23 pages • 46 minutes read
Alexander PopeA modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.
Pope uses various literary devices including rhetorical questions, alliteration, metaphor, imagery, and personification to capture Eloisa’s despair, hope, sorrow, and tender feelings toward Abelard. Rather than depicting Eloisa as a pitiful victim, he chooses to depict her as a tragic heroine. In describing Eloisa’s painful experiences, he shows her strong character and desire to overcome hardship.
Pope also shows that Eloisa is sensitive and thoughtful, as she is constantly questioning her choices and reflecting on the truth. Pope uses rhetorical questions to show this aspect of Eloisa’s character, such as when Eloisa asks, “[w]hat means this tumult in a vestal’s veins?” (Line 4) and “[w]hy feels my heart its long-forgotten heat?” (Line 6). Eloisa curses the rocks in the convent’s grottos and caverns, where she prays on her knees. Though she is a nun in the convent, Pope has Eloisa criticize the shrines and the nuns who worship them, using metaphor to compare the nuns to the lifeless statues. Eloisa states that she has not forgotten her life before the convent, and she has not become cold and passionless.
By Alexander Pope
British Literature
View Collection
Family
View Collection
Grief
View Collection
Guilt
View Collection
Medieval Literature / Middle Ages
View Collection
Memory
View Collection
Poems of Conflict
View Collection
Poetry: Family & Home
View Collection
Religion & Spirituality
View Collection
Romance
View Collection
Short Poems
View Collection
Valentine's Day Reads: The Theme of Love
View Collection