Itability of Maturity Loss: An Analysis of “Windigo” At first sight, the poem "Windigo" published by Louise Erdrich in 1984 seems to revolve around the idea of an evil entity. However, upon further inspection, it becomes apparent that a more ominous theme is at play. Windigo is a dark and mysterious poem that explores the theme of inevitable maturity, Louise demonstrates this theme by utilizing metaphors, similes, and imagery to convey the experience of inevitable maturity from the narrator's point of view. Louise Erdrich's Windigo uses metaphors to portray the inevitability of maturity. The metaphor "River shaking in the sun" (Louise 24) illustrates the narrator's fear and uncertainty as they confront their loss of innocence. The trembling river reflects the narrator's apprehension and anxiety when facing the …show more content…
Additionally, the following quote, "Steam rolled from my wintry arms, each leaf shivered," (Louise 17) represents the inevitability of maturing as seen through the metaphor of steam, which symbolizes the narrator's fear and anxiety. The shivering leaves, on the other hand, represent the impact of the narrator's fear on the world. This metaphor illustrates how the narrator's fear of growing up affects the world around them, emphasizing the inevitability of maturing and the consequences it brings. Another example of the inevitability of maturity throughout the poem Windigo is shown through the use of personification. The quotation “When the kettle jumped into the fire” (Louise 2) suggests that the narrator's childhood is being lost and destroyed. This is represented by the kettle, a once shiny and valuable object, being destroyed by an uncontrollable force, in this case, the fire. By using personification in this quotation, Louise helps the reader understand the narrator's helplessness toward
In this poem, she shares many different images, all of which have very intense and powerful meanings. She used words such as smolder, glitter, and shining to describe the intense way snow is described. For example “the broad fields/ smolder with light” (Oliver 645, 24-25), which means the fields glisten mildly. Also “Trees/ glitter like castles” (Oliver 645, 22-23), represents how the snow reveals light like castles do showing their inhabitants.
In Gwen Harwood’s poetry, the changes in an individual’s perspective and attitudes towards situations, surroundings and, therefore transformations in themselves, are brought on by external influences, usually in the form of a person or an event. These changes are either results of a dramatic realisation, as seen with shattering of a child’s hopes in The Glass Jar, or a melancholy and gradual process, where a series of not so obvious discoveries produces similar reformation. An example of the later case would be Nightfall, the second section of Father and Child, where the persona refers to her forty years of life causing “maturation”. For the most part these changes are not narrated directly but are represented by using dynamic language techniques to illustrate constant change in the universe of the poem.
Therefore, Oliver’s incorporation of imagery, setting, and mood to control the perspective of her own poem, as well as to further build the contrast she establishes through the speaker, serves a critical role in creating the lesson of the work. Oliver’s poem essentially gives the poet an ultimatum; either he can go to the “cave behind all that / jubilation” (10-11) produced by a waterfall to “drip with despair” (14) without disturbing the world with his misery, or, instead, he can mimic the thrush who sings its poetry from a “green branch” (15) on which the “passing foil of the water” (16) gently brushes its feathers. The contrast between these two images is quite pronounced, and the intention of such description is to persuade the audience by setting their mood towards the two poets to match that of the speaker. The most apparent difference between these two depictions is the gracelessness of the first versus the gracefulness of the second. Within the poem’s content, the setting has been skillfully intertwined with both imagery and mood to create an understanding of the two poets, whose surroundings characterize them. The poet stands alone in a cave “to cry aloud for [his] / mistakes” while the thrush shares its beautiful and lovely music with the world (1-2). As such, the overall function of these three elements within the poem is to portray the
The poet shows that this simple, pleasant memory and how it re-in-acts his childhood. The way in which the windmills squeaks and groans to bring water from the ground whereas during the period of rain they work in harmony, as the rain comes down. The poem is gentle and nostalgic. It seeks not only to recreate the scene for the reader, but to have the reader feel the day to day struggle of living in the hash Australian outback, the struggle of agriculture during a drought.
In Louise Erdrich’s “Tracks';, the readers discovers by the second chapter that there are two narrators, Nanapush and Pauline Puyat. This method of having two narrators telling their stories alternately could be at first confusing, especially if the readers hasn’t been briefed about it or hasn’t read a synopsis of it. Traditionally, there is one narrator in the story, but Erdrich does an effective and spectacular job in combining Nanapush and Pauline’s stories. It is so well written that one might question as he or she reads who is the principal character in this story? Being that there are two narrators, is it Nanapush, the first narrator, him being a participant in the story, who tells his story in the “I'; form? Or is it Pauline, the second narrator, who also narrates in the “I'; form? Upon further reading, the motive for both narrators’ stories become more evident, and by the end of the book, it becomes clear that one character is the driving force for both of the narrators’ stories. This central character is Fleur Pillager. She in fact is the protagonist of “Tracks';. Even though she is limited in dialogues, her actions speak more than words itself.
Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun was one of the most successful painters of her time. Over the course of her life, spanning from 1755-1842, she painted over 900 works. She enjoyed painting self portraits, completing almost 40 throughout her career, in the style of artists she admired such as Peter Paul Rubens (Montfort). However, the majority of her paintings were beautiful, colorful, idealized likenesses of the aristocrats of her time, the most well known of these being the Queen of France Marie Antoinette, whom she painted from 1779-1789. Not only was Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun the Queen’s portrait painter for ten years, but she also became her close, personal friend. She saw only the luxurious, carefree, colorful, and fabulous lifestyle the aristocracy lived in, rather than the poverty and suffrage much of the rest of the country was going through. Elisabeth kept the ideals of the aristocracy she saw through Marie Antoinette throughout her life, painting a picture of them that she believed to be practically perfect. Elisabeth Vigée-Lebrun’s relationship with Marie Antoinette affected her social standing, politics, painting style, and career.
The conceit in line 8, “like an iceberg between the shoulder blades” (line 8), illustrates the briskness death emanates whilst taking the life from the warmth of your body. This ice and fire comparison coaxes the reader to pursue the unwelcoming thought of death as the adverse path to travel by. By no means does Oliver attempt to romanticize the idea of a brief and painless endeavor. Furthermore, the recurrence of cessation illustrated by the “hungry bear in autumn” (2) simile suggests the seasonal regularity death’s toll takes on the living. The presence of frequency characterizes the shift in forbearance to the acceptance of the inevitable. Oliver is caught up in reminiscent thought as she employs worldly imagery to describe life. For example, in lines 15-16 Oliver writes “and I think of each life as a flower, as common / as a field daisy.” This line stands out in the fact that it represents the first occurrence of communal thought. Describing each life as a “flower” in a “field” suggests that life is supposed to be about the people whom you surround yourself with, and less about the solidarity that stems from the notion of darkness. Oliver’s implication of poetry and down-to-earth imagery captures not only the progression of thought, but also her feelings towards the concepts of life and
As characters in the poem are literally snow bound, they find that the natural occurrence actually serves a relaxing and warming purpose, one that brings together family. This effect is further achieved through the use of meter throughout the work as a whole. In its simplistic yet conversational tone, the author uses meter to depict the result that nature has forced upon these humans, who are but a small sample size that actually is representative of society that that time. Due to nature, the characters can talk, represented by the conversational meter, and thus, they can bond within the family. A larger representation of this more specific example can be applied to a more general perspective of human’s relationship with the natural world. Although “Snowbound” captures what humans do as a result of nature, it can also represent a larger picture, where nature appears at the most opportune times to enhance relationships from human to human. In “snowbound,” this is symbolized by the fire, “Our warm hearth seemed blazing free” (Whittier 135). This image relays a spirited, warm, mood full of security, which is expertly used by the author to show how fire, a natural phenomena, can provide such beneficial effects on humans. This very occurrence exemplifies how such a miniscule aspect of nature can have such a profound effect on a family, leaving the reader wondering what nature and its entirety could accomplish if used as a
In order to completely grasp exactly how the old maid appears to the woman on the sidewalk and the love she feels for the man walking with her, Sara Teasdale uses personification to describe the characters in the poem. One would be, “Her soul was frozen in the dark/ Unwarmed forever by love’s flame.” Obviously, a person’s soul cannot be frozen, but the meaning is that the old maid had never felt a heated intensity between herself and someone special to her which could give her a cold outlook on life. Another time the poet uses personification is when the speaker states, “His eyes were magic to defy”. Eyes cannot be magic. By saying that his eyes were magic the reader can get the notion that when the speaker looks into the eyes of her lover she feels awed, happy, or even entranced. Sara Teasdale also uses a metaphor in her work, “Her body was a thing growing thin,” In that line the speaker is comparing the old maid’s draining body to something that can get thinner. The poet uses a rhyme scheme of rhyming the second with the fourth line and there are four lines in every stanza. Finally, in this narrative poem there are eight syllables per line of the poem.
She questions who created "the swan," "the black bear," and "the grasshopper," all extremely different animals. By doing so, the speaker is able to depict the fascinating diversity of nature and how it is the home of both big beasts and small insects. However, as the poem progresses, the speaker starts to interact with nature when the grasshopper hops onto her hand as she feeds it. The speaker carefully observes the grasshopper's behavior, describing in great detail how the grasshopper moves "her jaws back and forth" as she eats a sugar cube from the speaker's hand. The speaker utilizes imagery to convey a very specific image of the majestic grasshopper to the reader, describing "her pale forearms" and the grasshopper's "enormous and complicated
Frost uses different stylistic devices throughout this poem. He is very descriptive using things such as imagery and personification to express his intentions in the poem. Frost uses imagery when he describes the setting of the place. He tells his readers the boy is standing outside by describing the visible mountain ranges and sets the time of day by saying that the sun is setting. Frost gives his readers an image of the boy feeling pain by using contradicting words such as "rueful" and "laugh" and by using powerful words such as "outcry". He also describes the blood coming from the boy's hand as life that is spilling. To show how the boy is dying, Frost gives his readers an image of the boy breathing shallowly by saying that he is puffing his lips out with his breath.
Not only the words, but the figures of speech and other such elements are important to analyzing the poem. Alliteration is seen throughout the entire poem, as in lines one through four, and seven through eight. The alliteration in one through four (whisky, waltzing, was) flows nicely, contrasting to the negativity of the first stanza, while seven through eight (countenance, could) sound unpleasing to the ear, emphasizing the mother’s disapproval. The imagery of the father beating time on the child’s head with his palm sounds harmful, as well as the image of the father’s bruised hands holding the child’s wrists. It portrays the dad as having an ultimate power over the child, instead of holding his hands, he grabs his wrists.
Chicken pox is not an Entrée that is served at one’s family holiday dinner party. Chicken pox is an extremely contagious disease caused by the Varicella zoster virus. Chicken Pox is not a disease that is known to affect other animals or insects. Unlike other diseases, where human and other animal close interaction causes the exchange of virus and disease this disease did not come from a human-chicken interaction. The name chicken pox has been stuck for generations; there are many theories behind its name. Chicken pox could sneak up on its young victims in the form of an innocent touch, or by inhaling tiny particles from a cough, or sneeze which then enters the respiratory tract. Once the virus attaches itself to it gracious, and unwilling host cells it causes a crimson rash that could be located on different parts of the body. The rash is highly irritating which makes it almost impossible not scratch. In the United States each year about 5,000 to 9,000 people are hospitalized, and around 100 people die from the microbe Varicella zoster that causes chicken pox.
Through alliteration and imagery, Coleridge turns the words of the poem into a system of symbols that become unfixed to the reader. Coleridge uses alliteration throughout the poem, in which the reader “hovers” between imagination and reality. As the reader moves through the poem, they feel as if they are traveling along a river, “five miles meandering with a mazy motion” (25). The words become a symbol of a slow moving river and as the reader travels along the river, they are also traveling through each stanza. This creates a scene that the viewer can turn words into symbols while in reality they are just reading text. Coleridge is also able to illustrate a suspension of the mind through imagery; done so by producing images that are unfixed to the r...
Figurative language is used by William Wordsworth to show the exchange between man and nature. The poet uses various examples of personification throughout the poem. When the poet says:”I wandered lonely as a cloud” (line 1),”when all at once I saw a crowd” (line 3), and “fluttering and dancing in the breeze” (line 6) shows the exchange between the poet and nature since the poet compares himself to a cloud, and compares the daffodils to humans. Moreover, humans connect with God through nature, so the exchange between the speaker and nature led to the connection with God. The pleasant moment of remembering the daffodils does not happen to the poet all time, but he visualizes them only in his “vacant or pensive mode”(line 20). However, the whole poem is full of metaphors describing the isolation of the speaker from society, and experiences the beauty of nature that comforts him. The meta...