HS 204: Introduction to Literature: Poetry Section Spring 2008

HS 204: Introduction to Literature: Poetry SectionSpring 2008 Prof. Milind Malshe Dept of Humanities & Social Sciences, IIT, Powai, Mumbai.

Introduction • OUTLINE • I) The Human Species • II) The Idea of Humanities • III) Literature: LANGUAGE • FORMS/GENRES • IV) Poems & Poets

I) The Human Species:presence, distinctiveness & ascent • 1. The all-pervading presence and ascent • 2. The biological background • 3. Distinctive biological characteristics • 4. Society & Culture • 5. Comparison: “Animals”

The Human Species :presence and ascent: • 1. The all-pervading presence and ascent: • Presence: The spread and dominance of human beings all over the earth is unrivalled in completeness • Ascent: Conquest of the most diverse and hostile places and made them habitable → no part of the earth is unaffected by the human presence

The Human Species :biological background • 2. The biological background: • Biologically, human beings → animal • ↓ • classification: • The highest order of mammals → PRIMATES (i.e. monkeys, apes, human beings) → strong physical similarities

The Human Species :distinctive biological characteristics • 3. But 3 most important biological characteristics separate human beings from ALL other animals: • Characteristics that have made ASCENT possible: • (a) ability to walk upright • → from quadrupedalism (walking on all fours) to bipedalism (the striding walk) • → hands were left free and the visual field expanded considerably

The Human Species :distinctive biological characteristics • (b) fully developed opposable thumb: • 2 types of grips developed → power grip • → precision grip → unique and it enhanced the accuracy of hb’s touch • → manufacturing and using tools with accuracy

The Human Species :distinctive biological characteristics • (c) comparatively enormous brain → unique sensory perception, intelligence, speech, imagination, reasoning skills and knowledge (including self-awareness) • → MIND: thinking, reflection

The Human Species :society & culture • 4. Society & Culture • Society: many animals do exhibit “social” instinct, i.e. instinct to stay together (the “herd” instinct) and to form social relations for the sake of security & protection – e.g. they have systems of communication mainly for survival and procreative purposes

The Human Species :society & culture • Culture: • but no other animal has “culture”, i.e. behaviour based on norms and conventions which are predominantly • ETHICAL (e.g. “fasting”, “taboos”) • & • AESTHETIC (e.g. art) – Note that human language has functions far beyond survival and procreation

Comparison • We have been comparing the human species with the other animal species • This has been mainly a rational, scientific approach to the comparison • Let us now see how a poet can approach this comparison

ANIMALSby Walt Whitman (1819-1892) I think I could turn and live with animals, They are so placid* and self-contained; I stand and look at them long and long. They do not sweat or whine* about their condition They do not lie awake in the dark and weep for their sins, They do not make me sick discussing their duty to God. Not one is dissatisfied - not one is demented* With the mania* of owning things; Not one kneels* to another, nor to his kind that Lived thousands of years ago; Not one is respectable or industrious over the earth.

ANIMALS • Words which you must know: • placid • (adj) = easy-going, peaceful • whine • (v) = comstantly complain • demented • (adj) = wild, mad, uncontrolled • mania • (n) = obsession, craze • kneels • (v) = go down on one’s knees, stoop

ANIMALS • What is the “theme/central idea” of this poem? • Animals? • What are the “expressive devices” used? • Let’s look at another poem by the same poet, Walt Whitman:

When I heard the learn’d astronomer, When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me, When I was shown the charts and diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them, When I sitting heard the astronomer where he lectured with much applause in the Classroom, How soon unaccountable I became tired and sick, Till rising and gliding out I wander’d off by myself, In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time, Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars. Walt Whitman (1819-1892)WHEN I HEARD THE LEARN’D ASTRONOMER

What is the “theme” of the poem? • Stars? Astronomy? Boredom? • Astronomy= science, scientific schematization, quantification • What is the poet’s attitude ? • Choice of words: learn’d, applause • Syntactic structures: repetition, passive voice • Length of the lines • The two divisions of the poem: contrast between the two approaches to NATURE

II) The Idea of Humanities • Humanities • (1) definition: study of human life, mind, society, culture, history • (2) Social evolution of human beings • (3) The meaning of “Culture” • (4) Dimensions of Society & Culture • (5) Comparison: Science vs Poetry

II) Humanities:1. Definition • Dictionary meaning: “the branches of learning having primarily a cultural character” • i.e. study of culture • study of human life, mind, society, culture, history

II) Humanities:(2) Social evolution of human beings • From hunter-gatherer • to sophisticated technological being (about 12,000 years) • Quite rapid when compared to evolution • From ape-like ancestors • To homo-sapiens (millions of years) • The rapid social evolution possible because of the MENTAL power

Nature: understanding • ↓ • manipulation • Culture • Thus, humanities = study of the human mental faculty • and society/culture • ≠ psychology • ≠ sociology • ≠ anthropology

II) Humanities:(3) The meaning of “Culture” • What is CULTURE? • Dictionary def.: • (a) training & develop of the mind (→ process) • (b) refinement of taste & manner thro’ such training (→ product) • (c) social & reli. structures wh. characterize a society (→ foundations)

Let’s have a look at poems which thematize the issue of the breakup of a society, civilization or culture: “London” by William Blake (1757-1827) “Dover Beach” by Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) “The Second Coming” by William Butler Yeats (1865-1939) II) Humanities: Culturethe breakup of a civilization/culture

I wander through each chartered* street, Near where the chartered* Thames does flow, And mark in every face I meet, Marks of weakness, marks of woe. In every cry of every Man, In every Infant’s cry of fear, In every voice, in every ban, The mind-forged manacles* I hear. How the chimney-sweeper’s cry Every blackening Church appals*; And the hapless Soldiers sigh Runs in blood down Palace walls. But most through midnight streets I hear How the youthful Harlot’s curse Blasts the new-born Infant’s tear, And blight* with plagues the Marriage hearse*. London by William Blake ( 1757-1827)

Blake’s London • Words which you must know: • chartered=well-organized, streamlined (according to a “charter”?) • mind-forged manacles= chains made by the mind • appals= shocks, fills with horror • blights= destroys • hearse=a vehicle for conveying the dead body to the place of burial

Blake’s London • Is it a poem about the city of London? • The “territory”? The land? • Streets, the Thames • Or the “society”? Indicators? • Faces, cry, voice • What kind of human beings are described? • Are any social institutions mentioned? • Why? What is the “theme”? A key phrase?

TECHNIQUE: THE RHYME SCHEME I wonder through each chartered* street, a Near where the chartered* Thames does flow, b And mark in every face I meet, a Marks of weakness, marks of woe. b In every cry of every Man, c In every Infant’s cry of fear, d In every voice, in every ban, c The mind-forged manacles* I hear. d How the chimney-sweeper’s cry e Every blackening Church appals*; f And the hapless Soldiers sigh e Runs in blood down Palace walls. f But most through midnight streets I hear g/d How the youthful Harlot’s curse h Blasts the new-born Infant’s tear, g/d And blight* with plagues the Marriage hearse*. h

London: Technique • The use of “I”: personal identity? • Repetitions: chartered, mark (v) & (n) every I hear • Sentence Structure: • Main clauses: I wander…, (I) mark… I hear… ; I hear how…

Dover Beach Matthew Arnold (1822-1888) The sea is calm to-night.The tide is full, the moon lies fairUpon the straits; -on the French coast the lightGleams and is gone; the cliffs of England stand,Glimmering and vast, out in the tranquil bay.Come to the window, sweet is the night air!Only, from the long line of sprayWhere the sea meets the moon-blanch'd land,Listen! you hear the grating roarOf pebbles which the waves draw back, and fling,At their return, up the high strand,Begin, and cease, and then again begin,With tremulous cadence slow, and bringThe eternal note of sadness in.

Sophocles long agoHeard it on the Aegean, and it broughtInto his mind the turbid ebb and flowOf human misery; weFind also in the sound a thought,Hearing it by this distant northern sea. The Sea of FaithWas once, too, at the full, and round earth's shoreLay like the folds of a bright girdle furl'd.But now I only hearIts melancholy, long, withdrawing roar,Retreating, to the breathOf the night-wind, down the vast edges drearAnd naked shingles of the world.

Ah, love, let us be trueTo one another! for the world, which seemsTo lie before us like a land of dreams,So various, so beautiful, so new,Hath really neither joy, nor love, nor light, Nor certitude, nor peace, nor help for pain;And we are here as on a darkling plainSwept with confused alarms of struggle and flight,Where ignorant armies clash by night.

Dramatic Monologue: drama within a poem, implied listener • Is it a love poem? • What does Dover Beach stand for? • The sea as a metaphor for life. • Sophocles: Gr. Tragedian (Oedipus rex), symbol for human tragedy

The Second Coming • By William Butler Yeats (1865-1939)

Turning and turning in the widening gyre* The falcon* cannot hear the falconer; Things fall apart; the centre cannot hold; Mere anarchy is loosed upon the world, The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity. Surely some revelation is at hand; Surely the Second Coming is at hand. The Second Coming! Hardly are those words out When a vast image out of Spiritus Mundi* Troubles my sight: somewhere in sands of the desert A shape with lion body and the head of a man, A gaze blank and pitiless as the sun, Is moving its slow thighs, while all about it Reel shadows of the indignant desert birds. The darkness drops again; but now I know That twenty centuries of stony sleep Were vexed to nightmare by a rocking cradle*, And what rough beast, its hour come round at last, Slouches* towards Bethlehem* to be born?

The Second Coming= The second coming of Christ to usher in the millennium; end of human history & the start of the Christian culture Here, end of the 2000-plus years of Christian culture & the start of a new supernatural force widening gyre= cycle (of histotry) [The birth of Christ brought to an end the first cycle 2000BC to the dissolution of the Greeco-Roman culture] the falcon=a bird which can be trained to hunt other birds; a bird of prey Spiritus Mundi= the spirit or soul of the world, containing past memories of the race The Second Comingwords & refs you must know

The rocking cradle=the cradle of the infant Christ “The blood-dimmed tide is loosed, and everywhere The ceremony of innocence is drowned; The best lack all conviction, while the worst Are full of passionate intensity.” Ref to the Russian Revolution of 1917 “ceremony of innocence”: Yeats believed that ritual was the basis of civilized living Also see SPINX (separate file)

We have so far seen three very significant poems about the break-down of civilization and cultural values • Let’s now see a poem expressing an optimistic vision of “freedom”: about one’s “motherland” (one’s own territory; attachment; patriotism, etc) • Rabindrnath Tagore (1861-1941)

Rabindranath Tagore (1861-1941)Where the mind is without fear Where the mind is without fear and the head is held high; Where knowledge is free; Where the world has not been broken up into fragments by narrow domestic walls; Where words come out from the depth of truth; Where tireless striving stretches its arms towards perfection; Where the clear stream of reason has not lost its way into the dreary desert sand of dead habit; Where the mind is led forward by thee into ever-widening thought and action ... Into that heaven of freedom, my father, let my country awake.

Language & Structure • Comment on the use of “thee” and “my father” • Also, identify the major figures of speech: • Personification? • “tireless striving stretches its arms” • “stream of reason has not lost its way” • What effect is produced by the repetition of the “where”-construction? • Also comment on “led by thee” and “let my country awake”

`Where’- ideal, visionary world • `desert sand of dead habit’- Convention as opposed to tradition Dead, sheer habit living, changing • Passive voice: `I’ is never mentioned. (Notion of nationalism is problematic; the political nation-state is a modern concept, it is the British who organized the Indian state.) `fear’ of oppression not just from outside, but internal; `self-critique’ `orientalism’: construction of the east by the west ;`post-colonialism’: describes the condition after colonization ; European double-speak: European countries were getting rid of hierarchic structures within their own countries but imposing it in the colonies.

After the first powerful, plain manifesto* The black statement of pistons, without more fuss But gliding like a queen, she leaves the station. Without bowing and with restrained unconcern She passes the houses which humbly crowd outside, 5 The gasworks, and at last the heavy page Of death, printed by gravestones in the cemetery. Beyond the town, there lies the open country Where, gathering speed, she acquires mystery, The luminous self-possession of ships on ocean. 10 It is now she begins to sing --- at first quite low Then loud, and at last with a jazzy madness… The song of her whistle screaming at curves, Of deafening tunnels, brakes, innumerable bolts. And always light, aerial, underneath 15 Retreats the elate* metre of her wheels. Streaming through metal landscapes on her lines, She plunges new eras of wild happiness, Where speed throws up strange shapes, broad curves And parallels clean like trajectories from guns. 20 At last, further than Edinburgh or Rome*, Beyond the crest of the world, she reaches night Where only a low stream-line brightness Of phosphorus on the tossing hills is light. Ah, like a comet through flame, she moves entranced, 25 Wrapt* in her music no bird song, no, nor bough Breaking with honey buds, shall ever equal (1933) Stephen Spender (1909-1995) The Express

manifesto (n)=a public statement of opinions or intentions on behalf of an organized body (Does it bring any specific “manifesto” to your mind?) elate (adj)=giving joy Edinburgh= capital of Scotland (University 1583) What does it stand for? Rome= capital of Italy, the spiritual centre of medieval Europe wrapt (adj)=wrapped, covered, enclosed Identify the similes & metaphors: Manifesto Like a queen The heavy page of death Like a comet through flame Music no bird song … shall ever equal What is the effect of these? Do these suggest the theme of the poem? What is the theme? What is the tone of the poem? Language:Lexical Choice & Figures of Speech

Literature:LANGUAGE & FORMS/GENRES • LANGUAGE:structure & function • FORMS/GENRES: narrative, lyric, dramatic, discursive telling emoting showing discoursing

LANGUAGE:structure & function • Language: structure • Levels of structuring: sounds -> phonology words -> morphology sentences-> syntax meanings -> semantics Arbitrariness of language 3 types of signifier-signified relations: ICONIC, INDEXICAL, SYMBOLIC

LANGUAGE:structure & function Language: functions: emotive/expressive: ref to self/sender persuasive/conative: ref to the other/receiver referential/descriptive: ref to the context metalingual: ref to the code (lang about lang) phatic/ritualistic: ref to the contact poetic/aesthetic: ref to the unique message

Poetic Language • Special “poetic diction”? • Poetry as “A WAY OF SAYING”: “what oft was thought / But never so well expressed” • Special relationship bet content & form: “organic”? • FORM: imagery & figures of speech

Appreciation of a poem: • The “theme” or the “central idea” • The “technique” or the “devices” which structure and express the theme • Why the poem is “appealing” or “interesting” or “significant” • Analyze both the text and the context

Text and Context: CONTEXT • The poet: his/her period & background • The historical and cultural context • The “local” significance • The “universal” significance

Textual Analysis • The title: direct & indirect relevance to theme • The indicators of time & space/territory • The identity of the speaker “I” (and the listener “you”): the use of pronouns • The opening & closing lines • The Tone or the Mood • Reality (imitation, description) vs. Vision • vs. Expression • Rhyme & Rhythm: repetition • Imagery & Symbolism

In Madurai, city of temples and poets, who sang of cities and temples, every summer a river dries to a trickle in the sand, baring the sand ribs, straw and women's hair clogging the watergates at the rusty bars under the bridges with patches of repair all over them the wet stones glistening like sleepy crocodiles, the dry ones shaven water-buffaloes lounging in the sun The poets only sang of the floods. He was there for a day when they had the floods. People everywhere talked of the inches rising, of the precise number of cobbled steps run over by the water, rising on the bathing places, and the way it carried off three village houses, one pregnant woman and a couple of cows named Gopi and Brinda as usual. A River by A. K. Ramanujan (1929-1993)

The new poets still quoted the old poets, but no one spoke in verse of the pregnant woman drowned, with perhaps twins in her, kicking at blank walls even before birth. He said: the river has water enough to be poetic about only once a year and then it carries away in the first half-hour three village houses, a couple of cows named Gopi and Brinda and one pregnant woman expecting identical twins with no moles on their bodies, with different coloured diapers to tell them apart.

HS 204: Introduction to Literature: Poetry Section Spring 2008