The Seduction

The document discusses views of love and seduction presented in three poems: "To His Coy Mistress" by Andrew Marvell, "Cousin Kate" by Christina Rossetti, and "The Seduction" by Eileen McCauley. It analyzes how each poem, written in the 17th, 19th, and 20th centuries respectively, portray love and seduction. "To His Coy Mistress" uses urgency and flattery as the man tries to convince his mistress to seize the day. "Cousin Kate" also depicts a lord attempting to seduce a maid with flattery, though she seems hesitant. The document examines differences in attitudes across the eras.

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The Seduction

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Anthony Perez

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Consider the different views of love and

seduction presented in the poems you have

studied.

Seduction is the process of deliberately enticing a

person to engage in some sort of behaviour, frequently
sexual in nature. The term may have a positive or
negative connotation. Famous seducers from history
include Cleopatra, Giacomo Casanova, and the fictional
character Don Juan. Seduction is a very popular subject in
the poetic world with many Author’s we have studied
three poems in particular to his coy mistress by Andrew
Marvell, Cousin Kate by Christina Rossetti, The Seduction
by Eileen McCauley. In the three different poems we learn
about how love and seduction was viewed in Marvell’s 17th
Century; Rossetti’s late 19th century England and Modern
times.

To his Coy mistress was written by Andrew Marvell in

the late 17th century it is about the Lord of a manor
attempting to win one of the maid’s love it is written in
courtly language. A word that sums the mans point of view
very well is “Carpe Dium” meaning to seize the day the
whole poem talks about how they need to get together
before it is too late he uses a lot of flattery to achieve this.
He gives the impression that he has no time to waste by
using such sentences as “for youth passes swiftly”; the
maid is playfully hesitant and seems to be not sure
whether his love is true.

Cousin Kate was written by Christina Rossetti in the

late 19th century.

The Seduction was written by Eileen McCauley in the

th
20 century.

The poem is written in ballad form in the opening

stanza Kate is very content and seems quite happy she is
from a lower class family and she works in for the lord of a
mansion and he try’s to seduce her by with flattery and
complimenting her, he says that they need to waste no

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time and get together as quick as possible because there
time will so be over “but dallying will not do” meaning he
has no time. If they had “world enough and time” they
would spend there time on leisurely walks and passing
time together he then spends time talking about her
features “two hundred years to adore each breast , but
thirty thousand to each breast”; he comes up with
preposterous numbers showing that she deserves all the
time in the world but then changes turn and so the poet
says they must seize the day.

Even though Andrew Marvell writes “to his Coy

Mistress” in first person even though the poem is actually
about another Mans passionate love for her and expresses
his thoughts, the man is impatient and extremely
desperate, he is motivated by the thought of seducing her
rather than true love; Passion owns him which can make
people think he is immature.
The title create a mental image of one person looking
over another persons shoulder and reading the start of a
letter

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, Marvell wrote the entire poem.

that the author then reported the plea exactly as the young man expressed it. However, the author added the title,
using the third-person possessive pronoun "his" to refer to the young man. The word "coy" tells the reader that the
lady is no easy catch; the word "mistress" can mean lady, manager, caretaker, courtesan, sweetheart, and lover. It
can also serve as the female equivalent of master. In "To His Coy Mistress," the word appears to be a synonym for
lady or sweetheart. In reality, of course

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