The Eagle is a short poem, in which the poet describes a strong, pride, brave and great eagle. In fact, it`s to memorize the poet`s  closest friend Hallam，who is died . It`s also a description of his own life, and an expression of his strong mind. This paper will start from a stylistic perspective and base on the stylistic knowledge. We will have an analysis on the feature and the effect of the stylistics on the sound, words,sentence , imagery and figure of speech of this poem. And this new perspective aims to let the reader have a deep understanding of the poem from a new perspective. The reader will not only have a better impression of the poem itself, including the features, the meaning and the aesthetic effect, but also have a profound and true understanding of the affection that the poet implied in the poem.

A. Sound

1. This poem has two stanzas, six lines and each line contains 8 syllables.So this poem is very shourt but is also seems to nbe very neat.

2.In metre, this poem is written in tetrameter. It’s also in the commonest type of verse foot - iambic foot, after each weak sound, a stressed sound is exactly followed.

3.The most of the words in this poem are monosyllables,no more than three syllables,excepet “thunderbolt’,which has three syllables.So those words are terse, short but forceful. And they can express the eagle`s handsome and speediness.

4.It has a rhyme. The rhyme scheme of this poem is “aaa, bbb”. And the rhyming words are “hands,lands ,stand, crawls,walls,falls”, expressing a stronger feeling or a greater strength.

5.As for phonetic devices,we can see it consists many kings of phonetic devices, which picture out the prominent image of the eagle,and also make the poem full of musical effect and full of melody.

(1)Alliteration is used many times in this poem, such as “claps , crag, crooked’in the first line of the first stanza. Those words show the vitalityand the masculinity of the eagle by the powerful pronounce /k/.  And “lonely , lands”,” with , world” and “ watches walls” are also belongs to alliterration.

(2)Assonance also can be seen here, such as “claps, crag,, hands”, “close , lonely”, “sea, beneath” and “wrinkle , him”. They provide this poem the beauty of sound.

(3)Consonance is an important phonetic device in this poem, such as “claps, hands”, “ringed , world”, “wrinkled , crawl” and “watches, his , walls”.They also give this poem a good coherence in sound.

(4)There is another special phonetic device in this poem---Onomatopoeia. In the poem we can see, the short but loud vowels such as /æ/ ,and the plosive sound,such as / k/ , /p/ , / g/ , / d/,  make an impression of tough of the eagle. Then , with the sound / i :/,/ l/ and / n/ ,it describes the waves of the ocean.These special phonic sounds make the eagle seems more powerful and bring the readers the impact of mightiness hearing feeling.

B. Words

This poem shows the poet`s careful choice of words, especially to choose words to describe the eagle and his environment. So that each word can express exactly what needs to be expressed and suggest every emotional shade that the poem is calculated to evoke in us.

1. When describe the eagle,words such as “ clasp”,“ Close to”, “stand” ,’watch” and “thunderbolt” are used. And those words give us an brave and strong image of the eagle.

2. Then,when the poet describe the environment, words like “lonely”, “beneath”, “wrinkled” and “crawl” are used. In this way, the vaste and boundless sky and ocean seem to be nothing in the eyes of the eagle. So it also serves as a foil to the powerful and mysterious of the eagle.

3. We also should pay special attention to the pronoun “he”. It`s a personnification.The poet describes the eagle as a male, and this refer to the pride and other spirits associated with male. The subjective case "he" occurs four times, the objective case "him" once and the third person possesive pronoun "his" once. In short, those words also show great masculinity upon the eagle.

4. So when it comes to words of this poem , we can see the beauty of pattern. And the language of poetry is the vivid language,which also has rich artistic glamour.Maybe that`s one of the reasons why Tennyson`s poem is attractive.

5. Lexical repetition can be found in this poem. The word “he” has been used four times in such a short poem, within thetwo stanzas. And even the definite article “the” has been repeted four times,which also give a special sound effect and view effect.. Such repetition is to heighten the atmosphere of the poem, to emphasize the meaning of the eagle, and strengthen the coherence of the poem as a whole .

C. Sentences

1. First of all, let`s pay attention to the title. There is no sentence at all, except a fragment, I mean a noun phrase “the eagle”. But this phrase is exactly the shining point, for it just the right style of this poem.It`s short and brief, just like the right spirit of the eagle.

2. Then, seen from the whole poem, we find the sentences are very similar in length,not very long. And there are six lines in the poem, and we can even say there are six sentences in the poem. Those six sentences ,the three sentences in the first stanza are all composed by 7 words, and every sentence in the second stanza is composed by 6 words,but allsentences in the poem has 8 syllables.So this poem has a complete and united structure.

3. As for sentence  pattern, we can easily find they are simple sentences without too much sentence changes. The first line is a full sentence, with a basic sentence patern  SVO. The last sentence of the first stanza and all the three sentences in the second stanza have the same sentence pattern SV. Just the second sentence of the first stanze has a little change. In my view, it should be SVP, but in order to get the coherence in the whole poem, the poet ellipsises the subject “he” and the predictive link verb “is”.

4. What`s more, syntactical Repetition is used too. It has repeted the same structure in the third and the sixth sentences. “He stands” and “he falls”, these two short sentences are both at the end of each stanza. And these two sentences may be called periodic sentence, which give more emphasis the hero “he” ,  produce a great momentum, and its emotional appeal to the full .

D.Figure of speech

1.Personification is one of the most important fatures in this poem.In the whole poem, the eagle is written like an brave man.The poet uses “he” refering to the eagle and describing eagle’s talons as "hands", thus make the eagle full of human emotions and spirits.

2.Overstatement also is used here. In the second line, “close to the sun” is an exanple of exaggeration. So it can emphasis the power of the eagle and express the author`s or his friend`s insistence of pursuing truth and beauty.

3.Similer is also here.For example,in the last sentence of the poem,“like a thunderbolt”is both a similer and overstatement at the same time. And from such a powerful word, we can find the high tide of the poem and the emotion of the poet. So, in this way, the special rhytorical effect can be expressed.

4.Pun may be uesd here ,too. In the last but one line, we can see “like a thunderbolt he falls”.In this sentence, “falls ”can be understood as the fall of the eagle, maybe it`s too tired ,and it want to fall down to have a short rest,or it will fall down to death. But also,it can be understood as the fall of his friend, which just died at the golden age of his life and will never reback.. So, that`s the very  wonders of portic language.

E. Imagery

Imagery is one important part of a poem, and they convey much more than what the words appear to mean .By those words, the poet expresses his feeling and thought in a more romantic way or a more suitable way.

And many images are used here, such as the eagle, the sun, the azure wolrd, the sea, the  mountain and the thuderbolt. Of course, the eagle is the main subject in this poem, and it`s presented as being strong and tough, proud and majestic, sharpeyed, alert, and quick movement..

Then, the other images in this poem also have their special usage. Just as we have mentioned above, all the images work together to convey the eagle’s prominent characters.

After the whole analysis of the poem in stylistic way, we may find there are so many perfect points in this little poem.And the eagle`s characters , such as aggressiveness, powerfulness and unyieldingness, are all revealed fully.To analysis this poem deeper, we also could find the deep sorrow in Tennyson`s heart for his lost friend and his vivid express of his own spirit  of braveness, aggressiveness and violence.