The irony of Levis dying before he could finish this book titled Elegy is almost too much. You can’t even begin to plan something like that. I mentioned this to my group, but I can’t help but think that the reason why most of these poems seem like a jumbled puzzle is because of the sheer fact that they are unfinished. Who knows how many more drafts Levis would have done to the “Cook” poem, or the “Elegy Ending in the Sound of Skipping Rope”. There is absolutely no way to tell. As Levine writes at the beginning, he didn’t alter a single thing. He left the poems as they were when Levis died: “I have rewritten nothing. I have revised nothing.” (xi). This infuriates me, in a way. Because here we are, debating and trying to wring through his mess of Greek mythology and all these other references and word choices when they might not be what he actually meant. Take for instance, in the “Skipping Rope” poem, when Levis writes, “The characters met on faint blue paper. / They were thin as paper then.” (68). How do we know that he didn’t mean to repeat the word paper? Authors could look at that and say with a high and mighty tone that, “Oh yes, the repetition of the word ‘paper’ works well here because blahblahblah” but in reality, it could be a mistake. Later on in the poem, he asks the question, “What withered away?” (71). What if he meant to ask a different question, which could change the entire feel of that section of the poem? There are endless questions that can never be answered because the author is dead. I think you get my point. Anyway.
That being said, I think that these poems, as hard as they are to read through and understand, have a lot more said than what is written. Although, I will argue that you have to be either an English scholar or very knowledgeable about art history to completely understand the context sometimes. Such as in the first poem, “The Two Trees”, when it is talking about the tree being “In the shape of its limbs / As if someone’s cries for help / Had been muffled by them once, concealed there, / Her white flesh just underneath the slowly peeling bark” (4). In my first reading of it, I just thought he was personifying the tree. I had no idea it was referencing Apollo & Daphne in Greek mythology until it was explained in class. After knowing that, the ending of the poem made much more sense to me. But for just reading the poem, I shouldn’t have to do research to understand it. I love poems that make me think, and I love pondering over poetry with the best of them, but researching is just going a little bit too far for me.
To get back to my first point in the last paragraph, these poems really do have a lot more said than what is on the page. Take for instance the “Boy in Video Arcade”. This poem’s first three lines say so much in two sentences: “Some see a lake of fire at the end of it, / Or heaven’s guesswork, something always to be sketched in. / I see a sullen boy in a video arcade.” (19). My point is clear when in class, we debated the meaning of this for about half an hour. Is “it” death? Is “it” a tunnel? We’ll never know! Who is this boy? Is it Levis? We’ll never know. But I can’t even tell you how much I am in love with those three lines. For argument’s sake, I will just throw my idea that those lines must be in their final draft. Because if they were to be changed in some new drafts Levis might have made, I probably would cry. I almost think those three lines could be a poem that could stand on its own.
The mystery that is the unedited Elegy will no doubt be continually debated on and there won't ever be a clear answer. That bugs me, but that's just the way it goes.
Thursday, September 30, 2010
Callie's take of Levis
I found Larry Levis’ poetry confusing and difficult to understand. His collection of poems entitled Elegy contains poems of varying content, style, and length and even though he did not compile it himself, I believe Philip Levine did an excellent job especially when it comes to the order the poems are placed in. I enjoyed this because a couple of the poems in the third section relate back to images and names that were in the first two sections.
As we talked about in class, Levis’ poetry looks like it would be easy to read, not like Alice Notley’s poetry for example, but once you begin to read the poems you soon discover that you are confused and unsure of not only what is happening in the poem metaphorically but also what it happening literally. One example of this is the poem “Elegy for Whatever Had a Pattern in It”. This poem, on the first read is a jumble of Spanish names, black widows, girls who hairspray their hair too much, and the idea that we are all representations. But on a further read you realize that not only are there patterns apparent in the content throughout such as the pattern of the hourglass on the black widow’s body and the pattern of Ediesto Huerta’s work habits, but also the patterns of repetition in the actual language of the poem. It seems as though each time you read through a poem you discover something else.
I did have one thought that we didn’t talk about in class and that is the titles. The last nine poems all begin with “Elegy with a” or “Elegy for” or “Elegy ending in a”. These poems don’t necessarily even relate to their titles except that they have one line which references the title. When we read W.S. Merwin’s poetry we discovered that the title added a little something or a new slant to the poem, but Levis’ just doesn’t seem to do that. I wonder if maybe I’m just not looking hard or deep enough to find a further meaning in these titles or if Levis didn’t title them himself. I wonder if Levine had to title them and he didn’t want to bias the poems one way or another with anything that wasn’t straight from the poem. One poem in particular made me laugh because of the title. “Elegy Ending in the Sound of a Skipping Rope” has nothing to do with a skipping rope until the very last line: “until I could hear only the endless,/Annoying, unvarying flick of the rope each time/It touched the street.” (81) As I was reading through the poem I kept waiting to hear a jump rope or even a reference to it, but it didn’t show up until this last line. And I literally laughed out loud when I read that line.
I did enjoy the reappearance of Anastasia and Sandman throughout the collection as well as the other reoccurring themes such as horses and death and the afterlife. However, I feel like it would take an entire semester to fully understand all of the references and nuances found in this collection of poetry.
Emily M.'s response to Levis
Levis’s writing did not seem like it would be overly challenging when I first glanced at it; it looked straightforward. In retrospect, maybe this is why I had such difficulty making sense of what he wanted me to get out of it, or if it was meant to be open to interpretation. His writing style was formal in looks alone, proper punctuation, full sentences (although there were run-ons) and correct capitalization, but that was as far as it went. Levis’s sentences might have been complete thoughts, often times however they made little sense in context and alone. The poems worked as a whole, taking a section here or there rarely allowed the reader to gain meaning, it was only in its full being that I felt I understood what was going on. As with other poets we have read this meant reading closely, and multiple times, and even then, there were questions left unanswered. This was both a charming and frustrating quality for me, while I enjoyed going in depth I struggled with not being able to pin down his meanings and references.
Levis used a great deal of the outside world in his poems, and these references came from all over. I found that these little allusions were similar to the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland, they lead down twisted paths where we encountered knew knowledge, that didn’t quite fit with what we believed the poem to be about. These hints lead us deeper, while sometimes the pieces fit together (easily or with a little work); other times they were dead ends. What I found interesting about Levis’s use of references was that they often fit in the same categories as his other poems. Some of the categories I came up with included, cultural/political, his own poems, outside art (paintings, poets etc.), and faith (religion)/death, it seemed to be a pattern throughout the book which I found noteworthy. I am not sure if this was an accident of Levis’s part, or if it was intentional but going through the book, it was clearly that he had developed somewhat of a theme in his work beyond the use of Elegy. He also does create some powerful images that are more often than not dark. His focus on death and the afterlife were the most prevalent in the book especially in the second section.
Our first class after reading Levis, we discussed his first poem in depth. We went over its meaning and format, and discussed the importance the mulberry tree and his use of the Latin language. Appropriately, the final page of his work included both, although he did not arrange these pieces himself it I found it a fitting ending. The final poem summed up his work, full of references, language that required thought, questions, metaphors and reality. Overall Levis does challenge the traditional idea of poetry, and forces his readers to think about reading in a new way. His work is at times confusing, but always interesting and it was very enojyable to read.
Levis used a great deal of the outside world in his poems, and these references came from all over. I found that these little allusions were similar to the rabbit hole in Alice in Wonderland, they lead down twisted paths where we encountered knew knowledge, that didn’t quite fit with what we believed the poem to be about. These hints lead us deeper, while sometimes the pieces fit together (easily or with a little work); other times they were dead ends. What I found interesting about Levis’s use of references was that they often fit in the same categories as his other poems. Some of the categories I came up with included, cultural/political, his own poems, outside art (paintings, poets etc.), and faith (religion)/death, it seemed to be a pattern throughout the book which I found noteworthy. I am not sure if this was an accident of Levis’s part, or if it was intentional but going through the book, it was clearly that he had developed somewhat of a theme in his work beyond the use of Elegy. He also does create some powerful images that are more often than not dark. His focus on death and the afterlife were the most prevalent in the book especially in the second section.
Our first class after reading Levis, we discussed his first poem in depth. We went over its meaning and format, and discussed the importance the mulberry tree and his use of the Latin language. Appropriately, the final page of his work included both, although he did not arrange these pieces himself it I found it a fitting ending. The final poem summed up his work, full of references, language that required thought, questions, metaphors and reality. Overall Levis does challenge the traditional idea of poetry, and forces his readers to think about reading in a new way. His work is at times confusing, but always interesting and it was very enojyable to read.
Wednesday, September 29, 2010
Notley, The Descent of Alette
The Descent of Alette is an absolute relief; Alice Notley delves into the female epic gloriously in her symbolic, engaging contemporary plot that leads the heroine Alette down below the subways into the underground, “ “into an unknown” “unlit world” ” (41), where she traverses the caves alone until, finding strength by embracing herself as an owl, flies upwards to defeat the tyrant, finally surfacing where “ “‘The light has been made new’” ” (147). As extremely meaningful and intriguing the world of Alette is, what makes this collection succeed as an epic is not the outcome of the story, but the function of the form; as poetry, this book was something completely face-slapping different, by the end of it you feel as bewildered and enlightened as Alette does when she finally encounters not the brightness of the surface above the subway, but what the light brings: “ “all the / lost creatures” “began to” “emerge” “Come up from” “below the subway” / “From the caves &” “from the dark woods” “I had visited”… “I watched through” “tears of clarity” “many forms of being” / “I had never” “seen before” (148).
Just as Alette begins lost in Dante’s dark woods, descending the many caves of the Inferno under the subway, so does she rise like Dante to an understanding similar to his vision of God at the height of his journey in the Paradiso: “already I could feel my being turned— / instinct and intellect balanced equally / as in a wheel whose motion nothing jars— / by the Love that moves the Sun and the other stars” (XXXIII, 143-46, Ciardi Tr). In a moment of truth, Dante realizes his soul is in unison with the movement of God’s love, and in the end of Alette’s journey, she has a similar understanding of wholeness, of everyone rising in one motion together: with “tears of clarity”…/ “Whatever,” “whoever,” “could be,” “was possible,” “or / had been” “forgotten” for long ages” “now joined us,” “now / joined us once more” “Came to light” “that morning” (148). While Dante journeys to understand the Divine Love of God, Alette journeys to understand herself and her gender, before freeing the world of the gender bias induced by the tyrant’s reign over society. The use of quotation marks are a breakthrough in themselves from other styles of male poetry, creating a new “spoken” structure that is hereby specifically female in The Descent of Alette.
Just as Alette begins lost in Dante’s dark woods, descending the many caves of the Inferno under the subway, so does she rise like Dante to an understanding similar to his vision of God at the height of his journey in the Paradiso: “already I could feel my being turned— / instinct and intellect balanced equally / as in a wheel whose motion nothing jars— / by the Love that moves the Sun and the other stars” (XXXIII, 143-46, Ciardi Tr). In a moment of truth, Dante realizes his soul is in unison with the movement of God’s love, and in the end of Alette’s journey, she has a similar understanding of wholeness, of everyone rising in one motion together: with “tears of clarity”…/ “Whatever,” “whoever,” “could be,” “was possible,” “or / had been” “forgotten” for long ages” “now joined us,” “now / joined us once more” “Came to light” “that morning” (148). While Dante journeys to understand the Divine Love of God, Alette journeys to understand herself and her gender, before freeing the world of the gender bias induced by the tyrant’s reign over society. The use of quotation marks are a breakthrough in themselves from other styles of male poetry, creating a new “spoken” structure that is hereby specifically female in The Descent of Alette.
Sunday, September 26, 2010
Descent of Alette Response, Kelsey M.
I was excited about the book before I opened it, not only because of the cover (which was extremely alluring--it's a very pretty book) but because of a conversation I had at work. My supervisor asked me what I was currently reading in classes, and when I mentioned this book, he stopped and looked directly at me.
"I saw her do a reading [of her work] once. It was like witchcraft; I swear, it felt like she floated out of the room, man."
After that, I was more than intrigued by Alice Notely and the book--fortunately, "the Descent of Alette" lived up to my expectations.
The most frustrating and rewarding part of the book was Notely's language. Upon reading her note at the beginning about the form she had chosen to use for the book, I questioned it. It soon came to my attention, however, that it was clear that the use of the quotations was vital to her intent. The quotations, at their most basic level, cause a kind of deliberateness in both the word choice and placement by the author, and the comprehension by the reader. It breaks up the flow of a line while simultaneously creating suspense and tension between each set of quotations. Each enclosed phrase is to be appreciated for its obviously intentional pairing, but is also part of a whole, as we are reminded by the perpetuation of this form throughout the text. As I also mentioned in class and in a DWP, I also felt that this came to change the act of reading the text--while the quotations are used untraditionally...they are still quotation marks and cannot be regarded as anything else. This meant that eventually, the reader comes to regard them as an element unto themselves.
I also loved the point that Notely makes about the form of her book, that the quotations "remind the reader that each phrase is a thing said by a voice." This speaks strongly to the theme of "pluralism" that runs through the book--the view of Alette as standing for many people (both literally and figuratively in the story). This idea of voices, particularly many voices, also seems to hearken back to the idea of "Herstory"...the idea that the history of womankind is passed down verbally, while men's history is written. Notley often talks about how "form" and words are all invented by the Tyrant (as a figurehead for patriarchal society) and describes the many attempts to escape this, such as with the old woman and the painter that Alette meets. Notely sees to imply, with this particular form, that the story of Alette is told, and that this is merely a careful recording--the essential form of Alette's story does not adhere to the traditions of a patriarchal society.
The theme of transformation also reinforces this idea. Throughout the book, Alette both witnesses and is the subject of many transformations. The "crazy" woman in the subway attempts to make her "own world" by rejecting everything that is made by man/the Tyrant; the artist strives to "invent air" so that she may know a form not derived from man/the Tyrant. Alette's many transformations both speak to her "pluralness" and also allow her to remained unclaimed by the Tryant. This becomes clear when Alette regains her memory; it is then that she remembers her name. Alette's name and memory suggest that who she is, is not form--she is essentially something not invented by the Tyrant, but her form is only one expression of herself. This is similar to the idea that Notley's text is not the story, but a telling of it, thereby breaking free of (or attempting to) the traditional, invented form.
Friday, September 24, 2010
Equality of the genders in The Descent of Alette
One of the most interesting things I found in this book was that Notley's ideas of equality of the genders clearly weren't the same as ones of other people who would consider themselves feminists. This is show in two poems, one near the middle of the book and one near the end.
In the first poem, Alette comes across a chamber where a man is standing, and they both decide that they would want to see what the world is like without gender. So they take off their sex organs and stick them on the walls. What would seems like it should have been a euphoric moment in the text was anything but, and the man and Alette were both blinded and unable to tell what was happening anymore, and so they took their sexes back. This shows one of Notley's beliefs, that equality among the genders cannot be accomplished by getting rid of gender all-together.
The next poem is when Alette is reborn and is filled with a strange light that makes her feel calm. Throughout the poems, women have been represented as the darkness, and men the light. By giving Alette this light, it was, in a way, merging women and men and making them equal. Notley's belief, therefore, is that in order for the genders to be equal, they must be on the same level of understanding, but getting rid of sex and gender all-together isn't the way to do it. Humans have come to associate their very identities with man or woman, some to the point where if they feel like they are actually the opposite gender, they are willing to undergo surgery to change that. Therefore, because it's such an important part of us, getting rid of it only causes confusion and pain.
At first The Descent of Alette was very difficult and almost troublesome for me. The quotation marks seemed a bit unnecessary and I didn't really know what to think of the poems. However, as I continued reading through to the second, then third, and finally the fourth book my feelings towards the work changed completely. It is not your typical "feminist" collection of poems and the subject is not an overly popular one either: the descent to hell. Notley creates vivid and fantastic imagery coerced with an intriguing pursuit of self-discovery that makes it impossible to put the book down.
Despite the numerous dichotomies that she brings up such as male/female, animal/human, darkness/light, etc, she is always the central character in the story and the one who experiences the most transformations (both physically and mentally). She blurs the lines between these categories. Another interesting way in which she blurs lines occurs between book one and book two. The first book reveals her gloomy observations of tormented people on the subway; a subway with a monotonous and depressing course. She holds conversations with some, and questions others, but what appears to happen is that all the people become incorporated inside herself. This transforms her "I" into a plural representation of self. I feel that if Notley didn't do this, Alette wouldn't have been able to have entered and dealt with each room, or cave, in the second book. I'm glad she did this. For while I recognize that this book is very much about Alette's struggle to discovery herself and answer her own life questions, it needs to be universal in some sense as well, otherwise readers would not be able to relate to the book.
One particular point in the book really made me think. Alette is conversing with the woman with the basket and asks her why she is following Alette. She replies with "To tell you this: There are few books by us women, because it wasn't to be books it was to be something else...books ruined us...created time...distanced us from the perpetuation of our beautiful beginning moment...only moment created death" (70.) She is stating that books and documentation of any form created death and the concept of time, without them life would just be a continuing progression and everyone would exist forever in the immediate moment. I believe this statement supports the idea that there is something outside the sphere of humankind that existed before, and exists beyond what we know. It was not created by humans and therefore cannot necessarily be destroyed by them, but is still unreachable in some way (due to the tyrant mainly.)
While Notley's book is excruciatingly dark and depressing, it is fascinating all in the same time. Her animalistic imagery is intriguing and the action is exciting. Even though it is probably one of the most different collections of poetry that I have encountered, I have definitely enjoyed reading her work.
Despite the numerous dichotomies that she brings up such as male/female, animal/human, darkness/light, etc, she is always the central character in the story and the one who experiences the most transformations (both physically and mentally). She blurs the lines between these categories. Another interesting way in which she blurs lines occurs between book one and book two. The first book reveals her gloomy observations of tormented people on the subway; a subway with a monotonous and depressing course. She holds conversations with some, and questions others, but what appears to happen is that all the people become incorporated inside herself. This transforms her "I" into a plural representation of self. I feel that if Notley didn't do this, Alette wouldn't have been able to have entered and dealt with each room, or cave, in the second book. I'm glad she did this. For while I recognize that this book is very much about Alette's struggle to discovery herself and answer her own life questions, it needs to be universal in some sense as well, otherwise readers would not be able to relate to the book.
One particular point in the book really made me think. Alette is conversing with the woman with the basket and asks her why she is following Alette. She replies with "To tell you this: There are few books by us women, because it wasn't to be books it was to be something else...books ruined us...created time...distanced us from the perpetuation of our beautiful beginning moment...only moment created death" (70.) She is stating that books and documentation of any form created death and the concept of time, without them life would just be a continuing progression and everyone would exist forever in the immediate moment. I believe this statement supports the idea that there is something outside the sphere of humankind that existed before, and exists beyond what we know. It was not created by humans and therefore cannot necessarily be destroyed by them, but is still unreachable in some way (due to the tyrant mainly.)
While Notley's book is excruciatingly dark and depressing, it is fascinating all in the same time. Her animalistic imagery is intriguing and the action is exciting. Even though it is probably one of the most different collections of poetry that I have encountered, I have definitely enjoyed reading her work.
Caroline's Response to Notley
I have to say, right off the bat, that for me, finding this book was like finding gold. After only a few pages I began to feel privileged to be experiencing something so unique and, well, profound. Perhaps most shocking to me was that I was feeling this way about a book I was reading for a college class! Here’s where I admit, I’m a 5th year college student, 3 months from graduating, who didn’t expect much out of this semester at all. But here I am, absolutely changed by Notley’s writing, truly engaged in Alette’s unique journey to self-discovery. I realize that this might not be the most popular reaction to this crazy, at times mind altering text, but I’m really ok with that because I thoroughly enjoyed developing my own relationship with Alette.
To begin, I have to go back to something we were discussing last class. I have to return to the moment when Alette finally remembers, when she finally knows who she is again and what happened to her brother. In my opinion, this was the single most striking moment in Alette’s journey, yes, even over eating the mouse and detaching her sex organ. In this instance, she says, “”My name is” “Alette” “My brother” “died in battle”” (136). It’s amazing that, after everything she has been through, all of the wild experiences she has endured, all of the suffering she has seen and challenges she had withstood, this one human instance of remembrance transcends everything else and becomes her defining moment. This memory is what drives the rest of her actions. The memory of her soldier brother was the one piece of information that could fuel her enough to complete her destiny, to finally defeat her Tyrant. In some way, Alette needed to grapple with the death of her brother, needed to see it clearly, in the face of the Tyrant, and tell him that her brother died when, “ “Two of your leaders” “last fought”” (136). As I had said a few class sessions ago, I was always in it to find out how Alette’s Tyrant would appear, who he would be, and what he would embody for her. In the end, I am so satisfied that this whole journey was a matter of avenging her brother, of finding inner peace with his untimely death.
To backtrack for just a moment before I let go of this book, I have to bring up one more moment from early on in her story. Back in Book Two, as Alette travels through the caves, she comes to one in which she meets a group of red-eyed demon saints. Wanting, as always, to understand this strange place, she drinks a liquid that is supposed to make her “like them”, to allow her to be a demon-saint for a short time. What actually comes of it is that Alette becomes closer than ever to her dead brother, without even realizing it. At this point, her memory is still shot, but upon drinking the potion, she began, “ “…to feel strange” “sensations:” “as if” “I had killed,” “killed many people” “the way a soldier has”” (55). As we discussed in class, soldiers appear throughout the book, in a way that we know must be important but that never really becomes clear until we find out about her brother. Knowing that now, this passage means so much more to me. Although Alette is not aware of it here, when she becomes a demon-saint, she also becomes quite close to her brother, feeling like a soldier. I think that each cave represents some tiny fragment of experience that Alette must have in order to become strong enough to remember, strong enough to use those memories positively. This cave offers her the chance to be her brother, to feel the weight that a soldier does, while still not having to be aware of any of it, or aware of its greater meaning.
Clearly I could go on forever about this book. Which I have to admit is a great feeling. It’s not often that I come across a book that resonates so heavily with me, that engages me so fully. I think the book accomplishes so much, for feminism, for self-discovery, for poetry, literature, language, art, on and on, etc. Maybe the quotation marks are off-putting at first, and perhaps the story is just completely whacky, but in my eyes, Notley is one of the most prolific writers of our time.
To begin, I have to go back to something we were discussing last class. I have to return to the moment when Alette finally remembers, when she finally knows who she is again and what happened to her brother. In my opinion, this was the single most striking moment in Alette’s journey, yes, even over eating the mouse and detaching her sex organ. In this instance, she says, “”My name is” “Alette” “My brother” “died in battle”” (136). It’s amazing that, after everything she has been through, all of the wild experiences she has endured, all of the suffering she has seen and challenges she had withstood, this one human instance of remembrance transcends everything else and becomes her defining moment. This memory is what drives the rest of her actions. The memory of her soldier brother was the one piece of information that could fuel her enough to complete her destiny, to finally defeat her Tyrant. In some way, Alette needed to grapple with the death of her brother, needed to see it clearly, in the face of the Tyrant, and tell him that her brother died when, “ “Two of your leaders” “last fought”” (136). As I had said a few class sessions ago, I was always in it to find out how Alette’s Tyrant would appear, who he would be, and what he would embody for her. In the end, I am so satisfied that this whole journey was a matter of avenging her brother, of finding inner peace with his untimely death.
To backtrack for just a moment before I let go of this book, I have to bring up one more moment from early on in her story. Back in Book Two, as Alette travels through the caves, she comes to one in which she meets a group of red-eyed demon saints. Wanting, as always, to understand this strange place, she drinks a liquid that is supposed to make her “like them”, to allow her to be a demon-saint for a short time. What actually comes of it is that Alette becomes closer than ever to her dead brother, without even realizing it. At this point, her memory is still shot, but upon drinking the potion, she began, “ “…to feel strange” “sensations:” “as if” “I had killed,” “killed many people” “the way a soldier has”” (55). As we discussed in class, soldiers appear throughout the book, in a way that we know must be important but that never really becomes clear until we find out about her brother. Knowing that now, this passage means so much more to me. Although Alette is not aware of it here, when she becomes a demon-saint, she also becomes quite close to her brother, feeling like a soldier. I think that each cave represents some tiny fragment of experience that Alette must have in order to become strong enough to remember, strong enough to use those memories positively. This cave offers her the chance to be her brother, to feel the weight that a soldier does, while still not having to be aware of any of it, or aware of its greater meaning.
Clearly I could go on forever about this book. Which I have to admit is a great feeling. It’s not often that I come across a book that resonates so heavily with me, that engages me so fully. I think the book accomplishes so much, for feminism, for self-discovery, for poetry, literature, language, art, on and on, etc. Maybe the quotation marks are off-putting at first, and perhaps the story is just completely whacky, but in my eyes, Notley is one of the most prolific writers of our time.
Thursday, September 23, 2010
Notley Response
I will open by saying that I really enjoyed The Descent of Alette more than most poetry I’ve read in the past few years. Since high school literature classes, I’ve seen my fair share of poets, but none stick out in my mind like Notley. I admire especially how Notley managed to create a story through her poetry. No, Descent is not a book of poems loosely linked by common themes (like Merwin), no, this is a story from start to finish. As a Creative Writing major, that really captivated and caught my attention in a way that poetry hasn’t before.
With that devotional piece aside, I’ll dive right in. In this entry I’d like to talk a little more in depth about what I didn’t cover in my presentation, where I stuttered like a mad man and probably didn’t make any sense. Haha. Here goes.
What caught me most about Descent was the semi-hypocritical goal of the text, the idea of trying to create a decidedly female epic. While Notley’s form of poetry is certainly unique (with the quotations marks and a large measure of ambiguity) her story model follows that of the Inferno. Replacing Virgil of sorts is an Owl, who is also supposedly her father, and replacing Dante is Alette, a woman on a search for the evil tyrant, this ambiguous evil similar to Satan himself.
This idea left me a little befuddled by the end of the text, as I wondered if Alette and the other women had failed in their quest to create a female literary or art form. But then I thought more so about how the Owl, though suspecting he was once a man, no longer found his sex/gender to be of any real importance (pg 102).
(As a side note, while I did analyze this, don’t ask me to make sense of eating the mouse, that was weird, I kinda spaced out after that.)
In terms of the animals, to speak more on what I was trying to get across in my presentation, I viewed the symbolic nature of the animals in a way that woman, rather than trying to emulate men with their reason, embraced the so called stereotypes of their existence (being more emotional, more maternal or animalistic) and instead of treating that as something to be ashamed of, instead embracing it and making it empowering.
In conclusion, I enjoyed Notley mostly because of how accessible she was to a person more accustomed to reading novels as opposed to poetry collections. I generally have a difficult time analyzing poetry (looking at poetry requires a totally different lens as opposed to that of a novel) but this text bucked all the norms.
With that devotional piece aside, I’ll dive right in. In this entry I’d like to talk a little more in depth about what I didn’t cover in my presentation, where I stuttered like a mad man and probably didn’t make any sense. Haha. Here goes.
What caught me most about Descent was the semi-hypocritical goal of the text, the idea of trying to create a decidedly female epic. While Notley’s form of poetry is certainly unique (with the quotations marks and a large measure of ambiguity) her story model follows that of the Inferno. Replacing Virgil of sorts is an Owl, who is also supposedly her father, and replacing Dante is Alette, a woman on a search for the evil tyrant, this ambiguous evil similar to Satan himself.
This idea left me a little befuddled by the end of the text, as I wondered if Alette and the other women had failed in their quest to create a female literary or art form. But then I thought more so about how the Owl, though suspecting he was once a man, no longer found his sex/gender to be of any real importance (pg 102).
(As a side note, while I did analyze this, don’t ask me to make sense of eating the mouse, that was weird, I kinda spaced out after that.)
In terms of the animals, to speak more on what I was trying to get across in my presentation, I viewed the symbolic nature of the animals in a way that woman, rather than trying to emulate men with their reason, embraced the so called stereotypes of their existence (being more emotional, more maternal or animalistic) and instead of treating that as something to be ashamed of, instead embracing it and making it empowering.
In conclusion, I enjoyed Notley mostly because of how accessible she was to a person more accustomed to reading novels as opposed to poetry collections. I generally have a difficult time analyzing poetry (looking at poetry requires a totally different lens as opposed to that of a novel) but this text bucked all the norms.
Notley Response
Throughout most of the reading of "the descent of Alette," all I could think of was a hellish underground world. It was a reality beyond comparison. For quite a bit of time I read in such a confused state that I often felt myself needing a break to come back to reality. Notley creates such an extreme world in which there seems to be no clarity or understanding for Alette thus for the reader as well.
Even though the transition from Merwin to Notley was extreme I found that despite the constant quotations I found myself really in tune with the words. I didn't find myself stopping at all. I almost found the quotation marks to be helpful because they almost focused my attention to the language even more than if they weren't there. I found that at least in the beginning I thought of the quotes more as thought and completed ideas rather than different speakers or perspectives and this really helped me follow and grasp what was going on. Looking back at the book as a whole and probably around the start of the second book I began looking at the possibility of different speakers and it almost fell right into place without confusion.
I found her choice of animal parallels to be somewhat odd. The choice of an owl seemed odd to me and I am still pondering her deeper meaning of this owl. Throughout history owls have come to hold so many different meanings and labels. In Indian culture, Greek mythology and throughout Aesop's fables, owls depict wisdom and support. This is the theme I concluded the owl was meant to symbolize but there is also, folklore which shows an owl to be a bird related to witches and evil. Overall, the owl was meant to help Alette both in her transformation and to complete her journey. Also, prior to the class discussion, I had never heard of a snake as a female representation. The only knowledge I had of a snake was related to the Biblical representation of the serpent in the Garden of Eden.
Overall, I found that unlike Merwin, Notley's "descent of Alette" spoke on something much deeper than the argument of language and it's meaning. Notley really hit home the support of feminism. In some ways I appreciated what Merwin had to say because it didn't seem so agenda filled. It was more about the importance of language and meaning.
Even though the transition from Merwin to Notley was extreme I found that despite the constant quotations I found myself really in tune with the words. I didn't find myself stopping at all. I almost found the quotation marks to be helpful because they almost focused my attention to the language even more than if they weren't there. I found that at least in the beginning I thought of the quotes more as thought and completed ideas rather than different speakers or perspectives and this really helped me follow and grasp what was going on. Looking back at the book as a whole and probably around the start of the second book I began looking at the possibility of different speakers and it almost fell right into place without confusion.
I found her choice of animal parallels to be somewhat odd. The choice of an owl seemed odd to me and I am still pondering her deeper meaning of this owl. Throughout history owls have come to hold so many different meanings and labels. In Indian culture, Greek mythology and throughout Aesop's fables, owls depict wisdom and support. This is the theme I concluded the owl was meant to symbolize but there is also, folklore which shows an owl to be a bird related to witches and evil. Overall, the owl was meant to help Alette both in her transformation and to complete her journey. Also, prior to the class discussion, I had never heard of a snake as a female representation. The only knowledge I had of a snake was related to the Biblical representation of the serpent in the Garden of Eden.
Overall, I found that unlike Merwin, Notley's "descent of Alette" spoke on something much deeper than the argument of language and it's meaning. Notley really hit home the support of feminism. In some ways I appreciated what Merwin had to say because it didn't seem so agenda filled. It was more about the importance of language and meaning.
Shawn's Response to Notley
I feel bad--I really do. Why? Well, since you asked, because of some divine act on behalf of the poetry gods (and because of the way the books and blog assignments line up) I'm always writing about a poet I don't wholeheartedly enjoy. Then, when it comes time for the rest of the class to respond to the blog assignments, my blog is always the one that's always whining, neither pleased nor satisfied. With that tawdry excuse of my excessive whining out of the way, let us now continue to Notley...
First things first: those quotation marks. I knew it was going to be a rough ride when I first saw those. And it was...in a way. Just like a rough ride in a car will make you slow down, Notley's metrical quotations accomplished the same thing in a literary fashion. I found myself taking the time to read each foot without "mentally slurring" the words (what Notley warns against in the Author's note. I found myself "slurring" a lot while reading Merwin--not slurring drunk, of course, (really!) but slurring in accordance with his wispy, ethereal manner of writing. Notley's poetry, on the other hand, has a sense of progressive, forward motion (almost a marching quality) because of the way the iambs are enclosed. This causes the reader to slow down in a quick way (let me explain); one in which he or she is reading every word but with a sense of motion because of the way the iambs are placed. So, I guess it's not a bad thing, just an unusual thing.
Something else unusual in "The Descent of Alette" was the very distinct sense of purpose with Notley's poetry. Most poets--I would assume--use poetry as some sort of meditation: a place in which to hone ideas, make points, and discover (for their own sake) revelations. We don't find this in much of Notley's work. From the get-go, she marches (see previous paragraph) us into the story head on with everything planned out and hoping we'll be the ones making the revelations. This is evidenced by Notley's exorbitant use of symbolism--a tell-tale sign of a well thought-out work--everything is planned and everything stands for something else. Of course, Alette makes revelations on her way to kill the Tyrant and the reader learns a couple lessons along the way, but I don't think a whole lot of meditation for Notley in the act of writing the poems in "The Descent of Alette." There is, instead, an end and a means to an end. It could be argued that the poems possess a dreamlike quality that could be likened to a more meditative sense of poetry, but I don't think so. Take, for example, the line on page 136 where the phrase "neck's nape" is repeated. The fact that the phrase is repeated is not to impart a dreamlike quality, but, rather, to underscore the important features of Alette's brother's beauty: to make the point that, before the Tyrant, there was once something beautiful about men, but the Tyrant has robbed that from them as well as women. Yes, the repitition does impart an out-of-body, dreamlike quality, but I don't think that was the specific reason it was used.
First things first: those quotation marks. I knew it was going to be a rough ride when I first saw those. And it was...in a way. Just like a rough ride in a car will make you slow down, Notley's metrical quotations accomplished the same thing in a literary fashion. I found myself taking the time to read each foot without "mentally slurring" the words (what Notley warns against in the Author's note. I found myself "slurring" a lot while reading Merwin--not slurring drunk, of course, (really!) but slurring in accordance with his wispy, ethereal manner of writing. Notley's poetry, on the other hand, has a sense of progressive, forward motion (almost a marching quality) because of the way the iambs are enclosed. This causes the reader to slow down in a quick way (let me explain); one in which he or she is reading every word but with a sense of motion because of the way the iambs are placed. So, I guess it's not a bad thing, just an unusual thing.
Something else unusual in "The Descent of Alette" was the very distinct sense of purpose with Notley's poetry. Most poets--I would assume--use poetry as some sort of meditation: a place in which to hone ideas, make points, and discover (for their own sake) revelations. We don't find this in much of Notley's work. From the get-go, she marches (see previous paragraph) us into the story head on with everything planned out and hoping we'll be the ones making the revelations. This is evidenced by Notley's exorbitant use of symbolism--a tell-tale sign of a well thought-out work--everything is planned and everything stands for something else. Of course, Alette makes revelations on her way to kill the Tyrant and the reader learns a couple lessons along the way, but I don't think a whole lot of meditation for Notley in the act of writing the poems in "The Descent of Alette." There is, instead, an end and a means to an end. It could be argued that the poems possess a dreamlike quality that could be likened to a more meditative sense of poetry, but I don't think so. Take, for example, the line on page 136 where the phrase "neck's nape" is repeated. The fact that the phrase is repeated is not to impart a dreamlike quality, but, rather, to underscore the important features of Alette's brother's beauty: to make the point that, before the Tyrant, there was once something beautiful about men, but the Tyrant has robbed that from them as well as women. Yes, the repitition does impart an out-of-body, dreamlike quality, but I don't think that was the specific reason it was used.
The Descent of Alette--Renate's Response
Can I say, first, that the frequent use of quotations was really strange to me (as I'm sure it was to many people)? When I opened the book, I wasn't sure how I was supposed to read. I first paused at every break, every new "quotatious" phrase. It would have been as if I were taking a breath every few words: "'One day, I awoke' *breathe* '& found myself on' *breathe* 'a subway, endlessly' *breathe* 'I didn't know' *breathe*. . ." (3) On and on and on. I rarely get headaches, but the onslaught of quotations was starting to hurt my head.
Once we get past the strange use of punctuations, an even stranger story unfolds. All through this book, I thought, 'What would this be like as a novel?' Easier to read, I guess. Still not easy to understand. The story certainly would not translate in the same way, and would not even more so in movie form. None the less, I also thought about what a Descent of Alette movie would be like. An independent film. Rated R (NC-17? X? Unrated?). Gosh, would they really cover the floor of the train in blood (or, you know, fake blood) (27)? Show people removing their sex organs (57)? A headless woman with blood flowing out of her neck (89)?
I would like to touch upon the animals in this book, specifically the owl and the snake--the two that appear the most. I think the animals are so important because they were created by nature and not the tyrant, who rules over all of humanity and man-made things. The animals were made by something over which the tyrant (the big bad guy) has no control.
The owl is Alette's aid. He is the one who prepares Alette to face the tyrant. He kills her, gives her a part of himself, and turns her into a product of nature--an owl. Only in this way can Alette defeat the tyrant: "'When the time comes,' 'think like me, he said' 'Not like' 'a human woman' 'but like an owl'" (115). If the owl had been a different animal, would it have turned Alette into that animal?
Owls are usually associated with wisdom in our modern culture, but in some ancient cultures (Aztec, Maya, Kikuyu of Kenya) the owl was a sign of death and evil. The death part works--Alette kills the tyrant as an owl--but evil? I suppose, from the tyrant's view, the owl is evil. Ha ha.
The snake makes a little more sense, I think. She used to be the subway train, seems to be the the first mother but no longer human: "'Extended' 'a black tongue' '& said in' 'a woman's whisper:' 'When I was' 'the train,' 'when I was' 'the train,' 'flesh & blood' 'flesh & blood' 'took you to your' 'destination' 'to your life'" (36). Alette first meets her in the subway and ends up walking inside her at one point.
. . . OK, so maybe that part doesn't make much sense. But the symbolism in the next sentences will make sense! Snakes were not always associated with evil. The ancient Greeks thought of snakes as a earthbound symbol, a child of Gaia, the titan associated with earth. The snake is an animal, and in Descent of Alette, animals are free of the tyrant's power because nature created them. Earth, nature. . . get it? And guess what else? In India, snakes are a symbol of fertility. Fertility + first mother = connection!
Of course, I only looked these things up on Wikipedia.
Anyway--really cool, really weird, REALLY confusing. But I liked that it read as a story. And that it had a happy ending.
Once we get past the strange use of punctuations, an even stranger story unfolds. All through this book, I thought, 'What would this be like as a novel?' Easier to read, I guess. Still not easy to understand. The story certainly would not translate in the same way, and would not even more so in movie form. None the less, I also thought about what a Descent of Alette movie would be like. An independent film. Rated R (NC-17? X? Unrated?). Gosh, would they really cover the floor of the train in blood (or, you know, fake blood) (27)? Show people removing their sex organs (57)? A headless woman with blood flowing out of her neck (89)?
I would like to touch upon the animals in this book, specifically the owl and the snake--the two that appear the most. I think the animals are so important because they were created by nature and not the tyrant, who rules over all of humanity and man-made things. The animals were made by something over which the tyrant (the big bad guy) has no control.
The owl is Alette's aid. He is the one who prepares Alette to face the tyrant. He kills her, gives her a part of himself, and turns her into a product of nature--an owl. Only in this way can Alette defeat the tyrant: "'When the time comes,' 'think like me, he said' 'Not like' 'a human woman' 'but like an owl'" (115). If the owl had been a different animal, would it have turned Alette into that animal?
Owls are usually associated with wisdom in our modern culture, but in some ancient cultures (Aztec, Maya, Kikuyu of Kenya) the owl was a sign of death and evil. The death part works--Alette kills the tyrant as an owl--but evil? I suppose, from the tyrant's view, the owl is evil. Ha ha.
The snake makes a little more sense, I think. She used to be the subway train, seems to be the the first mother but no longer human: "'Extended' 'a black tongue' '& said in' 'a woman's whisper:' 'When I was' 'the train,' 'when I was' 'the train,' 'flesh & blood' 'flesh & blood' 'took you to your' 'destination' 'to your life'" (36). Alette first meets her in the subway and ends up walking inside her at one point.
. . . OK, so maybe that part doesn't make much sense. But the symbolism in the next sentences will make sense! Snakes were not always associated with evil. The ancient Greeks thought of snakes as a earthbound symbol, a child of Gaia, the titan associated with earth. The snake is an animal, and in Descent of Alette, animals are free of the tyrant's power because nature created them. Earth, nature. . . get it? And guess what else? In India, snakes are a symbol of fertility. Fertility + first mother = connection!
Of course, I only looked these things up on Wikipedia.
Anyway--really cool, really weird, REALLY confusing. But I liked that it read as a story. And that it had a happy ending.
Amanda Bissonette - Notley Response
The first thing I thought of when I started to read this book was a nightmare. It seemed like one of those dreams where no matter what you did or where you went, you would never get out or feel safe. Everything was so out of the ordinary and scary which led me to the idea of a nightmare. Also the confusion felt by Alette and myself, not knowing what was going to be in the next subway car or station, led me to think that this was a nightmare as well. We discussed in class, the possibility that Notley purposely made the reader confused, and I agree with this because I feel like in order to get the most out of the story, you have to be on the same level as Alette. It wouldn’t be fair for the reader to know everything and the main character still is in the dark. It gave me something to think about as I was reading. Who was the tyrant? Why did Alette end up in that subway car? Without that confusion, you wouldn’t be able to read that much into the story. You would know everything and just be watching this one character figure things out.
After having our discussions in class, the duality of male vs. female made a lot more sense. There are several points in the reading where women are shown to be on a lower level than men. We assume the tyrant is a man, and Alette, a woman, must defeat him. This gives a powerful voice to women and this is where the feminism we mentioned a lot in class comes out. The tyrant over rules everyone is this world and the women of the world seem to be brought down more than the men. “I am a painter I have been trying to find a form the tyrant doesn’t own something he doesn’t know about hasn’t invented, hasn’t mastered hasn’t made his own in his mind not rectangular not a sculpture not a thing at all he owns all things…my very own body did he invent me” (Notley, 25). This woman is afraid that the tyrant owns her because he owns all form, including human form. She is saying that she will never be able to be her own person, fully, because the tyrant will always own a part of her, her body.
Another interesting thing that we discussed was the use of quotation marks. We still don’t know there exact purpose, but I think it was to show dialogue between multiple characters, although sometimes it was hard to tell who was talking. A lot of the time, a poem is just one character thinking or talking, but Notley is showing that her work can still be considered a poem even though there are many characters. There was also almost no punctuation. I don’t completely understand why there is no punctuation but it makes me think about the nightmare concept again because in a dream there are no stops, it is just a constant stream of activity.
Richard's Response to Notley
So... "Descent of Alette." What is there to say about it that we've not covered already?
Well, one of the things that really fascinated me about it (after I managed to actually start understanding what I was looking at) was the fact that there seems to be a subtle theme of old and new, or antiquity and modernity. I'm actually kind of surprised that no one seemed to bring this up. We see that the deeper Alette descends, the less modern her surroundings become. We are shown that she starts in a subway, one of the biggest modern conveniences we have. Up above that is a modern city, though we don't go there until the end.
As Alette travels down deeper, she leaves modernity behind and we end up in a more natural, more antique world, where older ideas seem to prevail. It has a much more fantastical feel to it. The whole thing does have a fantasy feel, but the settings deep within the earth such as the caverns, rivers, beaches, and forests, feel much more reminiscent of a classic fantasy novel. At the heart of antiquity, the heart of the forest, is the house of the tyrant, who we established is the embodiment of the oppressive institution, set in a very old, outdated way of thinking that not only harms women, but also men, if the man who gives Alette his heart is to be believed (which he is).
What's strange is the fact that, even after he is dead, his body apparently made of cloth, Alette reveals that the city up above is actually his skeleton, giving credence to the idea that even though humans have come a very long way since our beginnings, modernity still holds some of these antique ideas, even if it is subconsciously, and only through our own conscious efforts and powers can we cast aside the remnants of the tyrant.
As a side note, it surprised me that no one noticed that Alette herself becomes an owl (or as she puts it, takes on an 'owl form') during her fight against the Tyrant. I don't know about anyone else, but the owl has always been a symbol of wisdom and intelligence to me. The fact that she takes on this form, and that her father was also in this form, gives me the idea that knowledge was the thing that defeated the tyrant. After all, intelligence and information is the best way to combat ideas, is it not?
Well, one of the things that really fascinated me about it (after I managed to actually start understanding what I was looking at) was the fact that there seems to be a subtle theme of old and new, or antiquity and modernity. I'm actually kind of surprised that no one seemed to bring this up. We see that the deeper Alette descends, the less modern her surroundings become. We are shown that she starts in a subway, one of the biggest modern conveniences we have. Up above that is a modern city, though we don't go there until the end.
As Alette travels down deeper, she leaves modernity behind and we end up in a more natural, more antique world, where older ideas seem to prevail. It has a much more fantastical feel to it. The whole thing does have a fantasy feel, but the settings deep within the earth such as the caverns, rivers, beaches, and forests, feel much more reminiscent of a classic fantasy novel. At the heart of antiquity, the heart of the forest, is the house of the tyrant, who we established is the embodiment of the oppressive institution, set in a very old, outdated way of thinking that not only harms women, but also men, if the man who gives Alette his heart is to be believed (which he is).
What's strange is the fact that, even after he is dead, his body apparently made of cloth, Alette reveals that the city up above is actually his skeleton, giving credence to the idea that even though humans have come a very long way since our beginnings, modernity still holds some of these antique ideas, even if it is subconsciously, and only through our own conscious efforts and powers can we cast aside the remnants of the tyrant.
As a side note, it surprised me that no one noticed that Alette herself becomes an owl (or as she puts it, takes on an 'owl form') during her fight against the Tyrant. I don't know about anyone else, but the owl has always been a symbol of wisdom and intelligence to me. The fact that she takes on this form, and that her father was also in this form, gives me the idea that knowledge was the thing that defeated the tyrant. After all, intelligence and information is the best way to combat ideas, is it not?
Monday, September 20, 2010
W.S. Merwin, The Shadow of Sirius
I did not fully appreciate Merwin’s book of poetry until I read the third and final section, which has a lot of poems involving growing old, the coming of autumn, and death. I am responding to the idea that Alysse brought up in her blog post about this theme, and I agree that I found this section a little depressing for it; I kept thinking, this incredible poet is extremely old and he’s talking about dying? However, after I listened to a number of interviews with him I fully appreciate his theme. In the interview with Merwin on NPR (which I now see is on the links page) he reads the poem “A Single Autumn,” about living in his parents’ old house for a period after they died. He said about his parents, “One of their greatest gifts to me was that neither of them turned out to be afraid of dying at all.” He says, “That is a great gift to be given, that feeling of no fear, and I think I inherited it from them very early.” When discussing his poem “Rain Light,” he says that the poem is about the world eventually coming to an end for humans, but that there is no point to fear and dread it, “which is a waste of time,” he adds. As an atheist and someone who is terrified of dying, I can’t say I share Merwin’s “gift” but I appreciate his view on death in these poems, and I think it’s important to realize when reading this section of his book; this incredible poet is extremely old, is talking about dying, and is fearless and contemplative on the subject, which makes very powerful poetry: “each star is roaring alone into the darkness / there is not a sound in the whole night” (103). His poems are both extremely powerful and very peaceful.
In another interview with him, a Reading with Naomi Shahib Nye, he talks about the unknown, which also encompasses his view of death. He says, “What we know is very remarkable, but it is a tiny part of the enormous, universal thing that is what we don’t know, what we never will know, and what is in every sense unknowable.” The ultimate unknowable is death, and Merwin is fascinated with the unknown; he compares what we know as “a hair floating in empty space—so small, so little, and deceptive, hiding what you don’t know” that sometimes you can’t see the huge space around you, although you have some connection with it. In the interview, he says the ultimate unknown is death, something that we can’t even perceive because it is so far out in “space” that our floating-hair-of-knowledge can’t even comprehend it. He says the closest way to get to the unknown is by the imagination: “the imagination moves closer to the unknown, and comes out of the unknown.” His poems do just this in the third section of his book; meditative about endings, of seasons and life, reaching out to space: “nothing is to be heard but the drops falling / one at a time from the tips of the leaves / into the night and I lie in the dark / listening to what I remember / while the night flies on with us into itself” (93).
Last thought: if you haven’t heard Merwin read his poetry yet, google him! This also made me appreciate his poetry even more.
NPR interview: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103317326
“A Reading with Naomi Shahib Nye” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8aNeNNtPQWc
In another interview with him, a Reading with Naomi Shahib Nye, he talks about the unknown, which also encompasses his view of death. He says, “What we know is very remarkable, but it is a tiny part of the enormous, universal thing that is what we don’t know, what we never will know, and what is in every sense unknowable.” The ultimate unknowable is death, and Merwin is fascinated with the unknown; he compares what we know as “a hair floating in empty space—so small, so little, and deceptive, hiding what you don’t know” that sometimes you can’t see the huge space around you, although you have some connection with it. In the interview, he says the ultimate unknown is death, something that we can’t even perceive because it is so far out in “space” that our floating-hair-of-knowledge can’t even comprehend it. He says the closest way to get to the unknown is by the imagination: “the imagination moves closer to the unknown, and comes out of the unknown.” His poems do just this in the third section of his book; meditative about endings, of seasons and life, reaching out to space: “nothing is to be heard but the drops falling / one at a time from the tips of the leaves / into the night and I lie in the dark / listening to what I remember / while the night flies on with us into itself” (93).
Last thought: if you haven’t heard Merwin read his poetry yet, google him! This also made me appreciate his poetry even more.
NPR interview: http://www.npr.org/templates/story/story.php?storyId=103317326
“A Reading with Naomi Shahib Nye” http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8aNeNNtPQWc
Friday, September 17, 2010
Merwin
The Shadow of Sirius
This book put me to sleep in a good way. After reading it, (and I mean this happened both times I read it completely through) I looked over at my clock and realized I had dozed off. It just lulls me into such a zen and serene mood that I fall asleep. I like that.
I envy Merwin in the worst way for his punctuation. He punctuates without periods, commas, etc. and it bothers me so much because instead of forcing you to absorb the poem you experience it in a way you couldn’t possibly understand if you had to take a breath at the end of the lines. I myself depend on punctuation so much that it borders on the obsessive, which is why I think I envy his ability to let the images exist simultaneously as well as overlapping each other so they become inseparable.
I can’t help wanting to ascribe a theme to his book. I realize that it delves into memory and what it means to be a super old guy and I do mean old guy not old girl because even though he doesn’t gender the speaker in his poems, it isn’t exactly androgynous either. I’m not sure this changes anything. In any case, I feel like I’m missing something in the title the shadow of Sirius that gets plastered over every poem and adds yet another layer that is significant. One doesn’t lightly title a work of poetry the same way one doesn’t lightly title a poem. It means something. What is it about the brightest and closest star in the sky that interested Merwin enough to name his collection after it. Is memory closest? Is the brilliance of stars closes to memory? Does its being the dog star have any bearing on his subject? I’m contemplating writing him about this because I desperately want to know.
It bothers me that he doesn’t have a poem about clocks. I get that the theme of time and age and memory and past and future having a clock as a metaphor is obvious and therefore beneath Merwin (I don’t imagine he would dare write an obvious poem) but neither does he do anything with physical measuring of time (that I noticed). The interplay between language and perception of time and memory is of course really really interesting, but he either ignores or doesn’t care about the physical manifestations of the concept(s?). How would the work be changed if suddenly at the end Autumn was tearing apart a watch with a leather band and playing with the second hand while leaves fell somewhere in Europe and the old lady wept at the pinnacle? Are we trying to grasp time when we hold pocket watches and cell phones with timepieces? I need Merwin to answer this for me, I think. Although, I really do get lost in his ideas about memories and transience of experience and what it means to experience versus name and identify and exist beyond meaning. I apologize for that sentence not making much sense.
I realize I’m rambling on, but I have one more point (or maybe two?). Why does Merwin use stanzas?! I love his lack of punctuation and the ability to meld images together and moments and his use of sometimes nearly even line breaks (in space not meter) and his confusing yet simple language. I can’t figure out why he also uses the stanza. I know he wouldn’t do it just because it felt like it needed a break. But there are poems in which the sentence/image/thought/whatever continues onto the next line and that line is sometimes the next stanza/paragraph/unit. In Lament for a Stone (35), it works for the waves receding into the previous stanza only to rush on again forward in the next over the stone and the idea and the rhythm, BUT what about all the other poems that begin and end with a single line as its own stanza?! I feel like I’m opening and closing the book of those poems except he gives me no book imagery and aside from the simple fact that I’m literally holding one, I have nothing about books in front of me. Books, either as metaphor or vehicle, have no presence in the collection, I’ve resigned this projection to my brain, but I haven’t figured out his stanza-construction-thing. He’s so intent on making everything blend together that I don’t see why he would separate things in odd places. There is a logic to it, there has to be.
John Moore's Response to Merwin
W. S. Merwin’s The Shadow of Sirius, toys with concepts such as memory, time, nature and, life time experiences. Merwin’s poetry is both a thought proviking yet calming read. While using no punctuation whatsoever, Merwin slows the tempo of his poetry down dramatically. The lack of periods and commons and other punctuation forces the reader to focus more on the actual words and flow of the poem. With that said, I personally thought all of Merwin’s poems in this particular book were not only a pleasant read but were also quite enjoyable to divulge into. For example the poem titled “Europe” is quite simple in contextual meaning. Yet, when one further reads into the layering of time and thoughts Merwin elegantly added, the trip to Europe becomes a voyage for the reader as well. As Merwin writes in “Europe”, “there was a road down the cliff that I would descend some years later and recognize it there we were all together one time” he is playing with his past memory and in doing so brings that memory into future tense. What surprised me most about The Shadow of Sirius however was Merwin’s ability to completely boggle the readers mind with one poem, and then transition to another with total ease. I have never read such consoling poetry that in the very same instance can bring me to another plane of thinking.
Merwin’s overall form I guess could be considered transcendent Zen. Many of his poems like “The Piano”, “The Pinnacle”, and “Cave” are transcendent in form. Yet in the very same instance almost all of the poems in The Shadow of Sirius have very Zen like qualities. Even the slightly darker poems such as “White Note”, “Nocturne II”, and “By Dark” read smoothly, and are presented with tranquility. When considering the actual meaning of the title I cant help but think it only emphasizes the idea that the entire book is simply a collection of memories. With that said, I also believe that Merwin split the book into sections to show how we recollect memories, and how they evolve over time. Personally I only remember finite details of memories however when I hash the memories out I start to remember more of the blurred details contained within the memory. These vague details are what I believe Merwin wrote about. He clearly is a wise man with a life full of experiences, and now in his later years, memories.
W. S. Merwin’s poetry I feel is loving, sad, and sensible all at the very same time. He masterfully makes the reader focus on the words on the page and feelings coupled with those words. I don’t believe there is a single person who can say that they cannot relate to Merwin’s poetry. The only aspect of The Shadow of Sirius I did not enjoy was that it had an end. If this collection of poetry went on for thousands of pages I would have tirelessly read until I could not open my eyes.
Brittany's thoughts on Merwin
When I thought about it even further, after discussing this book in class and looking back at the poetry itself, I began to better understand just how distinct the three sections of The Shadow of Sirius are.
The poems of the first section seem to be in the present, like Merwin wanted the reader to experience those memories right along with him. These poems were about specific events, not just the fact that "oh, something happened that he'll remember." We create those memories right along with Merwin. We walk right behind him as he is eight years old, walking through his future home for the first time in “Child Light.” We see his last few moments of innocence as Merwin himself sees them. It’s almost like we’re standing at the bow of the ship with Merwin in “Europe” as he views the coast of Spain for the first time. I found this poem especially powerful in just how much we are connected to the narrator, how even though most of his readers have never been to Europe before, I’m sure we can all still close our eyes and imagine that sight of mountains forming over the horizon.
Part two is explicitly about memories, dedicated to what I believe are three of Merwin’s dogs that have died (the line in “Dream of Koa Returning” that mentions “long amber fur” helps to validate this theory). The fact that this section is so short helps to show that sometimes people (or animals) are in your life for a short time, that before you know it they’re gone.
The third section, the most moving in my opinion, talks of old age, of losing memories and dying. As the first section talks about spring and new beginnings, the third one talks of the shift to autumn, to fading memories. “Youth of Grass” is a prime example of Merwin’s use of dying plantlife to signify dying memories, with a narrator who is surprised to find that a field has not stayed green forever like he had originally thought, but that has since turned to brown. Just as the seasons wax and wane, so does memory.
The poem “Recognitions” has to be my favorite out of the entire book, and I think it helps to illustrate the theme of the third section. A wave and an ash tree, two seemingly unrelated objects, have suddenly been thrust into a familial relationship by Merwin, albeit an odd one. They had been “separated since they were children,” and even though most of their memories of being together were gone, they still went on believing that each other existed. This goes to show, although memories may start to fade, sometimes they can hold on, and that small amount might be enough.
I loved the tone of the poetry throughout the book, and I don’t think that he could have written about with subject matter with anything else. His voice had a somber tone for the most part, but he ended many of his poems on an almost hopeful note. As I read the words it was so easy to see the wistfulness in his voice, the yearn for some of those memories back. The book itself ends on a very quiet note, almost like a whisper: “here is where they all sing the first daylight// whether or not there is anyone listening.”
The poems of the first section seem to be in the present, like Merwin wanted the reader to experience those memories right along with him. These poems were about specific events, not just the fact that "oh, something happened that he'll remember." We create those memories right along with Merwin. We walk right behind him as he is eight years old, walking through his future home for the first time in “Child Light.” We see his last few moments of innocence as Merwin himself sees them. It’s almost like we’re standing at the bow of the ship with Merwin in “Europe” as he views the coast of Spain for the first time. I found this poem especially powerful in just how much we are connected to the narrator, how even though most of his readers have never been to Europe before, I’m sure we can all still close our eyes and imagine that sight of mountains forming over the horizon.
Part two is explicitly about memories, dedicated to what I believe are three of Merwin’s dogs that have died (the line in “Dream of Koa Returning” that mentions “long amber fur” helps to validate this theory). The fact that this section is so short helps to show that sometimes people (or animals) are in your life for a short time, that before you know it they’re gone.
The third section, the most moving in my opinion, talks of old age, of losing memories and dying. As the first section talks about spring and new beginnings, the third one talks of the shift to autumn, to fading memories. “Youth of Grass” is a prime example of Merwin’s use of dying plantlife to signify dying memories, with a narrator who is surprised to find that a field has not stayed green forever like he had originally thought, but that has since turned to brown. Just as the seasons wax and wane, so does memory.
The poem “Recognitions” has to be my favorite out of the entire book, and I think it helps to illustrate the theme of the third section. A wave and an ash tree, two seemingly unrelated objects, have suddenly been thrust into a familial relationship by Merwin, albeit an odd one. They had been “separated since they were children,” and even though most of their memories of being together were gone, they still went on believing that each other existed. This goes to show, although memories may start to fade, sometimes they can hold on, and that small amount might be enough.
I loved the tone of the poetry throughout the book, and I don’t think that he could have written about with subject matter with anything else. His voice had a somber tone for the most part, but he ended many of his poems on an almost hopeful note. As I read the words it was so easy to see the wistfulness in his voice, the yearn for some of those memories back. The book itself ends on a very quiet note, almost like a whisper: “here is where they all sing the first daylight// whether or not there is anyone listening.”
Thursday, September 16, 2010
Alyssa's ideas about Merwin
Although the last third of Merwin’s book, The Shadow of Sirius, is a gorgeous representation of the beauty of nature in the fall, it makes me severely depressed when the context is factored in. All the ending poems are written as a reflection and are attempting to accept death as his fate. He seems very much okay with the idea, like he’s already turned the thought around in his mind a few times and has shrugged at it, like it’s just another everyday fact. He’s going to die one day. So will everyone else. It’s like he wrote the poems to make other people aware of the fact, as well. Such as in the poem “To Paula in Late Spring” (84), the first lines are, “Let me imagine we will come again / when we want to and it will be spring”. He is conveying spring as being born again, like the season. In spring, everything is coming to life, that if we come back to this world after we die, let it be spring, where everything is brand new. Because of the title of the poem, we know he is speaking to a friend named Paula, and he says, “we will be no older than we ever were”, almost like they are ghosts in their own version of heaven. I found this poem to be haunting, like he is trying to convince Paula that death is inevitable, so why fear it. Paula was maybe about to die, and this was Merwin’s attempt to ease her into the idea. Rather, he wants to say to her to embrace death, because it will be beautiful.
What I appreciate about Merwin is that although he has one distinct style, he doesn’t let that conform his way of writing. His work, for me, never droned on, or seemed redundant. Plenty of his poems have unique ways of being on the page, which is a very good quality. “September’s Child” on pg. 98 is one of a kind in this collection of work. All the lines are ten to fifteen words long, which is entirely different from any of the other poems. It reads more like prose because of this: “September light gray and rose touches the ridge above the valley / seeps upward at daybreak through its own silence / without beginning without stages with white clouds still cloaking the river”. Compare this to “Little Soul” on pg. 51, where the number of words in the entire poem is shorter than the words of “September’s Child”’s first three lines: “Little soul little stray / little drifter / now where will you stay / all pale and all alone / after the way / you used to make fun of things”. There is just such variety that kept me interested the entire way through. I’ve never had a poet that I could read every single poem in a book and still stay interested before.
Basically, W.S. Merwin’s work is depressingly beautiful and has a unique style that is interesting to read.
What I appreciate about Merwin is that although he has one distinct style, he doesn’t let that conform his way of writing. His work, for me, never droned on, or seemed redundant. Plenty of his poems have unique ways of being on the page, which is a very good quality. “September’s Child” on pg. 98 is one of a kind in this collection of work. All the lines are ten to fifteen words long, which is entirely different from any of the other poems. It reads more like prose because of this: “September light gray and rose touches the ridge above the valley / seeps upward at daybreak through its own silence / without beginning without stages with white clouds still cloaking the river”. Compare this to “Little Soul” on pg. 51, where the number of words in the entire poem is shorter than the words of “September’s Child”’s first three lines: “Little soul little stray / little drifter / now where will you stay / all pale and all alone / after the way / you used to make fun of things”. There is just such variety that kept me interested the entire way through. I’ve never had a poet that I could read every single poem in a book and still stay interested before.
Basically, W.S. Merwin’s work is depressingly beautiful and has a unique style that is interesting to read.
Merwin Response
In "The Shadow of Sirius"I was most interested in the fact that, in Merwin's struggle to write, he acknowledged his own inadequacies and the failings of language to become any kind of representation of life. In fact, I believe he himself says it well--he is quoted on the back cover as saying, "I have only what I remember." The fact also remains that he only has language to convey what he remembers in order to express or preserve it.
Merwin makes a brilliant point there, and in many poems, suggesting that in order to name something, it must be finished, and by then, it is gone and so only memory remains.
"Raiment" is an example of Merwin's thoughts on language; in it he describes the way in which a word is not a thing but a kind of covering which we use to describe a thing. He says of this, "apparently we believe/in the words/and through them/but we long beyond them/for what is unseen/what remains out of reach." Merwin approaches the topic similarly in "Day without a Name" in which he writes about the nature of time, our perception of it, and therefore the language we use for it. Merwin says simply, "today nothing is missing/except the word for it."
I think that part of the beauty of "The Shadow of Sirius" is that while Merwin moves through memories of his life and speaks of the nature of nostalgia (mentioning the ability to long for the past even in inanimate things, as mentioned in, "Lights Out" and "Recognitions") the poems become aware of their own limitations. Merwin makes it clear that the poem is not the moment, not the thing...though he strives to capture both feelings and the past. The beauty in this is that there is less a sense of futility and more of a sense of poetry being enough.
When Merwin approaches a topic of nostalgia, longing, or grief, it does not hold as much of a dark quality as it does great reflection.
Emily M's Response to Merwin
Merwin’s work had a lot themes running throughout that made his book very cohesive. As we discussed in class there were a number of instances where time was layer creating pasts within the past, and the present that had already become the past, all while looking to the future. There was more than that however, that tied his pieces together, such as his constant use of unknowns. Whether those unknowns came in the form of unnamed subjects or unanswerable questions he engaged the reader by suggesting these ideas and forcing them to find their own answers or create new question based off of the ones he had purposed himself. “Lake Shore in Half Light” is a good representation of this idea of an unknown question. He discusses remembering almost everything about the question, he seems to hint that this question is connected to his past by sharing the pieces of a specific memory that are assumable connected to his “question”. In the end however the reader is left without any real “answer” to what the question was.
Another theme I saw throughout this book was the importance of relationships. In almost every poem Merwin discusses some form of connection, most often between two people. The memories he shares with his reader he often shared with another person first hand. We are able to see these relationships in both his “literal” memories as well as his poems that are left open to interpretation. The poem “Going” I feel does a wonderful job of displaying Merwin’s feelings about connections with others, as well as taking a closer look at language on its own. His lines, “Only humans believe there is a word for goodbye we have one in every language one of the first words we learn”, I believe sum up how he recognizes the value of the bonds shared between people and how it translates throughout life and language.
Overall, I feel like The Shadow of Sirius was meant to be a book sharing Merwin’s life experiences, his thoughts and his beliefs accumulated over the years. His wisdom was put into every poem including the ones where he admitted to that he still had questions that have not and maybe cannot be answered. His writing style I think represents the stage he is at his life, where he is reflecting on his experiences and has reached a point of acceptance. It is about acceptance of the past, of experiences, memories, feelings, and what can’t be changed. He uses his age to his advantage I think, and creates a book that does not shove his knowledge at his reader but instead offers it as what it is his life. It is relatable while at the same time being unique to his life, and what he sees being the “cliff-notes”, the important moments and thoughts that made the difference and were important. He shares all of this with a veil fogging his memory, loosing details, and romanticizing some memories.
I feel like his work was effective for no other reason than he allowed people to draw their own conclusions and gave an individual experiences to every reader.
Another theme I saw throughout this book was the importance of relationships. In almost every poem Merwin discusses some form of connection, most often between two people. The memories he shares with his reader he often shared with another person first hand. We are able to see these relationships in both his “literal” memories as well as his poems that are left open to interpretation. The poem “Going” I feel does a wonderful job of displaying Merwin’s feelings about connections with others, as well as taking a closer look at language on its own. His lines, “Only humans believe there is a word for goodbye we have one in every language one of the first words we learn”, I believe sum up how he recognizes the value of the bonds shared between people and how it translates throughout life and language.
Overall, I feel like The Shadow of Sirius was meant to be a book sharing Merwin’s life experiences, his thoughts and his beliefs accumulated over the years. His wisdom was put into every poem including the ones where he admitted to that he still had questions that have not and maybe cannot be answered. His writing style I think represents the stage he is at his life, where he is reflecting on his experiences and has reached a point of acceptance. It is about acceptance of the past, of experiences, memories, feelings, and what can’t be changed. He uses his age to his advantage I think, and creates a book that does not shove his knowledge at his reader but instead offers it as what it is his life. It is relatable while at the same time being unique to his life, and what he sees being the “cliff-notes”, the important moments and thoughts that made the difference and were important. He shares all of this with a veil fogging his memory, loosing details, and romanticizing some memories.
I feel like his work was effective for no other reason than he allowed people to draw their own conclusions and gave an individual experiences to every reader.
Callie's take on Merwin
W.S. Merwin’s The Shadow of Sirius is definitely broken down into three distinct parts. The first is composed of poems written from the aspect of an aged man looking back on forming the memories which made up his life and made him into the man he is. For example, in the poem Still Morning, he writes, “It appears now that there is only one/age and it knows/nothing of age/…/and I am a child before there are words” (7). From these lines it is obvious that this speaker is looking back on their childhood and the fragility of age as it feels to us through time. In other words, it is hard to pin down age when we look back on it because we are the same person now as we were back then. Sure, things change and we can mark time but in a general way it seems as if our childhood was just a few short months ago when in actuality it was several years ago. He goes on to write, “in a building/gone long ago and all the voices/silent and each word they said in that time/silent now” (7). He has memories of people speaking in this building when he was in his childhood. But now, the building is gone and with it are gone the sounds not only in the present but also in the past as if the nonexistence of the building voids the memories he once made there.
The second part is composed of poems dealing with memory itself. For example, the poem Calling a Distant Animal, refers to a bird the poet once listened to but can hear no more for the bird has long since died. “tone torn out of one birdsong/though that bird/by now may be/where a call cannot/follow it” (44). This bird is long gone, but the memory of it and its birdsong is what the poet is referring to. He then continues in the same fashion, “the same note goes on calling/across space/ and is heard now/ in the old night and known there”. In other words, he can still hear the bird’s song in his memory even in his old age and he knows exactly what it is. Again, “a silence recognized/by the silence it calls to” refers to the idea that he recognizes the silence because he can’t physically hear the bird anymore except for in the silence of his memories.
And the third part is composed of poems dealing with the loss of memory and the acknowledgement that inevitable death is on its way. For example, the poem Going is all about saying goodbye which I believe is a tribute to the loss of memory as well as life. “It is made out of greeting/but they are going away/the raised hand waving/the face the person the place/the animal the day/leaving the word behind” (58). That word being “goodbye” represents our human need to give an end to something by saying this to people or anything, really, that is lost. It is an interesting view on saying goodbye to so many things in our lives.
All of the poems, though vastly different in length, content, and rhythm, have the unique quality of showing a glimpse of a scene or memory. But these are mere glimpses; they are not full thoughts or memories. I really enjoyed this aspect because it leaves some things up to my imagination which is based on my own experiences and memories. I believe that W.S. Merwin does this on purpose.
I really enjoyed Merwin’s poems and his very unique outlook on so many things from playing the piano, to remembering a dog to watching the seasons change.
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