"The Waste Land" has been discussed in class now
and we spoke a great deal about the interpretation of each section. In "A Gme of Chess" there is a
monologue between the two characters that was somewhat confusing, but after our
discussion in class I have found new meaning.
A woman has had several children already and did not want children in
the first place. Her friend is sort of
rubbing it in her face that she has done everything wrong if she had never
wanted to have children. The woman with
the children married a military man who is soon to return from deployment and
who is assuredly going to want to have physical exploits with his wife upon his
return, which will lead to yet more children.
The woman and her friend are discussing how it is that she can keep from
having coitus with her husband and not have anymore children. All the talk is in vain though, as one can't
deny their spouse physical pleasure without them possibly seeking it elsewhere. I believe it is called a game of chess
because the woman and her military husband will be playing a strategic game for
both of them to get what they want.
March 06
"The Waste Land" by T.S. Eliot is in five
sections. Most of the sections were okay
to understand, but one section in particular was hard for me to even read
through. IV "Death by Water"
is the shortest section by far and I had to read through it a good five times
before I understood it all. I think
Phlebas is dead or dying and is having his life flash before his eyes as he "[Enters]
the whirlpool" of death. The last
stanza is speaking directly to a higher power and asking if the higher power
would consider Phlebas in a place on high.
"The Fire Sermon" was very ironic. A woman and man have coitus outside of
wedlock and then the woman looks out her window at a church where it is a sin
to have intercourse outside of wedlock.
I have no idea if these poems were meant to be funny at the time they
were written, but this particular one seems quite comical to me.
March 01
"The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock" was written
by T. S. Eliot in 1910. This was before
Eliot was struck upon by misfortune.
This poem is about a man who is forever questioning if he should do
something or not. He want to be brave
and step out and live his life, but he needs but one silly excuse to sit in his
own little world and pass the time. He
feels that he has all the time he needs left to do the things he never
does. The poem goes on with the
questions of what to do in life. Starting
at line 120, Eliot changes to the time of being old. He is still questioning what he should do
down to what to eat and how to part his hair, but the indecisive man mentions
having heard mermaids singing, but they don't sing to him. He is becoming a bit delusional and the last
line suggests that the man finally dies, "Till human voices wake us, and
we drown." (131). It's a sad poem
that is more focused on the internal conflicts that arose in this man quite
literally every moment of his life.
February 28
According to our book, T. S. Eliot came from a wealthy
background and was well educated. He
originally was a philosopher, but in 1914 Eliot became a poet, married, and
moved to England. In 1916 Eliot finally
met with misfortune in the form of poverty and marital and literary
problems. In 1918 Eliot wrote
"Whispers of Immortality".
This poem is separated into two different settings. The first is about seeing a dead body. In earlier times, plant bulbs would be buried
with a body when it was put to grave.
The characters see death all around the dead. The second part is fairly confusing. It starts out talking about a woman's bust
and then seems to say that because of her beauty and charm she is well kept
while others are in a bad way. Most of
Eliot's poems are very confusing to me, but they were all the rage during his
time. This may be a good research
topic. "What was the world like in
the 1900's to invite such a prestige upon Eliot and his poetry?"
February 23
W. H. Auden’s poetry was very confusing to me. The poem that was easier for me to understand was “The Shield of Achilles”. This, I fear, is only due to my knowing a little bit about the history of Achilles. Achilles was a demigod son of the goddess Thetis who was a sea nymph. The shield of Achilles was lost when a friend wore it into battle and was slain. The first two stanza’s are speaking of the beach near Troy where Achaeans were stationed before the siege. The “She” in the poem, I believe, is Thetis. She is trying to get her son new armor from the god of fire, Hephaestos. The mother is worried because she has seen that her son has defiled a temple that worships the “gods” and has given no offerings to the “gods” for favor during the battle and with good reason. Having seen these actions, Hephaestos is displeased with Achilles and decides he is not worthy of his armor. In the last stanza, Thetis is watching her son most carefully because she is certain he is soon to die. Her assumptions are proven, if I remember the story correctly.
February 21
I found “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain” by Langston Hughes very interesting. Hughes was the only Harlem Renaissance writer to remain productive long after the Harlem Renaissance’s end. Hughes was also the first poet to bring the blues into literary verse. Hughes muses included black urban poor and working class. In “The Negro Artist and the Racial Mountain”, Hughes basically says that the colored middle class is taught to be ashamed of his heritage whereas the poor working class still hold true to themselves. This can be seen in two separate passages where it is written, “One sees immediately how difficult it would be for [a colored middle class poet] to interest himself in interpreting the beauty of his own people…He is taught rather…to be ashamed of [that beauty] when it is not according to Caucasian patterns” and, “[the so-called common element] furnish a wealth of colorful distinctive material for any artist because they still hold their own individuality in the face of [Caucasian] standardizations.”
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