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Cecily and Gwendolen are both very interesting characters in The Importance of Being Earnest by Oscar Wilde. Although they live under the strict rules of the Victorian Age, they behave in a very peculiar manner. Their attitudes towards the men they are interested are very different from what was socially expected from upper class girls. Somehow, these characters represent a transgression, especially that one related to gender constructions.

From act 1, we have some information about Gwendolen and Cecily. Gwendolen usually flirts with Jack in the same way he flirts with him. Open flirts were not expected by that society as the marriages were normally arranged by the families. When Gwendolen visits Algernon, she starts a very close conversation with Jack a little distant from her mother, Lady Blacknell. She speaks to him with a very romantic,  exaggerated and trivial language. She wants to love a man with the name of Earnest, which is part of her ideal based on the monthly magazines. Jack’s name (Earnest) becomes almost an obsession to her wishes:

“We live, as I hope you know, Mr. Worthing, in an age of ideals. The fact is constantly mentioned in the more expensive monthly magazines, and has reached the provincial pulpits, I am old; and my ideal has always been to love someone of the name of Earnest. There is something in the name that inspires absolute confidence. The moment Algernon first mentioned to me he had a friend called Earnest, I knew I was destined to love you” [Act 1]

When Jack proposes to her, she almost teaches him how to do it. In fact she pressures him to do so:

“Gwendolen: I adore you. But you haven’t proposed to me yet. Nothing has been said at all about marriage. The subject has not even been touched on.

Jack: Well… may I propose to you now?

Gwendolen: I think it would be an admirable opportunity.” […] [Act 1]

Then, she shows the proposal acceptance to her mother, Lady Blacknell. It seems that Gwendolen has always the desire of showing to others how loved she is and she emphasizes how it is important to her what others will see:

“Jack: (nervously): Miss Fairfax, ever since I met you I have adimired you more that any girl I have ever met since… I met you.

Gwendolen: Yes, I am quite aware of the fact. And I often wish that in public, at any rate, you had been more demonstrative.”

“Gwendolen: What wonderfully blue eyes you have, Earnest! They are quite, quite blue. I hope you will always look at me just like that, especially when there are other people present”[Act1]

Algernon’s opinions about Gwendolen also confirm how she behaves differently from the ‘ideal’ girls of Victorian Age:

Algernon: […] You don’t mean to say Gwendolen refused you? I know it is way she has. She is always refusing people. I think it is most ill-natured of her.[Act1]

It seems that Gwendolen is too much interested in show she is able to do what she wants, despite the rules. Her behavior breaks the general idea of a pure girl, innocent and submissive to her parent’s decisions.

The other character, Cecily is the representation of a non-innocent girl. From act I, we already know she has different tastes and likes. The first one is her interest on Earnest, Jack’s brother:

“Jack: […] Cecily is a little too much interested in him. It is rather a bore. So I am going to get rid of Earnest” […]” [Act 1]

She wants to know Earnest as soon as possible, she feels attracted to his wicked condition. She does not want a normal man to be her husband because she is too much exotic and original in her desires or even in her imagination.

“Cecily: Oh, I don’t think I would care to catch a sensible man. I shouldn’t know what to talk to him about” [Act1]

Moreover, Cecily creates her own world full of fantasies and rules. She does not want to study her lessons because she does not see any application to what she really wants to her life:

“Cecily (picks up books and throws them back on the table): Horrid Political Economy! Horrid Geography! Horrid, horrid German!” [Act 2]

Instead of the lessons, she keeps a diary where she writes her inventions which are part of her parallel world:

“Cecily: I keep a diary to enter the wonderful secrets of my life. If I didn’t write them down, I should probably forget all the about” [Act 2]

Not surprisingly, Earnest was the subject of some of her writings. Before meeting him, Cecily invented they had engaged a relationship. When Cecily confesses what she feels, she shows she is also obsessed by the name Earnest, which was one of the points she took on consideration before falling in love with him:

“Cecily: Well, ever since dear Uncle Jack first confessed to us that he had a younger brother who was very wicked and bad, you, of course, have formed the chief topic of conversation between myself and Miss Prism. And, of course, a man who is much talked about is very always attractive. One feels there must be something in him, after all. I dare say it was foolish of me, but I feel in love with you, Earnest.”[Act2]

She does not care about other’s opinions and she has something in her behavior that shocks people. Cecily lives according to what she wants, and she is very smart in getting what she wants. She can manipulate people with a very subtle manner or using her talents:

Cecily: Uncle Jack, if you don’t shake hands with Earnest I will never forgive you.

Jack: Never forgive me?

Cecily: Never, never, never.”[Act2]

As we can notice, the whole play criticizes the upper classes on the Victorian Age. The characters Gwendolen and Cecily are both example of how the ideal was different from reality. There were strict rules for women but the idea is that rules and labels can be disobeyed and manipulation is a real mean to achieve what is wanted.  

In the play The Glass Menagerie, the first time Laura’s nickname was mentioned happened in Scene II. Amanda was very disappointed with his daughter because Laura had quitted her lessons of typewriting at Rubicam’s college. The conversation resulted in the discussion of how single ladies suffer when they depend on other people. Amanda asked Laura if she have ever liked a boy. Laura answered yes and described Jim, a popular high-school boy. She said to her mother that Jim used to call her Blue Roses. Amanda asked her daughter to explain the reason:

 Amanda: Why did he call you such a name as that?

Laura: when I had that attack of pleurosis – he asked me what was the matter when I came back. I said pleusosis – he thought that I said Blue Roses! So that’s what he always called me after that. Whenever he saw me, he’d holler, ‘Hello, Blue Roses!’ […]

Scene II

Although, Jim misunderstanding, when we analyze Laura’s nickname, some symbols come to our minds because Laura is a very special kind of girl, like that special kind of flower, a blue rose. We can make inferences about the color, and roses, their aspects, characteristics, images that are related, and specially their significance and meanings.

First, we can discuss the blue color. This color is commonly associated to negative feelings, such as, depression, sadness, isolation, coldness and others. But there are also some ideas that contradict those feelings. The blue color represents the infinity and eternity, the link with the sea, the oceans and the sky and it has also the power of being a tranquilizer color, full of depth and lack of attachments. In the play The Glass Menagerie, it seems that blue tends to have a negative conotation accordingly to the English language.

Laura is a beautiful and gentle girl, although she feels she is inferior because of her leg disability. She also has no ability to have relationships outside her house. So, negative feelings may be involved, such as, isolation and lack of an active attitude in dealing with certain situations and facing her problems. The period Laura lives is also blue, Depression. In addition, Laura’s father abandoned her family when she was younger, which may increased her difficulty to overcome her limitations.

The second word of Laura’s nickname, roses, can also represents a plenty of symbols and it has many meanings. Roses are known for their beautiful and as a signal of love. They are also recognized by their delicate scent and the soft petals. There is also a link with the idea of pain. Although, roses are really beautiful and fragile, they usually have thorns that can hurt and make a certain suffering.

Laura has some qualities as the roses, she is beautiful, delicate and fragile. But she has also a portion of herself that evokes pain, her thorns, that may be represented by her passivity and dependence, which causes deception on her mother and increases frustration in her brother, Tom.

When we associate the color blue and the roses, we have other symbols. In nature, there are no blue roses, they do not exist unless the genes are modified in genetic engineering. In this case, blue roses can only be created by men.

In relation to Laura and blue roses, we are able to draw associations. Laura feels herself different and unable to become what her mother wants her to be. Laura’s shyness and apprehension prevents her from dealing with harsh reality and stress, which makes her live almost in a particular world with her glass collection and the old songs from her father. There are comments that say that the character Laura was a representation of Tennessee William’s sister, Rose, which had some similarities with the girl in the play. We cannot state if this information is true or false. Anyway, Laura is a very special kind of character and she can be compared to the special blue roses in terms of uniqueness.

Lady Macbeth is a very ambitious woman. Since the moment she reads the letter by her husband (Act I, Scene V), she starts to plan a way to make Macbeth the king as soon as possible. When the messenger tells King Duncan is coming, she begins to evoke all the darkness, the evil forces and cruelty, in order to kill the King:

“Come, you spirits

That tend on mortal thoughts, unsex me here,

And fill me, from the crown to the toe, top-full

Of direst cruelty!” (Act I, Scene V)

Macbeth, in the other hand, feels fascinated by the prophecy of the Witches, although, since the beginning he realizes that King Duncan must to be killed as himself wants the throne. The image of the crime affects Macbeth, that he feels astonished:

“I am Thane of Cawdor.

If good, why do I yield to that suggestion

Whose horrid image doth unfix my hair

And make my seated heart knock at my ribs [...]” (Act I, Scene III)

King Duncan is very well-received by the criminal couple. Macbeth is aware of the consequences of the murder and his also afraid of them.

“But in these cases

We still have judgement here, that we but teach

Bloody instruction, which, being taught, return

To plague the inventor” (Act I, Scene VII)

Continuing  Scene VII (Act I), he is convinced that his possibility of committing a crime is motivated by vaulting ambition. He was used to kill men, in the battles, but in not that specific case, an unguarded elderly man while sleeping, and moreover, being the king. In the same scene, Lady Macbeth definitely convinces his husband that they would not fail in the evil act and she incitates him to show courage, in reference to virility:

“Lady. We fail?

But screw your courage to the sicking place,

And we’ll not fail.” (Act I, Scene VII)

When the night comes, Macbeth and his wife has prepared the scenery for the crime. Macbeth waits for a bell while he stays disturbed by a dagger his own mind created. The description of the night creates the atmosphere. Lady Macbeth herself confesses she could murder the king, if he does not remind her father:

“Had he not resembled

My father as he slept, I had done’t” (Act II, Scene II)

After Macbeth had killed King Duncan, he understands that there is no way back, the situation and the consequences, he listens to voices, while Lady Macbeth demonstrates a naive behavior towards the situation:

Macbeth. “Still it cried “Sleep no more!” to all the house;

“Glamis hath murdered sleep, and therefore Cawdor

Shall sleep no more! Macbeth shall sleep no more!” (Act II, Scene II)

Lady. “Who was it that thus cried? Why, worth Thane,

You do unbend your noble strength to think

So brainsickly of things” (Act II, Scene II)

In conclusion, we can say Macbeth and his wife commited the crime because of too much ambition. Lady Macbeth sees her husband as an ambitious man, but without the illness necessary in her opinion:

Lady ”Glamis thou art, and Cawdor, and shalt be

What thou art promised. Yet do I fear thy nature.

It is too full o’ the milk of human kindness

To catch the nearest way. Thou wouldest be great;

Art not without ambition.” (Act I, Scene V)

So, she uses all her skills in order to manipulate Macbeth and convinces him that he could not loose such opportunity of being king as the Witches have announced. Macbeth is tempted, but he recognizes that kill a good man that gave him all the support to his growth would bring consequences. Even though, he murders Duncan.

In my opinion, Lady Macbeth is as guilty as Macbeth in at least Duncan’s murder, because she could touch Macbeth’s weakness as anybody. The witches only announced the prophecy, but Lady Macbeth planned it. Macbeth executed. Both are guilty in the same level and they are partners in crime.

As the title suggests, the poem To Counter Malthus evokes one of the best-known theories about population explosion. According to Thomas Malthus, wars and deseases were forms of controlling the population growth and if there were not something to stop it, there was not food enough to feed everyone because the lands to produce it were limited on the continents crowded by people. Let’s see how Avison criticizes that theory:

None us in this so

burdened earth has known

how to live, let alone

who is too many.

In this initial stanza, Avison is showing that people do not know how to live, even so a part of them tend to attack others (who is too many). We can deduce that these too many are the poor people that suffer and are blamed to demand lots of food to survive. The poet is calling our attention to reflect about Malthus theory. She is criticizing the fact that poor people are responsible for the problems of population explosion but nothing is talked about the reponsibility of wealthy people. People do not how to live but they want to decide about who is too many (poor people).

Presence, each day

afresh, you give a

purifying signal to

sting us alive.

In this second stanza the word ‘Presence’is mentioned. We can deduce it is a reference to God. The whole stanza seems like a dialog with Him. The poet is saying that God each day gives the signal to keep us alive. The signal is ‘purifying’, although it stings us. The verb ‘sting’ contain a certain idea that evokes some hurt or pain, but it comes from God’s power, and if we are alive is because of Him.

Vast territories and seashores

still bear these thronging

strangers. May none die

without somebody caring.

In this stanza, the poet shows her arguments against Malthus theory. If we consider that lands are necessary to produce food and they cannot ‘bear’ (strong word) people, especially ‘throning strangers’, we are against our own conditions of human beings. Moreover, if we look at the historical context, life condition in Europe was difficult and people had tp leave the poorest areas to escape from suffering. Malthus saw the growth of these throning (crowd of people) as a threat. Against him, Avison shows that these people are not the problem, the problem is the lack of care, but the ‘strangers’ will not die while the individuals of the same condition help them.

To know even one other is

costly. And being known.

Alive, among so many

more now? a concern…

Here the poet shows how difficult is to live in a world of individualism. We live together, we are among others, so many of us separated by the costs of our own lake of care and interest. It seems that the poet is referring to our own time, the world now. In the end of the verse appears a quastion and the the word ‘corcern’ that indicates worry about something. Moreover, the ellipsis tend to make the readers create their own reflections.

Hunger makes men desperate, threatens

to congeal the quandary. Yet

Presence abides untouched

in the churn of Quantity.

In the final stanza, the poet shows how the hard conditions of life affect men’s behaviours. After the period appears the conjuction ‘yet’ that indicates that in the churn of Quantity (the hearts of too many people) there are no worry about these people who suffer and feel hunger. Again the idea of if there were no poor people anymore, the world would be a better place (Malthus), idea criticized by Avison. As we could see in the poem, she was a woman that thought about social issues and maybe she believed that the big problem is not the poverty, it is the lack of love to each other, the poverty inside the hearts. Malthus considered people as numbers, while Avison consider them as the corcen of the Presence (God).

None us in this so

burdened earth has known

how to live, let alone

who is too many.

Presence, each day

afresh, you give a

purifying signal to

sting us alive.

Vast territories and seashores

still bear these thronging

strangers. May none die

without somebody caring.

To know even one other is

costly. And being known.

Alive, among so many

more now? a concern…

Hunger makes men desperate, threatens

to congeal the quandary. Yet

Presence abides untouched

in the churn of Quantity.

A Thunderstorm – Archibald Lampman

1. Form.

The poem A Thundestorm is a sonnet, it has 14 verses of equal length. The poem shows an alternation of unstressed and stressed syllables. In the first third lines we can see why the rhyme is iambic pentameter:

ˇ    /     ˇ   /    ˇ     /    ˇ       /    ˇ  /

A moment the wild swallows like a flight     a

ˇ      /      ˇ    /        ˇ      /     ˇ     /   ˇ    / 

Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high      b

ˇ       /   ˇ     /      ˇ    /     ˇ    /   ˇ        /

Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky    b

The rhyme scheme is abbaaccadeffde

2. Senses and movements.

As we already know, the poems by Archibald Lampman has images and details that create an atmosphere of an impressionist picture or painting. Our 5 senses are required and tested  in any interpretation of his poems. We can also draw a picture using the information that is in his poems. Let’s see the ideas of senses and movements in A Thunderstorm:

A moment the wild swallows like a flight

The first line of the poem suggests the perception of the sight, the vision of the wild swallows. This sense is followed in the next line. As the poem indicates, a thunderstorm is coming. The wild birds fly.

Of withered gust-caught leaves, serenely high,

The birds are compaired with these leaves, withered leaves that fly. The swallows are flying calmly high in the sky.

Toss in the windrack up the muttering sky.

Here apears their movement in the windrack. The sky is described as muttering, it suggests a certain production of sounds. The hearing sense is required.

 The leaves hang still. Above the weird twilight,

While the swallows fly, the leaves keep hanging. The light before sunset, the twilight is introduced and described as an weird twilight. The word weird creates an special characteristic to it.

The hurrying centres of the storm unite

Here we probably can deduce that the centers of the storm are big thick clouds that hurries this union. A thunderstorm is being formed.

And spreading with huge trunk and rolling fringe,

The centres of the storm has a ‘huge trunk’ that spreads energy and we can have a mental image of the sky being filled by the force of the storm.

Each wheeled upon its own tremendous hinge,

This verse shows how the thunderstorm is violent and somenthing that scares us, the powerful of the forces is something so huge that they are wheeled upon themselves. We have to considerer the visual image of the sky at this moment and also we can include the sound of everything is involved in. If the poetic voice is there, for sure, his body feels the sensation of being inside it.

Tower darkening on. And now from heaven’s height,

Here the verse shows the alternation of the color, as we could see in the third line the twilight was a little before, and now things are darkening because the phenomenon in the sky.

With the long roar of elm-trees swept and swayed,

The images that appear in this verse are commom if we consider the situation, the wind is making sounds, a long roar of theses trees is presented, we can imagine how strong it is because the elm-trees are suffering almost an attack by the thunderstorm. The idea of movement is frightening because of this violence. This verse shows what is happening on the ground.

And pelted waters, on the vanished plain

This verse is also describing the ‘attack’ of the forces, the verb ‘pelted’ affirms how violent they are with the waters and in on the plain (that follows in the next line), for me is being attacked by lightnings.

Plunges the blast. Behind the wild white flash

The idea of the lightening inspires our body, especially our sight. The impressionist picture of the sky dark with flashes of light would be something frightening or extremely exciting if we thing about the pure energy involved.

That splits abroad the pealing thunder-crash,

Here  we can join the lightening with the thunders. For me there is no safe shelter to hide in. The combination is so strong and powerful that our eyes and ears just wait for the next blow.

Over bleared fields and gardens disarrayed,

The landscape suffers the effects of the energy that comes from the sky. The fields are described as ‘bleared’, and the gardens as ‘disarrayed’. These verbs show the out of order, the mess the thunderstorm causes.

Column on column comes the drenching rain.

The rain comes, a drenching rain, on columns that finally completes the whole show of the nature. The thunderstorm ‘dominates’ everything in that region.

The idea of the movements starts since the beginning of the poem, the swallows flight, the leaves shaking according to the wind and the changes of the twilight to night. The sky gets new colors. Then, the clouds unite and the wind, thunder and blow the landscape. And also, since the moment we see the tittle we alrealdy make predictions what we will see. The senses in the poem are suggested all the time. In any thunderstorm we can see the movements, we can hear the sounds, we can feel the smell of the rain, or even taste it, but the sensation of being touched by the wind and the rain (not directly mentioned) is also possible in that context.

R. S. Thomas shows in the poem Welsh History the view of the Welsh people in the past, in the present and in the future. Firstly, I will say about his view of the Welsh people in the past, following a chronological sequence.

According to the poem, the past of the Welsh people was marked by fights, traditions and legends. That people of ‘small bones’ fought in retreat against the colonizers, even so, they were a brave people. Their kings died, but their traditions were still followed, and the people was raised based on legends.

In a second moment that may represent the present, the poet shows the situation the Welsh people face now. Life is hard enough for that country people because their rural lives are full of difficulties and limitations. Moreover, their bodies, houses and their homeland show their ineptitude to change the bad aspects (lines 17, 19, 20 and 21). The poet’s feeling may be rejection of this way of life, their lack of strength to fight. Fight against the problems and against themselves too.  So, the poet shows that the enemy is not only the ‘strangers’.

In a third moment, R. S. Thomas shows a quite opmistic view about the future of the Welsh people. He believes that some day the Welsh people will see the war, the battles in a different way, because the minds should open to the new reality, and maybe, follow the old ways, quarrel for crumbs, will not be possible anymore. This moment will demand no weapons, but ability to dialogue and reflect about their identity, their needs and their warrior past. 

Welsh History

We were a people taut for war; the hills
Were no harder, the thin grass
Clothed them more warmly than the coarse
Shirts our small bones.
We fought, and were always in retreat,
Like snow thawing upon the slopes
Of Mynydd Mawr; and yet the stranger
Never found our ultimate stand
In the thick woods, declaiming verse
To the sharp prompting of the harp.
Our kings died, or they were slain
By the old treachery at the ford.
Our bards perished, driven from the halls
Of nobles by the thorn and bramble.
We were a people bred on legends,
Warming our hands at the red past.
The great were ashamed of our loose rags
Clinging stubbornly to the proud tree
Of blood and birth, our lean bellies
And mud houses were a proof
Of our ineptitude for life.
We were a people wasting ourselves
In fruitless battles for our masters,
In lands to which we had no claim,
With men for whom we felt no hatred.
We were a people, and are so yet.
When we have finished quarrelling for crumbs
Under the table, or gnawing the bones
Of a dead culture, we will arise
And greet each other in a new dawn
Armed, but not in the old way.

R. S. Thomas (1913 – 2000)