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aspire

Verb
Pronunciation

Understanding ARPABET Pronunciation

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The pronunciation guide uses the ARPABET phonetic system—the same system used in speech recognition and text-to-speech applications.

Vowel Examples:
AE1 = cat, bat
EH1 = bed, head
IY1 = see, me
OW1 = go, boat
UW1 = boot, do
Stress Numbers:
0 = no stress (unstressed)
1 = primary stress (loud)
2 = secondary stress (medium)
Example:
AH0 TH IY1 N AH0
= a-THEE-na (Athena)

The stressed syllable (marked with 1) is pronounced louder and clearer than others.

Quick Definition

To strive toward a high goal or elevated state; implies ambition and upward motion, often used in poetry to convey noble ambition, spiritual yearning, or the pursuit of excellence.

Detailed Definition
Here, "aspire" means to soar upward, as a bird or winged being might. Blake’s use gives the line a lofty, almost mythic tone, and the verb is more elevated than its everyday sense of simply wanting something.
Example
Example in poetry:
“On what wings dare he aspire?” makes aspire mean to rise toward an ambition or ideal; John Milton’s Satan declares, “To reign is worth ambition though in Hell”; Percy Shelley’s “To a Skylark” turns upward flight into an emblem of poetic aspiration; in contemporary poetry, a speaker may aspire not to glory but to survival, justice, or connection
Additional Notes
In this line, "aspire" is used in an older, more elevated sense of rising upward, which may not be the first meaning readers think of.; Found in the poem, The Tyger by William Blake
Also Known As
yearn strive seek
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