September | 2014 | Rukhaya M.K

Month: September 2014 (page 3 of 6)

Poetry Analysis: R. Parthasarathy’s “Exile”

The poet is engaged in a conversation with the well known musician Ravi Shankar in a basement flat. The lamps led the people through the thick fog that enveloped the city of London. The imagery of the holes is apt as though the light streaks in just as sunlight enters through holes. The word ’flat’ may apply to the shelter, or to may qualify the word conversation implying that the conversation was flat and of no consequence. The conversation seemed to ‘fill’ the night that otherwise had a lot of space as implied. Ravi Shankar and the speaker had been smoking, drinking beer and munching snacks. The lack of punctuation for the animate chatter was provided by the inamate crisps. Ravi Shankar whiled away his youth ’whoring’ after English gods, that is, Parthasarathy implies that Ravi Shankar aped the English way of life to the extent of idolizing the English people and worshipping them.

The poet Parthsarathy had done the same in the past,and senses the futility of the whole endeavour. He felt like he was in exile in a foreign country. The word ‘exile’ brings in a sense of alienation from his native place, and from himself. His very existence is like a tree.…

Poetry Analysis: Nissim Ezekiel’s “Poet, Lover, Bird Watcher”

September 18, 2014 / rukhaya / 0 Comments

The poem is extracted from Nissim Ezekiel’s forth volume of poems that appeared in 1965 under the name The Exact Name. Here, Ezekiel tries to analyze the creative process of the poet, and makes an attempt at defining it. He compares a poet in this sense, to a bird-watcher or lover. It is only perseverance and inspiration that results in a natural poem.

Ornithologists and lovers do not rush their way towards things, they rather wait for the apt moment .Likewise, the art of poetic diction does not result after much after-thought. It is rather a spontaneous process. The poet echoes Wordsworth’s definition of poetry a “spontaneous overflow of powerful feelings”. Just as an ornithologist waits for a bird in order to patiently identify its movements, and accurately classify and describe the bird, a lover waits patiently for his lady love to submit to him without much ado. Likewise, a poet must proceed with great resolve for his poetic consciousness to comply with him. The poet makes use of two apt metaphors, the first a bird for the ‘flight of imagination’ and, second-the ladylove as a source of inspiration.

Therefore, it is perfect endurance or slow movement that results in fruition.…

Poetry Analysis: Jayanta Mahapatra’s “Hunger”

September 18, 2014 / rukhaya / 10 Comments

“Hunger’, according to Jayanta Mahapatra was an expression of his solitude. He writes in this regard: “Hunger” was written twenty-five years ago. I grew up in Cuttack, close to a temple. There were two rivers close by. The ways of life there were different. I was into religion. My poems today don’t have those old images. I’ve taken the temple out of my system. I had an unhappy childhood. I had an abnormal relationship with my mother. I owe a lot to my father, though. He put me in a missionary school. The school had a British headmaster… I was trampled upon in my childhood. That still remains with me. I’m not deliberately holding on to tensions. I ran away from home thrice. I’m shaped by factors beyond my control. Now I’m at peace with myself, but this wasn’t the case ten years ago. Perhaps as a result of that childhood I always feel alone, alone when I’m with my family or part of a crowd. There’s a chasm inside which can never be bridged. In “Hunger” I was writing from experience.”
The title of the poem ‘Hunger’ may therefore reflect the poet’s need for company, and spiritual intimacy. He asserts that he had an abnormal relationship with his mother.…

Poetry Analysis: A.K.Ramanujan’s “A River”

September 18, 2014 / rukhaya / 1 Comment

Madurai is a city celebrated for its temples and poets. The poets in Madurai quite often pen poems about cities and temples. Their poems narrate how every summer a river flowing through Madurai reduced itself to a narrow stream, and how later it got flooded with rain waters. While the river is reduced to a narrow stream, its water cannot pass through the Watergate as the debris of straw and women’s hair obstruct the flow. The bridge over this river appears like a puzzle of repaired patches. The stones of the bridges glisten once again with the onset of rain, and the dull ones retain their original hue.

The poets limit the subject of their writings to floods in the rivers .What Ramanujan implies is that poets only idealize or commercialize the situation, and nothing is done practically to prevent or reduce the damage done by the devastation. A visitor to Madurai gets to hear of the impact of the flood-how the flood waters religiously washed away three village homes, one pregnant woman and several cows every year. As an imminent flood lurked over the people’s minds they constantly talked about the rising water-levels.

The poets objectively cited the lines composed by previous poets; little did they care for the pregnant woman drowned in the flood.…

Poetry Analysis: Rabindranath Tagore’s “The Child”

September 17, 2014 / rukhaya / 1 Comment

Rabindranath Tagore’s “The Child” was originally written in English in a single night and later translated into Bengali as Sishutirtha (Iyengar, p. 119). Tagore’s “The Child” was originally written in English in a single night, and later translated into Bengali as Sishutirtha. The poem is significant as it is Tagore’s only poem written in English. Tanusree Shankar’s interpretation depicts it as “a flowing, rhythmic, spiritual journey of Man through the ages, from the bondage of ignorance, ultimately to the freedom of enlightenment and self realization. At the same time, it may also be considered a celebration of the mother – the feminine principle in the universe. “

The poem portrays man’s journey from the futility of existence and darkness of ignorance to the sprouting of new life as represented by the child. The first flush of dawn reflects on the dew-dripping leaves of the forest. ‘Flush’ connotes a strong emotion and a question, the response of which the sky seeks. The light of sky gets reflected in the objects of the earth. Parallel to this phenomenon is the man who reads the skies, forecasts the climate or predicts the future. “Friends, we have come!” Parallel to this is the saying that they have arrived.…

Poetry Analysis: Henry Derozio’s “To the Pupils of the Hindu College”

September 17, 2014 / rukhaya / 0 Comments

The Hindu School, founded by Raja Ram Mohan Roy, David Hare and Radhakanta Deb, is indubitably one of the major cornerstones in the history of institutional education in Bengal. The college produced many avant garde philanthropists and educationists who were later to be active participants in the Bengal Renaissance movement.
The poem is in the form of a sonnet that eulogizes the contemporary youth. According to the speaker, the building blocks of the day function as the foundation tomorrow and hence have to moulded in the right direction. The students expand like the petals of a young flower in the practice of blooming. The metaphor of the flower connotes ideas of the prospects of blossoming coupled with a sense of freshness, rawness, emanating fragrance and essence, rendering the whole process natural. There is also the implication of a new vision or perspective. The poet watches the gentle opening of their minds as it gradually unfolds like the fragile petals of a flower. The difference between ‘look’ and ‘watch’ is that you look at a static object but you watch a kinetic object/frame. So, each movement of the students’ mind is studied by the poet Derozio, as he analyzes their progress.

They are all united in the awe and inspiration that education instills in them.…

The Return to Roots in Harold Pinter’s “Homecoming”: An Analysis

September 14, 2014 / rukhaya / 2 Comments

Harold Pinter’s The Homecoming comes across as a regular Pinter play with a plot characterized by its deceptive simplicity, and replete with Pinteresque pauses. John Lahr called the play “a brilliantly sculpted event.” The play deals with the theme of ‘homecoming’ as Teddy and Ruth return to England, their homeland after a period of six years to meet Ted’s working class family in North London. It is also a homecoming to their identities as Teddy has been living an educated existence in America and is now returning to his raw family life in North England. The story revolves around Max, a retired butcher and his three children Teddy, a professor in America; Lenny, the pimp and Joey, the amateur boxer. Max’s brother Sam also lives with him. Teddy visits home after many years with his wife, Ruth while Teddy’s family is unaware that Teddy is a married man with three kids. Max is initially reluctant as he equates all women with prostitutes and accuses Teddy of bringing home a ’tart’. However, as soon as Teddy announces that Ruth is his wife, Max accepts the fact. He hits Teddy first and then welcomes him to the household as he comes to terms with reality.…

Poetry Analysis: Emily Dickinson’s “This is my Letter to the World”

September 14, 2014 / rukhaya / 1 Comment

Emily Dickinson’s “This is my Letter to the World” functions as an epistolary preface to her body of work. The form of the letter functions as a perfect metaphor as it an eloquent means of communication. The letter is a means of communication that has a one-to-one or one-to-many correspondence.

Erika Scheurer in her essay “Near, but Remote: Emily Dickinson’s Epistolary Voice” tells us that “while Dickinson did not value writing over speech, she did value dialogic writing and speech over monologic writing and speech. “A letter is also a more durable document than a spoken statement.” Emily Dickinson being a perfect recluse was not a person of much words. This was the perfect medium to express her innermost thoughts. Dickinson appears to be in line with Bakhtin’s notion of dialogism and Derridia’s subversion of phonocentrism.

A ‘letter’ synonymous with the word ‘alphabet’ is also emblematic of education. Emily Dickinson desires to pass on the meaningful messages that Nature imparted her with to the world steeped in worldly principles. It was well beyond the times for a woman to come up with such lofty ideals. Emily Dickinson was much ahead of her times. Which is why barring two poems, her entire volume was published only after her death.…

Poetry Analysis: Emily Dickinson’s “Success is Counted Sweetest”

September 13, 2014 / rukhaya / 4 Comments

Emily Dickinson’s “Success is Counted Sweetest” has been penned in iambic trimeter with the exception of the first two lines of the second stanza. The poem highlights aphoristic truths that are universal.

In the first stanza, Emily Dickinson endeavors to define the true essence of success. The general impression is that success can be ‘counted’ by only those who have experienced it numerous times. Nevertheless, it is more precisely evaluated or counted by those who have never succeeded as they can apprehend its true value. In another poem, “I Had Been Hungry, All the Years”, Emily Dickinson writes that “Hunger-was a way / Of Persons outside Windows- / The Entering-takes away-“.

For the true experience of life, failures are inevitable. For, what we learn from our failures, success can never teach us. The alliteration with the repetition of the ‘s’ sound lays emphasis on ‘success’. Success also tastes sweeter to the person who has persevered very hard for it, than to a person who has found success effortlessly. The former is also more thankful to God, and cherishes his accomplishment. The word ‘nectar’ here implies water. However, it is perception that renders it ‘nectar’. To the thirsty ones with parched throats, a drop of water tastes as sweet as nectar.…

Poetry Analysis: Emily Dickinson’s “I Felt a Funeral in My Brain”

September 13, 2014 / rukhaya / 0 Comments

Emily Dickinson’s “I Felt a Funeral in My Brain” was first published in The Poems of Emily Dickinson, Third Series in 1896.The poetess exemplifies the collapse of her abstract mental process through employing concrete metaphors.Emily Dickinson was a recluse throughout her life and incorrigibly obsessed with the concept of death. The metaphor of the funeral brings in ideas of mourning, closure, depression, blankness and inactivity. Therefore, ‘funeral’ serves as an apt metaphor to express the turmoil in the mind of the speaker. The movement of the mourners is likened to the oscillating of a pendulum making its presence felt as time does with its omnipresence.

The idea of ‘treading’ brings the impression of stamping feet, indicating a kind of pressure on the mental process and a steady increase in the same. The poem describes the onset of psychosis as the speaker struggles with her ego. The burden of the same gives the impression of sense ‘breaking through’. Here, ‘sense’ implies both sensory perception and rational thought. It reflects the quality of ‘sense’- being a fragile material that can be broken into a thousand pieces .Thereby; the poetess utilizes apt metaphors to connote the lack of coherence in her mind.

I felt a Funeral, in my Brain,
And Mourners to and fro
Kept treading – treading – till it seemed
That Sense was breaking through –
And when they all were seated,
A Service, like a Drum –
Kept beating – beating – till I thought
My Mind was going numb –

The mourners appeared to be seated around her; the sense of mobbing leaves her in a claustrophobic atmosphere.…

Rukhaya M.K

A Literary Companion