Tennyson’s poem uses an interesting device to build emotional intensity. The poem opens with rather conventional imagery. So, too, the music starts with a texture that mimics the endless crashing waves—a cascade of falling voices resolving suspensions only to create new ones: “break, break, break, …” The main narrative is then taken up by the choir in a style that is thick with suspensions that reflect the narrator’s yearning. But Tennyson’s narrator unexpectedly describes a rather more joyful scene: boys and girls at play, lads singing, stately ships…, a mood which is directly reflected in the music. Only then does the narrator reveal his loss. Even though the closing of the poem (and the music) is similar to the start, the contrast Tennyson created has heightened our emotions, and we feel the ending very differently—we have changed.
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