Felicia Hemans

Something that has always been important to me is the suffrage movement for women's rights in the United States, so when I read Felicia Hemans' "Corinne at the Capitol" I immediately had an affinity for the poem.  The poem itself was very lyrical and, for the most part, was peaceful in tone.  This was interesting to me because it seems to contrast severely with the movement for women's rights in both England and America which were hard fought battles that took years and years to achieve.  

The scene seems almost regal with the presence of chaplets and "Music whose rich notes might stir/Ashes of the sepulchre" (lines 19-20).  These seem to work together to portray the great achievement of the women's rights movement, especially as the "Daughter of th' Italian heaven" (line 1) walks up "th' ascending road,/Freedom's foot so proudly trode" (lines 9-10).  

The link between De Stael's novel Corinne, ou l'Italie and Heman's poem "Corinne at the Capitol" illustrates how even with rights, women still have issues with what kind of wife and mother to be, or if they should even be either at all.  This is seen in DeStael's novel when Corine dies of a broken heart when the man she loves marries her half-sister because Corinne could not imagine being a proper English wife (footnote 1).  This idea of being a good wife and mother is seen in the last stanza of "Corinne at the Capitol".  Though the poem's subject is still the "Radiant daughter of the sun" (line 41), another is "Happier, happier far than [her]" (line 45).  This other person ends up being "She that makes the humblest hearth/Lovely but to one on earth" (lines 47-48) which appears to be a housewife or mother, someone who has a family.  Even though the poem's subject may not be the happiest on Earth, she is still important because her actions will lay the path for other women who wish to find happiness outside of motherhood.