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Tag Archives: Litereature

Edward Taylor, My Shattered Fancy.3

18 Wednesday Nov 2020

Posted by memoirandremains in Edward Taylor

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Edward Taylor, Litereature, Meditation 29, My Shattered Fancy, poem, Poetry

The third stanza picks up on the concluding clause of the second stanza. The second stanza ends with the unfinished idea Thou’lt make me.

The third stanza begins, Thou’lt make me then its fruit

So second through third stanze read:

             Thou’lt make me

Thou’lt make me then its fruit. 

The chaining of the end-beginning clauses creates musical effect of speed, which is not common in Taylor’s often jagged verse. The effect is joyful and expectant. He will become a tree which shall not be moved though wind blow and hell attacks:


Thou’lt make me then its fruit, and branch to spring,
And though a nipping east wind blow, and all
Hell’s nymphs with spite their dog’s sticks therat ding
To dash the graft off, and its fruits to fall,
Yet I shall stand Thy graft, and fruits that are
Fruits of the tree of life Thy graft shall bear.


As explained with respect to the second stanza, the language of graft recalls the letter to the Romans. Here Taylor echoes Psalm 1. The blessed man whose delight is in the law of the Lord:

…he shall be like a tree

Planted by the rivers of water, 

That bringeth forth his fruit in his season;

His leaf also shall not wither;

And whatsoever he doeth shall prosper.

The rhythmic effects are interesting here. Two lines of regular rhythm are jarred by the accent on the first syllable of the third line, 

HELL’S NYMPHS

The enemy thus is emphasized. The fourth line scans

To DASH the GRAFT OFF, and its FRUITS to FALL,

The spondee GRAFT OFF followed by a pause, slows down the line and places emphasis on this attack. The damage is further emphasized in the second half of the line by the alliteration, “fruits/fall” which draws the two words together – but also harkens back to the f in Graft and Off.

The words “graft” and “fruit” then take the foreground in the final lines of the stanza. Notice how the repetition of the words also draws the two words together due to the alliteration of “f”, “r” and “t”:

To dash the graft off, and its fruits to fall,
Yet I shall stand Thy graft, and fruits that are
Fruits of the tree of life Thy graft shall bear.

The work which God does by grafting Taylor into the tree is a work which shall not be lost. This is a picturesque display of the doctrine of perseverance. Simply put, if God does a true work in a heart, that person will not be lost; God will cause them to continue. 

This is the understand of the doctrine of election: It is a comfort: you will not be lost. Unfortunately, it is sometimes raised a barrier: you cannot enter. Taylor puts the emphasis in the right. The tree will be battered; the graft will be tried: but, the graft will stand, because it is God’s work. This is shown in the first line of the stanza:


Thou’lt make me then its fruit, and branch to spring

God’s work will stand. Hell will raise against it, but Hell will prevail.

Joseph Conrad, The Lagoon Notes.2

02 Wednesday Oct 2019

Posted by memoirandremains in Literature, Uncategorized

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Analysis, Joseph Conrad, Litereature, Story, The Lagoon

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     A plaintive murmur rose in the night; a murmur saddening and startling, as if the great solitudes of surrounding woods had tried to whisper into his ear the wisdom of their immense and lofty indifference. Sounds hesitating and vague floated in the air round him, shaped themselves slowly into words; and at last flowed on gently in a murmuring stream of soft and monotonous sentences. He stirred like a man waking up and changed his position slightly. Arsat, motionless and shadowy, sitting with bowed head under the stars, was speaking in a low and dreamy tone. 

 The rhythm and sound of these sentences are remarkable. This really must be read out loud:

A plaintive murmur rose in the night;

a murmur saddening and startling,

as if the great solitudes of surrounding woods

had tried to whisper into his ear the wisdom

of their immense and lofty indifference.

Sounds hesitating and vague

floated in the air round him,

shaped themselves slowly into words;

and at last flowed on gently

in a murmuring stream of soft and monotonous sentences.

He stirred like a man waking up

and changed his position slightly.

Arsat, motionless and shadowy,

sitting with bowed head under the stars,

was speaking in a low and dreamy tone.

There is a deliberate repetition of s’s and m’s which imitate the “plaintive murmur” of the night. There is thrice used “murmur”. Arsat is both “motionless and shadowy”, gathering up the preceding sounds of the “murmuring stream of soft and monotonous sentences.” There is a contrasted “woods and wisdom”.

The sounds of the words are quite remarkable. The deliberate nature of the selection is seen in the use of the word “woods” to describe the jungle: it is not wrong, it is just not common. The sounds are “monotonous sentences.”

In following along with the perilous realm, Arsat is not merely motionless, he is a shadow himself. Indeed, he will be described as less than a whole man, below. He is under the stars and is in a dream world.

     ‘… for where can we lay down the heaviness of our trouble but in a friend’s heart? A man must speak of war and of love. You, Tuan, know what war is, and you have seen me in time of danger seek death as other men seek life! A writing may be lost; a lie may be written; but what the eye has seen is truth and remains in the mind!’ 

     ‘I remember,’ said the white man quietly. Arsat went on with mournful composure. 

     ‘Therefore I shall speak to you of love. Speak in the night. Speak before both night and love are gone – and the eye of day looks upon my sorrow and my shame; upon my blackened face; upon my burnt-up heart.’ 

 When Arsat begins to speak, his first words are of “heaviness”. Notice that this comes immediately after he is said to be motions, have a “bowed head”, his voice is “low”. The scene is of a man sinking.

The line, “A man must speak of war and of love” is marvelous. It is one of those majestic mottos that a contemporary writer could not voice without sounding hackneyed; but Conrad has carefully crafted a Byronic Hero: a man who struggles with some overwhelming, vaguely supernatural fate which has bowed him down. Since Arsat is already heroic, he can speak like this and not sound ironic.

The words “I remember” are the words of grace and friendship: he will enter Arsat’s world. But the white man has only shared in Arsat’s life of war. Now, Arsat is going to bring the white man into Arsat’s experience of love.

Notice that the story which he intends to tell is a story which must be told at night: It is a story which belongs to the dream world. When the sun comes and insists upon judgment, Arsat will have shame and a burnt up heart. The next section begins the story.

Conrad is one of the few writers who uses the second person narrative well. Done right, the technique creates a Shakespearean play-within-a-play dynamic. We are reading a story about hearing a story; there are levels of reality created by the story. I first enter into one world, created by Conrad for me. Then I enter into a second world created by a character created by Conrad.

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