ST.
XAVIER’S COLLEGE, RANCHI
DEPARTMENT OF ENGLISH LANGUAGE AND LITERATURE (ELL)
SEMESTER III
CORE COURSE 7- INDIAN WRITING IN ENGLISH
UNIT 1- POETRY
PDF no. 4 (study material prepared by Prof. Udita Mitra)
CRITICAL ANALYSIS OF OUR CASUARINA TREE
Our Casuarina Tree, an autobiographical poem by Toru Dutt (1856- 1877), brings together love,
loss, death and memories of childhood. It reflects the poet’s nostalgia for the childhood spent with her
siblings at her native village. The siblings are dead. The casuarina tree represents the memory of her
dead siblings and the happy days spent with them. The poet wants this memory to live forever in the
form of her poetry. This poem blooms out of her intense emotional anguish. This poem also shows her
precocity (talent seen at a very early age) in creating melody and images with words. This poem exhibits
several elements of Romanticism, such as intense emotions, nostalgia, personal experience, and man’s
connection with nature.
In the poet’s childhood, there was a casuarina tree at her native residence. The poet still
remembers the tree. The tree was a huge tall one. A creeper, like a “huge Python”, twisted around the
“rugged trunk” of the tree. But the tree was as huge as a “giant” so it had no problem in bearing the
creeper’s weight. The tree looked like a “giant” wearing the creeper like a “scarf”. Birds and bees spent the
day hovering on the tree’s “boughs” (branches). All the branches were full of crimson flowers. At night, the
nightingale’s “sweet song” came from the tree and flowed all over the garden. Every morning, on opening
the window (“casement”), the poet could see the tree. There would be a baboon on its top and baby baboons
on its lower branches. Cows would walk past the tree towards the fields. Next to the tree, there was a pond
with white water- lilies in it;
And in the shadow, on the broad tank cast
By that hoar tree, so beautiful and vast, Hoar- old
The water- lilies spring, like snow enmassed.
The poet loves the tree, not because of its beauty, but for being a part of the time she spent with
her dead siblings (“sweet companions”). At present, the poet is in Europe. When she stands on the moonlit
beaches in France or Italy, she hears the waves crashing on the “shingle- beach”. The sound of the waves
feels like a sad “dirge- like murmur”. The poet imagines that the sea is communicating the sorrow expressed
by the tree. When the leaves of the tree rustle, the rustling sound expresses the tree’s sadness over the
death of her siblings. That sadness travels through the sea to reach the poet. The tree is personified as a
partner in her sorrow;
It is the tree’s lament, an eerie speech,
Shingle- small round pebbles
Dirge- song sung at funerals
That haply to the unknown land may reach. Lament- cry of sorrow
Unknown, yet well- known to the eye of faith. Eerie- strange
Haply- by chance
The world of the dead is “unknown” in the practical sense. But many people
have the “faith” that their dead loved ones are somewhere nearby. The poet hopes that the tree’s sadness
may reach her dead siblings.
The sound of the waves always reminds the poet of the casuarina tree, as a symbol of her lost
childhood (“happy prime”). Though she has lost her siblings, she wants her love and her happy
memories to live forever. So she decides to write a poem and dedicate it to the casuarina tree that
represents the memory of her beloved siblings. She refers to William Wordsworth’s poem that talks about
4 old yew trees actually found in a place called Borrowdale. Just as those “deathless trees” have become
immortalized through that poem, she wants the casuarina tree to be immortalized in her own poem;
Mayest thou be numbered when my days are done
With deathless trees—like those in Borrowdale
,
Her verse can be technically “weak”. But it has grown out of her love for her siblings. She hopes that the
purity and intensity of that love would make her poem unforgettable for the readers;
May Love defend thee from Oblivion’s curse.
The poem goes through varying emotions which in turn creates contrast in terms of tone and
imagery. The lively colorful image of the tree is born out of the poet’s happy memories of her childhood.
The image of the moonlit beaches far away along the sad sea reflects the poet’s sorrow and loneliness.
Nature imagery is very prominent. Nature is seen as a living sympathetic companion for all creatures.
The tree itself is personified as a partner in the poet’s sorrow. Literary devices like consonance (/s/ in “The
water- lilies spring, like snow enmassed”) enhance the musical quality. Miltonic inversion is also seen
where the verb goes to the end of the sentence to keep to the rhythm. For example;
Like a huge Python……
…………………………….
A creeper climbs, in whose embraces bound
No other tree could live.
Metaphors are richly layered; for example, the tree, compared to a giant, is itself a metaphor for the poet’s
memories of her childhood. The poem reflects her yearning for the days and the people that are gone
forever.
***************************************************************************************
Additional explanation:
Ah, I have heard that wail far, far away Wail- cry
……………………………………………………………. Wraith- monster
When earth lay tranced in a dreamless swoon:
Tranced- -- sleep or be enchanted
The poet travels to many places across France
Swoon- andunconscious state
Italy. She goes to faraway lands and seas,Clime-
even at climate
night under the soft moonlight. She hearsFain-
stories
happily
or
fairytales of the water- monster living in caves
Consecrate-
by dedicate
the sea. Yet, no matter what she sees, hears,
Lay- tastes
song
or experiences, she cannot stop thinking Blessed
about her sleep- death
dead siblings. She misses them terribly. Her
Aye-life
forever
is
full of misery and loneliness. ‘Fear, trembling Hope… Time the shadow’-
lines taken from Wordsworth’s poem.
Oblivion- a state of forgetting or being
forgotten
