What is the tone of a prayer for my daughter

The tone is gloomy, precarious, and frightening, as well as didactic. The poem opens with a description of the speaker praying for his innocent infant daughter, Anne, lying in the middle of a storm “howling, and half hid.” The poet demonstrates his feelings through the use of symbols of weather.

What does the poet pray for in a prayer for my daughter?

The poet prays “In a Prayer for my Daughter” that his daughter will be reasonably beautiful and have a secure, innocent, and well-ordered life rooted in marriage, home, and traditional values.

What does the storm symbolize in a prayer for my daughter?

The storm is a recurrent symbol in this poem, representing the dangers of the new world the speaker’s infant daughter has been born into. The poem was written in 1919, in the aftermath of World War I. … The storm represents the threat of this new, dangerous, destructive world.

In what ways does the poem A Prayer for My Daughter reveal a father's concern for his daughter?

Yeats’s “A Prayer for My Daughter” does indeed show the concern of a father for his daughter, but in rather conventional terms. … In an atmosphere of such violent revolutionary flux, he wants his daughter to be part of that solid foundation which he’s come to believe is Ireland’s only true hope.

What does Yeats wish for his daughter?

Ans: he does not want his daughter to be too beautiful, the speaker wishes instead for her to be “chiefly learned” in “courtesy,” stating that the hearts of others can be won through “glad kindness.” He wishes his daughter to be a “flourishing hidden tree” who might be “rooted in one dear perpetual place,” someone …

What is the ideal form of beauty that the poet wishes for his daughter Prayer for My daughter?

D. The speaker in this poem has a number of wishes for his young daughter. He would like her to be beautiful, but not sufficiently beautiful “to make a stranger’s eye distraught,” nor to make the girl herself pay too much attention to her appearance.

What does intellectual hatred mean a prayer for my daughter?

He does not want her to harbor any form of “intellectual hatred,” which is, he says, “the worst.” By this, he means that he doesn’t want her to feel that, because she is intelligent, she is therefore superior to others. … An intellectual hatred is the worst, So let her think opinions are accursed.

What does the poet mean by intellectual hatred What are its various examples in the poem?

He means that thinking oneself smarter than others, holding her opinion to be the best, and arguing for it, is the worst sort of hatred, the most unbearable. He says even the most beautiful and gifted woman, born with every grace, can become–because of her “intellectual hatred”–“an old bellows full of angry wind.”

What qualities does the poet and vision for his daughter in a prayer for my daughter?

Ans. The poet wishes qualities like courtesy and natural gladness for his daughter so that she can survive with dignity and self-respect in the world of anarchic conditions. He wishes his daughter to flourish like a hidden tree in a forest.

Why is the poet so anxious for his child a prayer for my daughter?

Yeats wants his daughter to possess some qualities so that she can face the future years independently and with confidence. Yeats says: Let her be given beauty, but a more important thing is that her beauty should not be of a kind which may either make her proud of her beauty or distract a stranger’s mind and eyes.

Article first time published on

Why does the poet want his daughter to have a life of custom and ceremony in the poem A Prayer for My daughter?

The poet is worried to see the devaluation of the worldly ways. He is worried about the safety of his new born daughter and solicits for her a life of beauty, accompanied by natural kindness and heart-winning courtesy. He wants his daughter to avoid hatred.

What does Yeats pray for his daughter what kind of future would he like her to have?

Yeats suggests that kindness and generosity breed trust and affection between people. Yeats would also wish his daughter a life of stability and deep-rootedness—that is, a quiet life away from noisy thoroughfares.

What is the poem for my daughter about?

‘For My Daughter’ by Weldon Kees is an interesting poem about a speaker’s thoughts about having a daughter and considering her death. … These include images that suggest the imagined daughter’s death and how it would reveal itself in her hands and hair.

Why is W B Yeats so sad about the birth of his daughter?

W. B. Yeats is so sad about the birth of his daughter in “A Prayer for My Daughter” because he knows that there will be many obstacles in her life that she will have to face. For one thing, she will need to find a good husband who will bring her to an aristocratic house “Where all’s accustomed, ceremonious.”

What is the message of the Second Coming?

Yet for all its metaphorical complexity, “The Second Coming” actually has a relatively simple message: it basically predicts that time is up for humanity, and that civilization as we know it is about to be undone. Yeats wrote this poem right after World War I, a global catastrophe that killed millions of people.

Who is Linnet as mentioned in the poem A Prayer for My Daughter?

In stanza six of ‘A Prayer for My Daughter’, Yeats continues to talk about his hopes and expectations for his daughter. As she grew up, he wants her to be happy and content. He wants her to become “a flourishing hidden tree” and her thoughts like a “linnet” referring to its innocence and cheerfulness.

How would you sum up the poet's vision of radical innocence?

As he prays, he listens to the storm outside that seems to symbolize all the ways the world beats upon a person to take away innocence. The speaker wants his daughter to be beautiful but not too beautiful so as to turn her vain and make her lose her innocence.

What lesson does the poet teach to his daughter?

Placidity is also important to the poet, as he hopes that being calm and at peace, as opposed to being filled with hatred, will provide his daughter with protection against life’s challenges: “If there’s no hatred in a mind… / Can never tear the linnet from the leaf.”

What does the poet assert in the poem Fire and Ice?

The poem “Fire and Ice” by Robert Frost is about the hypothetical end of the world, with the speaker asserting that it will be destroyed either by fire or by ice. … The poet mentions that both fire and ice are probable ends of this world.

What kind of poem is white lies?

‘White Lies’ by Natasha Trethewey is a poetic exploration of racial identity in the American South through three lies a girl tells about being white. In ‘White Lies’, the speaker recounts childhood memories and the seemingly innocent lies she told.

You Might Also Like