“Half Past Two” uses the idea of time to present childhood as a time of innocence based in ignorance. U. A. Fanthorpe connects the idea of knowing how to tell time to broader knowledge of the rules and reasons that govern appropriate behavior, especially at school. Time appears as connected with fairy tales and memory in the first line. The child’s idea of time is associated with personal markers. The clock for him is not an instrument; rather, he sees its face as an animal-like object.
…he knew
Gettinguptime, timeyouwereofftime,
Timetogohomenowtime, TVtime,
Timeformykisstime (that was Grantime).
In “Piano,” D. H. Lawrence also presents time as associated with the past, as the speaker conveys their childhood memories. Similar to the personal associations that Fanthorpe uses, Lawrence’s speaker relates the experience of sitting under the piano and joins the abstract concept of music to home, the family, and especially the mother. The piano itself is an object that evokes the memories; the large size and the color, especially from the child’s perspective underneath it, of the “great black piano” parallel its major significance. The adult is saddened to think back on those times:
the heart of me weeps to belong
To the old Sunday evenings at home.
https://genius.com/U-a-fanthorpe-half-past-two-annotated
https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/44580/piano
Friday, August 14, 2015
How are recollections of childhood presented in "Half Past Two" and "Piano"? Support your answer with examples from the poems.
Subscribe to:
Post Comments (Atom)
What is the theme of the chapter Lead?
Primo Levi's complex probing of the Holocaust, including his survival of Auschwitz and pre- and post-war life, is organized around indiv...
-
The statement "Development policy needs to be about poor people, not just poor countries," carries a lot of baggage. Let's dis...
-
"Mistaken Identity" is an amusing anecdote recounted by the famous author Mark Twain about an experience he once had while traveli...
-
Primo Levi's complex probing of the Holocaust, including his survival of Auschwitz and pre- and post-war life, is organized around indiv...
-
De Gouges's Declaration of the Rights of Woman was enormously influential. We can see its influences on early English feminist Mary Woll...
-
As if Hamlet were not obsessed enough with death, his uncovering of the skull of Yorick, the court jester from his youth, really sets him of...
-
In both "Volar" and "A Wall of Fire Rising," the characters are impacted by their environments, and this is indeed refle...
No comments:
Post a Comment