My Papa's Waltz Syntax

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While the subject of “My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke has spurred passionate academic debate from professors, scholars, and students alike, the imagery and syntax of the poem clearly support the interpretation that Roethke writes “My Papa’s Waltz” to have mixed complexed opinions within the reader's inner soul for which many think the poem was about a young child getting abused by his dad but it comes to find out that it was an uplifting poem of a dad who drank that night and was play fighting with his son.
The writer used many conflict words like death, beat, and rust. Made and fooled into thinking it was abuse. I think Roethke did it on purpose to kill 2 birds with one stone, he wrote a poem that can be read as abuse and sad or happy and uplifting. After all, it was an inspiring and an eye-opening poem. The ways he used his words were two sided and seen in 2 ways that are completely opposite. For example in line 3 and 4 it says “but I hung on like death, such waltzing was not easy.” as the words hung on like death can throw you off as it being abuse but in lines 11 and 12 it says “at every step you missed my right ear scraped a buckle.” Could potentially mean that the child was, …show more content…

Roethke uses it to convey the image of a playful scene of him and his father.For example, in stanza 1 upon reading these touching words it becomes profoundly difficult to understand the conflict within the author's feelings or emotions. “But I hung on like death: such waltzing was not easy,” could make the reader believe this is actually abuse by the negative context of the words hung on like death. That can cause the reader to believe that the poor kid is hanging on trying not to die when actually they are waltzing and he's grabbing onto his shirt trying not to fall. As this mixed conflict is being taken in different ways, it's on how you see the imagery and how you choose to take the words

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