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Jenna Oberman
Dr. Valletta
Literature & the Arts
20 November 2006
The Dangerous Preservation of Innocence
Though the innocence of a child is something so sacred that many people would
like to preserve it forever, there is no safe way to do so without dire consequences. The
poems “The History Teacher” by Billy Collins and “Missing” by Rita Dove both handle
this touchy subject from two rather unlikely but effective angles. While one is narrated
by the naïve child herself, the other is narrated by a person in control of the naïve
children. Both poems portray the idea of protection and use powerful and direct tones to
reach the reader’s thoughts and emotions.
In “The History Teacher”, Collins takes on the subject of the naïveté of children
in the classroom, subject to their teacher’s lessons. Children are supposed to trust
everything their teachers say, and likewise teachers are meant to teach the truth to their
students. Though the teacher in this poem does not tell the entire truth, in fact playing
down history’s truths, the children are oblivious to this and take in all of the “facts” that
their teacher provides. He is trying to play out the children’s innocence for all it is worth,
because he is knowledgeable about the world and its severity. He does not want them to
have the knowledge that he has.
Collins writes about a teacher who is trying to protect his students’ innocence by
telling white lies about world history and not letting them know just how harsh and coldblooded the world and its people can get. He wants the children to live their carefree
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lives for as long as they can, and he wants to veil their minds from large and dreadful
issues. He makes big historical trends seem insignificant to the unknowing children by
giving lessons on “the Chilly Age…/when everyone had to wear sweaters” (lines 3-4)
and “The War of the Roses” happening “in a garden” (line 11). The teacher seems to
believe that even by hiding the children’s imaginations from cruel events in history, he
will protect them from knowing what people can do in the present and future. In
suppressing these ideas, the children will not be able to use these same harsh methods
that humans are able to do and not make history repeat itself. He is not looking at the
deeper issue. In lines 15-17, “The children would leave his classroom / for the
playground to torment the weak / and the smart,” it is shown that even though he tries to
keep ideas of war out of their minds, they start their own little ones unknowingly. These
petty children’s battles may seem insignificant, but they show that it is in human nature to
compete and fight, as in a war. He does not see this and consequently does not know that
keeping secrets is not stopping more occurrences to happen. What he does not take into
consideration is that he is only in essence protecting them; hiding all of this makes them
oblivious to what real harm can be done to them. He is keeping their guards down, and
this is highly dangerous if they plan to live in a world where these realities happen.
Education is the key. It seems as though in this case the teacher is the one who needs to
learn the lesson.
The overall tone of “The History Teacher” is somewhat airy and lighthearted,
though still direct. This shows the sharp contrast between the fragile innocence of
children and the unforgiving brutality of the worldly happenings of today, yesterday, and
tomorrow. The contrast with this directness is very effective because the author does not
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have to state the purpose of his poem. It is apparent to the reader how dangerous the
situation is and could get. The airiness makes the poem almost seem contradictory with
the major events in history that are being scaled down to something so small that the
association of the two is nearly absurd. This contradictory attitude shows in the example
mentioned earlier of the War of the Roses. This war sounds as if it is something fun and
playful in a garden, when in fact it is a large conflict with malicious bloodshed.
Contradictions may also be found in Collins’ tone using images. As the teacher is
walking home after giving his false lessons, he walks “past flower beds and white picket
fences” (line 19) while contemplating scenes of a war. The author continues describing
this walk with the same lightheartedness he uses on the children’s innocence throughout
the poem. The tone the author takes really gives the reader an idea of the vast mistake
the teacher is making by playing down the events of history.
When Rita Dove wrote “Missing”, she also took on the subject of innocence, but
it was that of a girl instead of a whole classroom of children. Though the girl thinks
nothing of going “out with the girls” (line 1), her naïveté catches up with her. The poem
is a realization of what could have been prevented if the girl would have taken more care
as to where she was going. Her innocence hid the knowledge of what could happen.
Though both poems deal with innocence and naïveté of children, “Missing”, also includes
the supernatural. Once the daughter loses her innocence, she is already dead; it’s too late
to protect herself from the worldly harms that her mother wished to conceal. This is
shown through the knowledgeable thoughts of the girl’s ghost.
The girl goes out with her friends. It is just an innocent trip, so she does not feel
the need to let her mother know where they are going. The girls are naïve to the dangers
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of who could be out there, and consequently the girl somehow gets killed. It is not stated
directly that the girl was killed or that her ghost talked to the mother. Dove explains the
daughter talking to her mother and not knowing “what penetrates” (line 10). This is one
of the clues given, along with being “returned” (line 7) and that nothing can bring the
daughter back. This event was her wake-up call to the reality of the cold world, but it
was obviously too late – she was dead. The whole idea is that her mother never got to tell
her of the perils outside, or she just did not get the chance to hold back her naïve
daughter. The mother feels at fault for this death at innocence, and she may very well be
part of the reason – as hiding a child from the truth to keep her innocence can only hurt
her. The reader can see that the girl lost her innocence when she says, “Now I understand
she can never / die, just as nothing can bring me back” (lines 11-12). She gets the whole
picture – that because of being hidden from the truth, she was lost forever. Her death was
an epiphany of responsibility and self-protection; as if she were to say, “Now I
understand…”, but a bit too late. This is the dire consequence that her mother has to
handle for not being able to stop the girl from going out. She can not die because she is
not alive anymore – she can not live with the fact that she is at fault for an innocent death.
The daughter stays with her mother in the house for the rest of time, showing she did not
lose all innocence; she wants to live with her mother even though she cannot be seen or
heard. This is still the way of a child, just a child with understanding of what goes on in
the world; a child who lost her innocence with her life.
The tone the Dove uses is somewhat similar to the tone that Collins used in his
poem. They both use a matter-of-fact directness while talking about a matter one would
not normally be so direct about. Instead of using lighthearted directness about the subject
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as Collins did, Dove used a very straightforward, clean-cut tone. This distinct way of
writing is shown in lines 10-11: “Pity is the brutal / discipline”. In using this tone, Dove
is able to make the reader feel and imagine the way the setting looked – perhaps a nice
tidy house, the girl well dressed, and an overall attitude of pleasantness until the bad
thing happens (and it even seems to linger…oddly enough). She uses this effectively,
speaking through the main character in first person. Though she is not direct in saying
that the girl died, she was very straightforward in putting across the loss of innocence
through something oddly and perhaps secretly terrible. In stating “I am the daughter”
(line 1), given the rest of the context, the tone makes it seem to the audience that they are
actually reading “I was the victim”. Though at the end of Collins’ poem, the tone seems
to become even more lighthearted, Dove’s poem makes a twist into the mysterious. The
last two lines “I am the one who comes and goes; / I am the footfall that hovers” show a
mysticism that questions just how much innocence was lost, and possibly how much the
daughter may blame the mother for the fateful event. The word “hover” is more evidence
that the girl is now a ghost, because ghosts don’t actually step on the floor, but hover. It
also gives a hint of the child hovering over the mother in a fashion so that the mother’s
mind is never relaxed – the thought of what happened to the daughter and the daughter
herself stays hanging around. The play on words with the double-meaning of “hover”
continues with the well known reference of parents hovering over their children, being
overprotective. This mother did not hover over her daughter, and perhaps should have to
prevent the daughter’s death. The roles seem to reverse. This suggests that maybe the
daughter is not only there because she wants everything to be better, but also to leave an
aura of uneasiness.
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While both poems deal with the same basic subject of the protection of children’s
innocence, they each use different characters and different viewpoints to get the message
across to readers. Bill Collins uses the idea of a teacher attempting to hide children in
“The History Teacher”; Rita Dove uses the idea of a mother that was too late to protect
her daughter in “Missing”. Collins’ poem is in third person omniscient; Dove’s is in first
person. Collins does not deal with what could happen to the innocent but naïve children,
while Dove’s shows the consequences that actually happen. The authors both make a
direct approach in each of their poems, though “The History Teacher” is more
lighthearted, and “Missing” has clean-cut yet mysterious tones added. No matter what
method was used in writing these separate poems, the same message comes across – there
is no safe way to protect the priceless innocence of a child.