This poem is an appropriate choice for students because the
poem presents a speaker who, like students, listens to a
lecturer. From the first four lines, describe the astronomer's
lecture.
How does the speaker of the poem respond to the lecture?
Notice the grammatically ambiguous wording of ll. 3-4.
How does the grammar in those places reflect the position and
feelings of the speaker?
Why does the speaker go outside? How does what he encounters
outside contrast with the astronomer's lecture? Why does the
speaker say "mystical moist night-air"? Why does he look in
"perfect silence"?
What does this poem suggest about the powers of nature? Is
the astronomer's lecture a type of "art"? If so, what does this
poem suggest about the relationship between art and nature?
Please note the differences
between the first part and the second part of this poem in, for
example, the line length (with the numbers of syllables
in each line being 1) 9, 14, 18, 23; and 2) 14, 14,13,10) and
their respective patterns (e.g. repetition of "When" in
the first part, and the iambic pentameter in the last line of
the second part) . Think more about the effects of these
differences. How do the different patterns here support the
ideas about the differences conveyed in the poem between
astronomy and nature?
Keep the general ideas (sense)
in mind, find out more about the sound effects of this poem
(e.g. its use of assonance, alliteration and open vowels).