Elizabeth Bishop’s “One Art,” first published in The New Yorker in 1976, is a poem that has fascinated readers and scholars for decades. It addresses the themes of loss, control, and the emotional complexities of accepting impermanence in life. At its core, the poem is a meditation on the nature of loss, framed within the structure of a villanelle, a highly rigid and formal poetic form. In this article, we will explore why Elizabeth Bishop chose the villanelle as the structure for “One Art” and how this decision enhances the thematic concerns of the poem.
1. The Villanelle: A Brief Overview
Before delving into Bishop’s decision to use the villanelle, it is essential to understand the structure of the form itself. The villanelle is a 19-line poem consisting of five tercets (three-line stanzas) followed by a final quatrain (four-line stanza). Its distinctive feature is the repeated refrains, where the first and third lines of the first tercet are alternately repeated as the final lines of the succeeding stanzas. These refrains come together in the final quatrain, completing the structure.
The strictness of the villanelle’s form offers both a challenge and an opportunity for poets. While the constraints of the structure might seem limiting, they also force the poet to engage with repetition, balance, and control. The tension between these rigid rules and the content of the poem is what makes the villanelle a particularly evocative form for exploring themes of obsession, loss, and the limits of human control.
2. Loss as a Central Theme in “One Art”
At the heart of “One Art” lies the theme of loss. Bishop addresses the idea of losing something or someone—a theme that permeates much of her poetry. The title itself, “One Art,” suggests that Bishop sees the act of losing as an art, something that can be mastered, honed, and performed. But, as the poem unfolds, it becomes evident that the poet’s relationship to loss is much more complicated than simple mastery.
The art of losing isn’t hard to master;
so many things seem filled with the intent
to be lost that their loss is no disaster.
The repetition of the refrain, “The art of losing isn’t hard to master,” provides a sense of control and resignation, implying that loss is an inevitable part of life. The phrase itself reflects a certain intellectualization of loss, as if the speaker is attempting to reduce its emotional weight by making it an “art”—something practiced and understood. The refrain, however, also carries an ironic tone, suggesting that while the speaker might claim that loss is easy to master, the emotional impact is far more profound and unmanageable.
3. The Villanelle as a Formal Structure for Control
Bishop’s choice to write “One Art” as a villanelle is directly linked to her exploration of control, which is a central theme in the poem. The villanelle’s rigid form reflects the speaker’s desire for control over the unpredictable nature of loss. At first, the repeated refrains suggest a sense of mastery over the experience of losing. The speaker claims to have “mastered” loss, suggesting a facade of control that quickly unravels as the poem progresses.
However, as the poem continues, the speaker’s tone becomes more desperate and vulnerable. What begins as an intellectual exercise in loss becomes an emotional reckoning with the complexity of human attachment and grief. The form’s repetitive nature mirrors the cycle of attempts at denial and the gradual unraveling of this illusion of control.
For example, as the poem progresses, the speaker moves from trivial losses (such as losing keys or a watch) to more significant, existential losses. The refrain “The art of losing isn’t hard to master” begins to lose its initial confidence and increasingly sounds more like a defense mechanism. In the final lines of the poem, the speaker acknowledges a devastating personal loss, and the refrain takes on a completely different resonance:
Even losing you (the joking voice, a gesture
I love) I shan’t have lied. It’s evident
the art of losing’s not too hard to master
though it may look like (Write it!) like disaster.
In this final moment, the rigid structure of the villanelle—once a symbol of control—becomes a way of containing the emotional chaos of loss. The structure no longer provides reassurance, but instead, it reveals the depth of the speaker’s emotional unraveling. The juxtaposition of the repetitive form with the increasingly personal nature of the loss reflects the tension between the speaker’s intellectual claim to mastery and the reality of the emotional experience.
4. The Role of Repetition in “One Art”
Repetition plays a key role in both the form of the villanelle and the thematic content of “One Art.” In a villanelle, the refrains are repeated at regular intervals, creating a sense of cyclical movement. This repetition mirrors the psychological process of grappling with loss, where the mind circles back to the same painful thoughts, even as the speaker tries to convince herself that loss is something manageable.
The refrain “The art of losing isn’t hard to master” acts as a mantra, a repeated assertion of control. But as the poem progresses, the speaker’s repeated insistence on this mantra becomes increasingly hollow. The refrain is no longer a source of comfort, but rather a reminder of the emotional gap between intellectual understanding and emotional experience.
Furthermore, the repeated refrain draws attention to the tension between intellectual knowledge and emotional truth. The speaker knows, on some level, that loss is inevitable, but she cannot quite reconcile that knowledge with the pain of actual loss. The artifice of the repeated refrain becomes a way of masking the deeper, unspoken grief that the poem ultimately reveals.
5. The Emotional Unraveling of the Speaker
One of the most powerful aspects of “One Art” is the way the speaker’s emotional unraveling is mirrored in the form of the villanelle. While the speaker begins with a tone of detachment and control, the increasingly personal nature of the losses described in the poem—culminating in the loss of a loved one—shatters this sense of control. The repeated refrains, rather than providing structure or stability, underscore the growing emotional turbulence that the speaker experiences.
In the final stanza, the refrain “The art of losing’s not too hard to master” takes on an almost desperate tone. The speaker implores herself to “write it” as if to affirm that she can endure this loss, but the act of writing it down only makes the loss more real, more final. The form, which had once seemed like an expression of mastery, now reveals the emotional cost of trying to control the uncontrollable.
This shift in tone—from intellectual assertion to emotional collapse—is made all the more poignant by the form itself. The villanelle’s repetition mirrors the obsessive thinking that accompanies grief. The speaker’s attempt to master the art of losing becomes increasingly futile as the poem progresses, culminating in the realization that some losses cannot be mastered, only endured.
6. The Villanelle as a Poetic Challenge
Bishop’s use of the villanelle can also be seen as a response to the inherent challenge of writing a poem about loss. The villanelle, with its repetitive refrains and rigid structure, offers a paradoxical tension between form and content. The content of “One Art” is deeply emotional, dealing with the painful reality of loss, while the form itself is highly controlled, even mechanical. This tension between the emotional content and the formal constraints mirrors the speaker’s struggle to reconcile her intellectual understanding of loss with the emotional reality of experiencing it.
By choosing the villanelle, Bishop acknowledges that while loss is an inevitable and universal part of human life, it is also a deeply personal and complex experience. The rigidity of the form may seem to imply control, but as the poem unfolds, it becomes clear that control is an illusion in the face of profound grief.
Conclusion
In conclusion, Elizabeth Bishop’s decision to write “One Art” as a villanelle is both a formal and thematic choice that deepens the emotional impact of the poem. The repetition of the refrains, inherent in the villanelle’s structure, mirrors the psychological process of dealing with loss, and the tension between form and content highlights the complexity of this experience. What begins as a confident assertion of control ultimately unravels into an acknowledgment of the limits of human agency in the face of loss.
By using the villanelle, Bishop enhances the thematic exploration of loss as something that cannot be fully mastered or understood, no matter how much one tries to control or intellectualize it. In the end, the villanelle becomes not just a structure for the poem, but a metaphor for the process of coming to terms with the inevitable and often painful realities of life.
