However, Milton’s “Lycidas” sets a new pattern for the later elegies in English language, when in them what the poet concerns is always his own anxiety. Faced with his own inevitable death, the poet relentlessly seeks a strong self value through the poetic imagination to sustain his mind. In this process, how to deal with the relationship between him and the dead man is very important. This essay distinguishes three modes of their relationships. In the first mode of the relationships, the poet contends with the man he mourns, and his value is achieved through his final victory, while in the second mode, though the poet doesn’t contend with the dead man directly, still he successfully empties the poetic power of the dead man, and leads him into a realm of nothingness which the living poet’s value lies in. In the third mode, however, the dead man would turn out to be a guiding power, and the poet would achieve the poetic value through his guidance. This essay would study those relationships between the poet and the dead man in several important elegies in English language after “Lycidas”, and try to find how the poet finally achieves his self value.
 
Keyword:Elegy,  Relationship,  Achievement of Self Value

摘要

挽诗在第一层次上是关于哀悼的，然而弥尔顿的《利西达斯》为其后的英语挽诗创作确立了一种新的模式，诗人在其中首要面对的是自我的焦虑。面对他本人最终不能幸免的死亡，诗人试图在诗歌想象中寻求一种强大的自我价值来支撑自己的生命。在这一过程中，如何处理他和死者的关系变得非常重要。本文区分了三种不同的关系模式。在第一种模式中，诗人通过与死者的直接竞争最终寻获了他的价值；在第二种模式中，尽管诗人不直接与死者争斗，但他通过倾空后者的力量，得以把他引向了了一个虚无的领地，而这正是诗人本人的自我价值所在；在第三种模式中，死者相反变成了一种指引性的力量，诗人将通过他的指引获得自我价值的实现。本文将研究《利西达斯》后几首主要的英语挽诗，详细阐述上述所列的三种关系模式，以便更好的发现诗人是如何最终实现其自我价值的。

关键词:挽诗，关系，自我价值的实现

1.    Introduction
Dr. Johnson’s accusation towards John Milton’s “Lycidas”, a pastoral elegy regarded by some critics as the greatest lyrical poem in the English language, is quite famous and astonishing, especially when we take into consideration Dr. Johnson’s status as an authoritative critic. In his Life of the Poets, he condemns that “Lycidas” is involved with too many allusions and mythologies, and “where there is leisure for fiction there is little grief” . So in Dr. Johnson’s standard, Milton lacks real emotion towards the dead man, and it should have been the aim of his elegy writing. Dr. Johnson’s accusation in fact is wise and admirable, as “Lycidas” belongs to an old genre whose aim in public is obvious, as Dr. Johnson states. Nevertheless, Dr. Johnson’s mistake results from his taking for grant Milton’s poetic aim, seeing only what he habitually expects to find in contemporary elegy writings instead of seeing what Milton actually writes.