I celebrate myself, and sing myself,And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you...
Song of Myself
Sunday
Song of Myself
I celebrate myself, and sing myself,And what I assume you shall assume,
For every atom belonging to me as good belongs to you...
Song of Myself
Thursday
O Captain! My Captain our fearful trip is done;The ship has weather’d every rack, the prize we sought is won;
The port is near, the bells I hear, the people all exulting,
While follow eyes the steady keel, the vessel grim and daring:
But O heart! heart! heart!
O the bleeding drops of red,
Where on the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.
O Captain! my Captain! rise up and hear the bells;
Rise up—for you the flag is flung—for you the bugle trills;
For you bouquets and ribbon’d wreaths—for you the shores a-crowding;
For you they call, the swaying mass, their eager faces turning;
Here Captain! dear father!
This arm beneath your head;
It is some dream that on the deck,
You’ve fallen cold and dead.
My Captain does not answer, his lips are pale and still;
My father does not feel my arm, he has no pulse nor will;
The ship is anchor’d safe and sound, its voyage closed and done;
From fearful trip, the victor ship, comes in with object won; 20
Exult, O shores, and ring, O bells!
But I, with mournful tread,
Walk the deck my Captain lies,
Fallen cold and dead.
Walt Whitman
Sunday
Emily's Mother
How did her mother fit in... to her life and genius?
Emily Dickinson is one of the most mysterious writers in literary history. Although she was a literary genius, only eight of her poems were published in her life, and she lived a secluded existence. But, this quiet life at home can be compared to the isolated life her mother lived.
About Emily's Mother: Emily Norcross
Emily Norcross was born on July 3, 1804, and she married Edward Dickinson on May 6, 1828. The couple's first child, William Austin Dickinson, was born just 11 months later. Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was born on December 10, 1830 and her sister, Lavinia Norcross Dickinson (Vinnie) was born several years later on February 28, 1833. From what we know of Emily Norcross, she seldom left home, only making brief visits to relatives.
Later, Dickinson would rarely leave home, spending most of her days in the same house.
She isolated herself more and more as she grew older, and she seemed to become more selective in whom she saw from her circle of family and friends.
Of course, one marked difference between Dickinson and her mother is that she never married. There has been a great deal of speculation about why Emiy Dickinson never married. In one of her poems, she writes, "I'm wife; I've finished that... " and "She rose to his requirement... / To take the honorable work / Of woman and of wife."
Perhaps she had a long-lost lover. Perhaps, she chose to live a different sort of life--without leaving home and without marrying. Whether it was a choice, or simply a matter of circumstance, her dreams came to fruition in her work. She could imagine herself--in and out of love and marriage. And, she was always free to spend her flood of words, with passionate intensity.
For whatever reason, Dickinson did not marry. And, even her relationship with her mother was troubled.
The Strain--Never Having Had a Mother
Dickinson once wrote to her mentor, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, "My Mother does not care for thought-—," which was foreign to the way Dickinson lived.
Later she wrote to Higginson: "Could you tell me what home is. I never had a mother. I suppose a mother is one to whom you hurry when you are troubled."
Dickinson's relationship with her mother may have been strained, especially during her earliest years. She could not look to her mother for support in her literary efforts, but none of the members of her family or friends saw her as a literary genius. Her father saw Austin as the genius, and never looked beyond. Higginson, while supportive, described her as "partially cracked." She had friends, but none of them really understood the true extent of her genius. They found her witty, and they enjoyed corresponding with her through letters. In many ways, though, she was completely alone.
On June 15, 1875, Emily Norcross Dickinson suffered a paralytic stroke, and suffered from a long period of illness thereafter. This period of time may have had more influence on her seclusion from society than any other, but it was also a way for the mother and daughter to become closer than ever before. For Dickinson, it was also just another small step away into her upper room—-into her writing.
Vinnie said that one of the "daughters must be constantly at home." She explains her sister's seculsion by saying that "Emily chose this part." Then, Vinnie said that Emily, "finding the life with her books and nature so congenial, continued to live it..."
An End
Dickinson cared for her mother for the final seven years of her life, until her mother died on November 14, 1882. In a letter to Mrs. J.C. Holland, she wrote: "The dear Mother that could not walk, has flown. It never occurred to us that she had not Limbs, she had Wings—-and she soared from us unexpectedly as a summoned Bird—-"
Dickinson could not understand what it meant: the death of her mother. She had experienced so much death in her life, not only with the deaths of friends and acquaintances, but the death of her father, and now her mother. She had wrestled with the idea of death; she had feared it; and she wrote many poems about it. In "'Tis so appalling," she wrote, "Looking at death is dying." So, her mother's final end was hard for her, especially after such a long illness.
Dickinson wrote to Maria Whitney: "All is faint indeed without our vanished mother, who achieved in sweetness what she lost in strength, though grief of wonder at her fate made the winter short, and each night I reach finds my lungs more breathless, seeking what it means."
Emily's mother might not have been the genius that her daughter was, but she influenced Dickinson's life in ways she probably didn't even realize. In total, Dickinson wrote 1,775 poems in her life. Would Emily have written so many, or would she have written any at all, if she had not lived that solitary existence at home? She lived for so many years alone--in the room of her own.
Emily Dickinson is one of the most mysterious writers in literary history. Although she was a literary genius, only eight of her poems were published in her life, and she lived a secluded existence. But, this quiet life at home can be compared to the isolated life her mother lived.
About Emily's Mother: Emily Norcross
Emily Norcross was born on July 3, 1804, and she married Edward Dickinson on May 6, 1828. The couple's first child, William Austin Dickinson, was born just 11 months later. Emily Elizabeth Dickinson was born on December 10, 1830 and her sister, Lavinia Norcross Dickinson (Vinnie) was born several years later on February 28, 1833. From what we know of Emily Norcross, she seldom left home, only making brief visits to relatives.
Later, Dickinson would rarely leave home, spending most of her days in the same house.
She isolated herself more and more as she grew older, and she seemed to become more selective in whom she saw from her circle of family and friends.
Of course, one marked difference between Dickinson and her mother is that she never married. There has been a great deal of speculation about why Emiy Dickinson never married. In one of her poems, she writes, "I'm wife; I've finished that... " and "She rose to his requirement... / To take the honorable work / Of woman and of wife."
Perhaps she had a long-lost lover. Perhaps, she chose to live a different sort of life--without leaving home and without marrying. Whether it was a choice, or simply a matter of circumstance, her dreams came to fruition in her work. She could imagine herself--in and out of love and marriage. And, she was always free to spend her flood of words, with passionate intensity.
For whatever reason, Dickinson did not marry. And, even her relationship with her mother was troubled.
The Strain--Never Having Had a Mother
Dickinson once wrote to her mentor, Thomas Wentworth Higginson, "My Mother does not care for thought-—," which was foreign to the way Dickinson lived.
Later she wrote to Higginson: "Could you tell me what home is. I never had a mother. I suppose a mother is one to whom you hurry when you are troubled."
Dickinson's relationship with her mother may have been strained, especially during her earliest years. She could not look to her mother for support in her literary efforts, but none of the members of her family or friends saw her as a literary genius. Her father saw Austin as the genius, and never looked beyond. Higginson, while supportive, described her as "partially cracked." She had friends, but none of them really understood the true extent of her genius. They found her witty, and they enjoyed corresponding with her through letters. In many ways, though, she was completely alone.
On June 15, 1875, Emily Norcross Dickinson suffered a paralytic stroke, and suffered from a long period of illness thereafter. This period of time may have had more influence on her seclusion from society than any other, but it was also a way for the mother and daughter to become closer than ever before. For Dickinson, it was also just another small step away into her upper room—-into her writing.
Vinnie said that one of the "daughters must be constantly at home." She explains her sister's seculsion by saying that "Emily chose this part." Then, Vinnie said that Emily, "finding the life with her books and nature so congenial, continued to live it..."
An End
Dickinson cared for her mother for the final seven years of her life, until her mother died on November 14, 1882. In a letter to Mrs. J.C. Holland, she wrote: "The dear Mother that could not walk, has flown. It never occurred to us that she had not Limbs, she had Wings—-and she soared from us unexpectedly as a summoned Bird—-"
Dickinson could not understand what it meant: the death of her mother. She had experienced so much death in her life, not only with the deaths of friends and acquaintances, but the death of her father, and now her mother. She had wrestled with the idea of death; she had feared it; and she wrote many poems about it. In "'Tis so appalling," she wrote, "Looking at death is dying." So, her mother's final end was hard for her, especially after such a long illness.
Dickinson wrote to Maria Whitney: "All is faint indeed without our vanished mother, who achieved in sweetness what she lost in strength, though grief of wonder at her fate made the winter short, and each night I reach finds my lungs more breathless, seeking what it means."
Emily's mother might not have been the genius that her daughter was, but she influenced Dickinson's life in ways she probably didn't even realize. In total, Dickinson wrote 1,775 poems in her life. Would Emily have written so many, or would she have written any at all, if she had not lived that solitary existence at home? She lived for so many years alone--in the room of her own.
Source: About.com: Classic Literature
Monday
About Astrophil and Stella
Sidney, Philip, Sir. The works of the Honourable Sr. Philip Sidney, Kt., in prose and verse : in three volumes : containing, I. The Countess of Pembroke's Arcadia.--II. The defense of poesy.---III. Astrophel and Stella.--IV. The remedy of love; sonnets, &c.--V. The Lady of May : a masque.--VI. The life of the author. 3 vols. 14th edition. London : Printed for E. Taylor, A. Bettesworth, E. Curll, W. Mears, and R. Gosling, 1725.Starred Book Collection
Astrophel and Stella (now called Astrophil and Stella), which includes 108 sonnets and 11 songs, is the first in a long line of Elizabethan sonnet cycles. "Sonnet cycles" were so named because they incorporated linked sonnets that generally described the progressive rise and fall of a love relationship. In other words, through a number of distinct but related poems, it was possible to infer a plot. Most of the sonnets in Astrophel and Stella are influenced by Petrarchan conventions, incorporating traditional methods such as addressing the moon and the world of sleep and dreams, mourning the lady's absence, praising her unique beauty, bemoaning her coldness, and highlighting the lover's frustrated longings. Like Petrarch's poems, Sidney's work displays a variation of emotion from sonnet to sonnet within the trappings of a vague but thematic narrative. Sidney's experiments with rhyme scheme in his sonnets also were deeply significant for English Renaissance poetry, essentially freeing the English sonnet from the inflexible rhyming requirements of the Italian sonnet form.
Though the poems circulated widely in manuscript form, an official edition was not printed until 1591, five years after Sidney's death. This text, however, was considered to be inaccurate, and the most authoritative version came from a 1598 folio of Sidney's Arcadia, which contained an edition of Astrophel and Stella. This folio was supervised directly by Sidney's sister.
Sidney's sonnet sequence also exhibits clear references to Homeric epic, particularly Homer's Penelope. Some scholars have suggested that the 108 sonnets in the sequence represent the 108 suitors of Penelope, who play a game of striving to hit the Penelope stone in order to determine who can court her. The 119 poems are also just one number short of the number of months Ulysses spent trying to return home to Penelope in The Odyssey. The structure of the sonnet sequence, falling one month short of achieving Ulysses's journey home, can be seen as an emphasis on Sidney's failure in his pursuit of his own Penelope.
It is generally accepted that the Stella of the poems is Penelope Devereux, later Lady Rich, and that Astrophel (Astrophil) is Sidney himself. Critics disagree, however, on whether Sidney's love for Penelope is real or merely literary, meant simply to emulate the style of Petrarch's poetic adoration of "Laura." Because neither Elizabethan historians nor Sidney's own early biographers gave any clear account of his relationship with the Stella of the poems, the sonnets themselves are the only key to contextualizing the poetry with his romantic life.
The impossibility of a successful relationship between the two is a key theme of the sequence. The rift between the two is also expressed in the title of the piece. First of all, the title is made up of one name of Greek origin and one name of Latin origin: a clear disjunction. The presence of the grammatical copula "and" suggests that the two are a couple (such as "Tristan and Isolde" or "Romeo and Juliet"), which readers immediately realize is not the case. Even the names themselves, meaning "star-lover" and "star," describes a separation between the two: there will always be distance between the stars and those who love them.
Read more...Saturday
A pleasing land of drowsy head it was,
Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye;
And of gay castles in the clouds that pass,
Forever flushing round a summer sky.
--Castle of Indolence
Of dreams that wave before the half-shut eye;
And of gay castles in the clouds that pass,
Forever flushing round a summer sky.
--Castle of Indolence
In the bosom of one of those spacious coves which indent the eastern shore of the Hudson, at that broad expansion of the river denominated by the ancient Dutch navigators the Tappan Zee, and where they always prudently shortened sail and implored the protection of St. Nicholas when they crossed, there lies a small market town or rural port, which by some is called Greensburgh, but which is more generally and properly known by the name of Tarry Town. This name was given, we are told, in former days, by the good housewives of the adjacent country, from the inveterate propensity of their husbands to linger about the village tavern on market days. Be that as it may, I do not vouch for the fact, but merely advert to it, for the sake of being precise and authentic. Not far from this village, perhaps about two miles, there is a little valley or rather lap of land among high hills, which is one of the quietest places in the whole world. A small brook glides through it, with just murmur enough to lull one to repose; and the occasional whistle of a quail or tapping of a woodpecker is almost the only sound that ever breaks in upon the uniform tranquillity.
I recollect that, when a stripling, my first exploit in squirrel-shooting was in a grove of tall walnut-trees that shades one side of the valley. I had wandered into it at noontime, when all nature is peculiarly quiet, and was startled by the roar of my own gun, as it broke the Sabbath stillness around and was prolonged and reverberated by the angry echoes. If ever I should wish for a retreat whither I might steal from the world and its distractions, and dream quietly away the remnant of a troubled life, I know of none more promising than this little valley...
Wednesday
Blank Verse
Is a type of poetry, distinguished by having a regular meter, but no rhyme. In English, the meter most commonly used with blank verse has been iambic pentameter (like that which is used in Shakespearean plays) read more...
You stars that reign'd at my nativity,
Whose influence hath allotted death and hell,
Now draw up Faustus like a foggy mist
Into the entrails of yon labouring clouds,
That when they vomit forth into the air,
My limbs may issue from their smoky mouths,
So that my soul may but ascend to Heaven.
Doctor Faustus
Thursday
Petrarchan sonnet
The Petrarchan sonnet is divided into two main parts, called the octave and the sestet.
The octave is eight lines long, and typically follows a rhyme scheme of ABBAABBA, or ABBACDDC.
The sestet occupies the remaining six lines of the poem, and typically follows a rhyme scheme of CDCDCD, or CDECDE.
The octave and the sestet are usually contrasted in some key way: for example, the octave may ask a question to which the sestet offers an answer. In the following Petrarchan sonnet, John Keats's "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer," the octave describes past events--the speaker's previous, unsatisfying examinations of the "realms of gold," Homer's poems--while the sestet describes the present--the speaker's sense of discovery upon finding Chapman's translations: Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold,
The octave is eight lines long, and typically follows a rhyme scheme of ABBAABBA, or ABBACDDC.
The sestet occupies the remaining six lines of the poem, and typically follows a rhyme scheme of CDCDCD, or CDECDE.
The octave and the sestet are usually contrasted in some key way: for example, the octave may ask a question to which the sestet offers an answer. In the following Petrarchan sonnet, John Keats's "On First Looking into Chapman's Homer," the octave describes past events--the speaker's previous, unsatisfying examinations of the "realms of gold," Homer's poems--while the sestet describes the present--the speaker's sense of discovery upon finding Chapman's translations: Much have I travell'd in the realms of gold,
And many goodly states and kingdoms seen;
Round many western islands have I been
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
Oft of one wide expanse have I been told
That deep-brow'd Homer ruled as his demesne;
Yet did I never breathe its pure serene
Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes
He star'd at the Pacific--and all his men
Look'd at each other with a wild surmise--
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
Round many western islands have I been
Which bards in fealty to Apollo hold.
Oft of one wide expanse have I been told
That deep-brow'd Homer ruled as his demesne;
Yet did I never breathe its pure serene
Till I heard Chapman speak out loud and bold:
Then felt I like some watcher of the skies
When a new planet swims into his ken;
Or like stout Cortez when with eagle eyes
He star'd at the Pacific--and all his men
Look'd at each other with a wild surmise--
Silent, upon a peak in Darien.
The Sonnet Form
A sonnet is a fourteen-line lyric poem, traditionally written in iambic pentameter--that is, in lines ten syllables long, with accents falling on every second syllable, as in: "Shall I compare thee to a summer's day?" The sonnet form first became popular during the Italian Renaissance, when the poet Petrarch published a sequence of love sonnets addressed to an idealized woman named Laura. Taking firm hold among Italian poets, the sonnet spread throughout Europe to England, where, after its initial Renaissance, "Petrarchan" incarnation faded, the form enjoyed a number of revivals and periods of renewed interest. In Elizabethan England--the era during which Shakespeare's sonnets were written--the sonnet was the form of choice for lyric poets, particularly lyric poets seeking to engage with traditional themes of love and romance. (In addition to Shakespeare's monumental sequence, the Astrophel and Stella sequence by Sir Philip Sydney stands as one of the most important sonnet sequences of this period.) Sonnets were also written during the height of classical English verse, by Dryden and Pope, among others, and written again during the heyday of English Romanticism, when Wordsworth, Shelley, and particularly John Keats created wonderful sonnets. Today, the sonnet remains the most influential and important verse form in the history of English poetry.
Two kinds of sonnets have been most common in English poetry, and they take their names from the greatest poets to utilize them: the Petrarchan sonnet and the Shakespearean sonnet.
Two kinds of sonnets have been most common in English poetry, and they take their names from the greatest poets to utilize them: the Petrarchan sonnet and the Shakespearean sonnet.
In just a short lifetime, Ms. Billie Holiday overcame the challenges of a poverty-stricken childhood to become one of the nation's most famous female African American jazz musicians. During the 1930's and 40's, she famously asserted her talents to raise the social and political consciousness of black society, particularly with her melodic protests against domestic violence and lynching practices across the south...
Source: Maryland Women's Hall of Fame Online
http://www.msa.md.gov/msa/educ/exhibits/womenshall/html/whflist.html
Saturday
Fenimore Cooper's Leatherstocking Novels
I. Pioneers: A raw frontier-village on Lake Champlain, at the end of the eighteenth century. Must be a picture of Cooper's home, as he knew it when a boy. A very lovely book. Natty Bumppo an old man, an old hunter half civilized.
2. The Last of the Mohicans: A historical fight between the British and the French, with Indians on both sides, at a Fort by Lake Champlain. Romantic flight of the British general's two daughters, conducted by the scout, Natty, who is in the prime of life; romantic death of the last of the Delawares.
3. The Prairie: A wagon of some huge, sinister Kentuckians trekking west into the unbroken prairie. Prairie Indians, and Natty, an old, old man; he dies seated on a chair on the Rocky Mountains, looking east.
4. The Pathfinder: The Great Lakes. Natty, a man of about thirty-five, makes an abortive proposal to a bouncing damsel, daughter of the Sergeant at the Fort.
5. Deerslayer: Natty and Hurry Harry, both quite young, are hunting in the virgin wild. They meet two white women. Lake Champlain again.
These are the five Leatherstocking books: Natty Bumppo being Leatherstocking, Pathfinder, Deerslayer, according to his ages.
2. The Last of the Mohicans: A historical fight between the British and the French, with Indians on both sides, at a Fort by Lake Champlain. Romantic flight of the British general's two daughters, conducted by the scout, Natty, who is in the prime of life; romantic death of the last of the Delawares.
3. The Prairie: A wagon of some huge, sinister Kentuckians trekking west into the unbroken prairie. Prairie Indians, and Natty, an old, old man; he dies seated on a chair on the Rocky Mountains, looking east.
4. The Pathfinder: The Great Lakes. Natty, a man of about thirty-five, makes an abortive proposal to a bouncing damsel, daughter of the Sergeant at the Fort.
5. Deerslayer: Natty and Hurry Harry, both quite young, are hunting in the virgin wild. They meet two white women. Lake Champlain again.
These are the five Leatherstocking books: Natty Bumppo being Leatherstocking, Pathfinder, Deerslayer, according to his ages.
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