“Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard” is a poem composed by Thomas Gray over a period of ten years. Shortly after the death of his close friend Richard West in 1742, "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" was first published in 1751. The use of double meaning in this poem may alienate the intended audience from the theme general of death, mourning, loss. , despair and sadness; however, this poem clearly uses several literary devices to convey the author's feelings about the deaths of his friend Richard West, his beloved mother, his aunt, and those fallen soldiers during the Civil War. This essay will explain how Gray uses this symbolism and dual meaning throughout the poem to convey the inevitability of death, mourning, inner conflict, finding virtue in one's life, facing one's misfortunes, and recognizing those who otherwise would seem insignificant. The poem “Elegy Written in a Country Cemetery” Gray symbolizes death using the method of double meaning. In the opening stanza, Gray states: "The curfew sounds the death knell of the dying day, / The herd wind blows slowly over the meadow, / The plowman goes home slowly, / And leaves the world to darkness and to me” (1-4). The speaker literally observes his surroundings as the day draws to a close, noticing the cows moving slowly on the other side of the mountain peak and a tired plowman returning home, leaving him to gaze into the darkness. However, the underlying connotation of the first stanza is death, which Gray symbolizes through the use of the word "knell." The kneeling is the ringing of a bell at a funeral; therefore, the reader can infer from the first line when Gray states: "Curfew tolls the death knell for the day of departure" (1) it is about being in the middle of a newspaper...... were there and the lives they lived. He wants to recognize those who would otherwise be insignificant compared to someone of stature. Gray ends the elegy by speaking about his own death and how his life compares to that of commoners. He was neither famous nor rich and had lived a life of sorrow and misery. In conclusion, Gray's "Elegy Written in a Country Churchyard" uses symbolism and double meaning throughout the poem to convey the inevitability of death, of mourning, of inner conflict, of discovering virtue in its life, facing one's misfortunes and recognizing those that would otherwise seem insignificant to those of greater stature. Works Cited Gray, Thomas. “Elegy written in a country cemetery.” Masters of British Literature, Vol. A.Ed. David Damrosch and Kevin JH Dettmar. New York: Pearson/Longman, 2008. Print.