By: Adam Griffith
Biography
 Son of Otto Roethke who owned a greenhouse
 Born May 25th 1908 in Saginaw, Michigan
 Died August 1st, 1963 in Bainbridge Island, Washington
 Father and Uncle both died in the year 1923 when he
was 15, drove him into a depression
 Attended University of Michigan from 1925-1929
Biography continuded
 become an English professor at a variety of universities
including Lafayette College, Pennsylvania State
University, and Bennington College.
 The Great Depression and both World Wars helped
drive him farther into his depression
 influenced by several poets including but not limited
to Emerson, Thoreau, Whitman, Blake, Wordsworth,
Yeats and Dylan Thomas
Biography continued
 First book of poetry called Open House in 1941
 Only had 6 other books published in his life time and 1
post humorously (The Far Field 1964)
Poetry Analysis
 My Papa’s Waltz” by Theodore Roethke is about a
father who comes home a little bit drunk and tipsy,
and joyfully plays with his son
 creates the image of a son who loves his father very
much and wants nothing more than to continue
playing with him even though it is a little rough
Poetry Analysis continued
 image of a dance up throughout the entire poem by
writing it in iambic trimeter to be as close to a waltz as
possible because a waltz is a three beat dance
 this type of play and roughhousing is not without
consequence because he frequently alludes to the pain
he feels and the small scrapes and bruises he receives
for engaging in this playful activity with his fath
Poetry Analysis continued
 Roethke includes the image of the mother in line
seven. This shows that this waltz is not unobserved
and that she is there to step in and stop it if it gets too
out of hand and the boy could be seriously injured
Criticism
 a man of great emotion and used poetry as an outlet
for his feelings about his own personal past and the
events of his life
 Elegy for Jane: Jay Parini feel that Roethke’s expressed
grief is for the human condition of death and that we
must all die while others such as Lynn Ross-Bryant,
Roethke is simply expressing a deeply personal and
emotional grief over the loss of his student.
Criticism
 Epidermal Macabre: he examines himself and finds
that he is unhappy and unsatisfied with his life the way
he is living it
 Frederick Lenz says that Roethke is unhappy because
he is caught between two worlds, ignorance and
knowledge of a higher spiritual order
Criticism
 In a Dark Time: Even the title expresses the depths of
despair that he was in when he wrote it
 Roethke is saying that one only begins to really look at
their own life with a critical lens when they are at the
depths of despair
 Roethke’s confusion at what is going to happen, if he
will be able to pull himself out of this despair or if this
is it and he will forever be lost in a deep depression
END