The Bean Eaters Analysis

Life is full of inevitable change ad it is not always easy in order to understand our lives and ourselves, we much understand the sacrifices need to be made and this can mean having to face the unknown. Harwood’s collection of poetry explores the understanding that comes with change, despite the challenges it presents. Through her use of memories and the experience of losing what is valued in life, Harwood teaches readers that although the inevitable changes of life will not come easy, it is important to find ways to cope and move on with our lives.

The nature of Russian society is characterized by a sense of idealism. Russia’s beliefs of the potential for an ideal future have been pervasive throughout history. In 1920, Yevgeny Zamyatin wrote the short story “The Cave” during the midst of the Russian Civil War, a time when nationalism was at an all time low and people were hoping for a brighter future. In contrast to the goals that sparked the revolution, Zamyatin argues that the Russian Civil War will result in a primitive and decimated society that is ultimately worse off than the society that existed prior to the rebellion.

The autonomous choices Alma makes in the story provide insight in how it is important for the individual to know their own definition of meaningful, and how support in pursuing it is needed to obtain it. The poem “Atrophy” by Julia Copus is written from the perspective of someone who made the wrong choices and is stuck thinking of regrets instead of pursuing their fullest life. A meaningful life is defined by the individual alone and the power necessary to reach it is only obtained when an individual reconciles their past and present. If for too long an individual focuses on the past and abstains from making the choices necessary then they are capable of losing the ability

Lisa is on her grandmother’s worn but safe front porch, the two of them are snapping beans, yet Lisa is going through so much change within herself; she does not know what she can share with her grandmother.

'Larkin strips away the facades and exposes the empty reality of social ideals. ' To what extent do you agree with this statement?

For different people, comparable situations do not always reproduce the same end results or leave the same impressions. Rather, the resulting conclusion is often highly variable. As is the case of two labors featured in the poems, My Father’s Lunch” and “The life of a Digger”. While Erica Funkhouser’s speaker, Henry, experiences injustice and lack of reward for his hard labor in “The Life of a Digger,” Margarita Engle’s speaker experiences prosperity and remuneration for their father’s hard work in “My Father’s Lunch.” Each author uses the setting of a laboring man’s lunch break to demonstrate the ramifications of a hard day’s work and the rewards or lack thereof for their efforts.

Emilia Lanyer’s poem “The Description of Cooke-ham” is titled as if it is a pastoral ode praising the estate Cooke-ham. However, upon reading the poem, one quickly realizes that the true subject is actually Lanyer’s patroness, with whom Emilia stayed at Cooke-ham for some time. While the poem does describe, in detail, the beautiful natural scenery at Cooke-ham, it does so always in reference to this woman. Lanyer never names the subject by name, instead referring to her primarily in second person, though it is assumed that the subject is in fact her patroness, Margaret Clifford, Countess of Cumberland.

The poem, “My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke sounds like it can be lyrics to a song. It seems to be about a child dancing with their father, but it is so much deeper. The poem shows how a child is with their father every step of the way in their difficult life.

The attitudes to grief over the loss of a loved one are presented in two thoroughly different ways in the two poems of ‘Funeral Blues’ and ‘Remember’. Some differences include the tone towards death as ‘Funeral Blues’ was written with a more mocking, sarcastic tone towards death and grieving the loss of a loved one, (even though it was later interpreted as a genuine expression of grief after the movie “Four Weddings and a Funeral” in 1994), whereas ‘Remember’ has a more sincere and heartfelt tone towards death. In addition, ‘Funeral Blues’ is entirely negative towards death not only forbidding themselves from moving on but also forbidding the world from moving on after the tragic passing of the loved one, whilst ‘Remember’ gives the griever

The poem "Kindness" by Naomi Shihab Nye speaks about how you experience kindness and what it really is. The main point in this poem is that in order to experience people's kindness you need to experience hurt, sorrow, and loneliness. The author says that when you loose everything and have no one or thing that when kindness comes along it lifts you up "and then goes with you everywhere/ like a shadow or a friend" (33-34). When portraying this message the author uses a sad but hopeful tone to send the message she wants to say. This tone helps portray the message because you can feel how sad someone is when they are lonely and they have nothing. Then when the author changes the tone at the end of the poem in the last stanza to hopeful tone the reader can feel the hope and happiness that a person feels when they are down and they are given kindness.

A short poem similar to “Good Times” by Lucille Clifton normally would lack dimension and artistic value, however, through Clifton’s masterful writing and specific use of repetition, she elevates the poem to a noteworthy level, telling a complex story in a dense 18 lines. The short, repetitive poem lists an litany of momentary positives that juxtapose the more abundant times that are characterized by hardship. In focusing on “good times,” Clifton reveals the conflict between the present situation and previous memories. In “Good Times,” repetition is used in multiple ways to expose the complexity and depth of a single

The poem is set up in three stanzas. The first stanza is the speaker telling the woman that when she "[is] old and grey and full of sleep,"(1) just read "this book" of her past. The second stanza moves on to talk about her past relationships. Halfway through the stanza, though, he indicates "one man" who loved her better than the rest. This is an indication of his loving

While both poets try to be optimistic about the death of their loved ones, Wheatley, the more religious poet of the two, emphasizes the importance of religion by using her almost artistic sculpting of descriptive adjectives and robust nouns such as “The glowing stars and silver queen of light/ At last must perish in the gloom of night” and in using this word choice, she shows how much weight her religion holds (19-20). As Wheatley praises her God and his doings in her poem, Bradstreet makes sure to underline how much her relationship with her husband and kids mean to her. “Look to my little babes, my dear remains./ And if thou love thyself, or loved’st me,/ These o protect from step Dames injury” closing her poem with the focus of protecting her children from any harm possible shows us, the reader, that Bradstreet is mainly concerned with the wellbeing of her children (20-22). Both poets explain the certainty of death to the recipient of the poem, but the difference is, Wheatley is faced with a death that has already happened, whereas Bradstreet is more pessimistic possibly because of her struggle with her religion. This pessimistic behavior can also be seen in the fact that a pregnant Bradstreet prepares her family for her death in a time where she should be elated to bring life onto the earth. Instead of being joyous, Bradstreet says, “How soon, my Dear, death may my

Oscillating between the progression of life through the memories and experience of an individual is expressed through Gwen Harwood’s poem The Violets. The poem encapsulates the human experience as both integral to the formation of our perceptions of life and the timelessness that it provides to the audience. Gwen Harwood is able to create a text that goes beyond the way we respond, creating a deeper awareness of the complexity of human attitudes and behaviours.

In Spoon River Anthology, Masters uses colloquial diction and free verse to portray the lives of the lay-people that once lived in a fictional town near the Spoon River. The poems are significant because they are in the form of epitaphs that uncover truths often hid from view in small town life. The epitaphs are individually significant in that they contain irony that accompanies the colloquial, small town diction. In the epitaph of “Elsa Wertman,” Masters tells of a poor German girl who had an illegitimate child with a well-to-do gentleman of the small community. Ironically, her son is adopted by the wife of Thomas Greene and the boy is raised as the son of Thomas and Frances Greene, not Elsa Wertman. Ironically, the boy believes he came from