Below is a comparative analytical paragraph. The paragraph uses literary and linguistic analytical frameworks. However there are no references to the form of the poems here - just the language. As you read it try and identify the different parts of the paragraph structure. It is slightly different from the structure I've given in an earlier post.
One word of warning with this example. It is quite a long paragraph - about 250 words. I think you should aim to write 160 - 180 words per comparative paragraph.
Both Betjeman and Plath present horses in their poetry. In Pot Pourri Betjeman is horse riding. This is a symbol of upper class life style. In his poem we can imagine him riding to the home of the woman he loves 'over your boundary now, I wash my face in a bird bath' . Although on horseback he's not really interested in the horse at all. He's interested in where the horse can take him. The poem is a love poem. The two declarative statements above are addressed to his lover. This is done using the second person personal pronoun 'your'. The noun 'boundary' is interesting. He has not used a more practical lexis like fence or wall. Instead he uses a noun that suggests a large expansive property. It may even have sexual connotations. This is very different for Plath. For her, horses are powerful and elemental creatures that embody the power of nature. In the poem Ariel Plath too is riding a horse. She writes about the horese as 'God's lioness,/ How one we grow'. Here she relates the horse to 'God' this powerful emotive pronoun creates a shocking and vivid image in the mind of the reader. The noun 'lioness' conjures ideas of empowered female, wildness, uncontrollable power and energy. And in the line 'How one we grow', the horse embodies power and energy from the natural world that she herself seeks to draw from.
Click here to read Ariel by Plath
Click here to read Pot Pourri from a Surrey Garden by John Betjeman
