Mock Heroic Poem | Definition | Characteristics
Mock Heroic Poem | Definition | Characteristics
A Mock Heroic Poem is one in which the subject is mean or trivial while the style of treating the subject is grand or elevated. The author of such a poem makes the subject ridiculous by wrapping it up in a framework that is utterly inappropriate to its nature. In brief, to say, a mock-heroic poem is a toy adorned with a royal robe. The mock-heroic poems are humorous and satiric in character. It aims at exhibiting the vices and sins of society with laughter.
English Literature is rich in mock-heroic poems. Some of the well-read English heroic poems are Samuel Butler’s Hudibras, Alexander Pope’s The Rape of the Lock, Thomas Gray’s Ode on the Death of a Favourite Cat, Geoffrey Chaucer’s The Nonnes Preestes Tale and so on.
The subject matter of Chaucer’s ‘Nonnes Preestes Tale’ is the seizing off a cock by a fox and the cock’s escape from the mouth of the fox. Evidently, it is a trivial subject because the seizing of a cock by a fox can under no circumstance be regarded as a matter of significance. But Chaucer has dealt with the subject in such an elevated style that it becomes a mock-heroic poem. 0 0 0.
N. B. The article originally belongs to the book entitled ‘Menonimus Dictionary of Literary Terms‘.
Books on Literary Criticism by M. Menonimus:
- World Short Story Criticism
- World Poetry Criticism
- World Drama Criticism
- World Novel Criticism
- World Essay Criticism
- Indian English Poetry Criticism
- Indian English Poets and Poetry Chief Features
- Emily Dickinson’s Poetry-A Thematic Study
- Walt Whitman’s Poetry-A Thematic Study
- Critical Essays on English Poetry
- Tawfiq al-Hakim’s Novel: Return of the Spirit-An Analytical Study
- Tawfiq al-Hakim’s Novel: ‘Yawmiyyat Naib Fil Arayaf’-An Analytical Study
- Analytical Studies of Some Arabic Short Stories
- A Brief History of Arabic Literature: Pre-Islamic Period (500 AD-622 AD)
- A Brief History of Arabic Literature: Early Islamic Period (622 AD-661 AD) …
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