Death

Death and Martyrdom 7/26/13

            Holocaust survivor, Paul Celan, wrote several poems that were about his life during the Holocaust. Not only did Celan write about his own life and his own struggles, he wrote about his family’s struggles as well. Celan wrote the poem “Aspen Tree”, which tells of his mother’s early death during the atrocious event.  Another poem that deals with his struggles was “Deathfugue”. This poem was his most famous poem, and it deals with his life during the Holocaust.

            “Aspen Tree” is a story that deals with Celan’s loss of his mother. “On June 27, 1942, while Celan was away from the house, the Germans seized his parents and deported them to Nazi prison camps in the Ukraine. His father died of typhus later that year, and his mother was shot when she was no longer capable of working” (Paul Celan1467). In this poem Celan discusses the fact that his mother never received the peaceful death of an old woman. “Aspen tree, your leaves glance white into the dark. / My mother’s hair never turned white” (Celan lines 1-2). The aspen tree was able to grow old into the night, but his mother’s life was cut short, and she died fair-haired and young. “Rounded star, you coil the golden loop. / My mother’s heart was hurt by lead” (Celan lines 7-8).  Here Celan implies that his mother was shot in the heart by a lead bullet. Celan relates his mother’s death to inanimate objects in this poem, such as the aspen tree, dandelion, rain cloud, star, and the door. Each of these things are beautiful in their own way, and his mother was beautiful too, but unlike these inanimate objects her life was cut short. This poem is all about death, and how it wronged his mother.

            In the poem “Deathfugue” Celan discusses his martyrdom within the concentration camps. His suffering and extreme torment is evident within the poem. “He shouts dig this earth deeper you lot there you others sing up and play / he grabs for the rod in his belt he swings it his eyes are so blue / stick your spades deeper you lot there you others play on for the dancing” (Celan lines 16 – 18). Celan, along with the other prisoners, was forced to dig graves. Sometimes the graves were for fellow prisoners who would be lined up and shot, and sometimes the graves were for those who dug them. Either way, Celan was forced to dig the graves that he knew would eventually become a mass grave. For those who weren’t digging, they were forced to sing and dance for the SS officers. This treatment, this degradation of the prisoners was enough to make any prisoner, any human suffer. “He shouts play death more sweetly this Death is a master from / Deutschland / he shouts scrape your strings darker you’ll rise up as smoke to the sky / you’ll then have a grave in the clouds where you won’t lie too cramped” (Celan lines 21 – 24). The SS officer was taunting the prisoners and tormenting them, reminding them that if they don’t end up dead in a mass grave they will end up dead in the crematorium. This death, burning, was very common in the Holocaust, and the prisoners could see the smoke and the ash from the crematorium and know that this could be their fate one day.

            Death and Martyrdom are the main themes within “Aspen Tree” and “Deathfugue”. Celan’s work encompasses all the suffering of victims who lost their family members too soon, and the victims who had to live and work in the concentration camps. Death, suffering and torment surrounded the victims of the Holocaust and so these things became the common themes among the survivors.

Work Cited

Celan, Paul. "Deathfugue." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Martin Puchner. 3rd ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. 1469-470. Print.

"Paul Celan." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Martin Puchner. 3rd ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. 1467-469. Print.

Neruda

A City Of Death 7/21/13

            Pablo Neruda, author of the poem “Walking Around” depicts the city in which he lives in such a way that the reader believes the city to be full of death. The poem, written in 1933, feels as though it should come from an old man who has lived a full life and is tired of seeing his beautiful home, his city, fall to ruin. Yet, Neruda was only 29 years old when he wrote this poem.

            Neruda writes, “It happens that I am tired of being a man” (line 1). This subtle introduction to the poem indicates to the reader that this is not going to be a happy poem, in fact it will be one of sorrow and frustration and grief. He continues in the second stanza by saying “The smell of barber shops makes me sob out loud. / I want nothing but the repose either of stones or of wool, / I want to see no more establishments, no more gardens, / nor merchandise, nor glasses, nor elevators “ (Neruda lines 5-8). Neruda is pointing out how evolved the city is, and he does not like it. He wants stones back versus the pavement, and he is tired of the establishments and gardens versus pure nature. The world has changed too much; the city he lives in is not a natural place anymore.

            “It would be beautiful / to go through the streets with a green knife / shouting until I died of cold” (Neruda lines 15-17). Neruda wants to go through the streets of his busy and corrupt city and cry for peace. He is willing to fight for what he wants until he dies, and he believes that he will die fighting for what he wants.

            The second to last stanza of the poem states, “There are bids the colour of sulphur, and horrible intestines / hanging from the doors of the houses which I hate, / there are forgotten sets of teeth in a coffee-pot, / there are mirrors / which should have wept with shame and horror, / there are umbrellas all over the place, and poisons, and navels” (Neruda lines 34 – 39). Even nature and inanimate objects within the city are full of death like images. The birds are black and sick, and they sit on houses that are housing the evil and corrupt people of the city. There are false teeth implying that the health of the people has deteriorated. Mirrors have seen horrible and corrupt things and should be thrown away because the images are burned into them.

            The image Neruda creates is of a corrupt city full of death. Everyone, including the animals and nonliving things, are simply waiting to die. He is a man who is tired of living, tired of watching his once beautiful city turn to such a corrupt thing. “Walking Around” depicts a young man who is much wiser than his years explain how dead his home has become.

Work Cited

Neruda, Pablo. "Walking Around." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Martin Puchner. 3rd ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. 1423-424. Print.

Gender

A Woman’s Power 7/11/13

            It is not uncommon to hear the phrase “never send a man to do a woman’s job”, and this phrase is very fitting when it comes to the story “The Rod of Justice” by Joaquim Maria Machado De Assis. Machado’s story depicts a young man, Damiao, who is fleeing the seminary because it simply is not the life for him. However, he cannot return home due to the fact that his father wishes him to complete the seminary and become a padre. In order to escape this predetermined path in life he runs to his godfather’s mistress, Sinha Rita.

            Sinha Rita is a forty-year-old widow who knows what she wants and how to get what she wants. Even though she has much power over her slaves and Joao Carneiro, Damiao’s godfather, she is easily manipulated into helping Damiao. “”My godfather? He ‘s even worse than papa, he doesn’t pay any attention to what I say, I don’t believe he’d pay attention to anyone…” “No?” interrupted Sinha Rita, her pride pricked. “Well, Ill show him whether he’ll pay attention or not…”” (Machado 913). She is a proud woman, and when Damiao hurts her pride she is determined to prove him wrong, to prove her power.

            The proud mistress calls Joao Carneiro to her house and demands that he help his godson be free of the seminary. “Get along. Joao Carneiro, your godson is not going back to the seminary. I tell you, he is not going back…” (Machado 914). Sinha Rita is not asking this man to help her; she is demanding that he help. Due to his affection for Sinha Rita, Joao Carneiro does his best to help is godson. “Joao Carneiro fought hard to get him not to make a decision right away, to sleep on it, and think over carefully whether it was right to offer the Church such an unruly and vicious character” (Machado 915 – 916). This answer does not satisfy the powerful Sinha Rita and she informs him “Joaozinho, either you rescue the boy, or we never see each other again” (Machado 916). These strong words signify that she controls their relationship. Whatever she says goes.

           Damiao was right to go to Sinha Rita. He knew that he would not be able to convince his family to let him leave the seminary, but a woman, specifically Sinha Rita, had the power to free him. However, in requesting her help he has to sacrifice some of his morals. He wants to defend a little black girl who laughed at one of his jokes. He feels the need to defend her because she laughed because of him. However, when it comes time to protect her he fails. His desire to be free overcomes his moral obligation to save the young girl. The young girl, Lucretia, had not finished her needle-work, and Sinha Rita wished to punish her for not doing what she should have. The problem is that she cannot reach the rod to punish the girl, so she asks Damiao to hand it to her. “Damiao was pricked by an uneasy sense of guilt, but he wanted so much to get out of the seminary! He reached the settee, picked up the rod, and handed it to Sinha Rita” (Machado 916).

Sinha Rita is a powerful woman, she controls her slaves by beating them, she controls Joao Carneiro by threatening to leave him, and she controls Damiao by controlling whether he gains his freedom from the seminary or not. This woman controls what happens, when it happens and how it happens. Without her nothing would get done, at least not to her standards.

Work Cited

Machado De Assis, Joaquim Maria. "The Rod of Justice." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Martin Puchner. 3rd ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. 911 - 916. Print.

Marti and Dario

Nature at its Best 7/6/13

            The three poets, Walt Whitman, Jose Marti, and Ruben Dario were all great poets of their time, and have had a long lasting affect on the world today. Whitman did not start out as a great poet, he had to work his way to being considered great unlike Dario who had already made a name for himself as a poet by the age of eight. Marti was not only a great poet, but he was a widely respected journalist, an essayist, and much more. Each of these men was well known not only for their poetry, but also for the lives they lived. However, both Marti and Dario (who did not care for Americans) held Walt Whitman in high respect, and some of their work demonstrates the similarities between the two poets and Whitman.

            One thing to notice as a commonality between the three is their portrayal of nature within their poetry. In Whitman’s Song of Myself, poem “52” he writes, “The spotted hawk swoops by and accuses me” (line1). This introduction of an animal then leads to the landscape underneath the hawk. “I bequeath myself to the dirt to grow from the grass I love” (Whitman line 9). These simple uses of imagery portray Whitman’s love of nature. He is one with it, the Hawk looks down at him and is saying the Whitman is hanging around and talking too much. However, the dirt of the earth stays out of his way, “The last scud of day holds back for me” (Whitman 4). Then later in the poem Whitman says that he will become one with the air and the sun, and that one day one will be able to find him underneath the dirt and grass, dead, but still nurturing for the new life to still come.

            Just like Whitman claims to be one with the earth, so does Marti. In his poem I Am an Honest Man, Marti writes, “In the mountains, I am a mountain. / I know the strange names / Of the herbs and flowers” (lines 8 – 10). Marti knows the mountains, and the flowers and herbs like the back of his hand. He dares to say that he is one with nature, and he feels he knows nature best. He goes on to show his respect for nature, “I trembled once – at the fence, / At the entrance to the vineyard - / When a barbarous bee / Stung my daughter in the forehead” (lines 29 – 32). A healthy respect for nature is also similar to Whitman. Whitman talked about great animals and their power; here Marti is talking about a small animal and its great power as well.

            Lastly, Ruben Dario compares animals and nature in his poetry, similar to Whitman. In Dario’s poem, Blazon, he writes, “The snow – white Olympic swan, / with beak of rose – red agate, / preens his Eucharistic wing, / which he opens to the sun like a fan” (lines 1 – 4). The swan is an “Olympic swan” meaning that it comes from the gods on Mount Olympus. They have great power, and Dario is expressing the animalistic power, like Whitman does in his poetry. This analogy of the swan and its power is stated multiple times in the poem. When describing the swan later in the poem he writes, “His whiteness is akin to linen, / to the buds of white roses, / to the diamantine white / of the fleece of an Easer lamb” (Dario lines 17 – 20). The swan is as beautiful as white roses; this imagery depicts Dario’s love of nature, which is comparable to Whitman’s.

Work Cited

Dario, Ruben. "Blazon." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Martin Puchner. 3rd ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. 692-93. Print.

Marti, Jose. "I Am an Honest Man." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Martin Puchner. 3rd ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. 681-82. Print.

Whitman, Walt. "52: Song of Myself." The Norton Anthology of World Literature. Ed. Martin Puchner. 3rd ed. Vol. 2. New York: W.W. Norton &, 2013. 653. Print.