Depth and Complexity of Poetry

What vocabulary is needed to define and/or describe poetry or poetic format?

How might you teach poetry to an incoming 9th grader?

Provide evidence that “Love on a Sonnet XIII” is a sonnet.

Describe how specific details within “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” creates imagery.

How does recognizing the pattern of a Sonnet help the reader understand the poem?

What pattern can you identify among: “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud,” “All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace,” “The War Against the Trees,” “Hope is the thing with feathers,” and “Much Madness is divinest Sense”?

What questions can you still ask about “All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace”?

What discrepancies do you note between “All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace” and “The War Against the Trees”?

What rules do we use to identify sonnets (both thematic and structure)?

What are the implicit rules of poetry? What are the explicit rules?

How does time period affect poetic form?

What recurring influences affect poetic theme?

Why might “The War Against the Trees” be controversial today? in Kilgore/White Oak?

Which poem might help address the controversy of “The War Against the Trees”?

Explain the issue raised in “All Looked Over by Machines of Loving Grace,” “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud,” and “The War Against the Trees”.

What pitfalls would a novice reader make about reading poetry fluently?

How many TOTAL lines would appear in Sonnets I-XIII?

What historical allusions can you find in “The War Against the Trees”?

Why are sonnets prevalent during the Victorian Age?

Are conditions right today for a resurgence of sonnets?

What are the differing arguments you can see in “The War Against the Trees”?

How would William Wordsworth view Emily Dickinson’s “Much Madness is divinest Sense”?