While it may seem that Leonard Cohen’s I Have Not Lingered in European Monasteries is a clear rejection of external institutions for an internal individualism, a closer reading sees a more conflicted persona that does acknowledge—and even yearn for— external dogma. Central to the poem is the negative refrain, “I have not”, which the persona uses in the first three stanzas to dismiss various institutions: European culture, mysticism, religion and so on. However, these negative refrains are superficial: they secretly have an affirmative subtext that celebrates their respective external dogma. It is only with the refrain in the final stanza that this becomes clear.
Category: Essays
Irving Layton’s The Swimmer can be interpreted as an exploration of the contrary connection between the artist and his art. The poet is simultaneously witness and participant; the art is simultaneously expression and mimesis. It is precisely this clashing relationship that makes the swimmer metaphor so apt: the swimmer is both apart from and within the water. The Swimmer can be read as the same emergent space in-between the swimmer and the sea: poetry is what is created from the poet and his art.
In The Fertile Muck, Irving Layton explores the physical and metaphorical dichotomies between the micro and the macro in the natural and artificial worlds. In doing so, Layton reveals a poetic omnipresence, accessible through love and imagination, which dominates reality.
Dorothy Livesay’s The Three Emilys explores the contrary roles of an artist and a mother. Livesay compares the poem’s persona, presumably herself, to the Emily’s, a synecdoche for Bronte, Dickinson, Carr and other female poets who forsook the domestic life. While Livesay initially sees the Emily’s lack of domesticity as pitiful, she eventually comes to envy their creative freedom.
In The Rocking Chair, A.M. Klein layers deep meaning upon a rocking chair by making it a symbol of the continuous identity and traditions of Quebec. This is cleverly done through subtle metafiction, particularly regarding The Rocking Chair’s stanza form. Klein deftly draws the The Rocking Chair, the actual rocking chair and Quebec together to emphasize regularity through emergence.
In Portrait of the Poet as Landscape, A.M. Klein engages with the identity of the poet and the role of his art. The poem is a künstlerroman, which sees the maturity of an artist against the decaying modern society around him. The insignificance and irrelevance of the poet in the modern age is stressed. It is not clear if the poet is living or dead—it does not matter for “We are sure only that from our real society / he has disappeared; he simply does not count” (Klein 15-16). Klein places the poet in juxtaposition with the public and the reader by using the plural person pronoun: “we” and “our” against the disappeared poet. The public does not care about the poet, nor does the poet appear to care about himself: he is “incognito, lost, lacunal” (Klein 28).
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Sturgeon: The Primordial and the Fish
Karen Solie’s “Sturgeon” explores the titular fish as it lives in a prairie river, focusing on one specific encounter being captured by the persona. But the sturgeon is more significant than just a mere fish—it represents a primordial nature that must confront a growing humanity. There are hence two aspects of the sturgeon, the primordial and the fish, allowing Solie to show the conflict with humanity on both a metaphysical and metaphoric level, as well as a physical and literal level, resulting in a complete understanding for the reader.
“Section: Rock-Drill De Los Cantares” is the sequence of Ezra Pound’s “The Cantos” containing Cantos LXXXV-XCV. Here, Pound’s ideas on paradise, slowly built upon in the previous cantos, are brought to their zenith. These eleven cantos capture the idea of paradise that Pound is trying to articulate and achieve, and the relationship this has on culture and language.
The primary difficulty of Ezra Pound’s “Hugh Selwyn Mauberley” lies in identifying the speaker in each of the respective poems in the sequence. Is Pound speaking, or is Mauberley? Precisely what is the relationship between the two? And what ideas is Pound ultimately trying to communicate? There is no consensus; conflicting interpretations, based on every possible combination and permutation of Pound and Mauberley exist.
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Poet and Persona in Sestina: Altaforte
“Sestina: Altaforte” by Ezra Pound explores the character of Bertran de Born, a French baron and Occitan troubadour. Pound manipulates the relationship between poet and persona, emphasizing the simultaneous artifice and naturalness in Bertran, to show Bertran’s primal and authentic character. Pound portrays Bertran independently to create a historical authenticity and objectivity, but cannot help but hint at the poet’s influence and own ideas. Hugh Kenner precisely notes this, saying Pound’s persona “crystallizes a modus of sensibility in its context.” (Kenner 11) The persona can thus be seen as a transparent mask: Pound wears the face of Bertran to immerse the reader in the historic context and character, but to make his own personal sensibilities stronger. Using this technique, Bertran is portrayed more vividly and personally, and “Sestina: Altaforte” can be read as an acceptance and vindication of Bertran de Born.