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On Finding a Small Fly Crushed in a Book

that in mind, it would be wise for people to reflect on what kind
POEM TEXT of legacy they’ll leave behind them. Since death is inevitable and
can come at any moment, this poem suggests, people should
1 Some hand, that never meant to do thee hurt, think hard about whether their lives will leave a beautiful mark
on the world.
2 Has crushed thee here between these pages pent;
3 But thou hast left thine own fair monument, The fly the speaker finds crushed in a book reminds them that
death comes to every living thing—and that it often comes
4 Thy wings gleam out and tell me what thou wert:
without warning. Addressing the fly, the speaker observes that
5 Oh! that the memories, which survive us here,
it died completely by accident, squashed by a person “that
6 Were half as lovely as these wings of thine! never meant to do thee hurt.” Just so, the speaker reflects, does
7 Pure relics of a blameless life, that shine death arbitrarily come to human beings: though people might
8 Now thou art gone. Our doom is ever near: feel as if they’re more important than flies and more in control
9 The peril is beside us day by day; of what happens to them, that’s only an illusion. The “book” of
10 The book will close upon us, it may be, life could “close upon us” at any moment, for no reason at all.
11 Just as we lift ourselves to soar away In fact, not only are people just as subject to sudden death as
12 Upon the summer-airs. But, unlike thee, bugs, they might have less to show for their lives than this fly
13 The closing book may stop our vital breath, does! The fly’s wings, the speaker approvingly notes, “gleam
14 Yet leave no lustre on our page of death. out” even after its death, a shining “monument” to its innocent,
“blameless” little life. People, on the other hand, often die and
“leave no lustre on our page of death”: in other words, they die
without leaving a single good “memor[y]” or worthy deed
SUMMARY behind them. (Perhaps, the poem implies, they even leave a
nasty blot instead.)
Someone who didn't mean you any harm, little bug, has In this tale of a squashed fly, then, there’s an implied lesson:
squashed you in this book, leaving you trapped eternally people should remember their own mortality, stay humble, and
between these pages. But you've made your own beautiful think about whether they’ll leave anything good and beautiful
memorial: your shining wings speak of the bug you once were. behind them when they go.
Oh, if only the memories we human beings leave behind were
even close to as beautiful as your pressed wings! Those wings
Where this theme appears in the poem:
gleam like a saint's sacred relics, showing that you were
innocent of any wrongdoing, still shining now that you're dead. • Lines 1-14
Everyone is always close to death; it's near us all the time. It's
possible that the metaphorical book of life will slam shut on us
at just the moment when we think we're about to fly off into the LINE-BY
LINE-BY-LINE
-LINE ANAL
ANALYSIS
YSIS
lovely summery air. But we're not like you, little bug: when
death's book closes on us, it might well kill us without our LINES 1-4
leaving anything beautiful behind.
Some hand, that never meant to do thee hurt,
Has crushed thee here between these pages pent;
THEMES But thou hast left thine own fair monument,
Thy wings gleam out and tell me what thou wert:
The speaker begins this sonnet with a tender address to a fly
DEATH AND LEGACY
squashed between the pages of a book. In bothering to speak to
Death, this poem reflects, comes to everyone—and a dead bug so respectfully, this speaker comes across as very
there’s no telling when or where. When the poem’s thoughtful and gentle. They observe that whatever "hand"
speaker opens a book and finds a fly pressed flat inside, they crushed the fly here, it "never meant to do thee hurt": this fly's
observe that all human lives are just as fragile as this poor little death was a mistake, not malice. (Of course, if the book belongs
bug’s: no one can predict when the metaphorical book of life to the speaker, perhaps the speaker is exonerating their own
will slam shut on them and they’ll meet their own "doom." With "hand" here.)

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Take a look at the way the speaker structures these lines: The sonnet
sonnet's second quatr
quatrain
ain begins with a sigh, a simile
simile, and a
surprising change in the rh
rhyme
yme scheme
scheme:
Some hand, || that never meant to do thee hurt,
Has crushed thee here between these pages pent; • Judging by the ABBA rhyme scheme of the first four
lines (hurt / pent / monument / wert), readers might
The highlighted caesur
caesuraa in the first line interrupts the action have expected this poem to be a typical Petrarchan
before it even begins: the speaker has to make it clear to sonnet, whose first two quatrains always rhyme
everyone involved that what happened here was not malicious ABBA ABBA.
before even saying what actually, well, happened. • But this quatrain uses a whole new set of rhymes: it
will run CDDC (here / thine / shine / near).
Accidents, the poem thus hastens to assure the reader,
sometimes happen; flies are squashed through no fault of their
Keep an eye out for even more experimentation with rhyme as
own, and by people who never meant to do any harm. This is
the poem goes on; this speaker will keep the sonnet form on its
just life's way. But there's some consolation in this fly's death,
toes.
too. Take a look at the speaker's metaphor here:
Returning to the action: the sight of the fly's squashed wings
But thou hast left thine own fair monument, seems to have given this speaker grander thoughts. Take a look
Th
Thyy wings gleam out and tell me what thou wert: at this simile:

The fly's pressed wings, in other words, are perfectly preserved Oh! that the memories
memories, which survive us here,
on the page—and thus form the fly's own "fair monument," its Were half as lo
lovvely as these wings of thine
thine!
beautiful tomb.
The speaker, in other words, laments that people who die rarely
Readers who, like the speaker, have found a fly pressed in a
leave behind any "memories" half so beautiful as this fly's
book, will be able to imagine this moment clearly. Flies' wings
"gleam[ing]" wings. And the speaker doesn't just mean that
do often look fresh, lively, "gleam[ing]," and rather beautiful flat
people don't build fabulous tombs for themselves (as they
on a page, even when that fly has been gone for a long time.
certainly sometimes dodo). There's a moral question here. To the
And they do speak of what the fly was: its fly-ness is plain to see
speaker, the fly's wings seem to be:
in those preserved wings.
But the speaker's comparison of these wings to a "monument" Pure relics of a blameless life
life, that shine
suggests that there might be more to see in these wings than Now thou art gone. [...]
just a pretty, poignant reminder of a little life. As this poem goes
on, the speaker will treat this fly and its wings as a metaphor for The fly's wings here are metaphorically transformed into
people and what they leave behind them when they die. "relics," like the holy bones of a saint. And like a saint, this fly has
These opening lines follow an ABBA rh rhyme
yme scheme (line 1 lived a "blameless," innocent life.
rhymes with line 4, while line 2 rhymes with line 3). This is the The implication here is that the fly's preserved wings tell the
standard pattern for the first quatr
quatrain
ain of a Petrarchan sonnet speaker what it was ("what thou wert") in a moral way, not just
(though the poet won't stick to this form exactly throughout.) an entomological one! The beauty of these wings, to the
They're also written using iambic pentameter, a meter with five speaker, is like the beautiful memory of a life well-lived.
iambs (poetic units that follow an unstressed-stressed
stressed syllable
But very few people, the speaker laments, leave these kinds of
pattern) in a row:
memories behind. And perhaps that's because so few people
are "blameless." The mark people leave on the world, the
Some hand
hand, | that ne
ne- | ver meant | to do | thee hurt
hurt,
speaker implies, is much more likely to be an ugly blot of bad
feeling than a gleaming "monument" to their characters.
It's possible to read that opening foot as a spondee (two
stressed beats in a row, "Some
Some hand
hand"), but, for the most part, LINES 8-12
the meter is steady.
Our doom is ever near:
LINES 5-8 The peril is beside us day by day;
The book will close upon us, it may be,
Oh! that the memories, which survive us here,
Just as we lift ourselves to soar away
Were half as lovely as these wings of thine!
Upon the summer-airs.
Pure relics of a blameless life, that shine
Now thou art gone. Reflecting on the squashed fly seems to have put the speaker in
a thoughtful mood. Take a look at the transition that happens at

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the caesur
caesuraa in line 8: pattern of an English (a.k.a. Shakespearean) sonnet:
EFEF (day / be / away / thee).
Now thou art gone. || Our doom is ever near: • And looking ahead, the poem will also close in the
English style, with a rhymed couplet
couplet, GG (breath /
From sadly sighing that few people leave any "memories" death).
behind them so beautiful as the fly's preserved wings, the
speaker abruptly turns to the idea that death is always hovering This unexpected change in the form reflects precisely the
nearby. unpredictability the poem describes.
Perhaps, in other words, people are quite like this fly in ways LINES 12-14
they might not find comfortable to think about: they, too, might
But, unlike thee,
be squashed without warning at any moment, and through no
The closing book may stop our vital breath,
fault of their own. Listen to how the speaker uses par
parallelism
allelism to
Yet leave no lustre on our page of death.
hammer this idea home:
The speaker has thoroughly explored how people are like flies:
[...] Our doom is ever near: they're fragile, mortal, and always close to death, even when
The peril is beside us day by day; they don't know it. (And Turner is far from the only poet to
The book will close upon us, [...] symbolically link flies and death in these ways.) In these last
lines, with another strong caesur
caesuraa, he turns to the ways in
The repeated sentence structure here shows that the speaker which people aren't like flies:
is also repeating variations on the same idea over and over,
culminating in the pungent metaphor of the closing book—a [...] the summer-airs. || But, unlike thee,
book that has become the Book of Life itself, slamming shut to The closing book may stop our vital breath,
bring an end to everyone's "day[s]." (And notice the diacope of Yet leave no lustre on our page of death.
"da
dayy by da
dayy," too, which reminds readers that every day of life is
a day closer to death.) In other words: just about every fly that gets squished in a book
leaves behind the beautiful "monument" of its wings. But people
What's more, that "book" might bang down on our heads just
who get squished by the Book of Life often "leave no lustre"
when we least expect it, the speaker continues:
behind them: that is, they've done nothing beautiful or worth
remembering, and the "memories" they leave, if any, might be
The book will close upon us, it may be,
rather nasty ones.
Just as we lift ourselv
ourselves
es to soar aawa
wayy
Upon the summer-airs
summer-airs. [...] And notice the way the speaker uses alliter
alliteration
ation to underscore
this contrast:
Once again, the speaker sees an analogy between people and
flies, here. Just as that fly might well have been about The closing book may stop our vital breath,
to—well—fly when the book closed on it, people might die just Yet leave no lustre on our page of death.
when they feel freest, easiest, and most in control of their lives.
The blissful warmth of the "summer-airs"—an image that might The movement from strong /b/ sounds—which thump like a
suggest the "summer," or prime, of one's life—is no guarantee of book falling shut—to gentle, drawn-out /l/ sounds suggests
safety. both the finality of death and the delicate traces of "lust[rous],"
shining memory.
Perhaps there's a darker implication here, too. The image of
"soar[ing]" might evoke what souls are sometimes said to do There's an implied lesson here, clearly. The sight of this poor
when they head off to the afterlife. The speaker might be little fly has led the speaker to reflect that death is always
suggesting that people shouldn't be too sure their souls will fly near—and that people often don't have much to show for their
straight to heaven when the book of life closes on them, lives. The "blameless" fly's legacy can outclass the legacies of
either—especially if they've unrepentantly led lives that were plenty of selfish, thoughtless humans.
far from "blameless." They might have a surprise waiting for Yet the poem's tone remains gentle. This isn't a thunderous
them even beyond the surprise of death. sermon, but an "Oh!", a sigh of sad resignation. This tender
And speaking of surprises, take a look at what the rh
rhyme
yme speaker, who extends such affectionate appreciation to this
scheme is doing now: fly's corpse, seems more resigned to human folly than appalled
by it.
• Having started in a roughly Petrarchan form, the
sonnet's rhymes now switch to the alternating

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to heaven, warning that less-than-"blameless" behavior might
SYMBOLS get in the way of that final flight.

THE FLY Where Metaphor appears in the poem:

Here as in many poems, the fly symbolizes mortality • Line 3: “thou hast left thine own fair monument,”
and the fragility of life. • Line 7: “Pure relics of a blameless life”
Crushed in a book, the poem's fly reminds the speaker that • Line 10: “The book will close upon us”
death is always a lot nearer than people like to think. Think of • Lines 11-12: “Just as we lift ourselves to soar away /
the idiom "to drop like flies": flies' short, easily-squished lives Upon the summer-airs”
remind the speaker that people never know when or where
death will strike them down. (And though this connotation isn't SIMILE
right there on the surface of this poem, flies also suggest death One strong simile sits at the heart of this poem, linking a fly's
because they lay their eggs on corpses.) pressed wings to the legacy a person leaves behind them when
In some sense, though, this fly has it easy: it led a "blameless" they die.
life and leaves an imprint of its beautiful wings behind in death. The speaker introduces this simile with a wistful cry:
People, the speaker reflects, should be so lucky: not every
fleeting human life leaves such lovely memories behind it. Oh! that the memories, which survive us here,
Were half as lovely as these wings of thine
thine!
Where this symbol appears in the poem:
• Lines 1-8 The fly's wings, in other words, remain shimmery, lovely, and
perfectly preserved—a little flicker of posthumous beauty. But
people, the speaker feels, rarely leave behind any "relics" so
delightful.
POETIC DEVICES The implication here is that people simply tend to be less
"blameless" than flies: they make mistakes, and they leave ugly
METAPHOR
memories behind them as often (or more often) than they leave
The poem's metaphors give concrete form to the speaker's beautiful ones. Many people, the speaker gravely observes,
thoughts on death and memory. "leave no lustre" (that is, no shine) behind them when they
When a little fly gets smashed between the pages of a book, the go—an image that suggests they might well leave an ugly blot
speaker sees its body as a "fair" (or beautiful) "monument" to its instead.
life. In other words, its "gleam[ing]" wings, perfectly preserved, In the speaker's sad sigh, then, there's an implied moral
become its own tombstone, a reminder of its life. warning. Every living creature, fly or human, will get squished
More than that, though, the speaker sees these wings as "pure by the closing pages of the book of life one day, the speaker
relics of a blameless life," remnants that speak of the fly's suggests, so it might not be a bad idea to consider whether the
innocence. The word "relics" here might even suggest there's memories one leaves behind will be beautiful as a fly's wings or
something holy about the fly: it's a word also used to describe ugly as a splotch of bug guts.
the venerated remains of saints.
People, the speaker suggests, might well take a lesson from this Where Simile appears in the poem:
fly, seeing themselves in the same position. Though we might • Lines 5-6: “Oh! that the memories, which survive us
often forget this, the "book will close upon us," the speaker here, / Were half as lovely as these wings of thine!”
says—a metaphor in which the literal book in which the fly got
pressed becomes the metaphorical Book of Life itself, bringing
REPETITION
an end to a life's story as it closes.
Repetitions help to give the speaker's thoughts on mortality a
And people aren't unlike flies in other ways, either. Just as the
grand, prophetic tone.
fly got smashed in an unsuspecting moment, the "book" might
slam shut on a person just as they're about to "soar away," the In lines 8-10, a passage of par
parallelism
allelism (with a speck of diacope
speaker says. This metaphor might suggest the illusion of to help it along) makes the speaker sound grimly insistent on
freedom that persuades people their lives are totally in their the inevitability (and unpredictability) of death:
own control—that they can just fly off about their business
without worrying about death. But it might also darkly hint at a [...] Our doom is ever near:
vision of a person blithely believing that their soul will fly away The peril is beside us da
dayy by da
dayy;

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The book will close upon us, it may be, The solid period here again marks a segue into a new idea. The
speaker has finished describing how people are like flies, and is
Similar sentence structures introduce all the speaker's now prepared to describe how they're unlike flies—a
pronouncements about our "doom," an everpresent "peril," and comparison in which people will come out the worse!
the threatening, closing "book"—that is, three different ways of
saying "death"! All these angles on the same thing make it Where Caesur
Caesuraa appears in the poem:
sound as if the speaker is insisting: I'm not kidding, death might
strike at any time. The diacope of "day by day," meanwhile, • Line 1: “hand, that”
• Line 5: “memories, which”
reminds readers that every day alive is a day closer to dying.
• Line 7: “life, that”
More subtly, the speaker also repeats the word "wings" a • Line 8: “gone. Our”
couple of times across the poem: once in line 4, and once in line • Line 10: “us, it”
6. This repetition helps to track the development of the • Line 12: “summer-airs. But,”
speaker's thoughts. First, the speaker sees the wings; then, the
speaker reflects on what those lovely wings, still "gleam[ing]," ENJAMBMENT
have to teach people about life, death, and legacy.
This poem uses only two enjambments in a sea of firm end-
stops
stops. These two unusual moments thus draw some special
Where Repetition appears in the poem:
attention to themselves. They also help to alter the poem's
• Line 4: “wings” pace, evoking what the speaker describes.
• Line 6: “wings” The first turns up in lines 7-8, where the speaker describes the
• Line 8: “Our doom is” fly's preserved wings as:
• Line 9: “The peril is,” “day,” “day”
• Line 10: “The book will” Pure relics of a blameless life, that shine
Now thou art gone. [...]
CAESURA
Caesur
Caesurae
ae help to give the poem a gentle pace and reflect new Leaving that "shine" hanging out in the air for a moment, this
developments in the speaker's thoughts. enjambment asks readers to draw the word out a little, to really
The poem's first caesura slows down its momentum before it's sit with the image of those tiny, glinting wings. That long
even had time to work up a head of steam: moment also mimics precisely what the poem describes,
preserving that "shine" long after the fly itself is "gone."
Some hand, || that never meant to do thee hurt, The second enjambment also reflects the very action the
speaker is talking about. Here, the speaker says that the "book"
The little pause here gets the poem off to a slow, reflective, of life might "close upon us":
thoughtful start. Before even saying what the "hand" here has
done, the speaker stops to assure readers that it didn't mean to Just as we lift ourselves to soar awa
wayy
do any harm. This quick pause for clarification makes the Upon the summer-airs. [...]
speaker seem like a fair-minded and careful thinker.
Later on, though, the poem's caesurae get more emphatic. Take Carrying this thought across a line break, this line evokes
a look at what happens in line 8, for instance: smooth, joyous flight—but also suggests that such flights might
be cut off in the middle by death's unexpected blow.
[...] that shine These two enjambments thus shape the poem's lines to the
Now thou art gone. || Our doom is ever near: speaker's thoughts, helping readers to envision both lingering
beauty and unpredictable disaster.
Here, a firm full stop marks a big transition: the poem moves
from the speaker's specific thoughts about the fly's beautifully Where Enjambment appears in the poem:
preserved wings and into the speaker's general thoughts about
• Lines 7-8: “shine / Now”
mortality.
• Lines 11-12: “away / Upon”
Something similar happens in line 12:
ALLITERATION
Just as we lift ourselves to soar away
Alliter
Alliteration
ation gives this poem some wistful music and helps to
Upon the summer-airs. || But
But, unlike thee,
emphasize important moments.
The closing book may stop our vital breath,

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For example, listen to the gentle sounds in lines 1-2: funeral hymn.

Some hand, that never meant to do thee hurt, Where Assonance appears in the poem:
Has crushed thee here between these pages pent;
• Line 1: “never meant”
• Line 2: “thee here between these”
The soft, breathy /h/ sounds here evoke the speaker's
• Line 3: “left,” “monument”
tenderness and sympathy: it's as if the speaker is whispering to
• Line 4: “gleam,” “me”
the poor crushed fly. The firm, plosive /p/ of "p
pages pent,"
• Line 7: “life,” “shine”
meanwhile, suggests the (literally) flat reality here; those
• Line 12: “summer,” “unlike”
thumping /p/ sounds might even evoke the sound of the fatal
book closing on the unsuspecting bug.
APOSTROPHE
And listen to what happens in the poem's closing couplet
couplet:
The speaker's apostrophe to the fly honors this squashed bug
The closing book may stop our vital breath, as an equal—or perhaps even a better.
Yet leave no lustre on our page of death. Talking to a fly pressed between the pages of a book, this
speaker behaves as if the insect were practically a saint: a
These paired /b/ and /l/ sounds help to stress these lines' "blameless" creature who's left behind a shining "monument"
contrast between the fly and humanity. Once again, a blunt (in the form of its preserved wings) that speaks not just to its
sound—a /b/ rather than a /p/ here—suggests the sudden life, but its goodness. The beauty of the "relics" this fly has left
impact of the "closing book" of life as it lands on some on the page, the speaker tells it, makes its death a better one
unsuspecting creature's head. Then, a long, elegant /l/ sound than the deaths of a lot of human beings, who often leave only
suggests the delicate, "lustr[ous]" beauty of the fly's nasty "memories" behind them when they go.
wings—and invites readers to wonder if their own lives will Readers might feel there's something both sincerely poignant
leave any traces even "half as lovely" behind. and ruefully funny about the speaker's apostrophe. Few
squished bugs get memorialized so grandly, addressed so
Where Alliter
Alliteration
ation appears in the poem: directly, or treated so respectfully. The apostrophe thus
characterizes the speaker as a thoughtful, sensitive soul, a
• Line 1: “hand,” “hurt”
person who's able to see the value even in a fly's life. (Maybe
• Line 2: “Has,” “here,” “pages pent”
• Line 4: “what,” “wert” the speaker feels a touch guilty, too: if this book is theirs, they
• Line 11: “soar” might have committed accidental fly-slaughter.)
• Line 12: “summer” But the apostrophe also suggests that this poem might be ever-
• Line 13: “book,” “breath” so-slightly tongue-in-cheek. The mild sorrow the speaker feels
• Line 14: “leave,” “lustre” over this fly (and the world-weary regret the speaker feels over
human folly) gets spun into a grand address to a fallen saint.
ASSONANCE
Assonance
Assonance, like alliter
alliteration
ation, gives the poem music and meaning. Where Apostrophe appears in the poem:
For example, listen to the echoing sounds in line 7: • Lines 1-4
• Lines 6-8
Pure relics of a blameless liife, that shiine • Lines 12-14

That long, clear /i/ sound suggests all kinds of hiigh, briight,
miighty beauties: in the speaker's eyes, this fly's wings aren't VOCABULARY
just pretty, they're images of saintly goodness.
Thee, Thou, Thine, Thy (Line 1, Line 2, Line 3, Line 4, Line 6,
The first lines, meanwhile, use chains of assonance to evoke the
Line 8, Line 12) - All of these words are old-fashioned ways of
speaker's reflective mood:
saying "you" (thee and thou) or "yours" (thine and thy).
Some hand, that neever mea
eant to do thee hurt, Pent (Line 2) - Trapped, caught, confined.
Has crushed thee
ee heere betwee
een theese pages pent; Hast (Line 3) - An old-fashioned or literary way of saying "have."
Fair (Line 3) - Beautiful.
This musical movement from /eh/ to /ee/ sounds creates some
gentle music; it's as if the speaker is singing this fly a quiet little Monument (Line 3) - In this context, a gravestone or tomb.

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What thou wert (Line 4) - In other words, "what you were." Oh
Oh! that | the mem
mem- | ories, which | surviv
vivee | us here
here,
Relics (Line 7) - Remnants, especially holy or sacred ones.
The first foot here isn't an iamb, but its opposite: a trochee
trochee, a
Peril (Line 9) - Danger. foot with a DUM
DUM-da rhythm. That means a strong, right-up-
Vital (Line 13) - Living, to do with being alive. front stress gives extra punch to the speaker's wistful "Oh!"
Lustre (Line 14) - A shine, a gleam.
RHYME SCHEME
This sonnet uses a variation on a traditional rh
rhyme
yme scheme
scheme.
FORM, METER, & RHYME Most English (or Shakespearean) sonnets start with three
quatr
quatrains
ains of alternating rhymes, then close with a final rhymed
FORM couplet
couplet. (See this famous sonnet for an example of how that
"On Finding a Small Fly Crushed in a Book" is a sonnet
sonnet—but a sounds.) This one does something a little different:
rather peculiar one. Turner, who often wrote in the sonnet ABBA CDDC EFEF GG
form, has played around with his rh
rhyme
yme scheme here, creating a This reads like a hybrid of an English sonnet and an Italian (or
hybrid of an Italian sonnet and an English sonnet: Petrarchan) sonnet, whose first two quatrains always rhyme
ABBA ABBA. Turner, an experienced sonneteer, seems to be
• An Italian sonnet (like this one
one) always starts with an experimenting here, playing with the possibilities of this old
eight-line passage (or octave) rhymed ABBA ABBA form.
and ends with a six-line sestet of varied C, D, and E
rhymes.
• An English sonnet (like this one
one), meanwhile, uses SPEAKER
three stanzas of alternating rhymes (ABAB CDCD
EFEF), and a closing couplet (GG). The poem's speaker is a thoughtful, reflective person. Finding a
tiny fly pressed between the pages of a book, this speaker is led
This sonnet starts by using the Italian ABBA shape in its first to think about the way that every living creature will be
quatrain, then introduces an unusual second quatrain rhymed smashed flat by death one time or another—and to observe
CDDC, then switches to traditional English sonnet rhymes for that most of us can only dream of leaving so beautiful an
its final quatrain (EFEF) and closing couplet (GG). impression as this little bug has. At once sensitive to natural
But besides that innovative rhyme pattern, this poem sticks to beauty and gently resigned about human failings, this speaker
sonnet tradition: it's 14 lines long in total and written in iambic might easily be imagined as Charles Tennyson Turner himself,
pentameter (that is, lines of five iambs, metrical feet with a who, in his work as a priest, saw plenty of death and plenty of
da-DUM
DUM rhythm: "The per per- | il is | beside
side | us da
dayy | by da
dayy"). folly.
Perhaps this poem's hybrid form reflects one of its themes.
Death, the speaker might subtly be warning readers, comes to SETTING
everyone alike, and pays no attention to human ideas of order:
be you English or Italian, the book of life will smash you flat, There's no clear setting in this poem; all readers know is that
too! the speaker is sitting down with a book and finds a fly pressed
Perhaps, though, this experimentation is just Turner's way of between its pages. In a sense, though, the poem's setting could
flexing his poetic muscles, pushing the boundaries of his be imagined as the whole world: death, as the speaker points
favorite form. out, is a universal fate.
While the poem is never explicit about its setting, its distinctly
METER Victorian tone—lofty, moral, mournful—might lead readers to
Like most sonnets
sonnets, "On Finding a Small Fly Crushed in a Book" picture Charles Tennyson Turner's own place and time: 19th-
is written in iambic pentameter. That means it's built from lines century England. Plenty of 19th-century poetry reflected on
of five iambs, metrical feet with a da-DUM
DUM rhythm. Here's how mortality; more than a few poems did so through the image of a
that sounds in line 4: fly
fly!

Thy wings | gleam out | and tell | me what | thou wert

wert:
CONTEXT
The poem sticks pretty steadily to this pulsing meter. But
sometimes (as in a lot of sonnets), the speaker breaks from this LITERARY CONTEXT
rhythm for effect. For example, look what happens in line 5: The English poet Charles Tennyson Turner (1808-1879) was a

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member of an illustrious literary family. Two of his many siblings it would be a big mistake to imagine that Victorians were all
were poets, too; most notably, his younger brother Alfred, LLord
ord buttoned-up prudes. Victorian England was also full of
Tenn
ennyson
yson was one of the best-known and best-beloved poets revolutionary ferment and sesexual
xual liber
liberation
ation.)
of the Victorian age. (Turner and Alfred Tennyson don't share a This poem's interest in death might also reflect a very Victorian
surname because Turner adopted an uncle's name when that preoccupation with mourning, which became almost a national
uncle left him his estate.) hobby after Queen Victoria's beloved husband Albert died.
These siblings weren't rivals, but close companions and Victoria mourned lavishly and publicly until the day she died,
enthusiasts for each other's work. Turner's first publication was and her citizens followed suit. Victorian mourning was a
a collaborative book with Alfred, the 1829 book Poems by Two ritualized affair, with strict rules about clothing and conduct.
Brothers. Turner also developed a poetic career of his own. This poem's reflections on what kind of "monument" we leave
While he primarily worked as a priest, he also became a behind us when we die fit right into a culture obsessed with
distinguished sonneteer
sonneteer; this poem comes from his 1873 grief.
collection Sonnets, Lyrics, and Translations, one of several books
(mostly of sonnets) that he published.
While sonnets are a perpetually popular flavor of poem,
MORE RESOUR
RESOURCES
CES
Turner's allegiance to them marks him as a pretty traditional
EXTERNAL RESOURCES
poet (even though he liked to play with the sonnet
form—witness this very poem's peculiar rh rhyme
yme scheme
scheme). While • A Short Biogr
Biograph
aphyy — Read a brief 1917 biography of
much Victorian-era poetry was rather nostalgic, it could also be Turner. (https:/
(https://www
/www.bartleb
.bartlebyy.com/libr
.com/library
ary/prose/
/prose/
innovative; Victorian writers like Ger
Gerard
ard Manle
Manleyy Hopkins and 5336.html)
Robert Browning
Browning, for instance, were experimenting with form • Early Publications — Read a newspaper article from 1880
in unprecedented ways. Turner, meanwhile, stuck to the that discusses the publication of a collection of Turner's
classics. sonnets. (https:/
(https://www
/www.theguardian.com/news/1880/jan/
.theguardian.com/news/1880/jan/
While Turner never became as widely known a poet as his 19/mainsection.fromthearchiv
19/mainsection.fromthearchivee)
younger brother, his gentle, reflective sonnets made an • APPortr
ortrait
ait of T
Turner
urner — See a portrait of Turner as a young
impression on writers as distinguished as the great Romantic man. (https:/
(https:///artuk.org/disco
artuk.org/discovver/artworks/charles-
poet Samuel TTaaylor Coleridge (who provided notes for one tenn
tennyson-turner-18081879-82107)
yson-turner-18081879-82107)
edition of Turner's work).
• The TTenn
ennyson
yson Family — Read an article that discusses
HISTORICAL CONTEXT Turner's relationship with his brothers—including the
Turner lived in a time of drama and turmoil. During his lifetime, more famous poet Alfred, Lord Tennyson.
proverbially, the "sun never set on the British Empire": Britain (https:/
(https://www
/www.english.cam.ac.uk/cambridgeauthors/
.english.cam.ac.uk/cambridgeauthors/
had colonial holdings across the world, and was the major world tenn
tennyson-and-the-apostles/)
yson-and-the-apostles/)
power. At the same time, the new wealth (and new difficulties)
of the Industrial Revolution were changing the face of Britain,
as what was once a primarily rural nation quickly became
HOW T
TO
O CITE
primarily urban. Staggering poverty and staggering luxury
coexisted in the newly crowded cities. MLA
Perhaps in response to all this uproar, Victorian English social Nelson, Kristin. "On Finding a Small Fly Crushed in a Book." LitCharts.
mores, especially among the upper classes, were marked by a LitCharts LLC, 8 Feb 2022. Web. 16 Feb 2022.
strong sense of propriety and conformity. The Victorians
CHICAGO MANUAL
considered themselves models for the world, and their strict
social, moral, and sexual codes meant that people today Nelson, Kristin. "On Finding a Small Fly Crushed in a Book."
sometimes use the word "Victorian" to mean "prudish." This LitCharts LLC, February 8, 2022. Retrieved February 16, 2022.
poem's gently sorrowful reflections on death and memory are a https://www.litcharts.com/poetry/charles-tennyson-turner/on-
finding-a-small-fly-crushed-in-a-book.
pretty nonconfrontational example of Victorian morality in art!
(Of course, what people say and what they do is quite different:

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