Critical Analysis of the Noiseless Spider
Introduction
A noiseless Patient Spider is a poem that is summarized in two stanzas. The first stanza is simply about the title of the poem, “A noiseless Patient Spider” while the second stanza looks deep into the soul of the poet and the activities of the spider. It tries to create a connection between different things and compared to the way a spider builds its web. This essay is aimed at providing a critical analysis of what Whitman means when he tries to depict his own soul using the noiseless patient spider.
For a number of people, a literal noiseless patient spider is not exactly a good thing, mainly because many people find spiders to be weird creatures with scary eyes and a scary number of legs and especially because they bite and some are poisonous (Diehl, 117-132). It is for this reason that Whitman metaphorically uses a noiseless patient spider to represent an unchained soul, a soul which is lonely and hollow. He leaves the imagination of where would such a soul escape to and what does such a soul do once it escapes and drifts? Does it have a purpose for drifting unlike the spider that moves just because it has to move (Krieg 29-31).
Whitman in the first stanza, describes the spider as a creature that explores its huge, empty environment, an allusion that could probably mean that people are alone at heart (Diehl 40). People’s souls are looking everywhere in the huge world for companionship. People are always in a constant search for their soul mates. Ironically, a female spider is known to eat up their mates immediately after mating and sometimes even before (Diehl 40). This brings to a close, the spider-soul metaphor.
Other than metaphor in the poem, Imagery also strongly manifests itself strongly and beautifully. The lines used in the poem easily bring the readers into focus and gives them a clear cut image of the human soul (Krieg 35). Each and every line exhibits a celestial image and the reader can instantly create a picture in their mind without necessarily having to use more specific wordings and descriptions. The image is solidified and becomes ethereal in the mind of the reader (Diehl 100).
In the second stanza, Whitman asserts that the spider symbolizes that there is still hope for the soul to connect with other souls in the outside world as well as other worlds altogether because to him, the soul is a cosmos (Diehl 150). This is so because in this second stanza, the soul is also put in an ocean space that is infinite to make possibility for the connection with others in the afterlife (Krieg 39).
Conclusion
A number of Whitman’s poetry are an attempt to get a deeper understanding of the soul, for instance, the existence of the soul, the nature of the soul as well as the view on human lives. According to these poems, the soul is seen to be a part of the human life which supports deism, lives on, is immortal and evolves entity constantly. The poem puts heavy emphasis on the soul’s isolation and therefore seeks to make the human soul less lonely by making it crave for more connection. For this reason, it can be concluded that; just like in “A noiseless Patient Spider”, there is a poignant aspect of truth, honesty and reality which makes it an interesting poem to carry out an analysis on.
Works Cited
Diehl, Paul. “A noiseless Patient Spider”: Whitman’s Beauty –Blood and Brain.” Walt Whitman Quarterly Review 6 (1989): 117-132
Krieg, Joann P. “Whitman’s Bel Canto Spider.” Walt Whitman Quartely Review 4.4 1987: 29-31