Non Sum Qualis..

• A04:

  Decadent Poem: poem, perversity love of excess and egotism

  ABABC rhyme scheme

  Alexandrines throughout (where the 6th and 12th syllables are stressed)
• A03:

  Speaker engages in self-indulgence and rebellion

  Victorians at this time thought poetry should display virtousness and promote ethical and morality- NSQ subverts this

  Libertine lifestyle of the decadent era
• A01:

  Speaker laments the loss of his lover by engaging in self-gratification
• Quote 1:

  'I have been faithful to thee, Cynara! In my fashion
• A02:

  Repetition of final line throughout becomes refrain-like creates a cyclical structure for the poem, suggest his love for her is incurable

  Final line interrupts the Alexandrine

  'In my fashion' - 1st person, self-centred minor phrase patriarchal view of men engaging in adulterous behaviour as leisure

  Conceited attempt to justify his actions almost shifts the blame on Cynara (she is ultimately the cause of his pain - 'desolation')

  Exclamation connotes pain
• Quote 2:

  'Surely the kisses of her bought red mouth were sweet
• A02:

  'Bought red mouth' - female reductionism through synecdoche her mouth comes to represent her as a whole (dehumanising)

  Seduction imagery alludes to the fact that the unknown women is a prostitute

  Objectification/commodification attraction is only physical - views women as tools for his own indulgence
• A05:

  Rumens: Downson's Cynara represents the lost love who ahas become a constant obsession'

  
  

  'That Cynara is ever-present, in spite of everything is all the poem wants to say
• A03

  Historical Context:

  - Victorian England was prosperous and conservative as well as constantly and rapidly changing.

  - Over the course of the 19th century, the Industrial Revolution pushed wealth into the cities at the peril of those in the country.

  - By 1900, the year Dowson died in London, the city was crowded and dirty but also full of wealth and potential. There was a deep divide between the rich and the poor as a result.

  The turn of the century also saw Queen Victoria take the throne and this is often thought of as a turning point in history as she was an extremely influential ruler.

  - Under Queen Victoria, Britain became an empire with extreme self-belief in its own moral rightness and its role as a model Kingdom for the rest of the world.

  - Despite this, near the end of the period, there was a pining for simpler times and people grew tired of the power assigned to Britain.

  - This period was also defined by a growing political and artistic cynicism and an interest in romanticised childhood and the blissful ignorance of the infantile mind. This was especially popular among the upper classes. Dowson's poem belongs to a world of wearied longing for an idealised golden age.
• A03:

  The Decadent Movement:

  - The Decadent Movement emerged in the 1890s. It consisted of radical themes such as self-indulgence, eroticism and rebelliousness.

  - This horrified the Victorians who generally believed literature should promote ethics and morality. There was a belief that literature could be used as a mode of encouraging virtuousness, which the Decadent Movement seemed to work against.

  - Many people saw the uncoupling of art and morality as dangerous. The Decadent movement shook the Victorian establishment with its sensuality and political experimentation.

  - Perhaps the most famous figure associated with the movement was Oscar Wilde.

  - There are 3 aspects of the poem which define Dowson's poem as belonging to the Decadent movement; its perversity, its love of excess and its egotism.