Waterloo. Lord Byron. Appreciation.

18.

Waterloo. Lord Byron. Appreciation by P.S.Remesh Chandran.

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum.

 

By PSRemeshChandra, 26th Apr 2011.  Short URL http://nut.bz/3.ub8mva/
Posted in Wikinut  Poetry

 

The maps of Europe were drawn and redrawn many times during the Eighteenth and the Nineteenth centuries. Countries became nations and empires which in no time were reverted back to nations and countries. It was not uncommon for people of those times to lay down spoons and forks in the dead of night and take muskets and pistols to brave war. Lord Byron in his famous poem portrays such a scene from the European arena.

Political thought should be followed by political action.

Byron in Albanian Dress.

George Gordon Noel Lord Byron was born in England in the Eighteenth century and lived through the Nineteenth century. He was a lame person and so he could not take part in the active moments of his nation. Because of this handicap, he possessed exceptional vigour, strength, courage and force at least in his writings. He believed that political thought should immediately be followed by political action. He had firm political opinions which could not be uttered in his century which naturally made him to turn himself into an irresistible revolutionary poet. His name stands brilliant and great among the star line of English poets. The Vision of Judgment, The Prisoner of Chillon and Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage are his most famous poems.

Spoon and fork lain down to take musket and pistol.

Vast Belgian halls where rich and famous assembled

Childe Harold means the child of Harrow University which was the poet himself. Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage is a long poem in which Byron describes his European travels. There are perhaps only two other famous poems of the like in English literature. They are Matthew Arnold’s ‘The Scholar Gipsy’ and William Wordsworth’s ‘Tintern Abbey Revisited’. These three constitute the University Trio in English poetry. Waterloo is a famous section from Childe Harold’s Pilgrimage.

The war of English and the French enters Belgium in the dead of night.

A ball in Brussels in 1815.

In Belgium he attended a midnight ball of the rich and famous in Brussels, the capital city. It was at that time that the French and English opened war which soon reached Belgium. The midnight revelry was broke down by cannon fire but instead of the expected chaos, Byron could not help but admire what he saw of the quickness with which the Scottish soldiers there responded to the sudden attack. Due to graphic descriptions of contradicting scenes before and after the outbreak of sudden war, this part of the poem became memorably fine and specially noted in the poem.

Heavy cannon fire shatters the sound of midnight revelry.

Battle in Brussels. Formed in ranks of war.

All the brave and beautiful in Brussels were assembled in that ball room in a large mansion to celebrate night. There were not less than a thousand people gathered in that vast hall. Lamps shone bright everywhere and soft music filled the atmosphere. It was not just opulence and extravaganza of the rich and powerful. Belgians thought and did everything great and magnificent. Electricity in the atmosphere could be touched with hands. Loving eyes exchanged glances. All went merry as a marriage bell until the deep sound of a cannon struck.

Youth and Pleasure chase the night with flying feet.

Austro-Bavarian-French Battery Charge.

In the midst of the revelry, most of them did not recognize it to be sound of French guns. Some said it was wind and some said it was chariot passing through the stony street. The midnight revelry continued. People had decided to sleep not till morn. Youth and Pleasure had decided to chase the night with flying feet. Personification of Pleasure here is delightful and apt, resembling Milton’s personification of Laughter in his University poem L’Allegro. The aristocrats, government officers, soldiers, students, lovers and lazy personages all reverted back to merriment and carnal festivity. Then the heavy sound was heard once again, this time nearer and louder. Now there was no doubt it was the opening roar of cannons.

Midnight carnival turns into a carnelian carnage.

The Scotts riding to battle.

The noble Duke of Brunswick was sitting in a niche in the festivity hall, passively nursing his drinks. He was fighting on the part of the English and had anger towards the French for taking away his power and authority. He was a soldier head to heel, was always alert and was the first to recognize the sound as a cannon’s roar. When he said it and said it was near, the others laughed. But he knew the sound too well which had stretched his father, a great Chieftain, on a bed of blood years ago. His desire for long awaited vengeance was immediately roused; he rushed into the field outside and fell fighting foremost as a hero. The Duke of Brunswick’s reaction to the sound of cannon heard in the distance was a forewarning to the massacre and carnelian carnage that was to follow. War was at their door step. Byron’s description of the reverberating din of merriment in the hall and the heart-rending rush to his death by the Duke of Brunswick are equally classical.

Love or lust or wine, the Scottish soldiers are duty-bound.

Byron Abroad. His Reception at Missolonghi.

It is interesting to note how this sudden crisis affected the Scottish soldiers present. Death of the Duke of Brunswick confirmed that it was not a joke but actual war. No one had thought such awful a morn could rise upon such sweet a night. Dancing stopped and partners parted. Some wept, some trembled, some sighed and all were pale. Many doubted whether they would ever meet again. The civilians all were dumb struck and silent, but the Scottish soldiers in the assembling were the first to recover. Love or lust or wine, they proved once more that they were duty-bound.

Squadrons and chariots swiftly forming in ranks of war.

Reenactment of Battle of Waterloo 1815.

They soon began to prepare for the war. There were hurried movements everywhere. Horses were quickly mounted; squadrons and chariots rode out with impetuous speed and all swiftly formed in ranks of war. Horns and trumpets were sounded which roused all soldiers into action. Famous Scottish war songs trumpeted through Scottish bagpipes resounded through the columns and ranks of the armies and thrilled even the enemies. The famous song, ‘Cameron’s Gathering’ rose high and wild and echoing through the Albion’s Hills, and reached the Anglo-Saxons as well as the French. In no time the soldiers were marching away to the battle field.

The Ardennes Great Woods shed tear drops over the unreturning brave.

Ardennes shed tears over the unreturning brave.

Byron stood apart and watched the soldiers marching away to Waterloo. This last part of this portion of the poem is his reflections on the soldiers marching away to their death and glory. It is not possible that many of them may return alive to their land. As the English army marched away through the Ardennes Great Woods, trees waved their branches and shed tear drops over the unreturning brave. It was nature’s send-off and lamentation for her dearest of sons.

Morning noon and night, and morning day again.

Artificial hill raised on the spot of Waterloo.

This lamentation of the woods is a fine and memorable scene in the poem, an achievement of Byron’s poetical diction and imagination. The brave soldiers who are now treading the grass might be dead and lying cold and low beneath the same grass before evening. The descriptions go through the calendar of activities of the day: Morning, evening, midnight, morning and day again; how quick and unexpected was the transformation from the peak of happiness to the depth of distress! But death would show no distinctions to man or beast. When the thunder clouds of the war clear away, the Earth would be uniformly covered with dead soldiers from both sides. Nature shows her kindness and justice by allowing the rider and horse and friend and foe to share and enjoy the same red burial ground which is grand and majestic after a war. 

________________________________
Pictures Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons.

________________________________

Dear Reader,

You are invited to kindly visit the Author’s Web Site of P.S.Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum at:

https://sites.google.com/site/timeuponmywindowsill/wiki-nut-articles

Translations of this article in French, German, Spanish and Italian published in Knol.com can be read by clicking here.

http://knol.google.com/k/psremesh-chandran/-/2vin4sjqlcnot/0#collections

Tags

Appreciations, British Poets, Childe Harolds Pilgrimage, English Language And Literature, English Literature, English Poems, English Songs, Gordon Lord Byron, Literary Criticism, P S Remesh Chandran, Poems, Poetry Reviews, Sahyadri Books And Bloom Books Trivandrum, Songs, Waterloo

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Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of Swan : The Intelligent Picture Book.

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The Lotos-Eaters. Tennyson. Appreciation.

17.

The Lotos-Eaters. Alfred Lord Tennyson. Appreciation by P.S.Remesh Chandran.

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum.

 

By PSRemeshChandra, 24th Apr 2011.  Short URL http://nut.bz/1f8a7337/
Posted in Wikinut  Poetry, Drama & Criticism

 

The great veil of Victorian hypocrisy was lifted by Alfred Lord Tennyson and was shown to the world the lovely English mind behind it that was his. The Lotos-Eaters is the world’s greatest poetical experiment synchronizing sublime music with the changing moods and fancies of the exotic, psychedelic intoxication of a band of marine soldiers marooned on an island that nowhere existed.

Failure of musical geniuses in exactly imitating changing moods of the exotically intoxicated.

Alfred Lord Tennyson was a Nineteenth century English poet. He is considered the greatest poet and true representative of the Victorian Era. In Memoriam was his masterpiece. The Lotos-Eaters is a memorable poem in which he describes the arrival of Ulysses’ Greek soldiers on theislandofLotos Eaters. They are a lazy philosophic lot who do not like hard labour of any kind. Once the sailors in the ship are given the lotos fruit, leaf and stem and they have eaten them, they too are such transformed that they no more wish to sea-travel and see their homes. Sublime music and selected words create an atmosphere of languor, laziness and sleepiness in the poem which is Tennyson’s unique achievement and craftsmanship. This is the poem in which Tennyson experimented with music changing with the moods of each action, each bit of music perfectly reflecting the corresponding change in mood. Attempts to perfectly orchestrate this song have more or less failed through years due to failure of musical geniuses in exactly imitating the changing mind and moods of the exotically and psychedelically intoxicated.

A land of mountains, rivers, valleys, wind and waves, and Lotos plants.

A Portrait of Baron Tennyson.

Greek hero Ulysses and his band of soldiers had spent ten years in the Trojan War. Returning home they were lost in the sea and had to spend a few more years in roaming the sea. At last they sighted land. It was the land of Lotos Eaters. From the height of their anchored ship they could see far into the interior of the island. It was an island of mountains, rivers, valleys, wind and waves. Streams and falls were everywhere. Green woods and meadows ornamented plains and hills. It was a land where all things always seemed the same. No signs of cultivation or other human activities were to be seen anywhere there.

Lotos: Personification of exotic, psychedelic intoxication of human mind.

Then the mild and melancholy eyed island dwellers appeared and they silently approached the ship. They bore branches, leaves and stems of that enchanted plant of Lotos as presentations to visitors to their island from which they gave to each. Before Ulysses could prevent, his soldiers one and all had eaten them. Once they tasted this magical herb their attitudes and outlook dramatically changed. The once-courageous and strong mariners and soldiers all seemed tired suddenly. Those famous soldiers who fought bravely beside Ulysses in the fierce Trojan War now no more wish to bear the burden of sailing their ship through turbulent seas. Whoever tasted that magical herb given by those islanders became exactly like them. They seemed to be deep asleep yet all awake. The voices of nearby persons seemed to them thin voices from the depth of grave. Even their own heart beats resounded loudly and musically in their own ears. So now we see the Ulysses’ famous soldiers all sitting on the yellow sand, begin singing a chorus, the likeness of which has never ever been seen anywhere in English literature. All the efforts of their captain, the mighty Ulysses, could not move them an inch or release them from their hallucination and the spell of that magical plant.

Why sweetness of soul’s music and soothing pleasure of sleep are denied to man?

Path to Tennyson’s Monument in the Isle of Wight.

The mariners who tasted Lotos all became philosophers overnight who begin to worship idleness. Man is the roof and crown of things. He is the first and foremost of things but he alone is destined to toil. He makes perpetual moan in his life and is thrown from one sorrow to another perpetually. Enjoying leisurely the sweetness of his soul’s music and the soothing pleasures of sleep are forbidden to him. Weariness, heaviness and distress weigh him down. Hearing the excellent arguments of the mariners expressed in their chorus will make us wonder at the mathematical perfection of their logic and philosophy. We will be moved to stay with them and approbate their logic verbatim. That is the descriptive skill of Tennyson which made him the prominent poet of his era and after. There has never been a poem describing the attitude towards life and the philosophizing of a unique, exotically and psychedelically intoxicated band of humans more vividly.

The leaf and fruit and flower all have their sweet lives; man alone toils.

Tennyson’s House in Farringford.

The mariners begin to compare the tediousness of their lives with the easiness and quietness of the lives of leaves, fruits and flowers. They complete the cycles of their simple lives without any toil. Leaves open, grow and fall gently. The ripe fruits drop silently in autumn nights. Whereas man is a traveller and roamer, flowers are fast-rooted in their fertile soil. Flowers enjoy their allotted length of days, bloom and fade and fall, without toil. But man is the only being that is seen to be toiling in one way or another, in the fields, forests or oceans. Time driveth onward fast and in little time man’s life period is expired. Whatever man achieves is taken from him to become portions and parcels of a dreadful past which we commonly call history. All things under the Sun have rest except man. Therefore the mariners are not going to mount the rolling waves and travel any more. They want to stay forever on the island. After listening to their arguments we will be tempted to do nothing but agree.

Why return after years like apparitions to their native island of chaos?

Fresh Water Bay seen from Afton Down.

But Ulysses is a very persuasive person. He used every trick and argument in his quiver to tempt his mariners to return toIthaca. But they warn their captain that it would not be wise for them to return to their island home ofIthaca. Everything might have changed there. Their sons would have inherited them after all these years. The returning ancestors would only be viewed as ghosts and apparitions come to trouble their joy. Or else the over-bold island princes ofIthaca, fearing no return of the heroes might have married their wives and spent their fortunes. Their great deeds in wars would have been half-forgotten, sung only in songs. Even if they are lucky and oriented enough to return to their land, it would be harder still to please their gods after all these years and settle order once again in their island. So why not spend the rest of their lives in this quietislandofLotosand enjoy sleep and laziness to their fill? How can even a very persuasive person counter, in the face of this unbroken torrent of reasons?

Mariners declining to resume travel: the dread of all sea-going captains.

Coastal Path to Tennyson’s Monument.

These instances were not uncommon in the days of the rowing sea ship travels. They were the dread of every captain. Crew may refuse to move on after months of tiresome travels and incline to stay for ever in a new found land. A sailor’s life is a life of action. The mariners here have had enough of action and of motion in their lives. They had been constantly rolling to the starboard and larboard sides of the ship as it swayed left and right on the surging waves. The deep sea where the wallowing monster that is the whale spouted his foam-fountain had been their home and playground for too long. Now that is past and enough. They are tired of the sea and now they are inclined only to live and lie reclined in the hollow Lotos Land forever.

Gods lying together happily on their hills, careless and fearless of mankind!

When man does not obey, the clever will threaten him with the consequences of antagonizing their gods. As a last resort Ulysses seems to have done this, because now begins their discourse which, if he had had an opportunity to listen to, might have converted even the most firm believer into an atheist. When sensations and feelings were divided between man and gods, miseries were reserved for man while pleasures went to gods. Man suffers much in this world. Blight, famine, fire and earthquake, ocean flood and desert heat are all his lot. Man sows the seed, reaps the harvest and toils endlessly till his death. He stores wheat and wine and oil for his future but he has no future as he is most often withdrawn silently without notice from this world. Even after death he is doomed to suffer in hell. Man’s sorrowful songs of lamentation steam up to gods’ abode in heaven, like tales of little meaning though the words are strong. But listening to them, gods find music in his woes and laugh. It is the gods who are responsible for man’s sorrow. But they act indifferent to man. They lie together happily on their hills, careless and fearless of mankind. They keep their divine food nectar always close to them; what else do they do except relishing and draining it? They hurl their thunder bolts at man far below craving in the valleys, that is a joke to them. They sit in their golden houses surrounded by clouds and smile at the misery of man far below. All arguments of their captain were blunted by the magnificent and sincere defense of the mariners. Tennyson in the poem does not tell us whether their captain was finally able and eloquent enough to persuade his soldiers to return to their home land, but history does.

_________________________________

Pictures Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons.

_________________________________

 

Dear Reader,

If you cannot access all pages of P.S.Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books,Trivandrum, kindly access them via this link provided here:

https://sites.google.com/site/timeuponmywindowsill/wiki-nut-articles

Translations of this article in French, German, Spanish and Italian published in Knol.com can be read by clicking here.

http://knol.google.com/k/psremesh-chandran/-/2vin4sjqlcnot/0#collections

Tags

Alfred Lord Tennyson, Appreciations, British Poets, English Language And Literature, English Literature, English Poems, English Songs, Literary Criticism, P S Remesh Chandran, Poems, Poetry Reviews, Sahyadri Books And Bloom Books Trivandrum, Songs, The Lotos-Eaters, Victorian Poets

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PSRemeshChandra
Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of Swan : The Intelligent Picture Book.

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008. Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening. Robert Frost Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandrn

008

Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening. Robert Frost Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

 

By PSRemeshChandra, 19th Mar 2011. Short URL http://nut.bz/eslzz8m7/
First Posted in Wikinut>Reviews>Books>Poetry, Drama & Criticism

Link: http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2012/02/08-stopping-by-woods-robert-frost.html

Nature creates many beauties for man to observe but man, being burdened with the multitude of tasks of running a family, cannot spare his time for sharing the pleasantness nature imbues. In his rush of life he is forced to abandon the easy solaces nature offers which if accepted, would have served as a balm for his mind in flames. Robert Frost’s poem ‘Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening’ shows a glimpse of what treasures man has lost. True, what man forgets first is the beauty of his mother.

A British poet trained on practical American lines.

 

01. Robert Frost Portrait 1913.

Robert Frost was a farmer and poet who had a deep concern for nature. He lived during 1874-1963. ‘Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening’ is his world famous poem which appeals to man’s desire to be always be with nature. In the poem we see the poet riding a little horse into a snow falling forest in the evening. His sense of beauty tends him to stay but his dominating sense of duty sends him away. The genius of Frost shuttles between dream and reality and finally lands on immediate reality. Perhaps his long American life might have trimmed him on practical lines.

Nature’s Cynosures are for all the world to see.

 

02. Whose Woods These Are I Think I Know.

The poet stops by the wood on a snowy evening in winter. He doesn’t know who the owner of the forest is. Judging from the fact that there were no signs of any modern constructions to be seen there, he assumes that the owner of the forest might not be a town’s man, but a villager. So far so good. He hopes that the owner will not appear there at that time of heavy snow fall, as he does not wish to be seen tress-passing into private land. Sweet English reserve and shyness! Even though somewhat reluctant to enter a private property, his soul’s desire to be with nature tempted him and he entered the forest riding his horse.

All a winter’s work for the squirrels and sparrows to see.

 

03. All A Winters Work.

Nature’s benedictions are man’s common asset, limited to no one’s ownership. She creates her cynosures for all the world to see, through generations and ages. She creates them not exclusively for humans, but anticipating the admiring eyes of the squirrels, sparrows, peacocks and the marsupials also.

Animal instincts are sharper-tuned to sensing danger than man’s.

 

04. To Watch The Woods Fill Up With Snow.

Snow heavily falling on the trees and rocks and shrubs will form curious images of strange shapes and sizes. The poet plunges deep into observing their beauty and quite forgets the passing of Time. The horse was more danger-conscious and responsive to surroundings than the poet. Have anyone ever heard about an animal that took its own life? It became suspicious. What is this fellow on my back doing?

Between the woods and frozen lake.

 

05. Between The Woods And Frozen Lake.

Dangers of an ink-black night are ahead. No farm houses are to be seen anywhere nearby. They are standing between an unfriendly wood and a frozen lake where no one will get shelter and can survive. Man and animal can be lost and frozen in these circumstances. Besides, it is the darkest night of the year that is approaching. Is this man on my back having ideas of suicide? Animal instincts are sharper-tuned to sense danger than man’s. So thinking such and such, the horse gave his harness bells a shake to ask his master whether there was any mistake. Actually he was asking his master why they were stopping and staying in that unfavorable atmosphere for long.

The Tiny Little Boy with Hay-Ho, the Wind and the Rain.

 

06. Forage is scarce in winter, so a long neck.

The sounds of the horse-bells were heard distinctly against the only other background sound there, the swish-swishing sound of the easily-flowing wind sweeping against the incessantly down-falling snow. The exquisiteness of the description here reminds the readers of another master craftsman. In The Twelfth Night by William Shakespeare, there is a little song sung by the clown:

‘When that I was a tiny little boy,

With hay- ho, the wind and the rain.’

Everyone knows the wind and the rain, but who is this Mr. Hay-Ho? Critics have long debated who this Hay Ho is. It is very simple. Every little child knows Hay Ho; it is the combined effect of sound caused by wind on the rain personified. When wind blows against a green paddy field and the long lines of grass bow their heads in row after row, Hay Ho is present there. When we walk along a tar road while the rain comes down in torrents and the wind sweeps heavily against the rain, then again we can see Hay Ho on the road, coming towards us and going away from us. Hay Ho is indeed something to a tiny little boy and also for the poets. One is always the other. An exactly similar beauty with words is created here by Frost, in describing in vivid and suggestive words the swish-swishing of the wind and the rain in the snow-filled forest.

One single line written across the face of Time: How far to go before rest?

 

07. Miles to go before I sleep, and miles to go…..

The timely sound of his horse-bells roused the master to reality and reminded him of his immediate duties. Thus rightly inspired, the poet continues on his journey, singing those famous lines which made this song immortal.

‘The woods are lovely, dark and deep,
But I have promises to keep,
And miles to go before I sleep,
And miles to go before I sleep.’

An admirer of Robert Frost from across the oceans.

 

08. The woods are lovely, but I have promises to keep.

The sleep referred to here is the final sleep. These are lines written across Time, to inspire the world through ages. It is not certain whoever were inspired, excited and intoxicated with these lines. But it is known, the famous author of books such as Glimpses Of World History and The Discovery Of India and the first Prime Minister of India, Jawaharlal Nehru, wrote them down on his walls to be seen always.

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this song.

 

09. Stopping By Woods Video Title. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zy6nlrKRH10

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening. A primitive prototype rendering of this song was made in a crude tape recorder decades earlier, in 1984. In 2014, a home made video of this song was released. In 2015, a third version with comparatively better audio was released. The next version, it’s hoped, would be fully orchestrated. It’s free for reuse, and anyone interested in can develop and build on it, till it becomes a fine musical video production, to help our little learners and their teachers.

Link to this video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zy6nlrKRH10

Also read the article The Life And Works Of Robert Frost Reintroduced By P S Remesh Chandran.

 

10. Life And Works Of Robert Frost Article.

http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2017/04/073-life-and-works-of-robert-frost.html

Readers are advised to also read the article The Life And Works Of Robert Frost Reintroduced By P S Remesh Chandran in Sahyadri Books Trivandrum at http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2017/04/073-life-and-works-of-robert-frost.html

 

First Published: 19 March 2011

Last Edited……: 24 March 2017

 

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Pictures Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
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Picture Credits:

01. Robert Frost Portrait 1913 By The New York Times.

02. Whose woods these are I think I know By Ruhrfisch.

03. All a winter’s work By Böhringer Friedrich.

04. To watch the woods fill up with snow By Adrian Michael.

05. Between the woods and frozen lake By Harke.

06. Forage scarce in winter, so a long neck By Unknown.

07. Miles to go before I sleep By Jim Champion.

08. The woods are lovely, but I have promises to keep By John Davies.

09. Stopping By Woods Video Title By Bloom Books Channel.

10. Life And Works Of Robert Frost Title By Sahyadri Archives.

11. Author Profile Of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Meet the author: About the author and accessing his other literary works.

 

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of ‘Swan, The Intelligent Picture Book’. Edits and owns Bloom Books Channel. Born and brought up in Nanniyode, a little village in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Kerala. Father British Council-trained English Teacher and mother university-educated. Matriculation with High First Class, Pre Degree studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship, discontinued Diploma Studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

11. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Dear Reader,

If you cannot access all pages of P S Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum, kindly access them via this link provided here:
https://sites.google.com/site/timeuponmywindowsill/wiki-nut-articles

Visit author’s Sahyadri Books Trivandrum in Blogger at
http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.com/ and his Bloom Books Channel in You Tube at https://www.youtube.com/user/bloombooks/videos  

Author’s Google Plus Page: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+PSRemeshChandran/posts

Face Book Page: https://www.facebook.com/psremeshchandra.trivandrum

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American Poets, English Poems, Literary Essays, Literary Reviews, Poem Appreciations, Poetry Reviews, Poem Studies, Free Student Notes, Poem Notes, College Notes, Sahyadri Books Trivandrum, Bloom Books Trivandrum, P S Remesh Chandran, Robert Frost, Stopping By Woods On A Snowy Evening, Nature Poems, Winter Poems

 

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007. Song To The Men Of England. P B Shelley Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

007

Song To The Men Of England. P B Shelley Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

 

By PSRemeshChandra, 18th Mar 2011. Short URL http://nut.bz/21kpi-9l/
First Posted in Wikinut>Reviews>Books>Poetry, Drama & Criticism. Link: http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2012/02/07-song-to-men-of-england-pbshelley.html

 

A revolutionary is a person who causes constant changes around him wherever he is. In this sense, Shelley was a revolutionary poet. Song To The Men Of England opened up world’s eyes to the torture, brutality and exploitation workers were subjected to in England during the time of her colonial prosperity and raised the question: Why can’t they revolt? Karl Marx predicted workers’ revolution in England as follow up of the Industrial Revolution but it never happened. The English workers were inert.

Kill not a bird or beast or man, they are all our brethren.

 

01. A portrait of Percy Bysshe Shelley.

Percy Bysshe Shelley wrote each poem to celebrate a particular tune as we can see in his poems Song To The Men Of England, Ode To The West Wind, To A Skylark, The Cloud, Adonais and many others. He is considered one of the greatest poets in English and his influence on world literature is immense. When we refer to him as a revolutionary poet, it does not mean he stood for merciless killing. In fact, he considered even animals as our fellow creatures, not to be slain for human food. It was after reading his works that the famous English author and dramatist George Bernard Shaw became a vegetarian.

Workers and exploiters are like bees and drones in bee community.

 

02. A 1939 weaving loom with flying shuttles.

Here in this poem, Shelley asks the Nineteenth Century peasants and workers of England why they are not revolting against the landlords and the industrial production owners who are exploiting them to the last drop of their blood. In the Bee Community, female bees do all the work and the male drones live by exploiting them. Shelley calls the workers Bees and the exploiters Drones which is apt.

Purpose of weapons fails when they are used against man.

 

03. A 200 single yarn beaming machine of 1907.

Shelley’s questions to the workers of England skillfully bring out the pitiful living conditions they live in in England in his times. He is asking them for what reason they plough the fields for the lords who are responsible for their poverty. For what reason, with toil and care, they weave the rich robes their tyrants are wearing, while their own children are shivering in the dark without cotton or coal. From their birth till their death why the workers feed, clothe and save those ungrateful drones, who in their turn, would either drain their sweat or drink their blood.

Weapons become spoiled when they are stained with their makers’ blood.

 

04. The celestial forge of Venus and Vulcan. 1641 Oil.

The Bees of England forge many weapons, chains and scourges which go straight to the hands of the tyrants to be used against them in it’s time. Weapons were invented to assist man in his works, but when used against its creator, their purpose fails and they become spoiled. Critics have differed in their interpretations of the word ‘spoiled.’ A weapon to become spoiled means ‘to become stained with its maker’s blood’. Knives were invented for cutting away tree branches from paths of the ancient man in the forests, chains were invented for lifting huge weights from the ground, and whips were designed for taming wild animals. But when they come to be used for throat-cutting, binding men together and for beating man, their purpose fails and they become spoiled.

Sacrificing their lives, making arms and robes and riches for tyrants.

 

05. Forge arms, in your defense to bear.

The workers pay so high a price by living in constant pain, fear and poverty but even then, in spite of all these sufferings, at least their physical and spiritual needs are not satisfied. If not for fulfilling at least their basic animalistic needs, why should they labour from morning till night and from night till morning again? (Shelley can say this, but there was unbelievable poverty in England. Peasants and workers lived in abject poverty, want and exploitation in the middle of immense wealth arriving from distant colonies. Just a little food for sustenance and the shade of a shack to rest their heads beneath was all that the workers of England wished in those times). Leisure, comfort and calmness are the spiritual needs of man. Food, shelter and the medicinal treatment of love are the physical needs of man. It is not strange to note that Shelley, unlike most of the other poets in his times, has included love as a physical need of man, like food. The workers sow seed, but the harvest is taken away by lords. They bring wealth out of earth through their work, but the riches are amassed and kept by others. They weave robes for others, but their own children have nothing to wear. The arms they forge also go to the armories of oppressors. Thus Shelley convinces the workers of England and elsewhere that they are exploited to the extreme, and that rising through revolts is the only option before them.

A poet’s burning eloquence forcing the doors of England open.

 

06. Sow seed and reap, but let not the idle heap.

We will normally think the poet, spreading such radical ideas in Colonial England, will finally find his way to London Tower, the English equivalent of the notorious French Bastille. But it was also the era of the Industrial Revolution, immediately following the English version of the Italian Renaissance. No workers’ revolution ever occurred in England then or later as Shelley hoped, and Marx had predicted. Communism, the supreme theory of revolution, was born indeed in England’s soil, but Carl Marx fuming and storming his head in the British Museum for Thirty two long years came to nothing. Prosperity extinguishes revolutionary traits, whereas poverty inflames them. But England in later years did become a haven and world headquarters for revolutionaries in exile, due to the open door policy there, carved out of passionate poetry and literature by generations of sympathetic littérateurs. Shelley’s burning eloquence in this song cannot be denied its due share of influence and credit in bringing about this change.

The silent song of weaving winding sheets to graves.

 

07. Weaving their winding sheet to their graves.

Shelley showed to the workers exploited everywhere in the world that they have a right to rise in revolts. He encourages them to sow seed but let no tyrant reap the harvest; find wealth but let no impostor heap them. But his clarion-calls fell into deaf ears. Seeing the inertness of English workers, towards the end of his poem, Shelley condemns them. By not revolting against their exploiters, they finally will have to shrink to their cells, holes and cellars which are their dwelling places, as the vast halls they constructed and decorated are all possessed by the rich. Imagine a great massive elephant getting melting itself down and disappearing into the tiny pit of a sand-elephant: that is how the proletariat shrinks. The great beast does not know its capabilities. It is a pity to see the workers still wearing the chains they themselves wrought and shaking them. ‘The steel ye tempered glance on ye’, he writes. ‘Glance’ here has a dual meaning. He used the word in its both senses- ‘slip off from the hand causing a mortal wound’, and ‘have a quick look at’. The steel the workers themselves tempered is ridiculingly laughing at them! If their destiny goes on unhampered in this way, with plough and spade and hoe and loom- the tools of their trade- they will be continuing to build their tomb and weave their winding-sheet till their beautiful England becomes a vast sepulchre.

Shelley set fire to the conscience of his century.

 

08. Shelley’s poem To A Skylark Video Title By Bloom Books Channel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFVoiRm-yEI

Shelley must have been very bold and daring to have published this poem during the peak of England’s colonial powers and sovereignty. And he certainly must have been extremely sympathetic and deliquescent in his attitude to workers in his native land. He indeed was a very brilliant poet to have set fire to the conscience of his century. This poem is a masterpiece of poetical eloquence, as well as of political eloquence. It is a brilliant example of commitment and involvement in flames, in action.

Thousands and thousands of workers and peasants succumbed to poverty and mortal illnesses in Shelly’s days in England. Not many poets in his times cared to write about these misfortune-struck people. And he too wrote not many poems of this kind about them. Perhaps he might have conceived that ‘the present turbulence in his times might be inimical to the fine achievements of mankind so far and become a hindrance to drastic changes in future’. That might have been why he decided to bless his land with a poem which would open everyone’s eyes to a world problem. It is a perfectly musical poem, with a perfectly balanced rhythm and a captivating tune which came along originally with the song. Actually the song and its tune are inseparable in this poem. Do not anyone be misled by those lazy, dragging and monotonous tunes which we find in many recitations of this song already circulating in the internet and those tuneless and prose-like utterances propagated by conventional and less imaginary teachers. They want only to exhibit before their listeners and poor students their pompous recitational skills and that impurity we call accent. They did sore injustice to the excellent musical-minded poet Shelley. The original tune of this poem proves that it was accompanied by some kind of rural peasants’ dance in some remote hamlet of England. It contains such a simple, light, country tune, with no complications.

Going through Shelley’s poems is like a squirrel going through a mountain of gold dust.

 

09. Shelley’s poem Ozymandias Video Title By Bloom Books Channel.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_exxBg5urk0

It would have been a fine spectacle to watch if someone orchestrated and choreographed the Song To The Men of England as a tribute to Shelley. Singing Shelley’s songs is like going through a savoury treat delightful to the tongue and the palates. A singer of this song would undergo an experience similar to the one of the squirrel’s who went through a mountain of gold dust and found it impossible not to be sprayed with a few golden dust particles.

Percy Bysshe Shelley’s life and works during 1792-1817.

 

10. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley.

Percy Bysshe Shelley was born in 1792 August 04 in Horsham, England as the first of seven children of the Sir Timothy Shelley, a country squire and baron, and his wife Elizabeth Pilfold Shelley. His father was a British Parliamentarian of the Whigs Party. He began boys’ boarding school at Eton College in 1804. After six years’ of boarding school studies, he enrolled at University College, Oxford in 1810 where he became indifferent to studies, published ‘The Necessity of Atheism’ which made his father angry and caused his expulsion from Oxford the next year. He published his first novel ‘Zastrozzi’ also in that period. In 1811 he ran away with a young student Ms. Harriet Westbrook to Scotland who he soon became tired of. In 1813 he published the long poem Queen Mab and exposed his political views irrespective of his father being a conservative Parliamentarian. In 1814 he eloped again with the daughter of the famous writer and philosopher William Godwin- young Mary Wollstonecraft- to Europe and the next year we see Shelley hiding in London to evade his creditors. During the years from 1815 to 1818, Shelley became close friends with poets Lord Gordon Byron and John Keats, published The Spirit of Solitude in 1816, children were born and died, married the mother of their children Mary, toured Switzerland and came back with the book History of Six Weeks Tour published in 1817, his first wife Harriet took her life by jumping into London river, and his second wife Mary started writing the famous horror novel Frankenstein.

Shelley’s life and works during the years 1818-1824.

 

11. Writer Philosopher William Godwin.

In 1818, Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley published Frankenstein, an all time success, Shelley published Ozymandias and The Revolt of Islam, and they travelled to Italy never to return. Song To The Men Of England and The Masque Of Anarchy were written while Shelley was in Florence. In 1820 Shelley wrote the mythological drama Prometheus Unbound, and in 1821 when John Keats died, he wrote the elegy Adonais. While living in Pisa and Rome, he completed the tragedy The Censy. In 1822 his schooner Don Juan caught up in a storm and Shelley died at the age of 29. He was cremated on the beach and his ashes buried in Rome. Sir. Timoti Shelley was still furious over the political and heretical writings of his son and threatened Shelley’s wife Mary in 1924 never to publish anymore of his son’s works while he lived. He even threatened to stop financial support to her if she did. After many years, in 1839, he reluctantly allowed Mary to publish Shelley’s collected poems and essays on the condition that ‘it contained no memoirs of his son’. Mary Wollstonecraft Shelley was an intellectual equal to Shelley in genius and her ‘The Complete Poetical Works of Percy Bysshe of 1824 stands a monumental work.

Irony in Percy Bysshe Shelley’s life.

 

12. Different editions of Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein.

Left wing activists considered Shelley as ‘Red Shelley’ but in real life he was a strict vegetarian and against blood sheds of any kind. His words were not final but wavering and often contradictory. He who said in his work Defense Of Poetry that ‘man’s imagination is only a reflection of god’s’ was expelled from Oxford University for publishing in 1811‘The Necessity of Atheism’. No one cared his non-belief in god was not final and binding. Literary critics pointed out that his views were contradictory and wavering for he became in soul The Cloud, The West Wind, The Skylark and The Man Of England all at the same time, synchronizing his mind with the natural elements and nature’s creations which were his characters, but these critics of Shelley forgot all the while that he synchronized his soul with his characters beautifully.

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem Song To The Men Of England.

 

13. Song To The Men Of England Video Title.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zy6nlrKRH10

Bloom Books Channel has recitation videos of Song To The Men Of England, Ozymandias and To a Skylark. Their You Tube links are:

Song To The Men Of England: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=zy6nlrKRH10

Ozymandias:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=_exxBg5urk0

To a Skylark:

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=qFVoiRm-yEI

A primitive prototype rendering of these song were made in a crude tape recorder decades earlier, in 1984. In 2014, home made videos of these songs were released. In 2015, their third versions with comparatively better audios were released. The next versions, it’s hoped, would be fully orchestrated. They are free for reuse, and anyone interested in can develop and build on them, till they become fine musical video productions, to help our little learners and their teachers.

First Published: 18th Mar 2011

Last Edited…….. : 15 April 2017

___________________________________________
Pictures Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
___________________________________________

Picture Credits:

01. Portrait of Percy Bysshe Shelley 1819 By Alfred Clint.
02. 1939 weaving loom with flying shuttles By Imus Eus.
03. 200 single yarn beaming machine 1907 By Imus Eus.
04. The celestial forge of Venus and Vulcan 1641 By Le Nain Brothers.
05. Forge arms in your defense to bear By Penny Mayes.
06. Sow seed but let not the idle heap By Bernard Gagnon.
07. Weaving winding sheets to graves By Thomas Khaipi.
08. Shelley’s poem To A Skylark By Bloom Books Channel.
09. Shelley’s poem Ozymandias By Bloom Books Channel.

10. Mary Wollstoncraft Shelley By John Williamson.
11. William Godwin 1875 By Henry William Pickersgill.
12. Different Editions of Frankenstein By Andy Mabbett.
13. Song To The Men Of England Video Title By Bloom Books Channel.
14. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Meet the author: About the author and accessing his other literary works.

 

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of ‘Swan, The Intelligent Picture Book’. Edits and owns Bloom Books Channel. Born and brought up in Nanniyode, a little village in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Kerala. Father British Council-trained English Teacher and mother university-educated. Matriculation with High First Class, Pre Degree studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship, discontinued Diploma Studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

14. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Dear Reader,

If you cannot access all pages of P S Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum, kindly access them via this link provided here:
https://sites.google.com/site/timeuponmywindowsill/wiki-nut-articles

Visit author’s Sahyadri Books Trivandrum in Blogger at
http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.com/ and his Bloom Books Channel in You Tube at https://www.youtube.com/user/bloombooks/videos  

Author’s Google Plus Page: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+PSRemeshChandran/posts

Face Book Page: https://www.facebook.com/psremeshchandra.trivandrum

 

Tags

 

Bloom Books Trivandrum, British Poets, Free Student Notes, Literary Essays, Literary Reviews, Men Of England Wherefore Plough, P S Remesh Chandran, Percy Bysshe Shelley, Poem Appreciations, Poem Notes, Poetry Reviews, Revolutionary Poems, Revolutionary Poets, Sahyadri Books Trivandrum, Song To The Men Of England

 

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Identifier: SBT-AE-007. Song To The Men Of England. Percy Bysshe Shelley Poem. Articles English Downloads Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Editor: P S Remesh Chandran

006. Leisure. W H Davies Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

006

Leisure. W H Davies Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

 

By PSRemeshChandra, 16th Mar 2011 Short URL http://nut.bz/qp4j6ml6/
First Posted in Wikinut>Reviews>Books>Poetry, Drama & Criticism. Link: http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2012/02/06-leisure-whdavies-appreciation-by.html

 

Man is always eager to observe and enjoy the beauties of nature. Only that he does not get enough time for rest to elate and thrill his mind by soaking up the magnificent spectacles Mother Nature has created around him. It was in the midst of and from these beauties that man was created. Therefore, his wish to always be with them is only natural. Whenever he has to leave the beauties of nature behind, he pines in his heart as if leaving his homeland.

Go to a jungle river, bath and wash your clothes, spread them on rocks to dry and lie under some shady stream-side trees.

 

01. William Henry Davies Portrait 1915.

Staying with nature and enjoying the innocent beauties nature created around man is soothing to the soul and invigorating to the physic. Going to a riverside jungle, lying under a tree growing out of large boulders shading us from sunlight, listening to the voices of birds chirping nearby and the gentle murmur of a stream flowing away, is an experience not all can have everyday. Frequenting Jungle Rivers, bathing in river, washing our clothes and spreading them on rocks to dry and resting under a spreading tree while they are drying, is a pleasure we will wish to have everyday. Once we have visited such a scenic beauty spot and have rested there feeling the wind blowing across us and water flowing below us and listened to waves gently lapping over the shore, we will consider ourselves lucky and would dream of going to such places again and again and refreshing us again.

Primitive man who sat in his mountain cave watching the beauty of a sunset was the first poet.

 

02. Reading in leisure: The greatest of all pastimes.

Archaeological excavations of ancient sites of human living have taught us that there has been no time in human history that was totally deprived of leisure and time for rest. Whenever man got freed of inevitable and immediate works, he always found a little time to indulge in leisurely activities like painting, singing, writing and debating. Primitive man who, after a delicious meal, sat in leisure in the mouth of his mountain cave and watched the beauty of a distant sunset was the first person who chiseled poems on rocks. From the snow-buried Neanderthal Valley in Germany and the ice-frozen caves of Cro-Magnon in France, we have dug up evidence of the outcomes of a hunting society’s pass-time and leisure in the form of magnificent rock wall paintings, and stood in awe.

The idea of calm and leisure exists in a sitting cat.

 

03. Statue of Davies on the seafront of Port Williams.

Man is not alone in enjoying the beauties of nature and leisure. Cats, horses, cows, squirrels, birds- they all catharsizes their souls through leisure. Cats are the first to enjoy music, sunshine, rest and leisure. In beautiful evenings they can be seen washing and meticulously cleaning themselves taking hours, then walking to their regular elevated acoustically-optimized spots and sitting there listening to their favourite church or temple music coming through loudspeakers, while basking themselves in bright warm sunlight. Cows and sheep constantly and steadily gaze at things situated far away for any length of time, but if we go and stand behind them and look for what they had been gazing at for long that much interestedly, we will see nothing particular or special. They are enjoying their leisure.

Work stretches to fill the time available to finish it.

 

04. Cats are the first to enjoy leisure and sunshine.

One curious thing about work is it stretches itself to fill the time available to finish it. The more time available to finish it is there, the work takes more time to finish. So practically man gets no time for leisure. In earlier societies in which everyone had to work without rest to make their living, there was no leisure, no civilization and no culture to be mentioned, and they remained barbarians. ‘A society enters upon the process of civilization only when it is able to afford a minority who does no work but just sit, eat and think.’ Discovery of agriculture, mechanization and tools guaranteed enough food crops to be produced for all without everyone having to work for achieving this level of self-sufficiency and generated leisure time, and civilization began. Leisure is something that is disappearing from this world. Leisure is what brought civilization and culture into this world, will keep the light of civilization burning, and keep the world from falling apart in future. Without its soothing balm, civilizations, societies and nations are lost. Without its cementing bondage, empires of intricate economics and politics would crumble and fall. And without its promising prospect, man’s achievements on land, air, sea and space would go to smithereens.

Admiring eyes of a tramp and rural shepherd in America.

 

05. There is enough to see but man has not time. 

William Henry Davies was a British poet who lived during 1871-1940. In the earlier years of his life he led the life of a tramp and rural shepherd in America, the stamps of which can be seen in his poems. In his famous poem Leisure, he regrets the loss of leisure from human life. He was very keen in his observations of nature and in this he stands in line with Robert Frost and Alexander Pope.

Flight of Leisure through Middle Ages, Renaissance, Industrial Revolution and Twenty First Century.

 

Duration of leisure available in society is a measure of its achievements in arts, music, science, literature, civilization and culture. Since the invention of agriculture and the wheel, human society had been advancing steadily in this respect till the middle ages. Since then, slavery and bondage for the poor and corpulent fleshly ills for the rich became a custom, civilization nearly dried up and the world fell into a long period of dark ages. Only in a few corners of the world did the light of knowledge burn dimly but without diminishing. Human intelligence- chained up and bound- strove fiercely to free itself from the bondage of evil religion and the darkness of dogma, and a few rays of bright light began to appear here and there in the world. Mechanization and a series of scientific discoveries brought leisure again to man’s society since the Sixteenth Century and the ‘re-awakening of thought began, knowledge became fashionable and science commenced to stir’, the total effect of which we called Renaissance which lasted four centuries and marked a peak in human achievements. Industrial revolution of the Nineteenth Century brought lethargy and stupor for the Twentieth and Twenty First Centuries and leisure is now giving way to round-the-clock engagement, greed for riches and prosperity, and discontentment- the enveloping of another kind of dark ages. The result: civilization is drying up again, repeating the cycle.

Squirrels forget their hidden caches and man recovers them for dinner.

 

06. Basking in Sun in leisure after eating apple.

Man is now left with no time to observe and enjoy the beauties of nature. He has now no time left to stand beneath the flowery branches of trees and stare as long as the sheep or cows do at the things he likes. The cattleman profession of the poet is reflected here. Passing through the woods, he sees squirrels running everywhere and hiding their nuts in the grass. Sometimes they may forget these caches and man will find them and recover them for his dinner, the thought of which makes the poet laugh heartily, for he himself had often sought these forgotten stores in his hunger. But now he has no time left to enjoy the briskness and beauty of their movements.

Squirrels have a fixed time and route to enter a grove and drink honey before going to the next.

 

Have anyone observed a squirrel harvesting honey from a plantain grove? It has a fixed time and route to enter a plantation, say 3 PM in the evening for a particular plantation. It enters at one corner by jumping from a coconut leaf from the neighboring plantation into this grove, travels harvesting through all plantains along a time-and-distance-economized route and moves out at the opposite corner by jumping into a coconut tree on the edge of the grove, passing on to the next grove to harvest. After savoring honey from one plantain tree, it will jump to another through plantain leaves till all plantains in that grove are covered, without ever coming down to the ground which is risky. To make a living, it has to cover many groves each day and that is why it economizes the time and distance of travel. So, the squirrels have their fixed time and route to enter a grove and cover it before going to the next. The author of this article has had to closely watch this time-table and schedule to enter his grove to drink honey from plantains before the squirrel arrives.

Watching star studded skies at night was a great pastime for the primitive man.

 

07. Guardian of the gateway in leisurely vigil: A heron.

Water bodies with glassy surfaces reflecting nature is a fine spectacle in woods. While walking through woods, the sudden appearance of the view of a lake or brook through the woods is delightful. Clean brooks and streams reflecting the rippling broad daylight would appear like bluish star-studded skies at night with their abundance of stars, a majestic sight to see through woods. But alas! The rush of life urges the modern man to move forward without stopping, to attend to the daily chores of life, leaving behind those beautiful sights un-enjoyed.

Innocent radiance of a smile would embrace anyone with its charm and warmth.

 

08. Leisure beneath the mountain canopies 1523.

Hills and valleys and meadows remain the same but their expressions change with time, like expressions in a human face change according to mood. We call the face along with its expressions countenance. It is nature’s countenance that is changing with time. Morning, noon and night add specific expressions to nature’s face. It’s like nature going through various emotions and smiling. We know a smile begins in the eyes and finishes in the lips which would take a little time to complete. But we cannot sit there watching through morning, noon and night to see nature’s smile finish. If someone has that much time, he is lucky indeed. Like a child’s, nature’s smile has an innocent radiance which enchants anyone with its charm and it has warmth which embraces anyone sitting for long with her. That is why man wishes to remain with nature as longer as he can.

Today the river is crystalline, tomorrow she is choky and narrow and then she is muddy and overflowing, like a fine dancer changing costumes.

 

09. Absolute leisure in the lap of eternity.

Nature also dances. And she is a lavishly gifted dancer. Her attires and adornments constantly changes with the passing of seasons. Today the leaves are tender green, tomorrow they are red and then they are dead brown. Today the earth is hot, tomorrow it is wet and then it is cold and bare with snow. Today the river is crystalline, tomorrow she is choky and narrow and then she is muddy and overflowing. It is like a fine dancer on stage changing costumes and continuing dancing. For whom does she dance? It is the mother dancing to delight and make happy the child. She is dancing for birds, butterflies, animals, fishes, snakes and man. It is ultimate beauty that is dancing there and it is soothing and solacing to see this supreme dancing of Mother Nature on hills, valleys and meadows. Birds, butterflies and animals watch it but man alone does not have time to watch his mother dance.

Dance of nature in hills and forests completes with the cycle of seasons.

 

10. Last home of Davies in Gloucestershire, England- Glendower.

Some critics have shrunk the meaning here to the presence of some mortal human beauty dancing and smiling in the wild and un-diligent readers also may fall into the same fallacy. But the logical reference here is to the presence of the perfect beauty, i.e., Mother Nature, dancing in the hills and the wild. The smile of nature is completed only with completion of the cycle of seasons, which means, to see the full smile of nature, one has to wait there at the same spot throughout one full year. Or we will see only an unfinished part of a smile without seeing its beginning and end. Man cannot wait that long and he has not that much time to spare. So, if this life is such full of care and anxiety that we are left with no time to stand and stare at things we like as long as we wish to, then it indeed is a very poor life in this earth.

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem.

 

11. Leisure Video Title. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MuZDwnc_a0

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem Leisure titled ‘What Is This Life If Full Of Care’. A primitive prototype rendering of this song was made in a crude tape recorder decades earlier, in 1984. In 2014, a home made video of this song was released. In 2015, a third version with comparatively better audio was released. The next version, it’s hoped, would be fully orchestrated. It’s free for reuse, and anyone interested in can develop and build on it, till it becomes a fine musical video production, to help our little learners and their teachers.

You Tube Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2MuZDwnc_a0

 

First Published: 16th Mar 2011

Last Edited….. : 23 March 2017

 
__________________________________________
Pictures Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
__________________________________________

 

Picture credits:

01. William Henry Davies Portrait 1915 By Bonhams.

02. Reading in leisure: the greatest of all pastimes By Cristofano Allori.

03. Statue of Davies on the seafront of Port Williams. Sculpture By Andrew Brown, Photo By A M Hurrell.

04. Cats are the first to enjoy leisure and sunshine By 4028mdk09.

05. There is enough to see but man has not time By J M Garg.

06. Basking in Sun in leisure after eating apple By V Menkov.

07. Guardian of the gateway in leisurely vigil: A heron By Pauline Eccles.

08. Leisure beneath the mountain canopies 1523 By Tang Yin.

09. Absolute leisure in the lap of eternity By John Webber.

10. Last home of Davies in Gloucestershire England By Martin Evans 123.

11. Leisure Video Title By Bloom Books Channel.

12. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Meet the author: About the author and accessing his other literary works.

 

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of ‘Swan, The Intelligent Picture Book’. Edits and owns Bloom Books Channel. Born and brought up in Nanniyode, a little village in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Kerala. Father British Council-trained English Teacher and mother university-educated. Matriculation with High First Class, Pre Degree studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship, discontinued Diploma Studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

12. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

 

Dear Reader,

If you cannot access all pages of P S Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum, kindly access them via this link provided here:
https://sites.google.com/site/timeuponmywindowsill/wiki-nut-articles

Visit author’s Sahyadri Books Trivandrum in Blogger at
http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.com/ and his Bloom Books Channel in You Tube at https://www.youtube.com/user/bloombooks/videos  

Author’s Google Plus Page: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+PSRemeshChandran/posts

Face Book Page: https://www.facebook.com/psremeshchandra.trivandrum

Tags

 

Bloom Books Trivandrum, British Poets, College Notes, English Poems, Free Student Notes, Leisure, Literary Essays, Literary Reviews, P S Remesh Chandran, Poem Appreciations, Poetry Reviews, Sahyadri Books Trivandrum, W H Davies, What Is This Life If Full Of Care.

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Identifier: SBT-AE-006. Leisure. W H Davies Poem. Articles English Downloads Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Editor: P S Remesh Chandran

 

004. The Leech Gatherer. William Wordsworth Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

004.

The Leech-Gatherer. William Wordsworth Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

 

By PSRemeshChandra, 15th Mar 2011. Short URL http://nut.bz/134a-2vx/
First Posted in Wikinut>Reviews>Books>Poetry, Drama & Criticism. Link: http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2012/02/004-leech-gatherer-william-wordsworth.html

William Wordsworth’s poetry has no style because nature and life has no style. The perfect plainness of his poems gained him popularity. He mostly wrote about nature and man and is considered the world’s greatest nature poet. The world was very late in recognizing his merit. However, glory found its way to his grave. The Leech-Gatherer, alternatively titled ‘Resolution And Independence’ is the universal symbol of eternal human labour.

A poet’s perennial interest in man and nature.

 

01. A Portrait of William Wordsworth.

When Wordsworth, Samuel Taylor Coleridge and Mary Shelley decided to author one horror creation each, Coleridge wrote The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner which terrorized even him and became an all-time classic in horror. Mary Shelley wrote the novel Frankenstein which still terrorizes the world by creating nightmares in the minds of whoever thinks of that abominable human being that rogue scientist assembled from several body parts. Wordsworth, so soft in nature and inept at creating situations of terror, wrote The Stolen Boat which terrorized no one except perhaps him. Failing to create horror situations remained a shame in his mind for many years which he wished to rectify by writing a poem with finer horror conceptions someday. The Leech-Gatherer was an addition to this sequel of horror tales by these three friend writers which fulfilled its mission by creating a new sophistication in horror. It is one of the immortal creations of Wordsworth and can be identified as such among the hundreds of inferior poems he created throughout his life. There has been a universal question raised in this world which we have never been able to answer yes or no: ‘Will the world look after us and provide for us when we are old?’ The Leech-Gatherer is Wordsworth’s the answer to this ages-old question.

Appearance of exquisite nature pictures in poetry pages, after Edmund Spenser.

 

02. Dove Cottage in Grasmere. Once Home to Wordsworth.

The poem opens with presentation of a series of beautiful nature pictures, second only to Edmund Spenser’s in his The Fairee Queene. After the heavy rain and storm of yester night, the Sun is rising calm and bright as if nothing had happened the day before. The atmosphere is such still and silent that the sweet sounds of birds singing in distant woods can be heard as distinctly as if they were very near. The voices of Stock-Dove, Magpie and Jay, mixed with the pleasant noise of waters flowing everywhere, fill the atmosphere. All the Sun-loving creatures are out of doors, i.e., out of their dens and caves, and the simple grass is shining bright and fresh with rain drops adorning them. Unable to hide her mirth, the hare is running races on the moor in the morning air, like frivolous playful kitten. Wherever she touches her feet, tiny water particles rises up like mist from the splashy earth, glittering in the Sun, forming beautiful rainbow-glows about her tiny feet. The poet also can feel the very pulse-beat of Nature as those creatures as he is personally present there with sensitive eyes and ears, capturing the pressure and temperature of that atmosphere and bringing to us the freshness of those scenes intact.

A poet as light and happy as a lark.

 

03. Grasmere Village With The Dove Cottage.

He was then a morning-traveller upon that moor. He was as happy as a boy that he sometimes heard and sometimes heard not the roaring sounds of the great woods and waterfalls around him.’ Now he has quite forgotten how sad he had been moments earlier, and would again be moments after. He has reached the peak of happiness if there is one, forgetting all his pangs and past memories, and that sad useless melancholic mood common and so natural to man.

Premonitions of a lonely traveller on the moor.

 

04. Waterfall and Stone Hut where the Poet wrote poems.

When we are happy, we begin to think that our happiness won’t end. And when we are sad, we begin to feel anxious about whether our sadness won’t end someday. We want our sadness to end immediately and happiness never to end. Happiness and sadness are but waves in a sea of thoughtfulness, receding to that same deep stillness. John Milton, while studying for M.A., had to write two long essays describing two entirely contrasting things for his vivo voce examination. He selected Day and Night which no other things have more contrast between, and decided to write these two essays as poetry. Therefore the world got two immortal poems. He selected the Italian title L’Allegro for Day which meant the mirthful man. And he selected the Latin title Il Penseroso for Night which meant the thoughtful man. The opposite of happiness is not sadness in his view. All the world’s philosophers know contrast to happiness and mirth is not sadness but thoughtfulness. It is only natural for man to fall from the height of happiness to the depth of dejection, and then to thoughtfulness. This happens to the poet also in that fine morning on the moor.

Clouds come thick into the serene mind of a poet.

 

05. He was a traveller then upon the moor.

Fears and fancies come thick into the poet’s mind, like clouds coming ominously into a serene sky. In the midst and presence of such blissful creatures as the warbling sky lark and the playful hare, he feels himself to be walking far away from the world and all earthly cares. His whole life he has lived in pleasant thoughts as if life’s business were a summer dream. His poetry-writing career had not brought him enough to buy even his shoe-strings. Many mighty poets have returned to earth in their misery, suffering fleshly ills such as cold, pain and heavy labour. Would he too die the same way? Would solitude, distress, pain of heart, and poverty be awaiting him too, to accompany him to the grave? Is it not that the tragic career of all poets, as a rule, begins in gladness and ends in sadness and gloom? That marvelous Village-Milton that was Chatterton, who had walked in glory and in joy along his native mountain side following his plough, living the life of a farmer, had perished in poverty, though with pride. But why are these ominous thoughts coming to him at this untoward moment? The goose-bumps springing up all through his body parked at that lonely and desolate moor told him that Nature is soon going to present him with some sign of divine warning to admonish him about the rarity and preciousness of Time. Then he saw it- the warning, placed there on the wild, for all the world to see.

The warning written on the lonely moor, beside a pool.

 

06. Sudden appearance of a ghost of a man here.

A very old man, perhaps the oldest man that ever wore grey hairs, appeared suddenly beside a pool in that wild- the oldest person the poet ever saw in this world. He never fitted in with those lonely wild surroundings. Such an extremely old man in such strangest of circumstances was odd and out of place. Nature startles man with her bizarre and striking spectacles. ‘Sometimes huge stones can be seen lying couched on tree-less bald mountain tops, causing wonder to all who look at them.’ One will begin to think whether or not they are gifted with an unnatural ability to walk up the mountain eminence and lie couching there, precariously balanced. Another equally tantalizing spectacle is at the sea shore, that of ‘some huge sea-beast crawled forth and reposing on some shelf of rock or sand to sun itself.’ Such bizarre and out of place seemed the appearance and look of that old man in such strange surroundings. Some wild experience of disease or pain had caused his body to bend unnaturally double, making his feet and head come close together in life’s pilgrimage. One will wonder how he can still make himself stand erect in that set up of a nature-tortured frame. He propped his body upon a long grey staff of shaven wood. ‘Upon the margin of that pool, he stood there as motionless as a firm cloud that moveth not in the wind, and if it moves at all, moves all together.’ It means the old man could not turn or shift his face or hand or leg without turning or shifting the whole body. Ease and flexibility of bones and muscles had totally vanished but still the old man was making his meager living through the hardest and most painful of works. It is life that is important, and it has to go on at any cost. That is not only desperation but determination also. Not anywhere else in world literature has the uncanny appearance of old age ever been pictured more graphically and movingly.

Will the world look after us when we are old?

 

07. Gardens landscaped by the poet in Rydal Mount.

The old man was stirring the pond with his staff and studying the muddy water. Wordsworth very much wished to ask the old man what his engagement and occupation was there, and why. He asked and the old man answered in an uncommon, lofty, decorated language that fitted only the ethereal and the out-of-the-world. He was simply catching leeches from the pool. Enduring many hardships on the way, he had come to this pool to gather leeches for food and for sale. He has resolved to be independent and self-reliant in his old age. He roamed from pool to pool and from moor to moor, gaining his legitimate living in this way. He ‘gained an honest maintenance and got housing by chance or choice each day through God’s help.’

Was it real, or a vision of admonition from eternity?

 

08. Pond on the moor which the poet frequented.

The old man’s words burnt deep into the lazy poet’s mind. He wondered whether he hadn’t seen this person somewhere in his dreams. Yes, this is the Eternal Man of Time- Kaala Purusha in Sanskrit- walking through ages, ‘sent from some far off region to strengthen the poet’s mind by apt admonition.’ The lonely place, the old man’s shape and speech- all troubled him, and for a while, he lost his senses. A shadow passed through the front of his eyes and a blanket of clouds moved away from his mind, letting in a ray of light. When he regained consciousness after moments, he was a completely changed and new man, like the wedding-guest in The Rime Of The Ancient Mariner. The poet resolved to think about the leech-gatherer on the lonely moor in future whenever his mind lost its strength. Thus the alternate title of the poem, Resolution And Independence, is appropriate. The element of horror in the poem owes its thanks to the poet’s friend Coleridge. The plainness of the poem is derived from Burns. The genuine contribution of Wordsworth in the poem is the unique moral treatment of the Man and Nature theme.

Why should one catch leeches?

 

09. Marshes And Bogs: Breeding Grounds For Leeches.

Leeches were used to drain blood from human body as part of medical treatment. They attach themselves to human body or animal bodies like horses and cattle, suck blood, remain on the victim’s body for nearly 20 minutes, swell themselves to full size and then disengage themselves and fall. After they have fallen, bleeding from the victim’s body won’t stop before sometimes 8 hours or more. A collector of leeches could lose large quantities of blood this way and could get infected with diseases from leeches. If leeches are killed or removed before sucking much blood, they would loose biological properties and could not then be used for blood-letting in medicine. Therefore catching leeches was certainly a painful, risky and harmful affair, unlike harvesting frog-legs for restaurants. Unless the engaged person decided to sacrifice something in him, there was no question of collecting leeches for medicine. Only poor people and people with no other means for survival turned to leech gathering for a living- invariably helpless aged people. Doctors, especially surgeons, needed large quantities of leeches and naturally they could not get these themselves. Therefore this supporting occupation of leech-gathering came into being and existed till the passing of the nineteenth century when sophisticated blood-letting methods and equipments were invented. Leeches collected this way were small and inconspicuous to see till they drew blood to their fill and swelled up into enormous sizes. It indeed was horror to see them sucking up blood and swelling. Leech-gatherers had to enter ponds, lakes and rivers in marshes and bogs, expose their legs to attract leeches and bleed themselves. Over-capture and destruction of habitat caused dwindling in their numbers even in the 19th century and there is reference in Wordsworth’s poem about this: ‘One they could be seen everywhere but now they cannot be seen everywhere as before; I have had to travel far and wide to see them’.

Wordsworth’s Lake District was famous for bogs and marshes and poor men could be seen collecting leeches everywhere. Life was hard in colonial England for the majority of people, in the midst of gained and looted riches arriving in ships at every port from distant colonies. We never suspect Wordsworth as a revolutionary poet like Shelley but the hint is there. The misery of these leech-gatherers might certainly have urged Wordsworth to write The Leech Gatherer to bring world’s attention to the sad living conditions of these uncared-for poor people in England’s hamlets and villages, like Shelley wrote Song To The Men Of England to bring world’s attention to the miseries and predicament of the peasants and factory workers of England in the same century.

A special note from author: An appendix to this appreciation.

 

10. Beauty Spots Of Nature, Haunts Of Poets.

There is a jungle beauty spot with a broad, step-waterfall at Meenmutty in Nanniyode Village in the Trivandrum District of Kerala. Mighty mountains surround it. I was a regular visitor to this place where I would wash my clothes, bathe in the rushing stream and lie on the rocks. On the distant mountain folds can be seen often an old man coming down, appearing and disappearing according to the nip and dip in the terrain. Finally he would reach the river bank and take a dip beside me in the torrent. Unlike the other natives, we were the two who preferred bathing above the waterfall to rather than descending to the safety of the lower tranquil part of the river. We both liked taking the risk of being swept away down by a flash flood that may originate due to proximity to mountains. Then he would take his bait and catch one or two fishes for his dinner. Then he would rise, and taking the fishes, the firewood, two killed birds and a hare and grass bundles for his goats- all gathered from the mountains- walk down through the rocks towards his home. Whenever he appeared on the river bank in the evenings, a water crow, the blackest and the ugliest I ever saw, also appeared and sat beside him on a rock amid the stream, hoping for a fish from his catch which he invariably threw to it. I knew this old man was severe and strict to his children and wife and others and was hated by them, but his ragged and weather-beaten frame and his uncouth behavior was an attraction to me, a fascination. He, in my eyes, was a genuine unpolished creation of nature, independent and resolute in every way in his old age.

One day news came that he was bitten by a deadly snake in the mountains and was lying in critical stage in hospital in the city. Many times it was rumoured that he has gone, and that it was good for his family. The water crow sat there on the rock amid the torrent each day. It was the first time I prayed Lord Shiva to perform a miracle and do not withdraw this creation from the village too soon. The Lord, anyway, has an adornment of a magnificent snake coiled around his neck. After days of lying unconscious the man was brought back to life, to the disappointment of many. In the distant mountain folds his head can still be seen rising up and down as he comes down to the river carrying his catch. The water crow still sits there on the rock in the stream and gets its snacks.

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem.

 

A primitive prototype rendering of this song was made in a crude tape recorder decades earlier, in 1984. In 2014, a home made video of this song was released. In 2015, a third version with comparatively better audio was released. The next version, it’s hoped, would be fully orchestrated. It’s free for reuse, and anyone interested can develop and build on it, till it becomes a fine musical video production, to help our little learners, and their teachers.

You Tube Link: Will soon appear in Bloom Books Channel at https://www.youtube.com/user/bloombooks/videos .

 

First Published: 15th March 2011

Last Edited…………: 14 April 2015

__________________________________________
Pictures Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
__________________________________________

Picture Credits:

01. Portrait Of William Wordsworth By Friedrich Bruckmann.
02. Dove Cottage in Grasmere Once Home To Poet By Strobilomyces.
03. Grasmere Village With Dove Cottage By Val Vannet.
04. Waterfall And Stone Hut By Andy Davidson.
05. He Was A Traveller Then Upon The Moor By Unknown.
06. Sudden Appearance Of A Ghost Of A Man Here By David Anstiss.
07. The Gardens Landscaped By The Poet In Rydal Mount PD By Cmyk.
08. Pond On The Moor Which The Poet Frequented By David Kitching.
09. Marshes And Bogs: Breeding Grounds For Leeches By Martin J. Heade.
10. Beauty Spots Of Nature By Ivan Shishkin.
11. Author Profile Of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Meet the author: About the author and accessing his other literary works.

 

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of ‘Swan, The Intelligent Picture Book’. Edits and owns Bloom Books Channel. Born and brought up in Nanniyode, a little village in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Kerala. Father British Council-trained English Teacher and mother university-educated. Matriculation with High First Class, Pre Degree studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship, discontinued Diploma Studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

11. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

 

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Identifier: SBT-AE-004. The Leech Gatherer. William Wordworth Poem. Articles English Downloads Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Editor: P S Remesh Chandran

003. Forsaken Merman. Matthew Arnold Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

003.

The Forsaken Merman By Matthew Arnold A Creation of Beauty. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

By PSRemeshChandra, 13th Mar 2011. Short URL http://nut.bz/1ljtosiw/ First Posted in Wikinut>Reviews>Books>Poetry, Drama & Criticism. Link: http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2012/01/03the-forsaken-merman-matthew-arnold.html

Matthew Arnold was a severe critic of literature. Essays In Criticism was his monumental work in which he let no great poet go unscathed. Usually such critics would be asked a question: why don’t you write a great poem? The Forsaken Merman was Arnold’s answer to this question in which he proved not only could he create poems with hilarious themes but incorporate multi tunes also into a single poem. After creating a few more poems, he returned to academics and criticism.

The Cornish legend holds that Matthew can still be heard singing from the deep sea.

01. Matthew Arnold Portrait 1883.

Matthew Arnold relates a very strange story in his poem The Forsaken Merman. The poem is beautiful and picture-like, descriptions of seascape and landscape vivid, and presentation of the theme logical. But the story is actually impossible to happen, and the inspiration for this theme has been traced to a spectacular sea-side village named Zennor in the County of Cornwall in England. It is not clear whether he happened to visit this village or not, but there indeed is a Mermaid Chair in the Zennor Church and also an associated legend of a hero having this poet’s name, Matthew. Perhaps Arnold might have heard or read about this legend. A mermaid who lived in the Pendour Cove in Zennor was entranced by Matthew’s exotic singing in the church and she regularly visited the church in disguise. One day Matthew found out, fell deeply in love with her, and followed her to her deep-sea cavern beneath the waves. They were never seen again on the land. The Cornish legend holds that, in silent nights, Matthew can still be heard singing from the deep sea, the sweet music faintly brought to shore by the breeze. Matthew Arnold only reversed the role of characters in his poem- it was the woman who went to the sea in the poem and later returned to land, abandoning her husband and children.

A lady from the land making her home in the deep sea cavern.

02. Ocean is nothing but land submerged.

Margaret, a lady from the land, happened to fall in love with and marry a King of the Sea, a merman. She now has her home and her children in a cavern in the deep sea where they live. The winds are all asleep there. We know the wind rages only on the surface, and beneath it, everything is calm except for ocean currents. The cavern is sand-strewn, cool and deep, and cold and dark as the abyss is. Sea plants, sea animals and sea snakes coil and twine all around their home. Sometimes great whales could be seen swimming by, like the great ships moving on the surface of the sea. Margaret has a loving husband and endeared children in that abysmal wonderland and she is now leading a happy and contented life in the depth of the sea, apparently.

Life arriving alighted on meteorites from cosmic realms.

03. Lady from the land makes home in sea cavern.

Days of festivities in the land are endeared and nostalgic to all terrestrial human beings living far away from land. One day, on a silent Christmas night, the sounds of pealing church bells from the land reach the ocean bottom. Man is mortal, temperamental and selfish. But the watery world is something precious, rare and ethereal. Ocean is where life originated, smithereens of which arrived alighted on meteorites from cosmic realms unimaginably distant, and deposited there on the ocean aeons ago. Considering the longevity or brevity of the history of life on sea or life on land, there is difference in the subtlety of these living forms’ loyalty to the place of their origin and habitat. Sea life is ancient and primeval whereas land life is recent and experimental, aged only a few million years. The sea demands much in loyalty from her inhabitants but the loyalty of land-locked beings to the place of origin of their life is brittle and untested. This test of character is what we are going to see in the poem now.

Church bells from the land reach where the winds are all asleep.

04. Where the winds are all asleep.

Hearing the toll of church bells from far away land, Margaret becomes home-sick and wishes to rise to the surface, reach land and take part in the Christmas festivities there. She forgets she is a mother and wife now. It is terrible and strange that she has become tired of sea-life by overnight. Or has she been always disliking sea life but pretending to liking it- the terrestrial conceit of a woman? She says:

“It will be Easter time in the world- ah me!
And I loose my poor soul Merman, here with thee.”

It means, it is mirth and happiness in the upper world, but ah me- I am doomed in sorrow and isolation in the nether world. She asked her merman’s permission to go to land and he generously gives it. So, with her loving husband’s permission, she rises from the sea and reaches her home in land. The land has its thrills, beauties and enjoyments just as the sea has its. Soon Margaret forgets her family left behind in the deep sea.

From the deep sea in search of beloved wife.

05. The church on the hill side.

Mermen and angels are thought to be alike in many respects. Ardence, affection, kindness and mercy are their characteristics. Monarchs of the deep, reflecting the magnanimity and loftiness of the limitless ocean, keep their vows of chastity and integrity. The King of the Sea waited long for his wife’s return from the land. At last, being anxious, one day, with their children, he too rises from the sea, comes to land and visits the church where Margaret usually prayed.

Generations of grief in the tumultuous soul of the holy trinity.

06. From the deep sea in search of beloved wife.

They secretly stood outside and peeped inside through the church window. Being not humans and therefore aliens in land, they dared not go inside. This grief-stricken trio consisting of father, daughter and son knew nothing about the Christian kindness that may or may not be flowing through that church. They were a holy trinity unto themselves, stricken by grief. Generations of grief – creative grief – had been what caused that cosmic particle from stars deposited aeons ago on the ocean to germinate, grow and evolve into life forms. Wind and waves and sky, and the warmth of the earth, could never have quietened the tumult in their souls. God manifests through man in his acts of kindness, consideration and ardence. It is man’s debt to his creator to quieten and pacify the minds of others. Won’t humans ever pay their debts to their gods?

A mother of ingratitude, her eyes sealed to the holy book.

07. Steps to the Church where Aliens walked.

Margaret’s face was buried deep in the Bible. Through mutually understandable gestures, the Merman King tried in many ways to signal to her that their children very much longed for her. He asked the children to call and appeal to the motherhood in her in their tiny voices, in the hope that children’s voices would be dear to a mother’s ear. The children called their mother in their voices familiar to her. It was all in vain. She listened not. ‘She gave them never a look, for her eyes were sealed to the holy book!’ It is the first time the readers of this poem curse and hate the holy book. Is the holy book an excuse for causing pangs of pain in other hearts? To alleviate the pain in other hearts, to act as the representative of God- that was what human beings were sent to the world for and given the holy book. She was pretending. So it was useless persuading her to go back with them to the sea, they learned. She was determined not to return to sea.

We will gaze from the sand hills, at the white sleeping town.

 

08. Her eyes were sealed to the Holy Book.

Before returning to sea with his children, the Merman once again visited the church and the town where his wife lived. He could see she was living a very happy and contended life. She was seen always singing of supreme joy. ‘She sang her fill, singing most joyfully.’ However, the merman could see a tear dropping down her sorrow-clouded eye. She was, must have been, actually sad for her children left at sea. The cold, strange eyes of her little girl child looking at her through the cold church window must have created pangs in her guilty soul. The insolent indifference of this earthly woman orphaned her little children then and there. So, the disappointed merman with his children decided to return to sea. Before he goes, he proposes to his children to visit the land in moonlit nights again. They would come and see the church and the town by nights. He sings:

“We will gaze from the sand-hills
At the white sleeping town,
At the church on the hill side
And then come back down.”

The pain in the eyes of a girl-child left out by her mother.

09. We will gaze from the sand hills.

Matthew Arnold created the closing lines of this poem ever memorable. The grief of a girl-child who is left out and abandoned by her belovèd mother can never be, and shall be, described in words. It is unspeakable taboo, sacred. Tennyson perfectly put this more touchingly than anyone in his sensational classic, In Memoriam:

‘I sometimes feel it is a guilt
To put in words the grief I feel.’

The readers will never forget the pain in the cold strange eyes of the girl-child looking at her mother through the church windows. Arnold wished to make the world weep with his poem; he succeeded.

A special note on Matthew Arnold and his musical experiment.

10. We will gaze from the sand hills at the lost town.

Matthew Arnold was the son of Thomas Arnold, the famous teacher who introduced the Public School System in England. The son did not fail his father even once, and not only shone like a star in literature, but excelled as an Academic and Inspector of Schools also. Even though he was a critic in his blood, we will forget he is, once we get deep into his poems. He is a very imaginative and gifted poet by birth too. What he really was- a fine critic or a finer poet- perhaps he himself might not have known well. Anyway, his over-indulgence in and unquenched thirst for literary criticism was responsible for the scantiness of his poems. We would wish, had he produced more poems. His creations in both fields are excellent and equally respected.

It is known that no one has ever orchestrated The Forsaken Merman in full, which is great loss to the world. Matthew Arnold used a variety of exotic tunes in the song to express each move and twist in mood appropriately and touchingly along the song which, it seems, he conceived as a complete musical entertainment for the world. I approached this song not as an academic but as an appreciator, an enjoyer, earnestly trying to sing it. I was thrilled at my success, at how Matthew Arnold was there to guide me through the movements of music in each line, through each phrase. I did nothing exceptional or special in my endeavour but sang it repeatedly with love till the original music unfolded itself; the original tune which was in the poet’s mind while writing this poem clicked and opened automatically, as a favour to me. I felt it was the poet’s gift to generations beyond ages. It was like simplicity and humbleness unlocking a closed and secured thing of precious beauty through perseverance and consistence; academic achievements and pedagogical experience have nothing to do with it. It was that simple. It must be said that this clever poet skillfully locked his lines and hid his music to prevent the lazy and the haughty from accessing the sublime beauty in them. He wished only the genuinely interested and adequately unorthodox persons to succeed in singing his lines.

The musical experiment Matthew Arnold did in The Forsaken Merman is unique in the field of music as well as in the field of literature. Only one other poet has ever attempted such a bold, thrilling experiment in music as well as in literature. It was Alfred Lord Tennyson, and the poem was The Lotos-Eaters. In this song Tennyson invented and used a number of tunes to move in synchronization with the tantalizingly changing actions of his intoxicated characters. He adapted even the swaying to-and-fro motions of the ship carrying the lotos-eaten dreamers to the island to corresponding movements in the music in this poem. The world is still waiting for good orchestrated and choreographed versions of The Forsaken Merman and The Lotos-Eaters. They are yet to come, but they will come indeed.

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem.

11. The Forsaken Merman Video Title. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKkurqG5zp8

A primitive prototype rendering of this song was made in a crude tape recorder decades earlier, in 1984. In 2014, a home made video of this song was released. In 2015, a third version with comparatively better audio was released. The next version, it’s hoped, would be fully orchestrated. It’s free for reuse, and anyone interested can develop and build on it, till it becomes a fine musical video production, to help our little learners, and their teachers.

You Tube Link: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=OKkurqG5zp8

First Published: 13 Mar 2011

Last Edited:   23 March 2017

_________________________________________
Picture Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
_________________________________________

Picture Credits:

01. Ocean is nothing but land submerged. By Asea.
02. Lady from the land makes home in sea cavern. By Chris Gunns.
03. Where the winds are all asleep. By Ricardo Tulio Gandelman.
04. The church on the hillside. By Jonathan Billinger.
05. From the deep sea in search of beloved wife. By Jan Reurink.
06. Steps to the church where aliens walked. Author Not Known.
07. Her eyes were sealed to the holy book. By Matthias Feige.
08. We will gaze from the sand hills. By Steve Cadman, London UK.
09. We will gaze at the lost town. By Daderot. Mermaid Statue at Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio.
10. The Forsaken Merman Video Title. By Bloom Books Channel.

11. Author profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

About the author and accessing his other literary works.

 

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of ‘Swan, The Intelligent Picture Book’. Edits and owns Bloom Books Channel. Born and brought up in Nanniyode, a little village in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Kerala. Father British Council-trained English Teacher and mother university-educated. Matriculation with High First Class, Pre Degree studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship, discontinued Diploma Studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

12. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri

Dear Reader,

If you cannot access all pages of P S Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum, kindly access them via this link provided here:
https://sites.google.com/site/timeuponmywindowsill/wiki-nut-articles

Visit author’s Sahyadri Books Trivandrum in Blogger at
http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.com/ and his Bloom Books Channel in You Tube at https://www.youtube.com/user/bloombooks/videos  

Author’s Google Plus Page: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+PSRemeshChandran/posts
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Identifier: SBT-AE-003. The Forsaken Merman. Matthew Arnold Poem. Articles English Downloads Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum.

Editor: P S Remesh Chandran

002. Sophist. A Poem By P S Remesh Chandran

002.

Sophist. A Poem By P S Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

 

By PSRemeshChandra, 2 Sep 2010. Short URL http://nut.bz/oth.p1gi/ First Posted in Wikinut>Writing>Poetry

Link: http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2010/09/sophist-poem-by-psremesh-chandran.html

 

The ancient Sophist saints in Greece were exceptionally clever with the use of their tongues. Don’t play with them- they can bind us cunningly with their tongues. And don’t corner them- we will never forget what hit us. Here in this poem, one sophist saint is tried in Court for crime when Judges get stung. Classical sophists were well-versed in paradoxes, understanding the meaning of which won’t be easy. So, here, the court had to let him go free.

A poem with a Greek theme, praising the sophists’ skill in paradoxes.

 

Words are what convey human thoughts to others, and unless they are sharpened and used as weapons, mankind won’t survive, for man has no other armour than words to defend himself against other human beings. A sharper precise word, sometimes spoken loud, may act like weapon and save one’s life. In times of crises, faculties with words come naturally to man: it is so, because anti-survival instincts also are inborn in man; it’s a natural safeguard against self-destruction. No other creatures in the world have so much self-destructing traits in them as man. Saints, scholars and sophists are needed by mankind for safe-guarding against its own anti-survival instincts.

SOPHIST

A Poem By P S Remesh Chandran

 

A sophist saint in ancient Grecian land
Said whatever he said was a falsity,

Was asked to state anything before he died,
When once he’d committed an act of crime.

He would be hanged, if tell the truth he did;
And would be beheaded, if he told untruth.

Being always prepared for th’unexpected,
That to be beheaded was he, stated he.

If he was executed cutting throat,
Then that would prove that what he’d told was truth,

For which the sentence had to be hanging him,
Thereby to prove that he had told untruth,

For which again to be cut the head apart,
Or if to be hanged; is this a paradox?

So thinking such and such the Judges swoon’d,
And asked the saint to step out from the Court.

Thus neither to be beheaded or be hanged,
He roamed the country side and forest land.

A magpie on the gallows, always swift to fly away.

 

01. A magpie on the gallows.

Sophists were learnèd saints who lived among ancient Greeks and Romans. They were well-versed in paradoxes. A paradox is a statement which appears to be false, but which is true. One sophist once said: ‘Whatever I say is false.’ What is the true meaning of this phrase- is he a regular teller of lies or truth? If that statement is true, then he must be a regular teller of untruth. But what if that statement also is false? Then the meaning would be in the negative, meaning he would tell truth too occasionally. That is the skill of a sophist in dealing cleverly with words and escaping unscathed on occasions when faced with danger.

Sophists are sophistications in verbal combats, personified in human form.

 

Sophists can say tricky things, understanding the meaning of which wouldn’t be easy. Trying to understand the true meaning of their words would make our heads spin. That is why, in history, we see people keeping themselves at a distance from sophists, for fear of being outsmarted and also out of respect. Mathematics and Logic were developed remarkably well in ancient Greece. Analysis, logic and deduction were, and are, essentials to understanding the words of a Sophist. Sophists and their tricky sentences have always been a fascination for the world. They were sophistications of verbal combats personified in human form. In many lands they were known as Soofi Saints. We know Mulla Nazaruddeen was one among them. Such people who can soothe, please, entertain and terrorize the world through their words are what language, literature and society wants to have in plenty, but unfortunately is too short of.

He roamed the countryside and forest land.

 

02. He roamed the countryside and forest land.

Sophists are not a lost race. In all centuries and in all countries, they are there. Entertaining their people through wit and wisdom, encouraging them to laugh and learn through life, they live safe and secure among the intolerant and the jealous of their times, inspiring societies, villages, towns and nations with their words and lives. A person recently, in the same place where the Portuguese Captain Vasco da Gama landed in India and thereby opened the oceans of the Orient to European trade, thought that enough respect and reverence were not being given to the hundreds and hundreds of Washing Stones situated at that famous Kozhikkode beach. After centuries of continuous service, he saw, they were being neglected by people, without respecting their good service. So, he organized a large public meeting and a parade, to honour the centuries-long services of these washing stones. Thousands of people took part in that meeting and the parade, and paid tributes to the meritorious services of those washing stones. His name was late Mr. Raama Daasan Vaidyan- the same person who delighted and enlightened people through half-crazy but thoughtful acts, including the starting of a Coconut Climbing Training College. In every society, if we look, we can see sophists still in vigorous action, in the east, as well as in the west.

First Published: 02 September 2010
Last Edited……: 26 September 2015

___________________________________________
Pictures Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
___________________________________________

Picture Credits:

 

01. A Magpie on the Gallows 1568 By Pieter Bruegel the Elder.
02. He roamed the countryside and forest land By Andrew Smith.

03. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem.

 

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem which will soon be released and link posted here in the next edit.

You Tube Link: Visit Bloom Books Channel at https://www.youtube.com/user/bloombooks/videos

About the author and accessing his other literary works.

 

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of ‘Swan, The Intelligent Picture Book’. Edits and owns Bloom Books Channel. Born and brought up in Nanniyode, a little village in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Kerala. Father British Council-trained English Teacher and mother university-educated. Matriculation with High First Class, Pre Degree studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship, discontinued Diploma Studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

03. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

 

Dear Reader,

If you cannot access all pages of P S Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum, kindly access them via this link provided here:
https://sites.google.com/site/timeuponmywindowsill/wiki-nut-articles

Visit author’s Sahyadri Books Trivandrum in Blogger at
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Identifier: SBT-AE-002. Sophist. P S Remesh Chandran Poem.Articles English Downloads Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

Editor: P S Remesh Chandran

 

001. Solitude. Alexander Pope Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

001.

Solitude. Alexander Pope Poem. Appreciation By P S Remesh Chandran

Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum

 

By PSRemeshChandra, 7th Mar 2011. Short URL http://nut.bz/281k669t/ First Posted in Wikinut>Writing>Poetry. Link: http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.in/2011/11/01.html

Alexander Pope was born a Catholic in Protestant England, was forbidden to live in London City and was liable to pay a double taxation. Moreover, he was suffering from a series of diseases. ‘To combat these handicaps’, he possessed more than the courage of a lion. His poems were acrimonious attacks on society, and in a few cases they were against authority. He mentioned names in his poems, leaving dashes in places, which his contemporaries happily filled in to the embarrassment of adversaries.

Satisfaction, self-sufficiency and piety are the characteristics of a happy life.

 

01. Portrait of Alexander Pope.

‘Ode On Solitude’ which was alternately titled ‘The Quiet Life’ was written by Alexander Pope to celebrate the virtues of a happy and satisfied life. In this poem, he discusses the characteristics of a happy life which are satisfaction, self-sufficiency and piety. Man was the fittest subject for his poetry. In an imaginative treatment, he illuminates the knowledge about man, in relation to individuals, society and the Universe. He once said: The proper study of mankind is man. To him belongs the greatest number of quotations in the English language. Essay On Man, Essay On Criticism, The Rape Of The Lock, and The Temple Of Fame are the most famous of his works. They are very long poems, but Ode On Solitude is a short poem. Even though it is very short, it conveys to mankind the full philosophy of how to live contented. We cannot search for a happy man in this world because he is a very rare specimen to find, but can certainly identify one by tracing the characteristics of a happy life back to him.

Be happy to breathe one’s native air in his own ground.

 

02. Happy to breathe his native air in his own ground.

Everyone knows that he who goes after increasing the area of land in his possession by encroaching into his neighbor’s property will land in trouble, and lose the quietness and happiness of his life. The happy man is satisfied with what he is having at present. He is not interested in increasing his landed properties. His wish and care are bound within the few acres of land given to him by his ancestors. These few paternal acres are enough for him. In the old England, whoever wanted more prosperity than what his natives had, went to France and made money. At one time, it was even joked that whoever vanished from Dover in search of a job would certainly make his appearance soon in Calais, the counterpart town on the French coast across the Channel. But the happy man wishes not to go abroad to France or anywhere else to make money or to enjoy life as others of his times did. He is content to breathe his native air in his own ground. Thus satisfaction is characteristic of a quiet, happy life.

He who watches the passing of time without anxiety is happy.

 

03. A day’s labour blesses us with a night’s sleep.

Dependence leads to bondage and bondage deprives man of his freedom. With the loss of freedom, the quietness and happiness in man’s life is lost. Therefore the happy man would be self-sufficient also. He would not depend on others for food, clothes or drinks. His herds would be supplying him with milk and his flocks of black sheep would be supplying him with wool for making his attire. He would be winning his bread by cultivating his own fields. And he would have planted enough number of trees in his homestead which would yield him cool shade in summer and enough firewood to burn in winter. Thus self-sufficiency is another characteristic of a happy life.

Time passes as if a sledge is sliding over the snow.

 

04. Herds and woods for milk and fire.

If somebody can watch without anxiety the passing of time, then he is a blessèd person indeed. Hours, days and years slide soft away as if a sledge is sliding over the snow. Time progresses in a straight line and no point in it will ever be repeated. The feelings and passions attached to a particular moment in life can never be enjoyed anymore. Right actions at the tiny moments constitute what is happiness in life. All our actions of yester years become our past and what we plan and intend to do in coming years become our future. There is no history without actions. Thus righteousness also is a determinant of the happiness of a person’s life and history. Piety or unchanging belief also is a faculty desirable, which the happy man would be in possession of in plenty. He regrets not a moment in his life, and therefore, has no anxiety in the passing of time. Therefore he can unconcernedly observe the passing of time, in health of body and peace of mind. His is the perfect attitude towards Time.

Withdraw stealthily from the world: Let not even a stone tell where one lies.

 

05. Who can unconcernedly watch time passing away.

The nights of the happy man would be spent on sleeping sound. His daytime activities do not leave room for horror-filled dreams during nights. His day time would be devoted to a recreation-like studying, which is everyone’s dream. It must be remembered here that not all are blessèd with a successful books-publishing career and heavy royalties from published books as the poet. But a thirty percent book reading, ten percent life experience and the rest sixty percent travel would make any man perfect. Study and ease, together mixed, is a sweet recreation, which is the poet’s formula for life. The happy man’s innocence, his perfection and his meditative traits make him pleasing to the world.

Books are real monuments for a poet, taking him to eternity.

 

06. Books are real monuments for a poet.

Like a truly happy man, the poet wishes to live unseen and unknown like a nonentity, and die unlamented. He wishes to withdraw stealthily from this world and pleads that not a stone be placed over his grave to tell the world where he lies. He wishes perfect, undisturbed Solitude. Conversely, this poem is the real epitaph for this poet. It teaches the world lessons.

Brilliant success and sweet revenge of a poet.

 

07. Alexander Pope’s villa in Twickenham on the Thames.

For people who idealize perfect life, especially for poets, it would be impossible to achieve success in normal circumstances. So it would be interesting to note how this poet, hunted by his society, took his sweet revenge on those who excluded him and his people from London’s social and literary circles. Pope considered thousands of lines in Shakespeare’s works not original, and contaminated by stage actors’ speeches to please and thrill audience. So, he completely edited and recast them in clean poetic form and published a Regularized New Edition of Shakespeare in 1725. He translated Odyssey as well. These, and his major works in later years, gained him universal fame, were translated into many languages including German, and caused him to be considered as a philosopher. But the epic feat of this unmarried poet was done in the very early years of his literary career. Like Keats, Pope was an admirer of Greek Poetry from his boyhood. His dream was, translating the Iliad into English, which he did in six books during the six years from 1715. Even the severe Samuel Johnson called it ‘a performance beyond age and nation’. Coming from Johnson, it was indeed praise. Publication of this monumental work brought him instant fame in England and abroad and also a fortune for his wallet. With this immense wealth, the poet bought him a home in Twickenham on the Thames which he decorated with precious stones and intricate mirror arrangements. He made the subterranean rooms resound with the pleasant noise of an underground stream. Because mermaids could not be purchased, he did not equip one.

Bloom Books Channel has a video of this poem.

 

08. Solitude Of Quiet Life Video Title. http://youtu.be/L66GcSKH6j8

A primitive prototype rendering of this song was made in a crude tape recorder decades earlier, in 1984. In 2014, a home made video of this song was released. In 2015, a third version with comparatively better audio was released. The next version, it’s hoped, would be fully orchestrated. It’s free for reuse, and anyone interested can develop and build on it, till it becomes a fine musical video production, to help our little learners, and their teachers.

You Tube Link: http://youtu.be/L66GcSKH6j8

First Published : 07 March 2011

Last Edited: 25 September 2015

___________________________________________
Pictures Courtesy: Wikimedia Commons
___________________________________________

Picture Credits:

01. Portrait of Alexander Pope 1727. By Michael Dahl.
02. Happy to breathe his native air in his own ground. By Robert.
03. A day’s labour blesses us with a night’s sleep 1887. By Изображён сенокос и косцы.
04. Herds and woods for milk and firewood. By Rvgeest.
05. Who can unconcernedly find time passing away. By Ian Paterson.
06. Books real monuments for a poet. Dunciad Book II Illustration 1760. Artist F.Hayman, Engraver C.Grignion.
07. Alexander Pope’s villa in Twickenham on the Thames 1759. By Samuel Scott.
08. Solitude Of Quiet Life Video Title. By Bloom Books Channel.

09. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

About the author and accessing his other literary works.

 

Editor of Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Author of several books in English and in Malayalam. And also author of ‘Swan, The Intelligent Picture Book’. Edits and owns Bloom Books Channel. Born and brought up in Nanniyode, a little village in the Sahya Mountain Valley in Kerala. Father British Council-trained English Teacher and mother university-educated. Matriculation with High First Class, Pre Degree studies in Science with National Merit Scholarship, discontinued Diploma Studies in Electronics and entered politics. Unmarried and single.

09. Author Profile of P S Remesh Chandran By Sahyadri Archives.

Dear Reader,

If you cannot access all pages of P S Remesh Chandran, Editor, Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum, kindly access them via this link provided here:
https://sites.google.com/site/timeuponmywindowsill/wiki-nut-articles

Visit author’s Sahyadri Books Trivandrum in Blogger at
http://sahyadribooks-remesh.blogspot.com/ and his Bloom Books Channel in You Tube at https://www.youtube.com/user/bloombooks/videos  

Author’s Google Plus Page: https://plus.google.com/u/0/+PSRemeshChandran/posts

Face Book Page: https://www.facebook.com/psremeshchandra.trivandrum

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Alexander Pope, Appreciations, Bloom Books Trivandrum, British Poets, English Poets, English Songs, Essays, Free Student Notes, Ode On Solitude, Poetry Appreciations, Poem Reviews, P S Remesh Chandran, Quiet Life, Sahyadri Books Trivandrum, Solitude.

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Identifier: SBT-AE-001. Solitude. Alexander Pope Poem. Articles English Downloads Sahyadri Books & Bloom Books, Trivandrum. Editor: P S Remesh Chandran