Rugby Chapel is an elegy

Matthew Arnold was one of the three great poets of the Victorian age in English literature. His poem “Rugby Chapel” is an elegy, and it has some personal relationship because he wrote about his father, Doctor Thomas Arnold. Doctor Thomas Arnold was the headmaster of the Rugby School, and when he was the headmaster, the school became very famous and successful in England. After his death, the school lost some of its success and reputation. Anyway, this is a very good elegy, and before discussing this poem as an elegy, it is better to talk about the form of an elegy in English literature.

An elegy is a kind of poem where the death of a person or idea is mourned. The poet expresses his sadness at the death of a person very close to him or any idea he believes deeply. Normally, elegies are written about people rather than ideas. However, it is not only about expressing sadness or mourning or it is not only limited to that person only. The goal is to show that the person was a very high person, and there was a tremendous loss of the world or society at his death. Perhaps the most famous elegy in English literature is “Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” by Thomas Gray. In that poem, Thomas Gray mourned the death of some village people and the good qualities they possessed.

The reader may ask himself or herself why Arnold wrote this elegy called “Rugby Chapel”. The first and obvious answer should have been that he wanted to mourn over the death of his father. However, it is more than the death of his father because after his father died, a magazine called Edinburgh Review criticized his father as a headmaster. This negative criticism had an impact on Matthew Arnold, and he wanted to prove that his father was not only a good headmaster but also a great person. So, there is a personal motif behind writing the elegy “Rugby Chapel”.

The loss is obviously personal because losing parents is one of the saddest experiences that human beings have to suffer in this world. A father is a guardian who looks after the children, and when we lose our father, most of us have the feeling that we have lost our shelter. Thus, the father is like a shelter, and Arnold has stated that children get shelter like a big oak tree gives shadow to people. His father always guided him, and for this reason, he could overcome most of the obstacles in this world. However, after his father’s death, he started to suffer because there was no one to guide him.

Arnold also stated that his father did not lead a meaningless life. His father was an ideal person and wanted to follow the right path or true way. He was not afraid of anything, and he was never tired of fulfilling his duties. In short, the poet’s father was a different kind of person, and he was always dedicated to his students. He was higher than the average people, and he was a good leader.

Matthew Arnold also said that his father was a person who used to encourage those people who were afraid in life. He did not hesitate to help the people and he did not care for his own comfort. Thus, he was a good person for society. The qualities that the poet speaks are rare in most people, and for this reason, Matthew Arnold’s father was a great person or a great figure.

Arnold did not fight back at the people who criticized his father. Rather, he indirectly praised his father a lot and tried to show that his father was a person who was worthy of only praise and did not lack any quality in his character. Thus, what we can see is that there is a personal intention of Arnold to prove that his father was a great person, but he has done it in a very good way. He has also shown that the qualities that his father used to possess were not only rare but also possessed by very few people alive today.

There is no doubt that “Rugby Chapel” is a great elegy, and it is perhaps one of the best elegies written during the Victorian period. Yes, there is a personal motif, and it is natural for a son to praise his father just as Arnold did. However, Arnold was very balanced when he was praising his father, and he did not show any emotion most of the time in this poem. This has given more or less a neutral point of view about the father, and it is up to the readers to reach their own conclusion about the father. If any person wants to enjoy this poem, he or she should read the background information about the Edinburgh Review’s criticism against Doctor Arnold (the poet’s father). In any case, it was a great elegy.

Symbols in “Ode to the West Wind” poem

“Ode to the West Wind” is perhaps the best poem of P B Shelley. This poem has made him immortal in the history of English literature, and it is one of the greatest and most memorable poems in the whole of English literature also. Shelley has symbolized the west wind, and at the same time, he has expressed his revolutionary ideas in this poem. 

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Shelley was good at using symbols in his poetry. In "Ode to the West Wind," the west wind may symbolize many things. The first thing that comes to the mind of the readers is that the west wind symbolizes nature but not in the sense that Wordsworth used nature in his poems. Here, nature is alive and strong, and it is personified in the form of the west wind. This nature is not static but dynamic, and it has the strength to destroy the old leaves, but at the same time, it preserves the seeds. So, the future is secured. At the same time, the west wind is like a force that can create a revolution. Shelley was among the second generation of romantic poets, and he was greatly inspired by the French Revolution. This west wind has a kind of strength that can touch not only nature but also human society. This is the dream of Shelley. Thirdly, this west wind also symbolizes the personality of Shelley. Shelley was an exceptional person during his time. He did not believe in the traditional form of relationship, but at the same time, he was different from most people and even from most poets of his time. He dreamt of a new world and a new society in which people will have more freedom and more liberty. Shelley wants that the west wind also touches him and gives him the strength to stand up in society.

The French Revolution took place in 1789, and it had a profound impact on Wordsworth, Coleridge and all the romantic poets. However, no other romantic poet was so deeply influenced by the idea of revolution. The main goal of the French Revolution was to establish a society where the citizens will enjoy maximum freedom and rights. At that time, France was ruled by an autocratic monarchy, and it created a lot of frustration among the people. It should be noted here that Shelley was influenced by the writings of Russo, and we know that Russo was a very important figure behind the ideas of the French Revolution.

Shelley was not very happy with the condition of contemporary England. No revolution similar to the French Revolution took place in England, and the king was still very powerful. The middle-class people did not have any right to vote, and the right to vote was limited to only a few aristocratic and rich people. Shelley’s own personal ideas and lifestyle were not appreciated by the contemporary people in his society. So, the condition of contemporary England was frustrating in every way to the poet.

The contemporary condition of England was like the winter, but Shelley was hopeful that spring would come. For this reason, he wished that the west wind would come and destroy the old ideas in England and bring new hope for the future. People would get influenced by new ideas from people like Shelley and perhaps to some extent from Byron, and they would rise up and start to change society. Of course, if we read history, we will know that the changes that Shelley dreamt of did not happen in England very quickly, but they happened slowly. The poets of three or four generations after him were also deeply influenced by his ideas and carried his ideas further.

Shelley also wants the west wind to influence his own personality. He wanted to write better poems and influence the people. Shelley wanted a new life for himself, and he wanted the west wind to come and make him fresh and strong.

When Queen Victoria took power, the condition of England started to change, and the rise of the middle-class took place. Freedom and equality among all the people did not come very quickly, but it was the dream of Shelley to see a democratic and modern England where people will be respected irrespective of their ideas and ideologies. This matter happened, but it took a lot of time, and we have to say that poets like Shelley and poems like “Ode to the West Wind” contributed immensely to changing England this way.

Mehdi Hasan Khan: The developer of Bengali keyboard Avro

Mother tongue is the language of freedom. In this digital age, one can either write in his mother tongue with a pen on a piece of paper or on a computer with a keyboard. Now, writing on a gadget is more convenient than writing on a notebook. But can a computer understand any language except English? Many Bengalis were suffering from this indecisiveness. Avro freed the Bengalis from this thought. Instantly after pressing few keys, Bengali letters- অ, আ, ক, খ- appeared on the computer screen. What a relief it was! Many people thought, who is the man who has done this impossible task? The answer came from the bank of the Padma river. Medical student Mehdi Hasan Khan developed this software called Avro. But how many of us tried to know about this creator of Avro that brought Bengali scripts on digital platforms? Let us remember the story of Mehdi Hasan Khan, one of the proudest people of Bengal. 

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Mehdi Hasan Khan, a Bangladeshi boy, was a medical student of Mymensingh Medical College. While studying in medical college, the thought of writing Bengali letters on the computer came to his mind. After a lot of brainstorming, he finally got his ‘Eureka’ moment in Archimedes’ style and quickly started implementing the idea. He wanted to innovate a technology that will allow people to type Bengali with an English keyboard. They will type Bengali words in English script. Accordingly, he started developing the software. At that time, people around Mehdi did not stop mocking him after seeing his ‘madness’.

He was told to quit studying medicine from the medical college. But this talented man with an innovative mindset did not pay heed to this. We got the result of his long hard work and research. From ordinary people to office workers and officers, everyone can type easily with Avro. Mehdi did not stop giving software as a gift. He made a catch line- ‘Let language be free’. The biggest advantage of it is that any language can recognize Avro. For this reason, its acceptance and popularity are the most.

Amar Ekushey (The immortal 21st February) is in our heart and soul. Today, thanks to Avro, you can express your thoughts to your Bengali beloved from Tanzania to Russia, sitting anywhere in the world by writing in pure Bengali. Mehdi Hasan Khan erased this distance. The father of Avro, Mehdi Hasan Khan, holding whose hand the Bengali language has been spread in digital platforms all over the world, is almost forgotten today. The inventor of Avro has neither international recognition nor special recognition. Doctor Mehdi Hasan Khan leads a very simple life. Watching the fruits of his labor spreading everywhere gives him great peace of mind. For this reason, Mehdi Hasan deserves credit on International Mother Language Day. 

Avro’s phonetic keyboard is the most popular and widely used keyboard among all the keyboard layouts used by Bangladeshi internet users for writing Bengali. The main reason for its popularity is that one does not have to memorize the layout like other Bengali keyboard layouts available in the market. For example, if you type ‘Ami bhat khai’, it will be written ‘আমি ভাত খাই’. Therefore, with Avro, anyone can become skilled in Bengali typing at any time by practicing for a couple of minutes. Without Avro, it would not have been possible to write Bengali so easily and in such a short time. With Avro, it is possible to type in Bengali with equal efficiency both online and offline. Another great aspect is that it is absolutely free. You will not have to spend any money. 

What is Avro?

Avro Keyboard is a UNICODE and ANSI supported free and open source Bengali writing software with graphical layout modifier for Microsoft Windows, MacOS, Ubuntu and Linux. With this software, we can write Bengali very easily on the computer. On March 26, 2003, Avro Keyboard software was launched for writing Bengali based on Unicode in Windows.

The literal meaning of Avro is ‘Sky’. Flipping through the pages of dictionary, Mehdi Hasan Khan, who was then an 18-year-old young man, chose this word to name his dream. It will be a free software which everyone will use. This idea motivated him to choose this name.

You must remember that before the launch of Avro Keyboard, Bijoy was the only medium of writing Bengali on the computer. But with the change of technology, the scenario has changed a lot. At present, Avro has occupied the place of Bijoy. Let’s see how long Avro can keep their dominance over Bijoy.