[Arialle]

My public high school education was so ghetto that I never got to analyze this poem ever. I loved it though!

[Serah.]

Arialle, on Mar 11 2010, 09:30 AM, said:

My public high school education was so ghetto that I never got to analyze this poem ever.

^this^

I did love the poem though. <3

[StyxNStones]

Sure, I can rant on cue.

This poem brings to mind courtly love, which apparently originated as early as the 11th century. Characteristics such as love at first sight and the elevation of women to some impossible ideal come from that sort of love and aren't typically found in the ideas that surround love or loving found in other times or other societies (for example, compare Plato's description of love in the Symposium). In its original form, courtly love was about the passion in the moment. You'd "fall in love" at sight and could just as easily "fall out of love". Much like the Wiki notes, the Church had some opposition to something so transitory. Though it originated amongst the nobility, courtly love would catch on amongst peasants as well. Inevitably, it would have to be reconciled with the Church's teaching and by turning the story into one of "people fall in love at first sight but following that get married and live happily ever after" that's exactly what happened. The ideas of having a soul mate or there being one right person out there for everyone that you would be able to know right away find their origins here as well. That this then becomes the romantic fairytale for centuries thereafter is a fact that I don't feel I need to source.

The point I'd like to make is that courtly love is lame. The evidence is within the poem itself. The person scripting it isn't talking about 2 people meeting on the train, he's talking about one human, a male, and an object that isn't a human ("an angel", "a creature"). The tale of courtly love is exactly this; it is a tale of human (defined as male) struggle towards some mysterious good (in this case a female), who is lil' more than a MacGuffin. The girl, placed on a pedestal, is lil' more than an ornament, a fancy thing to look at. She has no input, no opinions, no feelings. In fact, "she was simply there".

[Arialle]

One-sided love sucks!

[StyxNStones]

Arialle, on Mar 11 2010, 09:43 PM, said:

One-sided love sucks!

What is love?

[Arialle]

StyxNStones, on Mar 11 2010, 03:46 PM, said:

What is love?

Love the song~!

*Bobbing head back and fourth... :)

[Serah.]

Cluud, on Mar 11 2010, 04:00 PM, said:

you guys could analyze it right now though. :l

I would but unfortunately I'm too lazy at the moment. :[

[Lulei]

Arialle, on Mar 11 2010, 08:30 AM, said:

My public high school education was so ghetto that I never got to analyze this poem ever. I loved it though!

This probably summarizes three fourths of NA/US, myself included >>< That and I avoid poetry like an evil stepmother... Besides, styx's minirant was pretty thorough on anything I see interesting except writing structure (does anyone like looking at that anyway???). It's also pretty hard to beat this quote...

StyxNStones, on Mar 11 2010, 04:38 PM, said:

...courtly love is lame...

Off topic:

StyxNStones, on Mar 11 2010, 04:46 PM, said:

What is love?

I've said before, "Love is bind ~<3" Err.. wait, uh... here, have something smooth...

[Arialle]

Lulei, on Mar 11 2010, 06:04 PM, said:

I've said before, "Love is bind ~<3"

Funny, my love IS bind~!

[Nudeh]

The poem seems to depict, in an over-extravagant manner, the Victorian picturesque type of Love scene. The characters of elevation and diction seem to try and pull the couple out of the ordinary situation, bringing them into a more idealized and representative state. What the poet wishes to convey in the poem however, is a little beyond me.

Styx's explanation seems right in ways to me, yet I have trouble believing the modern poet of the 21st century would indulge entirely in that sort of topic; Wilde and other satirists seem to have done their work in making a mockery of that age of romance. For me, while the nigh godly elevation makes their relationship seem trivial, I feel like the author elucidates the manner in which the boy's attraction manipulates his perception (manipulate seems to have a negative connotation, but I do not mean it that way) in such a way as to turn her every action into one of perfection. The focus of the author stays too transfixed on the behavior of the boy to make it seem like satire to me.


As a note, though I digress from the topic, it is my opinion that literature does not "mean."
In clarification, literature and art are mediums of communication between humans. Conveying ideas and experiences is the only real thing that is transmitted, and what the reader draws from them is the only "meaning" that is generated. A league of the world's "elite literature experts" could misinterpret the "intended message" of an author. But then again, who would be right? Millions of fringe examples would prove both sides false to some extent. Thus, to me, literature is not to find truth, but to compound my perspective. I read an experience and interpret it my own way. Of course, if the author describes their own meaning of the work, that too will heavily impact my perception of it.

Of course this method is not perfect, and I never intend to be; Authors write within their own scope of understanding, and we read with ours. Great literature persists but rarely remains the same in my eyes. So back to the poem, what emotions and feelings does it evoke in you? What do you draw from the way the author presents the pair from the eyes of a train passenger (note not the omniscient third person voice)? I don't believe there are wrong answers (just incredibly bad ones ;) )

[GoddessofLove]

I do not remember being cold there, not warm. No pain of cold and heat. The temperature of sleep, feverless and chilless. I do not remember being hungry. Food seeped through invisible pores. I do not remember weeping. I felt only the caress of moving— moving into the body of another— absorbed and lost within the flesh of another, lulled by the rhythm of water, the slow palpitation of the senses, the movement of silk. Loving without knowing-ness, moving without effort, in the soft current of water and desire, breathing in an ecstasy of dissolution.

[Arialle]

GoddessofLove, on Mar 12 2010, 03:39 AM, said:

I do not remember being cold there, not warm. No pain of cold and heat. The temperature of sleep, feverless and chilless. I do not remember being hungry. Food seeped through invisible pores. I do not remember weeping. I felt only the caress of moving— moving into the body of another— absorbed and lost within the flesh of another, lulled by the rhythm of water, the slow palpitation of the senses, the movement of silk. Loving without knowing-ness, moving without effort, in the soft current of water and desire, breathing in an ecstasy of dissolution.

:) Nice post~! I wonder if it is what I am thinking of....

[GoddessofLove]

Arialle, on Mar 12 2010, 09:56 AM, said:

:) Nice post~! I wonder if it is what I am thinking of....

What do you think it is?

[DoomCookie]

StyxNStones, on 11 March 2010 - 09:38 PM, said:

Sure, I can rant on cue.

This poem brings to mind courtly love, which apparently originated as early as the 11th century. Characteristics such as love at first sight and the elevation of women to some impossible ideal come from that sort of love and aren't typically found in the ideas that surround love or loving found in other times or other societies (for example, compare Plato's description of love in the Symposium). In its original form, courtly love was about the passion in the moment. You'd "fall in love" at sight and could just as easily "fall out of love". Much like the Wiki notes, the Church had some opposition to something so transitory. Though it originated amongst the nobility, courtly love would catch on amongst peasants as well. Inevitably, it would have to be reconciled with the Church's teaching and by turning the story into one of "people fall in love at first sight but following that get married and live happily ever after" that's exactly what happened. The ideas of having a soul mate or there being one right person out there for everyone that you would be able to know right away find their origins here as well. That this then becomes the romantic fairytale for centuries thereafter is a fact that I don't feel I need to source.

The point I'd like to make is that courtly love is lame. The evidence is within the poem itself. The person scripting it isn't talking about 2 people meeting on the train, he's talking about one human, a male, and an object that isn't a human ("an angel", "a creature"). The tale of courtly love is exactly this; it is a tale of human (defined as male) struggle towards some mysterious good (in this case a female), who is lil' more than a MacGuffin. The girl, placed on a pedestal, is lil' more than an ornament, a fancy thing to look at. She has no input, no opinions, no feelings. In fact, "she was simply there".

Personally, I think that you're over-analyzing what the poem is saying. To me, the poem is simply trying to capture/convey that one moment of pure, innocent, uncorrupted essence of youthful love. The period of time before you knew anything about sex, marriage, genitals, social roles, etc.

You know, when a boy sees a girl, the boy gets this weird feelings inside him that he never experienced and can't seem to explain. She seems so beautiful, unknown and enigmatic that you see her as a celestial being? (IE whatever happened when you were young, and you saw a girl/guy that you really really liked?)

The kind where little fluffy forest animals emerges from the shrubs, a little rainbow action happens on in the background, and lines of little Cupids emerges with trumpets, blowing a fanfare. Like all the Disney movies.

You're injecting too much the ideals of the "adult world", and how in that adult world, love is transient, maybe even cruel. But such world doesn't exist in the poem. It simply focuses on that one time. That one moment, where all these foreign feelings are conspiring within him, and how the author was there, seeing it and realizing what was happening. To recognize the genuine sentiment that's happening in front of him. Nothing before, nor after.


Just my two cents.

This post has been edited by DoomCookie: 22 July 2010 - 09:30 AM