Felicia Hemans

Poetry

"Casabianca"

• mixing ballad meter with orientalism
• story of filial devotion past death, nobility

With mast, and helm, and pennon fair,
That well had borne their part -
But the noblest thing which perish'd there
Was that young and faithful heart!

Context

• from Charles's seminar:
  • FH is representative of a type of piety that gets articulated in Anglo-American poetry
  • Elizabeth Gray, NZ scholar: second wave feminsm takes for granted that women's religious poetry participates in patriarchy: taking it away takes away the most salient position from which these women could speak