1️⃣ T. E. Hulme (1883–1917)
T. E. Hulme was born on September 16, 1883, in Endon, England. He attended St. John’s College, Cambridge, but left without taking a degree. In 1912, the literary magazine New Age featured five of his poems, which were then reprinted in Pound’s poetry collection Ripostes. Although he published very few poems during his lifetime, he was one of the founders of the imagist movement and an important figure in twentieth century poetry. T. S. Eliot writes,
“Hulme is classical, reactionary, and revolutionary; he is the antipodes of the eclectic, tolerant, and democratic mind of the end of the last century.”
His poem:-
ð The Embankment
(The fantasia of a fallen gentleman on a cold, bitter night)
Once, in finesse of fiddles found I ecstasy,
In a flash of gold heels on the hard pavement.
Now see I
That warmth’s the very stuff of poesy.
Oh, God, make small
The old star-eaten blanket of the sky,
That I may fold it round me and in comfort lie.
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
The poem starts from London's Embankment which is an area well-known for homeless people sleeping rough and a ‘fallen gentleman’ reflects on his past and how he found pleasure in worldly social activities. Afterwards the ‘finesse of fiddles’ suggesting musical gatherings and beautiful women – probably given the ‘flash of gold heels on the hard pavement prostitutes. The poet probably sleeping rough on the streets. The poem’s speaker beseeching God to make a blanket of the starry sky so that the speaker’s wish for warmth might be granted. Here the blanket is also a symbol of vastness which covers larger parts. Basically the poem is short but it is not that much easier to analyse. They had written about ‘fallen gentlemen, not just men down on their luck, but often, by implication, those who had succumbed to sexual temptations and been subsequently ruined emotionally or financially, and had treated the stars in the night sky as an appropriate topic for their poetry.
Therefore that is precisely what the ‘old, star-eaten blanket of the sky’ achieves through a concise compacting of the two ideas, with the starry sky being overlaid with the less grand (or typically poetic image of the moth-eaten blanket. The starry sky is a more fitting subject for poets to sing or write about: we think of the night sky as beautiful and romantic and a moth-eaten blanket as squalid and unattractive, but to the speaker freezing to death on London’s streets, the blanket is more immediately valuable and beautiful than the sky above him.
2️⃣ Joseph Campbell (1904-1987)
He was an American author and teacher best known for his work in the field of comparative mythology. He was born in New York City in 1904, and from early childhood he became interested in mythology. While abroad he was influenced by the art of Pablo Picasso and Henri Matisse, the novels of James Joyce and Thomas Mann, and the psychological studies of Sigmund Freud and Carl Jung.
His poem:-
ð Darkness
I stop to watch a star shine in the boghole –
A star no longer, but a silver ribbon of light.
I look at it, and pass on.
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
In the poem the illusive image is presented. LikeBoghole' and also the modern metaphor like 'Silver ribbon'. In darkness everything is invisible. This poem was written during the 20th century so there was a great impact of two world wars and perhaps darkness indicates the horror and terror of wars. This reflects the disinterestedness prevalent in modern times. but there is no ultimate solution of darkness(War). It is just an illusion and that is 'Silver ribbon' so poets look at it and make a poem.
3️⃣ Edward A. Storer (1880‐1944)
He was born in Alnwick on 25 July 1880 to Frances Anne Egan and James John Robson Storer, he died in Weybridge (London) on 11 February 1944. He was one of the first promoters and theorists of Imagism along with T. E. Hulme and F. S. Flint, but his contrasting relation with Ezra Pound contributed to make him soon forgotten. His poetry was based on the value of the image to which language had to be adapted in conciseness and vividness through the use of simple and universally comprehensible symbols.
His poem:-
 |
ðImage
Forsaken lovers,
Burning to a chaste white moon
Upon strange Pyres of loneliness and
drought.
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
The poem reflects the separation of two lovers but if analyse it critically so there are other meanings which we can find. As Forsaken lovers' people of civilization are burning. Here 'Burning' gives various meanings. Burning with lust, isolation, so-called ideal thoughts of the Victorians etc. The word 'Burning' is also used in T.S T.S Eliot's poem The Wasteland where it has taken place in The fire sermon as there is given the message that
'Burning that images the restless lusts of the nymphs, the heirs of city directors, Mr Eugenides, the typist, the carbuncular clerk, Elizabeth and thames-daughters. They are unaware that they burn. Sexual perversion and lust are the causes of spiritual death and degeneracy in the modern world. Regeneration can come about only if modern humanity heeds the teachings of the great moral and religious teachers of East and West.
And also we can connect this poem with the Universal Human Law.
‘Fatal Love and Inevitable Death'
4️⃣ Ezra Pound (1885-1972)
He is now recognised as the central figure of Anglo/American modernism, the man who did most to shape the movement which in turn did most to shape the 20th Century cultural landscape in the west. Through a friendship with his hero, W. B. Yeats, Pound discovered Japanese literature. These influences fed into the Imagist movement of which Pound was a leading light. Advocating clarity of image and succinctness of language Imagism was in reaction to what was seen as the decorative style of the Georgian romantics.
His poem:-
ð In a Station of the Metro
THE apparition of these faces in the crowd;
Petals on a wet, black bough.
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
Pound’s “In a Station of the Metro” in the use of the word "apparition" indicates faces are becoming visible to him very suddenly and probably disappearing just as fast. The glimpse of beautiful faces in a dark subway and elevated that perception into a crisp vision by finding an intensified equivalent image. The faces reflected in a puddle over black asphalt as in general sense of wetness and faces compared to flowers on a tree branch. The metaphor provokes a sharp, intuitive discovery in order to get at the essence of life. Pound’s definition of the image was
“that which presents an intellectual and emotional complex in an instant of time."
5️⃣ Hilda Doolittle (1886-1961)
She was an avant-garde poet and novelist known in her own days primarily for her work in the Imagist movement. Her early poems published in Poetry were examples of Imagistic principles: austere in structure and diction, they blended mythology and symbolist techniques to create a verse form that was classical yet modern, spare yet complex. After her initial and intense relationship with this movement, H.D. moved away from Imagism and became interested in psychoanalysis, feminism, and other areas.
Her poem:-
ð The Pool
Are you alive?
I touch you.
You quiver like a sea-fish.
I cover you with my net.
What are you—banded one?
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
In the poem poet has provides various imagery as Auditory Imagery, Tactile Imagery, Visual Imagery, kinesthetic, Auditory Imagery.
It is human interaction between the speaker and the person who the speaker is asking a question and intends to give a help. The person whichis reference to You quiver like a sea-fish in the poem. Which reflects someone that is in trouble or who is going to die, sick. Maybe who is spirit less. The speaker tries to offer a help to the person mentioned and asking what exactly her or his trouble is? Such similar lines used in The Wasteland as given below
Are you alive, or not?
Is there nothing in your head?"
There is reflected image of lady’s annoyance at the indifferent lover – empty headed, hollow man –dead than alive.
6️⃣ Richard Aldington (1892–1962)
He was an English writer and poet. Aldington was known best for his World War I poetry, the 1929 novel, Death of a Hero, and the controversy resulting from his 1955 Lawrence of Arabia: A Biographical Inquiry. His 1946 biography, Wellington, was awarded the James Tait Black Memorial Prize. Ezra Pound had in fact coined the term imagistes for H.D. and Aldington, in 1912. At this time Aldington's poetry was an unrhymed free verse, whereas later in his verse the cadences are long and voluptuous, the imagery weighted with ornament.
His poem:-
ð Insouciance
In France (1916–1918)
IN and out of the dreary trenches,
Trudging cheerily under the stars,
I make for myself little poems
Delicate as a flock of doves.
They fly away like white-winged doves.
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
This poem may seem like it is related to the soldiers. The poet has the effect of world war and the setting of France which talks about the trenches which are on borders though all soldiers live in trenches. 'Dreary trenches' which means a dark hole or dug in the ground, it is used as a metaphor for the ups and downs of life. In these lifeless trenches soldiers are marching cheerfully under the stars like a shelter, sky. On borders all soldiers are together and they are away from their family. The soldiers are tough like rock but the poems created by him are as delicate as a flock of doves which stays for a while and then flies away. It symbolised how they feel lonely and how they die, the same as how doves fly away suddenly.
7️⃣ T. S. Eliot (1888-1965)
His poem:-
ð Morning at the Window
They are rattling breakfast plates in basement kitchens,
And along the trampled edges of the street
I am aware of the damp souls of housemaids
Sprouting despondently at area gates.
The brown waves of fog toss up to me
Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,
And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts
An aimless smile that hovers in the air
And vanishes along the level of the roofs.
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
The title evokes joyful awakening but there is a hidden meaning like a poem which represents a clear image of poverty and decay immersed in a modern city with a lifestyle very mundane and miserable.
It brings out the poverty of the people who after facing war conditions and feelings of sympathy towards people. Modern characteristic that can be identified is the isolation, in this case, the isolation of the speaker, since he is apart from everything that is happening outside his window, he's "aware of the damp souls".
He hears the "breakfast plates" but he is not in contact or in communication with them neither a part of the reality that he describes. I think he uses images to build up the theme of poverty. It also shows despair because he mentions the passer-by has tears in the eyes, another one wants to smile but fails to smile.
8️⃣ William Carlos Williams
His poem:-
ð The Red wheelbarrow
so much depends
upon
a red wheel
barrow
glazed with rain
water
beside the white
chicken.
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
The poem 'The Red Wheelbarrow' reflects these ideas of imagism. Because it is almost entirely based on a simple, bare description of a tableau, or scene. The poem that isn't a part of this description is the first two lines, 'so much depends/upon.
Lots of people believe that many of the theories used by Williams are commenting on the functionality of the wheelbarrow - the way it allows people to move things from one place to another easily.
The words 'rain' and 'water' also symbolise positive and negative. The colours 'red' and 'white' are used in a dual way. It makes the poem difficult in understanding. By reference reading it can be said that the poem is for some child who is dying.
9️⃣ Wallace Stevens
His poem:-
ðAnecdote of the Jar
I placed a jar in Tennessee,
And round it was, upon a hill.
It made the slovenly wilderness
Surround that hill.
The wilderness rose up to it,
And sprawled around, no longer wild.
The jar was round upon the ground
And tall and of a port in the air.
It took dominion everywhere.
The jar was gray and bare.
It did not give of bird or bush,
Like nothing else in Tennessee.
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
In the poem "Anecdote of the Jarc". Stevens portrays the complex relationship of humans to nature through confusion of who is greater than whom and how they depend on each other. The poem may the reader to feel the confusion and chaos present between the jar as a symbol for humans and nature. This relationship can be felt and read through the form the poem is written in. These two lines embody the poem to start and finish in a calm way. Both end in the word Tennessee. Which can represent the relationship outline as being simple like the port went above all the chaos.
Through the simple use of metaphor, Stevens has created a masterful work in the Modernist tradition as this poem addresses the issues of metaphor and fragmentation as well as other modernist poems. Which can be related to the theme of destruction is the theme of fragmentation. Fragmentation in modernist literature is always thematic, formal. Therefore the fragmentation used in this poem is also being used to demonstrate the chaotic state of modern existence.
ð E. E. Cummings
His poem:-
ð ‘l(a‘
l(a... (a leaf falls on loneliness)
l(aleaf falls) one liners
➡️ "Modernist" symbols, imagery and metaphors :-
Opening of the poem that violates the careful syntax of Cummings’ in the poem. ‘a leaf falls on loneliness’? Which separates the two things that need to be kept together.
Basically this poem seems like it is inspired by the Japanese haiku form. The central concept of loneliness and the fleeting motion of a falling leaf. It signifies that the word ‘one’ appears on a line because the ‘l’ in the following line takes place as a place all alone.
Which we can call ‘a leaf falls on loneliness’ for convenience’ sake, we can analyse ‘loneliness’ as the more general, abstract, universal theme and momentary observation of the falling leaf. Symbols which used 'Falling leaves' in this poem also suggest death, decline. When we compare it with the 'Mythos Grid' the coming of winter: despondent and melancholic images of frailty and transience. These feelings sit well alongside the concept of loneliness.
ðThank you.....
Well explained the poems with the quite to the point explanation it will help me to explore more of it.
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