Funeral Oration for a Mouse (Masterplots II: Poetry, Revised Edition)
At a glance:
- Author: Alan Dugan
- First Published: 1961
- Type of Work: Ode
- Genres: Free verse, Poetry, Ode
- Subjects: Guilt, God, Death or dying, Funeral rites or ceremonies, Life, philosophy of, Animals, Rats or mice
The Poem
“Funeral Oration for a Mouse” is a short poem in free verse, its thirty-seven lines divided into three stanzas of unequal length. The title, in comically dignifying a mere mouse with a grand “funeral oration,” prepares the reader for the poem’s leveling of human and beast. Although at first sight the orator (or the speaker of the poem) may seem lowered in stooping to such a low theme, it becomes clear from the body of the poem that the mouse, in view of its great determination and courage, is indeed the more dignified of the two.
The poem begins as a...
[The entire page is 1489 words long]
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