The conversation is in a bit of a lull, so maybe changing things up would help. I gave my book with "Sunday Evening" in it back to the library, so I probably won't be able to post until Monday, though.
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The conversation is in a bit of a lull, so maybe changing things up would help. I gave my book with "Sunday Evening" in it back to the library, so I probably won't be able to post until Monday, though.
Well, we could pick another poem then if that would help or don't you have any of the poems now?
You can get one off the internet collections Quark. Why don't you pick and we'll go with whatever you can access.
I'm ready for the next one. We promised Lynne "Sunday Evening." I'll read it tonight, which happens to be Sunday evening. :wink5:
Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
Go ahead and do "Sunday Evening." I'll post tomorrow when I can get hold of the book. I checked out three initially, but then I turned two back in since it took it us almost two weeks to get through the first poem. Of course, if anyone has a link to the poem, send it my way, but I haven't been able to find anything by search engine or google books.Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulclem
I can send you the poem later.
If anyone is reading the Nichols version it is poem no. VIII "The Evening of the Holy Day". I re-read it last night, it is a good choice, lots of meat on this one...
Edit: sorry it is no.XIII.
Yeah, there's quite a bit to talk about. The first thing that caught me is the fact that the speaker pushes the Sunday further and further into the past as the poem goes on. At the start of the poem, we're talking about a Sunday that has recently happened, and is still happening. By the end of the poem we're talking about a distant past that can never be recovered. The poem compares it to fallen Roman empire (it's hard to get more distant and removed than that) and to his own boyhood (long past and unrecoverable). At the start of the poem we're talking about a day that has just past, and one that will eventually return. By the end, though, we're talking about something that's completely gone.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
Yes there is a lot to go on, I'm feeling a bit swamped trying to fit my thoughts together briefly. As I’m out tomorrow and short of time now I’ll just briefly throw a few wide ranging thoughts into the air - bullet point style if that is OK, instead of looking at one aspect more deeply? Of immediate interest to me in this poem are the following points:
1 Life’s brevity
2 lack of religious comfort
3 The smallness of man in relation to the world/universe
4 Youth’s innocence Vs aged wisdom
5 Comfort of death/rest peace
6 The cruelty of nature/love/desire
7 Loneliness as a default emotion
8 Poverty as a common factor
Again for me there are a lot of similar things going off in this poem as were happening in the last poem(s). In particular I think that the quickness of time/life’s brevity is pretty central once again. I mean take this part from lines 28-33:
Here for me we have not just a mourning for his own passing (indeed there is possibly some envy towards the peace of the dead woman) but the mourning for mankind in general. He goes on to comment just after these lines of the loss of the great Roman Empire asking “now where’s the noise of all those ancient peoples?” It is not just for the individual who is nothing to time’s cruel shadow, but “all human circumstance” everything even great civilisations which of course only seeks to highlight an individual’s lack of importance in the grand scheme of things.Quote:
And cruelly it clutches at my heart
To think the world and all must pass and leave
Scarcely a trace. And now this festival
Is gone, and hard upon its festive heels
The common day must tread; time steels away
All human circumstance.
2 lack of religious comfort
For me in this poem there is no religious comfort to such bleak (or realistic) ways of viewing life. The fact that the poem is set on a religious day which passes so quickly “And now this festival/Is gone, and hard upon its festive heels/The common day must tread” and the overall lack of religious happening suggests there is no or very little comfort to be found in religion at all. Quickly now bath time awaits...
3 The smallness of man in relation to the world/universe
Partially covered by point one, and similar to it actually, but it is also in the opening of the poem showing the universe looking down upon human life. 1-4:
For me there is a looking down upon human significance here and elsewhere in the poem.Quote:
The night is mild and clear without a wind,
And silent over the roofs and down in gardens
The moonlight pauses, and distantly reveals
In all serenity each height.
4 Youth’s innocence Vs aged wisdom
As in the last poem there seems to be a play-off between the innocent of youth and an older more cynical understanding of how the world is.
5 Comfort of death/rest peace
The dead women in the poem, the object of the narrator’s failed love seems to be at peace or he seems to think she is at peace, however there is no peace for the narrator who has to “go on living” to me this suggests that there may be peace in death, but not particularly in a religious context.
My rubber duck is missing me...
6 The cruelty of nature/love/desire
7 Loneliness as a default emotion
8 Poverty as a rule
As shown in his fatal attraction to the female figure and in the lonely song of the poverty stricken worker. Such loneliness is also that of the narrator and possibly that of the dead women in life too, perhaps there is a suggestion of this a sort of default thing? Again poverty features in this poem as it did in the last or at least the poor song of a poor worker.
Again, sorry to bullet point things but I might not be around much tomorrow or possibly much over the next couple of days (apart from at work) so I just wanted to get a few things out there. Of course though there is still more to look at that I am interested in and have had to ignore...
Rock and roll. :)
I didn't think this poem was all that interesting. I read it a few times last night. All I got was "woe is me she doesn't love me." I'll give it another shot tonight.
The poems do fit well together. Does anyone know how these were published? Is the connection we're seeing something that would have been recognizable to the poems' original readers? In any case, I think the parallels are hard to ignore. The poems share the same timeline (right before Sunday and right after Sunday) and link the same emotional extremes to each end of the timeline. Hope, innocence, and faith warm the feelings of everyone right before Sunday, but soon after the speaker lapses into weariness and doubt. As I said about the last poem, I think the two points in time represent a more dogmatic past and a secular modernity, and I see the same setup here.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
Death is certainly not far off in this poem. Is the woman dead, though? I haven't read the entire Canti (so I don't know if she died previous to this poem), but this poem didn't give me the impression she was dead. It does say:Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
But I took this rather literally to mean that she had a day of activity and retired to sleep.Quote:
Today was a holy day: your pastimes passed
And laid to rest, you rest; and dream perhaps
Of all you charmed today, and all who charmed
You in their turn
Yeah, there's a painful letting go of everything in this poem. He has to acknowledge that the woman doesn't care for him, that the past will never come back, and that his own ambitions might turn to nothing. It definitely shows his lack of importance in the grand scheme of things. The individual doesn't have much of a level to control anything outside of himself or herself in this poem. Of course, there's an interesting tension because its topic is the individual. We're focused in on his feelings. How can the poem downplay the individual, then?Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
The poem reads that way for me, too.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
I'm not sure what I make of these two figures, yet. I'll have to give it some thought.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
Death is certainly not far off in this poem. Is the woman dead, though? I haven't read the entire Canti (so I don't know if she died previous to this poem), but this poem didn't give me the impression she was dead. It does say:
But I took this rather literally to mean that she had a day of activity and retired to sleep.Quote:
Today was a holy day: your pastimes passed
And laid to rest, you rest; and dream perhaps
Of all you charmed today, and all who charmed
You in their turn
Yes it could be read in a literal sense, but I read it to mean her death, when all the other factors are considered in the poem this reading makes more sense to me. I mean with the focus on time's passing and the idea of death in the poem, the death of individual and civilsations - putting these together and the emphasis on the rest "laid to rest, you rest" suggests to me her death. Of course though it could be taken literally as well.
Edit: I mean "laid to rest" does seem a little odd don't you think?
I didn't think this poem was all that interesting. I read it a few times last night. All I got was "woe is me she doesn't love me." I'll give it another shot tonight.
Really? I did more for me than that, though I know you are reading a different translation and it might read differently with the Grennan or it could just be you. :p
For the speaker she may as well be dead. I just got the ideas she was still alive because Leopardi write that she will "dream perhaps/ Of all you charmed today, and all who charmed/ You in their turn." It makes it sound like she was socializing just that day. That's the way it came off to me. Of course, I could be completely wrong, as I haven't read the entire sequence of poems. She may have died in a previous poem.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
Anyway, I still have to post some stuff on the woman and the poor worker. I probably won't get to it until late tonight, but I'll try to post more.
I think this poem is a meditation on time and how elusive it is.
It begins with night when everything has happened already. And so it proceeds. Even hurt is a memory along with the Roman Empire and the Holy day. He's never actually referred to experiencing anything - it has all happened. The only thing that seems to stay is the peace afterwards and the pain - even in memories.
Initial thoughts for now.
Yes, I think there is more there than my initial reading. I need to study it a bit more.
I haven't forgotten about this thread, but I've been a little busy of late. Work has been difficult recently, since apparently my students have no idea how to do research. There's been much hand holding, and, suffice it to say, there hasn't been much time to post on LitNet.
I agree with that, but what do you make of his desires in this poem? He longs for the woman, just as he once longed for the holiday:Quote:
Originally Posted by Paulclem
If the poem is about the past falling away from us, what does that mean for these desires? What are these desires? Are we meant to take them on face value--as desire for a holiday and a woman? Or, is there something deeper? This is the part of the poem that seems elusive.Quote:
In my first age, that age when holy days
Are desperately desired
Ha, students eh?
Yes there is the obvious desire for the women in the first part of the poem and in the lines you quote above. I think I took this desire aspect as a sort of youthful lust for life, which is where I think I was coming from the other day with the youth Vs old age thing. As in the last poem we looked at the narrator had more of a lust for life in youth which faded with the wisdom of older age, wisdom about the way of the world and the full understanding of time's passing etc and here I see the same thing here (though I have not looked at the poem since).
I'll have another look at the poem tomorrow and maybe post something more when I have the time.
True. I think there is a hope or a "lust for life" there, and that the state the speaker finds himself at the end is one of hopeless despair. This poem seems to show the emotional repercussions of the ideas that were latent in "Saturday in the Village." The doubts that enter quietly into the previous poem become the subject of this one, and the speaker recoils emotionally.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
New poem?
What about "La ginestra o il fiore del deserto/The Broom or The Flower of the Desert" poem no. XXXIV in the Nichols? I can't remember much about it now but I remember thinking something of it when I first read through the Canti. I think it is quite a dark and meaty one and we are sat back on a mountain which is always fun...
Fine with me. We seemed to grind to a halt with the last one. I'm on holiday now, so I should be able to do a bit.
Ok, I'll get to it tonight. I may still want to comment on that last one. I'm just behind on my reading.
Sure, pick the long one Neely. I don't think it will be too hard to discuss, though, since it's kind of slow moving. Compared to the other poems, it's practically glacial in its gradual progression. Leopardi introduces an idea and then builds onto it throughout an entire stanza or more. It's not quite as dense as some of the others we've done. "Saturday in the Village" and "The Infinite" were packed tighter than the little 2-door vehicle I carpool to work in. "The Broom or The Flower of the Desert," on the other hand, focuses on just a handful of ideas and takes its time developing them.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
The first idea I'd like to bring up is in these lines:
It's this sense that man's dignity lies in a sort of cosmic humility. I don't think it's a particularly new thought--people have been making it since the ancients--but I'm curious about how Leopardi handles it. I also wonder whether Leopardi means to make this point in a general way or whether he's advancing this claim to a specific audience--one located in a particular people at a particular time. Earlier, the speaker addressed the overly hopeful in these lines:Quote:
That man has a truly noble nature
Who, without flinching, still can face
Our common plight, tell the truth
With an honest tongue,
Admit the evil lot we've been given
Clearly, this is leveled at some in a particular time. So what about these people at this time is overly hopeful? There seems to be a topical point as well as a general one that Leopardi seems to be making. The general point isn't all that new, but the topical one might be--and it might help us understand what Leopardi is doing in this poem. I don't really have a good answer to this question right now, but it's something I'm thinking about while I'm rereading the poem.Quote:
Look and see yourself here,
You proud, vain, ignorant century,
Of course Virgil feel free to shoot from the other poem too.
Yes, I thought I'd pick a long one and make you all work a bit, I can't let laziness creep in, chop, chop - though it is slightly longer than I remembered it. You are quite right though it seems to move much more slowly than the others in giving us its fruits.
Yes I agree with your point about 'cosmic humility' if you mean comparing the insignificance of mankind to the universe sort of thing.
Quote:
Look and see yourself here,
You proud, vain, ignorant century,
Clearly, this is levelled at some in a particular time. So what about these people at this time is overly hopeful?
I took this arrogance to be levelled at his contemporaries in particular; the way that people's attitudes have gone from an original unity (if there ever was an original unity) to a false pretension. Here is another significant part on the same type of criticism of mankind:
He seems to think that if mankind could put away this sense of elevated self-importance then they might be able to see that “Mother Nature” (or time) is the real enemy and not each other. He seems to look back to a golden time of unity, like I said, in such lines as “Mankind has been united, organised/Against her from the first” (128) though I would strongly wonder if there has ever been such a golden time of unity, but perhaps that is beside the point?Quote:
A man of slender means and feeble body,
A man who is magnanimous and noble,
Does not deceive himself
That he is rich and strong
...
He feels no shame at all in looking poor
In health and wealth, in stating openly
His own clear estimation of his value,
...
That other is not noble,
In my belief, but stupid
(Lines 87+)
I’m also interested in how he seems to elevate the Bloom in having more sense than the human race in understanding the lowly place in the grand scheme of things. There are also a few references to “the light” which I would read in a religious sense perhaps, whether in a positive sense or a negative one I’m not sure because I’ve not really looked into that angle yet. I might read into that a little later on tonight.
I guess that's what I'm asking. Are we talking about some mythical golden age or is there a real time that Leopardi is talking about? And why did we slip from that golden age?Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
Is that a reference to reason and thought? I'm not exactly sure which lines you're talking about (I think we have different translations), so you might want to post them on the thread.Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
No, I’m coming away from any real religious context now that I’ve looked at it properly. Originally it was things like this:
Lines 80+
As well as the many references to “light” and there is a line which says “temples disfigured” but if you put them together a religious angle doesn’t seem to tally that well overall, though it seems a strong possibility just based upon the extract above.Quote:
And that is why
You turned your coward back upon the light
Which showed the truth; why, while you flee, you call
Him base who seeks the light,
Him only noble who,
Deceived or else deceiving, mad or wise,
Exalts the human lot above the skies.
Wow, now that I have finished my big exam, I have time to return to this; going to take a while to get through all the great posts though, so will wait to comment until later.
Ah yes I thought I hadn't seen you around for a while, I thought that you was either working hard or on holiday. I expected working hard though. Me I'm trying to do both - but with little success I'm afraid, in one of them anyway...
Wow, indeed. Hopefully everything went well. What were you being tested on?Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
I think the lines above help us explicate that part, though. In the Grennan translation it looks like this:Quote:
Originally Posted by Neely
Some bold added. This passage sets up Leopardi's version of Plato's divided line. We get something like this:Quote:
Freedom is the dream you dream
While putting thought in chains again--
Thought, which all that brought us
Almost out of the barbarous dark, alone
Enabled civilization, is what alone
Steers the state toward a better life.
Having no love for bitter truth
Of that hard lot and lowly place
Which nature gave us, you turned
Your coward's back on the light
That lets us see things as they are
Civilization-|-Barbarism
-----------|-----------
Thought---|-Cowardice
-----------|-----------
Freedom---|-Chained Imprisonment
The light appears to stand for everything on the left, while the dark represents everything on the right. On the left is everything that's ideal, and on the right is everything that the speaker sees in Italian society. I don't know if religion enters into this so much. I'd have to look at that "temples disfigured" part to say for sure. Mostly, though, this is a return to the Enlightenment ideas of some of the other poems. The idea that man's mind is enslaved by slavish customs is straight out of Rousseau: "Man was born free, but everywhere he is in chains." Kant defined Enlightenment as intellectual maturity and bravery--as opposed to ignorance which is a state of blind following. I don't mean to say that Leopardi is exactly like these other figures (he's not), but this idea in the poem is torn right out the popular thought of the day.
That being said, I think Leopardi is much more interested in the emotional and social implications of these ideas than the other people I mentioned. So much of the Canti seems to be about what these ideas do for love, ambition, Italy, poetry, etc.
Oh, and, if you're going to look for a religious message in this poem, you're probably going to want to look at these lines:
Quote:
And the many times you've loved to tell
Fable and fairy tales of how
On your behalf even the authors
Of the universe itself came down
To this dark grain of sand called earth,
And how, time after time, they talked
with you on friendly terms, and how
Over and over you've told these same
Silly dreams, insulting men of any sense
Yes, I had noticed those too. I think that there's probably enough to go on to suggest that Leopardi is criticising those who seek escape in religion, though it wouldn't be my primary position either.Quote:
Oh, and, if you're going to look for a religious message in this poem, you're probably going to want to look at these lines:
Can someone tell me which poem we are reading? I am kind of lost. And perhaps someone can give me some sizable English chunks of it, as the Italian version is probably slightly different.
We were recently talking about "La Ginestra O Il Fiore Del Deserto," or "Broom or The Flower of the Desert," but the thread has been rather empty of late. I guess that's fitting--given the poem we're reading.Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
Here's the poem in Grennan's translations:Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
Okay, this goes on for a while. Maybe you could just pull a book from the library. Since you're at a major research university, this shouldn't be difficult. In fact, a quick search turns up the exact translation I'm using:Quote:
Here on the naked back
Of this amazing
Exterminator, Mount Vesuvius,
Cheered by
http://search8.library.utoronto.ca/U...ch_form_simple
Hmm, to try and bring this thread back to the top, and reawaken the discussion of The Broom,
To the point of this Barbarism over Civilization, or the other binaries - the idea I got when reading the poem was of the dominance of the cycle - the cultivated Romans that are gestured to by the dominance of Vesuvius throughout the poem are crossed with the simple fact; Pompei was wiped out. The villages, and the panorama afforded the reader simply stands as a projection of what he considers a type of blissful ignorance.
I think he is neither in agreement with an enlightenment view or a romantic; he seems to be abandoning the sort of "cultivated rationalism" that gives Enlightened thinkers their sense of superiority, as much as he is dismissing the Nobel Savages of Rousseau's thought as ignorant specs. The vision on top of Vesuvius, gesturing to Jesus' view from the mount, I would argue, shows but the insignificance of life - as the spewing mountain, symbolic of the dominant nature and cruelty of a world made insignificant by lack of meaning - his view is that of the transcient, that which is but a spec in the reality (his term is grain of sand) - his gesture to the stars and constellation rather than speak to the fate and presence, seems to suggest that humanity is just but one little aspect of a giant natural cycle, of which we have no control.
The ending, rather than praise a sort of enlightenment, seems to gesture that his idea of "enlightenment" is that of self defeat; one is insignificant, so the moral, and learned are the ones who realize their insignificance - in essence, the nihilist.
The vehicle of the Broom then, is a vehicle for nature - nature is the broom that sweeps over all - Vesuvius' lava, the moving of the planets.
IF we return to a reading that intertexts the Bible - we can see Leopardi is comparable to Jesus, when viewing the world. His position as dying "prophet" if you will is coupled with his view of the future - instead of the awakening with the second coming, his view gestures to the Broom - the world, its pathway, is but anticipating the destruction - the explosion that will end it all, the broom that will sweep its memory clean away, as it is but an insignificant spec in a grand, meaningless scheme.
Good idea JBI. Unfortunately I did not bring my book with me and it will probably be another month before I am home. I'll try to glance in here if the discussion moves along.
JBI and Virgil: Love to revisit this discussion later today or tomorrow; unfortunately have to deal with the curse of the reading class, work.
Hi Virgil,Quote:
Originally Posted by Virgil
We could PM the poem to you so you could take part.
I'll have a look later tonight after work.
I'm glad you brought it up again JBI.
Ha, ha, quality...Quote:
Originally Posted by quasimodo1
I'll have a go at digging the poem up again and following JBI's pointers.
Good idea, JBI. We never did finish this poem. In fact, we hardly started it. I got sidetracked by family stuff. People were moving or needing to be visited. I actually just got back from my niece's second birthday (I got her some plastic trinket). I'd love to get back into the Leopardi discussion, though.Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
That's how I read "Sunday Evening" with its stress on peace, quiet, and nothingness: "All/ Is peace, all quiet, the whole world still." "The Broom or The Flower of the Desert" seems to be the more polemic version of that earlier poem. Polemic, though, implies a correct position and a mistaken opponent, so I think some of the nihilism of the previous poem drops out here in this poem. It seems like, rather than a cycle, the poem suggests that life, civilization, etc. gradually move toward a better life and then backslide to some primitive, inorganic state. There's a generative and progressive impulse on the one side that contributes to a better life and civilization, but there's also a contrary force pushing back from nature that counters that civilizing impulse. I think you can see this in certain place like here:Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
(Bold added, of course)Quote:
Thought, which all that brought us
Almost out of the barbarous dark, alone
Enabled civilization, is what alone
Steers the state toward a better life.
The poem does posit a "better life," rather than an endless shifting cycle of different states that are neither better nor worse. Leopardi genuinely appears to want his readers to embrace thought, sympathy, and justice in the poem. There is a realization that nature might be more powerful than these human impulses, but I don't think it makes them meaningless. I would say that Leopardi is really suggesting that we restore the "social bond/ Against the savagery of nature." Or, at least, that wish is what's giving the poem its energy. And the polemic is what's motivating so much of the rhetoric here. The opening epigraph makes Jesus's castigation of non-believers the model for the poem's attack on those who don't see the truth of "thought" and the "social bond/ Against the savagery of nature."
I don't know if I agree - I think the better life could ironically be gestured as "no life" or death. There is a collection of works from his Zibaldone and philosophical papers translated as Thoughts that sheds light and provides an interesting context of the poem. Generally, within its frame, Leopardi seems to see death, which he was rather clear was coming for him by this point, as the sort of release; the end to the bitter life. I do not think he is rather being optimistic, but rather he is lying to himself openly, for the sake of creating a peace of mind which he both craves and abhors.
For instance, his whole career seems to be marked by a contradiction of rejection of religion, nihilism, and belief in the cruelty in nature on one hand, and then on the other hand, a yearning for a sort of religious experience, for a sort of familial/sexual experience that seems intertwined with religious imagery, and also a sense of the transient in nature.
Ultimately though, the regeneration you speak of seems to be in line with Hamlet's "To Be or Not to Be" soliloquy, which I believe Leopardi had read in the original if I am not mistaken, in that it gestures to a sort of peace and calmness in the end with death - nature prevailing restoring a calm emptiness to what was once the buzzing Pompeii - he very much is exaggerating his own experience through a rather giant image - the destruction of all.
That seems a problem with Leopardi's work, that he likes to project his own suffering as a human state, and his own lack of being loved as a human condition, and his own death and decay as a "human condition". If the poem is doing anything, it is taking a view of the world - creating a panoramic view of humanity, through the lens of his interior.
I am not too sure if the ending is gesturing to a hope, or rather ironically marking a peacefulness in the absolute destruction of his time period, a perhaps veiled reference for his death (without issue as they say), and the end to his "suffering."
Yeah, I don't think the poem is holding out much hope either. You're right that it project a bleak picture of human destiny. What I was saying, though, is that the poem does seem to believe that there are better and worse places to be, and that it's best to work to improve society when we can. Those lines that I quoted point to the benefits of thought. You're saying that there's a veiled reference to death lurking there, but you might want to explain that out more. Thought is usually considered the practice of an active mind--not one dead in oblivion. Later on the poem encourages "struggle"--another active role:Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
This sounds a bit too much for death. Throughout the poem, too, these active roles--whether struggling for the common good or appealing to though--recur frequently. I've quoted from two places, but I could pull many more. Leopardi talks of the "forg[ing]" the "social bond/ Against the savagery of nature." I think you're right that death lingers not far off from Leopardi's mind in place like these lines:Quote:
She's [nature] the one he calls enemy,
And believing the human family
Leagued to oppose her, as in truth it is
And has been from the start, he sees
As allies all men, embraces all
With unfeigned love, giving and expecting
Prompt assistance, useful aid
In the many hazards and lasting hurts
Of the common struggle
Now that sounds like preparing for death. You're certainly right that "our common plight" is probably just a thinly disguised mention of his own coming demise. I don't agree, though, that his approaching death leaves him nihilistic. I don't think death overwrites the other portions of the text where the speaker asks society to move toward a more rational and compassionate understanding. If Leopardi wanted us to write all of that off, I don't think he would have phrased the "common stuggle," "forg[ing] ... the social bond," and "thought" in such active terms.Quote:
Who, without flinching, still can face
Our common plight, tell the truth
With an honest tongue,
Admit the evil lot we've been given
And the abject, impotent condition we're in;
Who shows himself great and full of grace
Under pressure, not adding to his miseries
The hate and hostility of his fellow-men
I read back over the poem today, and I think I agree that the biographical element is at least as strong as the polemic here. I'd back away from saying that it's just polemic that's motivating the verse. Really, Leopardi is coming to terms with his own death and incapabilities. I just don't think that's all that's going on in the poem. I still think the polemic element is in the poem. It's hard to read sections like the ones I posted above in a purely self-pitying, biographical context.Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
Two things here: I don't think Hamlet's soliloquy promises calmness in death, nor do I think Leopardi suggests nature will restore peace. Only if you stop reading nine lines into Hamlet's speech could you say that he's talking about calmness in death. After that, he continues: "For in that sleep of death what dreams may come/ When we have shuffled off this mortal coil/ Must give us pause" (III. i. 65-7). This is the "dread" of the "undiscovered country" that prevents people from pursuing death. Ultimately, death isn't calmness. It's dreadful dreams that will give us pause. As for "Broom or the Flower of the Desert," I'm not convinced that nature restores a calm emptiness. It seems like nature reduces the world to a horrible emptiness. Nature is not something that's embraced with open arms in the poem. Rather, it's something that's to be resisted.Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
I liked that you brought in the biographical elements to the poem. That was all stuff I didn't consider until you posted, but I think you're overstating your case case when you say we should read sections like the ones I posted in purely that light.
I never responded to the more evaluative part of your post, so I'll do that here. I didn't answer this part mostly because I agree with it. Leopardi does seem at his best when he keeps to the events of his life. "Saturday in the Village" and "Sunday Evening"--while taking up some of the same ideas--end up being much more subtle and, above all, believable. It's a little hard to take seriously the enormous claims of this poem when we know it's motivated so much by the misfortunes of his own life, rather an honest appraisal of Italian society. Or, I should say, that his own misfortunes unduly color his impressions of Italian society, and that weakens his polemic. Also, I didn't think the poem was that clever. "Saturday in the Village" and "Sunday Evening" wove together religious fervor, interpersonal love, a good knowledge of literary tradition, and the events of his childhood to create something quite interesting. "Broom" falls a little short of that.Quote:
Originally Posted by JBI
Oh, and this thread needs a bump:
http://lifeboat.com/images/bump.sign.jpg
Very Deserved
Ive read the poem through and just re-read the first 50 lines.
I The broom seems to represent an offering or a memoriam in the lines:
Nothing is found but ruin
Where you are rooted, gentle flower, and where,
As pitying other people's harm, you send
Your incense breathing perfume to the sky l 32-35
Which seems , in the light of the last stanza, to represent Leopardi's view, or perhaps an idealised self image in its personification as heroic:
That head of yours was never bowed before
In craven supplication and in vain
Never to the oppressor; never held erect
Either, in crazy pride towards the stars. l. 307-310