Donald's Snowball Fight

We've lost all our snow, and our lack reminded me of this old Donald Duck short--one of my favorites.

Mickey's Christmas Carol

Last time I posted one of these ("Mickey and the Beanstalk" -- scroll to the end of the post if you want to watch the movie), my motives were literary.  This time, just nostalgia.  Please enjoy:

(As much as anything, the snow this morning and the end of finals finally kicked me into the Christmas spirit -- that and Angie read the kids the Disney storybook of this last night.)

Wednesday's for Kids XXIII -- DOUG TENNAPEL (woo-hoo!)

from Ghostopolis

For kids a little older than I usually address here (and this week I'm trying to make up a bit for my tardiness the last couple entries), I present the great Doug TenNapel, graphic novelist (he does other stuff, but I'm pretty much only familiar with the books) and certifiable nutcase.

In the collage below are all the books of his which I've read, some of which I proudly own and all of which I highly recommend (those who are both interested and astute may recognize the absence of one of his novels, which will here remain nameless, and which I don't recommend, for personal moral reasons) and are here in a sort of organization:  Down the left hand side are the books I've read and in rough order of best (Creature Tech, which I've mentioned here before) at the top to the least, yet-still-totally awesome (Flink) at the near bottom, followed by three titles I haven't gotten to yet (lack of personal funds are a particular obstacle when the local libraries don't bother carrying this man's stuff, which, by the way, is hilarious, adventurous, beautifully drawn, witty in language and plot, absolutely ridiculous, absurd, and often drawing in theme from everything from Christian mythology and American History to popular current movies and other books), which I eagerly anticipate.  The big one on the right, Ghostopolis (which is in preparatory phases for film adaptation by Hugh Jackman, Disney, and others--crazy cool, if it actually happens), I just read today while "team teaching" (which fairly amounts to nothing save sitting in the back of another teacher's classroom while that teacher obstinately ignores you) for an English teacher, and I enjoyed it thoroughly--the book, not the "team teaching."  Always a fast read, a rushing escape, and, well, I'll say it again, laden with beautiful and surprisingly kinetic illustrations.

Sunday Poetry XXVI -- EASTER

Rudyard Kipling -- Our Next Author: PLEASE CAST YOUR VOTE

Rudyard Kipling

While I can't say I've read tons of Kipling, I've made it through a fair amount of his verses and many of his stories.  For better or worse (likely the latter), I have not read The Jungle Book, and the Disney version, like the original or not (likely the latter), is on my short list of all time favorite movies.  That said, of his poetry/verse stuff I've read, this is my favorite:

I have eaten your bread and salt.
I have drunk your water and wine.
In deaths ye died I have watched beside,
And the lives ye led were mine.

Was there aught that I did not share
In vigil or toil or ease, –

One joy or woe that I did not know,
Dear hearts across the seas?

I have written the tale of our life
For a sheltered people's mirth,
In jesting guise – but ye are wise,
And ye know what the jest is worth.

It is the prelude poem, brief and surprisingly elegant, to his "Departmental Ditties."


SO HERE IT IS (because of the hope for short/fun):  I suggest that Kipling be our next author, and hope, therefore, to narrow our search down to one from the following three (please read a little about each and indicate your preference below in comment):

• Kim
• Just So Stories (with original illustrations here)
• The Jungle Book (all three novels here in various forms, thanks to the treasure of Gutenberg.org)

* added later, because, well, who doesn't need friends:

Wednesday's for Kids XX -- CASEY AT THE BAT

(www.valomilk.com)

So I sort of flip-flopped-blended the kids stuff and poetry this week, but what the heck.  Both today's and Sunday's are fairytales of sorts and have both been interpreted--loosely--by Disney.  I'm not offering much commentary, but leave the comparison, favorable or not, to you.

Casey at the Bat
by Ernest Lawrence Thayer
The Outlook wasn't brilliant for the Mudville nine that day:
The score stood four to two, with but one inning more to play.
And then when Cooney died at first, and Barrows did the same,
A sickly silence fell upon the patrons of the game.

A straggling few got up to go in deep despair. The rest
Clung to that hope which springs eternal in the human breast;
They thought, if only Casey could get but a whack at that -
We'd put up even money, now, with Casey at the bat.

But Flynn preceded Casey, as did also Jimmy Blake,
And the former was a lulu and the latter was a cake;
So upon that stricken multitude grim melancholy sat,
For there seemed but little chance of Casey's getting to the bat.

But Flynn let drive a single, to the wonderment of all,
And Blake, the much despis-ed, tore the cover off the ball;
And when the dust had lifted, and the men saw what had occurred,
There was Jimmy safe at second and Flynn a-hugging third.

Then from 5,000 throats and more there rose a lusty yell;
It rumbled through the valley, it rattled in the dell;
It knocked upon the mountain and recoiled upon the flat,
For Casey, mighty Casey, was advancing to the bat.

There was ease in Casey's manner as he stepped into his place;
There was pride in Casey's bearing and a smile on Casey's face.
And when, responding to the cheers, he lightly doffed his hat,
No stranger in the crowd could doubt 'twas Casey at the bat.

Ten thousand eyes were on him as he rubbed his hands with dirt;
Five thousand tongues applauded when he wiped them on his shirt.
Then while the writhing pitcher ground the ball into his hip,
Defiance gleamed in Casey's eye, a sneer curled Casey's lip.

And now the leather-covered sphere came hurtling through the air,
And Casey stood a-watching it in haughty grandeur there.
Close by the sturdy batsman the ball unheeded sped-
"That ain't my style," said Casey. "Strike one," the umpire said.

From the benches, black with people, there went up a muffled roar,
Like the beating of the storm-waves on a stern and distant shore.
"Kill him! Kill the umpire!" shouted someone on the stand;
And its likely they'd a-killed him had not Casey raised his hand.

With a smile of Christian charity great Casey's visage shone;
He stilled the rising tumult; he bade the game go on;
He signaled to the pitcher, and once more the spheroid flew;
But Casey still ignored it, and the umpire said, "Strike two."

"Fraud!" cried the maddened thousands, and echo answered fraud;
But one scornful look from Casey and the audience was awed.
They saw his face grow stern and cold, they saw his muscles strain,
And they knew that Casey wouldn't let that ball go by again.

The sneer is gone from Casey's lip, his teeth are clenched in hate;
He pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate.
And now the pitcher holds the ball, and now he lets it go,
And now the air is shattered by the force of Casey's blow.

Oh, somewhere in this favored land the sun is shining bright;
The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light,
And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout;
But there is no joy in Mudville - mighty Casey has struck out.

Sunday Poetry XXIII -- JACK AND THE BEANSTALK (not a poem, but the Jacobs tale and Disney's Mickeyfied short)

(scroll down for Disney's "Mickey and the Beanstalk")

By combination of the edition my kids read this week and the here-and-the-references and Italy's translations of old Mickey Mouse cartoons (Topolino) in The Mysterious Flame of Queen Loana, I was brought to this: a fantastic tale, and one of my favorite Mickey Mouse shorts.

Two important "Jack and the Beanstalk" links:

background by Wikipedia
annotations by Surlalune

by Arthur Rackham

THERE was once upon a time a poor widow who had an only son named Jack, and a cow named Milky-white. And all they had to live on was the milk the cow gave every morning, which they carried to the market and sold. But one morning Milky-white gave no milk and they didn’t know what to do.

"What shall we do, what shall we do?" said the widow, wringing her hands.

"Cheer up, mother, I’ll go and get work somewhere," said Jack.

"We’ve tried that before, and nobody would take you," said his mother; "we must sell Milky-white and with the money, start shop, or something."

"All right, mother," says Jack; "it’s market-day today, and I’ll soon sell Milky-white, and then we’ll see what we can do."

So he took the cow’s halter in his hand, and off he started. He hadn’t gone far when he met a funny-looking old man, who said to him: "Good morning, Jack."

"Good morning to you," said Jack, and wondered how he knew his name.

"Well, Jack, and where are you off to?" said the man.

"I’m going to market to sell our cow here."

"Oh, you look the proper sort of chap to sell cows," said the man; "I wonder if you know how many beans make five."

"Two in each hand and one in your mouth," says Jack, as sharp as a needle.

"Right you are," said the man, "and here they are, the very beans themselves," he went on, pulling out of his pocket a number of strange-looking beans. "As you are so sharp," says he, "I don’t mind doing a swop with you — your cow for these beans."

"Walker!" says Jack; "wouldn’t you like it?"

"Ah! you don’t know what these beans are," said the man; "if you plant them overnight, by morning they grow right up to the sky."

"Really?" says Jack; "you don’t say so."

"Yes, that is so, and if it doesn’t turn out to be true you can have your cow back."

"Right," says Jack, and hands him over Milky-white’s halter and pockets the beans.

Back goes Jack home, and as he hadn’t gone very far it wasn’t dusk by the time he got to his door.

"Back already, Jack?" said his mother; "I see you haven’t got Milky-white, so you’ve sold her. How much did you get for her?"

"You’ll never guess, mother," says Jack.

"No, you don’t say so. Good boy! Five pounds, ten, fifteen, no, it can’t be twenty."

"I told you you couldn’t guess. What do you say to these beans; they’re magical, plant them overnight and —"

"What!" says Jack’s mother, "have you been such a fool, such a dolt, such an idiot, as to give away my Milky-white, the best milker in the parish, and prime beef to boot, for a set of paltry beans? Take that! Take that! Take that! And as for your precious beans here they go out of the window. And now off with you to bed. Not a sup shall you drink, and not a bit shall you swallow this very night."

So Jack went upstairs to his little room in the attic, and sad and sorry he was, to be sure, as much for his mother’s sake, as for the loss of his supper.

At last he dropped off to sleep.

When he woke up, the room looked so funny. The sun was shining into part of it, and yet all the rest was quite dark and shady. So Jack jumped up and dressed himself and went to the window. And what do you think he saw? Why, the beans his mother had thrown out of the window into the garden had sprung up into a big beanstalk which went up and up and up till it reached the sky. So the man spoke truth after all.

The beanstalk grew up quite close past Jack’s window, so all he had to do was to open it and give a jump on to the beanstalk which ran up just like a big plaited ladder. So Jack climbed, and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed till at last he reached the sky. And when he got there he found a long broad road going as straight as a dart. So he walked along and he walked along and he walked along till he came to a great big tall house, and on the doorstep there was a great big tall woman.

"Good morning, mum," says Jack, quite polite-like. "Could you be so kind as to give me some breakfast?" For he hadn’t had anything to eat, you know, the night before and was as hungry as a hunter.

"It’s breakfast you want, is it?" says the great big tall woman, "it’s breakfast you’ll be if you don’t move off from here. My man is an ogre and there’s nothing he likes better than boys broiled on toast. You’d better be moving on or he’ll soon be coming."

"Oh! please, mum, do give me something to eat, mum. I’ve had nothing to eat since yesterday morning, really and truly, mum," says Jack. "I may as well be broiled as die of hunger."

Well, the ogre’s wife wasn't such a bad sort after all. So she took Jack into the kitchen, and gave him a hunk of bread and cheese and a jug of milk. But Jack hadn’t half finished these when thump! thump! thump! the whole house began to tremble with the noise of someone coming.

"Goodness gracious me! It’s my old man," said the ogre’s wife, "what on earth shall I do? Come along quick and jump in here." And she bundled Jack into the oven just as the ogre came in.

He was a big one, to be sure. At his belt he had three calves strung up by the heels, and he unhooked them and threw them down on the table and said: "Here, wife, broil me a couple of these for breakfast. Ah! what’s this I smell?

Fee-fi-fo-fum,
I smell the blood of an Englishman,
Be he alive, or be he dead,
I’ll have his bones to grind my bread."

"Nonsense, dear," said his wife, "you’ re dreaming. Or perhaps you smell the scraps of that little boy you liked so much for yesterday’s dinner. Here, you go and have a wash and tidy up, and by the time you come back your breakfast’ll be ready for you."

So off the ogre went, and Jack was just going to jump out of the oven and run away when the woman told him not. "Wait till he’s asleep," says she; "he always has a snooze after breakfast."

Well, the ogre had his breakfast, and after that he goes to a big chest and takes out of it a couple of bags of gold, and sits down counting them till at last his head began to nod and he began to snore till the whole house shook again.

Then Jack crept out on tiptoe from his oven, and as he was passing the ogre he took one of the bags of gold under his arm, and off he pelters till he came to the beanstalk, and then he threw down the bag of gold, which, of course, fell into his mother’s garden, and then he climbed down and climbed down till at last he got home and told his mother and showed her the gold and said: "Well, mother, wasn’t I right about the beans? They are really magical, you see."

So they lived on the bag of gold for some time, but at last they came to the end of that so Jack made up his mind to try his luck once more up at the top of the beanstalk. So one fine morning he rose up early, and got on to the beanstalk, and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed till at last he got on the road again and came the great big tall house he had been to before. There, sure enough, was the great tall woman a-standing on the doorstep.

"Good morning, mum," says Jack, as bold as brass, "could you be so good as to give me something to eat?"

"Go away, my boy," said the big, tall woman, "or else my man will eat you up for breakfast. But aren’t you the youngster who came here once before? Do you know, that very day my man missed one of his bags of gold."

"That’s strange, mum," said Jack, "I dare say I could tell you something about that but I’m so hungry I can’t speak till I’ve had something to eat."

Well, the big tall woman was that curious that she took him in and gave him something to eat. But he had scarcely begun munching it as slowly as he could when thump! thump! they heard the giant’s footstep, and his wife hid Jack away in the oven.

All happened as it did before. In came the ogre as he did before, said: "Fee-fi-fo-fum," and had his breakfast off three broiled oxen. Then he said: "Wife, bring me the hen that lays the golden eggs." So she brought it, and the ogre said: "Lay," and it laid an egg all of gold. And then the ogre began to nod his head, and to snore till the house shook.

Then Jack crept out of the oven on tiptoe and caught hold of the golden hen, and was off before you could say "Jack Robinson." But this time the hen gave a cackle which woke the ogre, and just as Jack got out of the house he heard him calling:

"Wife, wife, what have you done with my golden hen?"

And the wife said: "Why, my dear?"

But that was all Jack heard, for he rushed off to the beanstalk and climbed down like a house on fire. And when he got home he showed his mother the wonderful hen, and said "Lay" to it; and it laid a golden egg every time he said 'Lay."

Well, Jack was not content, and it wasn’t long before he determined to have another try at his luck up there at the top of the beanstalk. So one fine morning, he rose up early, and went on to the beanstalk, and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed and he climbed till he got to the top. But this time he knew better than to go straight to the ogre’s house. And when he got near it, he waited behind a bush till he saw the ogre’s wife come out with a pail to get some water, and then he crept into the house and got into the copper. He hadn’t been there long when he heard thump! thump! thump! as before, and in came the ogre and his wife.

"Fee-fi-fo-fum, I smell the blood of an Englishman," cried out the ogre. "I smell him, wife, I smell him."

"Do you, my dearie?" says the ogre’s wife. "Then if it’s that little rogue that stole your gold and the hen that laid the golden eggs he’s sure to have got into the oven." And they both rushed to the oven. But Jack wasn’t there, luckily, and the ogre’s wife said: "There you are again with your fee-fi-fo-fum. Why, of course, it’s the laddie you caught last night that I’ve broiled for your breakfast. How forgetful I am, and how careless you are not to know the difference between live un and a dead un."

So the ogre sat down to the breakfast and ate it, but every now and then he would mutter: "Well, I could have sworn —" and he’d get up and search the larder and the cupboards, and everything, only, luckily, he didn’t think of the copper.

After breakfast was over, the ogre called out: "Wife, wife, bring me my golden harp." So she brought it and put it on the table before him. Then he said: "Sing!" and the golden harp sang most beautifully. And it went on singing till the ogre fell asleep, and commenced to snore like thunder.

Then Jack lifted up the copper-lid very quietly and got down like a mouse and crept on hands and knees till he came to the table when he got up and caught hold of the golden harp and dashed with it towards the door. But the harp called out quite loud: "Master! Master!" and the ogre woke up just in time to see Jack running off with his harp.

Jack ran as fast as he could, and the ogre came rushing after, and would soon have caught him only Jack had a start and dodged him a bit and knew where he was going. When he got to the beanstalk the ogre was not more than twenty yards away when suddenly he saw Jack disappear like, and when he came to the end of the road he saw Jack underneath climbing down for dear life. Well, the ogre didn’t like trusting himself to such a ladder, and he stood and waited, so Jack got another start. But just then the harp cried out: "Master! Master!" and the ogre swung himself down on to the beanstalk, which shook with his weight. Down climbs Jack, and after him climbed the ogre. By this time Jack had climbed down and climbed down and climbed down till he was very nearly home. So he called out: "Mother! Mother! bring me an axe, bring me an axe." And his mother came rushing out with the axe in her hand, but when she came to the beanstalk she stood stock still with fright, for there she saw the ogre just coming down below the clouds.

But Jack jumped down and got hold of the axe and gave a chop at the beanstalk which cut it half in two. The ogre felt the beanstalk shake and quiver so he stopped to see what was the matter. Then Jack gave another chop with the axe, and the beanstalk was cut in two and began to topple over. Then the ogre fell down and broke his crown, and the beanstalk came toppling after.

Then Jack showed his mother his golden harp, and what with showing that and selling the golden eggs, Jack and his mother became very rich, and he married a great princess, and they lived happy ever after.

Jacobs, Joseph. English Fairy Tales. London: David Nutt, 1890.

Sunday Poetry XX -- from ODES TO COMMON THINGS, by Pablo Neruda

Pablo Neruda

I'm not a communist, for whatever that's worth, but I love Pablo Neruda--well, his poetry.  Not even that, really--too broad.  I love his odes.  I confess I didn't discover Neruda until after I'd seen Il Postino, one of my favorite movies, by the way, and which features the Chilean, ex-patriot poet as mentor to a hapless, stricken mailman in the broad, speculative field of Romance.

Here is one of my favorites of his odes--one that reminds me how great life really is.

Ode to things

by Pablo Neruda

I have a crazy,

crazy love of things.

I like pliers,

and scissors.

I love

cups,

rings,

and bowls –

not to speak, or course,

of hats.

I love

all things,

not just

the grandest,

also

the

infinite-

ly

small –

thimbles,

spurs,

plates,

and flower vases.

Oh yes,

the planet

is sublime!

It’s full of pipes

weaving

hand-held

through tobacco smoke,

and keys

and salt shakers –

everything,

I mean,

that is made

by the hand of man, every little thing:

shapely shoes,

and fabric,

and each new

bloodless birth

of gold,

eyeglasses

carpenter’s nails,

brushes,

clocks, compasses,

coins, and the so-soft

softness of chairs.

Mankind has

built

oh so many

perfect

things!

Built them of wool

and of wood,

of glass and

of rope:

remarkable

tables,

ships, and stairways.

I love

all

things,

not because they are

passionate

or sweet-smelling

but because,

I don’t know,

because

this ocean is yours,

and mine;

these buttons

and wheels

and little

forgotten

treasures,

fans upon

whose feathers

love has scattered

its blossoms,

glasses, knives and

scissors –

all bear

the trace

of someone’s fingers

on their handle or surface,

the trace of a distant hand

lost

in the depths of forgetfulness.

I pause in houses,

streets and

elevators

touching things,

identifying objects

that I secretly covet;

this one because it rings,

that one because

it’s as soft

as the softness of a woman’s hip,

that one there for its deep-sea color,

and that one for its velvet feel.

O irrevocable

river

of things:

no one can say

that I loved

only

fish,

or the plants of the jungle and the field,

that I loved

only

those things that leap and climb, desire, and survive.

It’s not true:

many things conspired

to tell me the whole story.

Not only did they touch me,

or my hand touched them:

they were

so close

that they were a part

of my being,

they were so alive with me

that they lived half my life

and will die half my death.

"NOSTALGIA FOR THE NIGHT"

Go here and watch the trailer:

http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/independent/nostalgiaforthelight/

This is real.  Of it I'd love to learn more, and hope to see the movie; but this isn't the point:

O, how reality is so infinitely more 
creative than our imaginations!

The Atacama, by virtue of its simple geography, juxtaposes--generating a reciprocal, implicit allegory between them--the efforts of scientists gazing upward to space to find the origins of life to those searching the sand, digging downward toward their lost family, which task and object become their locus of self-identity.

I challenge you to find a fictional metaphor as poignant and original.

Jane Eyre -- THE NEW MOVIE

I'm looking forward to this.  The trailer and clip do seem to indicate some liberties taken by the filmmakers, but I'm remaining optimistic.  Whether you enjoy the book or prefer to skip it, I also recommend the BBC miniseries, Jane Eyre, fairly dry and fairly accurate, both typically so of the production company.

http://trailers.apple.com/trailers/focus_features/janeeyre/

Alice in Wonderland VIII -- chapter 5: ADULTS ARE ALL WONDERFUL MONSTERS

While they skipped the quintessential "You are Old Father William," the scene with the caterpillar is, I think, one of the best moments in Disney's animated Alice in Wonderland.

Carroll said that the nose and
chin of the Caterpillar are actually
two of his legs; I don't know what
Tenniel might have said about it.

1. As seen in the previous chapter, Alice has constant problems with the "adult" creatures in Wonderland, and as said in a comment for that chapter, I believe Wonderland is indicative of Alice's, or any kid's, experience navigating the world of adults, and not that world as an adult will see it, but as as child sees it.
2. Alice's inability to recite poetry "correctly:" is it an issue of simple forgetfulness, a general lack of self control on her part, or the influence of the place upon her?
3. Robert Southey's "The Old Man's Comforts and How He Gained Them" is below (Southey also wrote "Goldilocks and the Three Bears").
4. Is there any deeper connection between the poem and Alice/Carroll/the narrative than the Caterpillar's apparently random request?
5. If the creatures of Wonderland are parallels for stuffy old grownups, why are they so easily offended?  Along those same lines, what of its advice, "Keep your temper"?
6. Does the caterpillar read Alice's mind when it says, "Of the mushroom," regardless of Carroll's belief that mind-reading and telekinesis were real?
7. Puzzle: how might Alice guarantee that she gets one piece from each side of the mushroom?
8. Her growth (both up and down) indicate that her changes are not always proportional.
9. What do you make, if anything, of Alice the Serpent?  And what of Alice's truthfulness, which always gets her in trouble here?
10. I wonder if Carroll's efforts to demean adults through his descriptions of them in the book (because if they're all adults, then so is the pigeon, and, excuse me, but the pigeon is an idiot: "but if they do, why, then they're a kind of serpent") are meant to show how very dissimilar he is to them, as if he's working mightily to denounce his obvious participation in their exclusive club.

The Old Man's Comforts

and How He Gained Them

by Robert Southey

You are old, Father William the young man cried,

The few locks which are left you are grey;

You are hale, Father William, a hearty old man,

Now tell me the reason, I pray.

In the days of my youth, Father William replied,

I remember’d that youth would fly fast,

And abused not my health and my vigour at first,

That I never might need them at last.

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,

And pleasures with youth pass away;

And yet you lament not the days that are gone,

Now tell me the reason, I pray.

In the days of my youth, Father William replied,

I remember’d that youth could not last;

I thought of the future, whatever I did,

That I never might grieve for the past.

You are old, Father William, the young man cried,

And life must be hastening away;

You are cheerful, and love to converse upon death,

Now tell me the reason, I pray.

I am cheerful, young man, Father William replied,

Let the cause thy attention engage;

In the days of my youth I remember’d my God!

And He hath not forgotten my age.

Sunday Poetry XII (and Jane Eyre XXVIII) -- JANE EYRE IS A BIRD

For brevity's sake, I am not including the full poems I reference here.  Also, and as I've done before (even just last week), I'm going to leave the majority of dot-connecting to you.

The topic comes from our most recent Jane Eyre installment, chapter 27, which in its reference to birds as "emblems of love" throws back in a contrary manner (opposite really, but birds still the same) to chapter 1, where Jane is reading from Bewick's History of British Birds.  Before we get into the direct application to the book, however, I want to look at some more birds.


Birds, symbolically, are a lot like that of trees, at least on the positive end of things, where they can represent nature and God (often, and particularly in the case of Jane Eyre, the same thing) and love, and, in their movement between earth and Heaven, they can represent prayer and angels or spirits.  However, they have a freedom impressionistically lacking in trees, and their folkloric connection to deity is stronger than that of trees.  (Look at Quetzalcoatl and, on the less dramatic side, Mr. Stork -- video below.)

There is also a darker element to birds, which seems more appropriate, at least by first impression, to Jane Eyre.  Birds are often carrion eaters--consumers of the dead.  Blend this with their naturally spiritual element, and you have a symbol well worthy of Jane Eyre, and particularly chapter 1.  Crows, owls, vultures, etcetera are not birds associated with that which is pleasant and beatific and uplifting.  I posted this picture yesterday:

Here a man--one unlucky soul from the Book of Samuel--after being stoned gets taken apart by the birds.  It reminds me of that moment in Pirates of the Caribbean shortly before Jack SPARROW escapes (see? "sparrow": freedom -- though also, perhaps, idiocy -- in that name) where we see crows poking at the eye of some woebegone sailor in a cage.

Gustave Dore'

Pirates and birds, not to mention the illustrator of the above engraving, Gustave Dore (one of my very favorite illustrators, by the way, and thank goodness he was so spectacularly prolific!), brings us to Rime of the Ancient Mariner, by Samuel Taylor Coleridge (short version HERE; complete poem HERE (and, really, read the whole thing; it's worth it and will only put you out about ten or fifteen minutes).  Here we see the curse that follows the destruction of nature, and in this case, an albatross, symbol of good fortune as well as symbol of Jesus Christ (consider its shape against the sky, sun up and behind it, viewed from the deck of a ship far below).

What interests me here is the combination of hopefulness (the albatross as Christ) with the migratory nature, almost aimlessness, of the sea bird.  This and other sea birds are the subject of the chapter of Bewick's, which young Jane Eyre is reading.  But what about the most recent chapter we've read, where the birds are all about the Love?

Certainly that--love--fits birds just fine.  Read the smackingly sappy (sorry) Ode to a Nightingale, by Keats: HERE.

Note the mention of the dryad in the first stanza: bolster, as if it were needed, to the connection mentioned above between birds and trees (beside the fact that so many birds frickin' LIVE in trees!).

Joseph Severn

While I think these two poems do a good job reflecting at least a little of what Bronte was intending in their respective chapters, it does little to make connection between the two, because birds are such facile and even capricious symbols; they can be practically anything.  But perhaps if we forget about the individual symbolics of specific species or varieties, then we might make a general definition for birds (easy -- they fly, right? and flying is freedom, unfettered and irresponsible), and apply it to Jane.

Look at her circumstances in each chapter as they apply to freedom.  In chapter 1, she craves it, but freedom appears to be impossible, unreachable; hence the birds are dark, migratory, and carnivorous--drawn haunts of the derelict and dead.  In chapter 27, she is faced with the necessity of taking up her a new and undesired freedom, but she doesn't want to go!  She sees love--tweedly little birds, cute and white (I'm making that up)--but it, the love, is as unreachable--keen to fly just beyond her grasp--as was freedom back at the beginning.

Maybe this is stretching, but it works.  Birds are such instinctive symbols that, I think, even if Bronte didn't intend their application here, it works nonetheless.  What might not work, though I'm putting it out there anyway, is Jane's name:

JANE EYRE.  (And this is how totally I am going from the mark.  Read Ancestry.com's derivation of the last name Eyre, from Ayer: "English: from Middle English eir, eyer ‘heir’ (Old French (h)eir, from Latin heres ‘heir’). Forms such as Richard le Heyer were frequent in Middle English, denoting a man who was well known to be the heir to the main property in a particular locality, either one who had already inherited or one with great expectations.")  But say the last name aloud.  Eyre.  Say it.  Eyre; Air.  Birds!  Jane Eyre is a bird, folks!  Take her first name (which means gracious and merciful, by the way) and we've really got a pretty good description of Jane's character: a forgiving and benevolent bird.  Does she not travel here and there spreading the good of her soul?

I welcome you thoughts.

Sunday Poetry XI -- TIGERS: GRR

SIRENS, TIGERS, and DREAMS, OH MY! and monsters too.

thank you: Chelsea Art Museum

Yeah, yeah.  I know.  Corny.  Hackneyed.  Irresistible.  But if you disregard the first of the trio, then it's likely smackingly obvious where this post is going, and, well, since the sirens really don't have that much to do with it, probably it is.

Francisco de Goya said, or painted really, "THE DREAM OF REASON BEGETS MONSTERS," in his etching to the right, and certainly in his head it did, and he painted them for the world to see.  Monsters is not a new topic here at The Wall, and I am not (thank me later) going to bore you by getting into it again.  The point isn't the monster, but the dream that produces it.  Perhaps all of us, rational or not, yet beget monsters--more or less monstrous--through our dreams.

Consider the first four stanzas of Margaret Atwood's "Siren Song" (taking the poetry's intent likely far from its originally intended context):

This is the one song everyone

would like to learn: the song

that is irresistible:

the song that forces men

to leap overboard in squadrons

even though they see the beached skulls

the song nobody knows

because anyone who has heard it

is dead, and the others can't remember.

Shall I tell you the secret

and if I do, will you get me

out of this bird suit?

(I wonder if the deliberate removal from context and subsequent application of a quotation is anything like the deliberate and maligned censoring of an author's published words.  If so, I am guilty, guilty, guilty.)

Goya

Good poetry is like a dot-to-dot in one of those coloring/activity books I buy my kids to keep them quiet in church.  The dots, obviously as there but the connecting of them is left to the reader.  While I'm in no way claiming any of this (my words) as poetry, much less good poetry, I am leaving the majority of dot-connecting to you--one poem, quotation, and painting to the next--partially because I think the connections are more profound that way, but mostly because my kids just went to bed (which really means things are supposed to be quiet but they aren't--at all) and I'm having a really hard time focusing long enough to articulate the shortest and most menial of my thoughts.

One of my favorite poems to use in my English classroom, and quite a classic, is "Aunt Jennifer's Tigers" (below), by Adrienne Rich.  It's a great poem, and it's a perfect one to teach because of its abundant use of classic (and by "classic," here, I mean all the required stuff that shows up all over state boards of education English curricula) poetic devices.  All that aside, sure the poem is beautiful, but pay attention to the tigers, the dreaminess, and how, really, they're indeed monsters from the dreams of a rational or reasonable mind:

Aunt Jennifer's tigers prance across a screen,

Bright topaz denizens of a world of green.
They do not fear the men beneath the tree;
They pace in sleek chivalric certainty.

Aunt Jennifer's finger fluttering through her wool
Find even the ivory needle hard to pull.
The massive weight of Uncle's wedding band
Sits heavily upon Aunt Jennifer's hand.

When Aunt is dead, her terrified hands will lie
Still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by.
The tigers in the panel that she made
Will go on prancing, proud and unafraid. 

Now put that together with “Dreamtigers,” by another of my all-time favorites, the great Jorge Luis Borges (seriously, if you like any of the stuff we talk about here at The Wall and you haven’t read this guy yet, get with the program!):

In my childhood I was a fervent worshiper of the tiger—not the jaguar, that spotted “tiger” that inhabits the floating islands of water hyacinths along the Parana’ and the tangled wilderness of the Amazon, but the true tiger, the striped Asian breed that can be faced only by men of war, in a castle atop an elephant.  I would stand for hours on end before one of the cages at the zoo; I would rank vast encyclopedias and natural history books by the splendor of their tigers.  (I still remember those pictures, I who cannot recall without error a woman’s brow or smile.)  My childhood outgrown, the tigers and my passion for them faded, but ther are still in my dreams.  In that underground sea or chaos, they still endure.  As I sleep I am drawn into some dream or other, and suddenly I realize that it’s a dream.  At those moments, I often think: This is a dream, a pure diversion of my will, and since I have unlimited power, I am going to bring forth a tiger.

            Oh, incompetence!  My dreams never seen to engender the creature I so hunger for.  The tiger does appear, but it is all dried up, or it’s flimsy-looking, or it has impure vagaries of shape or an unacceptable size, or it altogether too ephemeral, or it looks more like a dog or bird than like a tiger.

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There is another piece of lit that I think qualifies, potentially, as part of this dot-to-dot, but it's bigger than I've got space her to include, a children's story, frequently banned, entitled, Little Black Sambo. Here’s the link (HERE – scroll down to the story), and then here, too, is the old movie.

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