Thyrsis: A Monody, to Commemorate the Author's Friend, Arthur Hugh Clough

In pastoral poetry, shepherds are a symbol of the innocence and simplicity of rural life and are often juxtaposed with the complexity and corruption of life in the city (a contrast that can be found in the poem). The narrator looks back on the youthful days he and Thyrsis spent in the countryside as an ideal, uncomplicated way of living “with the shepherds and the silly sheep” (Line 45). (“Silly” in this context means innocent.) There “our shepherd’s pipes we first assayed” (Line 35). The shepherd playing his pipes is a symbol for writing poetry. The narrator is therefore stating that this was the time when both he and Thyrsis began their work as poets. When he states that “My pipe is lost” (Line 37), he means that he has lost the ability to write poems. The shepherd’s pipe is also referred to as a “reed” (Line 78) and a “flute” (Line 221).

The Scholar Gipsy symbolizes the never-ending search for truth, wisdom, and a kind of enlightenment. In their youth, the narrator and Thyrsis linked his presence to that of the elm tree. They agreed that as long as the tree existed so would the Scholar Gipsy.