On Mar 13, 1:47 pm, Karla
sbcNOSPAMglobal.net> wrote:>>On Mar 12, 6:17 am, "Dennis M. Hammes"
arvig.net> wrote:>>> George Dance wrote:
>>>> On Mar 3, 4:08 pm, Karla
sbcNOSPAMglobal.net> wrote:>
>>>>>Project Gutenberg includes four volumes of Sara Teasdale's poetry. This
>>>>>poem is included in two of the volumes. On the title page for LOVE SONGS,
>>>>>under "Copyright Status", Project Gutenberg informs us that this work is
>>>>>not copyrighted in the U.S.
>
>
>>>>>Since many works prior to 1922 are no longer under copyright in the U.S.,
>>>>>this makes sense "The Look" was transcribed from a 1918 reprinting of a
>>>>>1917 edition.
>
>>>>>So, I would question whether this is a "blatant copyright violation" as
>>>>>this poster claims. The original poster, "sirblob" has re-titled it "the
>>>>>biscuit tin" but left Ms. Teasdale's original words intact. Sirblob appears
>>>>>to be claiming this poem as his own by adding, after the subject line, "my
>>>>>13th poem of the year". I am inclined to tag it 'plagiarism', not a
>>>>>copyright infringement.
>
>>>> Agreed: sirblob is a plagiarist.
>
>>>>>To plagiarize is to take (ideas, writings, etc.) from (another) and pass
>>>>>them off as one's own.
>
>>>>>Copyright, on the other hand, is the exclusive right to the publication,
>>>>>production, or sale of the rights to a literary, dramatic, musical, or
>>>>>artistic work, or to the use of a commercial print or label, granted by law
>>>>>for a specified period of time to an author, composer, artist, distributor,
>>>>>etc.
>
>>>>>Definitions of 'plagiarize' and 'copyright' are from Webster's New World
>>>>>Dictionary, Fourth Edition.
>
>>>>>Since, to our knowledge, Ms. Teasdale's poem is not copyrighted, it's
>>>>>unlikely that the use of the poem is infringment or a "blatant copyright
>>>>>violation." :)
>
>>>>>Here's another Sara Teasdale poem:
>
>>>> I didn't like that one. Here's one of Teasdale's more philosophical
>>>> poems:
>
>>>> There Will Come Soft Rains
>
>>>> There will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
>>>> And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
>
>>>> And frogs in the pools singing at night,
>>>> And wild plum trees in tremulous white;
>
>>>> Robins will wear their feathery fire,
>>>> Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire;
>
>>>> And not one will know of the war, not one
>>>> Will care at last when it is done.
>
>>>> Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
>>>> If mankind perished utterly;
>
>>>> And Spring herself, when she woke at dawn
>>>> Would scarcely know that we were gone.
>
>>>> -- Sara Teasdale
>
>>> Exercise for poets: point out a half dozen places (even without
>>> reasons, or saying which bad technique was substituted for a good
>>> one) that this is a not-very-good poem, and at least one thing that
>>> makes it not very good philosophy.
>
>>> Exercise for editors: point out why it sold to its readership.
>
>>> Exercise for teachers: point out why it sold to babies subsequently.
>
>>The poem uses a weasel technique of suggesting while denying:
>
>>"I'm not saying Bush is the greatest President we've ever had, but..."
>>"I'm not saying Nature is cuddly and caring, but..."
>
>>... "but", the frogs sing joyfully, the robins "wear" their colour
>>proudly, the trees display bridal modesty, and "Nature", whoever "she"
>>is, can be guaranteed to be still around even after humanity has
>>liquidated itself.
>
> OB, I really don't see what you mean. Where is the "but" in the poem? Certainly,
> Teasdale paints a pretty nature, but the larger points seems to be that we kill
> each other off and nature keeps on rolling. Until Fat Boy and Little Boy, it
> wasn't readily evident that something else might be true.
Tut, "Teasdale says nothing about nature - the word isn't mentioned
once."
Sarcasm aside,
Not one would mind, neither bird nor tree,
If mankind perished utterly;
but
there will come soft rains and the smell of the ground,
And swallows circling with their shimmering sound;
And frogs in the pools singing at night,
And wild plum trees in tremulous white;
Robins will wear their feathery fire,
Whistling their whims on a low fence-wire...
Does this help? The birds and trees may not care about our killing
ourselves, but they do care about shimmering, singing, whistling,
being tremulous and wearing feathery fire - all things which they
would in reality be quite unable to do if we weren't around, because
these things are not properly actions but (human) perceptions and
interpretations put upon those actions.
Teasdale doesn't seriously even try to imagine a post-holocaust
scenario. For a more intelligent (if somewhat savage) poem that at
least deals with the difficulty of doing so ("on the bank of whatever
river / it used to be" I like especially), try
http://www.ppu.org.uk/learn/poetry/poetry_nuclear2.html
>>By personifying Nature, Teasdale avoids addressing what she pretends
>>to address, the indifference of the universe to the fate of man (which
>>Arnold /does/ address, as you point out), while pushing a subtext
>>along the lines of "hey, folks, what's the point in fighting wars, it
>>makes no darn difference to anything, let's all go hug trees
>>instead" ("Not one" is suspiciously suggestive of "no one"). The
>>"Nature" she presents is impossibly fluffy (an Eden without serpents)
>>and consists entirely of cliches from other poems, and her assertion
>>that it can get along fine without humans is disingenuous, insofar as
>>any landscape offering swallows, robins and plum trees will almost
>>certainly be highly artificial (she avoids mentioning the ploughed
>>fields and hedgerows, but they're still there in the reader's
>>visualisation - the selection and the cliches guarantee that).
>
> This is rather mixed up. Would it change what Teasdale is saying if she included
> cockroaches and venus fly traps? I don't think so.
It would make her stated point a lot more forcefully, IMO.
> In choosing to personify
> nature given her theme might not be the wisest time to use such a device, but it
> hadn't become anathema to do so yet.
>
> I don't see her saying that nature would get along fine without humans, only
> that nature wouldn't notice that we'd gone.
"Spring" would "wake at dawn" and "scarcely know that we were gone".
For her to "scarcely" know this, as opposed to just not knowing it at
all, the personified Spring must at least be able to note some vague
sign of our absence: the implication is that the annihilation of
humans is no big deal as far as she's concerned, on any level. Notice
that "Spring" as opposed to whatever "nature" might be imagined to
consist of, is something that might be expected to get along fine
without us - seasons don't need people to keep them turning - but
Teasdale populates her Spring cunningly with cuddly creatures before
she gets around to making this point.
>
>>The poem, then, says nothing about the real world, and would
>>presumably therefore appeal to people who don't want to know about the
>>real world, i.e. babies. QED?
>
> So you want to change her point to your point?
I want her to make her own point honestly and clearly, using the best
and most powerful tools available to her. I don't think she does this.
But then again, I'm not a Lit Crit, just a tremulous tyro shimmering
his whims through a low-sense wire.
>
> Karla
>
>>Once I was visited by some JWs who left me a Watchtower depicting,
>>full-page, an Edenic scene in which a lioness disported herself with a
>>lamb, and three humans dressed in smocks had a picnic nearby. On their
>>next visit, I asked them how God intended to modify the digestive
>>system of carnivores so that they could become vegetarians, and
>>whether such a gung-ho orgy of genetic modification didn't seem a bit
>>rich coming from a Higher Being who has forbidden even compatible
>>blood transfusions among members of a single species. I never saw them
>>again.
>
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