Poetry

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Il Postino [The Postman] (Michael Radford, 1994)

Poetry

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Watch Clip on YouTube.

Poetry

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Poetry Terms

How NOT to Read a Poem

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening

Whose woods these are I think I know.His house is in the village though;He will not see me stopping hereTo watch his woods fill up with snow.

My little horse must think it queerTo stop without a farmhouse nearBetween the woods and frozen lakeThe darkest evening of the year.

He gives his harness bells a shakeTo ask if there is some mistake.The only other sound's the sweepOf easy wind and downy flake.

The woods are lovely, dark, and deep.But I have promises to keep,And miles to go before I sleep,And miles to go before I sleep.

Poetry

How NOT to Read a Poem

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Poetry

Mrs. D. was an imperious, white-haired woman who not only gave extra credit for every symbol we could find in The House of the Seven Gables (the chickens in the back yard = repressed sexuality, etc.) but concocted a humiliating scheme in which 11-A students would tutor 11-Bers, including me, thereby allowing close acquaintances to be more than ordinarily supercilious and condescending to their about-to-become-former-friend. The highlight of the year, however, was our discussion of Frost's "Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening." The poem, we were told, and we had to regurgitate what we "learned" on a subsequent test, is about Santa Claus; indeed Kris Kringle is the speaker, taking a break "without a farm house near" to contemplate the work that yet lies ahead in delivering all those presents. (The "little horse" is, of course, really a reindeer; he thinks it odd to pause in an empty field because there is no house to deliver presents to; the speaker has "miles to go before [he] sleeps" because he has "promises to keep" to all those little boys and girls, etc.--you get the idea.) Though not yet literary, not yet even a reader, I smelled a rat. Such an approach seemed silly.

How NOT to Read a PoemENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Poetry

How silly I realized only recently, while teaching introduction to literature at Middle Tennessee State University. In the required text, Michael Meyer's comprehensive Bedford Introduction to Literature, I was surprised to find an excerpt from Herbert R. Coursen, Jr.'s "The Ghost of Christmas Past: 'Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening,'" an essay, originally published in College English in 1962, four years before I suffered through Mrs. D's class. A parody of poetic interpretation, a "how not to do it" guide, Coursen's essay had evidently been misread by Mrs. D. with all the literalism of the British audience of Swift's "Modest Proposal." She didn't get the joke, and she passed on her lack of discernment to us. All over Western Pennsylvania there are probably hundreds of people now in their fifties who think the poem is about Santa Claus.

How NOT to Read a Poem

PoetryCollege English

(December 1962).

How NOT to Read a Poem

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

I ask them to take a poemand hold it up to the lightlike a color slide

or press an ear against its hive.

I say drop a mouse into a poemand watch him probe his way out,

or walk inside the poem's roomand feel the walls for a light switch.

I want them to waterskiacross the surface of a poemwaving at the author's name on the shore.

But all they want to dois tie the poem to a chair with ropeand torture a confession out of it.

They begin beating it with a hoseto find out what it really means.

Billy CollinsIntroduction to Poetry

from The Apple that Astonished Paris (Fayetteville, Ark: University of Arkansas Press, 1996).

How NOT to Read a Poem

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

My husband gives me an Afor last night's supper,

Linda PastanMarks (1978)

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

My husband gives me an Afor last night's supper,an incomplete for my ironing,

Linda PastanMarks (1978)

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

My husband gives me an Afor last night's supper,an incomplete for my ironing,a B plus in bed.

Linda PastanMarks (1978)

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

My husband gives me an Afor last night's supper,an incomplete for my ironing,a B plus in bed.My son says I am average,an average mother, but ifI put my mind to itI could improve.

Linda PastanMarks (1978)

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

My husband gives me an Afor last night's supper,an incomplete for my ironing,a B plus in bed.My son says I am average,an average mother, but ifI put my mind to itI could improve.My daughter believesin Pass/Fail and tells meI pass.

Linda PastanMarks (1978)

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

My husband gives me an Afor last night's supper,an incomplete for my ironing,a B plus in bed.My son says I am average,an average mother, but ifI put my mind to itI could improve.My daughter believesin Pass/Fail and tells meI pass. Wait 'til they learnI'm dropping out.

Linda PastanMarks (1978)

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Gestalt Shift

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Gestalt Shift

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Gestalt Shift

Necker’s Cube

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Gestalt Shift

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Gestalt Shift

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Gestalt Shift

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery

Gestalt Shift

ENGL 2030—Fall 2013 | Lavery