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A loss of self mastery


            Just like being in a dream like state, being in love can also cloud the senses of .
             Realities can become blurred and a loss of control over ones self can .
             occur. In Lady Mary Wroth's When Nights Black Mantle Could Most Darkness Prove .
             the reader is shown a character that is both dreaming and in love. In studying the .
             figurative language and form in Lady Mary Wroth's poem it becomes evident that love, .
             often powerful and overwhelming, leads to the loss of the protagonists own self mastery. .
             This can be seen by examining not only the lyrical content of the poem, but the poetic .
             schemes and metrical variations as well. These include metaphor, rhythm, rhyme, .
             alliteration, assonance and personification. .
             The dream is the central concept of this poem. However, many things provide the .
             framework for the poet's intentions. One aspect of this is the powerful use of metaphor .
             in Lady Mary Wroth's poem. For instance, in the opening stanza of the poem it reads .
             "and sleep deaths Image did my senceses hiere". (pg 25). This metaphor is comparing .
             sleep and death, which leads the reader to associate the dream to come with a dark, death .
             like image. The dream in question is obviously not a happy one, and this is established .
             quite early on by this particular metaphor. In the second stanza, the reader is shown that .
             the protagonist is beginning to fall in love as she dreams. The metaphor describing this is .
             as follows: "In sleepe, a chariot drawne by wing"d desire" (pg. 25) the comparison being .
             between desire and a mythical figure of a chariot with wings. This alluding to the fact .
             that love is entering the women's mind and soul as she is in an unconscious state; that .
             being the state of dreaming. A third example of a metaphor is in the third stanza. It is .
             here that the protagonist is struck by cupid's arrow and the line speaks of Venus Queene .
             of love "adding fire to burning hearts which she did hold above".


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