"But even they are not required to think of it
as being about(esp. only about) a child who died
in the Blitz.
I can see that maybe it's not required to think
of the poem as only about a child who died in the Blitz.
But I can't see not being required to think of it
as being about -- somehow -- a child who died in
the Blitz. This allows all of the New Historicist
creative readings based on ignoring facts. The fact
is pretty explicit. I'm not interested in those who
don't get the basic fact -- in fact, they are lazy readers
with no chance of encountering the poem I would think.
The poem also asserts and demands a certain kind
of encounter and, at the least, this means making
some effort to provide just this sort of context as, at
least, a beginning.
Halvard Johnson <[log in to unmask]> wrote: On Aug 23, 2007, at 6:59 PM, Jon Corelis wrote:
> "In that great poem A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child
> in London, with its dark, magnificent, proud movement, we see Death
> in its reality -- as a return to the beginning of things, as a robing,
> a sacred investiture in those who have been our friends since the
> beginning of Time. Bird, beast, and flower have their part in the
> making of mankind. The water drop is holy, the wheat ear a place of
> prayer. The 'fathering and all-humbling darkness' itself is a
> begetting force. Even grief, even tears, are a begetting. 'The
> stations of the breath' are the stations of the Cross."
>
> -- Edith Sitwell
>
>
> Is the unstated fact that the poem is about a child who died in the
> Blitz make this a political poem? Does knowing or not knowing it
> change the poem?
In as much as the words on the page are not the poem (which is the
result of a reader's interaction with the words on the page), the answer
to the second question is yes, just as not knowing the dictionary
meaning
of a word changes the poem the reader is making of the words on the
page.
With regard to the first question, I suppose the poem is political to
anyone who thinks it's political. The poem is only about a child who
died in the Blitz to those who know more about the context of the
writing of the words on the page than most readers might. But even
they are not required to think of it as being about (esp. only about) a
child who died in the Blitz.
I've heard it argued that all poems are political, in one way or
another,
and somewhat agree.
"Context is everything that content is not."
--Anon.
Halvard Johnson
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