First Love By John (Analysis

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In John Clare's poem 'First Love' we see love as an instant attraction and he says it was a love 'so sudden.' It also highlights the aspect of unrequited love as the relationship between the poet and the person he loves has never even started. In fact he is hardly noticed as we can see from the rhetorical question 'And when she looked 'what could I ail?'' It is only in his own mind that she even perceived his love for her. ‘She seemed to hear my silent voice And loves appeal to know’ (L19, 20) This depicts love as obsessive and selfish. A love that exists only in the mind of the lover. John Clare is writing as an adult looking back to his youthful past, to his 'First Love'. It is an innocent love toward a girl he has only just seen, yet feels instantly transfixed and ensnared by. The very first line of Clare's poem declares 'I ne'er was struck before that hour' The use of the word struck gives us an image of someone unexpectedly being hit by a spell or by one of cupids arrows, leaving him unable to resist falling in love. It is a romantic love that is inspired by a brief visual attraction rather than the love that grows as a result of long acquaintance or familiarity. This is clear from the lack of any concrete or detailed description of the object of his love, other than to say 'Her face blossomed like a sweet flower' and 'I never saw so sweet a face'. Instead, he describes in great detail the effect that this 'sudden' love had on his own being. He describes his face turning 'deadly pale' his legs 'refused to walk' his blood rushing back so that it 'took my sight away' and 'blood burnt round my heart'. From this description we see that 'love' has a very strong physical impact within his own body. This may reflect the changes that occur within a young man and how love can be confused with the first
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