The Prodigal Son

THE PRODIGAL SON

Patrick White

         Patrick White was an Australian author widely regarded as one of the major English novelists of the twentieth century.  His novels and short stories enjoy wide critical acclaim.  His works include twelve novels, two short story collections, eleven plays and a few non-fiction.  He was awarded the Nobel Prize for literature in 1973.

The Prodigal Son is an essay by Patrick White which vividly describes the sentiments of an expatriate. In this essay, Patrick White considers himself as a prodigal son. The Parable of the Prodigal Son is one of the parables of Jesus in The Bible. In the story, a father has two sons.  The younger son asks the father for his inheritance and the father grants his son’s request.  However, the younger son is prodigal and spends his fortune lavishly and becomes a destitute. The younger son is forced to return home empty handed and begs his father to accept him back as a servant. The father pardons him and tells the elder son that ‘he was lost and now he is found’. Patrick White finds similarities between him and the prodigal son of The Bible.

Patrick White was himself an expatriate.  He was an Australian but was born and brought up in England.  He had spent more than 20 years of his life in abroad.  He studied in an English public school and had his higher education at King’s College, Cambridge. During those days, he had a high opinion on Britain.  Later when he wandered through west European countries and United States, he began to think of his own country, Australia.  The Second World War that broke out then also intensified his love for his motherland.  Earlier, life in the European countries seemed to be brilliant, intellectual and highly desirable to the author.  But now it appeared to be disgusting and meaningless.  He started thinking that he achieved nothing and his life rootless.
 
During the Second World War, Patrick White had to be there in the Middle East countries. The desert landscape found there aggravated his desire to go back to Australia. But, later when he visited Greece, the perfection of antiquity and the warm human relationship which he experienced there made him forget all about Australia.  Soon he realised that though he loved Greece, the country was not his own. So he came back to Australia, bought a farm at Castle Hill and with a Greek friend started to cultivate vegetables and flowers.

After returning back to Australia, White forgot himself as a writer.  He did not write anything. The Aunt’s Story, a novel which he had written immediately after the war was well received by the critics in abroad and failed to receive the attention of the critics in Australia as usual. He spent his life at the farm house eating and sleeping.  Nothing seemed more important than those activities.  But suddenly he began to grow discontented.  He realised that the only successful thing he could do was writing novels.  He wanted to write about the life of the Australians.  He wrote Voss, the story which he conceived during his stay in London. This novel proved that the Australian novel was not ‘dreary, dun coloured offspring of journalistic realism’. It presented the voice of the Australia to the world.

Patrick White loved the landscape of Australia though it was shabby.  He started appreciating even the ugly things in Australian life.  He adored the simple and humble life of the Australians. These are the personal reasons why Patrick White decided to stay back in Australia.  He considered the appreciation letters sent by unknown Australians praising White for depicting the Australian life in his novels as the best reward for his decision to stay in Australia.

Every Man in His Humour

EVERY MAN IN HIS HUMOUR AS A COMEDY OF HUMOURS

Ben Jonson is considered by many critics to be the equal of Shakespeare. The value of Ben Jonson’s plays is that they give us vivid pictures of Elizabethan society, its speech, fashions, and amusements.  Shakespeare pictures men and women as they might be in any age but Jonson is content to picture the men and women of London as they appeared in the 16th century. He wrote his plays more like a rebel and reformer than a representative of his age. In temperament he was inclined towards comedy.  But the comedies he wrote were different from the romances of the Elizabethan dramatists.  His aim was to expose in his plays the follies and foibles of people clothing them in comic patterns.

In pursuing his cherished aim ‘to sport with human follies and not with crimes’, Ben Jonson was guided by a popular medical theory of the time.  It was believed that a man’s temperament was determined by four fluids or humours present in his body.  These four humours were classified as the sanguine, the choleric, the phlegmatic and the melancholic.  A man of sound character was known to contain the four humours in a balanced proportion.  Too much any one of them made him eccentric or humorous. Ben Jonson’s comedies were directly linked with this theory and therefore came to be known as the comedies of humour.

Every Man in His Humour is one of Jonson’s best-known comedies and the most influential plays. Considered as the comedy of humours, the play describes the efforts of a young, well-born man to wed his true love though his father tries to stop the wedding.

The play opens with the miss delivery of a letter addressed to Edward Knowell. It is written by Wellbred, a friend of Edward inviting the latter to visit the Windmill Tavern.  The letter reaches the hands of Old Knowell.  The letter rouses the suspicion of the father about the nobility of his son. He sets out to investigate the matter. The father always believes that his son Edward has become wasteful and derailed. Edward actually visits the city both to visit his friend, Wellbred, and to seek the hand of Bridget who is from a lower economic and social class. But realizing that his father is following him and intent on damaging his attempts to wed Bridget, Edward begs the help of his father’s clever servant Brainworm who assumes several masks to trick Old Knowell and foil his pursuit.

Kitely, the brother of Bridget, is one of Jonson’s most striking ‘humours’. He is presented as a fool who doubts the fidelity of his wife. He is jealous and colours all his thoughts and behaviour accordingly. Then there is a very thin love intrigue between Bridget and Edward Knowell. All the twists are finally resolved at Justice Clement’s house.  Kitely’s jealousy and his wife’s suspicion are found baseless.  Brainworm unmasks his disguise. Old Knowell realizes that his son Edward is true and honest.  He realizes his folly and gives his consent for the marriage of Edward with Bridget.  The wedding of Edward and Bridget takes place.

Every Man in His Humour introduces a group of eccentric characters.  Each of the character has a particular humour.  Knowell’s humour is that he is excessively anxious and suspicious of the attitude of his son.  Kitely’s humour is his jealousy which is humorous.  Justice Clement is a crazy magistrate and his fond of liquor.  Stephen humour is his melancholy mood.  Edward and Wellbred’s humours are their sense of intellectual superiority.  Humour as the trait of absurdity, eccentricity or abnormality is perfectly portrayed in the play.

A RED RED ROSE

                                                                        Robert Burns

            Robert Burns was a Scottish peasant who took to poetry and became the national poet of Scotland.  Many of Burns’ poems are meant to be sung. He composed many of his songs while ploughing or resting after his work. His poems deal with emotions such as love, hate, sorrow and joy. In many of his poems he expresses his own personal emotions so vividly and powerfully that they have universal appeal.
            A Red, Red Rose is a love poem by Robert Burns. The poem was inspired by a simple Scottish ballad which Burns had heard in the country. The poem has the form of a ballad and is meant to be sung aloud. It describes the speaker’s deep love for his beloved and promises that this love will last longer than human life and even the planet itself, remaining fresh and constant forever.
            The poet is in love with a woman.  The beloved is very beautiful like a red rose that is ‘newly sprung in June’.  In other words, the poet’s love is like a flower that has just blossomed.  Like the flower, his love is new, fresh and young.   This love is also as sweet as a beautiful song played by a skilled musician.
            The beloved is so beautiful that the poet loves her with a deep and strong passion. His love for her is so strong that his love will last until the oceans become dry. Even after the seas have evaporated and the earth has decayed, the poet will still love the beloved. This love will endure until their own lives end and even until all human life comes to an end.
            The poet concludes by saying goodbye to the beloved. He wishes her well during their temporary separation. The poet reaffirms his faithful love by promising to return even if the journey covers a very long distance and takes a very long time.

Kubla Khan

KUBLA KHAN

                                                                                  Samuel Taylor Coleridge

            Samuel Taylor Coleridge was a well-known English poet, literary critic and philosopher. He was one the founders of the Romantic Movement in England and a member of the Lake poets.  His poem represents the culmination of Romanticism in its purest form.  Saintsbury rightly calls Coleridge the high priest of Romanticism.

            Coleridge’s poem Kubla Khan was written in 1798 but not published until 1816. It is one of those three poems which have made Coleridge, one of the greatest poets of England, the other two being The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and Christabel. Coleridge himself describes this poem as the fragment of a dream which he saw when he had fallen asleep after reading the account of Kubla Khan, a great Mangolian ruler, in an old book of travels written by Purchas.

            Kubla Khan is a brilliant achievement in the field of supernatural poetry.  Coleridge beautifully imagines and skilfully describes the palace of Kubla Khan in the poem.  He achieves a remarkable success in making the description lively and complete. The poem begins with the description of the kingdom of Kubla Khan.  The action takes place in the unknown city, Xanadu.  Kubla Khan was the powerful ruler who could create his pleasure dome by a mere order.  Alpha was the sacred river that passed through Xanadu.  The river flowed through the measureless caves to the sunless sea.  There were gardens in which streams were flowing in a zigzag manner.  The gardens had many flowers with sweet smells and the forests had many spots of greenery.

            There was a wonderful chasm sloping down the green hill.  The cedar trees were growing on both sides of the chasm.  The place was visited by fairies and demons.  When the moon declined in the night it was visited by a demon. She was sad for her lover. From the chasm shot up a fountain violently.  It threw up stones.  They were falling down in every direction. The sacred river Alpha ran through the woods and dales.  Then it reached the unfathomable caves and sank noisily into a lifeless ocean with a tumult.  In that tumult, Kubla Khan heard the voices of his ancestors.  They warned him of approaching war and danger.

            In the second part of the poem Coleridge describes the pleasure dome of Kubla Khan.  Its shadow floated midway on the waves.  There was mixed music of the fountains as well as of the caves.  The pleasure dome was bright with sunlight and also had the caves of ice.  Then the poet tells the reader about a vision that he saw.  In his vision, the poet saw an Abyssinian maid playing upon her dulcimer.  The poet wanted to revive her song and music. The music inspired the poet with divine frenzy.  With the divine frenzy the poet would recreate all the charm of Kubla Khan’s pleasure dome.  The poet would be divinely inspired and so people would draw a circle around him and close their eyes with divine fear.  The poet must have fed on honeydew and drunk the milk of paradise.

            Kubla Khan is a poem of pure romance.  All the romantic associations are concentrated in this short poem.  It contains many sensuous phrases and pictures like bright gardens, incense bearing trees laden with blossoms, sunny spots of greenery etc.  Supernaturalism is also a romantic quality. Kubla Khan is a supernatural poem based on a dream.  There are images and expressions in it which are supernatural in character and create an atmosphere of mystery and awe like ‘caverns measure-less to man’ ‘ a sunless sea’ and ‘deep romantic chasm’ Though Kubla Khan is a fragment, it is regarded as a complete piece and is often hailed as the very definition of Coleridge’s poetry.

Life Doesn’t Frighten Me

Maya Angelou

            Maya Angelou was an American poet and an activist. She fought for the rights of the black people in America. All her poems and novels centre on themes such as racism and identity.  In her poem Life Doesn’t Frighten Me she lists out the things which one should not afraid of.

            The narrator of the poem is a young girl. She may be Maya Angelou herself. She says that she is not afraid of the shadows cast on the wall by the moonlight spreading strange figures. The noises heard by her in the hall also do not frighten her. She can hear the dogs barking down the street.  In the big cloud close to the moon she can see the figure of a ghost. Generally, children are frightened by these terrible figures and scaring noises but not the young girl.

            The young girl is lying on a bed and the bedspread has the image of a dragon breathing flame. But the girl is not afraid of it and rather says boo to it. Outside her window there are guys fighting. They are tough and violent. This doesn’t frighten her. Even panthers in the park and strangers in the dark frighten her little. She takes even the boys bullying her in the class by pulling her hairs or by showing frogs and snakes in a lighter way.

            The girl convinces herself that nothing can frighten her as she has a magic charm – a mantra which is powerful enough to let her walk on the ocean floor. The magic charm is nothing but fearlessness. This sums up the whole message of the poem that anything is possible if you can conquer fear.

           

A Psalm of Life

Henry Wadsworth Longfellow

            ‘A Psalm of Life’ is an inspiring poem written by the American poet Henry Wadsworth Longfellow. The poem glorifies life and advises the mankind to follow the path of righteousness.

            The poet says that some pessimistic people consider life as unreal and empty.  They discard it as full of sadness. Such people are dead in their spirit. But the poet believes that life is real and interesting. Grave or death is not the destination of life.  The Bible says, “Dust thou art and to dust returnest”. This statement is applicable only to our body. After our death our body vanishes but the soul exists.

            Life means to act at present.  It is not for enjoyment or for sorrow.  We must not waste time in expecting a more suitable time to come.  At the same time, we should realise that yesterday is dead and tomorrow is far away.  Therefore, we must act right now.  When we act, we must keep faith in god and god will reward us for our act.

            Death envelops both the strong and the weak, the brave and the coward.  We are marching towards our grave.  We are losing our valuable period of life day by day. Life is also a battle field.  We are all soldiers in the world’s broad field of battle.  The poet urges us to be a hero in the battle.  We must not surrender.  We must not be driven like dumb animal in the battle of life.

            While we work, we have to follow the footprints of great men who lived in the past.  By following their noble ideals, we can make our lives great and sublime. Later, our lives will be recorded as examples for the future generation. If any person gets disappointed or fails in his attempt, he may look at the examples set by us and get adequate consolation.

            Therefore the poet advises us to get ride of laziness and be brave enough to face any situation in our lives.

ODE ON A GRECIAN URN

John Keats

            John Keats is one of the celebrated romantic poets.  He occupies a unique position in English poetry as the lover and worshipper o beauty.  He is a poet of sensations.  The poem Ode on a Grecian Urn is written by John Keats in the form of an ode.  In this poem Keats emphasizes that art is permanent and has a lasting beauty.

            John Keats calls the urn a bride of quietness. Though the urn is wedded to quietness, it tells the tale of Greek life in ancient time through the pictures.  The urn is not the child of passion but an adopted child of silence and slow time.  The urn is addressed as a sylvan historian as it records the rustic beauty truthfully.  The poet wonders whether scene depicted on the urn represents life in the vale of Tempe or the life in the dales of Arcady.  He also asks whether the figures carved on the urn are those of men or of gods or of both.

            The poet notices three scenes engraved on the urn – a fair youth playing a pipe, a tree that shelters him and a lover who tries to kiss his beloved.  The poet says that the music of the pipes played on the urn is more pleasing than any song heard by the sensual ear.  The youth playing the pipe will never stop playing and the tree will never shed their leaves.  Similarly, the lover can never kiss his beloved and hence his love for her will never diminish.

            Then the poet describes a procession of men to a holy place.  An unknown priest is leading a heifer to the altar.  The poet wonders from which town the people have come to witness the sacrifice.  It could be a town near a river or sea or on a mountain.  But he is sure that the town will remain empty and silent for ever.

            The poet addresses the beautiful urn and says that with its beauty and silence the urn baffles the human mind.  The urn is a pastoral poem in marble.  Even when this generation passes away, the urn will remain as it has remained for centuries.  Like a prophet, the urn will prophesize the message that beauty is truth and truth is beauty.