Figurative Languages in Nathaniel Hawthorne's The Ocean

 The Ocean

Nathaniel Hawthorne

The Ocean has its silent caves,

Deep, quiet, and alone;

Though there be fury on the waves,

Beneath them there is none.

The awful spirits of the deep

Hold their communion there;

And there are those for who we weep,

The young, the bright, the fair.

Calmly the wearied seamen rest

Beneath their own blue sea.

The ocean solitudes are blest,

For there is purity.

The earth has guilt, the earth has care,

Unquiet are its graves;

But peaceful sleep is ever there,

Beneath the dark blue waves.

Figurative languages found in the poem above are:

1. Personification

The personification figurative language here are:

- 'The Ocean'. The author gave almost a conscience to it by making it the only word that is capitalized in the poem as if it's 'alive' and able to do things; have its silent caves.

- 'The awful spirits of the deep' here is described to hold their communion there, which is a personification where it means deep in the sea, there are many things happening, many creatures, almost like they have their own communion.

- 'The earth has guilt, the earth has care' is a personification that means the earth has its own good and bad side. The earth or the surface of the ocean is where humans experience their lives and emotions.

2. Metaphor

- Though there be fury on the waves,

Beneath them there is none.

The couplet above are a metaphor of beneath a chaotic surface, there is serenity and peace.

- But peaceful sleep is ever there,

Beneath the dark blue waves.

The couplet above are a metaphor of silence and peace in the deep of the sea, for those who we weep (in the previous stanza).

3. Euphemism

- Calmly the wearied seamen rest

Beneath their own blue sea.

The couplet above is an example of euphemism, where "the seamen rest beneath their own blue sea" actually means people who died in the sea.

Zahwa Ayu

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