Curious George, by H.A. Rey
The dangerous and often charming allure of childlike mischief lies behind the story and art of Curious George. Rey draws dark curved outlines that give the impression of slyness, and garishly applied watercolors to suggest danger, warmth and fun. This is a book for all mischievous children from 3-7.
Wempires, by Daniel Pinkwater
This is a very strange book, by a very strange author. He draws simply, I believe with just ink. They look very much like scribbles. Despite the crudeness, the art is captivating because it fit the narrator's perspective so well. The story is about a regular little boy who wants to be a vampire, and the smiling, matter-of-fact illustrations leap straight from his words onto the page. Because the pictures are somewhat bizarre, and not much too look at in and of themselves, this book is much for the 6-11 age bracket, and even then, only for kids who can fully immerse themselves in weirdness.
Monsters, by Russel Hoban and Quentin Blake
This is my favorite team of picture book creators. Hoban specializes in telling the stories of little boys making room for their repressed imaginations and Blake gives them life in his messy, junkyard style illustrations. Blake uses ink or pencil outlines and water colors, I believe, cobbling fantasies from all manner of squigglies and doodads. This story makes use of childlike illustration to get directly at the child's imagination, working from scribbles to a "real version" drawn in a more vivid style.
Richard Scarry
Color, variety and constant action characterize Richard Scarry's stories.
May 7, 2007
Apr 23, 2007
Piddling
ENGL 221
Professor Iris Creagh
Sam Lively
22 April 2007
Free For All
It was the highest priority for Thomas Paine. William Bradford and the Pilgrims of Plymouth colony were willing to die for it. Both parties were willing to sacrifice other lives for more of it. The word is freedom. Its mention prompts many an American patriot to shed proud tears, thinking perhaps that the salty water on his or her cheeks is made of the same stuff as Paine’s ink and the Pilgrims’ blood. The dream extends on into eternity, when all will be seated together at a heavenly round table reading the Declaration of Independence aloud to standing ovations. This happy unity finds its surest base on the shared desire for freedom.
Conversely, varying definitions of freedom can introduce strife that could undermine a community. Paine and the Pilgrims held a few basic ideas of freedom in common, but differed fundamentally in more precise understandings of what evils they wished to be free from. The extent of the difference is drastic enough that neither party would survive in a fully realized conception of the other’s ideal society. Yet their legacies survive in close proximity to each other, even referenced in tandem, and modern America apparently sees no hypocrisy in paying homage to both.
The first landmark in the Pilgrims’ ultimate vision of freedom was escaping persecution. Their oppressor was the "lordly and tyranous" Anglican Church; the state church was devoted to routing out Separatists like the Pilgrims (Bradford 26). In this sense, they had much in common with freedom seekers such as Paine. In Common Sense, Paine builds his case for freedom largely on the misdeeds of the English monarchy. Paine rails against tyranny in the political realm, whereas the Pilgrims were focused on the abuses of religion, but the villain is the same in each case.
If they were reading each other’s works up to this point, Paine and Bradford might be voicing hearty exclamations of "Hear, hear!" and "Amen!" respectively. This ease of agreement is likely the reason Paine leaned so heavily on castigating England in Common Sense; it was far easier for him to find fellow believers in the wrongs of tyranny then in rightness of his favored brand of government, and especially in his beliefs about religion.
Religion comes strongly to bear in the determination of evil, and there begins the divergence of Paine’s and the Pilgrims’ values as they pertain to freedom. Paine is adept at camouflaging his unpopular religion of Deism. A cursory reading of Common Sense might give the reader the impression that Paine is a devout Christian. Paine thumps the Bible heavily to make several points in that text; he quotes liberally from I Samuel to undermine the doctrine that kings were established by God’s will. Apparently preferring to leave unequivocal judgements of evil, he quotes this passage, add his own emphasis in capitalizing it: "WE HAVE ADDED UNTO OUR SINS THIS EVIL, TO ASK A KING" (12).
Paine proceeds to make a value judgement that could nestle comfortably into Bradford’s work: "For monarchy in every instance is the popery of government" (12). Bradford writes of the "grosse darknes of popery" (25). This similarity is likely intentional, as Paine was writing for a predominantly Christian audience of mostly Puritan heritage, and it is, perhaps, deceptive. In his Age of Reason, written nearly 20 years after Common Sense, Paine confesses his Deist religious beliefs, stating, "My mind is my own church" (464). Later in this work he discredits the same Bible he made such thorough use of in his prior work.
Under the light of this information, the Bible appears much less in the actual framework of Paine’s arguments in Common Sense than his many allusions to the "scripture" at first indicate. More essential to his case is his humanistic belief in the fundamental right of man to live under the power of his own reason, free from the folly of another. Any Bible verses he includes he uses as confirmation of this belief. Perhaps he took on the auspices of a Bible-believing Puritan in Common Sense to avoid any unjust dismissal from his audience before his arguments were heard. Regardless, his views on freedom are not so rooted in Judeo-Christian beliefs as he makes them out to be.
The Pilgrims placed the Bible, religious counsel and supernatural revelation above all other resources available for decision-makers. Their entire reasoning for departing stemmed from their need "to have the right worship of God & discipline of Christ established in the church, according to the simplicitie of the gospell… and to have & be ruled by the laws of God’s word" (Bradford 25). Their lesser respect for man’s reason is evident in a quote from the same passage, decrying the sullying of God’s truth with "men’s inventions." They refer to Catholic rituals, but their disdain for those is not based on differing interpretation of the Bible; they loathe the addition worldly practices not specifically derived from the Bible.
Though his disbelief in the Bible distances Paine from the Pilgrims on a pre-suppositional basis, his reasoning in Common Sense remains only a short leap of faith away from the doctrines espoused in Of Plymouth Plantation. He does not believe in man’s innate goodness, perhaps partaking of the Calvinist doctrine that proclaims man's total depravity. Based on this belief, he does not advocate a libertine freedom, and acknowledges the need for government. He chooses an interesting metaphor for government, calling it a "badge of lost innocence" (4), an image reminiscent, or prophetic, of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Scarlet Letter.
The Pilgrims wore their badge of lost innocence with gravity. Since they viewed evil as a constant presence in the community, per man’s total depravity, their need for government was great. With unlimited personal freedom came unchecked sin, an epidemic the Pilgrim community had left their homes to be free of. The story of Thomas Granger, taken down by Bradford in Of Plymouth Plantation illustrates. Granger was a teenager found guilty of bestiality and sentenced to death. Bradford’s commentary provides an important insight into the Pilgrims’ understanding of the role of government and the need to limit freedoms. The boy could not live because "one wicked person may infecte many" (203).
While Paine may have agreed with Pilgrims’ justice system as it pertained to laws such as the one that condemned Granger, he would part most dramatically with them on the extent of their government and their willingness to impinge on the freedoms of others. The Pilgrims’ believed they possessed a far-reaching commission in the enforcement of morality. A trouble-making Puritan named Thomas Morton settled near Plymouth; he erected a maypole and began to throw parties, providing alcohol and women to any who cared to stop by. According to Bradford, "it was if anew they had revived & celebrated the feasts of the Roman Goddes Flora, or the beastly practieses of the madd Bacchinalians" (141). The Pilgrims resolved to end the celebration by force, storming Morton’s settlement, cutting down the maypole and imprisoning Morton. This was the extent of the Pilgrims’ tolerance for others’ religious freedoms.
Paine, had he lived amongst the Pilgrims and avowed his faith to them, would have likely received similar treatment. His beliefs were as distant from the Pilgrims as were Morton’s, and though he may not have distributed alcohol, any sort of writing meant to persuade the Pilgrim faithful of a more worldly course of action would have earned the designation of evil and made him subject to the government. Paine could not have lived freely with the Pilgrims.
Nor would the Pilgrims have been welcome, or perhaps even safe, in Paine’s free society. In Age of Reason he designates any mixing of church and state as "adulterous." He follows this observation with a vision on the sort of revolution he desires to follow the American and French Revolutions, a "revolution in the system of religion" ending in the sole adoption of Deism. The Pilgrims would likely be casualties of such a revolution.
The time difference between the two parties prevented a true conflict and resolution between their opposing goals. Paine’s careful dilution of his radical religious motivations and his willingness to limit his vision for freedom to what could be expressed in Puritan terms also downplayed the controversy his true views would have sparked. What remains is a shared revulsion for a foreign tyrant, strong belief in the duty of government to free its society of evil and the word freedom. Love of freedom, if the bold dreams and visions freedom promises are kept only to the minds they delight, unites Thomas Paine and the Pilgrims of Plymouth colony.
Works Cited
Bradford, William. Of Plymouth Plantation Ed. Harvey Wish. New York, NY: Capricorn Books, 1962.
Paine, Thomas. "Common Sense." The Life and Major Writings of Thomas Paine. Ed. Phillip S. Phoner. New York, NY: Citadel Press, 1974.
Professor Iris Creagh
Sam Lively
22 April 2007
Free For All
It was the highest priority for Thomas Paine. William Bradford and the Pilgrims of Plymouth colony were willing to die for it. Both parties were willing to sacrifice other lives for more of it. The word is freedom. Its mention prompts many an American patriot to shed proud tears, thinking perhaps that the salty water on his or her cheeks is made of the same stuff as Paine’s ink and the Pilgrims’ blood. The dream extends on into eternity, when all will be seated together at a heavenly round table reading the Declaration of Independence aloud to standing ovations. This happy unity finds its surest base on the shared desire for freedom.
Conversely, varying definitions of freedom can introduce strife that could undermine a community. Paine and the Pilgrims held a few basic ideas of freedom in common, but differed fundamentally in more precise understandings of what evils they wished to be free from. The extent of the difference is drastic enough that neither party would survive in a fully realized conception of the other’s ideal society. Yet their legacies survive in close proximity to each other, even referenced in tandem, and modern America apparently sees no hypocrisy in paying homage to both.
The first landmark in the Pilgrims’ ultimate vision of freedom was escaping persecution. Their oppressor was the "lordly and tyranous" Anglican Church; the state church was devoted to routing out Separatists like the Pilgrims (Bradford 26). In this sense, they had much in common with freedom seekers such as Paine. In Common Sense, Paine builds his case for freedom largely on the misdeeds of the English monarchy. Paine rails against tyranny in the political realm, whereas the Pilgrims were focused on the abuses of religion, but the villain is the same in each case.
If they were reading each other’s works up to this point, Paine and Bradford might be voicing hearty exclamations of "Hear, hear!" and "Amen!" respectively. This ease of agreement is likely the reason Paine leaned so heavily on castigating England in Common Sense; it was far easier for him to find fellow believers in the wrongs of tyranny then in rightness of his favored brand of government, and especially in his beliefs about religion.
Religion comes strongly to bear in the determination of evil, and there begins the divergence of Paine’s and the Pilgrims’ values as they pertain to freedom. Paine is adept at camouflaging his unpopular religion of Deism. A cursory reading of Common Sense might give the reader the impression that Paine is a devout Christian. Paine thumps the Bible heavily to make several points in that text; he quotes liberally from I Samuel to undermine the doctrine that kings were established by God’s will. Apparently preferring to leave unequivocal judgements of evil, he quotes this passage, add his own emphasis in capitalizing it: "WE HAVE ADDED UNTO OUR SINS THIS EVIL, TO ASK A KING" (12).
Paine proceeds to make a value judgement that could nestle comfortably into Bradford’s work: "For monarchy in every instance is the popery of government" (12). Bradford writes of the "grosse darknes of popery" (25). This similarity is likely intentional, as Paine was writing for a predominantly Christian audience of mostly Puritan heritage, and it is, perhaps, deceptive. In his Age of Reason, written nearly 20 years after Common Sense, Paine confesses his Deist religious beliefs, stating, "My mind is my own church" (464). Later in this work he discredits the same Bible he made such thorough use of in his prior work.
Under the light of this information, the Bible appears much less in the actual framework of Paine’s arguments in Common Sense than his many allusions to the "scripture" at first indicate. More essential to his case is his humanistic belief in the fundamental right of man to live under the power of his own reason, free from the folly of another. Any Bible verses he includes he uses as confirmation of this belief. Perhaps he took on the auspices of a Bible-believing Puritan in Common Sense to avoid any unjust dismissal from his audience before his arguments were heard. Regardless, his views on freedom are not so rooted in Judeo-Christian beliefs as he makes them out to be.
The Pilgrims placed the Bible, religious counsel and supernatural revelation above all other resources available for decision-makers. Their entire reasoning for departing stemmed from their need "to have the right worship of God & discipline of Christ established in the church, according to the simplicitie of the gospell… and to have & be ruled by the laws of God’s word" (Bradford 25). Their lesser respect for man’s reason is evident in a quote from the same passage, decrying the sullying of God’s truth with "men’s inventions." They refer to Catholic rituals, but their disdain for those is not based on differing interpretation of the Bible; they loathe the addition worldly practices not specifically derived from the Bible.
Though his disbelief in the Bible distances Paine from the Pilgrims on a pre-suppositional basis, his reasoning in Common Sense remains only a short leap of faith away from the doctrines espoused in Of Plymouth Plantation. He does not believe in man’s innate goodness, perhaps partaking of the Calvinist doctrine that proclaims man's total depravity. Based on this belief, he does not advocate a libertine freedom, and acknowledges the need for government. He chooses an interesting metaphor for government, calling it a "badge of lost innocence" (4), an image reminiscent, or prophetic, of Nathaniel Hawthorne’s Scarlet Letter.
The Pilgrims wore their badge of lost innocence with gravity. Since they viewed evil as a constant presence in the community, per man’s total depravity, their need for government was great. With unlimited personal freedom came unchecked sin, an epidemic the Pilgrim community had left their homes to be free of. The story of Thomas Granger, taken down by Bradford in Of Plymouth Plantation illustrates. Granger was a teenager found guilty of bestiality and sentenced to death. Bradford’s commentary provides an important insight into the Pilgrims’ understanding of the role of government and the need to limit freedoms. The boy could not live because "one wicked person may infecte many" (203).
While Paine may have agreed with Pilgrims’ justice system as it pertained to laws such as the one that condemned Granger, he would part most dramatically with them on the extent of their government and their willingness to impinge on the freedoms of others. The Pilgrims’ believed they possessed a far-reaching commission in the enforcement of morality. A trouble-making Puritan named Thomas Morton settled near Plymouth; he erected a maypole and began to throw parties, providing alcohol and women to any who cared to stop by. According to Bradford, "it was if anew they had revived & celebrated the feasts of the Roman Goddes Flora, or the beastly practieses of the madd Bacchinalians" (141). The Pilgrims resolved to end the celebration by force, storming Morton’s settlement, cutting down the maypole and imprisoning Morton. This was the extent of the Pilgrims’ tolerance for others’ religious freedoms.
Paine, had he lived amongst the Pilgrims and avowed his faith to them, would have likely received similar treatment. His beliefs were as distant from the Pilgrims as were Morton’s, and though he may not have distributed alcohol, any sort of writing meant to persuade the Pilgrim faithful of a more worldly course of action would have earned the designation of evil and made him subject to the government. Paine could not have lived freely with the Pilgrims.
Nor would the Pilgrims have been welcome, or perhaps even safe, in Paine’s free society. In Age of Reason he designates any mixing of church and state as "adulterous." He follows this observation with a vision on the sort of revolution he desires to follow the American and French Revolutions, a "revolution in the system of religion" ending in the sole adoption of Deism. The Pilgrims would likely be casualties of such a revolution.
The time difference between the two parties prevented a true conflict and resolution between their opposing goals. Paine’s careful dilution of his radical religious motivations and his willingness to limit his vision for freedom to what could be expressed in Puritan terms also downplayed the controversy his true views would have sparked. What remains is a shared revulsion for a foreign tyrant, strong belief in the duty of government to free its society of evil and the word freedom. Love of freedom, if the bold dreams and visions freedom promises are kept only to the minds they delight, unites Thomas Paine and the Pilgrims of Plymouth colony.
Works Cited
Bradford, William. Of Plymouth Plantation Ed. Harvey Wish. New York, NY: Capricorn Books, 1962.
Paine, Thomas. "Common Sense." The Life and Major Writings of Thomas Paine. Ed. Phillip S. Phoner. New York, NY: Citadel Press, 1974.
Dec 30, 2006
Can't ever get enough
Writing is a craft. Must put my feet to the plow. That last sentence doesn't sound write. I think I've been away too long.
I've been pretty cynical about most forms of art. I'm inclined to poke at most artistic offerings, in hope (or despair?) that the piece in question will cave under the pressure and disintegrate into devilish foolishness or spring out, jack-in-the-box!, a moronic, drooling noise-maker.
A little more practice here, a little time in the Word there, a lot of prayer over there, and some reading behind that corner, and a masterpiece should gently slip out. Anyone can do it right?
Or is my skill finding fault and tearing, rendering me useless in telling a new story, or in the scientific field, doing new research?
Slipping away... Spear that thing before it's lost down the the storm drain.
I've been pretty cynical about most forms of art. I'm inclined to poke at most artistic offerings, in hope (or despair?) that the piece in question will cave under the pressure and disintegrate into devilish foolishness or spring out, jack-in-the-box!, a moronic, drooling noise-maker.
A little more practice here, a little time in the Word there, a lot of prayer over there, and some reading behind that corner, and a masterpiece should gently slip out. Anyone can do it right?
Or is my skill finding fault and tearing, rendering me useless in telling a new story, or in the scientific field, doing new research?
Slipping away... Spear that thing before it's lost down the the storm drain.
Jun 2, 2006
Edward Teach, mysterious fellow.
I had him at Cambridge. Rather shy. Not an outstanding pupil, but curious enough. Absent-minded, I remember thinking of him, but not the idle sort that frequented my classroom. That mind was always somewhere specific. I wasn't surprised when I heard he left for a sea voyage.
Ed, yeah. Nice enough fella. A bit of a drunk on Sunday afternoons. He'd rear himself up and holler all sorts of fancy philosophy at me. I just tried to say 'yessir' to everything but that got him right mad and he got to more drinking. Had a few friends, lowlifes if you ask me. A cripple, and some soldiers... oh, and that preacher. Strange bunch. Talked up storms.
Ohh, Ed. Sweet man, sweet man. Those eyes! Softest brown you'd ever seen, but so fiery too. You always could count on a lark and a laugh in his company. Not that he was without his faults. Such a man for spirits, and so moody, like a woman, he was.
Excellent seaman. Really took pride in his work. A steady hand, even green.
I had him at Cambridge. Rather shy. Not an outstanding pupil, but curious enough. Absent-minded, I remember thinking of him, but not the idle sort that frequented my classroom. That mind was always somewhere specific. I wasn't surprised when I heard he left for a sea voyage.
Ed, yeah. Nice enough fella. A bit of a drunk on Sunday afternoons. He'd rear himself up and holler all sorts of fancy philosophy at me. I just tried to say 'yessir' to everything but that got him right mad and he got to more drinking. Had a few friends, lowlifes if you ask me. A cripple, and some soldiers... oh, and that preacher. Strange bunch. Talked up storms.
Ohh, Ed. Sweet man, sweet man. Those eyes! Softest brown you'd ever seen, but so fiery too. You always could count on a lark and a laugh in his company. Not that he was without his faults. Such a man for spirits, and so moody, like a woman, he was.
Excellent seaman. Really took pride in his work. A steady hand, even green.
Apr 4, 2006
Blackbeard was not always so mean. Dorothy Hudson can attest to that. She met him on the docks at Charleston. He wasn't like other seamen. He was educated, thoughtful and colorful. He was no Blackbeard then, but relatively cleancut.
He was a man in desperate need of adventure. The schools of England had not sufficed, the long ocean voyage, the exotic ports: all were trifles in his bored, cynical mind.
He was a man in desperate need of adventure. The schools of England had not sufficed, the long ocean voyage, the exotic ports: all were trifles in his bored, cynical mind.
Apr 3, 2006
first scene of the coaster
The first scene: the first dance class of the season begins. Clive always shows up for such events, to see if John can hook him up with a hot dish. Alex, tired of studying, shows up, too. There are never enough guys.
Sure enough, only one guy shows up: a tall, handsome German named Nick, with girlfriend Gretchen. John sends Alex downstairs to fetch Sal to even things up. Out of the entire group, only John, Charlene and the nordic Gods, Nick and Gretchen, seem to be at ease. Molly is boy crazy, Clive is girl crazy. Alex is always nervous about physical contact. Ashley is struggling under the weight of her emotional baggage. A bespectacled, frumpy looking girl named Lily doesn’t seem pleased with the selection of guys to dance with. The token large woman, Pat, is, of course, a little worried.
The initial pairings: Nick and Gretchen, Clive and Ashley, Sal and Molly, Alex and Lily and John and Pat. John rotates once every five minutes. Gretchen draws the intial attention for her striking blonde hair, severe gray dress, slender figure and goddess bearing. That she had a Calvin Klein type foreign model hanging on her arm and ignoring all outsiders only added to her intrigue. Ashley, though pretty, can’t compete with exotic mystery, at least on a first glance scenario. Molly, an average looking girl with extra weight around the hips, only registers as an annoying man-chaser. Pat is to be avoided like the plague. Lily is frightening with those alien goggles.
John, though handsome, is not initially attractive for his critical eye and business-like manner. Clive and his black forest of hair is striking in appearance and engaging in manner, but too obviously ogling Gretchen to even disguise himself enough to deceive any but Molly or Lily. Alex is cute in his shy way, but too fumbling in the dance to impress any one but Molly, who’s ready to dive on anything with a good face. Sal is older and grumpy, practically shoving his partners around. He and Pat get into it. Nick is skilled and effortless in his dance, but frustrated and snobbish when dancing with anyone but Gretchen.
When Charlene shows up John is surprised. She’s wearing a black hat, her white hair curled, her blue dress sharp and pretty. John breaks off the rough beginning of the dance to dance with her. The business-like manner and piercingly critical gaze dissolve into gentle strength and cooperation as they danced the waltz. Ashley is immediately effected by both. Charlene squeezes John’s hand and smiles to the crowd before walking out.
Alex gets Ashley for a partner in that vulnerable moment: he’s fascinated by her obvious thoughtfulness (he’s just danced with Lily, Pat and Molly). Studying her distant face, it doesn’t take him long to realize she’s pretty in a subtler way than anyone he’s met before. Ashley, coming partially back to earth from her thoughts, is mildly intrigued by this young guy who looks at her with such gentle interest and without glance at her chest or attempts to show off on the dance floor. They begin to talk in between rock steps.
Sure enough, only one guy shows up: a tall, handsome German named Nick, with girlfriend Gretchen. John sends Alex downstairs to fetch Sal to even things up. Out of the entire group, only John, Charlene and the nordic Gods, Nick and Gretchen, seem to be at ease. Molly is boy crazy, Clive is girl crazy. Alex is always nervous about physical contact. Ashley is struggling under the weight of her emotional baggage. A bespectacled, frumpy looking girl named Lily doesn’t seem pleased with the selection of guys to dance with. The token large woman, Pat, is, of course, a little worried.
The initial pairings: Nick and Gretchen, Clive and Ashley, Sal and Molly, Alex and Lily and John and Pat. John rotates once every five minutes. Gretchen draws the intial attention for her striking blonde hair, severe gray dress, slender figure and goddess bearing. That she had a Calvin Klein type foreign model hanging on her arm and ignoring all outsiders only added to her intrigue. Ashley, though pretty, can’t compete with exotic mystery, at least on a first glance scenario. Molly, an average looking girl with extra weight around the hips, only registers as an annoying man-chaser. Pat is to be avoided like the plague. Lily is frightening with those alien goggles.
John, though handsome, is not initially attractive for his critical eye and business-like manner. Clive and his black forest of hair is striking in appearance and engaging in manner, but too obviously ogling Gretchen to even disguise himself enough to deceive any but Molly or Lily. Alex is cute in his shy way, but too fumbling in the dance to impress any one but Molly, who’s ready to dive on anything with a good face. Sal is older and grumpy, practically shoving his partners around. He and Pat get into it. Nick is skilled and effortless in his dance, but frustrated and snobbish when dancing with anyone but Gretchen.
When Charlene shows up John is surprised. She’s wearing a black hat, her white hair curled, her blue dress sharp and pretty. John breaks off the rough beginning of the dance to dance with her. The business-like manner and piercingly critical gaze dissolve into gentle strength and cooperation as they danced the waltz. Ashley is immediately effected by both. Charlene squeezes John’s hand and smiles to the crowd before walking out.
Alex gets Ashley for a partner in that vulnerable moment: he’s fascinated by her obvious thoughtfulness (he’s just danced with Lily, Pat and Molly). Studying her distant face, it doesn’t take him long to realize she’s pretty in a subtler way than anyone he’s met before. Ashley, coming partially back to earth from her thoughts, is mildly intrigued by this young guy who looks at her with such gentle interest and without glance at her chest or attempts to show off on the dance floor. They begin to talk in between rock steps.
Mar 23, 2006
ENGL 231
Sam Lively
Romantic paper
03/23/06
The Monster of the Upper Sky
From childhood’s hour I have not been
As others were – I have not seen
As others saw – I could not bring
My passions from a common spring
-Edgar Allan Poe ("Alone")
It is ironic that the poet's isolation is part of what makes him compelling to so many people. It may be the artistic expression of a "pity party," a ceremony of misery that somehow brings pleasure. The Byronic hero (who drives Lord Byron's dramatic poems and has migrated to a number of other works) suffers under such isolation, but does so with an entirely different attitude. In the dramatic poem, Manfred, Byron magnifies the suffering to a suitably romantic extreme. In it, he portrays Manfred not as a simpering victim, but as monster with only himself and his fate to blame.
Manfred is a tortured young nobleman, seeking relief through his mastery of the dark arts of sorcery. A terrible wrongdoing haunts his memory; forgetfulness and death are his goals. He describes himself by means of his guiding star:
… a star condemn’d,
The burning wreck of a demolish’d world,
A wandering hell in the eternal space (44-46, Act I)
This description certainly has elements of self-pity and victimization; fate can be blamed for his condemnation and the wreckage of his life. Yet the sentiments here are much more powerful than moping: hell implies an active torment. After Manfred summons the spirits of nature to do his bidding, the spirit of his guiding star expands on his previous description:
The hour arrived – and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame,
A pathless comet, and a curse,
The menace of the universe;
Still rolling on with innate force,
Without a sphere, without a course,
A bright deformity on high,
The monster of the upper sky! (116-123, Act I)
Manfred breaks from the mold of tragic victims in this portrayal: he is not in danger, but dangerous; he is not pitiful but spectacular in his plight; he is not cursed, but is a curse. He is not bound to any path of fated misery, but is a free-roaming inferno, unable or unwilling to restrict himself, and perhaps without a greater power to contain him.
Manfred does not seek any to contain him. He refuses subjugation to spirits and does not condescend to lesser men. In response to the friendly injunction of a fellow man to befriend humans, he says:
I could not tame my nature down…
And be a living lie – who would become
A mighty thing amongst the mean, and such
The mass are: I disdained to mingle with
A herd, though to be a leader – and of wolves.
The lion is alone, and so am I (116, 119-123, Act III)
Though Manfred's loneliness is part of his anguish, it is self-imposed, not for any lack in himself, but for his superiority. The one being he desired relationship was the woman he wronged and indirectly destroyed (Byron dances around the exact situation, but it strikes of Byron's own affair with his half-sister). It is this vulnerability that links him to humanity, and ironically it is his own unrestricted power, "rolling on with innate force" that strikes at his weakness. He likens himself to the deadly Saharan dust storm called the Simoom:
The red-hot breath of the most lone Simoom,
Which dwells but in the desart, and sweeps o’er
The barren sands which bear no shrubs to blast,
And revels o’er their wild and arid waves,
And seeketh not, so that it is not sought,
But being met is deadly (128-133, Act III)
Such is Manfred's plight: his innate destructiveness makes any relationship tragic, yet he is too human not to want one. He is his own tormentor, but he will not deny himself. He seeks death as his relief, and will accept no other: not even penitence, offered by the Church. He achieves his death, his victory the absence of redemption and the making of his own way, even as a "wandering hell."
Byron constructs in Manfred a terrifying object; his existence is a horrifying one, but, in its horror, commands awed attention. He is all at once the fire and the tinder: he exists to destroy himself. He is the "monster of the upper sky" that draws all eyes upward, until he burns to nothingness. None would aspire to become him, but all find a form of fascination with him.
Works cited:
Poe, Edgar Allan. "Alone." Lays of the New Land.
Gordon, George. "Manfred." Norton Anthology of English Literature.
Sam Lively
Romantic paper
03/23/06
The Monster of the Upper Sky
From childhood’s hour I have not been
As others were – I have not seen
As others saw – I could not bring
My passions from a common spring
-Edgar Allan Poe ("Alone")
It is ironic that the poet's isolation is part of what makes him compelling to so many people. It may be the artistic expression of a "pity party," a ceremony of misery that somehow brings pleasure. The Byronic hero (who drives Lord Byron's dramatic poems and has migrated to a number of other works) suffers under such isolation, but does so with an entirely different attitude. In the dramatic poem, Manfred, Byron magnifies the suffering to a suitably romantic extreme. In it, he portrays Manfred not as a simpering victim, but as monster with only himself and his fate to blame.
Manfred is a tortured young nobleman, seeking relief through his mastery of the dark arts of sorcery. A terrible wrongdoing haunts his memory; forgetfulness and death are his goals. He describes himself by means of his guiding star:
… a star condemn’d,
The burning wreck of a demolish’d world,
A wandering hell in the eternal space (44-46, Act I)
This description certainly has elements of self-pity and victimization; fate can be blamed for his condemnation and the wreckage of his life. Yet the sentiments here are much more powerful than moping: hell implies an active torment. After Manfred summons the spirits of nature to do his bidding, the spirit of his guiding star expands on his previous description:
The hour arrived – and it became
A wandering mass of shapeless flame,
A pathless comet, and a curse,
The menace of the universe;
Still rolling on with innate force,
Without a sphere, without a course,
A bright deformity on high,
The monster of the upper sky! (116-123, Act I)
Manfred breaks from the mold of tragic victims in this portrayal: he is not in danger, but dangerous; he is not pitiful but spectacular in his plight; he is not cursed, but is a curse. He is not bound to any path of fated misery, but is a free-roaming inferno, unable or unwilling to restrict himself, and perhaps without a greater power to contain him.
Manfred does not seek any to contain him. He refuses subjugation to spirits and does not condescend to lesser men. In response to the friendly injunction of a fellow man to befriend humans, he says:
I could not tame my nature down…
And be a living lie – who would become
A mighty thing amongst the mean, and such
The mass are: I disdained to mingle with
A herd, though to be a leader – and of wolves.
The lion is alone, and so am I (116, 119-123, Act III)
Though Manfred's loneliness is part of his anguish, it is self-imposed, not for any lack in himself, but for his superiority. The one being he desired relationship was the woman he wronged and indirectly destroyed (Byron dances around the exact situation, but it strikes of Byron's own affair with his half-sister). It is this vulnerability that links him to humanity, and ironically it is his own unrestricted power, "rolling on with innate force" that strikes at his weakness. He likens himself to the deadly Saharan dust storm called the Simoom:
The red-hot breath of the most lone Simoom,
Which dwells but in the desart, and sweeps o’er
The barren sands which bear no shrubs to blast,
And revels o’er their wild and arid waves,
And seeketh not, so that it is not sought,
But being met is deadly (128-133, Act III)
Such is Manfred's plight: his innate destructiveness makes any relationship tragic, yet he is too human not to want one. He is his own tormentor, but he will not deny himself. He seeks death as his relief, and will accept no other: not even penitence, offered by the Church. He achieves his death, his victory the absence of redemption and the making of his own way, even as a "wandering hell."
Byron constructs in Manfred a terrifying object; his existence is a horrifying one, but, in its horror, commands awed attention. He is all at once the fire and the tinder: he exists to destroy himself. He is the "monster of the upper sky" that draws all eyes upward, until he burns to nothingness. None would aspire to become him, but all find a form of fascination with him.
Works cited:
Poe, Edgar Allan. "Alone." Lays of the New Land.
Gordon, George. "Manfred." Norton Anthology of English Literature.