3/28/2017 4 Comments Poetry of The Past #11619: “How Many Paltry, Foolish, Painted Things” by Michael Drayton
Link: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/44155 Hello lovelies! Today I’m gonna start a new series (or at least a potential new series…)! When I first read through the sonnet (Remember sonnets? 14 lines, alternating rhyme scheme with a rhyming couplet at the end!) “How Many Paltry, Foolish, Painted Things”, I was a bit confused about the actual subject of the poem. And so I went back and stared at the title for a while, breaking it down into its individual segments, and then bringing it together as a whole: Something that is “paltry” has little meaning, importance, or worth. “Foolish” is self-explanatory: lacking good judgment! “Painted Things” are… hmm…art related maybe? Or perhaps about women “painted” in makeup? This part is where I have trouble determining Drayton’s attitude. Is he referring to artwork in general as a “thing” because he doesn’t see any true masterful qualities about it? Or is he being derogatory towards women in referencing them as “things”? To try to find some clarity, I read through the first four lines of the piece. From there, I was able to tentatively conclude that this poem is about women. The first line brings about an insulting, degrading, salty tone that hovers over the lines, with the constant punctuation adding a suffocating density to it. The next two lines add a new puzzling element to my quest to figure out who or what this poem is truly about: “That now in coaches trouble every street,/ Shall be forgotten…” At first (don’t judge), I sincerely thought that this poem was about prostitutes. The “now in coaches trouble every street” led me imagine that Drayton was possibly annoyed that the buggies (a new invention) were improving access to prostitutes and making them more “visible” on the street. The “shall be forgotten” bit also made me think this way. But then I questioned whether or not Drayton was just misogynistic about all “types” of women during that time period: dainty women next-door, rich noble ladies, etc. The second half of line 3 and line 4, “whom no poet sings,/ Ere they be well wrapp'd in their winding-sheet?”, and the subsequent stanzas completely reverted my interpretation of the work as a whole. Drayton metaphorically compares the occupation of poet to that of a singer, and for the rest of the poem uses this comparison to glorify the “song” he plans to write about the subject woman. Line 5 marks a shift from the bitterness of the first stanza to a more lighthearted and optimistic tone. Drayton chooses to write an “immortal song” (line 14) for the subject woman, so that young girls, women, and mothers in the future will read the “lyrics” and envy her, “[grieving] they liv’d not in these times/ To have seen [her], their sex’s only glory” (lines 11 – 12). Here, Drayton places the subject woman on a pedestal of grandeur, which leads me to believe that the subject woman is someone close to Drayton’s heart. This mysterious lady is in fact so important that he blatantly places all other women on an abysmal level below her, forcing them, when “nothing else remaineth” (line 6), to be forgotten in time… Well, that was a rollercoaster…that’s it for now! Leave a comment below about your interpretation of the piece. Who (or what) do you think is the subject of this poem? Is Drayton misogynistic, or is he uplifting the forgotten women of the Elizabethan era?
4 Comments
"Maine Coast"
Link (With reading - 0:00 – 1:08): https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems-and-poets/poems/detail/90623 Hey everyone! For this installment of “Contemporary Poets: Lillian-Yvonne Bertram,” we’re going to do something a little…different. This time, I urge you to first read and mentally analyze the poem text, and then listen to Bertram read her piece via one of the audio links. I found that it completely altered my understanding of the work. Just in case the Poetry Foundation link doesn’t work right, as I had some trouble with a bad gateway earlier, here is the poem (don’t sue me!) and the same audio recording from a different, but affiliated, site: “ for Dylan I watch the ocean square into a turning Burn. Burning, my holes glass over. Lightning Hits the beach, melts me shut. I’ve drowned Before, in the bye along a row of shored Rocks. From the barrel chest butcher I buy Tight roasts. This year’s man, his clownish dog walks me In the park until I die on his leash and domestic Night’s sticky seizures. I thumb and ♥ it Like liking a million times. The rich own long Lighthouses to show us how away from them We are. Past waiting for the press of his chest To my back, I hobby along to the next hem’s Promise. Again I straddle the blade thinking This is the time it will fill the gash. ” Audio: http://www.wnyc.org/story/maine-coast/ (0:35 – 1:42) For context, Bertram wrote this poem to discuss conflicting emotions she experienced during what was designed to be a romantic summer in Maine. The first thing that stands out to me that emphasizes this topic is the enjambment. The first sentence sets into motion the pacing of the piece: “I watch the ocean square into a turning/Burn.” The ocean is in turmoil, the speaker’s mind is in turmoil, but the speaker watches the ocean “square,” which indicates that they are in a fixed position spatially. To me, this creates an image of the world spiraling and revolving around a fixed point. It illustrates an internal struggle that the speaker has to unwillingly experience, the resolution of which could impact their future and all subsequent interactions with those around them. The last line serves as closure for the flow as it is the only end-stopped line. The final sentence, “Again I straddle the blade thinking/This is the time it will fill the gash,” indicating a bleak submission to the status quo. Many of the stylistic choices Bertram makes add a certain personality, a feel, to the piece that provides depth to the motifs and themes being alluded to. I think that the sentence “I thumb and [heart] it/Like liking a million times” represents an obsession with maintaining what may be a damaged relationship for the sake of holding on to that social media status. On the other hand, the lines “Past waiting for the press of his chest/To my back, I hobby along to the next hem’s/Promise” signify that the speaker may be bored or annoyed by the repetitive nature of their relationship, or tired of exchanging blank promises and feeling hurt when they go unfulfilled. What are your thoughts about this piece? Did the audio alter your interpretation at all? Comment below! |
AuthorHello everyone! My name is Alecia Guishard. Welcome to Reader's Delight, a site that fosters an open discussion on literature, as well as provides an avenue for my own thoughts on various reads. Archives
March 2017
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