#94946
02/07/2003 9:49 PM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 6,296 |
What bits of American history can you identify in this poem of Plath's:
What a thrill ----
My thumb instead of an onion.
The top quite gone
Except for a sort of hinge
Of skin,
A flap like a hat,
Dead white.
Then that red plush.
Little pilgrim,
The Indian's axed your scalp.
Your turkey wattle
Carpet rolls
Straight from the heart.
I step on it,
Clutching my bottle
Of pink fizz. A celebration, this is.
Out of a gap
A million soldiers run,
Redcoats, every one.
Whose side are they one?
O my
Homunculus, I am ill.
I have taken a pill to kill
The thin
Papery feeling.
Saboteur,
Kamikaze man ----
The stain on your
Gauze Ku Klux Klan
Babushka
Darkens and tarnishes and when
The balled
Pulp of your heart
Confronts its small
Mill of silence
How you jump ----
Trepanned veteran,
Dirty girl,
Thumb stump.
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#94947
02/08/2003 2:30 AM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 872
old hand
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old hand
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 872 |
What bits of American history can you identify in this poem of Plath's
What bits of American history can you identify in this poem of Plath's?
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#94948
02/08/2003 9:11 AM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Well, I'm glad you asked, milum. But I don't think I know American History 101 as well as I should--
I see the Pilgrims and the Indians; (16th c)
And the Redcoats...(18th c)
And the Kamikaze... (20th c)
And the KKK... (20th c)
But how does Babushka fit in specifically? And what else have I missed that's subtler here?
And the Mill of Science? Is this just a generic term?
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#94949
02/08/2003 9:24 PM
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Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320
enthusiast
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enthusiast
Joined: Jan 2002
Posts: 320 |
Doesn't the Gauze Ku Klux Klan Babushka refer to a band-aid on her sliced finger? Plath did display a fascination with pain, even (particularly) her own. It's one of the things I most dislike about her poetry. Not that there aren't other things I do like.
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#94950
02/08/2003 10:33 PM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Yes, of course, the gauze is the babushka and all that, but I'm more interested in the historical connections she makes than just the immediate, more literal/imagistic references to the bleeding thumb and bandages.
Babushkas are Russian, right? So is she simply making a parallel reference perhaps to the Cold War period?
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#94951
02/08/2003 10:34 PM
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Joined: Jul 2000
Posts: 3,467
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Dunno. But I do identify what I consider pretty bad poetry. Sorry, poetry lovers, but that poem just plain sucks.
TEd
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#94952
02/08/2003 10:39 PM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Whether it sucks or not isn't the question, Ted. She's apparently moving through American history with quick references, and I'm try to figure out where it could be argued she's making such references.
This sure ain't a favorite poem of hers for me...but I am curious--and with a board of such an astute group of beings as do dwell here, I had hoped maybe someone could spot some more possible references. And I still do hope someone might spot something beyond the obvious ones I picked out.
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#94953
02/09/2003 12:51 AM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 872
old hand
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old hand
Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 872 |
This sure ain't a favorite poem of hers for me...but I am curious--and with a board of such an astute group of beings as do dwell here, I had hoped maybe someone could spot some more possible references. And I still do hope someone might spot something beyond the obvious ones I picked out.
I too am curious, why do you think it important to find referents to "history" in Sylvia Plath's poem. Her references were to war and bloodshed, in order perhaps, to relate to her internal eternal sufferings, and by consequence her self loathing, to the blood of her flesh.
But even if what I say is true, it is only one aspect of this wonderful poem. True poets have subtleties known only to the gods. You should know, wordwind, you are a poet.
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#94954
02/09/2003 1:17 AM
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Joined: Jan 2001
Posts: 13,858
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I think "babushka" is a metaphor, meaning the kind of hat a Russian grandmother used to wear,
being a diminutive of 'baba: as in "Baba Yaga".
babushka
n.
5Russ, grandmother, dim. of baba, old woman, orig. < baby talk: so named as frequent garb of old women6 a kerchief or scarf worn on the head by a woman or girl and tied under the chin
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#94955
02/09/2003 1:34 AM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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And what you say of "bloodshed" is one "aspect" that's caught my interest in this poem today, milum. And being a weak history student, I decided to take the question to the board to get some help with this single aspect. That's all. Nothing more; nothing less. But sometimes something bigger comes out of something small. Again, that's all.
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#94956
02/09/2003 2:14 AM
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Joined: Mar 2000
Posts: 11,613
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I'll give my humble opinion; I am not a poet or a student of poetry, or of Ms. Plath. But--to me this reads like the tip of her thumb was cut nearly off; this reminded her of scalping, and the ensuing blood and bandaging reminded her of wars she had studied. In other words, the present injury was the primary focus that just happened to make her think of certain war images. I don't get the impression at all that historical ref.'s were of much importance.
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#94957
02/09/2003 1:05 PM
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Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 13,803
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I don't get the impression at all that historical ref.'s were of much importance.
To quote the college English professor when told by Isaac Asimov the he (Asimov) hadn't meant all those things when he wrote the story about which the professor had been expostulating, "Just because you wrote it, what makes you think you know what it's about?"
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#94958
02/09/2003 4:57 PM
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Joined: Dec 2000
Posts: 2,661
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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...the professor had been expostulating...
Sometimes a cigar is just a banana! [Groucho-e]
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#94959
02/10/2003 1:06 PM
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Joined: May 2000
Posts: 679
addict
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addict
Joined: May 2000
Posts: 679 |
The whole thing looks like a moment in the Slick Willie/Monica affair.
This isn't a poem about war and history and pain. It's about sex!!!! The sexual connotations are so blatantly obvious!!!
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#94960
02/10/2003 1:54 PM
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Joined: Apr 2000
Posts: 10,542
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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Posts: 10,542 |
there are mountains of sites out there that claim this is all about self-mutilation; the only disagreement seeming to be whether it was triggered by an accident or something purposeful.
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#94961
02/10/2003 2:09 PM
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Joined: Sep 2001
Posts: 6,296
Carpal Tunnel
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Carpal Tunnel
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I read that the poem's genesis began with one of Plath's children's caretakers who'd had an accident and had sliced the tip of a finger.
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