The Seduction

Consider the different views of love and seduction presented in the poems you have studied. Seduction is the process of deliberately enticing a person to engage in some sort of behaviour, frequently sexual in nature. The term may have a positive or negative connotation. Famous seducers from history include Cleopatra, Giacomo Casanova, and the fictional character Don Juan. Seduction is a very popular subject in the poetic world with many Author’s we have studied three poems in particular to his coy mistress by Andrew Marvell, Cousin Kate by Christina Rossetti, The Seduction by Eileen McCauley. In the three different poems we learn about how love and seduction was viewed in Marvell’s 17th Century; Rossetti’s late 19th century England and Modern times. To his Coy mistress was written by Andrew Marvell in the late 17th century it is about the Lord of a manor attempting to win one of the maid’s love it is written in courtly language. A word that sums the mans point of view very well is “Carpe Dium” meaning to seize the day the whole poem talks about how they need to get together before it is too late he uses a lot of flattery to achieve this. He gives the impression that he has no time to waste by using such sentences as “for youth passes swiftly”; the maid is playfully hesitant and seems to be not sure whether his love is true. Cousin Kate was written by Christina Rossetti in the late 19th century. The Seduction was written by Eileen McCauley in the 20 century. th

The poem is written in ballad form in the opening stanza Kate is very content and seems quite happy she is from a lower class family and she works in for the lord of a mansion and he try’s to seduce her by with flattery and complimenting her, he says that they need to waste no Anthony Perez

time and get together as quick as possible because there time will so be over “but dallying will not do” meaning he has no time. If they had “world enough and time” they would spend there time on leisurely walks and passing time together he then spends time talking about her features “two hundred years to adore each breast , but thirty thousand to each breast”; he comes up with preposterous numbers showing that she deserves all the time in the world but then changes turn and so the poet says they must seize the day. Even though Andrew Marvell writes “to his Coy Mistress” in first person even though the poem is actually about another Mans passionate love for her and expresses his thoughts, the man is impatient and extremely desperate, he is motivated by the thought of seducing her rather than true love; Passion owns him which can make people think he is immature. The title create a mental image of one person looking over another persons shoulder and reading the start of a letter

Anthony Perez

Anthony Perez

, Marvell wrote the entire poem. that the author then reported the plea exactly as the young man expressed it. However, the author added the title, using the third-person possessive pronoun "his" to refer to the young man. The word "coy" tells the reader that the lady is no easy catch; the word "mistress" can mean lady, manager, caretaker, courtesan, sweetheart, and lover. It can also serve as the female equivalent of master. In "To His Coy Mistress," the word appears to be a synonym for lady or sweetheart. In reality, of course

Anthony Perez