Analysis Of My Papa's Waltz Poem By Theodore Roethke

Comparing and contrasting Sylvia Plath’s “Daddy” and Theodore Roethke’s “My Papa’s Waltz”, one finds the two poems are similar with their themes of abuse, yet contrasting with how the themes are portrayed. Furthermore, the speaker 's feelings toward their fathers’ in each poem contrast. One speaker was hurt by the father and the other speaker was indifferent about how he was treated by his father. The fathers’ feelings toward the children are also different despite how each treated the child. Both poems accurately portray the parent-child relationships within an abusive home, even if they have different

Both of the poems are about the unconditional love to their father, but each defines it differently. It shows that no matter what happened love never ends. Love is not just about hugs and snuggles. In “My Papa’s Waltz” the father, who is whisking the boy away to bed, shows that no matter how tough the waltz was, the boy didn’t want to leave his dad. In “Those Winter Sundays” the love is being defined differently.

In the beginning of the poem Roethke describes what a child thinks about their father’s life. “The whiskey on your breath / could make a small boy dizzy; / But I hung on like death:/ Such waltzing was not easy”. The first stanza shows the way the child describes this father’s life. The first two lines talk about, “whiskey” and, “make a small boy dizzy” this shows that people like the child 's father cannot take such a difficult life like the child 's father does.

Another example of this, in the last stanza, lines 15-16, is made as Roethke notes “[t]hen waltzed me off to bed/[s]till clinging to your shirt.” The last lines of the poem show the true relationship at the end of all the confusion lost in the midst of the middle of the poem. The father loves his son and waltzes him to bed and the boy, loving his father, slings to his shirt to stay with him. The poem expresses the confusion and complexity created in a relationship such as this one between father and son, but at the end, the confusion is unnecessary and what prevails is not the negatives, but instead the positive aspect of

In stanza 3 states “But I hung on like death,” uses simile. It benefits the cause of alcohol that soon becomes tragic for the son. He’s gotten used to it that being abused, death can affect him. Additionally it touches people's ideas to illuminate the true meaning of the poem and to create a negative picture in the reader's mind that is shown by the son of an abusive father. In stanza 13 through 14, “You beat time on my head with a palm caked hard by dirt.”

The mother has nothing but a “countenance” expression to the actions the father is doing to his child. It can show that the narrator didn’t know anything better but to love. Although the poem may sound simple and easy to understand, My Papa’s Waltz is really a complex story

“My Papa’s Waltz” is written from the perspective of someone looking back on a vivid memory from their childhood. The poem demonstrates a problematic father son relationship. The playful tones of “romped until the pans slid” and “waltzed me off to bed” show that the child had love for his father. However, the concerning tones of “the whiskey on your breath”, “scraped a buckle”, and “you beat time on my head” reveal the abusive behavior of an alcoholic father toward his son. While reading this poem, the sensory and kinesthetic imagery immersed me in the experience.

In My Papa’s Waltz the speaker is a son who loves his father deeply even though his home is torn apart by alcohol and abuse. When reading throughout the poem there are words that will pop out

The subject of “My Papa’s Waltz” poem by Theodore Roethke has spurred passionate academic debate from professors, scholars, and students alike, the imagery, syntax, and diction of the poem clearly support the interpretation that Roethke writes “My Papa’s Waltz ” to describe the fond relationship with his father as a child. It has been argued that If he was being abused that he would have run away when he had the chance, rather, he didn’t want to let go of his father because they both were having fun. The son’s mother was growing due to motherly instinct out of her son’s safety of how crazy they were walzting, but made no attempts at the son and father’s intervention because it wasn’t necessary to interrupt them. Ultimately to describe

Throughout “My Papa’s Waltz” and “Those Winter Sundays”, the author’s reflect on how their fathers were hard workers, although each memory is emotionally different. In “My Papa’s Waltz”, Roethke remembers his father coming home from work and his hands “Was battered on one knuckle” (Line 10). Even though the father had a long day at work, the boy recounts him coming home and dancing with him. Whereas “Those Winter Sundays”, Hayden recalls his fathers hard work by describing his “Cracked hands that ached/

My Papa’s Waltz is a poem written by Theodore Roethke. The poem is a memory of a short moment of his childhood. The setting of the poem is in a kitchen. The poem starts when the dad comes home and his son hangs himself on to his dad. This poem has a simple abab rhyme scheme.

The speaker as a child would see his father as a harsh man but as an adult, when he looked back he saw that his father had a love for his family. His father's love could be considered as a hidden love. However in the poem “Piano” the speaker's life seemed great until he looked back at his past to see his mother playing the piano and

As the reader nears the end of the first quatrain there is a turn of events. For example, in the first quatrain the poet uses negative toned vocabulary: “But I hung on like death: / Such waltzing was not easy” (Roethke, 3-4). Specifically, the word ‘death’ sticks out because dancing is supposed to be fun not scary. Additionally, the poet has, once again,

Billions of people live in this world, each one taking part in countless relationships. These relationships form through the various interactions of everyday life. There are the relationships between friends, teachers and their students, and even the relationships between pets and their owners, all of which develop unique and amiable friendships over time. These relationships, however, often end and cannot withstand life’s hard ways, leaving only the strongest and deepest bond to survive the storms—the bond within the family. Simon J. Ortiz and Robert Hayden both depict this family bond differently in their poems. In “My Father’s Song,” Ortiz describes the caring and tender relationship between a father and his son. Hayden, however speaks in

I wrote this poem attempting to emulate the style of Theodore Roethke, specifically his poem “My Papa’s Waltz”. The inspiration of this poem was a camping trip and a hike me and my friends went on a couple of years ago. I used Roethke’s ABAB rhyme scheme and attempted to keep a similar meter. I also used the same style of syntax seen in “My Papa’s Waltz”, by using two lines of a stanza as one sentence. I attempted to convey the sense of wonder and nature I felt while on the trip, and I think this is best captured in the first stanza.