Justin Melson
Professor Christa Raney
American Literature 222-01
11 November 2014
The Respectable Fish
In “The Fish” by Elizabeth Bishop, the speaker is in old, rusted rented boat fishing. In the beginning, the speaker catches a fish that she admires off the side of his or her boat. For what it can do, the speaker notices that it is an older fish by saying its skin was like “ancient wallpaper”. After the speaker finishes examining the fish, the speaker notices the hooks hanging from the lower jaw of the fish. While looking in the water, she notices a rainbow that oil from the old rented boat has made in the water and the speaker lets the old fish swim another day.
In “The Fish”, the speaker conveys a tone of respect and admiration for
the fish through her descriptions and the fish’s humanistic appearance. The first part of respect that the speaker shows is when she explains how big the fish is. The speaker states, “He hung a grunting weight, / battered and venerable/ and homely” (lines 7-9). The respect the speaker shows is for how big he has gotten with his “grunting weight”. Also he is battered and homely show that he had many hooks to show for his many battles he had won. With the fishes battered look the speaker gives it a human look. This battered look resembles a person who has went through a battle and came out a survivor. Next, the speaker portrays respect for the fish is when she notices all of his hardware that hung from his lower jaw: Five old pieces of fish-line/ or four and a wire leader/ with the swivel still attached, / with all their five big hooks/ grown firmly in his mouth. (51-54). The speaker admires the many battles that the fish has fought by being able to break-off five different fishermen and still is alive. While the speaker looks at the fish, she describes them as medals, such as a person winning an award for something they had accomplished or even a war veteran. With the fish’s medals hanging from his lower jaw, she thinks of how he was able to become wise enough to break them off without becoming some fishermen’s supper. Finally, the speaker also admires his head area. The speaker states, “I admire his sullen face, / the mechanism of his lower jaw” (lines 46-47). As the speaker gives the fish many human characteristics, such as the sullen face, As readers this reveals a image of a dull face. That is not the only item the speaker points out, he or she also points out that the way that the jaw of the fish moves while out of the water and how it got so many of the “medals” hanging from its mouth. As the speaker gives us many tones of respect for the fish, he or she reveals her gratitude for the fish by letting it go to live its homely life.
Poverty is often taxing to one’s life in multiple ways, some of which include mind taxation, stress taxation, emotional taxation and of course money taxation. Mother Theresa once said “Loneliness and the feeling of being unwanted is the most terrible poverty”. How would you find time to look for the one that would make you feel special and wanted, while having to live in situation which doesn’t forgive free time? “Night Waitress” by Linda Hull is poem that looks at daily life of a waitress who struggles to answer just that question.
Kim Addonizio’s “First Poem for You” portrays a speaker who contemplates the state of their romantic relationship though reflections of their partner’s tattoos. Addressing their partner, the speaker ambivalence towards the merits of the relationship, the speaker unhappily remains with their partner. Through the usage of contrasting visual and kinesthetic imagery, the speaker revels the reasons of their inability to embrace the relationship and showcases the extent of their paralysis. Exploring this theme, the poem discusses how inner conflicts can be powerful paralyzers.
"The Fish" is filled with poetic images all for the reason of making a powerful point,
In Drea Knufken’s essay entitled “Help, We’re Drowning!: Please Pay Attention to Our Disaster,” the horrific Colorado flood is experienced and the reactions of worldly citizens are examined (510-512). The author’s tone for this formal essay seems to be quite reflective, shifting to a tone of frustration and even disappointment. Knufken has a reflective tone especially during the first few paragraphs of the essay. According to Drea Knufken, a freelance writer, ghostwriter and editor, “when many of my out-of-town friends, family and colleagues reacted to the flood with a torrent of indifference, I realized something. As a society, we’ve acquired an immunity to crisis. We scan through headlines without understanding how stories impact people,
Carp fishing seems always to have been surrounded by a certain aura of magic and mystery, particularly on the more secluded and intimate waters. It's sad that much of this has been dispelled with the carp boom of the last few years. The hair-rig started the rot, and the ready made boilie finished it off! But reading through many angler's experiences, especially on Redmire, one wonders if, at times, there are other influences at work. I don't know why there should be, or why it would seem to apply only to carp fishing. Perhaps because, of all the angling methods, the pursuit of carp gives more time for contemplation, more time for outside forces to get into the mind. Or maybe these strange happenings are
Bishop's initial description of the fish is meant to further develop this theme by presenting the reader with a fish that is "battered," "venerable," and "homely." Bishop compares the fish to "ancient wallpaper." Even without the word ancient preceding it, the general conception of wallpaper is something that fades into the background. One is not supposed to take much notice of it. To add to this impartial picture, the fish is brown, the signature color of dullness. "Shapes like full-blown roses stained and lost through age" (lines 14-15) further cement the image of something with little time left. Fully bloomed roses conjure the image of a flower whose petals are at t...
The purpose of this essay is to analyze and compare and contrast the two paired poems “My Last Duchess” by Robert Browning and “My Ex-Husband” by Gabriel Spera to find the similarities presented within the pairs. Despite the monumental time difference between “My Last Duchess” and “My Ex-Husband”, throughout both poems you will see that somebody is wronged by someone they thought was a respectable person and this all comes about by viewing a painting on the wall or picture on a shelf.
The poems “Sea Rose” by H.D and “Vague Poem” by Elizabeth Bishop were both written by two women who took over the Victorian era. H.D’s works of writing were best known as experimental reflecting the themes of feminism and modernism from 1911-1961. While Bishop’s works possessed themes of longing to belong and grief. Both poems use imagery, which helps to make the poem more concrete for the reader. Using imagery helps to paint a picture with specific images, so we can understand it better and analyze it more. The poems “Sea Rose” and “Vague Poem” both use the metaphor of a rose to represent something that can harm you, even though it has beauty.
Death is a topic heavily conveyed in "Before She Died" by Karen Chase; the title is hopeful in it's mention of a time before death, but the poem is not. The presence of autumn is made aware to us, 'all the leaves gone almost from the trees,' (Line 3/4). Autumn in poetry usually has to do with decline and tiredness, this evident with the speaker 'not walk[ing] briskly through [a] field' (Line 4) and having to '[Lean] on [the speaker's dog]' (Line 6/7) for support. Along with the speaker's dog being 'aged' (Line 6), the author conveys a cogitative and somber tone using dark imagery, the depressing 'blue' (Line 6) of the sky and a poisonous 'strand of hemlock' (Line 8) present. Time is a common theme, the speaker mentioning how 'finite these
In Ocean at the End of the Lane, Neil Gaiman revisits Sussex, England and explores his childhood through the eyes of a fictitious little boy. The little boy, who is also the narrator, has an imagination far beyond the imagination of any adult and often faces a difficult time connecting with other people. He does not relate with many people, except for the Hempstock women. The Hempstocks are three-generations of women with super powers, who live together on a farm. They have lived on this farm for hundreds of years without any outside help from other men. Lettie’s a third-generation Hempstock, and the narrator’s greatest friend. Lettie’s imagination is as big as the narrators, and this leads to a great understanding between the two. Mrs. Hempstock, Lettie’s mother, is mostly concerned with feeding the narrator and reporting to the narrator’s father. Old Mrs. Hempstock, Lettie’s grandmother, is
“The Fish” by Elizabeth Bishop is an excellent poem that goes beyond its straightforward subject. She vividly describes the act of catching a fish while also utilizing the thematic elements of figurative language, imagery and tone to bring many more ideas into the picture. Overall “The Fish” is a poem that champions the beauty of nature while also putting forth a negative connotation on all things artificial through a simple topic.
I believe each one of these poets has a deep respect for the animals in their poems. The poets, in my opinion, doesn't really want to kill the animals they speak of. Even the narrator in the Woodchucks describes herself as a pacifist, but she is forced to make the choice between the woodchucks life or hers. She has a vegetable garden and the family of Woodchucks keep eating her families food. The narrator speaks of the last woodchuck that has become a formidable opponent, "There’s one chuck left. Old wily fellow, he keeps me cocked and ready day after day after day. All night I hunt his humped-up form. I dream I sight along the barrel in my sleep." In The Fish poem, you begin to see the transition by the narrator of someone ogling their prize
to each new stanza with the mention of these words: In the fourth stanza, "big
In poetry many elements are used to bring life to a literary work. Some of these include style, structure, imagery, diction, and allusion. In Elizabeth Bishop's poem, Filling Station, the author uses them skillfully to create meaning in a story that otherwise would be banal. Her usage of expressive details supports the writing which helps the reader to imagine what the author is describing. Her style also appeals to the readers emotions and imagination to draw them into her harsh reality.
This poem is about the how the author was sitting there staring at a lizard while it was breathing. My understanding of this poem was that the author was bored while he was doing his work and he decided to stare at a lizard that was near him. He also felt that he was getting close to timelessness almost feeling that time will just stand still as he is watching this lizard breath. The author goes on to describe how the lizards breathing looked like it was doing tiny push-ups while he was sitting there soaking up the sun through every hairline cavern and all of the skin. The author is also wondering at the same time whether if the lizard knows he is being watched while sitting there soaking up the sun. The lizard was enjoying life to me because he was alone (or so he thought) and was soaking up the sun so he can stay warm because the lizard is cold-blooded.