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‘Neutral Tones’ by Thomas Hardy is about a speaker’s neutral mental state after being dejected in love. The image of the “pond edged with grayish leaves” displays the speaker’s mental state.
"Neutral Tones" is a bleak and pessimistic poem that depicts the end of a love affair and the psychological aftereffects. Thomas Hardy wrote the poem in 1867, though it was not published until 1898 in the collection Wessex Poems and Other Verses.
Key learning points. Hardy uses colour imagery to create a bleak and barren emotional landscape. Hardy uses an oxymoron to convey the hostile and hopeless nature of the relationship. Hardy uses personification to suggest how he feels misled by love.
Neutral Tones. – They had fallen from an ash, and were gray. On which lost the more by our love. Like an ominous bird a-wing…. And a pond edged with grayish leaves. We stood by a pond that winter day, And the sun was white, as though chidden of God, And a few leaves lay on the starving sod; – They had fallen from….
19 sty 2019 · By describing them as ‘some words’ Hardy labels them as insignificant and meaningless. The verb ‘played’ also adds to that insignificance as it adds a childish tone and infantilises their conversations.
19 sty 2016 · ‘Neutral Tones’: a quintessential Hardy poem this, in so many ways. It’s a bleak take on love and a relationship gone sour, yet – as the title makes clear – the poem tries to depict the scene in a neutral way, describing things as they were.
Key learning points. Hardy recalls a devastating moment of separation in a romantic relationship. The desolate setting reflects the speakers despairing and hopeless emotions. The speaker's love for the subject seems to have been unrequited at the end of their relationship.
