While the subject of “My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke has spurred passionate academic debate from professors, scholars, and students alike, the imagery, syntax, and diction of the poem clearly support the interpretation that Roethke writes “My Papa’s Waltz” to illustrate an affectionate memory of a dance between his father and his younger self. The nostalgic tone weaved throughout the poem’s creative structure and descriptions of his fond memory. Imagery is the focus point for Roethke’s poem, and through descriptive words and various literary devices, it tells of a memory as a child. He creates vivid imagery using similes that depict a child dancing with his father, hanging “on like death, and hyperboles that describe the child and father dancing “until the pans slid from the kitchen shelf.” Although these phrases can be interpreted to have a perverse meaning, when in context, they portray the determination the little boy had as he and the father played roughly. Through the use of rhyme, iambic trimeter and diction, Roethke is able to establish a connection between the poem’s syntax and subject. Line 13 details his father beating time on his head for their dance. Not only is it portrayed to the reader through his creation of imagery, but also through the poems meter and rhyme. The steady beat the poem creates when read aloud mimics …show more content…
Words such as, “death,” “battered,” and “scraped” could mislead the audience to interpret a more sinister poem; however, these words take on a new meaning when they are connected back into the poem. “Death” refers to the child holding on to his father to keep up with him; “battered” and “scraped” describe the fathers hard working hands propping up the small child on his feet so the could dance. These “negative” words only contribute to the overall endearing memory, rather than take away from
" Certainly, this small boy's family life has its frightening side, but the last line suggests the boy is still clinging to his father with persistent if also complicated love" (Kennedy and Gioia 668). Although their dance appears to be "comic", Roethke seems to possess "an odd and ambivalent closeness" to his apparently intoxicated father (Balakian 62). Still, even more evidence of these mixed feelings is illustrated in the third stanza. "This love dance, a kind of blood rite between father and son, shows suppressed terror combined with awe-inspired dependency" (Balakian 62).
The author uses negative connotations such as “battered...knuckle”, “palm caked hard by dirt”, and “ear scraped” to illustrate his interpretation of the situation now as an adult. Roethke uses negative connotations to show that as a child he thought of this as “romping”;but, now as an adult he thinks of it differently. The author’s use of diction gives to sides to the interpretation of the poem; that’s why this poem is considered one of his best. Overall, diction helped tie up this poem by allowing the reader to have a connection with the
Theodore Roethke’s short poem “My Papa’s Waltz” is a small representation of the bond between a young boy and his father while waltzing in their kitchen. The father has had too much whiskey in his system and seems to be drunk. The father and son are knocking over pans and creating a huge mess, upsetting the mother. The boy is trying to enjoy the dance with his father, but his ear is getting scraped on by his father’s belt buckle. This straight forward poem ends with the father waltzing the son up into his bed for the night.
The word romped appears, it makes this very important dance seem carefree, but they “romped until the pans” (Roethke 5). As the stanza goes on, the reader understands the father and son dance causes pandemonium in the house, that even his “mother’s countenance/could not unfrown itself” (Roethke 7/8). Yet again, another event as simple as dancing with your father, Roethke continues to carry out the same tone involving disturbance and violence that continues to take a toll on any of the relationships that involve the father, which results in destroying their
Theodore Roethke once proclaimed that “the darkness has its own light,” which seems ‘ato be a statement full of contradiction. Losing his father at a young age and suffering from depression throughout his later years, Roethke’s life was by no means easy. His poetry acted as his outlet and allowed him to see a smidgen of light, even though his life was encompassed by darkness (“Theodore Roethke”). Roethke’s poem “My Papa’s Waltz” is an extraordinary example of the light that Roethke was able to find amidst darkness. Roethke accentuated both love and loss through his word choice, the poem’s rhythm and by including figurative language.
The subject of the poem “My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke made a passionate academic debate from professors, scholars, and students alike by using; imagery, symbolism, and diction to make his poem clear. The poem “My Papa’s Waltz” describes the abuse the author's experiences growing up as a child with his intoxicated father. The author share his experiences through this poem. The poem is a horrid experiences from the author's point of view. The author share his experiences and also the author In addition the author develops imagery to let the readers experiences the abuse from his intoxicated father as a child.
Ultimately, Roethke’s use of negative diction influences one to believe that his poem tells the story of his abusive father. With the use of negative diction, the author is able to create a woeful and melancholy tone that paints multiple eerie images. After carefully analyzing the poem, one can conclude that the author tells his traumatic experience with his abusive father; Roethke is “beat” on his “head,” his “right ear scrape[s] a buckle,” and he “rompe[s]” to the point that pans begin falling. The author shares his experience as a dreadful memory, not a joyful dance with his father. Roethke uses negative diction such as “romped,” “death,” “whiskey,” “beat,” “scraped,” and “battered.” All these words have a negative connotation that illuminates
"My Papa's Waltz”, by Theodore Roethke, provokes the reader to experience different ranges of emotion and interpretation. It represents a young son’s recollection of dancing a waltz with his father in their kitchen. However, unlike the traditional version of the waltz this particular dance was not at all graceful nor joyful. The similes used describing the father son waltz produce bellicose images. The son recalling that he “hung on like death” demonstrations great difficulty attempting to waltz with his father during his drunken, seemingly aggressive behavior as well as the great deal of love he held for him(3). The imagery is clear in mentions of the smell of whiskey on the fathers breath and how they clumsily this waltz had been; “we romped until the pans/slid from the kitchen shelf” (5-6).
The boy says “I hung on like death: / such waltzing was not easy” to show he is being beaten badly but is still hanging on strongly for this life (Roethke 3,4). He also uses the phrase “battered on one knuckle” to describe his father’s knuckles after he was most likely hit (10). The writer chooses the word “battered” in the poem to describe his father’s knuckles because it creates a realistic visual image of the beating. When a person is battered badly by another person, their knuckles often become tore up and
Roethke informs the audience in stanza one that the little boy “hung on like death.” Some will pay close attention to the use of the word death; it is used early on to show readers this may not be just a happy memory, but it is also haunted. Death is also the one thing no one can escape. Maybe the little boy felt that he needed to escape his father but knew that was not possible, just like it is impossible to escape death. It is hard for the reader to determine why the little boy felt he had to hold on so
The diction choice within the poem immediately gives off a negative tone about the poem. Initially the poem appears that it would be a rather nice and peaceful poem because of the title “My Papa’s Waltz” however the poem shifts to a negative tone immediately in the first stanza. The first stanza immediately has the narrator direct his words to a drunken father who is rather rowdy. Following this immediate negative tone comes the diction choice of the words “death”, “romped”, “unfrown”, “battered”, “scraped”, and “beat”. All of these word choices capture an essence of negativity and violence. Due to these words flowing through the poem the idea of violence is placed into the readers mind because of the darkness of the words. The diction then supports the imagery Roethke creates about
Helping the reader visualize what was occurring in one of his memories. When he smelled the “whiskey” on his father's breath it made him feel “dizzy” which makes known how intoxicated the father was to make his son feel dizzy by just smelling his father's “breath.” When they were waltzing some “pans” were sliding of the kitchen shelf shows how unbalanced and inebriated he was as they were “waltzing.” As well as, when the child “hung” onto his father like “death” could infer that he was afraid of losing his father and wanted to spend more time with him. Indeed, the poem has created many obscure points of views that could be interpreted either as a fond memory of him with his father or a abusive
Since poetry is an openly passionate form of expression and every individual is unique in his or her own personal way, one could potentially interpret one poem in more than one way. In Theodore Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz,” I interpreted the author’s overall meaning and general expression of his diction as two or three different ideas. The more times I read the poem, the more I developed a different sense of this deeply strong and emotional piece. I eventually came to a cohesive meaning of the written piece after a few perplexed readings.
In the late nineteen forties, Theodore Roethke emerged with a poem that has been the source of much debate. "My Papa's Waltz," is an account of a relationship between son and father. Alas, many readers who are exposed to this piece fail to note the love present in the connection of the characters. In an attempt to illuminate the author's true intention several factors must be examined. After several examinations of Roethke's poem as well as learning of his childhood it is evident that this poem does not suggest an abusive environment, but is an appreciative account of the love and playfulness between the characters. Therefore, a successful interpretation of this poem will look beyond the four stanzas and study not only the history of the writing, but the life of the poet.
In the poem, My Papa’s Waltz, Theodore Roethke shares the male main character’s reminiscing memory about a specific time in his youth reflecting his emotions of love and fear towards the imperfections of his father. The young boy in the poem loves his father’s presence and eats up every second he has with him fueling his masculinity and macho-ness.