THEODORE ROETHKE
(1908-63)
“My Papa’s Waltz”
“Child on Top of a Greenhouse”
MY ANALYSIS
 “Child on Top of a Greenhouse”
• about a boy who is admiring nature.
• Cuts his foot on glass
• Ashamed of who he is
 “My Papa’s Waltz
• About a boy being abused by his father
• Father is a drunk
• Mother cant stop him
CRITICAL - “MY PAPA’S
WALTZ”
 Ciardi: “My Papa’s Waltz is a poem of terror… the house is shaking, the mother
is frowning, the father’s hand is scarred by violence, every misstep in the dance
scrapes the father’s belt buckle painfully against the boy’s ear” (Fong 80).
 Kennedy: “Although this reader [one who believes it is about abuse] noticed
some of the events in the poem to be desperate, he missed the tone of the poem so
misunderstood it altogether…Nor did he stop to feel the suggestions in the last line,
with the boy still clinging with persistent love” (Fong 79-80).
EXPLICATION “MY PAPA’S
WALTZ”
 The Whiskey on your breath / could make a small boy dizzy
• Father is a drinker
 But I hung on like death
• Kid is holding on for dear life
 My mothers countenance / could not unfrown itself
• Mom could not do anything to stop it
EXPLICATION
 The hand that held my wrist / was battered on one knuckle
• Hand is hurt from violence
 At every step you missed / My right ear scraped a buckle
• Every time the boy messed up he got hit with the belt
 Still clinging to your shirt
• Still holding on to try not to be dropped
LITERARY ELEMENTS
 Rhyme scheme
•
•
1st+3rd word and 2nd +4th word of each stanza rhyme
Ex: Breath and Death
 Metaphor
•
At every step you missed / my right ear scraped a buckle
•
But I hung on LIKE death
 Simile
 Euphony
•
•
“A smooth, pleasant sounding, choice of and arrangements of sounds”
Sounds like one is dancing alone as they read
EXPLICATION “CHILD ON
TOP OF A GREENHOUSE”
 Wind billowing out the seat of my britches
• Just sitting and enjoying the breeze
 My feet crackling splinters of glass and dried putty
• Cut his feet, but does not seem to react much
 A few white clouds rushing eastward
• Enjoying the beauty of the clouds going by
EXPLICATION
 And everyone, everyone pointing up and shouting
• I don’t think anyone is accutaly there
• He is showing that he is ashamed of something
• Thoughts of others judging him are overcoming the beauty of nature
LITERARY ELEMENTS
 Caesura
•
Up through the streaked glass, flashing with sunlight
 Personification
•
•
Flowers= accusers
Elms- plunging and tossing

Free Verse

Imagery
•

My feet crackling splinters of glass and dried putty
Simile
•
The half grown chrysanthemums staring up LIKE accusers
WORKS CITED
 Fong, Bobby. "Roethke's "My Papa's Waltz"" JSTOR. College Literature, 1990.
Web. 5 May 2013.
 Roethke, Theodore. “My Papa’s Waltz.”
 Roethke, Theodore. “Child on Top of a Greenhouse.”
 "Theodore Roethke." The Poetry Foundation. N.p., n.d. Web. 05 May 2013.
 "Two Interpretations: "A Child on Top of a Greenhouse"" Tripod. N.p., n.d.
Web. 05 May 2013.
 Google images