ON THE VANITY OF EARTHLY GREATNESS

The poem describes what happens to powerful people and animals after they die. It seeks to show that time reduces all great things of history into something insignificant. In other words, the poet shows how greatness continues only for a short time by representing several instances in the poem. The tusks of mastodons that clashed in the war have now become the playthings. The sword of Charlemagne the Just which devasted several emperors has now used. People who used to fear with the hug of grizzly bear now sit comfortably on its fun. Similarly, the powerful general Great Caesar is confined to the shelf.

Q. What isironical about the poem?

=> He, the writer knows that writing poems stands for nothing but he is not stopping it which is ironical about the poem.

MALINI

Malini

This play takes place in hindu kingdom. Malini , the daughter of a king has been caught by Buddhist monks. She wears simple dress and abandons ornaments. Her parents, especially her mother, suggest that she should not follow monks because they practice black arts and fill people’s mind with lies. However, Malini does not believe them. A group of Brahmins come to the front of the palace  and demand her banishment. They find Hinduism, their traditional religion, endangered by Buddhism. Supriya objects to what Brahmins are demanding. He thinks that they are trying to determine truth with their number and shrill cry. Kemankar convinces him to be silent. Whenever the third Brahmin informs them that the army is supporting them, they are afraid that in the support there is the smell of rebellion. Then, they make penance and call on the Goddess. Meanwhile, Malini appears there because she has just left the palace. All Brahmins regard her as Goddess and bow their head. Though, they realize that she is Malini they are overcome by her love of the world. They request her to help them. The princess also becomes ready to serve them. They follow her and bring her back to the palace.

Kemankar is dissatisfied with Brahmins’ treatment to Malini. He leaves the kingdom to find soldiers of the other country to fight against the king and the followers of the new creed. He leaves his friend Supriya, behind to watch and  keep him informed. Kemankar warns him to be away from the girl. But Supriya feels attracted to Malini because he believes that she represents love and truth. Then he betrays Kemankar by handing over his letter to the king in which Kemankar has about the scheme of rebellion. Kemankar is arrested and the king offers Supriya the chance to ask anything he want even Malini. Supriya says that all he wants from the King is the life of Kemankar.

Kemankar arrives in chains. He is proud of what he has done. He asks to speak to Supriya. They argue. They then agree to die together because that is the only way to find who is right. Kemankar kills Supriya with his chains in his hands. The King asks for his swords to kill Kemankar but Malini says “Father, forgive Kemankar.”

THE CONCRETE CAT

Abstract- hate, anger, love

Poem- basically to read

Picture- basically to watch

Concrete poem- watch + read; letters get used as brush- stokes to create a visible images on the page

-an experiment poem

This is a poem of a cat. The poem draws a picture of the cat on the paper. The picture is drawn with words and letters, but not with sentences. The word CAT does not appear, but these words are the body of a cat, for example eye, mouth, paw and whisker. Other words are added to put the cat in a place, for example dish and litter box. These tell us the cat is a pet and not a wild cat. The poem ‘Concrete Cat’ is an example of concrete poem. It is a poem made for the eyes. The major focus of the poem is with the physical appearance of poetry not with ideas and emotions. Concrete poems are different from other poems they use words to create an image on the page.

KEEPING THINGS WHOLE

The poem Keeping Things Whole written by Mark Strand manages to say much by using few words. He knows that modern life is fragmented and we have many roles and responsibilities. We are always rushing from one place to another to make things complete. The poet says that all our movements are meaningful. He finds meaning in his movement to make things whole. We cannot be absolutely present in a place by not being absent in others. But still, we keep on moving and make things complete for sometimes.

OR,

This poem pleads for wholeness against the usual fragmentation that goes in life. The poet wants to keep things whole. He does not want anything to be broken. He does not find himself in the field. He finds that he is missing there. He thinks he divides the air when he walks. That is, he thinks when he is in a field; he breaks the field because he takes up space in it. The only way to make sure is that the field remains unbroken and whole is to keep moving.

OOPS! HOWS THAT AGAIN?

-an essay about verbal error

-shows why and what types of errors we make while speaking

-verbal errors may have psychological and linguistic value

Types: i. Mistranslation: wrong translation to give negative impression

ii.Tongue slip: accidently saying sth else that’s not intended

iii. Sponerism: exchanging the initial sound of words to give funny meaning. Eg. Town drain Other names fauxPas, Blooper, Missteps, etc

-sometimes our hidden wishes are exposed through verbal errors

-verbal errors are human, so it is not necessary to take them seriously

-anyone can make verbal errors

This essay describes the mistake people make when speaking and the reasons why they make mistakes. The mistakes are divided into four categories: slips of the tongue fauxpas, mistranslations and spoonerisms.

Slips of the tongue are common mistakes where the speaker says one thing when they mean to say another. For example, a businessman Peter Balfour whished Prince Charles the happy married life with Lady Jane. But the prince was betrothed with the Lady Diana. He completely turned fool by expressing such a wish in a royal lunch. In the same way, during the election campaign Nancy Ragan telephoned her husband how delighted she was to be looking at all the beautiful white people. But she was unaware of the fact that the voters were not only the whites but also the blacks. Likewise, the French Prime Minister said that the bombing was aimed at Jew but stroke the innocent Frenchmen. He meant that the Jewis in France were not Frenchmen and they were not innocent either.

Another kind of verbal mistake is faux pas. Usually a faux pas occurs when a person says something that he or she thinks is harmless but it actually has meaning that will upset some people. Several political leaders have made such slips. Jimmy Carter never fully recovered when he mentioned the Polish lust for future. Chicago Mayor had the same bitter experience when he assured the public that “the policeman isn’t there to create disorder, the policeman is there to preserve disorder.”

Mistakes also result from mistranslation. Mistranslations are mistakes made when words in bre language are translated badly into another language. For instance, the slogan “Come Alive with Pepsi” failed in German when it was translated: “Come Alive out of the Grave with Pepsi.” When Lubke greeted Indian President at the airport, he intended to ask, “How are you?” instead said: “Who are you?” to which his guest answered, “I am the President of India.”

The mistakes also appear due to spoonerism. Spoonerism occurs when a persom mixes up the letters of the words they are saying. Once radio announcer Harry von Zell said, “Hoobert Heever” for Herbert Hoover. Similarly, William Archibald Spooner caused a stir with his famous spoonerisms. He gave out a hymn in chapel as “Kinquering Kongs Their Titles Take.” Once a spooner chided a student : “You have hissed all my mystery lectures. In fact you have tasted the whole worm, and must leave by the first town drain.”

Rosenblatt mentions two theoretical explanations for such mistakes: linguistic and psychological. By referring to linguist Victoria Fromkin, he says that the brain stores new information into a grammatical framework. The information remained in wrong grammatical framework comes out as error. A grammatical framework was a part of Anneberg’s  trouble when he admitted before Queen as “some discomfiture as a result of a need for elements of refurbishing.”

On another front, psychoanalyst Eidelberg who made Freud’s work simple suggested that  a slip of the tongue involves the entire network of id, ego and superego. He offers the case of the young man entering a restaurant with his girlfriend and ordered a room instead of a table. This expression is the reflection of the repressed desire of preoedipal period.

We laugh at someone’s mistakes because such mistakes are deviations from the conventional and normal course of life. They provide us delightful relief. Henry Bergson theorized that the act of laughter is caused by any interruption of normal human activity (a pie n the face, a mask, a pun). Thus, slips of the tongues are like slips on banana peels. So we shouldn’t laugh at them who make such mistakes.