An Analysis of Millay's Poem, Renascence At first glance Edna St. Vincent Millay's first recognized poem, Renascence, seems to be easy to understand and follow. However, as this sing-songy poem is dissected, the reader embarks upon a world full of emotion, religion, confusion, pain and sin. This poem is split up into six sections or stanzas which separate the action of the poem into easy to understand parts. I have chosen to discuss the first section of the poem for my close reading. Although this section is the easiest to read, it sets up the action and requires the most "reading between the lines" to follow along with the quick and meaningful happenings. Millay begins her poem by describing, in first person, the limitations of her world as a child. She links herself to these nature images and wonders about what the world is like beyond the islands and mountains. The initial language and writing style hint at a child-like theme used in this section. This device invites the reader to sit back and enjoy the poem without the pressure to understand complex words and structure. Further into the first stanza Millay begins to ruminate about how she will go beyond her own boundaries and become familiar with the "Undefined." At this point the girl decides to achieve her knowledge by simply lying on her back and touching the sky. This is the juncture where readers may draw different conclusions about what she is really doing here. I personally thought that she fell into a dream like state or literally fell asleep and began to dream about infinity and the wonders of the heavens. Once the girl actually touches the sky, a whirlwind of repercussions takes over her next moments and forces her to ride an emotional ro... ... middle of paper ... ...if they do not understand things beyond their own life. Millay expresses those feelings in a poem that can be understood by the common reader. Millay is also capable of articulating the effect that knowledge of pain, suffering and death can cause on a child or young adult. And by the end of the poem Millay escapes, unharmed with her same thirst for knowledge. Most importantly Millay's readers feel as if they can sit down and live and learn from her poems without having to go through the agony of dissecting ancient language or multiple allusions to past works. By using easy to comprehend language Millay convinces her readers to go along with turbulent and sometimes unrealistic action to convey common feelings for all people. No matter what theme the reader applies to this poem it is important in some way to every reader and has meaning in many situations.
Rituals, teachings, ceremonies and identities of the Aboriginal people were lost and neglected in the past. Even today, those of the culture continue to heal and strengthen from the consequences. In Louise Halfe’s poem “My Ledders,” a native woman addresses the Pope expressing her passionate feelings towards the traditions that were robbed of her culture, while pleading him to change the teachings back to the original way. In the letter the speaker writes as if she was speaking, using phonetic spelling and broken English, asking the Pope if he could use his power to retain the native culture, as the government may listen to him. Directly linking the losses of native traditions, customs and languages to the residential school system, the speaker uses orature combining a native dialect along with satire to express how the losses in one generation continue to affect the aboriginal identity in future generations.
Despite being a cliché, “being drunk with power” can be true to its meaning, for people with power can act quite senseless. Based upon the information given to the readers by Marv, Cardinal Roark is publically known as a man of god, a war hero, a philanthropist, an educator, and the most powerful man in the state (Miller). Marv believes he is the most powerful man in the state because he has the ability to bring down mayors and to get the governor of his choice elected. No matter what a person may believe is the definition of “power,” it is a fact that a way to power is through wealth. Roark is a m...
Concussions have become arguably the #1 most prevalent issue in football today. The number of concussions throughout football has been rising for the past 20-30 years and there seems no way of stopping them. However, the NFL and many private researchers are set on finding a way to conquer this issue. They want to stop these concussions from happening and prevent the diseases resulting from them that have ruined so many football families’ lives. In order to solve this problem, I think that these researchers need to combine all of their knowledge to solve an issue that so many want solved. As soon as we conquer this “illness” we can return to enjoying the game that we love.
Many memories are made in football, but sadly some of the greatest players cannot recall them. The National Football League has been associated with concussions and brain traumas throughout the years, but lately it has been exposed by media and NFL veterans. The league recently “reached a $765 million preliminary settlement with thousands of former players who were suing the league over its treatment of concussions…” (Waldron). Many former players are experiencing the effects of taking hard hits over and over again; they were not properly treated, which makes the injury worse and long term. The concussion issue in the NFL is more prevalent today, because it affects not only the players, but the league as a whole.
There is a phrase that people here time and time again, but don’t truly understand the meaning of it until the phrase can be applied to their own lives. “You don’t realize what you have until it’s gone.” Atwood’s poem is a direct reflection of this quote. Her poem “Bored” talks about how she hated the repetitiveness of her daily events with her father. But it was only until he had passed on was it that she truly did realize how much she missed those daily events. Sometimes people don’t understand how important others mean to them until it is too late.
The poem also intends the reader know how society can be affected by people acting
Ways of prison can vary especially depending on the views of its society. As shown in the book Anthem, by Ayn Rand, prison, or in this case Palace of Corrective Detention, is a very harsh place to be in, especially since the inmates face even more cruel conditions than in the ones in modern day jail. Some key differences between modern day jail and Corrective Detention include how they deal with acts of violence, levels of security, and jail conditions in general.
Henley establishes the sense of suffering that the speaker is experiencing through the use of multiple literary devices. By beginning the poem with images of darkness and despair, Henley sets the tone for
The poem expresses the tension between individuals and society. Authorities dominate our lives. We form our beliefs by listening to the opinions of not only priests, but politicians and other leaders in society as well. We absorb their ideals like a sponge. This has been a common trait of humanity ever since the agricultural revolution brought the division of labor and management positions into culture. Someone had to be on top and in charge. Those who listen to authorities are almost living their life as if they are asleep. They spend their days helpless and arrogant, unwilling to waken to an enlightening truth about society. A truth that says individuals have a say in what their live is about. The people who spend their days asleep accept the values and ideas that their society has set for them as they dream of the better days in the future that will never
The relationship shared by Pierre and Helene is best described as a lustful charade. It is no coincidence that Pierre, one of the most introspective characters in the novel, first marries a shallow, inwardly-ugly adulterer. His first recorded attitude towards Helene is one of admira...
Edna St. Vincent Millay repeats the first two lines of her poem, “Recuerdo” in an effort to cling to the memory. Millay stresses the emotions felt by repeating, “we were very tired,we were very merry” (1, 7, 13) three times throughout the poem. The way the line is written suggests that they were merry because they were tired as a result of going "back and forth all night on the ferry" (2, 8, 14). This line is also repeated twice more to accent it as the most persistent activity of the night. It seems that throughout the poem, the events become more sporadic, but the author is sure these are the moments worth remembering. By repeating the lines, it is like she is reminding herself of how happy she felt that night as a constant emotion in the whole whirlwind of adventures.
The “pains of imprisonment” can be divided into five main conditions that attack the inmate’s personality and his feeling of self-worth. The deprivations are as follows: The deprivation of liberty, of goods and services, of heterosexual relationships, autonomy and of security.
During the poem the speaker does not address his readers. The readers are simply overhearing a man assessing the society in which he lives as he daydreams about what is could be and yet what it is not. It is evident that his goal is to get the readers to look down upon this society which is so caught up in daily routine; prohibiting anyone from having freedom of imagination. This detachment that is created between the speaker and his readers incorporated with the boring monotone at the very beginning of the poem gives the readers a negative impression of the society before they begin to analyze the actual words of the poem.
Kenyon’s choice of a first person perspective serves as one of two main techniques she uses in developing the reader’s ability to relate to the poem’s emotional implications and thus further her argument regarding the futility of mankind’s search for closure through the mourning process. By choosing to write the poem in the first person, Kenyon encourages the reader to interpret the poem as a story told by the same person who fell victim to the tragedy it details, rather than as a mere account of events observed by a third party. This insertion of the character into the story allows the reader to carefully interpret the messages expressed through her use of diction in describing the events during and after the burial.
Throughout the western world once the need for urban planning was recognized albeit gradually there had been many stages of improvement in the way Planners approached urban problems. Various time periods saw evolution of different methodologies and strategies in the way planners plan. The paradigms shifted from focusing initially on large plans and city beautiful movements to more neighborhood based community improvement plans today. However, the most important change that had occurred over the period of time in planning thinking should be the way the focus had shifted from physical aspects of a city to community participation and intermittent process involved in making a plan. “Thus since the early 1960s, the plan has not occupied center stage” (Neuman 1998, 208). This Plans performed a secondary role, sometimes even as flexible documents to support the process. In the end the Planning documents saw more of the process in terms of bringing together various groups, citizen participation, identifying the issues, negotiating and mediating and forming the immediate strategies to tackle some of these issues. In the end the comprehensive plans and the strategic plans started dealing less with the physical aspects as the Plan implementation became more and more difficult and irrelevant to keep up pace with the fast change scenarios. So cities like Houston relied on no comprehensive plans but more on the large scale development projects, infrastructure led developments, and initiatives grown from the neighborhoods (Neuman 2003, 25). However it cannot be said there is a fixed way of planning as the process itself is constantly evolving and as more and more ways of theories surface, the debates of “content versus context, rational versus ...