Poetry Introduction
1: Identity & Family
Tone, Sound and Free Verse
Image source
Housekeeping (1) –
Costumes, Props & Subtitles
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
Renting -- get receipts dated by the end
of Nov (11/30) to give them to me by
next Thurs (12/3)
Reimbursement-- the ones that pay will
get reimbursed on the spot—if the expense
total falls within the budget limit and
comes with the school’s tax ID
(35701598).
Prop Request Forms: send to David
yourself
Subtitles? Recommended, better
consistent (all the groups the same)-answers
given to Kate with the next group reports
Housekeeping (2)
Attendance and Group Reports
 A, C, F – missing the 4th reports
(meaning everyone is absent?)
 One person “missing” in E (their 5th report)?
 Actors/Actresses--No absence allowed
(or can be made up for) for group
rehearsals from now on.
 Comments & Subtitle sample ppt added
to our folder.
group leaders— 4 more weekly reports
(due 11/23, 11/30, 12/7, 12/14);
altogether 7 (important for attendance records)
Housekeeping (3)
Dress Rehearsals &
Play Schedule
12/10 8:30-12:30. Dress Rehearsal (1)
--breakfast served at 8:20 – 8:40
12/16 1:30-3:30.Rehearsal (2)
12/17 8:00-12:30..The Miny Play
Contest –lunch order today
Don’t be late!!!
12/10 (Thurs)
1. Attendance taken twice: at 8:30 and at 12:00
2. Working all the 3 hours: Except for the instruction
time, the director/group leaders should find work for
each person.
3. Each group with Hegel, perform for about 15 mins,
get instructions another 15 mins.
Act 1
Act 2-1
Act 2-2
Break
Act 3
Act 4
Act 5
From
09:00
09:30
10:00
To
09:30
10:00
10:30
10:40
11:10
11:40
11:10
11:40
12:10
12/16 1:30 -3:30
1. Attendance taken once: 30 mins before your performance
time
2. Before
 and after the prep & rehearsal times, the groups
can leave and find places to do rehearsal yourselves.
From
To
Act 1
01:30
01:50
Act 2-1
01:50
02:10
Act 2-2
02:10
02:30
Act 3
02:30
02:50
Act 4
02:50
03:10
Act 5
03:10
03:30
Poetry Unit Assignment

Due 12-07: One Poem: Annotations + one
paragraph analysis of its theme
(a. Note 作筆記; b. Download and Upload to 作業區）

Due 2016-01-04: Annotation of another poem
& Comparison of two poems
Outline
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I. What is poetry?
A. Its basic Components.
B. Its Functions: What is poetry good for?
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II. Poetry I: Identity
III. A Moment of Life Condensed
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II. Our Emotions Expressed
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F “I’m Nobody…” C “We Real Cool”
IV. Our interest in music and rhythm.
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E “Stopping By Woods” D “Those Winter Sundays”
Next Week: “This is Just to Say” “The Word Plum”
V. How do we read a poem?
VI. Sound and Sense, Meter and Rhyme
Poetry: Definitions
meter
1) literature in metrical form
(wordnet.princeton.edu/perl/webwn );
Denotation 
connotation
2) Poetry is life distilled. ~Gwendolyn Brooks
Poetry is thoughts that breathe, and words that burn.
~Thomas Gray
Traditional poetry is language arranged in lines, with a
regular rhythm and often a definite rhyme scheme.
Nontraditional poetry [free verse] does away with regular
rhythm and rhyme, although is usually is set up in lines. The
richness of its suggestions, the sounds of its words, and the
strong feelings evoked by its line are often said to be what
distinguish poetry from other forms of literature.(source)
Sound, shape & sense
Poetic Elements
Poetry
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wk 1 Speaker and Voice
wk 2-3 Sense: imagery and
figures of speech (意象與比喻語
言) denotation (意義) and
connotation (含意)
wk 4 Sound: rhythm (節奏),
meter(詩律), rhyme(韻).
(this & next S) Shape: line
arrangement & poetic form
Fiction
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Plot
Structure …
Narrator
Language
From The Dead Poet society (1) (2)
WHAT WILL YOUR VERSE BE?
What good amid these, O me, O life?
Answer.
That you are here—that life exists and identity,
That the powerful play goes on, and you may contribute a verse.
What is poetry good for?
It explores and deepens meanings of life

-- to expand our vision,

-- to beautify and enrich our lives.
Our Themes:
Identity & Daily Life,
Love & Nature
Death and Society,
Art and Modern Society
Its imagery and sounds

-- paint life and compose music with words,
Poetic Elements
Its language

-- renews and pushes beyond the limits of human language.
(Ref)
It sharpens our ears (for listening), trains our
pronunciation, expands our knowledge of language
(syntax, words) and activates our imagination.
As a start, let’s talk about how it (1) presents a
moment in life, (2) expresses our emotions and (3)
satisfies our need to sing and feel the rhythm of life.
Poetry is
1.
2.
3.
Life Story Condensed
Self Expression
Musical
Understanding
Poetry
From Paraphrasing, Analysis to
Application
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Poetry I: Lyric and Tone; Identity and Daily Life
[Reading and Paraphrase; theme & meanings]
Every group – short performance
[Group A: W. Carlos Williams “This is just to say” (p.
797);
Group B: Chasin, Helen “The Word Plum” (p. 828)]
Group C: Brooks, Gwendolyn “We Real Cool” (p
720)
Group D: Hayden, Robert “Those Winter Sundays”
(p 783)
Group E: Frost, Robert “Stopping by Woods…”
(p1091)
Group F: Dickinson, Emily “I’m Nobody! Who Are
You?”*
Poetry (1):
Tone, Identity and Daily Life

Life Story
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Self-Expression
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Frost, Robert “Stopping by Woods…” (p1091)
Hayden, Robert “Those Winter Sundays” (p
783)
Dickinson, Emily “I’m Nobody! Who Are You?”
Brooks, Gwendolyn “We Real Cool” (p 720)
Music


W. Carlos Williams “This is just to say” (p.
797);
Chasin, Helen “The Word Plum” (p. 828; ref.
830)
General Questions
What is ‘identity’?
What determines our identities?
Text
Identity
Factors (self vs. society)
“20/20”
Gender
What we pay attention to
“A Rose for
Emily”
Gender
The American South +
industrialism
“A & P”
Class/Gender
Small town America +
commercial society
“Araby”
Age/Gender
Religion vs. Commercialism
+ Dublin’s social problem
Pygmalion
Class/Gender
Late Victorian society +
English
General Questions
What is ‘identity’?
What determines our identities?
Self
Black
Text
Identity
Factors
“We Real Cool”
Collective
“Cool” Actions
Black
“I’m Nobody. Who
Are you?”
Private and
Associative
Social visibility
“Stopping by Woods” Private
Duty vs. rest
“Those Winter
Sundays”
Familial
Family poverty and
paternal care; Black
“This is Just to Say”
Familial
Daily order & a couple’s
relation
Unit 1: General Questions
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Which of the factors of identity
(society, family, your interest,
gender) concerns you the most?
Are parents always loving? What
makes their love difficult to
express, or 'difficult' for their
children to understand?
Can you see poetry out of daily life?
(1) Poetry offers
Vignettes of Life
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening
symbol
personification
Tone?
Whose woods these are I think I know.
His house is in the village, though;
He will not see me stopping here
To watch his woods fill up with snow.
rhyme
a
a
b
a
My little horse must think it queer
To stop without a farmhouse near
Between the woods and frozen lake
The darkest evening of the year.
b Open
b vowels
c and
bexplosives
He gives his harness bells a shake
To ask if there is some mistake.
The only other sound's the sweep
Of easy wind and downy flake.
c
c
d
c
The woods are lovely, dark, and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
d
d
d
d
Discussion Questions
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“I”: Who is the speaker? How would you
characterize him and his tone? Why do
you think he has decided to stop to look
at the woods?
“The horse”: What thoughts and
feelings does the speaker attribute to his
horse?
Speaker vs. the woods: What do you
think the speaker means by the line “But
I have promises to keep”? Why does he
use the conjunction “but” here? What
promises might he be thinking about?
An Unfulfilled Desire for
Nature, Magic, Rest (and Death?)
Death,
Rest,
Solitude
Woods
Life, Work,
Human
Society
Village
I
Frozen lake;
Snowy evening
SLEEP
Pay attention to its sound effects, use of
personification, images and symbols
horse
farmhouse
GO
Stopping by Woods on a Snowy Evening:
Sound and Sense
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Form: 4 rhymed quatrains; meter:
iambic pentameter; repetition of the
last two lines
Sound: long vowels, mellifluous
sound (/m/, /n/ or /v/) vs. explosives
(aspirated explosive /t/ & /p/; see the poem)
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Tone (expression of attitude and
feelings towards the subject)?
calm, meditative, tired, resigned to
fate
Frost’s New England Mentality (ref)
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
Frost's expression of the New England mentality toward woods dark,
deep and snow-filled has at its roots a place where all are snug in
farmhouses or cozy village homes; a place where all travel in security
with the safety of a favorite, contented horse pulling reliable sleighs.
This mentality views wintery woods as friendly, peaceful places. It is
not a mentality that casts--under normal circumstances--woods as
dangerous, malevolent places. New Englanders enjoy watching the
dark, deep woods that surround them quietly, almost magically, fill with
snow, watching almost mesmerized as the snow creeps higher and
higher up the tree bark or fence post.
For a New Englander, like Robert Frost was from 1885 on (37 years by
1922), winter snow is like a warm comforter descending on the land
and on one's soul for a long, peaceful slumber after a year of hard work
and toil. Falling snow filling a dark wood at the evening of the day is a
quieting sight that lights the eyes with a gentle glow and warms the
heart with thoughts of a later flower-strewn spring coming at the end of
winter quietude and slumber. The feeling produced is dreaminess, and
critic George Montiero, Professor Emeritus of Brown University, uses
the word "dreamy" to describe the poetic tone of the poem. He speaks
of the poet's "dreamy mind and that mind's preoccupations..." (George
Montiero, Robert Frost and the New England Renaissance). (source)
Robert Frost (1874–1963)
Norton
27
"Those Winter Sundays" (1962)
alliteration,
explosive sounds
Sundays too my father got up early
and put his clothes on in the blueblack cold,
then with cracked hands that ached
from labor in the weekday weather
made banked fires blaze. No one ever thanked him.
1) Cold +
color;
Cold + firewood
2) House
personified
I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking.
When the rooms were warm, he'd call,
and slowly I would rise and dress,
fearing the chronic angers of that house.
Open
Speaking indifferently to him,
vowels;
who had driven out the cold
Long and
and polished my good shoes as well, short lines
What did I know, what did I know
of love's austere and lonely offices? [rituals, ceremonious]
Questions for Discussion
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29
Why does the poem begin “Sundays too”
(rather than “On Sundays”)?
What does the use of alliteration, as in
“clothes,” “cold,” “cracked” (lines 2–3) and
“blueblack,” “banked,” “blaze” (lines 2, 5),
contribute to the poem?
What is the significance of the speaker's
reference to his fear of “the chronic angers
of that house” (line 9)?
What are the “austere and lonely offices” of
love in the poem (line 14)?
What does the poem suggest about how
the speaker felt about his father as a child?
Clues to the Last Question
1) Contrast between the last two lines
and the rest of the poem.
What did I know, what did I know
of love's austere and lonely offices?
2) Do you have similar experience with
your parents, where their love and care
don’t get appreciated?
"Those Winter Sundays" -1.
2.
3.
4.
Paraphrasing
Analysis (1) Connotation: the
contrast between the past view and
the present one about the
speaker’s father and his work.
Analysis (2) Poetic Language:
descriptions of the cold and the
house. Sound pattern.
Analysis (3) Does it matter to you
whether you know of the poet’s
background? Is the poem relevant
to you?
Robert Hayden
(1913–1980)
Norton
32
(2) Poetry expresses
our emotions
 Poetry can be understood in its
context, but also related to ours.
"We Real Cool" (1960 p. 685)
The Pool Players.
Seven at the Golden Shovel.
repetitions
We real cool. We
Left school. We
Lurk late. We
Strike straight. We
Sing sin. We
Thin gin. We
Jazz June. We
Die soon.
alliteration
internal rhymes
Strike straight:
1) attacking others;
2) play billiard balls
Jazz:
1) empty talk to or sex with
a woman named June;
2) going here and there in
June
"We Real Cool"
1.
2.
3.
4.
Paraphrasing
Analysis (1) Connotation: Speakers’
identity? Why “cool”?
Analysis (2) Poetic Language: Their tone?
How do the stress and sound Pattern
help convey the meaning? Symbol-Golden Shovel?
Analysis (3) What is “cool” for you?
Does developing a group identity matter
for you?
I'm Nobody! Who are you?
I'm Nobody! Who are you?
Are you--Nobody--too?
Then there's a pair of us!
Don't tell! they'd banish us—you know!
repetitions
How dreary--to be--Somebody!
How public--like a Frog-To tell your name--the livelong June-To an admiring Bog!
alliteration
Iambic meter
I'm Nobody! Who are you?
1.
2.
3.
4.
Paraphrasing
Analysis (1) Connotation: Speakers’
identity? That of “you”? The
differences between nobody and
somebody?
Analysis (2) Poetic Language: The
speaker’s tone in the 1st and 2nd stanzas?
The use of dashes? The metaphor of
bog and frog.
Analysis (3) Do you like to be a
somebody, or nobody? Or neither?
What do you feel about the speaker’s
criticism of “somebody” like a frog?
Emily Dickinson
(1830-1886)
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
A reclusive poet with mental
energies.
produced 1,775 known
poems as well as the
hundreds of letters. Only 7
(or 11) of the poems were
published anonymously in
her lifetime.
a traumatic experience
(between 1858 and 1862)
Stayed in her own house for
the last seventeen years of
her life.
Film: Emily Dickinson: The Poet In Her
Bedroom; voices and vision 15:15 (physical
world as inspiration); 29:30 (death)
(3) Poetry satisfies
our need to sing and feel the
rhythm of life.
One example: 李白【將進酒】
君不見黃河之水天上來，奔流到海不復回？
平仄仄平平平仄平仄平，平平仄仄仄平平
君不見高堂明鏡悲白髮，朝如青絲暮成雪？
平仄仄平平平仄平仄仄，平平平平仄平仄 (source)
人生得意須盡歡，莫使金樽空對月。
天生我才必有用，千金散盡還復來。
烹羊宰牛且為樂，會須一飲三百杯。
Stressed +
岑夫子，丹丘生，將進酒﹐杯莫停。
unstressed =
平平仄、平平平：平仄仄，平仄平。
meter (later)
與君歌一曲，請君為我傾耳聽。[……]
Line & Rhythm—樂府詩長短句 repetition with
variation)
This is Just to Say
Is this art? And how?
This Is Just To Say
I have eaten
the plums
that were in
the icebox
and which
you were probably
saving
for breakfast
Forgive me
they were delicious
so sweet
and so cold.
William Carlos Williams
1963)
(1883-
The Word Plum
The word plum is delicious
pout and push, luxury of
self-love, and savoring murmur
“P-lu-m”
full in the mouth and falling
like fruit
taut skin
pierced, bitten, provoked into
juice, and tart flesh
question
and reply, lip and tongue
of pleasure.
Eating Plum
Poetry?
The Word Plum
Analysis (1) – The poem describes
the uttering of the word plum (pout,
push, rolling of tongue, closing of
lips) and compares it to the eating of
a plum, and to ?
Analysis (2) – It also allows us to
imagine how the fruit is savored.
Analysis (3) – a. Which word do you
like the most—its sound, or shape or
meanings? b. Can reading poetry
“feel” like eating a plum?
Poetry and
Popular Songs
The two are interrelated, so
-- if you like songs, you should like
poetry;
-- if you know how to analyze
poetry, you must know how to do
that to songs (its music excluded).
painting and other arts
How do we read
and re-read a poem?
1.
Read and Paraphrase: Read a poem silently once to
try to catch its general meaning and mark new words
too. After you checked all the new words, read the
whole poem again and check and see if you can
paraphrase it. Remember that poetic syntax may be
different from that of our daily language.
[In other words, you sometimes need to move around
different parts of a sentence to understand its
meaning and “paraphrase” it.]
2. denotation  connotation: Read the poem the third
time and mark expressions that impress you. Try to
figure out the poem's deeper meanings.
Part to Whole Pattern: For some poems with
intricate image pattern or dense symbolic
meanings, you need to stop and dwell on some
parts of the poem and their interconnections.
How do we read
and re-read a poem?
3. sound  sense Read the poem out loud to
feel its sound effects.
Sounds – explosive or mellifluous sounds, long
or short vowels, nasal sounds, aspirated (p)
and unaspirated (b)
* The meanings of a (good) poem can not be
exhausted. Re-reading a poem (out loud or
silently) and taking note of your responses is
always good. The more times you read,
the more you will get from a poem.
Understanding
Poetic Language: Ref.
Sound and Sense
Sound & Sense

Different sounds create different
effects in different contexts. In
general




easily pronounced consonants (e.g. [l],
[r], [m], [n]) and open and long vowels
can be create a sense of ease or fluidity
Explosive sounds ([t], [d], [g], [k],[p]
[b]), sometimes combined with short
vowels, can create a sense of vitality or
difficulty.
nasal sounds ([m] & [n]) can create a
sense of melancholy
etc.
Rhyme & Rhythm
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
Rhyme is a sound device that usually entails
the repetition of the final vowel and consonant
sounds in two words.
internal rhyme: Some poems have rhymes
within the lines.
Assonance is the repetition of vowels sounds,
either at the beginning of words or within words.
Head rhyme: Alliteration is related to
assonance in that alliteration also involves the
repetition of sounds, this time the repetition of
consonants at the beginning or middle of words.
Meter (韻律 later): a regularly repeating rhythm,
divided for convenience into feet (音步). Meter
describes an underlying framework; actual
poems rarely sustain the perfect regularity that
the meter would imply.
(e.g. iambic pentameter 抑揚五音步 reference)
Lyric (抒情詩）



The most personal of poetic forms, lyric is
usually a short but intense expression of
personal feelings.
Although it is originally sung to the music
of a lyre, not all lyrics are to be
sung. Still, musical quality can be found
in some of the poems we have read (e.g.
“A Noiseless Patient Spider”).
Although it involves personal expressions,
the speaker of a lyric is not necessarily
the poet.
Conclusion

“Identity


Social vs. Personal, Public vs. Private
the parents and family relations:


“Those Winter Sundays” – hardship and stern
care
“This is Just to Say” – casual and familiar
Review


Questions—Speaker’s Tone and
Views, Sound and Line Pattern,
connections between the poem and
the poet.
Close Reading:


Tone as Conveyed thru’ content and
form (Sound Effect, Sound Pattern
[consonance, assonance and
alliteration], Line Length [where a Line
Ends and a Sentence Ends])
Lyric
Next Week

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All: annotation due 12/7
Each Group 10 mins’ performance: All the
crew members as audience, choosing best
actor and best actress
Summary & Figurative Language Hunt
Quiz on unit 1 poems; 12/24 Quiz on unit 1 &
2
[A & B Behn, Aphra “On Her Loving Two Equally” (p.
684)]
C Wordsworth “I Wandered Lonely as a Cloud” (p 677)
D Dickinson, Emily “A narrow Fellow in the Grass” (p 843)
E Burns, Robert “A Red, Red Rose” (p 808)
F Mary Oliver “Wild Geese”
Performances Today
11:00 – 12:00
-- Write on the board.
1) subtitles? 2) work schedule and transition music
3) Your Poem: Theme and Analysis
4) suggestions for the group
Perofmrance
Audience
11:00 – 11:10
Act 1 Group D
Group C & Group F
11:10 – 11:20
Act 2 Group C
Group E
11:20 – 11:30
Act 3 Group E
Group B
11:30 – 11:40
Act 4 Group B
Group A
11:40 – 11:50
Act 5 Group A
Group D
11:50 – 12:00
[Group F not today]
Back to Large Class
PlayContest: Tentative
Cast
Crew
Mini Play
Schedule
10/22 General Introd
Job Division starts
Group Leaders
10/29 Act I and Act II. (pp. 11-37)
Production Plan &
Casting
Text Chosen
Script Ready (11/6
11/5
Act II & III (pp. 38-71)
Line reading
11/12
Act III-IV (pp. 71-87 + Act V)
Rehearsal w/ script
Script Confirmed
Rehearsal w/ script
Technical Meeting;
Costume/PROP
deadline
11/19
Act V and Postscript
Mini Play Preparation
Rehearsal w/out
Poetry I: Lyric and Tone
script
Poetry II: Diction & Figurative
12/3
blocking
Language1
12/10 Mini Play Contest Rehearsal (1):
Advisor Hegel Tsai
11/26
12/17 Performance Day
the latest)
Set and Prop
Costumes
Subtitles produced
Dress Rehearsal
12/16 (1:30-3:30)
References


Figurative Language in Popular
Music
Figurative Language Pop Culture
2014