An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum
Far far from gusty waves these children's faces.
Like rootless weeds, the hair torn around their pallor.
The tall girl with her weighed-down head. The paperseeming boy, with rat's eyes. The stunted, unlucky heir
Of twisted bones, reciting a father's gnarled disease,
His lesson from his desk. At back of the dim class
One unnoted, sweet and young. His eyes live in a dream,
Of squirrel's game, in the tree room, other than this.
On sour cream walls, donations. Shakespeare's head,
Cloudless at dawn, civilized dome riding all cities.
Belled, flowery, Tyrolese valley. Open-handed map
Awarding the world its world. And yet, for these
Children, these windows, not this world, are world,
Where all their future's painted with a fog,
A narrow street sealed in with a lead sky,
Far far from rivers, capes, and stars of words.
Surely, Shakespeare is wicked, and the map a bad example
With ships and sun and love tempting them to steal-For lives that slyly turn in their cramped holes
From fog to endless night? On their slag heap, these children
Wear skins peeped through by bones and spectacles of steel
With mended glass, like bottle bits on stones.
All of their time and space are foggy slum.
So blot their maps with slums as big as doom.
Unless, governor, teacher, inspector, visitor,
This map becomes their window and these windows
That shut upon their lives like catacombs,
Break O break open 'till they break the town
And show the children green fields and make their world
Run azure on gold sands, and let their tongues
Run naked into books, the white and green leaves open
History is theirs whose language is the sun.
"An Elementary School Classroom in a Slum" was first published in 1964 in Stephen
Spender's Selected Poems. The poem has since appeared in several collections, including
Collected Poems 1928–1985, published in 1985. "An Elementary School Classroom in a
Slum" is perhaps the best example of Spender's political voice resonating throughout a poem.
In this poem, Spender expresses his ideological positions on government, economics, and
education. The students in this classroom are underprivileged and malnourished. The
capitalistic government is supposed to supply equal opportunity for education, but the
classroom in the slum offers little hope for change or progress for its lower-class students.
This poem, written during the time of the Civil Rights movement in the United States, is
fitting both in its commentary about race issues in American education and as a Socialist
proclamation against capitalism and social injustice in general. Although Spender was
British, his extreme left-leaning political ideologies were in response to the global question
concerning social injustice. His poem does not explicitly name any country, location, race, or
citizenship. Spender's intent was to shed light on social injustices worldwide; regardless of
Spender's own ethnicity, the hotbed of this global struggle was the American Civil Rights
movement.
Stephen Spender highlights the plight of slum children by using vivid images and apt words to picture
a classroom in a slum. Through this he touches, in a subtle manner, the themes of social injustice and
inequalities.
Lines 1, 2
The opening line of the poem uses an image to contrast the slum children’s faces with those of other,
happier and more fortunate children. The line should state: These children’s faces are far removed
from looking like gusty waves. The image used is ‘gusty waves’ indicating brightness, verve and
animation. But these are missing from faces of these children. The next image of ‘rootless weeds’
produces double effect. ‘Weeds’ indicate being unwanted and ‘rootless’ indicates not belonging. The
slum children are like ‘rootless weeds’ unwanted by society and not belonging to society. Their
uncombed hair fall on their pale faces.
Lines 3 to 8
Next, a few of the slum children are described. There is a tall girl whose head is weighed-down with
sadness, disinterestedness or shame or a mixture of all the three. She is probably over-aged for the
class. Another boy is thin, emaciated like paper and his eyes pop out from his thin body looking furtive
like rat’s eyes. He seems to have inherited stunted and twisted growth of bones from his father.
Spender has used the word ‘reciting’ to show that instead of studying/reciting, a normal activity in
school, the boy had only his inherited crippling disease to show/recite in the class. This could suggest
that the boy’s condition seem to have arisen because of his poverty especially his inability to avail
heath services at the right time. Right at the back of the badly lit room is an unnoticed young boy. He
is probably too young for poverty to have stifled his childish imagination. He daydreams of the
squirrel’s game and about the tree house, absent mentally from the classroom.
Lines 9 to 12
Spender then describes the classroom. The word ‘sour’ used to describe the cream walls of the
classroom indicates its derelict condition. Donations: there are many things that have been donated
on the walls. Contradicting this state and the slum children are Shakespeare’s head indicating
erudition, the picture of a clear sky at dawn and a beautiful Tyrolese valley indicating beauty of nature
and hope, dome of an ancient city building standing for civilization and progress and a world map
awarding the children the world. The lines “Open-handed map / Awarding the world its world” could
refer to the map of the world hanging on the wall of the classroom giving/showing (awarding)
everyone (the world) the world out there to explore and know (its world).
Lines 13 to 16
But the world of the slum children is the limited world that can be seen though the windows of the
classroom and not what the map promises. All these seem ironic when contrasted with the misery and
hopeless condition of the slum children. Their future is foggy, bleak and dull. Their life/world is
confined within the narrow streets of the slum enclosed by the dull sky far away from rivers, seas that
indicate adventure and learning and from the stars that stand for words that can empower their future.
'Lead sky' means a dullsky or a dimly lit sky. This symbolises the bleak, dull life and future of the slum
children.
Lines 17 to 24
The poet feels that the head of Shakespeare and the map are cruel temptations for these children
living in cramped houses (holes), whose lives revolve around (slyly turns) dullness (fog) and
hopelessness (endless night) as they imagine and long for (steal) adventure(ships), for a better future
(sun) and for love. Their emaciated wasted bodies compared to slag (waste) heaped together seemed
to be wearing the clothes of skin covering their peeping bones and wearing spectacles of steel with
cracked glasses looking like bottle bits mended. The slum is their map as big as the doom of the city
buildings and their life (time and space) foggy and dim. The poet repeatedly uses the word fog to talk
about the unclear, vague and dull life of the slum children.
Lines 25 to 32
The only hope of a life beyond the slums that enclose their lives like catacombs is some initiative by
the governor, inspector of schools or a visitor. The poem ends with the poet fervently hoping that slum
children will have access to better education and a better way of life. He uses the words ‘Break o
break open’ to say that they have to break out from the miserable hopeless life of the slum world so
that they can wander beyond the slums and their town on to the green fields and golden sands
(indicating the unlimited world). These can become their teacher and like dogs lapping up food
hungrily, they can learn directly (run naked) from the open pages (leaves) of nature and the world
which is sustained (whose language) by the sun standing for energy and life.