Scrutinize The Presence Of Jesus Christ

Over the decades, Gerard Manley Hopkins has been a perpetual source of controversy regarding his peculiar manner of writing poetry, as well as an obvious detachment from the typical Victorian mentality. In a time of a terrible religious decay, his poetry has a highly Christian foundation. This essay aims to scrutinize the presence of Jesus Christ under different representations in one Hopkinsian poem, namely The Windhover.
First and foremost, it is of significant importance to acknowledge the influences under which Hopkins created poetry. He was the product of two Victorian doctrines merged together: scholasticism and aestheticism. Hopkins, student of the Oxford University, benefited from a formation of high quality as an intellectual. In

In the beginning of the poem, the speaker "catches" a simple event pertaining to the animal kingdom, but this life episode is raised to the level of exceptionality by means of metaphors of Christ. First, He appears as a "minion", a servant reminding us that Jesus was sent in the world to be sacrificed for the sake of mankind forgiveness and salvation. However, he is not a common servant, on the contrary, his king is God Himself; therefore Christ becomes the "kingdom of daylight's dauphin". At the same time, Hopkins uses nouns like "morning", "kingdom of daylight" and "dawn" as metaphors which, on the one hand stand for the abode of God, and on the other hand they hint at Christ being the world’s leading exponent of good, innocence and purity (prince of light). Further on, Christ appears in the shape of a "falcon", a bird of prey. This association with a powerful bird that chases and kills weaker creatures is surprising, since Christ is usually represented by an innocent lamb. However, this time, Hopkins makes use of this affiliation of images to hint at the godly superiority and control over the nature. In addition, in the Medieval Age, the falcon was considered a symbol of order, male power, the quality of being skilful and graceful

Mariani saw in the verb “buckle” the image of Christ on the cross, “in the V-shaped collapse of his out-pinned arms, when his body buckled under its own weight” . One may consider this exaggerated, however, I believe his idea goes hand in hand with the final image of Christ that can be identified in the last 3 lines of the poem. Hopkins highly codifies and stylizes the scene of Jesus’s Crucifixion. The verb “gash” is a terrible visual image of the body of Christ being wounded and then it is intensified by a second one suggestive of Christ’s “gold-vermillion” blood shedding. Despite the fact that Christ’s body is severely injured, His grandeur is not weakened, on the contrary, He becomes even more wonderful and shining. His final sacrifice is meant to reveal the world His inner glow and kindness.
In conclusion, through his use of obscure and imprecise terminology, through his particular choice of words and complicated manner of placing them in the poem, Hopkins managed to convey his belief of God’s immanency in the world. The Windhover is clearly a devotional poem in praise of Christ’s beauty, love and kindness in the world. The large variety of images of Jesus Christ that Hopkins created cause the reader to reflect on the divine core of everything in