Actually that description of Sweeney is very reminiscent of Wyndham Lewis social cariccatur which he called a 'tyro'. Worth checking out.
P.M.
Peter Dillane <[log in to unmask]> wrote:
yes I also CR as most would I think but
I still ask myself why I engage in that economy of narrative collaboration when
the poet goes out of his way to tease out who is who for each event.
As Nancy also observed (paraphrasing from memory )
it is a poem of transient indistinct events with a grave menace in the
background. If there is a kind of slippage or indistinct view of person
and place I cant see why I should be so sure of my presumptions that I know who
is who.
The persons represented all are gravity bound to
this room and find themselves in specific locations except Sweeney who is
also guarding something like the gates of hell when the vista slips
towards the river plate and he also gets out from under the girl
seamlessly and then outside if that is him at the window.
outside with the nightingales.. I wonder what I am
supposed to think about that circumscribing which is only apparent when you view
him from inside.
Cheers Pete
----- Original Message -----
Sent: Monday, July 30, 2012 1:56 PM
Subject: Re: Sweeney's golden grin?
|
Thanks, Pete. Much grist for my grind.
"The person in the
Spanish cape / Tries to sit on Sweeney’s knees"
I always thought
"the man with heavy eyes" to be Sweeney who, apprehending the two ladies
to be "suspect", declines the gambit, pretends fatigue with heavy eyes
and departs.
CR
|
From: Peter Dillane <[log in to unmask]>;
To: <[log in to unmask]>;
Subject: Re: Sweeney's golden grin?
Sent: Mon, Jul 30, 2012 3:00:56 AM
| Hi CR,
no I can't but who says
the man with heavy eyes is Sweeney? The next stanza starts "The host
with someone indistinct" which I would say could be said of all present
except when explicitly say it is Sweeney whose knee is identified as the
place to fall from. The stage setting is provided with specific
locations but shifting naming of the characters. Now this is reminiscent
of the alternate names of epic oral verse but it is self conscious here
not entirely a nod to tradition. I feel as if there is a nightmare crowd
of shape shifting players 'the person" in the cape is "she" once she is
on the floor and later "the lady in the cape" so I guess I am ok to say
this is one person and that is the one in league with another "she" who
because of proximity of reference is Rachel nee Rabinovitch but
still it could be the "silent vertebrate in brown" that is the
other she although the "brown" suggests it is the silent man of the
preceding stanza. Nancy has written that this poem relies less on
conscious cleverness than the other Sweeney poems but I find this kind
of gambit distracting . Do you think circumscribe is just to
surround or is it to delimit and is "golden" a glorious adjective or a
more sinister toothy gold capped leer?
Cheers Pete
On 30/07/2012, at 12:07 PM, Chokh Raj wrote:
|
There's an anomaly (?) between Sweeney's animal laughter in
the opening stanza and his later golden grin. Could someone
please explain it? Here's the opening stanza:
APENECK
SWEENEY spreads his knees
Letting his arms hang down to
laugh,
The zebra stripes along his jaw
Swelling to
maculate giraffe.
CR |
From: P <[log in to unmask]>;
To: <[log in to unmask]>;
Subject: Re: Sweeney's golden grin?
Sent: Mon, Jul 30,
2012 1:27:30 AM
Really wonderful
poetry!!
P.M.x
Chokh Raj <[log in to unmask]>
wrote:
|
She
and the lady in the cape
Are suspect, thought to be in league;
Therefore the man with heavy eyes
Declines the
gambit, shows fatigue,
Leaves the room and
reappears
Outside the window, leaning in,
Branches
of wistaria
Circumscribe a golden
grin;
'Sweeney among the Nightingales'
Incidentally, a picture of
Wisteria at
CR
|
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