The Waste Land Section 5

Blake Fletcher

AP English

The Waste Land Section 5

The final section of “The Waste Land” is split up into two sections. The first section shows the fall of many major cities near Europe. It is kind of like the end of the world like an apocalypse where not just the world but the church is failing. People are losing faith, which is symbolized by the old church falling apart. The end of the first section I think that everything seems to get better. There is no real savior though, no hero, things seemingly get better at random. The second half of the final section seems to be more closely related to the title “What The Thunder Says”. The meaning of “What The Thunder Says” is related to a Hindu fable that says that “Thunder” symbolizes speaks and controls through the noise it makes. 

The Waste Land Section 4

Blake Fletcher

AP English

The Waste Land Section 4

            The fourth section of “The Waste Land Death By Water” is exactly what it sounds like. The speaker died I assume by drowning. He is becoming more and more distant from what his life was as he is devoured by the sea? Or the creatures within it. The thing I found interesting about this section is that it is made up of four rhyming couplets. This seems to be not only the shortest section but also the strictest formed section of “The Waste Land”. Also, I think that the speaker is trying to urge to everyone to know their limits maybe. Or in other words that everyone can die. No one is immortal.

The Waste Land Section 3

Blake Fletcher

AP English

The Waste Land Section 3

The third section of “The Waste Land” happens to be the longest of all the sections. Not only is it the longest but it might have the craziest form. Also, this may be the most provocative section of the poem. This whole section seems to have a very anti love theme. Also it starts out kind of dark and gloomy.

This section opens describing a riverbank which has rats scattered on it. Kind of a gloomy thought that doesn’t really set the mood for a romantic poem. Also, the colors used describe the banks are kind of off putting “The BROWN land” When I think romance I think white sand beaches. Also the discription of the rat walking along the riverbank is rather off putting “A rat crept softly through the vegetation Dragging its slimy belly on the bank.” The term slimy belly doesn’t really set the mood as a nice cruise down the river.

Now to the juicy part of the section, Tiresias shows up! Tiresias was the most famous ancient Greece prophet. He became a prophet because he at one point in his life had experienced what it was like to be a man and at another time in his life he had experienced what it was like to be a women. So Zeus and Hera called upon him to ask who experienced more pleasure in sex. Tiresias sided with Zeus and Hera got mad and cursed him blind. Zeus could not cure his illniss so he gave him the power of being a prophet.

It is odd that Tiresias, became a prophet because of his knowledge of sex and now is having visions of a girl possibly being raped. Tiresias being at one point man and at another point women clearly is not the find one person to love forever type which really matches the tone of the section of the poem.

Another place where the lust shines true is when Mr. Eugenides tries to pick up the speaker around line 210 when he asks the speaker to a hotel for the weekend. Is that really how you find love? Ask a random stranger to a hotel for a private weekend? I would have to say that this idea would have to be strictly lust.

In conclusion, I think that the main idea of this section of the poem could possibly be the lack of love in the world and that there is to much casual sex and rape.(the last sentence may be a tad extreme.) Althought the idea that somehow this is connected to Buddha somehow makes everything seem like there must be a deeper meaning to the words. Help?

The Waste Land Section 2

Blake Fletcher

AP English

The Waste Land Part 2 Summary

            This portion of “The Waste Land” is split up into two parts. The first half of the section shows a beautiful rich speaker who seems to be waiting for a partner. She starts to get impatient or maybe she is just throwing a hissy fit. The lines seem rather wild as she does this. The last few lines of the first half seem to mellow back out. The second half of the poem shows 3 friends in a bar kind of talking smack about their friend who refuses to get her teeth fixed????? Also, it one of them had an abortion because it would have possibly killed her to have another child? The conversation comes to a close because the bartender is closing the bar.

Waste Land part one

Blake Fletcher

AP English

The Waste Land Part 1

I am having trouble understanding this first section but I will do my best.

The first section of “The Waste Land” is set up with four Vignettes. Each Vignette shows a different speaker. The first Vignette reveals a woman who claims to be German. The second vignette reveals a man and his journey into an apocalyptic waste land. The third Vignette seems to be about a man recalling things to do with a girl. The last Vignette is the most creepy. The speaker in the final section seems to be walking through a town that is full of ghosts. He gets specific about a man whome he had fought next to in a war.

The problem I have with this first section is I can’t find a connection with the different speakers. Each section even seems to have a somewhat different tone to it. This is very confusing.

The form allows many different speakers to be shown. This is probably very effective if you understand the connection between the different speakers. Other than that the different speakers gives us a lot of insite into what is happening. It seems to me like maybe this is the time after a big war while everything is down and maybe the waste land could be a old war zone.

So to sum up, The first section of “The Waste Land” is set up with four different vignettes with four different speakers. The picture this presents seems to me as four completely different things. I need your help…

Fern Hill

Blake Fletcher

AP English

November 13, 2011

Fern Hill

The poem Fern Hill by Dylan Thomas seems to be about the difference between being a wreck less child and an adult with responsibilities. The poem opens to a worry free child whose only concern seems to be having fun. The colors and sense of time seem to play a large role in this as well and help support the theme of aging. The end of the poem reveals the dark truth about having responsibilities.

The first line of the poem is “Now I was young and easy under the apple boughs” this puts the image of a kid hanging out in the shade casted from an apple tree. The word easy doesn’t refer to his age it refers to that he was relaxed. This means that he was actually young and relaxing under an apple tree. Thus showing that the speaker in this stanza at least is a young boy or possibly an old man remembering his childhood.

The colors that describe the speaker in this poem mean a lot. For example in the second stanza “Golden in the mercy of his means” The color gold symbolizes purity and innocence. While in the final stanza “Nothing I cared, in the lamb white days” white is a symbol for death or winter which is also a time where everything seems to die apposed to spring where everything is “green” and growing.

In the beginning of this poem it shows a young boy who spends his days playing and relaxing. Time seems to be his friend and the days seem to last forever. In the end the grown man sees the days as short possibly not long enough to get all his work done. He constantly sees the moon and maybe dreads the day because all he does is work.

The saying “you can’t outrun your childhood” applies directly to this poem. Remembering how it seemed like days lasted years and you could just play and play and never run out of time when you where playing is fantastic. Now as an older person the speaker realizes how short the day actually is and is overwhelmed with the tasks at hand. He doesn’t seem to think he has the time to get all of the work done and it haunts him.

Death, Be Not Proud

Blake Fletcher

AP English

November 7, 2011

Death, Be Not Proud

1.     I think that the main figure of speech that the author uses is it seems like he is talking to death as if death is a person. That is kind of an odd image talking to your death?

2.     Death should not be proud because because even though many have called him powerful and mighty he is not. Because he can not kill the speaker. He should only take the readiest men. His arguments seem like insults at first and then towards the end of the sonnet it almost seems like it turns persuasive.

3.     The speakers tone does not strike me as religious. He says to take the readiest person. That means he is saying kill someone else not me. That really isn’t a religious idea. I agree with the second idea I think that the speaker of the poem is more trying to reassure himself that there is nothing to fear in death.

4.     Death be not proud more goes by the rhyme scheme of the Italian sonnet but has the turn in the final couplet so im not sure which that connects to because in my notes I don’t have the turn labeled for the Italian sonnet but I think that this poem may be a mix of English and Italian sonnet with more connections to the Italian sonnet.

Death, Be Not Proud Explication

The Hybrid Sonnet “ Death, Be Not Proud” shows a speaker who is possibly facing death and having to come to grips with the fear he is facing. He seems to be in denial early in the poem. The last few lines reveal a turn in tone that seems for the better for this distraught man.

In the first 8 lines of this Petrarchan sonnet it reveals the speaker trying to defy death. “Die not, poor death, nor yet canst thou kill me” this quote is a great example of his outlook on death. He sees death as a person who is facing like in a fight and that death is not quite strong enough to take him. It is literally a fight for his life. He says that there is much more pleasure left in his life, this shows that he isn’t quite ready to give up yet.

The last 6 lines reveal a different tone from the speaker, He seems to be coming around or understanding that death happens to everyone. “One short sleep passed, we wake eternally,” I think this means that he knows now that there is more out there then just dying. There is an afterlife he can have faith in. He knows that when he dies it is like taking a nap, but when he wakes up he will be eternally alive. The more positive ending seems to leave me with the feeling that he went peacefully. No one can escape death or fate. When it is your time it is your time and the speaker seemed to have a better understanding of that in the final sestet.

The Petrarchan sonnet “Death, Be Not Proud” has much meaning to everyone who reads it because it is near to everyone. As the speaker comes to realize death cannot be escaped by any soul. Everyone tends to fight the idea of dying, but in the end just as the speaker did they usually come to grips that everyone has their time. The understanding puts people at peace and settles them for their final rest. The speaker is struggling in the beginning to fight the natural course of life but seems calmer after the Volta.