APUNTES CURSO COMPLETO POESIA SINCE 1950, Apuntes de Poesía

¡Descarga APUNTES CURSO COMPLETO POESIA SINCE 1950 y más Apuntes en PDF de Poesía solo en Docsity! POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 1 POSTMODERN POETRY CONFESSIONAL POETRY The term ―confessional‖ was first used by M. L. Rosenthal looking over Robert Lowell‘s fourth book, Life Studies in 1959. The reviewer described Lowell as moving beyond what other poets had engaged in when it came to sharing one‘s emotions and experiences. The poems, Rosenthal stated, read as personal confidences. Readers connected with Lowell‘s desire to engage personally. He broke through the barriers of the traditional, idealized poetic figure and became an individual, one of a kind and relatable to those who sought out his work. Life Studies served as more than just a conduit for the creation of the term ―confessional‖ though. It changed the face of poetry and influenced some of the major writers of the budding movement, such as Anne Sexton and Sylvia Plath. Prior to its solidification in the late 1950s, poets such as John Berryman and Delmore Schwartz were writing works that are now considered as confessional poems. The former, Berryman, compiled a collection of sonnets that described his own infidelity. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 2 ROBERT LOWELL THE QUAKER GRAVEYARD IN NANTUCKET The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket was first published in Lowell‘s 1946 collection Lord Weary’s Castle. Since then it has become quite popular and influential. The volume was Lowell‘s second book of poetry and was awarded the Pulitzer Prize for Poetry in 1947. The fairly long and complicated poem explores themes of human existence, religion, and natural elements. SUMMARY OF THE QUAKER GRAVEYARD IN NANTUCKET ‗The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket‘ by Robert Lowell is a very complex and allusion-heavy poem that describes the sea, divine force, and corruption. Throughout the seven sections of the poem, the poet depicts the power of the ocean and humanity‘s inability to exert any kind of control over it. This is seen through the life and death of Ahab‘s crew, the explosion at sea of a special naval vessel in the first lines, as well as the various images of the waves and wind, scattered throughout the lines. The poet also brings in images of a graveyard that acts as a memorial site for many of the men who died at sea. There are numerous allusions to God and religion throughout. These include passages from the Bible. STRUCTURE OF THE QUAKER GRAVEYARD IN NANTUCKET ‗The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket‘ by Robert Lowell is a seven-part poem that is divided into stanzas of varying lengths. The shortest is ten lines long and can be found in sections four and six. The longest are twenty-six and twenty-four lines and are found in sections one and three. The rhyme and meter in the poem is somewhat scattered. The lines vary in length and use different rhyme schemes in their sections and stanzas. For example, the first lines of the first section rhyme ABCBCA. This pattern shifts slightly in the second section but maintains a feeling of rhyme throughout. In regards to the meter, Lowell switches between using iambs and trochees where either the first beat of a metrical foot is stressed or unstressed. A reader should also take note of the epigraph and dedication that come before the first stanza of ‗The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket‘. The dedication reads: FOR WARREN WINSLOW, DEAD AT SEA. This refers to Warren Winslow, Lowell‘s cousin who drowned at sea. He was part of a naval crew, all of whom died in an explosion. The epigraph, or the brief statement, quote or reference that comes before the poem text, reads: Let man have dominion over the fishes of the sea and the fowls of the air and the beasts of the whole earth, and every creeping creature that moveth upon the earth. This is an excerpt from the Bible, specifically Genesis 1:26. It is interesting to consider the contrast between Warren‘s death at sea and this statement that human beings supposedly have control over everything. LITERARY DEVICES IN THE QUAKER GRAVEYARD IN NANTUCKET Lowell makes use of several literary devices in ‗The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket‘. These include but are not limited to alliteration, enjambment, and allusion. The latter is one of the most important. It is used POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 5 his wives. All of these references create a dark and dreary image of the ocean that is hell-bent on causing the deaths of as many men as possible. The ocean is quite vast, the speaker suggests in the fourth and fifth lines of the section. It stretches all the way to Spain. There are endless possibilities and dangers waiting within it. There are several examples of alliteration in these lines with words such as ―blast― and bilge‖ and ―backwash,‖ as well as ―royal― and ―rock―. Lowell continues to paint an image of the sea describing the fishing boats, the ―warships―, and the deity- like power of the sea. The speaker suggests that the waves in the wind are only tools of a higher power used to beat down and control human beings. Time is personified in these lines as well. Lines 15-24 Lowell‘s speaker suggests that the Quaker sailors lost something, likely their lives but there is also something even deeper and more metaphorical at work. The sailors are described as ―childish‖. They are from a time in which things were simpler and people did not understand the full power of the natural world. There is an interesting transition in the seventeenth line of the section when the speaker describes the ―monster―. He refers to it as ―IS―. The whale is compared in a religious metaphor to Christ. It too came from a higher power. There‘s an interesting bit of dialogue at the edge of the section where the speaker relays the words of the Quakers who drowned. God, they think, is on their side because they were given time to praise him before the Atlantic rose up and took them. There is another allusion in the section to Psalm 124 where the line ―if the Lord had not been on our side‖ is found. PART IV Lines 1-10 Section IV of ‗The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket‘ is twenty lines long. The graveyard is brought back into the poem again and the speaker describes how the whaling industry came to an end. He speaks on the ―whale / who spilled Nantucket bones on the thrashed swell― is one aspect of what‘s responsible. The speaker also comes back to talking about Moby Dick. The ship is mentioned again, as is the general premise of the story, and the sailor‘s desire to pursue the whale. He does not describe them as being overly intelligent and seems to believe that it was foolish of them to embark on this quest. There is a good example of enjambment between the end of the first stanza of part four and the beginning of the second stanza in part four. The speaker describes again how the seagulls are wailing and mourning this time to see rather than dead sailors. It appears vulnerable, much more so than it was previously. The tide is flowing out and getting low. The sea is decreasing, perhaps the reason for the morning. Lines 11-20 The creatures of the sea are dying, including the crabs. The poet describes a ―death rattle―, the noise that a living thing makes right before it dies. The poet uses the phrase ―this is the end― for the third time in line eighty-five of this poem. This alludes to the theme of death which is run throughout the entire poem as well as the end of the whaling industry which so marked societal and cultural norms in this area of the eastern United States. It should be considered as a symbol for a specific end, rather than a larger into the water itself. There is an interesting use of alliteration and a half room at the end of the stanza with the phrase ―mast lashed master of leviathans―. The short phrase is a bit of a tongue twister and alludes to leviathans, large sea monsters from the Bible, and Odysseus from Homer‘s Odyssey. The latter was tied to a ship, to the mass, in order to save him from the calling sirens. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 6 PART V Lines 1-10 The fifth section of ‗The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket‘ begins with more imagery related to a whale. This time the whale‘s innards or its guts are the central image. The guts are spilling into the sea, as they did in Moby Dick. They are used as an image of darkness and dirty corruption overrunning the world. The speaker raises the question of who‘s fault this is. The whale‘s, the crew for killing the world, the sea, the sea deities? Lowell mentions his cousin and the drowned sailors of the past and uses another metaphor that depicts a fight against man‘s lesser nature. The imagery and atmosphere of the poem continue to jump around from emotions that pity the whale, pity to sea, and the sailors. In the next lines and speaker references the valley of judgment, in Hebrew, the Jehoshaphat. There in the valley, men are butchering the corpse of a whale. This is something that they‘re going to have to stand judgment for. Lines 11-18 The lines are fairly graphic as they describe ripping the ―sperm whale‘s midriff into rags― and the blubber spilling into the wind and weather. There is a plea for forgiveness and salvation at the end of the poem that again depicts the world or something of a diety. These lines also refer to ―Jonas Messias‖ and the story of Christ being stabbed in the side with a spear. PART VI Lines 1-10 The setting changes in the second to the last section of ‗The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket‘. Now, the speaker is located in a shrine in Norfolk, England. They are, the speaker describes how the penitent ones came and took off their shoes begging for forgiveness. The setting is much more pleasant than the previous description of the butchered whale. It‘s quiet, the violent sea that was the focus of the poem up until now has disappeared. The same people who are coming seeking God, or compared to ―cows― through a simile. They are being led, herded as if animals to make a pilgrimage to the shrine. When they get there, they are temporarily distracted from the problems that brought them there. They are made glad by this ―castle of God―. The sailor is able to find peace in this place as well. He‘s whistling the tune about ―Sion,‖ referenced in Psalms 2:6. Lines 11-20 There is also a statue of a lady described in the section. She‘s not especially attractive but she is as peaceful as the rest of the scene. Line one hundred and twenty-two of the poem is in Latin. It reads ―Neither form nor comeliness―. This is a reference to the statue of the woman in the previous lines in her expressionless face. The woman‘s face is unreadable, one cannot tell what she‘s thinking. She‘s found something that is not revealed to anyone else. It is something that can only be discovered in Heaven. She is privy to a secret of God– ―what God knows―. Despite the fact that this secret cannot be discovered, people continue to come to the shrine seeking it out. The seeking is similar to the way that the crew of Ahab‘s continues to seek out the whale. PART VII POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 7 Lines 1-8 The final section of ‗The Quaker Graveyard in Nantucket‘ begins with a description of a cenotaph or an empty tomb. This darker imagery immediately informs the reader that we are back to where things were before, in the spooky cemetery. The landscape is dark, the trees are creaking and the destroyed ship is bobbing ―on the untimely stroke― of the Atlantic. The seawater is filled with an explosion of fish and guts in addition to the dead sailors. The water also contains the monsters, as referenced previously with the word ―leviathan―. The corrupted waters are one of the most prominent symbols in this poem. They are again representing the larger corruption of the world and raise the question of who caused it and who is now responsible for its rectification. Lines 9-17 The speaker continues to spend time describing the various elements of a landscape including the wind. He uses religious imagery to emphasize each description. He says that mankind was formed from the ―Sea‘s slime―. This is the first reference to the fact that the sea and mankind have a kinship that should not be denied. The final lines allude to the great flood which was depicted in the Bible. It is God‘s will who lives and dies at sea. Those who choose to battle that which they cannot triumph over or doomed to failure, an allusion to the crew of the doomed ship in Moby Dick. MEMORIES FROM WEST STREET AND LEPKE Throughout the poem, Lowell creates powerful images of his past. These range from his fresh, laundered pyjamas to his daughter‘s clothes and the death of a fellow prisoner. Readers are confronted with a great deal in ‗Memories of West Street and Lepke‘ and it is helpful to read the poem at least twice to get to the heart of it. SUMMARY ‗Memories of West Street and Lepke‘ by Robert Lowell is an image-filled poem in which Lowell depicts his time in prison as a conscience objector. In the first lines of ‗Memories of West Street and Lepke,‘ Lowell depicts his home in Boston where he works as a professor. This leads him to reminiscence about his time in prison for objecting to serving in the Second World War. He alludes to a letter he wrote to President Roosevelt and what it was like to be in the ―bull pen‖ before being convicted to one year and a day in prison. The second half of the poem focuses on this period in his life and the people he met. These included Bioff and Brown, two men imprisoned for extortion, and Lepke, the mob boss of Murder Incorporated. Despite spending a great deal of time going into details about his life, what he saw around him in prison, and more, Lowell‘s speaker (who is likely Lowell himself) does not pass judgment on any of these things. They are simply statements of the past and what the world used to be like for him and others. THEMES In ‗Memories of West Street and Lepke‘ the poet engages with themes of memories/the past as well as wealth/poverty. The latter is connected to the kind of life that Lowell lives in Boston, how his life changed in prison and the economic disparity between the prisoners (such as Lepke who has a great deal in his cell he‘s not supposed to have). It is also important to note the allusion to the walls wealth creates in the first lines when the poet speaks about the man outside his Boston home. As the speaker looks back POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 10 In the second and third verse paragraphs, Lowell presents satiric vignettes of the institution‘s ―thoroughbred mental cases‖: Stanley, the former Harvard all-American with ―kingly granite profile in a crimson golf-cap‖; and ―Bobbie,‖ the ―roly-poly,‖ swashbuckling member of Harvard‘s Porcellian club. Lowell portrays himself in the poem‘s final verse paragraph as a strutting ―Cock of the walk‖ only to discover in ―the metal shaving mirrors‖ a reflection, not of himself, but of his own ―shaky future‖ in the ―pinched, indigenous faces‖ of his older companions. Wedged between the vignettes of other mental patients and Lowell‘s self-portrait is the next-to-last verse paragraph in which the poet presents the contrasting Roman Catholic attendants (who attend Boston University instead of Harvard). For this segment, at least, the poet assumes their perspective (―hours and hours go by under the crew haircuts‖). Even when Lowell seems to judge these nonaristocratic interlopers and their ―slightly too little nonsensical bachelor twinkle,‖ the reader may find their seriousness and intellectualism (with the ―B. U. sophomore‖ dozing over literary theorist I. A. Richards‘s 1923 The Meaning of Meaning) superior to the backward-looking antics of the ―Mayflower screwballs.‖ The poem concludes with Lowell‘s resigned assessment of his social class, and himself in particular, as ―ossified‖ artifacts unable to change even through self-destruction: ―We are all old-timers,/ each of us holds a locked razor.‖ FORMS AND DEVICES Lowell uses a cluster of metaphors to achieve both of his purposes in ―Waking in the Blue.‖ These purposes are his desire to ―confess,‖ through the therapy of his poetry, his terror about insanity and his suicidal tendencies, and his critique of New England social pretense. The central cluster of metaphors functions as a metaphysical conceit. Throughout the poem, Lowell extends the metaphor of the asylum as an ocean and its inmates as either sea animals—a seal and a sperm whale—or crew members ―swashbuckling‖ or strutting in ―turtle-necked French sailor‘s jersey‖ aboard a ship. In this surrealistic network of images, the blue outside the institution‘s window makes bleaker the agony of the oceanic asylum. Despite Lowell‘s attempts to console himself with the confident swaggering sailor-figure, he identifies with the seal and whale confined within the claustrophobic blue. This anxiety is most explicit at the poem‘s beginning when, according to the logic of the conceit, he becomes a whale waiting to be a harpoonist‘s victim: ―My heart grows tense/ as though a harpoon were sparring for the kill.‖ This same anxiety resurfaces as a fear of impotent self-destruction at the end of the poem when the harpoon is transformed into the ―locked razor‖ that ―each of us holds.‖ The same extended metaphor of sea animals swimming in the ocean and seamen swaggering above it introduces Lowell‘s critique of Bostonians circulating in a common blue-blood milieu. A related cluster of images allows the poet to make his social commentary more explicit. Lowell uses a number of images of corpulence—―a ramrod/ with the muscle of a seal‖; ―redolent and roly-poly as a sperm whale‖; ―After a hearty New England breakfast,/ I weigh two hundred pounds‖—to suggest aristocratic satiety. These images and an accumulation of mineral images—―the petrified fairway,‖ ―A kingly granite profile,‖ ―metal shaving mirrors,‖ ―a locked razor‖—anticipate Lowell‘s claim that ―These victorious figures of bravado ossified young.‖ In ―Waking in the Blue,‖ Lowell asks, ―What use is my sense of humor?‖ The answer is that Lowell (much like Sylvia Plath and John Berryman) uses humor throughout the poem as a defense against the confusion and terror evoked by such painful memories. Lowell includes absurdly incongruous details to mask his terror and save himself from his own confessions, juxtaposing Stanley‘s ―kingly granite profile‖ with his ―crimson golf-cap,‖ and ―Bobbie‘s‖ Louis XVI appearance with his swashbuckling dance in his ―birthday suit.‖ POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 11 Lowell also uses an unexpected rhyming couplet in the first verse paragraph for comic effect: ―My heart grows tense/ as though a harpoon were sparring for the kill./ (This is the house for the ‗mentally ill.‘)‖ The pairing of ―kill‖ and ―mentally ill‖ lends the final line a comically macabre, almost camp, effect. Significantly, this comic use of rhyme occurs in the verse paragraph that contains Lowell‘s most concentrated use of other formal techniques such as assonance (―Azure,‖ ―agonized,‖ ―Absence‖) and alliteration (―blue‖ and ―bleaker‖; and ―heart,‖ ―harpoon,‖ and ―house‖). It is at this moment in the poem when Lowell directly reveals the agony that underlies the rest of the poem, that such formal defense mechanisms are necessary. SKUNK HOUR ‗Skunk Hour‘ by Robert Lowell was written in 1957 and published in the volume, Life Studies, one of Lowell‘s most important poetic works. The poem is made up of eight sestets, or six-line stanzas. These stanzas do not conform to a particular rhyme scheme, but there are moments of internal rhyme a reader might notice. For instance, Lowell chose to repeat the ‗-ill‘ sound a number of times within the text. It appears throughout all eight stanzas, ranging from ―village‖ to ―filled.‖ Before reading this piece one should take note of the dedication which appears alongside the original text, it reads: for Elizabeth Bishop Elizabeth Bishop was an American poet and short story writer born in 1911. She is the author of ‗The Armadillo,‘ a piece that inspired Lowell to write ‗Skunk Hour.‘ Lowell dedicates his poem to her as a way of respecting her remarkable poetic works and her contribution to his own development as a writer. An identical inscription, this time directed toward Lowell, appears at the beginning of ‗Armadillo.‘ The two maintained a close friendship throughout their lives, despite the fact they rarely saw one another. You can read the full poem here. SUMMARY OF SKUNK HOUR ‗Skunk Hour‘ by Robert Lowell describes a speaker‘s fascination with a Maine town and the secret night- time activities he participates in. The poem begins with the speaker describing a number of the town‘s residents. There is a ―hermit heiress.‖ Her son is a bishop and her farmer is the first selectman of the town. The detail present at the start of the poem gives way to a more emotional and personal take on the town in the second half. Lowell‘s speaker describes how he spends his nights on the top of a hill looking for lovers in cars. He is seeking out some kind of gratification he cannot get in his normal life. These lines are dark, depressing, and full of deep feelings of loneliness. The poem concludes with the ―skunk hour.‖ This is a time in which the skunks prowl the streets of the town seeking out something to eat. He relates his own feelings to their need to search, find, and satisfy themselves. ANALYSIS OF SKUNK HOUR STANZA ONE In the first stanza of this piece the speaker begins by placing the events to come within one particular setting, ―Nautilus Island.‖ This is a real island in Penobscot Bay, Maine. It is part of the town of POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 12 Brooksville. The speaker will carry the reader through a number of different descriptions of residents of this area in the poem‘s eight stanzas. The first person who enters into the story is the ―hermit / heiress.‖ This strange combination of words is intriguing. It paints an image of a woman who was an ―heiress,‖ or inheritor of a great deal of money, but has chosen to live as a hermit. She has set aside what luck has given her. This character ―still lives…in her Spartan cottage.‖ From this line, one is able to determine that the woman has lived in this place for a great deal of time. One can also assume the speaker has been here before and knows the area well. He is comfortable enough with the place to state that the woman‘s sheep are still grazing in the same field ―above the sea.‖ The son of the old ―hermit heiress‖ is a ―bishop.‖ He has also chosen a simple life, but one more closely connected to society. There is also a ―farmer‖ living in the area who works on the woman‘s farm. He is described as being the ―first selectman‖ in the speaker‘s village. The ―Selectmen‖ are a governing body in many towns in New England. STANZA TWO In the second stanza, the woman‘s life is further defined. She is has a constant thirst for, the hierarchic privacy of Queen Victoria’s century The woman is old enough to remember, or at least have respect for, the Victorian era. She misses the way life was then. It was likely simpler and easier to understand. These are things that clearly suit the woman‘s personality. In the second half of this section, the speaker describes how the woman has been ―buy[ing] up all / the eyesores facing her shore.‖ With the money she inherited and never did anything with, she is buying properties across the water from her cottage. She sees them as being ugly eyesores. Through her purchase of them, she is able to let them ―fall‖ to pieces. Eventually, they will be gone and she won‘t have to look at them. STANZA THREE The speaker takes a step away from the story of the hermit to discuss the general progression of time in this area of Maine. As the season changes from summer to fall the ―millionaire‖ is lost. This is a reference to someone who lives on the island only during the summer months, leaving when it starts to get colder. The ―millionaire‖ is predictably dressed as if from an ―L.L. Bean / catalogue. In the following lines, the speaker mentions the millionaire‘s ―nine-knot yawl.‖ A yawl is a sailing craft often used by commercial fishermen. In this case, the millionaire had a version that was ―auctioned off to the lobstermen‖ after he left. The changing of the seasons is also marked by the ―red fox stain‖ over―Blue Hill.‖ This vague description is a complicated way to describe the reddening of the leaves in another area of the state, Blue Hill. STANZA FOUR POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 15 line two of the first stanza as well as ―ladders‖ and ―lysol‖ in stanza two. These examples help to increase the rhythm and rhyme in a poem, especially when that poem is written in free verse. Enjambment is another important technique in this poem. Its seen a few times as the poet cuts off lines before their conclusion and creates a new stanza or line. For example, the transition between lines three and four of the first stanza and lines three and four of the second stanza. Clearly, imagery is crucial in ‗The Colossus‘. Plath is known for crafting complex, moving images that are equally beautiful as they are disturbing. This poem is no exception. One of the best examples comes from the last stanza with the lines: ― Counting the red stars and those of plum-color. / The sun rises under the pillar of your tongue‖. ANALYSIS, STANZA BY STANZA STANZA ONE In the first lines of the poem the speaker addresses ―you,‖ the Colossus of Rhodes. She alludes to the statues destruction and the fact that never again will it be returned to the state it was in previously. The pieces are scattered and glue certainly won‘t do the job. The speaker is very aware that she‘s only caring for remnants. The imagery is so poignant in these first lines and becomes even more so as the metaphor slowly starts to reveal itself. Readers should also take note of the neologisms in this stanza. These, including ―Mule- bray,‖ are supposed to bring the image of the animal to mind as well as the sound that it makes. She‘s describing the statue as making these noises. They‘re all, oddly, coming out of its mouth. These sounds are ―bawdy‖ and animalistic. Its not something the speaker admires, in fact, it comes across as disturbing and even somewhat sexual. STANZA TWO The speaker continues to address the statue, posing a suggestion that the state considers itself an ―oracle‖. This is a curious suggestion and is followed by a related line accusing the statue of having delusions of grandeur. She knows it considers itself godlike and as above and beyond humankind in some way. But, this is immediately contrasted with the speaker‘s depiction of her everyday job. She has to clean the statue, as it is unable to do it itself. This is far from a godlike existence, something she is no doubt aware of. She has to ―dredge the silt from‖ the statue‘s throat. As if to prove that the state is nothing like the persona it presents, she describes how she is ―none the wiser‖ from the time she‘s spent with it. Her constant contact with this ―godlike‖ statue hasn‘t rubbed off on her. She hasn‘t learned anything about the future. STANZA THREE The speaker also spends the third stanza in order to describe more what her job is like. She is a hard worker. She moves up ―little ladders‖ (alliteration) while carrying ―pots and pails‖ (also alliteration). The rhythm in this line mimics the day in and day out nature of her work. She does the same thing over and over again. She uses a simile in the second line to compare herself to an ―ant‖. She‘s quite small in comparison to the statue. Even though it‘s in pieces, it is still quite large. While she might have been mocking the statue at POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 16 first, now she uses the word ―mourning‖ to convey something else. She does feel the sorrow of some sort for the statue. She‘s grieving. This is an important part of the extended metaphor. The following lines are filled with imagery. She describes the statue‘s ―brow‖ and the weeds that are growing up and through the stone. Its a constant process— removing the plant life and hauling around pieces of stone. Readers might take note of the death-like imagery in these lines. The words ―skull-plates‖ and ―tumuli‖ (burial mounds) certainly bring loss to mind. The statue, as a metaphor for the woman‘s lost father, is bringing out the emotion in her. STANZA FOUR There is an interesting allusion at the start of the fourth stanza. Here, she refers to ―Oresteia‖ Aeschylus‘s tragic trilogy, one more classical reference that keeps the poem in the right atmosphere. It is also used to describe the sky above the scene in all its grandeur. It‘s in the second line that the metaphor really starts coming through clearly. She refers to the statue as ―father‖. The eighteenth line of the poem contains another simile. She tells him that he is ―pithy and historical as the Roman Forum‖. This is yet another ruin and another of a classical nature. The use of the word ―pithy‖ in this line is curious. It‘s not entirely clear why Plath chose to use it, but one might speculate that it has to do with the larger metaphor. The Forum might be a ―pithy‖ way of describing her father/the statue. This stanza concludes with the speaker returning to talking about herself. She describes taking a break from her normal duties to have her lunch. She sits on the ―hill of black cypress‖. This adds to the dark, death-like atmosphere and the pervading contrasts between the world of the statue and normal everyday life. There is a good example of enjambment in the movement between the last line of this stanza and the first of the fifth. These additional dark images of death only further the mood the poet is trying to create. The use of the words ―fluted‖ and ―acanthine‖ bring the poem back to the motif of classical images. Both of these refer to a kind of classical column style. STANZA FIVE In the fifth stanza of ‗The Colossus,‘ the speaker picks up the line she started at the end of the fourth stanza. These lines are used to depict for the reader the true grandness of the statue. It reaches out, revealing the depth of the speaker‘s pain. The ruin is such that a lightening stroke would be required to ―create‖ something similar. She even depicts the ear as large enough to ―squat‖ in. The shape of the ear canal resembles a ―cornucopia‖ or a curved cone-shaped basket that‘s usually depicted with bountiful, recently harvested items. This is juxtaposed against the rest of the poem which is about desolation and death. The speaker appears to gain something from the time she spends there. She sits there, out of the wind. STANZA SIX In the sixth and final stanza of ‗The Colossus,‘ the speaker continues describing what it‘s like when she ―squats‖ in the statue‘s ear. She counts the ―red stars‖ and the ―plum-color‖ stars. This lovely imagery and perhaps related to the next line which mentions the statue‘s ―tongue‖ and the sunrise. Despite the light and the warm colors, the speaker describes are how hours are ―married to shadow‖. She is stuck where she is. She‘s in the shadow of her father‘s death, trapped by it in a miserable, unending way. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 17 The last two lines bring in a boat. She refers to the ―keel‖ or the ridge that‘s at the bottom of the boat that scars against ―the landing‖. She is no longer waiting to hear the arrival of a boat or wondering if someone (perhaps her father? Or someone to take her away from her ―marriage‖?) is going to turn up. It is important to refer back to the beginning go the poem at this point. She already stated that she can‘t put her father/the statue back together again but she can‘t stop trying. THE DISQUIETING MUSES The poem The Disquieting Muses written in 1957 serves as a good example of alienation depicted in poetry. The poem paints a non-communicative mother-daughter relationship. Plath wrote this poem getting highly inspired by Giorgio de Chirico eponymous painting. The poem has deep resemblance to the picture and the three Muses of Chirico‘s painting are depicted by Plath in different light. In the painting, far from being alive, the three muses are portrayed as hallucinatory, featureless sterile mannequins. The colors used make them un-human instead of inducing vibrancy and life in them. The shadows of unseen setting sun, the faraway castle, geometric objects etc creates a sinister, disturbing setting. The Muses are placed in a haunting atmosphere, being stripped away of meanings, giving them a surreal existence. Plath takes away this Muses and represents them as dark forces of Nature in her poem. ANALYSIS OF THE DISQUIETING MUSES The Muses are no longer attached to their mythical qualities of influencing artistic qualities in human instead the mannequins of Chirico becomes bad fairies and evil mothers in Plath poetry. The Muses are seen in their usual function of guiding the human, the speaker‘s patron but instead of giving good advice they fill the speaker with sinister fore boarding and negativity. This trio is similar to the three Witches of Shakespeare‘s Macbeth who represents the sinister trio of twentieth century women imparting evil gifts. In the presence of these Muses are symbolic to the tewentieth century parents who are unable to give their children a comforting environment for growing up instead hoards them with darkness. Their presence in the child‘s life makes her aware of the presence of the two contrasting world. And portrays how she finally succumbs into the negative one with her godmothers leaving the good world behind. The disquieting Muses is addressed to her mother. It opens with a stanza where the speaker blames her mother for bringing her up with the sinister elements from early infancy. While the five negative prefixes ―illbred,‖ ―disfigured,‖ ―unsightly,‖ ―unwisely‖ and ―Unasked‖ demonstrate negative elements, the repetitive stress on ―Mother‖ indicates the speaker‘s anger and accusations against the mother figure. The caring Mother is replaced by haughty godmother like characters. The speaker goes on to portrays in the second stanza the idealistic world of a child that the mother is supposed to establish for the children. The ideal mother creates an environment full of superheroes where evil is absent or can be easily defeated. However in the presence of this sinister Muses the child becomes powerless and cant not drive away the evil and rather becomes associated with them. Furthermore the bedtime stories in this stanza refers to and are centered on Plath‘s younger brother, Warren‘s favorite teddy bear, ―The Adventures of Mixie Blackshort,‖ which she created, and which ran periodically for several years. The hurricane episode of the third stanza symbolically shows the rapture of parental guidance and protective shield. It can be interpreted as the failure of the parents to keep the child safe in the presence of the Muses which continue to do mischief conforming their ever presence in the child‘s life. The Thor song is also autobiographical s it relates to Plath‘s father who used to teach them the song of Thor. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 20 Plath‘s tone is not triumphant, but rather sceptical. She calls her exit from the tomb, ―a big strip tease‖ revealing that when she came close to death, but was brought back to life, the people around her were there not to rejoice with her or comfort her, but to be entertained by her. Her sarcastic tone reveals her frustration with the spectators and her disappointment that she was unable to stay dead. STANZA 11-13 This is when she realizes that she is alive, though she wishes she were still in the tomb. This gives the reader the imagery of Plath looking at her hands, her knees, her flesh, and realizing she is still alive, at least physically. She realizes that she is just the same as she was before experiencing death. She writes, Nevertheless, I am the same, identical woman. The first time it happened I was ten. It was an accident. Explaining that she is the same woman she was before her near-death experience. Plath then begins to give the reader some history on her experiences with death, explaining that the first time was an accident, and she was only ten years old. This is when it becomes clear that the first accidental near-death experience was traumatizing to Plath, but somehow left her wanting another taste of death. Plath does not reveal the age of her second encounter with her own death, which was her first suicide attempt. However, since she says she has tried once every decade, we can assume she was around 20 years old. She explains this experience, The second time I meant To last it out and not come back at all. I rocked shut As a seashell. They had to call and call And pick the worms off me like sticky pearls. This section of ‗Lady Lazarus‘ reveals that Plath came so close to death, that she believed she had actually experienced death. She also ―meant to last it out‖ which reveals that she truly does not wish to live any longer. STANZA 14-19 Plath so identifies with death more than life or anything in life that she says, Dying Is an art, like everything else. I do it exceptionally well. She explains her own interest and ―talent‖ in this ―art‖ when she says, POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 21 I do it so it feels like hell. I do it so it feels real. I guess you could say I’ve a call. When she claims that death is her ―call‖, it reveals that she feels no purpose in life other than to die. She reveals that her only relief from suffering, emptiness, and numbness was what she experienced in her encounters with her own death. But every time she gets a taste of death, she ends up surviving, only to resume her former suffering. The next four stanzas reveal her thoughts about her return to her life of suffering. She reveals that she thinks it should be easy enough to end her life and stay put. She reveals that the hard part is coming back and facing the crowd. She feels she is being put on stage when people call her life ―a miracle‖. Plath takes on a tone of sarcasm when she suggests that there should be a charge for looking at her or touching her. STANZA 20-27 For the first time in ‗Lady Lazarus‘, Plath makes her readers aware of the source of her suffering. She writes, So, so, Herr Doktor.‗Herr‘ is the German word for Mr. The use of the German word ―Doktor‖ refers to the Nazi doctors who brought the Jewish victims back to health, only to resume their suffering. By putting an emphasis on the word ―Herr‖ twice in this stanza, Plath reveals that men are the enemy and the cause of her suffering. Plath then begins to explain why men are the enemy when she writes, I am your opus, I am your valuable, The pure gold baby That melts to a shriek. This reveals her belief that she is valuable to men only as an object, beautiful, but hard and lifeless. She does not deny that she is valuable to some people, particularly men, but only as a cold, hard object of beauty, not as a human being. She feels that her death, to the people around her, would be nothing more than watching a beautiful piece of jewelry burn. She uses heavy sarcasm when she says, ―do not think I underestimate your great concern‖. She feels that her death, to the people around her, would be nothing more than watching a beautiful piece of jewelry burn. The Nazis were known to use the remains of the burned Jewish bodies to make soap. They also rummaged around heaps of human ashes to find jewelry and gold fillings. This is how Plath views her value to other people. In the next of ‗Lady Lazarus‘, Plath turns to a tone of revenge. She continues to blame men, God, and the Devil, specifically pointing out that both God and Lucifer (the Devil) are men. This also reveals that she feels powerless under men. She refers to the Doktor, God, and the Devil all as men who hold some kind of power over her. It is difficult to tell whether Plath is referring to herself when she ―rises from the ashes‖ as a physically alive woman who has failed yet again at trying to end her life, or as one who has died and will return as an immortal. She may plan to stop attempting suicide and take her revenge on men instead of herself. Or she plans to come back as an immortal after she has died to take her revenge on men. The red hair suggests that could symbolize the mythical creature, phoenix, who can burst into flames and then be reborn from its ashes. Either way, Plath warns men everywhere, that she is no longer a powerless victim under them, but that she is ready to take her revenge. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 22 DADDY Sylvia Plath is most known for her tortured soul. Perhaps that is why readers identify with her works of poetry so well, such as ‗Daddy‘. She has an uncanny ability to give meaningful words to some of the most inexpressible emotions. She writes in a way that allows the reader to feel her pain. In this poem, ‗Daddy‘, she writes about her father after his death. This is not a typical obituary poem, lamenting the loss of the loved one, wishing for his return, and hoping to see him again. Rather, Plath feels a sense of relief at his departure from her life. She explores the reasons behind this feeling in the lines of this poem. When speaking about her own work, Plath describes herself (in regards to ‗Daddy‘ specifically) as a ―girl with an Electra complex. Her father died while she thought he was God‖. She adds on to this statement, describing her father as ―a Nazi and her mother very possibly part Jewish‖. Through the poem, she ―has to act out the awful little allegory once before she is free of it.‖ Literary historians have determined that neither of these statements about her parents was accurate but were introduced into the narrative in order to enhance its poignancy and stretch the limits of allegory. SUMMARY ‗Daddy‗ by Sylvia Plath uses emotional, and sometimes, painful metaphors to depict the poet‘s own opinion of her father. The poem begins with the speaker describing her father in several different, striking ways. He is at once, a ―black shoe‖ she was trapped within, a vampire, a fascist and a Nazi. While alive, and since his death, she has been trapped by his life. He holds her back and contains her in a way she‘s trying to contend with. She has to ―kill‖ her father in order to get away from him. POETIC TECHNIQUES Plath makes use of a number of poetic techniques in ‗Daddy‘ these include enjambment, metaphor, simile and juxtaposition. The former, juxtaposition, is used when two contrasting objects or ideas are placed in conversation with one another in order to emphasize that contrast. A poet usually does this in order to speak on a larger theme of their text or make an important point about the differences between these two things. in this poem, there is a consistent juxtaposition between innocence or youthful emotions, and pain. Metaphors and similes appear throughout the text in order to convey the speaker‘s emotional opinions about her father. He is compared to a Nazi, a sadist and a vampire, as well as a few other people and objects. Another important technique that is commonly used in poetry is enjambment. This occurs when a line is cut off before its natural stopping point. It forces a reader down to the next line, and the next, quickly. One has to move forward in order to comfortably resolve a phrase or sentence. There are instances in almost every stanza, but a reader can look to the beginning of stanzas three and four for poignant examples of this technique. THEMES In regards to the most important themes in ‗Daddy‘, one should consider the conversation Plath has in the text about the oppressive nature of her father/daughter relationship. The theme of freedom from oppression, or from captivity is prevalent throughout this text, and others Plath wrote. Despite her father‘s death, she was obviously still held rapt by his life and how he lived. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 25 implies that the speaker feels that her father and his language made no sense to her. In this instance, she felt afraid of him and feared everything about him. She never was able to understand him, and he was always someone to fear. She was afraid of his ―neat mustache‖ and his ―Aryan eye, bright blue‖. This description of his eyes implies that he was one of those Germans whom the Nazis believed to be a superior race. He was Aryan, with blue eyes. He was something fierce and terrifying to the speaker, and she associates him closely with the Nazis. A ―panzer- mam‖ was a German tank driver, and so this continues the comparison between her father and a Nazi. STANZA TEN In this stanza, the speaker compares her father to God. She clearly sees God as an ominous overbearing being who clouds her world. This is why she describes her father as a giant black swastika that covered the entire sky. The third line of this stanza begins a sarcastic description of women and men like her father. She mockingly says, ―every woman adores a Fascist‖ and then begins to describe the violence of men like her father. She calls uses the word ―brute‖ three times in the last two lines of this stanza. If these lines are were not written in jest, then she clearly believes that women, for some reason or another, tend to fall in love with violent brutes. STANZA ELEVEN In the first line of this stanza, the speaker describes her father as a teacher standing at the blackboard. The author‘s father, was, in fact, a professor. This is how the speaker views her father. She can see the cleft in his chin as she imagines him standing there at the blackboard. Then she describes that the cleft that is in his chin, should really be in his foot. This simply means that she views her father as the devil himself. The devil is often characterized as an animal with cleft feet, and the speaker believes he wears his cleft in his chin rather than in his feet. Her description of her father as a ―black man‖ does not refer to his skin color but rather to the darkness of his soul. This stanza ends with the word ―who‖ because the author breaks the stanza mid-sentence. STANZA TWELVE With the first line of this stanza, the speaker finishes her sentence and reveals that her father has broken her heart. She says that he has ―bit [her] pretty red heart in two‖. The rest of this stanza reveals a deeper understanding of the speaker‘s relationship with her father. Even though he was a cruel, overbearing brute, at one point in her life, she loved him dearly. It is possible that as a child, she was able to love him despite his cruelty. As an adult, however, she cannot see past his vices. This stanza reveals that the speaker was only ten years old when her father died, and that she mourned for him until she was twenty. She even tried to end her life in order to see him again. She thought that even if she was never to see him again in an after-life, to simply have her bones buried by his bones would be enough of a comfort to her. STANZA THIRTEEN In this stanza, the speaker reveals that she was not able to commit suicide, even though she tried. She reveals that she was found and ―pulled…out of the sack‖ and stuck back together ―with glue‖. At this point, the speaker experienced a revelation. She realized that she must re-create her father. She decided to find and love a man who reminded her of her father. Freud‘s theory on the Oedipus complex seems to POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 26 come into play here. The theory that girls fall in love with their fathers as children, and boys with their mothers, also suggests that these boys and girls grow up to find husbands and wives that resemble their fathers and mother. The speaker has already suggested that women love a brutal man, and perhaps she is now confessing that she was once such a woman. This is why the speaker says that she finds a ―model‖ of her father who is ―a man in black with a Meinkampf look‖. While ―Meinkampf‖ means ―my struggle‖, the last line of this stanza most likely means that the man she found to marry looked like her father and like Hitler. STANZA FOURTEEN In this stanza, the speaker reveals that the man she married enjoyed to torture. This is why she describes him as having ―a love of the rack and the screw‖. She confesses that she married him when she says, ―And I said I do, I do.‖ Then she tells her father that she is through. This means that having re-created her father by marrying a harsh German man, she no longer needed to mourn her father‘s death. She then describes her relationship with her father as a phone call. Now she has hung up, and the call is forever ended. STANZA FIFTEEN In this stanza of ‗Daddy‘, the speaker reminds the readers that she has already claimed to have killed her father. She revealed that he actually died before she could get to him, but she still claims the responsibility for his death. Now she says that if she has killed one man, she‘s killed two. This is most likely in reference to her husband. She refers to her husband as a vampire, one who was supposed to be just like her father. As it turned out, he was not just like her father. In fact, he drained the life from her. This is why she refers to him as a vampire who drank her blood. It is not clear why she first says that he drank her blood for ―a year‖. However, the speaker then changes her mind and says, ―seven years, if you want to know.‖ When the speaker says, ―daddy, you can lie back now‖ she is telling him that the part of him that has lived on within her can die now, too. STANZA SIXTEEN In this stanza, the speaker reveals that her father, though dead, has somehow lived on, like a vampire, to torture her. It is claimed that she must kill her father the way that a vampire must be killed, with a stake to the heart. She then goes on to explain to her father that ―the villagers never liked you‖. She explains that they dance and stomp on his grave. The speaker says that the villagers ―always knew it was [him]‖. This suggests that the people around them always suspected that there was something different and mysterious about her father. With the final line, the speaker tells her father that she is through with him. While he has been dead for years, it is clear that her memory of him has caused her great grief and struggle. The speaker was unable to move on without acknowledging that her father was, in fact, a brute. Once she was able to come to terms with what he truly was, she was able to let him stop torturing her from the grave. CONCLUSION Sylvia Plath (biography) begins ‗Daddy‘ with her present understanding of her father and the kind of man that he was. She then offers readers some background explanation of her relationship with her father. As ‗Daddy‘ progresses, the readers begins to realize that the speaker has not always hated her father. She has POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 27 not always seen him as a brute, although she makes it clear that he always has been oppressive. As a child, the speaker did not know anything apart from her father‘s mentality, and so she prays for his recovery and then mourns his death. She even wishes to join him in death. She then tries to re-create him by marrying a man like him. It isn‘t until years after her father‘s death that she becomes aware of the true brutal nature of her relationship. Though he has been dead in flesh for years, she finally decides to let go of his memory and free herself from his oppression forever. THE APPLICANT The Applicant is a poem that explores the meaning of marriage, gender stereotype and social pressures by using the framework of an interview, in which the speaker questions the applicant, a male. As the poem progresses it becomes apparent that the male interviewee is being given the chance to own something, namely a wife. The wife is a commodity, a thing of the market-place, and the applicant has to be the right sort of person to receive her. As Sylvia Plath herself explained: ―In this poem...the speaker is an executive, a sort of exacting super- salesman. He wants to be sure the applicant for his marvellous product really needs it and will treat it right‖. Written on October 11th 1962, the poem was first published in the London Magazine, 17th January 1963 and appeared in the book Ariel, in 1965, which has since become a classic volume, full of powerful poetry, despite or because of, the controversy surrounding its content and editorship. The Applicant is an important contribution to the debate over the role of the woman in conventional marriage, which first started to be seriously questioned in the early 1960s when Plath wrote this poem. Subsequent developments in politics and social issues - inequality and feminism especially - have helped keep this poem in the spotlight. It questions in a rather subverted, slightly sarcastic way, the notion that society knows best and that a woman should be treated like a domestic thing, ready to do whatever her husband needs her to do. Sylvia Plath did have these fears, as she wrote in her journals, that domesticity would interfere with her creativity; that chores, kids and husband would undermine her writing. This poem could have been inspired by the rise of satirical shows on t.v. in the early 1960s which began to prod and stir the established conventions. It is full of typically vivid Plath imagery and delivers quite a body blow to the conformist point of view. But it is also a complex and layered piece of work. The speaker seems to be interviewing a male applicant come seeking a job but those initial questions reveal something quite different. Is the candidate all there, or is he lacking a body part? Or is he a kind of misfit? Such questions puzzle, such poetic lines break awkwardly. The idea seems to be that, in order to make it in society, you have to lose pieces of yourself. That is some sacrifice. The tone is matter of fact and sharp, as if time is of the essence, as it often is in the high-powered world of commercial markets. Consumerism and societal pressures reinforce the stereotypes. RHYME, METER AND LITERARY DEVICES OF THE APPLICANT The Applicant, a free verse poem, has 8 stanzas, 40 lines in total, each stanza being a quintain (5 lines). There is no fixed, regular rhyme scheme but there is a mix of perfect, full and near rhymes in each stanza. This on-off rhyming brings a certain dissonance and monotony (with the repeats) which reflects the odd situation. There are certain words producing textures and sounds that weave a thread and form loose POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 30 This poem was published after Plath‘s death in Ariel, in 1965 but ‗Fever 103°‘ was written three years earlier in 1962. This was only the second book that Plath had published of her poetry. The first, The Colossus and Other Poems appeared three years before her death by suicide in 1960. She had by the time of her death become fairly well-known in literary circles. Her marriage to Ted Hughes and subsequent separation was one element that contributed to this fact. Like the majority of Plath‘s poems, the speaker is considered to be a woman. As a confessional poet, Plath often used her experiences within her own verse. Her personal life serves, for many scholars as a source of context for her poetry. But, readers should be careful in over asserting the personal details of Plath‘s life and trying to connect them with themes and images presented in this poem or any other that she wrote. SUMMARY OF FEVER 103° The poem is composed of a series of images that take the reader into the speaker‘s state of mind. She is at first filled with guilt about her own sexual desires. She expresses the belief that even the flames of hell would not be able to clean her. But, as the poem progresses these changes. She comes to realize that she is in fact too pure for the world. She enters into a new mindset that allows her to ascend to her self-created paradise in the last lines. LITERARY DEVICES IN FEVER 103° Plath makes use of several literary devices in ‗Fever 103°‘. These include but are not limited to simile and metaphor as well as an allusion. An allusion is an expression that‘s meant to call something specific to the mind without directly stating it. There is a wonderful example in stanza four when the poet makes an allusion to Isadora Duncan, an American dancer. See the body of the analysis for more information on how this allusion works. A simile is a comparison between two unlike things that uses the words ―like‖ or ―as‖. A poet uses this kind of figurative language to say that one thing is similar to another, not like metaphor, that it ―is‖ another. On the other hand, a metaphor is a comparison between two, unlike things that does not use ―like‖ or ―as‖ is also present in the text. When using this technique a poet is saying that one thing is another thing, they aren‘t just similar. The latter can be seen in the thirteenth stanza when the poet compares her ―head‖ to the ―moon,‖ allowing the reader to envision her in an entirely new light. The former, a simile, is even more prevalent. In the ninth stanza, she says that sin is ―Greasing the bodies of adulterers / Like Hiroshima ash and eating in‖. ANALYSIS OF FEVER 103° STANZAS ONE AND TWO In the first two stanzas of ‗Fever 103°,‘ the speaker asks rhetorical questions. She considers her own purity and if she even knows what it means to be ―pure‖. These two questions are what is known as a hook. They are meant to draw the reader in and encourage them to keep reading to find out what happens next. T=Plath does not disappoint as in the net lines she describes ―The tongues of hell‖ as ―dull‖. This is an interesting way to depict the flames that blaze in hell. They are ―dull‖ like the multi-headed god ―Cereberus‖. He is ―incapable, the next line states, of ―licking clean‖ the ―sin‖. These stanzas take the reader into the speaker‘s mind. She is experiencing all-consuming guilt about her state of being. For some reason, she has been inspired to call not to question her purity. She feels as though in hell the flames wouldn‘t even be capable of cleaning her of it. STANZAS THREE AND FOUR POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 31 The next stanzas of ‗Fever 103°‘ bring in various images related to hell. The wood burns, crying out as the fire moves through it. This is a great example of personification which makes the entire scene feel even more alive. There is an ―indelible smell‖ of a ―snuffed candle‖ as this all progresses. It is unforgettable, as if permanent. She is still describing her own body and mind and the fact that hell and its flames are unable to clean her. She repeats the word ―love‖ in the fourth stanza. She is addressing someone important to her, imploring them to hear what she has to says. She uses a simile to compare the smoke rolling off her body to Isadora Duncan‘s scarves. This is a complex use of figurative language that relates to an American dancer and her untimely death. One of her scarves was caught in the spokes of a car and strangled her to death. She was considered an impure woman and had prior to her death fled America due to press harassment. STANZAS FIVE AND SIX Plath‘s speaker fears that some similar fate is going to befall her. A scarf might get caught in a car and break her neck as it broke Isadora‘s. She also describes how in the process of her death by strangulations smoke is going to move around the world strangling others. This serious of violent images is an interesting and disturbing response to the speaker‘s own sexuality. It might lead one to question the circumstances that brought her to this mental place. STANZAS SEVEN AND EIGHT In the next two stanzas of ‗Fever 103°,‘ the speaker brings in colorful imagery—the leopard and the orchid. Neither of these is pleasant to her. The former is ―devilish‖ and the latter is ―ghastly‖. They are impacted by the mysterious moving yellow smoke that results from the speaker‘s own sins. She compares the smoke to an evil leopard that moves quickly and stealthily through the world. It dies, as does everything else in this poem (except for the speaker‘s sins). This time, rather than by smoke, it is killed due to ―Radiation‖. This is expanded on, somewhat in the next stanzas. STANZAS NINE AND TEN Now, tradition is the main killer of the poem. She references Hiroshima and the atomic bomb and its destruction. It is related directly to her own ―sin‖. By using repetition in the ninth stanza she is able to emphasize, as if distressed, the power of that sin. The sin is present on the ‖bodies of the adulterers‖ is if ash from Hiroshima. It is all-consuming. She refers to her lover again in the tenth stanza. She describes for this person the way her body has been moving from hot to cold, off and on, all night. This is likely a depiction of the desire she feels that‘s at the source of her sin. STANZAS ELEVEN AND TWELVE She tries to fix herself, subsisting only on ―Lemon water, chicken‖ and ―water‖. The purity of the water does nothing for her but make her ―retch,‖ another example of how incurable her sin is. It is here that the speaker moves from talking about impurity to talking about purity. She says that her body is ―too pure for you or anyone‖. She compares the way that she‘s hurt to the way that the world ―hurts God‖. STANZAS THIRTEEN AND FOURTEEN Now, floating away from the world, the speaker is a ―moon‖ and a ―paper‖ lantern. She is far above the physical pleasures of earth and made of a material that is ―delicate and infinitely expensive‖. She is ―gold beaten‖. But, this state of mind is soon to change again, reminiscent of the ―off on‖ images of the POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 32 previous stanzas. Now, she is sexually confident. Describing herself as a huge flower that is flushing with sexual arousal. The words ―Going and coming‖ are also part of the sexual innuendo that fills this stanza of ‗Fever 103°‘. STANZAS FIFTEEN AND SIXTEEN Her purity and separation from mankind is taking her into a new space where she‘s able to embrace her sexuality in a new way. She is rising up ―going up‖ away from the earth in these stanzas of ‗Fever 103°‘. She is, she says, an ―acetylene / Virgin‖. Acetylene is an inflammable gas that is only explosive when it comes into contact with fire. The heat in these lines is part of the theme of lust that urns throughout. This woman is pure in her lack of dependence on men for pleasure. She is in charge of herself. STANZAS SEVENTEEN AND EIGHTEEN The speaker has fully embraced her lust and desire in the last stanzas of ‗Fever 103°‘. She rises above the world to a ―Paradise‖ that she created. There, the rules are different. She is able to escape from the religious structure of Plath‘s society which deems sex and non-heterosexual married relationships as impure. She has shed a version of herself that was repressed and has now entered into a new life that sets her apart from the rest of the world. ANNE SEXTON RINGING THE BELLS Ringing of Bells is based on Anne Sexton's actual experience as a psychiatric patient in a mental institution, following bouts of depression and suicidal attempts. It is a subtle yet powerful poem, like a monologue, full of imagery and observation; it has figurative language too, which adds to the inner tension as the poem progresses. The initial lines are influenced by children's nursery rhymes – possibly. As the reader moves through the poem the atmosphere changes, from one of innocence and lightheartedness to a slightly chill darkness, the speaker resenting having to participate in an activity that makes her feel out of place, which she feels does little good. Anne Sexton's life with mental illness has been well documented over the years. From her letters and actions it is plain to see that she was a troubled soul - poetry gave her the chance to shine a light into the abyss and find a way out, albeit temporarily. Her brand of confessional poetry broke new ground; she touched upon subjects that were, at the time, taboo. With raw power, audacious language and vivid imagery she dug deep and managed to put her angst into many of her poems. And because she was a woman, she helped break down barriers whilst dividing opinion. A performer (she fronted a band whilst reading her poetry), a mother, a former model, Anne Sexton was many things to many different people. Thankfully, her inner discipline helped create poetry that still intrigues and shocks. Ringing of Bells is an early attempt to put her experiences into some kind of order. It is a short litany on a theme of helplessness; the speaker feels like a misfit yet cannot refuse to participate in what is deemed an exercise of no benefit to the crazy ladies. Ringing of Bells results from Anne Sexton's need to write down her immediate experiences in order to try and understand them. It also reflects her interest in nursery rhyme and the various rhythms contained therein. Being a creative poet she experimented with the old and new - borrowing from traditional sources POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 35 This is a rich poem with more themes and provocative images than can be described briefly. It is particularly good on patient experience, which varies from fear to shame to pride (her initial resistance to anesthesia leaves her "boss of my own body still"), and on the interwoven themes of life and death and mother-daughter relationship. FOR MY LOVER, RETURNING TO HIS WIFE ‗For My Lover Returning to His Wife‘ poem is forty-eight lines long and is contained within one block of text. Like most of her poems, this one does not contain a specific pattern of rhyme or rhythm. There are a number of moments of repetition, that help to unify the text though. Additionally, the poem is divided into two loose sections. The first is marked by a number of statements about the wife while the second is more concerned with how this situation is impacting the mistress. Sexton made sparring yet impactful use of anaphora, or the repetition of a word at the beginning of multiple lines. It can be seen in the first eight lines with the repetition of ―She.‖ This makes clear from the start that the speaker is very much concerned with her lover‘s wife. Most of her thoughts revolve around what this woman is to the listener. Repetition is also very prominent in lines 30-37. Within this section, Sexton uses ―for the‖ seven times. Her speaker is in the process of giving her lover permission to return to his wife without worrying about the ties that still exist between them. You can read the full poem here. SUMMARY OF FOR MY LOVER RETURNING TO HIS WIFE The poem begins with the speaker describing how her lover has a great relationship with his wife. She thinks of the wife as having been crafted to fit into his life, a state of being the speaker should not compete with. This realization, along with a serious of imagined and emotional images of her lover‘s relationship convinced her to let go of his heart. He should return completely to his wife he loves so much. For My Lover Returning to His Wife concludes with the speaker referring to herself as ―watercolor.‖ She will wash away easily, unlike the solid presence of the lover‘s true partner. ANALYSIS OF FOR MY LOVER RETURNING TO HIS WIFE LINES 1-8 In the first section of For My Lover Returning to His Wife, the speaker begins by making a short but impactful statement about her lover‘s wife. The woman is different from the speaker because she is ―all there.‖ There is a solidity about the wife‘s presence in the listener‘s life that is vastly different from the role the speaker plays. She goes on to list out all the reasons the listener should be more dedicated to his wife than he is to her. The first of these is that the woman was ―melted carefully down for you.‖ Some higher power crafted this particular person to be the perfect lover and partner for the listener. the was melted down like precious metal and then reformed into an ―exquisite‖ wife. The last lines present the wife in two different, but equally important ways. She is, ―Fireworks in the dull middle of February/ and as real as a cast-iron pot.‖ The wife seemingly has everything the lover could want. She is steadfast and she is exciting. The speaker clearly sees herself as being less than this. But this POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 36 raises an important question. If the wife has every attribute a man could want in a woman, why did he start a relationship with the speaker? LINES 9-15 In the next section of lines, the speaker turns to her own part in the story. Up until this point she has been an observer. Now her influence is felt on the story. She sees herself as having ―been momentary.‘ Her place in his life was nothing more than a blip, a ―luxury‖ that could not last forever. It seems as if the speaker was somewhere for the lover could go to indulge his baser urges and nothing more. This is certainly how she sees the relationship. She describes it as a series of images. The first being the sight of her own hair, ―[…] rising like smoke from the car window.‖ The time she spent with the listener was physical and fleeting. It was not long-lasting but instead resembled ―Littleneck clams out of season,‖ an unusual luxury. In the next lines, she returns to her appraisal of the listener‘s relationship with his wife. ―She,‖ meaning the wife, is much more to the listener than just some delicious food. The wife is permanent and everlasting. She will always be present in ―your‖ life and helps to maintain the ―harmony‖ of the world. LINES 16-22 The next lines present a few of the harmonious images the speaker relates the listener‘s wife to. She sees this woman preparing the listener‘s life for him as well as living one that is seemingly perfect. She sets out the ―wild flowers at the window at breakfast‖ then goes on to sit ―by the potter‘s wheel at midday.‖ The wife has also given birth to three children, tying her even more integrally to the listener. They are perfect as if they were ―drawn by Michelangelo.‖ She gave birth just like Michelangelo painted the Sistine Chapel. The artist and the wife are one and the same, labouring for ―terrible months in the chapel.‖ LINES 23-29 The speaker takes the listener and her readers into the chapel itself. She tells them that if ―you glance up‖ you would be able to see ―the children…there.‖ They are like ―balloons‖ resting peacefully against the ceiling. The narrative returns to the real world and the speaker describe the woman caring for her children. She takes them from supper to their bedrooms, comforting them and singing all the way. The speaker makes an important statement at this point which marks a turning point in For My Lover Returning to His Wife. The 39th line is short stating only, ―I give you back your heart.‖ Now that she has seen what kind of person the wife is, she knows that she can never live up to that standard. The two are so clearly perfect for one another that she is willing to release her lover‘s heart (or at least the portion he gave to her). LINES 30-42 The next lines contain a great deal of repetition. She is listing out everything she wants the listener to do now that he is free of his affair. He will be able to go and resume his relationship. The marriage will return to its previously passionate state. Through these lines, Sexton presents a variety of images that seek to portray, in their totality, the passion that exists between the two. There is a deep history of love, hurt, fear, and lust to contend with. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 37 Eventually, the narrative resumes and the speaker describes what she images their moments of intimacy are like. She sees her former lover pulling the ―orange ribbon‖ from his wife‘s hair and answering the ―call‖ of her body. All of this will resume again because she gave her permission. Although the speaker willingly ended the relationship she has maintained a sense of power, feeling as though she instigated the return of true love. LINES 43-48 In the last six lines of For My Lover Returning to His Wife, the speaker concludes her narration by returning to her own perception of the wife‘s place in the lover‘s life. The speaker describes her in the final lines as ―solid,‖ as well as ―naked and singular.‖ There is nothing contrived about what the two have together because the relationship is based on their mutual selves and dreams. The final image is a striking one. The speaker sees herself as being ―watercolor.‖ Her place in his life is incredibly temporary and washable, very unlike the solidity of the wife. 45 MERCY STREET ―45 Mercy Street‖ is an example of Anne Sexton‘s late work, just prior to her suicide. Released in a posthumous collection, this poem extends past the idea of confession. ―45 Mercy Street‖ is a pure cry for help from a tortured psyche which has already decided that death is the only viable escape. Sexton‘s work is a case study in severe depression and bipolar disorder. Regarding her classification as a confessional poet, Sexton often disliked the term, yet still applied it to herself on occasion. The struggle with mental illness is present throughout the poem as she wrote these poems when she came out of her sessions. The psychoanalysis of the patient was done to cure her in mental hospitals. She is undergoing the feelings of connecting back to the old self in this poem as she talks about the address of the place she lived in her youth. Remembrance of how his house looked and who all belonged to it brings a sense of connectivity in the poet who is struggling to be with her true happy and sound self. She wants to feel and become a part of the same old place where she lived with her family. The search for the house where she lived begins with the looking up for the house in her street. The desperation to see her house in the Beacon Hill shows that she has remembered her place all these years and has been willing to go back to the reminiscent surroundings of the house where she belonged. The day to day activities of the members are still alive in her memories as she draws a picture of her great grandmother taking out her corset in the basin, the grandfather taking a nap in the pantry, the grandmother calling the maid by ringing a bell. She remembers everything so well as it was just a recent thing. The fond memories mesmerize her and she feels the urge to get back to normal. The vivid description of her father impressing her mother by putting a big flower in her hair gives her memories of childhood when her mother was in her blooming youthful years. Now that she has turned into a youth, her mother may have wished to see her daughter blooming too, but unfortunately it didn‘t happen so as the poet was sent for a psychiatric treatment. She also connects to her own children who she could not nourish well as she was mentally troubled herself. Also her husband has also become tough and has failed to look inside her. It may be that she wants to connect to her place and her own people but there is something sad and sorrowful about the past that does not let her find her way through the dreams of her house. She still sways between good feelings and the remorse which has sent her mind into a horrible state and insists on not trying to look back and be a part of the dead past. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 40 following the same negation "if you did not / I wouldn't either" which goes forward and back, "That is love yesterday / or tomorrow, not / now‖. So here is what interests me on about the line I quote d above, "now" is in the the present tense, but also the poem is in the present tense. The conception construction (as past me calls it) only happens in the now but can be names as a form of nostalgia (past) or a desire (future) -- now is unclear. The line, "Now love also / becomes a reward / so remote from me I have / only made it with my mind" brings not only various levels of self-references, but also plays with the idea of "now" turning inward as a mental state. Now eventually becomes thought out and either becomes the past (remote from me) or the future (reward) but not now...now. I'm worried this will get too convoluted, so I'll just leave this here and move on. There's some powerful rhetoric against image, "But that image / is only of the mind's / vague structure." The irony of this line is that the poem is restructuring the image of "love" -- giving love a form (quatrains) to run straight to, personification to make love vivid but the things that are missing are tangible. Actions aren't necessarily visible, "vague to me / because it is my own." After this line the speaker addresses love directly, "Love, what do I think / to say I cannot say it‖, trying to take the conceptual to the image -- which turns surreal. The images to me at this half way mark are domestic and trivial at first, "crossed legs with skirt," and (due to the either/or proposition) the statement after the or will be further examined in the rest of the stanzas, "or / soft body under / the bones of the bed." A very surreal and gothic image, after reading this line a few times, the line because more of a joke than something serious. The image is indeed serious, but in the context of the poem it's more of the mind not being to comprehend the physicality of love and going "bare." Goes back to the conceptual but to the idea of the remote again when the speaker states, "Nothing says anything / but that which it wishes / would come true." Once again this circular logic of trying to define the undefinable. Until this line, "but the obsession I begin with now." This line is the second time the poem addresses the now and one of the qualities of "now" is obsession. This perpetual though of trying to define the past or future in accordance of what love is. Then there's the line which is syntactically interesting "also (also). Past me wrote the second also is litotes because of the parentheses; however, the litotes softens the movements -- this also slows down the poem and the focus is on the "beyond" which "it all returns." Note the ambiguous pronoun "it" returns to the last line signifying this cycle of trying to define the past and the future will continue -- so what is the understanding from the poem -- the cycle (not necessarily the process), and terms almost defined. A FORM OF WOMEN Creely, in this poem, shines as a sensory poet with the reflected light that Olson‘s Projective Verse throws into his words. Along the poem, Creely repeatedly makes references to physical states, images, and actions that may appear plain, usual, and casual but which are but the echo of deeper inner energy perfectly captured in the page by the poet. Creely, to this matter, points out which exactly is his state when walking at night, what is he doing, why and how is he fleeing; indeed he is fleeing, and he states this boldly, ―because I feared what I did not know but have wanted to know‖. He voices his aim; to touch the unreachable ―you‖ that has accompanied him, being able to know if that distant other is as despondent as he is; the poet goes as far as to childishly ask ―Do you love me‖. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 41 Nonetheless, as mundane the poem might appear at a first glance, as topoi the topic of the long lost, longing, love may seem as; the poem hides a larger sense, a projection within its syntax that camouflages the true means and aims of the poem. For instance, the first sentence which lays out from the first to third stanza is a clear example of mischievous syntax; ―I‖ could be used as a proper noun in the first stanza, as a case in point, or the ―it‖ at the last verse of the third stanza may purposely vaguely refer to almost every object within the sentence, from ―moonlight‖ to ―what I did not know‖. The one, more clear example of ambiguity given deliberately by the poet‘s language is the addressee of the poem. The answer to who ―you‖ refers to is within the musical eight stanza. The ―you‖ in the poem, as much as the addressee, is the Moon, as a figure, an image more sensory than metaphoric to refer to the ethereal idea of love, a form of women for Creely so to say. The knowledge his quest parted to look for is precisely this one; the possible acknowledgement of the Moon of the human condition, as the human condition acknowledges the Moon. Creely, in this way, wants to know if there is a two-way feeling; he compares it to love. DENISE LEVERTOV WHAT WERE THEY LIKE? The poem, What Were They Like?, is about the aftereffects of war, and what happens when one culture conflicts with another culture. The poem specifically protests about the damage done by the American military to the people of Vietnam during the war between the two nations in the 1960‘s and 1970‘s. It has a very unique structure, split into two verses. Reasons for structuring the poem like this are given in the annotations that follow: ―Did the people of Viet Nam use lanterns of stone? Did they hold ceremonies to reverence the opening of buds? Were they inclined to quiet laughter?‖ Apart from criticizing the American army, the poem also criticizes those who just believe in complaining by sitting at their homes, but in actuality don‘t do anything. All the questions asked in the poem are in the past tense so that it can give the impression that life has no meaning and no existence. The poem begins with numbered questions: making it seem more like a school exam than a poem. Moreover, the very title of the poem, ―What Were They Like‖ is not a question that‘s usually asked after. In the poem, Denise Levertov employs the public event of the Vietnam War (1959-1975) as her canvas on which she sketches the lyrical, strong, and sometimes sarcastic images by creating the thought-provoking and intriguing juxtapositions for her readers. In What Were They Like?, Levertov combines the intellectual with the emotional experience, the personal with the public, to come up with what she calls an ―inscape.‖ Levertov, rather than shedding light over the battlefield of the Vietnam War, shifts the readers‘ attention to the daily life of the Vietnamese. The way she makes use of irony, it makes their lot seem even more disastrous. Remember, the poet produces irony without using a war-like terminology to address the victims, but she employs simple words like ―buds,‖ ―lanterns,‖ ―laughter,‖ ―ornament,‖ and ―singing‖ so that the attention of the readers can be transferred to the everydayness of reality, and turned to the value of all simple things that people like to share in their lives. ANALYSIS OF WHAT WERE THEY LIKE? FIRST STANZA POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 42 The poem What Were They Like?, which can be read in full here, opens with a series of questions about the past. The questions appear to suggest an ancient, religious civilization, grounded in old skills and an appreciation of nature. The questions continue like a catechism… and answers seem to be required. The material seems to be almost primitive and traditional. And when the poet says, ―Had they an epic?‖ he seems to be referring to the ancient mythical civilization, most probably Greek‘s two great epics, Odyssey or Iliad. As we know Denise Levertov hated war, and had always protested the loss of human lives. In this poem also, he protests the war, and criticizes the American military for its operation against the Vietnamese. This very first part of the poem is replete with sarcastic questions and is an attack on those who do not understand the value of the lives of human beings. Through the questions, the poet wants to make her readers think about and then look for the answers. Through words like ‗electricity‘, stones, he wants to tell that the people of Vietnam passed a very simple and ordinary life, but due to the attack of American Army, the country was separated from other advanced nations such as America, United Kingdom and much more. Here, the poet plays a sympathy card on behalf of the Vietnamese, and try to create sympathy among the hearts of her readers toward the people of Vietnam, and sadden them by highlighting the simplicity of Vietnamese in front of her readers. The poet says they were happy villagers, who lived in harmony with nature. Through the imagery of ―lanterns of stone‖, the poet combines two incompatible things. This combination of words provokes in the readers‘ mind a diverse number of associations that set the mind in motion, and lead them to a different understanding of the events included into it. In the starting six verses of the poem, most of the questions are about the culture of the people of Vietnam. The poet has used these types of questions to tell the readers that the primary object of her poem is to teach the readers how the culture of Vietnam was severely affected by the war. SECOND STANZA Where in the first stanza, a speaker (questioner) asks questions, in the second stanza, there is someone who gives answers to the questions of the first speaker. As we go through the verses, it becomes clear that the first speaker is a man, and the second might know what has happened. The very first word in the second stanza, ‗Sir‘ has been used in sarcastic tone. This ‗catechism‘ provides numbered answers which relates to the questions asked in the poem. Moreover, beginning with ‗sir‘ may also hint at the person answering the question is being respectful. It is just like a soldier answering their commander, but it might be false respect. The poet (speaker) tells that all those gleeful, joyful and nature lover people are now dead, their light heart has turned to stone, which may mean that the speaker has given the answers of the first verse of first stanza where he asks ―Did the people of Viet Nam use lanterns of stone?‖ He tells though before war, they used to be happier, now there is no one left to answer as almost all of them are now turned to stone Remember, the questions asked in the first stanza of the poem are made in past tense, while the answers are given the present tense in the second stanza. The poet might have used this style to make her readers think back, and know what they did in the past. In the first stanza of the poem, the first speaker asks ‗Did they hold ceremonies to reverence the opening of buds?‘, the second man answers ‗Perhaps they gathered once to delight in blossom, but after their children were killed there were no more buds.‘ This means that they might have gathered once in blossom but after the death of their children in the destruction caused by war, there were no more buds. All their cultures and traditions have now been completely wiped out due to the repercussions of war. ‗There were POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 45 The use of a colon within the first line of The Ache of Marriage suggests that everything that comes afterward is an explanation of this claim, with Levertov depicting what it is like to be in a loveless marriage. STANZA TWO The assonance that carries across ‗thighs and tongue, beloved‘ is interrupted by plosive sounds ‘t‘ and ‗b‘ that disrupt the flow of this line. In doing so, Levertov initiates a beautiful harmony, which is swiftly derailed by the plosives. Levertov could be using sound to represent the path of her marriage, with the happiness they once had being disrupted by the ‗ache‘ that began to set in, unhappiness beginning to take over. This is furthered by the use of caesura, ‗tongue, beloved,‘ disrupting the meter of the line and causing a breakdown of metrical flow, representing Levertov‘s failing marriage. The classification of the marriage as an ‗it‘ gives the act a strange, almost alien quality. The relationship they are now in seems foreign to them, something they have ended up in without meaning to. They are unhappy, the unfamiliar atmosphere incited by the ‗it‘ furthering their sense of displacement within their own marriage. Levertov enacts images of bodily pain, ‘throbs in the teeth‘ building on the semantics of sickness and ‗ache‘ through the ‗throbs‘ that cease to stop. This sense of discomfort is extended by the reoccurring ‘t‘ throughout this line, cutting through the meter with the harsh consonant. Both through content and sound, Levertov presents the tumultuous and loveless relationship. STANZA THREE Levertov argues that she ‗look[ed] for communion‘, trying to find companionship and a sense of community in her difficult time. Yet, she finds no solace in turning to others, ‗turned away‘ without help. The focus on ‗each and each‘, the divisive ‗and‘ coming between the two parties could be understood as a spatial representation of their emotional distance within the relationship. They no longer have a connection, just two people who are pushing through each day of their relationship in the hope that things will one day work out okay. STANZA FOUR Levertov uses the metaphor of marriage being a ‗leviathan‘ that is slowly digesting them. They are in ‗its belly‘, consumed while ‗looking for joy‘, Levertov suggesting that they are in an almost inescapable pact. She does not know how to get out of her unhappy marriage, with the powerful metaphor of being digested reflecting the idea that her very sense of self is being stripped away from continuing while unhappy. They even reduce their expectations of the relationship, saying that they will look for ‗some joy‘, anything at all to act as a beacon of hope for their unhappy lives. STANZA FIVE The final stanza, going ‗two by two‘ measures only two lines. The separation across these lines could be Levertov representing the two disconnected members of this marriage, existing together yet wholly apart. She draws upon the image of the ‗ark‘, perhaps seeking complete destruction from which they can begin to rebuild. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 46 The final image of the poem returns to the ‗ache‘ of marriage, Levertov solidifying the idea that she won‘t be able to get rid of this deep sense of pain. Marriage has caused her nothing but loss, booming further and further distanced from her loved one while she struggles to continue each day as if everything were okay. The ‗ache‘ of marriage continues. THE DEPTHS The Depths by Denise Levertov is a three-stanza work that uses contradictions and metaphor to express how multi-layered life can be. The overview of life includes good things and bad things, proving that life is filled with varying elements that exist in both positive and negative states of being. At some points, in fact, it is hard to discern what the good and bad are within the poem‘s situations, which helps to solidify this contrasting method of expressing differentiation. To Levertov, it seems, life is neither primarily filled with good or bad, but its ―depths‖ are still worth ―tast[ing].‖ This thought is the theme of the poem. You can read the full poem The Depths here. THE DEPTHS ANALYSIS FIRST STANZA An interesting thing that is happening in this first stanza is a reversal of ideas. A ―fog‖ is often noted as something that is a hindrance, but in this work, it is treated as something quite different in comparison to what would typically be noted as something welcome—―light.‖ This ―fog‖ is ―white‖ and creates ―flakes of white ash in the world‘s hearth.‖ This makes the ―fog‖ feel decorative and lovely—something clean and worthwhile. The ―light,‖ by contrast, is an ―abyss‖ that ―is revealed‖ only when ―the white fog burns off.‖ This indicates that the ―light‖ is the ―everlasting‖ element that awaits after the ―fog,‖ but in a manner that seems as though the ―light‖ is a doom of sorts. In this, the poem thus far reads as though the ―fog‖ is the better state of being, and ―light[‗s]‖ ―abyss‖ is waiting somewhere underneath. From there, however, ―fog‖ is treated in a lesser manner when it is referred to as ―cobwebs.‖ This notion of ―cobwebs‖ comes with connotations of a lack of necessity, uncleanness, and age, and these ideas are in very real contrast to something that is ―white‖ and hides an ―abyss.‖ These ―cobwebs,‖ though, are still referenced as ―flakes‖ against ―the black fir trees,‖ which again represents a contrast of ―light‖ to dark. Given the complexity of the parallels that can be drawn from the lines, it is hard to define what truly is ―light‖ and dark—good or bad—to the narrator‘s way of thinking. What this could entail is that the author believes that in life, the good and bad are often gray areas where ―light‖ and dark blend, perhaps to an ―ash‖-like color, and what remains is a collection of varying elements that do not need to necessarily make sense. It does not matter, for instance, if the ―fog‖ is a ―cobweb‖ or a refuge from an ―abyss.‖ Whatever it is, it provides an element to life, becoming the ―ash in the world‘s hearth.‖ Every element, then, is relevant, and the lines between good and bad are undefined to the author, much like there is little structure to the size and rhyme scheme of the lines. SECOND STANZA The confusion of elements continues in this stanza when the ―[c]old of the sea is‖ noted as the ―counterpart to this great fire,‖ but the ―ocean‖ is noted as having a ―burning cold.‖ This presents a bit of a paradox since the only thing that is noted to have any sort of heat, specifically, is the ―ocean,‖ but the other body of water is noted as the heat‘s ―counterpart.‖ The reader would logically know that the ―ocean‖ does not actually have the ―burn‖ of the ―fire,‖ but the word choices make the ideas overlap almost into chaos. Why would a ―sea‖ ―counter[act]‖ ―fire,‖ but an ―ocean‖ ―burn[s]?‖ POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 47 The answer, perhaps, could reside in the size of the bodies of water. Because ―the sea is‖ smaller, it can provide a gentler touch to calm the ―fire,‖ but the grandness of the ―ocean‖ makes it come with worse ―burning‖ dangers and hazards. This would be a subtle comment that moderation could be key in life, which is reasonable given the already noted theme at work of good and bad intermingling. Just as deciding what is good or bad in the first stanza is difficult, here the idea of the amount is brought into the discussion to provide guidance. Perhaps, to the narrator, good or bad, ―light‖ or dark, and hot and ―cold‖ may interplay in a meaningful life, so long as moderation exists to ―counteract‖ varying elements, thus creating balance. For the final lines of this stanza, the narrator brings in the first-person perspective with ―we,‖ which indicates that the themes at work within The Depths are universal—that regardless of the reader, the narrator believes they will relate to the concepts. The confusion, again, arises with what ―we‖ do in that section—that after ―[p]lunging out of the burning cold of ocean we enter an ocean of intense noon.‖ This seems odd, given that the narrator refers to ―enter[ing] an ocean‖ after coming out of ―an ocean.‖ This could speak to the cyclical nature of life, that the interplay of good and bad elements could be something that follows us from one moment to the next. Like one ―ocean‖ is exchanged for another, one scenario is exchanged for another as well, all with a familiar notion of so many blending elements. Each scenario may be different—like the second ―ocean‖ was not noted as ―burning‖—but the key ideas of good and bad intermingling still carry a similarity throughout numerous events, according to the poem. The final sentence of this stanza utilizes alliteration with the ―s‖ sounds—‖Sacred salt sparkles.‖ This draws attention to this line, and since that attention is gained in what may be the most unifying concept as of yet in the poem, it reinforces the universal quality that the first-person perspective brought to the table. Given that this ―s‖ is a soft sound, this choice of word beginnings hints a softness of ideas, as in the narrator is allowing the reader to see that this idea of ―[s]acred salt‖ is a good thing. Essentially, then, the reader can infer that this happening ―on our bodies‖ represents glimmering goodness that comes with the varying elements of life. Overall, the impact that these varying elements have on us is for our benefit— that it is ―[s]acred‖ and makes us ―sparkle‖ and shine. THIRD STANZA The first two lines of this stanza are drenched in metaphor and contradiction when ―mist‖ is noted as able to ―wrap‖ around people ―in fine wool.‖ Since ―wool‖ is quite tangible, even scratchy to some, it certainly is not the texture that one would expect from an elusive ―mist.‖ This is another mismatch of elements that addresses that life is a combination of elements rather than simply good things or only bad things. This confusion continues in that there is no specific idea about life that is noted as what the narrator is comparing to ―mist,‖ but it can be inferred that life itself could be this ―mist‖ since it is intangible and mysterious, which seems to coincide with the narrator‘s comments on life. A ―mist‖ is neither substantial nor insubstantial as you can see it, but not touch it like you would ―wool,‖ and it is not altogether a good or bad thing. It is just a blend of factors that make for a mysterious situation, like the unknowns of life hat are constructed on blended elements. Another irony is at play when the final lines state the hope that ―the taste of salt recall to‖ people ―the great depths about‖ them. The irony is found in that often, a person might choose a different kind of flavor than ―salt‖ to express a positive element in life, like how sweet it is. Instead, The Depths uses something more savory and allows the reader to understand that, once more, it is not only about the good things—or the sweet things—in life that makes it a worthwhile thing to ―taste.‖ Rather, the author uses what might be the most common seasoning and one that has cleansing properties as well as a ―taste‖ POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 50 ALLEN GINSBERG HOWL Howl is a social commentary and revolutionary manifesto of Beats generation. The poem relies on linguistic grandeur, operatic catalogues, obscene references, and rambling digressions. The poem is in elegiac tone; the tone of mourning. Ginsberg presents the long list of the activities; therefore it is called catalogue technique. The title Howl indicates protest as cry, cry for all exploitation, repression and subjugation. The poet asks people to cry against capitalism, exploitation, repression and subjugation. This poem, ‗Howl‘ stands as the celebration of counter culture movement. The best minds of the 50s are destroyed by madness. This madness came in different forms. Those are scholars, best mind, and best generation. This madness came as a counterculture. Counter culture is not their choice, it is their compulsion. They suffered from hysteria when the dreams are postponed continuously. Howl presents a picture of a nightmare world and as some reviews predicted, the wasteland of its generation. The movement of Howl is from protest, pain, outage, attack and lamentation to acceptance, affirmation, love and vision-from alienation to communion. The poet descends into an underworld of darkness, suffering and isolation and then ascends into spiritual knowledge, blessedness, achieved vision, and a sense of union with the human community and with God. The poem is unified with and the movement carried forward by resuming images of falling and rising, destruction and regeneration, starvation, under-nourishment, sleeping and waking, darkness and illumination, blindness and sight, death and resurrection. In Howl Ginsberg describes the desperation, the suffering and the persecution of a group of outcast, including himself who are seeking transcendent reality. They have become naked so as to challenge the mainstream culture. They went to the Negro street and looked with anger; this anger is nothing but the expression of indictment (hatred) against American culture. They looked with frustration. Society born them and distorted them. They challenged that society which gave the birth, but not the accommodation. Their counter culture is seen in travel. They travel aimlessly from one city to another city. Their travel did not have any goal and destination. They loved narcotic things because they wanted to forget the pain given by that culture and to challenge the mainstream culture. They wanted to challenge the mainstream culture through obscene art (vulgar art). They wrote vulgar poetry. They do not allow stopping their spontaneity. They wrote whatever comes into their mind. Others go to University for higher education, but these people go to university for doing narcotic things such as writing vulgar on the windows and walls of the university. These people do not behave normally; they even talk to 70 hours. They talked about anecdotes, marijuana, sex, memory, drugs. They talked about the social taboos. They indulge in sexuality in open area. Sometimes they were found throwing semen over others. They broke the normal sexual courses. Sexual prevision can be seen in their poetry. They even burnt money to hate capitalism. Killing one was common. Homosexual hippies gave lectures on sexual matter. They threw salad on lecturers and gave speech on suicide. They even show drama on suicide. They have repulsion towards life and attraction towards death. Through suicide, they want to abuse the culture done by Americans. Here Ginsberg is optimistic of social acceptance. They have, done all these things to challenge the mainstream culture. Their purpose is to produce a society which accommodates these people with peace and tranquillity. Ginsberg is aware that they are rejected at present. But tomorrow they will get the reincarnation with the unlimited number of followers behind them. However, implicitly he has tried to compare the Beats with the resurrection of the Christ. As Christ was resurrected so will they be. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 51 The chant rhythms is a basic use of language that both reflects and directs social action toward communicate goals, a force that seems never to be far away when this rhythm enters poetry. There is rhythmically and thematically strong sense of communal rhythm. Howl is linked not only to the romantic tradition but also to the preliterary, oral, magic incantations of the universal shamanist tradition. LAWRENCE FERLINGHETTI GOYA’S DISASTERS OF WAR In Lawrence Ferlinghetti's In "Goya's Greatest Scenes We Seem to See," the speaker has scrutinized paintings by Francisco Goya and is now comparing/contrasting the suffering of humanity portrayed in them to the suffering of Americans on American freeways. The Goya paintings on which the poet has focused are likely those of the painter's later years, a series titled, Los Desastres de la Guerra (The Disasters of War). The comparison/contrast remains hyperbolic because the annoyances sustained by Americans on their highways cannot come close to the terrible suffering of the victims in Goya's renderings. The speaker is making his exaggerated claim in order to emphasize the highway problem, as he sees it. The victims in Goya's paintings are truly suffering slaughter and death at the hands of an enemy, and although it is sad that people on freeways die from traffic accidents, the number of those accidents is comparatively small and do not pile up bodies the way the war paintings do. The poem is divided into two movements. The first movement focuses on the Goya paintings, and the second focuses on American freeways. Please note: Without proper placement on the page, a poem loses its nuance of meaning. The antiquated word processing system on this site will not allow non-traditional placement of text. To experience the poem as the poet placed it on the page, please visit "Goya's Greatest Scenes We Seem to See." COMMENTARY Lawrence Ferlinghetti's "In Goya's Greatest Scenes We Seem to See" employs extended hyperbole to compare the suffering of humanity today with an earlier time. FIRST MOVEMENT: IMAGES OF SUFFERING HUMANITY The first hyperbolic claim is stated by the speaker when he says, "In Goya's greatest scenes we seem to see / the people of the world." It is impossible to see the people of world in Goya's scenes; no artist would ever be capable of portraying the people of the world—not even a photographer could snap all the people of the world. The speaker literally sees a sampling of people in one country during a particular time of war. He then claims that he seems to be seeing all of the people at the precise point in time when humanity took on the label "suffering humanity." Because the exact moment in time for labeling humanity as suffering humanity cannot be pinpointed, the speaker again engages his hyperbolic trope. In the rest of the first movement, the speaker offers some specific images of that suffering humanity: "they writhe upon the page," they are "Heaped up / groaning with babies and bayonets," there are "cadavers and carnivorous cocks," and they represent "all the final hollering monsters / of the / 'imagination of disaster'." All of these stark and disturbing images prompt the speaker to opine that the POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 52 images seem so precise and accurate that they might well still exist. He then declares that, in fact, they do still exist; the only difference is "the landscape is changed." SECOND MOVEMENT: THE FREEWAY OF DISAPPROVAL The speaker then focuses on the problem of the American freeway. That suffering humanity is now in automobiles driving from place to place, encountering traffic problems. Some are bothered by "legionnaires," while others are annoyed by "false windmills and demented roosters." These people along the American freeways are the same suffering humanity as the war victims of Goya's painting, but they are just "further (sic, farther) from home." Again, another exaggeration; the people are not, in fact, the same as Goya's. They differ in time and place and many other characteristics, not least of which is that they are drivers, not victims of war. The Americans are traveling these huge freeways that are "fifty lanes wide / on a concrete continent." The exaggeration of the number of lanes assigned to the freeways logically implies that the American landscape would be taken up by a lot of concrete. To express his disapproval, the speaker exaggerates again by claiming that those highways are on a concrete continent. Of course, he knows the entire continent is not concrete, but through his hyperbole, he is complaining that there is too much concrete, in his opinion. And to add insult to injury, not only are Americans now harassed with multilane complexes of concrete highways, but the motorists are also constantly harangued by the numerous billboards that advertise products offering happiness. But the speaker insists that the happiness offered by those commercial eyesores promise only "imbecile illusions of happiness." The speaker reports that the modern American landscape offers "fewer tumbrils / but more strung-out citizens / in painted cars." Those painted cars have "strange license plates / and engines / that devour America." The final hyperbolic claim gives the automobile engine the unique mammalian ability to gobble up the entire country—his final exercise in exaggeration capping his strong antipathy to modern modes of travel in America. CONSTANTLY RISKING ABSURDITY ‗Constantly Risking Absurdity‘ was first published in 1958 in his collection A Coney Island of the Mind: Poems. The poems in this collection are great representatives of Ferlinghetti‘s style of writing. His poems are usually fairly straightforward, using language that the average reader and understand. The imagery in this particular piece is accessible in a way that many poems are not. SUMMARY OF CONSTANTLY RISKING ABSURDITY Throughout the lines of ‗Constantly Risking Absurdity,‘ the speaker describes the high flying, dangerous acts of a poet/acrobat. He‘s in the air, balanced on the eye beams or the attention of the men and women below. He walks across the high wire, entertaining them with his THEMES IN CONSTANTLY RISKING ABSURDITY The major theme that pervades ‗Constantly Risking Absurdity‘ is that of writing/literature. The poet focuses, through the circus-related images, on what it means to write poetry. He is interested in the quest to rich the ultimate, high ―perch‖ on which Beauty exists. Through writing, poets seek out the truth, POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 55 NEW YORK SCHOOL The New York School refers to a group of experimental painters and a coterie of associated poets who lived and worked in downtown Manhattan in the 1950s and 60s. The painter Robert Motherwell coined the name, playing off the pre-World War II École de Paris, a group of painters that included Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse. Similarly, the New York School was not an academic institution but rather a community built on proximity, relationships, and similarities in styles, methods, and subject matter. Though stylistic diversity existed within the group, New York School poetry tended to be witty, urbane, and conversational. The poets allowed everyday moments, pop culture, humor, and spontaneity into their work, seeking to capture life as it happened. Influenced by literary surrealism and abstract expressionist painting, they responded to the events of the day without embracing the heavy seriousness characteristic of some post-war intellectuals. The New York School of poets is often organized into two generations: the first was centered around a core group of five poets: John Ashbery, Barbara Guest, James Schuyler, Kenneth Koch, and Frank O‘Hara. The second generation included poets Alice Notley and her husband, Ted Berrigan; Bill Berkson; and Ron Padgett. During the second generation, members founded nonacademic learning centers that served local communities, such as the Poetry Project at St. Mark‘s Church. The cross-pollination between writing and visual art was a hallmark of the New York School. The first- generation New York School poets collaborated and socialized with abstract expressionist painters, including Jackson Pollock and Willem de Kooning. The second generation found inspiration in the burgeoning pop art movement. The collection that follows is intended to give you a sense of the major players in the New York School, but it is not exhaustive. In fact, there is no definitive list of who exactly constituted the New York School: some poets contested the label; others‘ contributions have been underrecognized. The collection offers a sampling of poetry, essays by and about New York School poets, and audio and video recordings and discussions of their work. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 56 JOHN ASHBERY LEAVING THE ATOCHA STATION FARM IMPLEMENTS AND RUTABAGAS IN A LANDSCAPE Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape was published in 1966, in Ashbery‘s collection The Double Dream of Spring. Today it is one of his most popular poems. It‘s also a great example of Ashbery‘s unusual use of language and content. He‘s known for writing about anything and everything that he thought was interesting without regard for what might be considered appropriate poetic content. He is sometimes cited as America‘s most famous living poet. SUMMARY ‗Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape‘ by John Ashbery is an unusual poem that uses the cartoon characters from Popeye to speak about American, middle-class dissatisfaction. The poem is a strange one. It follows a few moments in the lives of recognizable characters from the Popeye cartoon included Olive, Sea Hag, Whimpy, and Swee‘pea. The characters are staying in Popeye‘s apartment and go through emotional ups and downs. At one point, they feel like they‘re on a vacation, and in the next, they‘re irritated with the city and want to go to the country. When Olive comes into the poem and declares that Popeye has been exiled to the country and also describes his ability to control lightning, the poem gets more complex. In the end, after going back and forth in regards to how happy or unhappy they are, Popeye sends thunder into the apartment that‘s ―domestic‖ and green like spinach. THEMES Ashbery engages with themes of nature, dissatisfaction, and communication in ‗Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape.‘ The latter, communication, is a tricky element of the poem. From secret messages to odd syntax, the characters in this piece have a hard time making their thoughts clear. One interpretation of the poem suggests that there is no true meaning to their words and that they should be taken as nonsense. Nature is another obvious theme, one that‘s in the poem from the start as the characters contend with the ideas of country/city and the presence of thunder. Their dissatisfaction is also clear from the start. No one quite knows where they want to be or what they want to be doing. STRUCTURE AND FORM ‗Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape‘ by John Ashbery is a seven-stanza poem written in the form of a sestina. This is an old fashioned poetic form in which Ashbery does not use a specific metrical pattern. The sestina is separated into sets of six lines, known as sestets. This remains consistent throughout the poem, except for the final stanza, which has only three lines, making it a tercet. Sestinas have six words that need to be repeated throughout the poem. They have to appear at the ends of each line of the stanza, except the seventh stanza. The six words in this poem are: thunder, apartment, country, pleasant, spinach, and scratched. LITERARY DEVICES POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 57 Ashbery makes use of several literary devices in ‗Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape.‘ These include but are not limited to enjambment, alliteration, and caesura. The latter is concerned with the pauses that a poet uses in the middle of the lines. For example, the final line of the first stanza reads: ―Her cleft chin‘s solitary hair. She remembered spinach.‖ Or, another example, line three of the second stanza, ―Today, and it shall be as you wish.‖ He scratched.‖ Enjambment is another formal device, one that occurs when the poet cuts off a line before its natural stopping point. For example, the transition between lines four and five of the first stanza as well as lines two and three of the third stanza. Alliteration is a type of repetition, one that‘s concerned with the use and reuse of the same consonant sounds at the beginning of multiple lines. For example, ―Seemed‖ and ―smaller‖ in line five of the second stanza as well as ―forced‖ and ―flee‖ in line two of the fourth stanza. ANALYSIS, STANZA BY STANZA STANZA ONE In the first stanza of ‗Farm Implements and Rutabagas in a Landscape,‘ the speaker begins by describing a secret message that hasn‘t been decoded. It describes Popeye, the cartoon sailor, who sits in a thunderstorm somewhere in the country. The speaker notes from the message that he‘s ―Unthought of,‖ meaning no one is thinking of Popeye. At the same time, the speaker describes the Sea Hag, someone whose supposed to be Popeye‘s friend, sitting in his apartment with Wimpy. These are both characters from the original television series. Together they‘re vacationing ―en la casa de Popeye.‖ There is an interesting use of imagery in the sixth line of this stanza when the Sea Hag scratches her ―clef chin‘s solitary hair.‖ STANZA TWO In the second stanza of the speaker describes how Wimpy brought the spinach. Something that‘s obviously quite central in the Popeye cartoon. In the cartoon, Wimpy is a chubby and usually happy man who wears a suit and is as obsessed with hamburgers, just as Popeye is with spinach. Wimpy seems to intuitively understand that the Sea Hag is going to ask for spinach. He announces that he has it before she has a chance. Things change in the next part of the stanza. The small apartment contracts and is juxtaposed with a large field in which thunder is ringing out. Despite the fact that they‘re on vacation and have the spinach, Wimpy suggests that he is dissatisfied. He uses the line ―For this is my country― at the end of the second stanza. It is possible to read deeper into this line, perhaps relating it to a more poignant American dissatisfaction. STANZA THREE The characters then consider something else that‘s bothering them, it‘s cheaper in the country. Another character is introduced in the 15th line of the poem. This is ―Swee‘pea.‖ One of the two characters exclaims, ―How pleasant!― In regards to his arrival. But, unfortunately, this new character is just as morose as the two that have already been introduced. Swee‘pea has a note on his bib. It feels very similar to the message that starts with the poem. It describes how ―thunder in tears is unavailing,‖ they have failed to accomplish their goal, whatever that may be. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 60 STANZA 2 The first line is silly and sentimental if readers think of poems as inanimate objects, which cannot feel or desire. More likely, Ashbery is poking fun at the idea of sentimentality. However, it also speaks, again, to the idea of meaning and comprehension, a reader‘s own struggle to ―possess‖ language, and a lover‘s desire to possess another. The speaker refers back to his own statement in the first stanza when asking, ―What‘s a plain level?‖ Such self-interviewing draws readers deeper into the poem, forcing them to pay closer attention to their own thinking processes. The ―that‖ refers to ―plain level‖ itself. By stating, in essence, that a plain level is a plain level, Ashbery is being tautological, that is, redundant. ―Other things‖ is left undefined. Continuing with his method of making statements and then questioning those very statements, Ashbery introduces the notion of ―play,‖ again referring to the very thing that he is doing in the poem itself. The introduction of the ―I‖ into the poem in the last line brings another element into play, the author. Ashbery builds meaning through suggestion and through asking questions, but he never answers them directly. The accumulation of statements and questions, of assertions and qualifications, of abstractions without referents, gives the poem texture, makes it dreamlike, surreal. STANZA 3 The ―outside thing‖ in the first line might refer to the world outside the poem itself, the world from which the poem springs. ―A dreamed role-pattern‖ suggests both structure and randomness, which the poet suggests is the stuff of ―play.‖ The second and third lines are enigmas, that is, Ashbery gives no clue as to how ―a dreamed role-pattern‖ and ―the division of grace these long August days / Without proof‖ are similar. One possibility is that Ashbery finished composing the poem during August. In his endnotes on Shadow Train, John Shoptaw lists the composition date of ―Paradoxes and Oxymorons‖ as July 29, which is close enough to support this theory. August is also considered by many to be the slowest month of the year, when summer is at its height. This would account for the description of the month as ―long.‖ Ashbery underscores the poem‘s own sense of play by making ―Open-ended‖ its own sentence and enclosing it in the middle of a line. ―The steam and chatter of typewriters‖ is the most concrete image in the entire poem and throws the reader into the world of things, as opposed to ideas. STANZA 4 The poet, the poem, and the reader are all in play in this final stanza. The ―it‖ in the first line is, presumably, the poem. Ashbery appears to liken it to a piece of music, which can also be ―played.‖ The ―I‖ makes its second and final appearance in the first line of this stanza, thinking of ―you,‖ presumably the reader. It is important to note that ―you‖ can also mean the speaker himself. The use of the second person to address another part of the speaker has a rich history in poetry, and Ashbery plays with this convention. The poet writes with the idea of the reader in mind (―I think you exist only / To tease me into doing it‖), an idea that changes as he composes the poem. The poem mimics the dance of lovers, a dance that frequently includes indecision, playfulness, and evolving attitudes. In the final lines, poem, reader, and speaker conflate into one entity. The processes, both of composing the poem and of reading the poem, are included in the idea of the poem. THEMES LANGUAGE AND MEANING ―Paradoxes and Oxymorons‖ questions the idea that language is an effective tool for communicating ideas about the physical, empirically verifiable world. The poem suggests that poetry, and by extension POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 61 all language, is ultimately about itself and its inability to say anything definitive about the world. The first stanza underscores this idea, as the poem eludes the understanding of the reader: ―You miss it, it misses you. You miss each other.‖ These words also echo the way that lovers frequently misunderstand one another, showing how language is often at a distance from things. By making the poem into a lover of sorts, a lover who can never be fully understood or possessed by the reader, Ashbery shows how language also makes promises, promises that often go unfilled. The self-questioning in the second stanza dramatizes the notion that even the speaker is not in control of what he says. Language seems to have a mind of its own, separate from that of the speaker. After asking himself, ―What‘s a plain level?‖, the speaker responds, ―It is that and other things.‖ The speaker‘s very inability (or unwillingness) to adequately define the term ―plain level‖ underscores the impossibility of definitive meaning. Using pronouns such as ―it‖ and ―that‖—which refer only back to themselves—underscores the self-reflexivity of language. This means that language can only point back to itself, and not to the world of things, which human beings often assume is what language does. Similarly, the ―Steam and chatter of typewriters,‖ highlights the material production of words for its own sake, without paying attention to the meaning of these words. In case the reader missed it during the first three stanzas, the final stanza hammers home the idea that the reader has quite literally been ―played,‖ that is, the poem, by hinting at meaning and then withdrawing further into muddy abstractions, toys with the reader‘s expectations and processes of meaning-making. APPEARANCES AND REALITY ―Paradoxes and Oxymorons‖ illustrates the idea that the world is never quite what it seems to be; appearances are deceptive. Greek philosopher Plato addresses this idea in The Allegory of the Cave, claiming that human beings live in the shadows of the real world. ―Paradoxes and Oxymorons,‖ a poem included in a collection titled Shadow Train, is in itself obscure and elusive in nature. One of the central paradoxes of the poem is its relationship to reality. After establishing that the poem is ―concerned with language on a very plain level,‖ the speaker complicates that level, ultimately suggesting, in the third stanza, that the poem, like reality itself, is ―a dreamed role pattern.‖ The poem, like reality, is a form of play ―without proof.‖ This last phrase calls attention to the idea that perception itself is unreliable. What happens in reality is like what happens in this poem: Both are unpredictable; both contain random events. Rather than representing reality, language is reality. The way in which human beings use it determines the ways in which they will perceive and experience the world. The final stanza underscores how the poem, itself a rarified form of language, has manipulated the reader‘s expectations and desires. The poem, like reality, is ultimately embodied in the reader. It exists because someone exists to read it. STYLE ―Paradoxes and Oxymorons‖ is not a sonnet, but it approximates one in form and subject matter, and critics reviewing Shadow Train regularly comment on the collection as a variation on a sonnet sequence. Historically, sonnets consist of fourteen lines. The Petrarchan sonnet, named after the fourteenth-century Italian poet Petrarch, has an octave (eight lines) that rhymes abbaabba, and a sestet (six lines) that rhymes cdecde or sometimes cdccdc, while the English, or Shakespearean sonnet consists of three quatrains (four lines) that rhyme abab cdcd efef, and a couplet (two lines) which rhymes gg. ―Paradoxes and Oxymorons,‖ like the other forty-nine poems in the collection, consists of four unrhymed quatrains. Ashbery‘s poem, however, like many sonnets, takes love (loosely) as its subject. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 62 FRANK O’HARA POEM Poem [Lana Turner has collapsed!] was written while O‘Hara was traveling on the Staten Island Ferry. He was on his way to a poetry reading at which he read this very poem a few hours later. It is representative of many of O‘Hara‘s most famous poems in that it has references to contemporary culture and facts of everyday life. He was part of the New York School of Poetry, the adherents of which believed in writing lighthearted poems about everything from walks in the city to celebrity gossip. This particular poem falls in an amusing category that was created just for O‘Hara known as an ―I do this, I do that‖ poem. The poem depicts a few moments in a speaker‘s life as he walks in New York and learns that Lana Turner has collapsed. The poem takes the reader through simple details that depict the landscape of New York, the speaker‘s state of mind, and his surprise at learning that Lana has collapsed. He‘s with a companion of some sort, to whom this poem is addressed, but doesn‘t pay too much attention to this person. Instead, he‘s more interested in the weather, comparing New York to California, and the world of Lana Turner. THEMES O‘Hara engages with themes of admiration and culture in ‗Poem [Lana Turner has collapsed!]‘. This is far from the only poem in which O‘Hara considers the influence of contemporary celebrity culture on himself, on another speaker, or on the broader population. He was well acquainted with the world he speaks about in this poem and isn‘t embarrassed about his admiration of it. The speaker admires Lana for the attention she gets and the fact that she remains so steadily in the spotlight. This is something quite unusual in the larger world of poetry. Most poets throughout time would not see the point in writing about low celebrity culture. They would instead choose to write about kings, historical and mythical figures, and artists. But, O‘Hara is more than willing to discuss Lana Turner in this traditionally ―high art‖ medium of poetry. STRUCTURE AND FORM A seventeen line poem that is contained within one stanza and written in free verse. This means that the poem does not make use of a specific rhyme scheme or metrical pattern. But, there are some examples of half-rhyme throughout the text. For example, ―snowing‖ and ―hailing‖ at the ends of lines three and four as well as ―suddenly‖ and ―see‖ in line ten. Although the category of ―free verse‖ seems as though the poem should be entirely without structure, this is not the case. LITERARY DEVICES O‘Hara makes use of several literary devices in ‗Poem [Lana Turner has collapsed!]‘. These include but are not limited to examples of anaphora, allusion, and apostrophe. The latter, apostrophe, is seen when the speaker addresses someone or something that either can‘t hear their words or does not have the ability to hear and comprehend them. These examples are usually started with the word ―oh‖ as is seen in the last line of this poem. Alliteration is an important formal device that is seen in the use and reuse of the same consonant sounds. For example, ―suddenly‖ and ―snowing‖ in lines two and three as well as ―hailing‖ and ―head‖ in lines four and five. Anaphora is another kind of repetition. It is seen when the poet uses the same word or POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 65 DETAILED ANALYSIS STANZA ONE In the first stanza of ‗The Day Lady Died,‘ the speaker gives the reader a bit of information about the setting. It‘s a Friday in New York, ―three days after Bastille day‖ (meaning it is July 17th). He provides the date, the exact time of day, and his location. He‘s walking through New York City, narrating everything he sees and does. Each of these activities is accompanied by time. The narrator is getting a shoeshine and then taking the train to dinner with friends, but he isn‘t sure which. STANZA TWO He mentions in the second stanza of ‗The Day Lady Died‘ that he stopped by a newsstand and bought ―NEW WORLD WRITING.‖ This is a reference to a literary magazine that was published during the fifties. It contained numerous examples of writing from different authors in one issue. He speaks sarcastically about his desire to see ―what the poets / in Ghana are doing these days,‖ as if it is the literary center of the world. The magazine was known to publish not only popular writers but various writers from around the world. It‘s unclear exactly how he feels about the inclusion of these writers, but he is at the very least skeptical. STANZA THREE Moving on from the magazine, he goes to the bank and barely has an interaction with someone named ―Miss Stillwagon‖ whose first name is likely ―Linda‖. He adds the last piece of information in parentheses as an afterthought meant only for the reader. Linda doesn‘t look up his bank balance like she normally does. This is something that‘s notable enough for him to mention. It is also the first indication that this particular day is any different from others that have come before it. The speaker buys books, one by Paul Verlaine, that have drawings in them by Pierre Bonnard, a French post-impressionist painter. He had considered getting several other things, but he set with his first choice. If nothing else, from these lines a reader should come to understand the speaker as an educated person. He is informed on various subjects and is ready to show that feature of his personality off. STANZA FOUR The fourth stanza of ‗The Day Lady Died‘ is six lines long. In it, the speaker buys his friend Mike a bottle of ―Strega.‖ He goes back and forth between different places, buying newspapers and going to the tobacconist. It‘s in the last line of this stanza that he mentions that ―her face‖ is on the ―NEW YORK POST‖. It is the first time that Holiday is mentioned in the poem and the speaker doesn‘t react to it, as if the news is of no importance. STANZA FIVE The poem ends with the speaker in a nightclub sweating and listening to a musician, Mal Waldron, play. It is so moving that ―everyone and I stopped breathing,‖ he says. It‘s struck him so profoundly at that moment because of the news he received about Billie Holiday earlier in the day. There is an interesting piece of historical context in the last line of this poem. It is noted, by O‘Hara himself, that one of the last times that he saw Holiday play was backed with the pianist Mal Waldron. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 66 LANGUAGE POETRY: SUSAN HOWE The Language poets (or L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E poets, after the magazine of that name) are an avant- garde group or tendency in United States poetry that emerged in the late 1960s and early 1970s. The poets included: Leslie Scalapino, Stephen Rodefer, Bruce Andrews, Charles Bernstein, Ron Silliman, Barrett Watten, Lyn Hejinian, Tom Mandel, Bob Perelman, Rae Armantrout, Alan Davies, Carla Harryman, Clark Coolidge, Hannah Weiner, Susan Howe, James Sherry, and Tina Darragh. Language poetry emphasizes the reader's role in bringing meaning out of a work. It plays down expression, seeing the poem as a construction in and of language itself. In more theoretical terms, it challenges the "natural" presence of a speaker behind the text; and emphasizes the disjunction and the materiality of the signifier. In developing their poetics, members of the Language school took as their starting point the emphasis on method evident in the modernist tradition, particularly as represented by Gertrude Stein, William Carlos Williams, and Louis Zukofsky. Language poetry is an example of poetic postmodernism. Language poetry has been a controversial topic in American letters from the 1970s to the present. The terms "language writing" and "language-centered writing" are also commonly used, and are perhaps the most generic terms. None of the poets associated with the tendency has used the equal signs when referring to the writing collectively. Its use in some critical articles can be taken as an indicator of the author's outsider status. Language poetry emphasizes the reader's role in bringing meaning out of a work. It developed in part in response to what poets considered the uncritical use of expressive lyric sentiment among earlier poetry movements. In the 1950s and 1960s, certain groups of poets had followed William Carlos Williams in his use of idiomatic American English rather than what they considered the 'heightened', or overtly poetic language favored by the New Criticism movement. New York School poets like Frank O'Hara and the Black Mountain group emphasized both speech and everyday language in their poetry and poetics. In contrast, some of the Language poets emphasized metonymy, synecdoche and extreme instances of paratactical structures in their compositions, which, even when employing everyday speech, created a far different texture. The result is often alien and difficult to understand at first glance, which is what Language poetry intends: for the reader to participate in creating the meaning of the poem. Watten's & Grenier's magazine This (and This Press which Watten edited), along with the magazine L=A=N=G=U=A=G=E, published work by notable Black Mountain poets such as Robert Creeley and Larry Eigner. Silliman considers Language poetry to be a continuation (albeit incorporating a critique) of the earlier movements. Watten has emphasized the discontinuity between the New American poets, whose writing, he argues, privileged self-expression, and the Language poets, who see the poem as a construction in and of language itself. In contrast, Bernstein has emphasized the expressive possibilities of working with constructed, and even found, language. Gertrude Stein, particularly in her writing after Tender Buttons, and Louis Zukofsky, in his book-length poem A, are the modernist poets who most influenced the Language school. In the postwar period, John Cage, Jackson Mac Low, and poets of the New York School (John Ashbery, Frank O'Hara, Ted Berrigan) and Black Mountain School (Robert Creeley, Charles Olson, and Robert Duncan) are most recognizable as precursors to the Language poets. Many of these poets used procedural methods based on mathematical sequences and other logical organising devices to structure their poetry. This practice proved highly useful to the language group. The application of process, especially at the level of the sentence, was to become the basic tenet of language praxis. Stein's influence was related to her own frequent use of language divorced from reference in her own writings. The language poets also drew on the philosophical works of Ludwig Wittgenstein, especially the concepts of language-games, meaning as use, and family resemblance among different uses, as the solution to the Problem of universals. POSTMODERN POETRY – UNIVERSIDAD COMPLUTENSE DE MADRID 67 CONCEPTUALISMS Conceptual writing (often used interchangeably with conceptual poetry) is a term which describes a range of experimental texts based on techniques such as appropriation (the "literary ready-made"), texts which may be reduced to a set of procedures, a generative instruction or constraint, a "concept" which precedes and is considered more important than the resulting text(s). As a category, it is closely related to conceptual art. The first notable difference from conceptual art is that textual-orientated gestures (such as copying, erasing or replacing words) prevail in conceptual writing. The second difference is that, while conceptual strategies "are embedded in the writing process", recent conceptual writing has a relationship with the development and rise of the computers and especially of the Internet: "With the rise of the Web, writing has met its photography. [...] Faced with an unprecedented amount of available digital text, writing needs to redefine itself to adapt to the new environment of textual abundance. [...] The computer encourages us to mimic its workings." The third difference is the concept of thinkership. Robert Fitterman writes that: Conceptual Writing, in fact, might best be defined not by the strategies used but by the expectations of the readership or thinkership. Pure conceptualism negates the need for reading in the traditional textual sense—one does not need to 'read' the work as much as think about the idea of the work. The term conceptual poetry is most often used for two reasons: it brings out the etymological meaning of the Ancient Greek word poiesis ("to make") and it emphasises the fact that this kind of writing has developed historically as a mode of avant-garde poetry (from Stéphane Mallarmé‘s Le Livre and Dada to Oulipo and concrete poetry) and, let aside the visual artists who also explore or have explored writing (historical examples include Marcel Duchamp, Joseph Kosuth and especially Andy Warhol), is now practiced also within the literary field. It is significant though that many of these writers, including Kenneth Goldsmith, are often supported by art institutions and may still come from art backgrounds. Conceptual poetry (or ConPo) is often used as a name for the entire movement which has more recently emerged and largely originates in the American academic scene of the 2000s (although conceptual writers are present today in most countries with avant-garde traditions[citation needed]). Both the new conceptual writers and their well-established models, the Language poets (among which David Antin, Clark Coolidge, Lyn Hejinian, Bernadette Mayer or Ron Silliman also authored conceptual writings), have been placed by the critic Marjorie Perloff in an American tradition dating back to Gertrude Stein and the Objectivists.[citation needed] The Flarf poetry group is often mentioned in the same context and at least some of their works are considered conceptual, but are different in some aspects to the "pure" conceptualists.