This whole poem to me was one that I could not understand, but at the same time I felt like I did understand it. Poems are supposed to have hidden meanings and symbolism and everything, and this is the first poem I felt like I could understand what Heaney wanted to say or what the theme was. I may be wrong, but poetry can have a few different meanings. I think.
Here it goes.
The Guttural Muse is on page 28 in my book and the first time reading it I definitely noticed "doctor fish" and "slime" because they both went together and were important in the poem. As I read it again, however, I started noticing more things related to water, oceans, lakes, etc. "muddied", "lake", "oily bubbles", "wounds of fish that touched it", "swarmed and puddled", "swim", and "soft-mouthed life". All of these words and phrases stood out to me because there is a strong theme of fish and water related topics. I am not sure if that was what Heaney wanted us to get out of it, or the whole thing with the crowds of people and the girl in the white dress, but I felt a stronger connection to the meaning that I found. As with almost everyone else it seems, I don't particularly enjoy reading poetry but if I have to I'll have an open mind about it. This is what I came up with. This does not mean that it is the right 'answer' to the poem but I believe there can be more than one answer. I am curious to see if anybody else noticed this or if it was just me. Can your background on certain topics help you understand a poem more than others may? Can your mindset at the time you read it change how you interpret the poem?
Chris, I really like how you broke it down and mentioned all the words or phrases that relate to water or fish. I found that very interesting because I didn't even think there were so many connections to water until you mentioned it.
ReplyDeleteAnd to answer your question, yes and definitely. There is communication in everything we do, and the way we communicate with others or even with ourselves is greatly influenced by so many factors such as backgrounds, cultures, opinions... Interpreting things is the same thing. We would notice different things in one poem maybe because of different genders. We might notice different things because of the expectations we have about poetry itself. I bet you there are 30 different interpretations in our class about each and every poem, and that is because we all are different.
Chris, I think you did a good job noticing these connections between the images in the poem. The next step, then, is to think, OK, why the references to water/fish. You can even do sort of a free association with what you think about when you think about water/fish. What associations do you have with them? Then, you can start pulling them together, and figuring out YOUR interpretation.
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