ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -Elegy (which may be traced to the Greek word elegos, “song of mourning”) commonly refers to a song or poem lamenting one who is dead; the word may also refer somewhat figuratively to a nostalgic poem, or to a kind of musical composition.

Detailed explanation-2: -In classical poetry, an Elegy is a mournful, melancholic, or plaintive poem, sometimes written as a lament for the dead and other times covering sad topics such as war. Elegies to lost love are also part of the genre. Ovid wrote elegies upon his exile, which he likened to death.

Detailed explanation-3: -elegy, meditative lyric poem lamenting the death of a public personage or of a friend or loved one; by extension, any reflective lyric on the broader theme of human mortality.

Detailed explanation-4: -While both are about death, the lament seems to express sorrow, but find no solace, while the elegy also expresses sorrow, but finds some consolation. Also the lament belongs to the oral tradition, while the elegy is a lyric. These differences can be exemplified through an analysis of the poems we studied in class.

Detailed explanation-5: -The word elegy derives from the Greek élegos, “funeral lament.” It was among the first forms of the ancients, though in Greek literature it refers to a specific verse form as well as the emotions conveyed by it. Any poem using the particular meter of the elegiac couplet or elegiac distich was termed an elegy.