Disability and Medicine
40 Carrion Comfort (1885/1918)
Gerard Manley Hopkins
Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889) was a nineteenth century Jesuit priest and poet. Hopkins was born into a High Church Anglican family on July 28, 1844. He was educated in literary studies, attending Highgate’s grammar school from 1854 to 1863, winning a poetry prize and a scholarship that paid for his studies at Balliol College at Oxford University from 1863 to 1867 (Everett). Religion remained a common topic of contemplation for Hopkins, and during his education, he was influenced by John Henry Newman, an ex-Anglican minister who converted to the Catholic faith. When Hopkins entered the Catholic Church in 1866, Newman administered the sacraments. Two years later, Hopkins joined the Jesuit order and after a decade in the Society of Jesus, he was ordained as a priest, which he remained until his death in 1889 (Everett).
After becoming a Jesuit, Hopkins struggled with the conflict between a Jesuit’s commitment to the “sacrifice of personal ambition” and the “self-indulgent” and “individualistic” nature of writing poetry (Everett). Upon joining the order, he destroyed his early works and refused to write poetry for several years; even so, he continued to contemplate his relationship with writing. His theological studies challenged his previous assumptions about the role of individuality in the world, and he eventually concluded that his religious convictions did not forbid his personal writing (Everett). By 1875, he was writing poetry again.
“God’s Grandeur” was written in 1877 and “Carrion Comfort” in 1885, but both remained unpublished during Hopkins’ lifetime. Almost three decades after Hopkins’ death, his friend and fellow poet Robert Bridges published his works in a 1918 anthology (Reid). This anthology lacked immediate success, and it was not “until 1930 [that] a second edition [was] issued, and thereafter Hopkins’ work was recognized as among the most original, powerful, and influential literary accomplishments of his century” (Reid).
“Carrion Comfort” is a grief poem that explores the speaker’s sadness. The speaker struggles with Despair, an anthropomorphized force looking to consume the speaker. However, the speaker resists actively indulging in his sadness, a choice synonymous with giving into Despair. As the octave continues, the speaker begins to question God about the reason for his suffering, a common biblical trope perhaps best exemplified in the character of Job. In the sestet, he shifts his questions towards himself as he begins to contemplate potential reasons for his suffering. Throughout the poem, the speaker wrestles to balance despair with hope and eventually takes comfort in the hope that he will outlive the depression of his current moment.
Inversely, “God’s Grandeur” is an admiration poem reflecting on the titular grandeur of God. In the poem, Hopkins presents God as a being who has control over and greater power than nature. Regardless, he represents God’s power through natural imagery, with an emphasis on fire, a common biblical symbol for God’s presence. At the same time, the speaker also uses fire imagery to show the harm that industrialization has inflicted on nature. Allusions to Moses at the burning bush—where God’s fiery presence consumes the plant without destroying it (Exod. 3:1-6)—contrast with the scorching effects of human industry. The speaker uses the vastness of nature to signify the smallness of man and at the end of the poem, hints towards the promise of divine creation in the face of human destruction.
- Hopkins initially viewed poetry after his conversion to be too self-indulgent and individualistic. How do the two poems portray the individual differently?
- Since Hopkins’ poems were rarely written for publication (during his lifetime), who are some potential audiences to which Hopkins may have been writing?
- Both of Hopkins’ poems included in this anthology are Petrarchan sonnets, meaning they consist of an octave and sestet with a set rhyme scheme. Traditionally, the octave poses a question or topic which is then addressed by the sestet, either through “a clarification or ‘turn’ of thought” (“Sonnet”). This “turn” is sometimes called a volta, and it is usually marked by a word or phrase that connects “the octave and the sestet” (“Volta”). Identify the volta in each poem. What is the effect of this “turn” and how does it unify each poem?
- A facsimile of Hopkins’ journals, The Later Poetic Manuscripts of Gerard Manley Hopkins in Facsimile, contains reproductions of Hopkins’ handwritten drafts of “(Carrion Comfort)” (280–283). It can be found at the Internet Archive. –E.Z. ↵
- Carrion refers to the “[d]ead putrefying flesh of a person or animal,” with the implication that only scavengers would eat this meat “unfit for food” (“Carrion, N. & Adj.” def. 2.a.). ↵
- The capitalization serves to personify despair. ↵
- To be slack means to be “loose,” with the implication that using the slack strands would cause them to be “held tightly or tensely” (“Slack, Adj. & Adv.” def. III.7.a.). ↵
- The remnants of the narrator’s humanity and traditional masculinity that despair has not overcome. ↵
- Here, the word rude functions as an adverb and applies to the verb rock found in the next line (i.e., rudely rock your foot on me). –E.Z. ↵
- To wring means to “twist” something “so as to cause ... pain” (“Wring, V.” def. I.2.a.). ↵
- The only specific mention of a right foot in the Bible is found in Revelation 10:1–6, where an angel declares the world’s destruction is coming to a close. Hopkins’ use of apocalyptic allusion lets him capture the world-wringing power of his opponent, but it also leaves room for hope in that Revelation’s apocalypse concludes with the world’s restoration. –E.Z. ↵
- A tempest is a “violent storm” (“Tempest, N.” def. 1.a.). To heap means to be “cast into a” pile (“Heap, V.” def. 1.a.). ↵
- The speaker questions why God afflicts him. These questions echo the questions of the character Job who, in the biblical book of Job, asks why God afflicts him without an apparent reason. ↵
- During a grain harvest, the grain must be beaten so that the chaff—the “thin, dry husks covering individual grains” (“Chaff, N.” def. 1.a.)—flies away, leaving the edible grain behind. Threshing is frequently used in the Bible as a metaphor for the refinement of faith (see Luke 22:31–32). –E.Z. ↵
- Grain and seeds are a biblical symbol of faith, particularly in the Gospels’ parables. See the Parable of the Sower (Matt. 13:1–23) and the Parable of the Wheat and Tares (Matt. 13:24–30) ↵
- A coil refers to an experience of “turmoil” or “confusion” (“Coil, N.(3)” def. 1). The word famously appears in the “To be or not to be” speech, where Hamlet talks of “shuffling off this mortal coil” (3.1.75). There are other potential parallels between that well-known soliloquy and this poem. –E.Z. ↵
- The word rod has multiple potential meanings. Rod can be a variant of the word rood, referring to Jesus’ cross (“Rood, N.” def. II.3.a.). Rod also refers to “a staff or stick ... carried as a symbol of office” or “as an instrument of punishment” (“Rod, N.” defs. I.1.a., I.4.a.). The rod is an image frequently found in the Bible as a symbol of God’s power and rulership (e.g., Exod. 7:17, Rev. 2:27), judgement (Job 21:9), or protection (Psalm 23:4). Regardless, kissing the rod implies worshiping God. ↵
- An allusion to Jacob’s experience spending a night wrestling with God (Gen. 32:22–32), symbolizing the internal struggle to have faith in God despite one’s earthly circumstances. ↵
- An allusion to the phrase “My God, my God, why have you forsaken me?” This phrase is the first verse of Psalm 22, and it was cried out by Jesus during his crucifixion (Matt. 27:46). ↵
