Textuality » 3A Interacting
DENOTATIVE ANALYSIS
Now I'm going to analyze the 2nd stanza of the epic poem "Beowulf".
In this stanza the narrator describes Beowulf and his crew's departure. Time passed and the boat was near to sail and Beowulf and the crew were ready to face a difficult voyage. The seamen were also warriors and, to combat the monster and to vindicate the king and the population of Denmark, they needed weapons. They loaded on the ship all the equipment that might be useful to fight the dragon.
Thy crew and Beowulf started their adventurous voyage and the narrator adds that they had strong - willed. The boat sailed quickly and t conclude the narrator says that they arrived at the end of the voyage just when they had programmed to arrive. When the sailors came to the end of their voyage, they anchored the ship and "they thanked God for that easy crossing on a calm sea": as you can see religion is an important aspect of Anglo - Saxon culture.
CONNOTATIVE ANALYSIS
In the first line there's the presence of the alliterative sound "ai" ("Time went by") to let the readers understand that in a short time Beowulf and his crew were ready to sail. The poet uses run - on - lines to create the speed of the ship and they adds speed to the text. He uses the alliterative sound "w", at line 23, that packs and sticks the words together to create the speed.
In the 25th line there's a simile: "she flew like a bird". The narrator uses this stylistic choice to say that the boat sailed quickly even if the sea was not too calm. This is rendered by the alliteration of "c" in the next line. The poet uses onomatopoeic words like "clash" and "thresh" at line 33 and 34 to recall the situation of the sailors' arrive. The sound of the people moved and the thresh of gear became alive.