Study Questions
Hopkins's sonnets typically shift from a personal, often sensual experience
rooted in the physical world to moral, philosophical, and theological
reflections. Discuss this movement in relation to several poems.
Trace some images of science and technology in Hopkins's poems. How did he
reconcile scientific understanding with religious belief?
Why do you think the method of "sprung rhythm" appealed to Hopkins? How does it
contribute to his poems?
How does Hopkins think and write about his religious vocation, and how does that
relate to his sense of his work as a poet? What other kinds of work or trades
appear in Hopkins's poem, and what does his attitude seem to be toward physical
labor?
Think about some of the images that recur in Hopkins's poems, and discuss why
they are appropriate to the themes that most concerned him as a poet.
Are Hopkins's poems at all political? Do they make any attempt to come to terms
with questions of history or nation? If so, where and how?
Hopkins is famous as a poet of both nature and religion. How does he combine
these two traditional poetic subjects, and to what effect?
What does Hopkins believe about the presence of God in the natural world?
Illustrate your answer with reference to two or more poems.
Does Hopkins's poetry more closely resemble Romantic or Modernist poetry?
Explain your answer.
Hopkins often said that he wanted his poetic language to be true to living
speech. In what ways do his unusual diction and his "sprung rhythm" succeed or
fail in this capacity?
