Donald Hall is a critically acclaimed poet, writer and editor. His writing often exemplifies his love for nature and peace. In Double Solitude, Hall gives the reader his perspective on solitude and how his love of it has affected his life. In Double Solitude, Hall is 87 and reflecting on his life and his marriages. This essay was written for people who choose to be alone; to let them know how the solitude that they love will take a toll on them in the long run. Hall effectively conveys this message with a couple of rhetorical strategies. Using repetition and heart-warming irony, Donald Hall lets solitude lovers know how he felt after a life of solitude, in order to prevent them from feeling the same way.
Throughout the essay, Hall uses repetition to draw emphasis to his love of solitude. In the start of the essay, Hall writes, “I spend my days alone… and lie back in the enormous comfort of solitude.” Later after he details his marriage and divorce with his first wife he writes, “For five years I was alone again, but without the comfort of solitude.” Hall’s reiteration of the “comfort of solitude” gives the audience an understanding of how Hall views solitude. His repetition lets his fellow solitude lovers relate to him while it allows other readers to have sympathy for him. After his use of repetition throughout his essay, Hall reveals his purpose with irony. After he tells the reader of the “double solitude” he shared with his second wife Jane, before she died, Hall writes, “Last January I grieved that she would not be beside me as I died.” Hall puts heavy emphasis on the comfort of solitude and then writes that he does not find that comfort in the end, and that he wishes he was with his wife. The ironic shift in Hall’s perspective unveils his purpose and shows his deep regret.
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