Gerard Manley Hopkins-Pied Beauty-Notes

Gerard Manley Hopkins – ‘Pied Beauty’

Hopkins was born in 1844, and died just 45 years later, in 1889, but in this relatively short life he wrote some of the most startling and original poetry of the whole 19th Century. He was a deeply intellectual and religious man, and became a Jesuit priest in 1877, the same year in which he wrote ‘Pied Beauty’.

Throughout his life Hopkins was deeply fond of the countryside and its beauty, in which he could see the work and power of God. In ‘Pied Beauty’ he expresses his delight and astonishment at the sheer diversity of nature.

‘Pied Beauty’ is a short poem, but a complex one in both its meaning and its form. The lines are generally iambic in basis, though while some are regular (lines 2 and 3, for instance, and line 10) others are certainly not, though the iambic beat can still be felt (lines 4 or 8, for instance). What effect, or effects, does this irregularity have? The short final line has been mentioned already, and its completion of the praise with which the whole poem began is very striking and very powerful. Given the brevity of the poem, too, the rhyme scheme is fairly complex (ABCABCDBCDC), though this is something that is unlikely to be noticed when actually reading the poem aloud; it does, however, ensure that despite the altering rhythms the poem never loses its tightness and focus. Given the date when Hopkins was writing, this is quite a daring style, far removed from much of the conventional formality of his Victorian contemporaries.

In lines 3 to 5, he is struck by the way in which so many things – skies, cattle, fish, leaves, birds, the landscape itself – all have different and multiple colours and shapes. Even man-made things are equally attractive, and he finds himself full of wonder at the constant changes and contrasts in everything that he sees.

The most powerful thing of all, however, is that all these changing things are created by God, for Hopkins the one unchanging being, and all he can do in the final line of the poem is to express his amazement in a short, utterly simple and almost breathless short line.

Some points for classroom discussion

There are some very unusual and initially difficult words in the poem, some of which Hopkins has apparently invented – ‘couple-colour’, ‘fresh-firecoal’, fathers-forth’, for example. What do you notice about each of these words? What makes them so effective?

Suggested comparison

Walt Whitman from ’Song of Myself’.

Some useful material on Hopkins’ life and work can be found on these websites:

http://victorianweb.org http://poemhunter.com

Christina Rossetti-A Birthday-Notes

Christina Rossetti – ‘A Birthday’

This wonderfully happy poem was written when the English poet Christina Rossetti was 27 years old, and expresses the tremendous joy and excitement that you may feel when you see or meet the person you truly love. Why, you may wonder, is it called ‘A Birthday’? Well, look what the poet writes in line 15, when she says that her love coming to her is “the birthday of my life”, the day, she suggests, when her life really begins.

Everything in the first stanza speaks of the happiness she sees around her, and the repeated expression ‘My heart is like . . . ‘ stresses this joy, but she says at the end of the first stanza that she is even happier than all of these things – why? The second stanza says that she would like to surround herself with the richest and most exotic things to celebrate the arrival of “my love”. Look at how the language changes between each stanza – in the first (apart from the word ‘halcyon’) it is simple and easy, while in the second it is much richer and less everyday. Choose a few words from each stanza to illustrate and support this idea.

What is the effect of concluding the both stanzas with the same line?

You may like to compare this poem with ‘Song’, written when she was just 18 years old; in this she writes of the contrast between another woman’s true happiness, and her own sense that this cannot continue (how do we know this?):

She sat and sang always
By the green margin of a stream,

Watching the fishes leap and play Beneath the glad sunbeam.

I sat and wept always
Beneath the moon’s most shadowy beam,

Watching the blossoms of the May Weep leaves into the stream.

I wept for memory;
She sang for hope that is so fair:

My tears were swallowed by the sea; Her songs died on the air.

There are many love poems in this anthology, but you should particularly compare Rossetti’s poem with at least two others: Henry Baker’s ‘Love’ (page 55) and John Clare’s’ First Love’ (page 131). Of these three, which seems to you most successfully to recreate the sense of young and truly innocent love? How does your choice succeed where the others do not?

Some useful material on Christina Rossetti’s life and work can be found on the following websites:
http://victorianweb.org
http://www.oldpoetry.com

http://www.carcanet.co.uk

Dante Gabriel Rossetti-The Woodspurge-Notes

Dante Gabriel Rossetti – ‘The Woodspurge’

Compare this poem with ‘A Birthday’, written by Rossetti’s sister Christina: hers is equally simple in style and language, but while she expresses great happiness, ‘The Woodspurge’, written in 1856 when the poet was twenty-eight, shows a man in deep grief and isolation. Like Christina’s poem, this one also uses images of nature, and ends with focus upon a simple wild plant, the woodspurge. But is the speaker really seeing this plant? Why does he say at the end that the only thing he has learned from this experience is that “the woodspurge has a cup of three”? Is this really all that he has learned, do you think?

It is worth looking in some detail at the first stanza, to see how Rossetti is able, in a simple and almost unemotional way, to express his mood, and the way that it has swung from pain (‘the wind flapped loose’, but is now ‘shaken out dead . . ‘) into a sense that he is so full of sadness that nothing matters any more (‘I had walked on at the wind’s will, – I sat now . . ‘), and indeed that what he is feeling is beyond human words (line 2 of stanza 2).

The critic David H Riede has written: “The poem’s refusal to locate significance anywhere movingly expresses the hopelessness of deep grief.” (http://www.victorianweb.org/authors/dgr/dgrseti12.html). Look at the extraordinary simplicity of the poem’s language, and its rhythm and rhyme (how many other poems do you know that have an ‘aaaa’ rhyme scheme?). What effect does this have upon the way we react to the speaker’s thoughts?

Some useful material on Dante Gabriel Rossetti’s life and work can be found on these websites:
http://victorianweb.org
http://www.oldpoetry.com

http://www.carcanet.co.uk

Kevin Halligan-The Cockroach-Notes

Kevin Halligan — ‘The Cockroach’

Kevin Halligan was born in Toronto,Canada in 1964 He regards himself as an Anglophile and has spent long periods living in England, but has also travelled in Asia, where this poem was written. His collection Blossom Street is based on his travels and he often observes alien counties with detailed fascination. In this poem he apparently focuses an intense concentration on an insect, but in a powerful twist of focus the whole poem flips back to reveal that the poet himself is actually the subject.

Halligan hones his poems obsessively. He is able to use a variety of forms with great control, and deceptive ease. This seems at first quite a simple poem but it is tightly constructed with great skill.

Some points for classroom discussion

Consider the tone of voice of the narrator and what effect this produces on the reader.

Suggested comparison

Judith Wright ‘Hunting Snake’.

Margaret Atwood-The City Planners-Notes

Margaret Atwood –‘The City Planners’

Giving a lecture at the 1995 Hay-on-Wye Literature Festival, Margaret Atwood described how she first became a poet; she was still at high school in Canada, where she was born in 1939; becoming a poet, she seems to imply, was something that simply happened to her, almost without her being aware of it:

“The day I became a poet was a sunny day of no particular ominousness. I was walking across the football field, not because I was sports-minded or had plans to smoke a cigarette behind the field house – the only other reason for going there – but because this was my normal way home from school. I was scuttling along in my usual furtive way, suspecting no ill, when a large invisible thumb descended from the sky and pressed down on the top of my head. A poem formed.” (http://www..library.utoronto.ca/canpoetry/atwood/write.atm)

In ‘The City Planners’, the speaker is similarly driving fairly aimlessly through the residential suburbs of a modern city, and becomes aware of how dull and the same everything is (look for instance at lines 3-8, or lines13-16); why, do you think, she finds such sameness so very unpleasing? There is no obvious hint in the regular and carefully planned houses and streets of the huge and potentially destructive power of nature, which will – one day – return this suburb into “the clay seas”; however, the speaker does feel some clear unease at certain aspects of the housing estate – which lines best suggest this unease? The city planners, safe in their offices, appear blind to this, and indeed to each other, hiding from the truth by trying to cover it with strict plans and enforced order.

Some points for classroom discussion

Where are the human beings in this suburb? Why is everything so eerily quiet? Why does the poem end with the strangely contradictory but very powerful words “the panic of suburb” and “a bland madness”?

Suggested comparison

Boey Kim Cheng – ‘The Planners’.

There are several useful websites, including:

http://www.cariboo.bc.ca/atwood http://www.web.net.owtoad/biog.html http://www.poemhunter.com http://randomhouse.com/features/atwood

Boey Kim Cheng-The Planners-Notes

 

Boey Kim Cheng – ‘The Planners’

Boey was born in Singapore in 1965, was educated there, but now teaches creative writing at an Australian university; perhaps this poem is critical of the way Singapore has been planned and built, though it could equally apply to any modern city. One critic has said that “the relation of the poet to his country has an abrasive element that can be sampled from ‘The Planners’.” (http://www.ethosbooks.com.sg).

Some points for classroom discussion

Is history being deliberately obliterated? (Lines 21-22) Does the poet like what is happening in the city? What do the last four lines of the poem, clearly central to what Boey is writing, say to you?
Is the poet more angry than sad? Or just resigned to what is happening?

Some brief biographical information on Boey can be found on these websites:

http://www.newcastle.edu.au/school/lang-media/staff/boeykimcheng.html

Suggested comparison

Compare what Margaret Atwood suggests about city planning in ‘The City Planners’ with what Boey Kim Cheng writes here; some parts of this poem, especially perhaps in the first two sections, seem strikingly similar in their ideas and images – which words and phrases suggest this? Atwood foresees a time when natural forces will take over again, and destroy everything that human planning has created; Boey’s poem has a similar theme, though he seems even more critical of the way that men want to conquer and even obliterate any possible ‘flaws’ that nature might contain.

Norman MacCraig-Summer Farm-Notes

Norman MacCaig – ‘Summer Farm’

Norman MacCaig was born in Edinburgh, the capital city of Scotland, in 1910, and spent much of his life in this and other Scottish cities until his death in 1996. His mother’s family, however, came from quiet rural parts of the country, and this background is reflected in ‘Summer Farm’. The poem begins with some utterly simple descriptions of what he sees, before concluding with the idea that by lying in the grass and looking at the farm he becomes aware of the many generations and many farms that have preceded this one – that he is “in the centre”, but at the same time only part of a hugely long sequence of people and places – a thought that in line 10 he is even afraid to consider.

The crux lies in the final stanza, where the poet sees himself as part of a sequence of ‘selves . . . threaded on time’; he is no longer just an individual, but ‘a pile of selves’ – what is he implying here? Similarly, he seems able to see beyond, or inside, the farm to visualise ‘farm within farm’. An image perhaps reminiscent of the Russian dolls; as you open each one, another – smaller but similar – is revealed . . . .

It has been said of MacCaig that he was “a poet who could write in an unpretentious way about ordinary things and make them astonishing”, and that he was “a master miniaturist”. (http://www.jacobite.org.uk/maccaig) Until the final stanza there is perhaps nothing that is out of the ordinary – until you look at some of the words that he uses, for example the straws that are “tame lightnings”, the ducks that “wobble by”, or the swallow that “falls”, and then returns to the “dizzy blue” – all expressions that startle, and make you think again about what they describe. Perhaps he is not quite such a simple writer as may at first appear.

Some points for classroom discussion

Why is the poet ‘afraid of where a thought might take me’?

Suggested comparison:

James Baxter, ‘The Bay’

Some brief biographical information on MacCaig can be found on these websites:

http://www.bbc.co.uk/scotland/arts/writingscotland/learning_journeys/place/norman_ maccaig/works
http://www.jacobite.org.uk/maccaig/backgr.html

Elizabeth Brewster-Where I Come From-Notes

Elizabeth Brewster – ‘Where I Come From’

Writing about an anthology of Canadian poetry published in 2000, one critic said this of the first few poems in the collection: “the bulk of the poems center round trees, oceans, cabins and childhood recollections, lulling the reader into a state of rustic complacency. ‘Where I Come From’ by Elizabeth Brewster summarizes this idea perfectly . . . . This sensation of being inundated with the natural is initially pleasant, like a fond recollection of a warm summer beach, then slowly becomes cloying. . . ” (http://danforthreview.com/reviews/poetry/coastlines.htm)

A key idea of the poem seems to be that a person’s character is always formed at least in part by the place where he or she is born – “People are made of places”. Wherever you go in life you will carry with you memories and echoes of your birthplace, whether it is a city, as in the first stanza, or the quiet Canadian countryside where Elizabeth Brewster herself was born in 1922 – “Where I come from, people/carry woods in their minds” – and certainly the picture she draws in the second stanza does seem at first to be idyllic and wonderful, strongly contrasting with the city images in the first stanza.

Some points for classroom discussion

This sensation of being inundated with the natural is initially pleasant, like a fond recollection of a warm summer beach, then slowly becomes cloying. . . ”
How far – if at all – would you agree that this comment can apply to this poem?

Suggested comparisons

William Wordsworth – ‘Upon Westminster Bridge’ Norman MacCaig – ‘Summer Farm’

There is some very brief biographical information on the following websites:

http://www.writersunion.ca/b/brewster.htm http://www.poets.ca/linktext/direct/brewster/htm

William Wordsworth-Composed Upon…-Notes

William Wordsworth – ‘Composed Upon Westminster Bridge’

Born in 1770 in the beautiful countryside of the north of England, Wordsworth often wrote of his deep love of nature and the countryside; in this sonnet, however, he recalls a moment when he and his sister Dorothy travelled to London and walked across Westminster Bridge in the early morning, before most people were awake. It is interesting that even when in the middle of England’s biggest city he still compares what he can see with the hills and valleys of his home countryside in the Lake District.

The poem’s language is remarkably simple – something that Wordsworth was always keen to manage in his writing – perhaps reflecting here the immediate and unsophisticated sense that he feels of how beautiful the London view is; the opening line, for instance, could hardly be more straightforward, and after a description of some of the sights that strike him so vividly Wordsworth ends the poem on a similarly and utterly simple note.

Some points for classroom discussion

What is the effect of the simple and straightforward listing of words in lines 5 and 6? How does Wordsworth make such plain description so effective? How many similes or metaphors are there in the whole sonnet? What happens in line 9, the beginning of the sestet? And what is the impact of the closing two lines?

Suggested comparison

Dorothy kept a diary for many years, and on July 27th 1802 she wrote this; you may like to compare what she wrote with what her brother’s poem says. Which of the two accounts and descriptions do you find more striking?

“It was a beautiful morning. The City, St Paul’s, with the river and a multitude of little boats, made a most beautiful sight as we crossed Westminster Bridge. The houses were not overhung by their cloud of smoke, and they were spread out endlessly, yet the sun shone so brightly, with such a fierce light, that there was even something like the purity of one of nature’s own grand spectacles.”

Also see: Elizabeth Brewster ‘ Where I Come From ‘.

There is some useful biographical material about Wordsworth on these websites:

http://victorianweb.org http://www.oldpoetry.com http://www.poemhunter.com

The City Planners & The Planners

Below is some additional information on the two poems written by Margaret Atwood and Kim Boey Cheng respectively, found on the internet:

“The City Planners” by Margaret Atwood and “The Planners” by Boey Kim Cheng

Many poets lament humanity’s soulless march toward technology and industrialization. Both “TCP” and “TP” reflect this sentiment. The poems are similar in ideas and tone, although Atwood’s is considerably more skilled and Cheng’s themes are more specific to his particular homeland.

“TCP” – themes of modernity pushing aside nature; loss of human/nature relationship; identity
Structure/Poetic Devices/Analysis
(Have students find devices for homework, but for analysis purposes the poetic devices worth noting consist mainly of just imagery, simile and metaphor although it is good to note that the free structure keeps the focus on the images and ideas. Atwood’s ironic/sarcastic/humourous tone is also an effective device for conveying her ideas)

• –  Atwood’s poem is rich with irony (humour) and linguistic inventiveness/ fun with words. It is written in her trademark free verse style, with little structure or formality.
• –  Her “us” is not a strong blank narrator because her situations are specific experiences and not general enough for all people to relate to. The poem also reflects her personal views, which are also too specific (“HS” and “TC” are stronger blank narrators because they are based in reaction and common crises, not specific experiences and opinions).
• –  She grabs our attention with her unusual manner of description, her irony and her claim of being offended by normal life (the all-too-normal suburbanites)
• –  “The houses in pedantic rows, the planted/sanitary trees” Atwood sees suburbia as dull and pedantic. She paints it not as the comfortable, safe existence that ‘normal people’ think it is, but like a boring, colourless situation. What other images clearly show her distain for suburbia?
• –  The lawnmower is sarcastically described as the most interesting thing in suburbia – this signals a shift in the poem for the dramatic and judgmental, no longer just merely observational. Atwood talks of how these City Planners, who are so full of themselves, think they know best; that all of their suburban creations will make the world better. Atwood disagrees, implying that modern suburbia will be the apocalypse/death of humanity. She identifies flaws in suburbia/modernization that foreshadow this breakdown of humanity – can you find them?
• –  Atwood’s ending is very hyperbolic, inferring that these self-absorbed and self-aggrandizing City Planners are just as empty and meaningless as the ‘burbs they pollute the world with.

  Consider: Is “TCP” a poem that shines with wit and brilliant phrasing, such as “bland madness”, or is it nothing more than a whiney rant, an exaggerated condemnation of something rather harmless?

• –  Atwood can also be showing us how these modern, manmade ‘plans’ are a form of escapism. Modern Man is hiding behind his unnatural, overly-organized environments so he does not have to fell he is not always in control (“HS”).
• –  Atwood can also be showing, in her comment about the Planners, that Man thinks what he does in important, but it is not and it will not last – that Planners who seek to control and mould nature are fighting an uphill battle that nature will always win (outlast).

  Consider: What words would you use to describe the tone of this poem? Prove with text.

  “TP” — themes of modernity pushing aside nature; loss of human/nature relationship; identity

Structure/Poetic Devices/Analysis
(Have students find devices for homework to show engagement, but the main devices worth noting, like “TCP” are imagery. Note that the metaphors are often mixed – terrible – and the imagery is hyperbolic and clumsy. Let’s focus on the message, not the bad poetry.)

• –  Atwood’s “TCP” is insular and only deals with her personal hatred/views regarding the suburbs (and how they represent the epitome of unhealthy technological advancement/ industrialization/dehumanization/moving away from the ‘natural way’…) however, Cheng’s poem has a broader scope: he reflects on not just his personal \pet peeve’, but on his home nation’s apparently soulless route of progress.
• –  Cheng begins with observation/ description of modern Singapore. He talks about how everything is decided, planned, made with precision – modern Singapore has none of the vagueness or irregularity of nature, “Even the seas draw back/ and the skies surrender” is hyperbole – the Planners have planned everything so exactly that even nature seems to bend to their will/plan. The idea that everything natural is gone and only the perfection of mathematics remains. Can you find more examples of this Singaporean ‘perfection’?
• –  The second stanza is also in many ways descriptive, but here for the first time the poem is also meaningful. Like Atwood, Cheng does not like the blind stomp toward technology and away from nature – although he focuses his criticism on Singapore instead of the concept of modern suburbia. Both could be described as anti- modernist.
• –  Singapore used to be a colony and now it wants to redefine itself on its own terms. It chooses to do so, says Cheng, by being a defiantly modern, scientific, unsentimental nation. Cheng’s description is dramatic – he writes of “history” being “new again”, and being blasted away by the drills. This can be seen as an overly simplistic analysis of Singapore.
• –  Cheng goes so far as to make Singapore seem like a scary, inhuman state now (examples?) and says that “But my heart would not bleed/poetry” implying that art/poetry and modern Singapore cannot exist at the same time/in the same place. *groan* NB: he wrote this after moving to Australia. He fears the Planners damage both the past and future by ignoring M/N relationship, ignoring nature in general and through their arrogance (believing themselves to be better than nature/beyond it/capable of creating perfection).

  Consider: Having read both “TCP” and “TP” now, who exactly do you think these Planners are? Can you think of job descriptions or real-life examples of these ‘people’?

  Compare/Contrast:

• –  Both poems revolve around the poet lamenting the move away from nature, toward technology /modernity and use poetic devices to emphasize this point: hyperbole, imagery, sarcasm, ironic humour.
• –  Both poems are only one-sided opinions/declarations about life. They make damning judgments about society without looking at the other side of the coin/other perspective or offering any solutions. They are argumentative rather than evocative, ‘preachy’ rather than meditative.

• –  Both lament a lack of M/N relationship (they portray a lack of N in life as harmful – how?)
• –  Both can be said to also be about identity, in that these poets build part of their identity on the fact that they disagree so strongly with the Planners (both set themselves apart from ‘them’/ ‘the bad/misguided Planners’). Consider: What words would you use to describe the tone of this poem? Prove with text.