Joseph Addison's The vision of Mirza

1. Rowel R. Piloton

3. • Addison was born on 1
May 1672 in
Milston, Wiltshire
• Was an English
essayist, poet, playwright
and politician
• He was educated
at Charterhouse
School, where he first met
Richard Steele, and at The
Queen's College, Oxford.
• Died at Holand House on
17 June 1719

4. Was a man of
cheerful and
amiable disposition.
He was a master of
the art of living with
his fellowmen. He
set himself to strip
off the mask of vice,
to show ugliness
with all its
deformity, and to
reveal the truth
with all its
loveliness.
Joseph Addison (1672-1719)

5. In April 1709, his childhood friend,
Richard Steele, started “The Tatler”.
Adisson inspired him to write this essay.
Adisson contributed 42 essays while
Steele wrote 188.
In The Spectator, Adisson soon became
the leading partner. He contributed 274
essays out a total of 555; Steele wrote
236 for this periodical.

7. Genre
Essay
An essay is generally a short piece of
writing written from an author's
personal point of view, but the
definition is vague, overlapping with
those of an article, a pamphlet and
a short story.

8. Point of View
First Person Point of View:
…The Sound of it was exceeding sweet, and
wrought into a Variety of Tunes that were
inexpressibly melodious, and altogether
different from any thing I had ever heard.
They put me in mind of those heavenly Airs
that are played to the departed Souls of good
Men upon their first Arrival in Paradise, to
wear out the Impressions of their last
Agonies, and qualify them for the Pleasures of
that happy Place. My Heart melted away in
secret Raptures….

9. Literary Devices
Symbolism
…I see vultures, harpies, ravens,
cormorants, and among many other
feathered creatures… …These,'
said the Genius, ` are Envy, Avarice,
Suspicion, Despair, Love, with the like
cares and passions that infest human
life.'

10. Allegory
Is a literary device in which characters
or events in a literary, visual, or
musical art for represents or
symbolize ideas and concepts.
Literary Devices

11. Vocabulary
habit
-clothes
rapture
- a feeling of great happiness or excitement
haunt
-favourite place
apprehension
-a feeling of worry; anxiety
hobble
-walk lamely

12. Summary
The speaker in the essay, “The Vision of
Mirza”, is having a conversation with a
genius man who was playing a musical
instrument up the mountain. At first, the
speaker was alone in the mountain, until
he heard a man playing an instrument. His
music was so sweet that the speaker was
attracted to it and went to see the player
of that instrument. As the speaker sees
him, the genius man told him to sit in a top
of a high rock.

13. Summary
The genius tells the speaker to tell him
what he sees. And the speaker answered
that he sees a valley with a tide of water.
The genius man tells him what is the
meaning of the valley and the tide of
water. The valley he saw is the Valley of
Misery while the tide of water is a part of a
great tide of eternity. The tide the speaker
saw rises out of a thick mist in one end and
loses itself in a thick mist at one end.

14. Summary
Then the genius man told the speaker
to look closer and tell him what other
things he sees. The speaker saw a
bridge used by the people to cross the
tide of water. And the genius man
explained that the bridge he saw is the
human life. That bridge was once so
strong but when a great flood hit it,
the bridge became weak.

15. Summary
Now, the people crossing it are
experiencing a hard time to prevent the
fragile parts of the bridge. Most of the
people fall down the bridge and are
drowned In the tide off water. Only small
number of people is able to cross that
bridge safely. There were different kinds of
bird that are hovering about the bridge
which represent the unusual factors that
infest human life.

16. Short Analysis
The Vision of Mirza by Joseph
Addison is a vision of paradise given
to him by a flute-playing genie. It
consists of mansions on green
islands. Some make it to these
islands, others fall (or are pushed)
into the sea.

17. Source:
http://www.bartleby.com/27/5.htm
l
https://www.google.com.ph/?gfe_r
d=ctrl&ei=8jAoU62OOMeQiAe9vYD
4BA&gws_rd=cr#q=the+vision+of+
mirza&safe=active