Symbols, Imagery, Wordplay
Speaker
This guy's a total stud. Or at least he used to be. Now he's having a bit of a dry spell, and his dance card has gone empty, so to speak. But why?Well, he seems a bit smitten with one woman in part...
Setting
The speaker tells us straight up, hey everyone, we're in "my chamber" (2). So there's no doubt about it, were in this dude's bedroom, where, we have to say, there is an awful lot going on. Or at le...
Sound Check
If you took a peek at our "Form and Meter" section, or heck, even if you've just read the poem, you're already well aware of the rhymes in this poem. The end of every single line has a partner in r...
What's Up With the Title?
The title of the poem, "They Flee from Me," is also the first line of the poem. Of course when we first read it, we're not sure who "they" are, and why they're fleeing from our speaker, but don't w...
Calling Card
Thomas Wyatt is kind of a big deal: he's often credited with introducing the sonnet into English (a 14-line poem). Why? Well, he translated the Italian poet Petrarch's famous sonnets into English....
Tough-o-Meter
"They Flee from Me" has some weird words ("therewith," "newfangleness") and sometimes the sentences are odd, but that's expected in something that's over four hundred years old! It is a bit confusi...
Trivia
Wyatt was once accused of having an affair with Anne Boleyn, Henry VIII's second wife. Talk about a scandal. (Source.)While imprisoned in the tower of London on suspicion of adultery, Wyatt may hav...
Steaminess Rating
"They Flee from Me" is a pretty sexy poem. A girl's dress falls off, the speaker mentions that he has had women over for some late night fun at least twenty times, and he even complains that the gi...