English Literature

The Heritage of Words

If you notice any errors in the ppt, please let
us know.
Your constructive suggestions will be highly
acknowledged.

Tanka Raj Dahal

Department of English
Kathmandu Model College, Bagbazar, Kathmandu
 Full Fathom Five Thy Father Lies
-William Shakespeare
Genre: Poem/Song
Writer: William Shakespeare
Extracted from: The Tempest
Issues: Why death is
meaningful
Speaker: Ariel, a spirit
Full Fathom Five Thy Father Lies
-William Shakespeare
About the Writer
• An English poet, playwright and

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

actor, widely regarded as the
greatest writer in the English
language and the world's
greatest dramatist
• He is often called
England's national poet and the
"Bard of Avon
• Written 37 plays and 154
sonnets
Context of the song

• A song sung by the Spirit Ariel

in Shakespeare’s play “The

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

Tempest”.
• The Spirit sings this song to
Ferdinand, the prince of
Naples, who mistakenly thinks
that his father is drowned.
• The spirit Ariel has presented
very artful and melodious
description about the death of
Ferdinand’s father.
 The poem
Full fathom five thy father lies;
Of his bones are coral made;

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

Those are pearls that were his eyes:
Nothing of him that doth fade,
But doth suffer a sea-change
Into something rich and strange.
Sea-nymphs hourly ring his knell:
Ding-dong.
Hark! now I hear them,—ding-dong, bell.
 Paraphrasing
• The prince of Naples is worried thinking that
his father is drowned. He is very sad about the

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

meaningless death of his father.
• Ariel gives him sympathy by making the death
meaningful through his powerful and magical
description.
• He says that nothing of the dead body has
decayed or rotten wastefully.
 Paraphrasing
• Everything of the dead body is changed into
meaningful and precious objects at the

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

bottom of the sea.
• Ariel finally requests Ferdinand to listen to the
death-bell rung by the sea nymphs to
welcome his father’s beautiful and meaningful
death
 Presentation of DEATH
• Shakespeare has presented death in an unusual
manner. In the poem death has been presented
as something beautiful.

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

• In this poem death is shown as a meaningful
change. Death is not an absolute end but only a
process of transformation into another natural
object.
• The organs of the king do not fade away instead
they are changed to very strange, valuable and
long-lasting ornaments.
 Presentation of DEATH
• Man who is part of nature transforms into
another natural objects after death. The body

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

of Ferdinand’s father has been changed into
something more valuable and strange.
• His bones have changed into corals and eyes
into pearls. Even after death, he is warmly
welcomed in heaven by nymphs by ringing the
bell.
 Presentation of DEATH
• He means to say than life does not die but
changes to other forms. The poem does not

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

lament death but celebrates it.
• Death is nothing but just a medium of changing
life from one form to another. Life after death
is permanent whereas life itself is ephemeral.
 Devices used in this poem.
Alliteration:
It is the repetition of initial consonant sounds in

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

two or more neighboring words or syllables
Example: Full Fathom Five thy Father lies.
Here, the ‘F’ sound is repeated four times in the
sentence.)
Examples: But a better butter makes a batter
better.
 Devices used in this poem.
Assonance:
It is the repetition of a vowel sound in a

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

sentence.
Example: Full Fathom Five thy Father lies
 Devices used in this poem.
Onomatopoeia:
It is a way of expressing on object by imitating its
sound instead of naming the object.

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

The naming of a thing or action by a
vocal imitation of the sound associated with it.
Example: Ding-dong-bell )
I was awoken suddenly by the cock-a-doodle-do of
the resident rooster.
Ticktock, ticktock… the sound of the clock was all
that could be heard in the hospital waiting room.
 By: Tanka Raj Dahal
Art and life
 Art and life
• Art is the product of creative human activity in
which materials are shaped or selected to convey
an idea, emotion or visually interesting form.

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

• Art has close connections with life
• Art is a faithful mirror of the life
• Life creates art and art provides delight to life.
• Art is a dead life, so art and life are inseparable.
• Life is art and art is life
• Art is related to creation and life is related to
experience of happiness, sadness, laughter, tears,
joy, certainties and uncertainties. But art brings

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

success in life.
• Life is transitory. It changes in different phrases in
course of time.
• Life comes across different sweet and sour
events. Life is mixture of tears and smiles. Pain
and pleasure are the friends of life.
• life is full of emotions, feelings, ideas and
sentiments.
• Art is the creation of life. It is permanent and
immortal. Art makes life beautiful and
meaningful.
• Art makes artist immortal. An artist lives in
memory of people all the time after his death.
• Some say that art is for the sake of life where
as some say that art is only for art’s sake.
However, life is itself the source of art and art
is the source of joy. Art is life and life is art.
• Without art life seems to be meaningless and
unattractive. The different forms of art like music,
writing, singing, drawing, acting, dancing etc.

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

make our life fruitful.
• It is impossible to separate art, or the arts, from
life; they are a part and parcel of it.
• When life declines and the standards of living
deteriorate, art also declines.
• When life marks an upward swing and shows all-
round improvement, such a un swing inevitably
gets reflected in the arts.
 By: Tanka Raj Dahal
Life and Art
 Questions
Long Questions asked from this chapter :
1. How is death presented in the poem? Is it
meaningful? Give reasons

By: Tanka Raj Dahal

2. Write an essay on life and art.
Short Questions asked from this chapter :
1. What happened when the father died? Do you
think the change are good or bad?
2. Find the alliteration and assonance in the poem?
What is the effect of these in the poem?
By: Tanka Raj Dahal