Approaches to Literature Assignment
2. Situation and Setting

I. Read the following poems carefully several times. A. Situations i. “To a Daughter Leaving Home” (p. 736) ii. “On My First Son” (p. 1096)

II. Examine one group of poems that interests you the most and answer the following questions. B. Group A iii. Who is speaking? To whom is the speaker speaking? Is there an auditor in the poem, or simply an audience outside of it? What is happening? The title of the first poem, “To a Daughter Leaving Home,” reveals some information of the setting and the situation. We can see that it might be a parent saying something or even writing a letter to his or hers daughter who is about to leave their family. In addition, according to the poet’s gender, it isn’t hard for us to assume that “a parent” is actually a mother. In this poem, it seems like the mother is speaking to her daughter, but to me, I think it’s more like a mother’s monologue, trying to express her love and blessing to her daughter, since her daughter has been “pumping, pumping / for your[her] life.”(line 18-19) As for the other poem “On My First Son,” apparently the speaker is a grieving father and in some ways, we can even tell that the speaker is not any other father who also lose their kids. The poem is autobiographical and the speaker is actually Ben Jonson himself. In the poem, lines like “Farewell, thou child of my right hand, and joy; / My sin was too much hope of thee, loved boy.” (line 1-2) and “Rest in soft peace, and, asked, say, "Here doth lie / Ben Jonson his best piece of poetry,” (line 9-10) show that the poet is speaking to his son, but that is not all. The rest of the poem is more like the poet questioning the fate and then trying to figure out some questions. Why lives should be taken away? How deep should we love?