‘The Gift’ by Li-Young Lee describes an unconventional relationship between father and son, especially that he is an Asian, which makes this relationship even more special than the rest of the others. The other poem ‘Sign for My father, Who Stressed the Bunt’ reveals another relationship between father and son, a more usual one that father is trying to teach the son by doing something that his son once believed to be useless, but turns out to be important. Both of the poems, I believe, use a free style of writing. There are no rhyme schemes. The speaker of both poems is the narrator himself; however, the reader for the first one is any person, and the reader for the second one is the father. The poem ‘The Gift’ is full with imageries. When …show more content…
Instead of showing what he saw and how he felt as the first poem, he chose to describe what he thought of the same thing in different ages, comparing all those thoughts and his father’s. As it was written in the poem, ‘I admired your style, but not enough to take my eyes off the bank that served as our center-field fence. That whole tiresome pitch about basics never changing, and I never learned what you were laying down.’ The narrator once thought that chasing home run is the only best part in baseball, and he thought he would never change his mind even though he admired his father’s style. However, after years, when the narrator looked back, he finally realized that, indeed, home run makes people awesome, but it was never the only one. Bunting can be beautiful too; Sacrificing himself for the team, for the common good, for someone else to have a better chance to score with a better score. After years, he finally understood what his father wanted him to learn — Sacrifice. The bunt was a symbol for sacrifice. At the end of the poem, he wrote, ‘ Let this be the sign I’m getting a grip on the sacrifice.’ It reveals the desire of the narrator’s to the reader. He wanted his father to know that he finally understood his father’s lesson; he finally understood
Li-Young Lee is a brilliant contemporary poet who used his figurative language skills to write about a complex relationship between father and son. In the poem, A Story, Lee utilizes his abilities of emotional appeal and literary devices to depict a loving father who reads stories to his five year old son; fearing that one day, his son will tire of him and leave. Lee was able to use strategic literary devices such as point of view, structure, and imagery to convey the complexity of the father and son relationship.
There are different types of parent and child relationships. There are relationships based on structure, rules, and family hierarchy. While others are based on understanding, communication, trust, and support. Both may be full of love and good intentions but, it is unmistakable to see the impact each distinct relationship plays in the transformation of a person. In Chang’s story, “The Unforgetting”, and Lagerkvist’s story, “Father and I”, two different father and son relationships are portrayed. “The Unforgetting” interprets Ming and Charles Hwangs’ exchange as very apathetic, detached, and a disinterested. In contrast, the relationship illustrated in the “Father and I” is one of trust, guidance, and security. In comparing and contrasting the two stories, there are distinct differences as well as similarities of their portrayal of a father and son relationship in addition to a tie that influences a child’s rebellion or path in life.
the poem On My First Sonne, the father loves his son a lot and feels
I have elected to analyze seven poems spoken by a child to its parent. Despite a wide variety of sentiments, all share one theme: the deep and complicated love between child and parent.
Both poems are set in the past, and both fathers are manual labourers, which the poets admired as a child. Both poems indicate intense change in their fathers lives, that affected the poet in a drastic way. Role reversal between father and son is evident, and a change of emotion is present. These are some of the re-occurring themes in both poems. Both poems in effect deal with the loss of a loved one; whether it be physically or mentally.
Rich in its complexity, Vladimir Nabokov’s The Gift deviates from standard literature in its lack of a standard narrative form. The Gift is structured in five chapters that vary significantly in tone, voice, pacing and narrative purpose; although Fyodor can be considered the main protagonist, the stylistic changes, shifting perspectives and "presentation of time" (Dolinin 7) within each chapter suggests that Fyodor 's voice cannot reliably be considered as the voice of the narrator. This is further complicated by Fyodor 's decision to write a novel at the end of Chapter 5, which will presumably be The Gift; by creating a scenario where the main protagonist declares his next work will be the one which is currently being read, the suggestion is that Fyodor is simply a thinly veiled representation of the author. However, the true narrator of The Gift is not the voice of Fyodor nor Nabokov, but the voice of the created work itself: The Gift, as a text and created work of art, is its own narrator.
I chose this piece because it’s the beginning, the reason why baseball got started. Also because I am learning about a sport that began so early and evolved into a major league sport. Many people find baseball can be boring because it is so long, its nine innings and that can last a while. The way the sport is, it is set up in a way that when your favorite team is winning, you tend to forget about how long the actual game is. This first inning takes place as early as the 1800’s and going into the 1900’s, explaining who started baseball. One interesting fact that I took heed to be the fact that baseball was not called “baseball”, it was actually called “base”, the game of ball.
One would not usually associate baseball, America's favorite pastime, with English romantic poets of the 18th and 19th century. Certainly, the thought of modern American baseball does not initially trigger notions of the sublime, natural scenes, and individual spirituality. Yet, what could be more poetic than the end of a curse, the greatest comeback in sports history, and the end of an 86 year drought without a championship? What is more poetic than all three of these occurrences happening in the same year to the same team? Less specifically, it is not hard to believe that a romantic poet would embrace the coming together of average Americans to cheer on their home team on a warm summer day. What is the seventh inning stretch but the mass-harmonizing of a short, heartwarming poem? It is true that baseball and romantics have more in common than one would at first suspect. Particularly, William Wordsworth and the Boston Red Sox are a terrific example of a romantic poet and a Major League Baseball team that seem to fit. Wordsworth's love of nature and verse and his sympathy toward the common man would draw him to the sport itself, while the history and mysticism of the Boston Red Sox would intrigue him. Indeed, William Wordsworth would have loved baseball and been a fan of the Boston Red Sox.
There are few ways in which the two versions are alike. The most obvious is that they tell the same story, albeit with a slight variation at some points, but in essence, the story told is the same. They are both about a knight who committed a crime against a woman and was sent on a quest by the queen to learn “what women most desire.” Throughout his journey, the knight asked many women what they most desired and received varied answers. Dejected, the knight travels back to the kingdom to receive his punishment, but he comes across an old woman. She tells him what women most desire, the knight is acquitted, and he is forced to marry the old woman. In the end, the knight allows the old woman to choose whether she would like to be beautiful or faithful, so she becomes a beautiful and faithful young woman because the knight learned his lesson about women. Moreover, by glancing at the two poems, it is obvious that the length is similar.
When considering the structure of the poems, they are similar in that they are both written loosely in iambic pentameter. Also, they both have a notable structured rhyme scheme.
The poem of A Story by Li-Young Lee analyzes the coming of age of a son through the eyes and emotions of a father. On the surface, it seems like a simple situation of a father telling the son a story to entertain him. But it is upon closer inspection and deep analysis that reveals the true meaning of the poem that the poet is trying to convey to the reader.
similarity is that the two poems are both about old men who have had a
Each of these poems is written in different form and with different style. Each form represents the time period of my life I am representing. “Daddy’s Girl” was inspired by “My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke. The two share the perspective of a young child desiring a close relationship with their fathers, due to their lack of involvement. “Daddy’s Girl,” is structured in three stanzas, each representing a different part of the scenario. The first stanza offers my desire to spend time with my dad. The parenthetical statement that “(I don’t actually like baseball)” (l. 2) shows that the activity I desired had nothing to do with the activity and everything to do with him. The second stanza is more in line with the time spent at the ballpark. My father always worked, but I didn’t mind as long as I got to be with him. My comment that, “Mr. Heller seems nice” (l. 8) relayed a desire to converse with my father about things he was interested in. I didn’t have the mental capacity to talk about the actual work, so the business partners involved would have to suffice. The third stanza displays the ever present fact that my father would leave, and I had to cope with that. I would take every opportunity I had to spend time with him. Furthermore the short stanzas and
Both poems where written in the Anglo-Saxton era in Old English and later translated into English. As well as both poems being written in the same time period, they are both elegiac poems, meaning they are poignant and mournful.
The relationship between a father and his son can be articulated as without a doubt the most significant relationship that a man can have throughout the duration of his life. To a further extent the relationship between a father and a son can be more than just a simple companionship. Just like a clown fish and a sea anemone, both father and son will rely on each other in order to survive the struggles of their everyday lives. Cormac McCarthy’s The Road and Gabriele Muccino’s The Pursuit of Happyness both depict a story between a father and son using each other as a means of survival when faced with adversity. When placed in a tough situation father and son must create a symbiotic relationship in order to survive. Upon the duo of father and son can creating a symbiotic relationship, it will result in a mutual dependency on each other. This theme of paternal love is omnipresent given the bond between the two characters.