Hello =] Ok, brace yourselves…this is going to be a long entry. I finally have some time to blog what I've been taking notes on in my notebook while reading. I'm almost done with the poetry component so I'll be posting all of the notes I've taken on it. Explaining "wit" is harder than I thought. From the poetry by Dorothy Parker, I've found that she's witty by the way in which she presents her attitude to the reader and the particular connotations of certain words. First poem: "Of a Woman, Dead Young"
TPCASTT (I've honestly found this strategy the most useful with poetry. I started out doing SOAPSTONE but found TPCASTT a lot easier when dealing with analysis.)
T- Title: First off, I would like to comment on the inverted syntax here. Why does Parker deliberately choose to place "Dead Young" subsequent to "Of a Woman"? She possibly did this in order to stress the fact that she may be going to make a generalization or observation about the traditional roles of women in society. The placement of the words, "dead" and "young" is an interesting combination. "Dead" is usually associated with age, deterioration. It is somewhat negatively connotative. It is very curt and straightforward. "Young" tends to have an opposite sort of connotation; usually one pictures a porcelain doll with rosy cheeks when hearing this word.
P-Paraphrase: If this woman had been beautiful or wiser than the women around her, or moved with more poise or made a statement, if she had sons by her side like many other women had, did she have better or was she just waiting? If They had seen a flower on the floor amongst the great mountains and rivers in the world, they would've stepped on it, unnoticed. C-Connotation: This poem is filled with many highly connotative diction to emphasize the coldness and heartless of others.
-"She"/"They": I know this is not connotation but I wanted to comment on the use of this pronoun throughout the poem. This pronoun is not reinforced by any names. These unspecific pronouns may be used to make a generalization about how mankind interacts with each other.
-"Beautiful": This word is highly positive. Beauty is usually associated is nature or something in its pure form. This word is somewhat ironic to be placed at the beginning of the poem when the speaker is expressing how "if this woman was more beautiful" than maybe she would have been accepted. Parker is definitely witty in using this word to show society as contradicting.
-"moved" and "defiance": I found it very interesting how these two words are used together in terms of their connotation. "Moved" usually is a conscious action and in this case, Parker is encouraging women to be defiant although she jokingly means the opposite. Wit is used here because of the contrast in connotation.
-"eviler": usually is meant to portray something negative but she adds an "er" to the end for comic affect.
-"blast": Interesting how Parker uses this word because it implies that things have gone out of proportion. -"trample": very negatively connotative word when expressing someone stepping on a flower. Brings to mind someone crushing the world. It is used to blow up the situation.
A-attitude: The attitude of Parker in this poem is most defiantly comic and mocking. First off, the contrast in diction between simple, straightforward objects incorporated with complicated, overly connotative words exemplifies the fact that often society blows situations out of proportion that are not within the normal traditions. S-Shift: The shift takes place during the second stanza where she brings in the extended metaphor involving nature which has nothing to do with the woman above. In the first stanza, she makes it seem like it is the woman's fault for dying unnoticed but when the reader reads the second stanza, it is quite evident that she is mocking society in the first stanza and further exemplifies her views using the metaphor of the flower (such a small and different aspect of nature as opposed to the large mountains and rivers) and that it is "trampled" due to society's ignorance and emphasize on the obvious rather than paying attention to the different aspects of life rather than being one sided.
T-theme: Society always blames those who are different than themselves due to their incoherent views but in reality, it is society's fault because they are the ignorant ones.
T-title: The title makes more sense now emphasizing the anonymous woman mentioned in the first stanza who did not conform to society's expectations of her. Because of this, she is seen as "dead" because not many in her presence seem to notice her due to her lack of conformity to the social norm. "Young" portrays the fact that she is a young woman with much potential that will now go unnoticed because of society's stupidity. I find this is where Parker uses her wit the most. She mocks society through the connotation of the title throughout the poem which really stick out to the reader once they have read it.
TPCASTT (I've honestly found this strategy the most useful with poetry. I started out doing SOAPSTONE but found TPCASTT a lot easier when dealing with analysis.)
T- Title: First off, I would like to comment on the inverted syntax here. Why does Parker deliberately choose to place "Dead Young" subsequent to "Of a Woman"? She possibly did this in order to stress the fact that she may be going to make a generalization or observation about the traditional roles of women in society. The placement of the words, "dead" and "young" is an interesting combination. "Dead" is usually associated with age, deterioration. It is somewhat negatively connotative. It is very curt and straightforward. "Young" tends to have an opposite sort of connotation; usually one pictures a porcelain doll with rosy cheeks when hearing this word.
P-Paraphrase: If this woman had been beautiful or wiser than the women around her, or moved with more poise or made a statement, if she had sons by her side like many other women had, did she have better or was she just waiting? If They had seen a flower on the floor amongst the great mountains and rivers in the world, they would've stepped on it, unnoticed. C-Connotation: This poem is filled with many highly connotative diction to emphasize the coldness and heartless of others.
-"She"/"They": I know this is not connotation but I wanted to comment on the use of this pronoun throughout the poem. This pronoun is not reinforced by any names. These unspecific pronouns may be used to make a generalization about how mankind interacts with each other.
-"Beautiful": This word is highly positive. Beauty is usually associated is nature or something in its pure form. This word is somewhat ironic to be placed at the beginning of the poem when the speaker is expressing how "if this woman was more beautiful" than maybe she would have been accepted. Parker is definitely witty in using this word to show society as contradicting.
-"moved" and "defiance": I found it very interesting how these two words are used together in terms of their connotation. "Moved" usually is a conscious action and in this case, Parker is encouraging women to be defiant although she jokingly means the opposite. Wit is used here because of the contrast in connotation.
-"eviler": usually is meant to portray something negative but she adds an "er" to the end for comic affect.
-"blast": Interesting how Parker uses this word because it implies that things have gone out of proportion. -"trample": very negatively connotative word when expressing someone stepping on a flower. Brings to mind someone crushing the world. It is used to blow up the situation.
A-attitude: The attitude of Parker in this poem is most defiantly comic and mocking. First off, the contrast in diction between simple, straightforward objects incorporated with complicated, overly connotative words exemplifies the fact that often society blows situations out of proportion that are not within the normal traditions. S-Shift: The shift takes place during the second stanza where she brings in the extended metaphor involving nature which has nothing to do with the woman above. In the first stanza, she makes it seem like it is the woman's fault for dying unnoticed but when the reader reads the second stanza, it is quite evident that she is mocking society in the first stanza and further exemplifies her views using the metaphor of the flower (such a small and different aspect of nature as opposed to the large mountains and rivers) and that it is "trampled" due to society's ignorance and emphasize on the obvious rather than paying attention to the different aspects of life rather than being one sided.
T-theme: Society always blames those who are different than themselves due to their incoherent views but in reality, it is society's fault because they are the ignorant ones.
T-title: The title makes more sense now emphasizing the anonymous woman mentioned in the first stanza who did not conform to society's expectations of her. Because of this, she is seen as "dead" because not many in her presence seem to notice her due to her lack of conformity to the social norm. "Young" portrays the fact that she is a young woman with much potential that will now go unnoticed because of society's stupidity. I find this is where Parker uses her wit the most. She mocks society through the connotation of the title throughout the poem which really stick out to the reader once they have read it.
I still haven't exactly put my finger on how to define "wit" in the poems I've read so far. I know they're witty because I can pick up on it but I'm still not sure why I percieve them to be so.
I'm going to post two or three more TPCASTTs on seperate poems but seperately because it'll get too confusing if I post them all in one post. Stay tuned. =]
I'm going to post two or three more TPCASTTs on seperate poems but seperately because it'll get too confusing if I post them all in one post. Stay tuned. =]
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