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Essay / The Lady's Cloakroom - Poetic Structure and Symbolism of the Poem
The way Jonathan Swift structures this poem is important to the meaning the poem is trying to convey. Women deceive men by making themselves appear different in an incredibly long and vile process. The narrator tells the story of an innocent man who opens Pandora's box of women's secrets. In the sentence where the narrator says "Shall I, the queen of love, refuse, because she came from a stinking ooze?" » Using the goddess of love in reference to the Roman or Greek goddesses Venus or Aphrodite, this is one of the many ways in which the narrator mocks Strephon, the pastoral character mortified by a woman's dressing room. The same metaphor is used to mock Strephon in the opening of the poem "The Goddess of her Chamber comes out, Array'd in Lace, Brocades and Tissues". This specific metaphor details this woman, is so charming that she can be defined as a goddess by Strephon, when in fact the narrator knows that Strephon will think just the opposite. The point in the poem where Strephon is most off and the shining moment of Swift's poetic devices is finding his chamber pot. “For here she spits, and here she spits. But ah! poor Strephon's intestines turned, When he saw and smelled the napkins, Sticky, degreased and slimy. Swift uses alliteration to emphasize the diction he has chosen to describe the use of the chamber pot. Then, to relay Strephon's reaction, Swift forces the narrator to use onomatopoeia to once again make fun of "poor Strephon." Finally the last line of the quote rhymes together seen and felt which changes the rhythm of the lines by putting the assonance in the middle of the line. Once again, Swift used alliteration to complete the idea by exaggerating the smells and the complete surprise that came over Strephon. Overall, the poem's rhetorical devices and structure work to exaggerate the narrator's desire to repel Strephon. Say no to plagiarism. Get a tailor-made essay on “Why violent video games should not be banned”?Get the original essay