WOOOOOO

O’Brien presents many views of dealing with death.  In the vignette “Friends”, Jensens friend, Strunk, dies. O’Brien tells is this “seemed to relieve Dave Jensen of and enormous weight.”  Later in “The Man I Killed”, when O’Brien killed a boy all he could do was stare and think of the life he just ended.  The third example of dealing with death is Norman Bowker dealing with Kiowa’s death.  He blamed himself for Kiowa’s death and eventually couldn’t deal with it any longer and resorted to killing himself.

The dictionary.com definition of a comrade is “A person who shares one’s interests or activities; a friend or companion.”  In the vignettes “Enemies” and “Friends” we can see a comparison between O’Briens view of comrades and this definition.  In “Enemies” Strunk and Jensen were comrades for the sole reason that they “shared activites”.  But, after their incident involving the jacknife they were comrades because they were friends.

In  the vignette “On the Rainy River” O’Brien attacks the idea of traditional heroism.  The traditional hero is one that is brave, noble, and courageous.  One of the major traditional heroes that I have read about is Beowoulf.  He is the epitamy of hero.  O’Brien, the character, is not one of these heroes.  In “On the Rainy River”, O’Brien is right on the border and could easily swim away but didn’t.  Granted, it is brave and courageous to go to war, but not for the reasons that O’Brien did.  O’Brien says, “I couldn’t endure the mockery, or the disgrace, or the patriotic ridicule.  Even my imaination, the shore just twenty yeards away, I couldn’t make myself be brave.  It had nothing do with morality.  Embarrassment, that’s all it was.“

Spin explores the idea of conrtolling reality and memory through story.  O’Brien tells us, the reader, that the stories can take on different meanings based on the way they are told.  Another thing he says about his stories is, “The memory-traffic feeds into a rotary up on your head, where it goes in circles for a while, then pretty soon imagination flows in and the traffic merges and shoots off down a thousand different streets.”  In these lines O’Brien tells us that his stories are not all true. He adds his own “spin” and imagination to these memories that he recollects.  This spin is there to make the reader feel what he felt during the event of the story being told.

Tangible:

1. Flak Jacket-protect against mines and booby-traps
2. Compress bandage-carried in helmet for easy access
3. Green plastic poncho-raincoat, groundsheet, or makeshift tent
4. Photographs
5. Two or three canteens of water

Intangible

1. Grief
2. Terror
3. Love
4. Longing
5. Fear of cowardice

What do you carry?

The tangible things I carry around daily are my wallet (with almost no money, drivers license, debit card, , 2 Subway cards, Burger King card, Walt Disney World Resort key, Cedar Point resort key, and a Tradewinds Resort key), a pen, my books, my backpack,  and my cell phone.  The intangible things that I carry are things that I don’t feel like expressing on this.

1. Describe what you know of the speaker, the listener, and the “she” referred to in the poem.

The occasion of the poem is a woman receiving a rose.  The literary devices that the poet employs are rhyme and personification. We know that the speaker appreciates and loves this woman.  We know that the “she” referred to is “young” and shy, “and not blush so to be admir’d.”

2. Paraphrase the four stanzas.

3. Describe the prosody

 The poem contains four five-line stanzas.  These all have the rhyme scheme of ababb.  The meter and rhymes create a song feeling which coincides with the title of the poem.  The spondees that begin line 1,2,6,13,14, and 16 all are orders to the envoy.  The most important on of these is “Then die” in line 16. 

1. What two unlike things are being compared, and what do they have in common?

In the first metapohor, the day is compared to the marriage of the earth and sky.  The dew is personified as a person crying.  The rose is then being compared to the sun because of it’s “brightness”.  The season of spring is then compared to a box of perfumes or herbs.  This are alike because they don’t last long.  The last metaphor is the sould of a virtuos person being compared to seasoned tiber which doesn’t bend in the wind. 

2. How is the poem structured, and how does this structure support its meaning?

The speaker addresses the three personified objects in separate stanzas.  The day, rose, and spring are all referred to as “sweet”.  All are also described with adjectives.  The three things are introduced in the order of their lenght of life.  A day is the shortest, a rose next, and spring last.  All these end with “For thou must die”.  The turn comes at the beginning of the final stanza.  The only exception to this is the virtuous soul.

3. How does the prosody reinforce the poem’s meaning?

All of the rhymes that rhyme with die and the repetitions emphasize the meaning of the poem.  The similarities of the first three stanzas contrasted with the fourth stanza also emphasize this ending.

1. Describe the form called rime royal: meter, rhyme scheme, stanza form.

A rime royal is a stanza with seven lines of iambic pentameter rhyming ababbcc.

2. What is the structure of the poem? How do the imagery and argument of each stanza develop and intensify the appeal?

In the first stanza he says “ye be my lady dere” and “unto youre mercy thus I crye” to appeal to the lady.  The second stanza again is flattering the lady in “Queene of confort and of good compaignye”.  This flattering continues in the third stanza with “my lives light And saviour”.

3. In exploring the extended metaphor of the poem, consider how diction accounts for the humor of Chaucer’s parody.

The metaphor of the poem is comparing his purse to the lady.  This is exaggerated with the many uses of flattery within the poem which is being satirized.

4. How does the envoy continue the tone of the poem even as it addresses a specific person?

The envoy continues the tone of the poem firstly with the first line by calling him a “conquerour”.  Throughout the rest of the envoy are many other examples of flattery.  At the end the king is reminded that he can solve the speaker’s problems.

1. What is the dominant meter and line length? What is the rhyme scheme? Describe the structure.

The meter is one of iambic tetrameter, but not really.  I knew it was iambic because of the accents but without looking I would not know it was tetrameter.  The poem consists of couplet rhymes except for lines 7, 8, and 9 which all have the same rhyme.  It then goes back into couplets for the rest of the poem.

2. What is the effect of the frequent use of alliteration in the poem? What mood does this create?

The frequent use of alliteration helps create a sorrowful mood.  “Sorrow’s springs are the same” emphasizes the sorrow with alliteration.  In the last line “Margaret” is connected with “mourn”.

3. Comment on the effect created by such unusual diction as Goldengrove and unleaving, fresh, wanwood and leafmeal, springs, and blight. How do the connotations of these words create the poem’s mood?

Goldengrove is the setting and unleaving is the act of the leaves turning autumn colored. “Wanwood” is a pale color which suggests death.  “Leafmeal” suggests decay.  The springs are the springs for the child’s tears.  Blight suggests death.

4. Analyze the poet’s use of figurative language. How does it suggest the theme of the poem?

The figurative language helps exaggerate the theme which is that death will become less troublesome and more intellectual with adulthood.  This is shown when “heart” is contrasted with “mind”.

1. What is the meter, rhyme scheme, and structure?

The meter is one of iambic pentameter.  The rhyme scheme is aabcbdcdeefgfg.

2. Paraphrase the three messages of the oven bird, then analyze the meaning of the word fall as it encapsulates the theme of the poem.

One of the falls is the fall of petals .  The other is when trees lose their leaves in the fall.  And the last is the fall of man and the loss of innocence and immortality.

3. How does the bird symbolize the human condition?

The bird symbolizes the human condition through loss and the wanting of perfection but never reaching it.

1. Describe a villanelle.  How many different end rhymes are in the poem? How many times is each sound repeated? Which words are repeated exactly at the ends of lines, in what pattern? How does the last stanza use the rhyming words? Why is this appropriate at the end of the poem?

A villanelle is a fixed form of poetry borrowed from early French poetry with nineteen lines (five stanzas of three lines, a last stanza of four lines) of any length or meter and two rhymes only, aba, emloyed in a set pattern.  Line 1 is repeated as lines 6, 12, and 18.  Line 3 is repeated as lines 9, 15, and 19.  The a rhyme is used 13  times and the b rhyme is used 6 times.  “hello” is used to end lines 1, 6, and 12, while “know” is used to end lines 3, 9, and 15.  In the last stanza both words are used in the last two lines to enforce the meaning of the poem, which is that “hello” is the thing we “know”.

2. Fine, wine, nine, line, pine, sign.  What is the significance of each of these words to the whole poem?

The word “fine” shows that the happy state is not going to last a lot longer.  The “wine” represents the cordialness of first meeting someone.  On Sunday at “nine” the relationship comes to an end.  “The next line” is saying that when we meet someone that our first conversation is already scripted.  The literal “pine” tree is symbolic of the verb pine which is to suffer with longing.  The “sign” is the fate of all relationships coming to an end.

3. What variations in meaning are present in the groups of repetitions and what is their effect?

The first “same, Hello” is the “same, Hello” that we all know when first meeting someone.  The next hellos is not the same and ironically not “simple” or “sane”.  But it still has the same meaning.  The next hello is almost flashing back to the first hello.  Finally, the last hellos is the “end. Hello” which ends the relationship.

The first good-bye is the good-bye that we all know at the end of a conversation.  The next good-bye is stating that this is what we know and is reiterated in the next good-bye.  The last good bye once again states that good-bye is the “only story.”

Line 3 states that every story we know has a hello and a good-bye.  The second repetition states that we already know this story and is continued in the next repetition.  The last one says “We know, we know” because she is defeated because of the relationship that has ended.

1. Describe the prosody of the poem.

This poem is a sestina which is a poetic from of six, six-lined stanzas and a three-line envoy. It is unrhymed , but has a fixed pattern of end words in a different sequence in each stanza. In the first stanza the sequence is abcdef. In the second it is faebdc. In the third it is cfdabe. In the fourth it is ecdfad. In the fifth it is deacfb. In the sixth it is bdfeca. In the envoy all six words are used.

2. In the first stanza, what is the effect of the personification and allusion? What is the Spanish counterpart to each? Sum up the meaning of the stanza.

In the first stanza English is being personified as a “snowy, blonde, blue-eyed, gum chewing” girl. The allusion in the first stanza occurs in line 3.  This is an allusion to the national anthem in “dawn’s early light”.  The allusion shows that the “dawn’s early light” does not remind her of America, but rather “dark-skinned girls” shutting blinds.

3. What mood or feelings are evoked in stanza two? How does language create this mood?

At the beginning of the stanza she is talking about her love for Spanish and it’s “soothing” quality.  Spanish is very comforting for her.

4. What do we learn in stanzas two and three about the difference between names and vocabulary words How does the example of the plant called the morivivir help illustrate this gap? What does the metaphor of the genii in the bottle tell us about the nature of language?

Before she learned English “sol, tierra, cielo, and luna” were just ordinary words, but after she learned English they became vocabulary words and “language closed”.  The example of the morivivir helps illustrate this gap because just like the language “closed” so does the plant when it is touched.

5. In stanzas four and five, why does the speaker invoke Gladys and Rosario from her childhood? How is her childhood sensitivity to words inextricably bound to Spanish? What is significant about the allusion to Adam?

In stanzas four and five, the speaker calls on Gladys and Rosario because they taught her Spanish in the beginning.  Her childhood sensitivity to words are inextricably bound to Spanish because they have “an intimacy” that is not present in English.  The allusion to Adam is significant because learning the names for everything she knows was like Adam naming everything on earth.