The Knight, Death, and the Devil by Randall Jarrell
"The Knight, Death, and the Devil" by Randall Jarrell is a free-verse poem inspired by a 16th-century engraving by Albrecht Dürer. The poem serves as an ekphrastic work, blending verbal description with interpretation of the visual art. It explores the themes of mortality and the human condition through the interactions of three central figures: the knight, Death, and the devil. Jarrell begins by vividly portraying Death, characterized with striking imagery, before shifting focus to the devil, whose grotesque appearance represents temptation and sin. The knight, depicted as a symbol of humanity, navigates a perilous journey with Death ever at his side, while the devil lurks nearby, seeking to lead him astray. The poem's structure carefully alternates between description and thematic exploration, with each choice of focus revealing deeper meanings. Through rich imagery and layered interpretations, Jarrell reflects on the inherent struggles of life, the passage of time, and the constant presence of death and temptation. This work invites readers to contemplate their own journeys in the face of these universal challenges.
The Knight, Death, and the Devil by Randall Jarrell
First published: 1951, in The Seven-League Crutches
Type of poem: Lyric
The Poem
“The Knight, Death, and the Devil” by Randall Jarrell is a carefully organized forty-line free-verse poem inspired by an engraving from the sixteenth century German artist Albrecht Dürer. The poem’s title is the same as the traditional title given to the engraving, but in German it is simply called “Der Reuter,” “The Rider,” making reference to the knight, its central figure.
In anthologies, the two works, one verbal, one visual, are often presented together. Thus the poem is an example of ekphrasis (Greek for “to speak out”), the verbal representation of a visual work of art. Its technique of alternating description and interpretation can be compared with the pure ekphrasis of John Keats’s “Ode on a Grecian Urn,” in which the art object exists solely and wholly in words, and with W. H. Auden’s “Musée des Beaux Arts,” which uses several paintings but centers finally upon Pieter Brueghel the Elder’s Landscape with Fall of Icarus.
In an ekphrastic poem such as Jarrell’s, description of the art object complements interpretation. Indeed, the very choice of what to describe, and in what order and in how much detail, itself constitutes an element of interpretation. Each choice suggests a thematic priority. The titles for the poem and the engraving suggest that first the knight, then Death, and finally the devil will be described, but Jarrell begins with Death (lines 1-8), moves next to the devil (lines 9-20), and concludes with the knight (lines 21-40). Ultimately the poem is about the resolute knight, symbol of all humanity, journeying with Death ever nearby while beset with trials and tribulations from the devil.
Forms and Devices
Jarrell opens with a description of Death “cowhorn-crowned, shockheaded, cornshuck-bearded,” compound adjectives that seek to capture the way Dürer has drawn him. Participles and strings of adjectives throughout the poem mimic a German extended adjective construction, appropriate diction since the inspiration for the poem is a German work of art. As Jarrell likens Death’s scraggly beard to cornshucks, he decides Death is but a “scarecrow” such as one might find in a cornfield, but his head “trimmed with adders,” poisonous snakes, is sinister nevertheless.
The artist has placed Death upon a pale horse that, Jarrell notes, “crops herbs beside a skull,” evidence of Death’s work. The pale horse is dictated by a biblical passage, Revelation 6:8. The skull and other imagery in the engraving suggest to the poet metaphors for the brevity of life. For example, in the engraving, Death holds up “the crossed cones of time,” an hourglass filled with sand. Death is “warning” the knight that his time is running out. Indeed, the sands of time “narrowing into now, the Past and Future/ Are quicksand” that will trap the knight, symbol of all humanity.
With a line break, Jarrell shifts his attention to the devil, but he does not name him until line 19. He is “the hoofed pikeman [who] trots behind,” for as the Book of Revelation says, “There was Death on a pale horse, and Hades [the devil] followed close behind.” In the engraving, the devil’s hoof might easily be mistaken for a horse’s hoof, but Jarrell carefully notes its owner.
Unmentioned in the poem but clearly visible in the engraving is a salamander that the artist has drawn near the devil’s hoof. Fabled for its ability to survive flames, the creature is an emblem of the virtuous soul shunning hellfire. Jarrell’s attention, however, is focused not on the salamander but on the hideousness of the devil’s appearance, his horn which is a “soaring crescent,” his “great limp ears,” the dangling “dewlap bunched at his breast,” and something like “a ram’s horn wound/ Beneath each ear.” The devil “leers up” at the knight, “joyless, vile, in meek obscenity.” Jarrell takes the poem beyond the picture as he says of the devil “Flesh to flesh, he bleats/ The herd back to the pit of being.” The phrase “flesh to flesh” suggests that the body is most vulnerable to the devil’s attack. Sins of the flesh are his delight. Like some diabolical ram he leads his sheep, docile humanity, into sin. Thus he is the antithesis of Christ, who leads his sheep away from hell, “the pit of being,” and who perhaps is symbolized by the “sheep-dog.”
Bibliography
Burt, Stephen. Randall Jarrell and His Age. New York: Columbia University Press, 2003.
Chappell, Fred. “The Indivisible Presence of Randall Jarrell.” North Carolina Literary Review 1, no. 1 (Summer, 1992): 8-13.
Cyr, Marc D. “Randall Jarrell’s Answerable Style: Revision of Elegy in ’The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner.’” Texas Studies in Literature and Language 46, no. 1 (Spring, 2004): 92-106.
Flynn, Richard. Randall Jarrell and the Lost World of Childhood. Athens: University of Georgia Press, 1990.
Hammer, Langdon. “Who Was Randall Jarrell?” Yale Review 79 (1990): 389-405.
Jarrell, Mary. Remembering Randall: A Memoir of Poet, Critic, and Teacher Randall Jarrell. New York: HarperCollins, 1999.
Pritchard, William. Randall Jarrell: A Literary Life. New York: Farrar, 1990.
Quinn, Sr. Bernetta. Randall Jarrell. Boston: Twayne, 1981.