oh captain my captain

What is the main idea in Oh Captain my Captain?

My Captain!”

• Metaphor: There are three extended metaphors in the poem. ...
• Personification: Whitman has used personification to give human qualities to lifeless objects. ...
• Imagery: Imagery appeals to the five senses of the readers. ...
• Apostrophe: An apostrophe is a device used to call somebody or something from afar. ...

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Why do people say Oh Captain my Captain?

Captain Lee has been a mentor to many during his time on Below Deck. Chef Rachel certainly tested the captain with her “eat my cooter ... And then people were like, ‘Oh yeah, she doesn ...

What does the ship represent in O Captain my Captain?

O Captain! my Captain! our fearful trip is done, the ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won, the port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting, For the sake of this post, let’s pretend that’s the end of Walt Whitman the poem. In what can only be described as a turbulent season, Damir Kreilach was the ship’s anchor.

What is the message in O Captain Your Captain?

My Captain!”

• Lines 1-4 O Captain! my Captain! ...
• Line 6 O the bleeding drops of red, Unlock all 274 words of this analysis of Line 6 of “O Captain! ...
• Lines 9-12 O Captain! ...
• Lines 13-18 Here Captain! ...
• Lines 19-24 The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done, From fearful trip the victor ship comes in with object won; Exult O shores, and ring ...

What does Oh Captain My Captain mean?

Walt Whitman wrote “O Captain, My Captain!” as a dedication to Abraham Lincoln. Although it seems like it is just a poem about a sea captain who dies at the end of a victorious voyage, it really refers to Lincoln 's untimely death shortly after his victory in the Civil War.

What movie do they say Oh captain my captain?

Dead Poets SocietyThe poem appears in the 1989 American film Dead Poets Society. John Keating (played by Robin Williams), an English teacher at the Welton Academy boarding school, introduces his students to the poem in their first class. Keating is later fired from the school.

Where does the phrase O Captain, My Captain come from?

"O Captain! My Captain!" is an extended metaphor poem written in 1865 by Walt Whitman, concerning the death of American president Abraham Lincoln. Walt Whitman wrote the poem after Abraham Lincoln's assassination. Repeated metaphorical reference is made to this issue throughout the verse.

Who is O Captain, My Captain addressed to?

In one sense the speaker is addressing his Captain directly, but in another respect he seems to be speaking to himself about his Captain.

What does Carpe Diem mean in Dead Poets Society?

“Carpe Diem”(Kleinbaum, 25) is an important and symbolic quote in Dead Poets Society. Carpe Diem, literally in Latin meaning to seize the day, is commonly interpreted to mean look for opportunities in life and make the most of them.

What is the ship a metaphor for in O Captain My Captain?

The Ship as the United States The captain's ship has been through tough times, having 'weather'd every rack. ' The ship is a metaphor for the United States, which has been battered with heavy loss of life and property during the Civil War. Despite the difficulties, the ship is ultimately 'anchor'd safe and sound.

Why did Whitman write O Captain My Captain?

Walt Whitman wrote “Oh Captain! My Captain!” to honor Abraham Lincoln after the President was assassinated in 1865.

Who is O Captain My Captain written about?

Walt WhitmanO Captain! My Captain! / AuthorWalter Whitman was an American poet, essayist and journalist. A humanist, he was a part of the transition between transcendentalism and realism, incorporating both views in his works. Whitman is among the most influential poets in the American canon, often called the father of free verse. Wikipedia

Background

Walt Whitman established his reputation as a poet in the late 1850s to early 1860s with the 1855 release of Leaves of Grass. Whitman intended to write a distinctly American epic and developed a free verse style inspired by the cadences of the King James Bible.

Text

O Captain! My Captain! our fearful trip is done; The ship has weather'd every rack, the prize we sought is won; The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting, While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring: But O heart! heart! heart! O the bleeding drops of red, Where on the deck my Captain lies, Fallen cold and dead. O Captain! My Captain! rise up and hear the bells; Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills; For you bouquets and ribbon'd wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding; For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning; Here captain! dear father! This arm beneath your head; It is some dream that on the deck, You've fallen cold and dead. My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still; My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will; The ship is anchor'd safe and sound, its voyage closed and done; From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won; Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells! But I, with mournful tread, Walk the deck my captain lies, Fallen cold and dead..

Publication history

Literary critic Helen Vendler thinks it likely that Whitman wrote the poem before "When Lilacs Last in the Dooryard Bloom'd", considering it a direct response to "Hush'd Be the Camps To-Day". An early draft of the poem is written in free verse. "My Captain" was first published in The Saturday Press on November 4, 1865.

Style

The poem rhymes using an AABBCDED rhyme scheme, and is designed for recitation. It is written in nine quatrains, organized in three stanzas. Each stanza has two quatrains of four seven-beat lines, followed by a four-line refrain, which changes slightly from stanza to stanza, in a tetrameter / trimeter ballad beat.

Reception

The poem was Whitman's most popular during his lifetime, and the only one to be anthologized before his death. The historian Michael C. Cohen noted that "My Captain" was "carried beyond the limited circulation of Leaves of Grass and into the popular heart"; its popularity remade "history in the form of a ballad".

Themes

Academic Stefan Schöberlein writes that—with the exception of Vendler—the poem's sentimentality has resulted in it being mostly "ignored in English speaking academia". Vendler writes that the poem utilizes elements of war journalism, such as "the bleeding drops of red" and "fallen cold and dead". The poem has imagery relating to the sea throughout.

In popular culture

The poem has frequently been invoked following the deaths of a head of state. After Franklin D. Roosevelt died in 1945, actor Charles Laughton read "O Captain! My Captain!" during a memorial radio broadcast. When John F.

Extended Metaphor

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Alliteration

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Epistrophe

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Apostrophe

Unlock all 245 words of this analysis of Apostrophe in “O Captain! My Captain!,” and get the poetic device analyses for every poem we cover.

Caesura

Unlock all 272 words of this analysis of Caesura in “O Captain! My Captain!,” and get the poetic device analyses for every poem we cover.

Anaphora

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End-Stopped Line

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To Think of Time

1 To think of time—of all that retrospection! To think of to-day, and the ages continued henceforward! Have you guess'd you yourself would not continue? Have you dreaded these earth-beetles? Have you fear'd the future would be nothing to you? Is to-day nothing? Is the beginningless past nothing? If the future is nothing, they are just as surely nothing.

This Compost

1 Something startles me where I thought I was safest, I withdraw from the still woods I loved, I will not go now on the pastures to walk, I will not strip the clothes from my body to meet my lover the sea, I will not touch my flesh to the earth as to other flesh to renew me. O how can it be that the ground itself does not sicken? How can you be alive you growths of spring? How can you furnish health you blood of herbs, roots, orchards, grain? Are they not continually putting distemper'd corpses within you? Is not every continent work'd over and over with sour dead? Where have you disposed of their carcasses? Those drunkards and gluttons of so many generations? Where have you drawn off all the foul liquid and meat? I do not see any of it upon you to-day, or perhaps I am deceiv'd, I will run a furrow with my plough, I will press my spade through the sod and turn it up underneath, I am sure I shall expose some of the foul meat. 2 Behold this compost! behold it well! Perhaps every mite has once form'd part of a sick person—yet behold! The grass of spring covers the prairies, The bean bursts noiselessly through the mould in the garden, The delicate spear of the onion pierces upward, The apple-buds cluster together on the apple-branches, The resurrection of the wheat appears with pale visage out of its graves, The tinge awakes over the willow-tree and the mulberry-tree, The he-birds carol mornings and evenings while the she-birds sit on their nests, The young of poultry break through the hatch'd eggs, The new-born of animals appear, the calf is dropt from the cow, the colt from the mare, Out of its little hill faithfully rise the potato's dark green leaves, Out of its hill rises the yellow maize-stalk, the lilacs bloom in the dooryards, The summer growth is innocent and disdainful above all those strata of sour dead. What chemistry! That the winds are really not infectious, That this is no cheat, this transparent green-wash of the sea which is so amorous after me, That it is safe to allow it to lick my naked body all over with its tongues, That it will not endanger me with the fevers that have deposited themselves in it, That all is clean forever and forever, That the cool drink from the well tastes so good, That blackberries are so flavorous and juicy, That the fruits of the apple-orchard and the orange-orchard, that melons, grapes, peaches, plums, will none of them poison me, That when I recline on the grass I do not catch any disease, Though probably every spear of grass rises out of what was once a catching disease. Now I am terrified at the Earth, it is that calm and patient, It grows such sweet things out of such corruptions, It turns harmless and stainless on its axis, with such endless successions of diseas'd corpses, It distills such exquisite winds out of such infused fetor, It renews with such unwitting looks its prodigal, annual, sumptuous crops, It gives such divine materials to men, and accepts such leavings from them at last..

O Captain! My Captain! Meaning

The title of the poem, ‘O Captain! My Captain!’ refers to Abraham Lincoln as a captain of the ship. Here, the “ship” is a symbol of the civil war fought for liberating the slaves. According to the poet, the ship is sailing nearer to the shore, meaning the war is about to end. They have achieved their coveted goal.

Structure

The poem, ‘O Captain! My Captain!’ consists of 3 stanzas in totality having 2 quatrains in each. A quatrain is a stanza consisting of four lines. Besides, this poem is an elegy. An elegy is known as a mourning poem. Apart from that, Whitman uses the free verse form while writing this poem. For this reason, the lines of the poem do not rhyme at all.

Literary Devices

Most of Walt Whitman’s poems use repetition and rhythm for rendering a spellbinding poetic beauty. He uses anaphora constantly as several verses begin with the same word/ phrase. For instance ‘When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomers’ uses ‘when’ 4 times to render a lyrical sound.

Themes

Whitman emphasizes the importance of self in the majority of his poems, ranging from ‘I Hear America Singing’ to others, he prizes the American populace to believe in themselves. More so, he even uses symbolical allusions to drive home a point. He may use inanimate objects for that end.

Similar Poetry

The following poems are similar to the themes and subject matter of Whitman’s lyric, ‘O Captain! My Captain!’.

Background

Lincoln's presidency (1861-1865) coincided with one of the most divisive times in American history. The country entered into the Civil War, encountered years of bloody fighting, saw the end of slavery in the nation, and ended the war with a lingering bitterness.

Setting and Symbolism

''O Captain! My Captain!'' utilizes a series of symbols related to sailing. There is the Captain, who is a reference to Lincoln. There are also references to the ''keel'' and ''deck,'' parts of the ship which has returned to ''port.'' The ship has ''weather'd'' a difficult voyage, a symbol for the bloody Civil War.

Themes

Loss, grief, and victory are central themes in ''O Captain! My Captain.''

Overview

Background

Text

Publication history

Style

Reception

Themes

In popular culture