“The Jabberwocky” is nonsense. Then again, so are Shakespeare’s works. Both contain words and phrases created by the authors who wrote them. Origin wise, “scuffled”, first heard in Antony and Cleopatra, is not unlike “slithy” or “gyre”. Emily Dickenson’s “I Could Not Stop for Death” is just as illogical as Carroll’s work. Both Dickenson and Carroll’s poems contain characters, which, in literal form, are non-existent in reality. One poem is just as hard to understand as another is. The difference between the three above poems, though, is that two live in the world of logical, adult understanding. “The Jabberwocky” stands out, because it thrives in childhood imagination.
Carroll’s works illustrate a firm understanding of nonsense. His stories and poems thrive in fantastic worlds of imagination. Because of this, they effortlessly thrive in the worlds of children, as well. Carroll writes with the mind of a child. He understood that, “For young children, whose brains are struggling to comprehend language, words are magical in any case; the magic of adults, utterly mysterious; no child can distinguish between "real" words and nonsensical or "unreal" words, and verse like [his] brilliant "Jabberwocky" has the effect of both arousing childish anxiety (what do these terrifying words mean?) and placating it (don't worry: you can decode the meaning by the context). Lewis Carroll, in whom the child-self abided through his celibate lifetime, understood instinctively the child's propensity to laugh at the very things that arouse anxiety…” (Oates 9)
As a young person, one hears this poem read to them, quite possibly in an imitation Scottish accent, by their parents. As the reader continues aloud, the young listener does not...
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...ther way, the reader has the opportunity with this poem to take hold of many things from the world of nonsense and come happily “galumphing back” (Carroll 734).
Works Cited
Carroll, Lewis. "The Jabberwocky." 1871. Literature: An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. By X. J. Kennedy and Dana Gioia. 12th ed. Boston: Pearson, 2013. 134. Print.
Flescher, Jacqueline. "The Language of Nonsense in Alice." Yale University Press 43 (1969): 128-44. JSTOR. Web. 13 Nov. 2013. .
Oates, Joyce C. "First Loves: From "Jabberwocky" to "After Apple-Picking"" American Poetry Review 28.6 (1999): 9. JSTOR. Web. 13 Nov. 2013. .
Rundus, Raymond J. ""O Frabjous Day!": Introducing Poetry." English Journal 56.7 (1967): 958-63. JSTOR. Web. 13 Nov. 2013. .
Kelly, Richard. Lewis Carroll “Alice” 78-97. U of Tenn. Twayne Publishers, G. K. Hall & Co. Boston, Mass 1977.
Roethke’s poem has a regular rhyme scheme that can be expressed as “abab”. The only exception to this scheme would be the first stanza as the words “dizzy” (2) and “easy” (4) are slant rhymes. Only the end syllables of the two words sound the same. As a result, the use of a consistent “abab” rhyme scheme allows the poem to reflect the
The speakers and audience in poem are crucial elements of the poem and is also the case in these poems. In the poem Untitled, it can be argued that the poem is being written by Peter based on what his father might say to him...
Poems, Poets, Poetry: An Introduction and Anthology. 3rd ed. Ed. Helen Vendler. Boston: Bedford/St. Martin’s,
Lewis Carroll, world renowned author, known most for his tale of literary nonsense published almost a century and a half ago, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland. Several conditions of Carroll’s life molded and shaped his writing. Evidence from Carroll’s book, Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland ,one can conclude that Carroll has engraved moments from his life, people around him ,as well as his beliefs and love of logic into his story, considering these are the things that Alice Liddell would recognize.
Therefore, Oliver’s incorporation of imagery, setting, and mood to control the perspective of her own poem, as well as to further build the contrast she establishes through the speaker, serves a critical role in creating the lesson of the work. Oliver’s poem essentially gives the poet an ultimatum; either he can go to the “cave behind all that / jubilation” (10-11) produced by a waterfall to “drip with despair” (14) without disturbing the world with his misery, or, instead, he can mimic the thrush who sings its poetry from a “green branch” (15) on which the “passing foil of the water” (16) gently brushes its feathers. The contrast between these two images is quite pronounced, and the intention of such description is to persuade the audience by setting their mood towards the two poets to match that of the speaker. The most apparent difference between these two depictions is the gracelessness of the first versus the gracefulness of the second. Within the poem’s content, the setting has been skillfully intertwined with both imagery and mood to create an understanding of the two poets, whose surroundings characterize them. The poet stands alone in a cave “to cry aloud for [his] / mistakes” while the thrush shares its beautiful and lovely music with the world (1-2). As such, the overall function of these three elements within the poem is to portray the
Ferguson, Margaret W., Salter, Mary J., and Stallworthy, Jon. The Norton Anthology of Poetry. fifth ed. N.p.: W.W. Norton, 2005. 2120-2121. 2 Print.
The beginning of the poem starts with a humorous tone. Kinnell begins his poem with a simile “snore like a bullhorn”, an “Irishman”, or playing “loud music” to express the idea of something that is really loud and noisy, but still cannot wake the son up as opposed to the child’s ability to wake up to “heavy breathing” and a “come-cry” (line1-7). The tone that the...
Oates, Joyce C. "Where Are You Going? Where Have You Been?" Compact Literature. By Laurie G. Kirszner and Stephen R. Mandell. 8th ed. Boston: Wadsworth, 2013. 505-16. Print.
Strand, Mark and Evan Boland. The Making of a Poem: A Norton Anthology of Poetic Forms. New
SparkNotes Editors. “SparkNote on Alice’s Adventures in Wonderland.” SparkNotes.com. SparkNotes LLC. 2005. Web. 30 Oct. 2013.
Many people know the culture-shaped story of Alice falling down the rabbit hole, into a dream-like adventure that has impacted the world. But not many people know about the real mystery, how it was created and how the world reacted to it. That is the actual magic, how the book that was shaped by 1800s English culture, affected the rest of the world’s culture from that point on. Dodgson’s work of art paints a picture of the childish outlook that was looked down upon during the Victorian period.
Jarrell, Randall. ?Fifty Years of American Poetry.? The Third Book of Criticism. NY: Farrar, Straus & Giroux, 1969.
The definition of nonsense has been debated throughout literature. Yet nonsense itself cannot be defined, but rather it is defined by its inability to be defined. It’s the destruction or defiance of the norm that often leads to creation of nonsense. The language of nonsense itself is closely intertwined with various techniques of style, structuralization and various motifs. Authors such as Lewis Caroll in Alice and Wonderland and Edward Lear’s The Complete Nonsense of Edward Lear use such techniques to invoke the language of nonsense as well as to create nonsense within their writing. Both Lewis Carroll and Edward Lear use the language of nonsense is also defined by paradoxes, the play on stereotypes, and the usage of polysemy.
Mays, Kelly. "Poems for Further Study." Norton Introduction to Literature. Eleventh Edition. New York: W.W. Norton and Company Inc., 2013. 771-772. Print.