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#Poetry Wislawa Szymborska

• Author: Wislawa Szymborska (1923 – 2012)
• Title: Sounds, Feelings, Thoughts: Seventy Poems by Wislawa Szymborska
• Genre: poems
• Published: 1981
• Table of contents: 261 pages
• Trivia: Wislawa Szymborskawas awarded the Nobel Prize for Literature 1996.
• Trivia: I could stare at Szymborka’s photo for hours!
• She looks like the cat that swallowed the canary.
• A person who appears self-satisfied especially
• …while concealing something  mischievous.

Thoughts:

1. I saw an interview with Szymborska and
2. …this is the still photo taken of it.
3. She captured my heart with her ‘je m’en fiche’
4. …( dont’ give a damn) attitude.
5. With a cigarette in hand and swirling a glass of wine
6. she commented on her life and poetry.
7. When asked why she never published more than 350 poems?
8. She answered:
9. “I have a trash can in my home”.
10. Her sense of humor and lack of pretentiousness,
11. …that is what attracted me to her work.

Two Monkeys Brueghel

Subject: enslavement

1. I am not very good at interpeting poetry yet
2. …and needed to research this poem.
3. Szymbroska links the ‘control’ of the two monkeys
4. to her situation and that of Brueghel.
5. Brueghel painted this in 1562 while Spain
6. dominated the two provinces The Spanish Netherlands.
7. North: William of Orange became
8. …stadtholder of Holland, Utrecht and Zeeland.
9. South: Count of Egmont took charge of Flanders and Artois.

Symbols:

1. Monkeys in chains is a symbol of repression and the
2. ….background of Antwerp’s harbor is a symbol of freedom.

Timeline:

1. Szymborska wrote this poem in 1957 as a condemnation
2. ….of the repressive atmosphere of the Stalinist period.

Tone: is somber almost hopeless.

Metaphor:

1. “..beyond the window floats the sky and the sea splashes“
2. …is a metaphor for freedom.

Imagery:

1. Image of chained ‘animals’ looking out to the sea (freedom)
2. …and not being able to free themselves.

Speaker:

1. The speaker in the poem is taking a final exam in
2. …“the History of Mankind” while the two monkeys look on.
3. “One monkey stares and listens with mocking disdain,
4. The other seems to be dreaming away–
5. But when it is clear I don’t know what to say
6. He prompts me with a gentle
7. Clinking of his chain.”

Plot:

1. Words like “jingling chains,” the speaker who
2. ‘ stutters and flounders’ or the description of
3. the monkey’s ‘ ironic smile or dozing off
4. ‘creates sense that any resistance was useless.

Reaction:

1. Szymborska made me feel emotional because
2. these animals represent the people who have become
3. unemotional and with no voice under political repression.
4. I asked myself: ” What would it feel like… being bound in chains?

Poem:

Two Monkeys by Brueghel   (trans. from the Polish by Magnus Kryski)

• I keep dreaming of my graduation exam:
• in a window sit two chained monkeys,
• beyond the window
• floats the sky,
• and the sea splashes.

• I am taking an exam on the history of mankind:
• I stammer and flounder.

• One monkey, eyes fixed upon me, listens ironically,
• the other seems to be dozing–
• and when silence follows a question,
• he prompts me
• with a soft jingling of the chain.

Conclusion:

1. It is said Szymborska is the ‘Mozart of poetry” .
2. Her words are at times humorous yet powerful.
3. By the 1950’s the political climate in Poland had changed considerably.
4. Poetry was to become an extension of state propaganda and
5. …a reinforcement of the official ideology.
6. Nobel winner Szymborska (literature) did not include her
7. …Stalinist poetry in her collected editions, she was too embarrassed.
8. This was an excellent book and I would recommend it wholeheartedly.
9. Coup de coeur!
10. #MustRead

#AWW2019 Helen Garner

• Author:  Helen Garner
  
• Title: Everywhere I Look
  
• Published: 2016
  
• Genre: essays
• Rating: A+++++
• Trivia: 2017 Indie Book Awards WINNER non-fiction
• Trivia: 2018 longlist Kibble Literary Award for an established author
• Trivia: 2017 shortlist NSW Premier’s Literary Award
  
• List of Challenges 2019
• Monthly plan
• #AWW2019
• @AusWomenWriter

Introduction:

1. I immediately felt an connection with Helen Garner when
2. reading this book.
3. The years are creeping up on both of us and she describes
4. moments I have gone through.

My Notes:

Moving…

1. 6 shoeboxes of old photographs
2. that failed to make the cut for the album.
3. and having to endure how young we looked
4. I threw out all the photo’s and negatives
5. ….just like Helen did!

Cleaning out closets…

1. Storage room, drawers….just like Helen said
2. “once you start you have to keep going til it’s done”.
3. In July it took me 9 days to clean out my house from top to bottom.
4. I hesitated when I had to throw
5. out my favorite sweatshirt.
6. It was 10 yrs old, fraying at the cuffs.
7. It had to go but I still think about it!

House…

1. A house can be domineering,
2. ….you have to get into the driver’s seat.
3. Bed…is mother
4. ...and bed is the center of our personal universe.
5. It is the safe point from which we let
6. …ourselves down in to the shadows of sleep.
7. In August I finally decided to get a new bed…after 40 years!
8. It is deluxe and I feel the arms of mother embracing me every time
9. I go to sleep.

Dear Mrs. Dunkley…

1. We all have a teacher that was unforgettable
2. Who was yours?

Part Three: Dreams of Her Real Self

1. So impressive thoughts about Helen Garner’s
2. grandchildren, daughter, mother, father….

Authors I met in the book:

Elizabeth Jolley -Novels

1. Palomino (1980)
2. The Newspaper of Claremont Street (1981)
3. Miss Peabody’s Inheritance (1983)
4. Mr Scobie’s Riddle (1983)
5. Milk and Honey (1984)
6. Foxybaby (1985)
7. The Well (1986)
8. The Sugar Mother (1988)
9. My Father’s Moon (1989)
10. Cabin Fever (1990)
11. The Georges’ Wife (1993)
12. The Orchard Thieves (1995) 
13. Famous last line in this book:
14. ‘The difference between a good haircut and a bad haircut is a week.’
15. Lovesong (1997)
16. An Accommodating Spouse (1999)
17. An Innocent Gentleman (2001)

Janet Malcom (1934) 

1. American writer,  journalist, staff writer The New Yorker
2. Is the writer who influenced and taught
3. Helen Garner more than any other!
4. According to Garner, Janet Maclom draws on
5. deep learning yet plain in its address.
6. That is a perfect description of Garner’s writing as well!

Other writers:

1. Jacob Rosenburg “Sunset West”
2. Alex Miller – “Coal Creek”
3. Raimond Gaita
4. “Romulus, My Father” (Australian philosopher)
   It tells the story of Romulus, his beautiful wife, Christina, and their struggle in the face of great adversity to bring up their son, Raimond. It is a story of impossible love that ultimately celebrates the unbreakable bond between father and son.
   Best Film Australian Film Industry 2007
   ORDERED THE MOVIE !!

Conclusion:

1. This was a book I did not want to end.
2. Garner’s insights about Russel Crowe’s filmography
3. and an Australian Ballet company were mesmerizing.
4. But my favorite essay was ‘The Insults of Age”.
5. This will be recognizable for every 60+’er!
6. Helen Garner’s writing is clean and crisp
7. ..nothing is slick or shallow.
8. It is “reading caviar” !

Sam Shepard….his last book

• Author: Sam Shepard
  
• Title: Spy of the First Person
  
• Published: 2017
• List of Challenges 2019
• Monthly plan
• #TBR  2019 challenge update  
• #TBR  2018 challenge update

Introduction:

1. Final work from Pulitzer Prize winning writer S. Shepard.
2. An unnamed narrator traces his memories of work
3. adventure, travel, family and friends.
4. This last work is a brilliant self-observation
5. as Shepard struggles with his fatal disease.
6. Sam Shepard started writing this in 2016 after diagnosis ALS.
7. He wrote…
8. …later when he was no longer able to hold a pen
9. …he recorded and dictated the final editing just days before he died.
10. Sam Shepard died on 27 July 2017.

What is it like to know the end is near
…and you write your last piece of prose?

1. Shepard lets his mind roam where his body no longer can go.
2. He frequently addresses his children to tell them some family history
3. …and how he feels as a father.

What was the most moving  part of the book for me?   chapter 14

1. “I’m not trying to prove that
2. I was the father you believed me to be when you were very young.
3. I’ve made some mistakes but
4. I have no idea what they were.
5. And I’ve never desired to start over again.
6. I have no desire to eliminate parts of myself.
7. I have no desire.”

Dedication:

1. Shepard’s children decided to dedicate this book
2. “In Memory of Sam”

Structure:

1. To understand the book I first studied the structure.
2. The chapters alternate between 2 people.
3. 26 chapters POV unnamed narrator (…very sick man, Shepard)
4. 11 chapters POV unnamed neighbor from across the street
5. …who ‘spys’ on the sick man.  (…probably Shepard outside himself)
6. Shephard is stepping away from himself for the last time
7. ….and taking the long view.

Conclusion:

1. This book may not be for everybody but
2. I am a Sam Shepard fan
3. …and my heartbreaks  reading his last words.
4. It is a moving work of autobiographical fiction. (96 pages)
5. It packs a punch.
6. There are things Shepard wants to say
7. …. and he knows it’s now or never.