Prompts for Thursday

Today I was pretty hard on some of you for not doing the reading. If you are a student who does the reading, please know that I was not talking to you. I assure you that I am aware of who reads and who doesn't. For those of you that do read, thank you.


Here are some questions for Thursday:

1. What does Auden's "Musée des Beaux Arts" teach us about suffering? (The poem references Brueghel's Landscape with the Fall of Icarus, pictured to the right; click on it for a larger view.) Please use specific lines from the poem as part of your response.

2. In "September 1, 1939," Auden writes, "All I have is a voice / To undo the folded lie." Based on your reading of his poem, what is the "lie" he is trying to "undo"?

3. What is happening in Larkin's "MCMXIV," and what do the scenes have to do with the poem's last line, "Never such innocence again"?

4. How do you think the speaker of Larkin's "Church Going" feels about the church? Why does he go there? What does he gain from his visits? Again, please reference the poem specifically.

5. Do you consider "Sad Steps" and "This Be the Verse" to be poetry? Can a subject like "Groping back to bed after a piss" be poetic? Can a poem that uses the word "fuck" multiple times rise above its shock value? What do you think?