Comparing "My Papa's Waltz" by Theodore Roethke and "Those Winter Sundays" by Robert Hayden
My Papa's Waltz, by Theodore Roethke, and Those Winter
Sundays, by Robert Hayden, are two somewhat similar poems about
respected fathers. To most people a father is not just the man who fertilizes
their mother's egg, but a man that spends time with and takes care of them.
While doing this, he gains their love and respect. In these two poems
Roethke and Hayden take an admiring look back at the actions of their
fathers, although; they both imply that their parents were not perfect.
In My Papa's Waltz, Theodore Roethke describes an episode in his
childhood. In this, what seems to be regular, occurrence his drunken father
comes home for the night reeking of alcohol and begins dancing with him.
Roethke describes his father's hands as being battered on one knuckle and
extremely soiled. They "romped until the pans slid from the kitchen shelf"
(5-6). This made his mother so upset that she could do nothing but frown.
Finally, his father "waltzed" him on to bed.
In ?Those Winter Sundays'; by Robert Hayden, the poet also
relinquishes on a regular occurrence in his childhood. On Sunday mornings,
just as any other morning, his father rises early and puts on his clothes in the
cold darkness. He then goes out in the cold and splits fire wood with which
he uses to start a fire in the house. After the entire house is warm he calls the
rest of his family out of bed. He does not get any thanks for doing this, but
that does not seem to matter.
In both poems the poets seem to look back on their childhoods with
much love and respect for their fathers. In ?My Papa?s Waltz'; the title
suggests a sense of love and honor. Usually when a child calls his father
Papa they have a very close relationship in which the child respects and
admires his father. Also, the use of the word Waltz suggests a Happy dance
of high class people. This is ironic because Roethke?s father is drunken and
dirty when this dance takes place, but when one thinks of the waltz they think
of a dance between two high-classed people in an extravagant ballroom.
Another example of the child?s love and respect for his father is illustrated in
the things he overlooks just to be able to carryout the dance. Although ?The
whiskey your [his father?s] breath could make a small boy dizzy'; (1-2), the
child ?hung on like death'; (3). The speaker also overlooks the pain of his ear
Brian quickly made a fire using small pieces of bark that caught fire really fast. He now had warmth and a shelter, the only he needed was a steady food supply.
In the book “The Boys of Winter” by Wayne Coffey, shows the struggle of picking the twenty men to go to Lake Placid to play in the 1980 Olympics and compete for the gold medal. Throughout this book Wayne Coffey talks about three many points. The draft and training, the importance of the semi-final game, and the celebration of the gold medal by the support the team got when they got home.
However, neither the setting of the poem nor its events can be linked to the ballrooms where people dance waltz. The opening lines of the poem portray the narrator’s father as a drunken person “The whiskey on your breath/ Could make a small boy dizzy”. The dancer is anything but elegant, he doesn’t waltz gracefully but romps “until the pans/Slid from the kitchen shelf”. The poem is set in a family home, most likely in the kitchen. Thus, the narrator is trying to downplay the social connotati...
“Those Winter Sundays” by Robert Hayden, “My Father as a Guitar” by Martin Espada, and “Digging” by Seamus Heaney are three poems that look into the past of the authors and dig up memories of the authors fathers. The poems contain similar conflicts, settings, and themes that are essential in helping the reader understand the heartfelt feelings the authors have for their fathers. With the authors of the three poems all living the gust of their life in the 1900’s, their biographical will be similar and easier to connect with each other.
over him and he talks to each member of the family in the order they
own dance. He then remembers the blood on the dance floor and leaves soon after. In the wake
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.
the fire they moved the rope back and forth so that the wood would get hot and start to burn.
When discussing the child’s sleep pattern with his father, it is reported that they start out the night with the child going his to bed with his father. He indicated that Stuart doesn’t mind the child sleeping with him. He indicated that his son doesn’t have much time with the child. The paternal grandfather stated that Stuart does encourage the child to sleep by himself.
gets home on a Saturday, the first thing he and Missie May does is welcome each other with a
then watches, with an excitable evil in his eye, as his human pyres go up in
Family bonds are very important which can determine the ability for a family to get along. They can be between a mother and son, a father and son, or even a whole entire family itself. To some people anything can happen between them and their family relationship and they will get over it, but to others they may hold resentment. Throughout the poems Those Winter Sundays, My Papa’s Waltz, and The Ballad of Birmingham family bonds are tested greatly. In Those Winter Sundays the relationship being shown is between the father and son, with the way the son treats his father. My Papa’s Waltz shows the relationship between a father and son as well, but the son is being beaten by his father. In The Ballad of Birmingham the relationship shown is between
give out a message to the reader apart from to put up a fight against
Jack London’s To Build a Fire follows an unnamed protagonist, who’s only referred to as “the man”, as he travels the Yukon Trail during a severe snow storm. Along with his husky wolf-dog, he determined to meet friends at an old junction by six o’clock. The man, who was warned not travel in the Klondike alone, presses forward through the terrain’s harsh weather. He later falls through the snow in what looked to be a secure spot. With his feet and fingers soaked, he starts a fire and begins drying himself. The man constructs the fire under a spruce tree in order to take its twigs and drop them directly onto the fire. Each time he pulled a twig a branch overturned its load of snow, eventually blotting out the fire. He grabs all his matches and lights them simultaneously to set fire to a piece of bark; it soon goes out. The man decides to kill the dog and use its warm body to restore his circulation, but is unable to kill the animal and lets the dog go. The man attempts to run from the thought of freezing to death but he quickly falls down. He decides he should meet death in a more dignified manner; the man falls off into a calm sleep.
...s he keeps his head. As he pushes on he is slowly becoming weaker and slows down dramatically. Again he decides to build a fire, but this time it is no use. He has built the fire under a large tree that has been weighed down by snow, and when he pulls off some twigs to feed the flame or the fire, the built up snow on the tree is loosened and falls on the man and puts out the fire. He does not move, he can’t. “You were right, old hoss; you were right,” the man mumbles before he finally closes his eyes and lets the cold take him, He dies in the snow. “This made the animal bristle and back away. A little longer it delayed, howling under the stars that leaped and danced and shone brightly in the cold sky. Then it turned and trotted up the trail in the direction of the camp it knew, where were the other food-providers and fire-providers,” (“To Build a Fire” Jack London).