Porphyria's Lover; Vastly Misunderstood Poetry

Comments and Criticisms2

Home
Porphyria's Lover - Essay
Porphyria's Lover on Trial
Comments and Criticisms
Comments and Criticisms2
Comments and Criticisms3
Comments and Criticisms4

Posted - 04/07/2006 :  19:43:18


" I am right and the whole world has been wrong for well over a century."

Well, there you go.

End of discussion.

 

J.T. Best

New Zealand
10 Posts

Posted - 04/08/2006 :  15:29:54


Thank you for your snide agreement with my conclusions. Your comments add reinforcement to the continuous battle engendered with trying to change 150 years of stare decisis. Regardless of my chosen words of alert to the need to change precedent, the result always mirrors your pontification.


quote:


Originally posted by C.....

" I am right and the whole world has been wrong for well over a century."

Well, there you go.

End of discussion.


B.....

USA
100 Posts

Posted - 04/08/2006 :  20:45:40


J.T.

I have always thought it to be about euthanasia, but not as release from suffering, unless he considers the enevitable loss of beauty suffering.

There must be many, many takes on Porphyria's Lover. The reasons for the death might well be construed as depraved or masochistic.

So you read poetry and discuss its interpretation?

Too bad we don't have maven searches or site links to the poets.


I will check out the two essays.

Best

B

B.....

USA
100 Posts

Posted - 04/08/2006 :  21:04:02


Oh - inevitable, of course.

b.

B.....

B.....

USA
763 Posts

Posted - 04/09/2006 :  15:33:13  




Here’s a suggestion: take that formidable intellect and apply it to the problem of unscrewing your head from your belly button. I guarantee the rush of oxygen will satisfy you far more than the odd-agreement.

J.T. Best

New Zealand
10 Posts

Posted - 04/09/2006 :  15:40:13


[Here’s a suggestion: take that formidable intellect and apply it to the problem of unscrewing your head from your belly button. I guarantee the rush of oxygen will satisfy you far more than the odd-agreement.quote]Originally posted by Brett

Well that reply certainly resolves the issue of Porphyria's death along with demonstrating the orifice whereat about your body wherein your head is located.

[methinks he does protest yo much thus adding credence to the lie]


 

Posted: Thu Apr 06, 2006 6:18 pm    Post subject:

 


awesome... something to read over lunch


this poem is by far and wide my all time favorite... looking forward to reading what you think


R......

 

Back to top

 

B..........
Poetry Buff


Joined: 18 Jan 2005
Posts: 201

Posted: Fri Apr 07, 2006 11:28 am    Post subject:

 


Hi JT Best, hope your essay goes well. However, it's a dangerous thing to say "this poem definitely doesn't mean this, it definitely means that". Different readers will all have a completely different interpretation of each poem: they will encounter different images in their head and different meanings. Consider a text perhaps as a prism, through which different beams of light - i.e. different viewpoints - pass through and are refracted in different directions. Of course, there are other ways of thinking about literature than such a poststructualist viewpoint, but if you do go against it, try and at least be aware of it and of the fact it is currently the most widely held way of thinking about literature.

Back to top

 

 

 

J.T. Best
New Member


Joined: 05 Nov 2005
Posts: 8

Posted: Fri Apr 07, 2006 12:03 pm    Post subject: Porphyria's Lover

 


It is axiomatic that what you say is true as relates to different shades of grey. I spent my entire life in a courtroom trying complex litigation and in every case the jury rendered a verdict. And so it is with Porphyria's Lover in that if I were to try the case before a jury of literary peers I could get a verdict to the effect that the poem is far more likely to be about euthanasia than it is about depraved sexuality. I do appreciate where you are coming from but that position, I would argue, is not applicable in this instance.

Back to top

 

 

 

B.........
Poetry Buff


Joined: 18 Jan 2005
Posts: 201

Posted: Fri Apr 07, 2006 2:24 pm    Post subject:

 


I don't think such an analogy works, to be honest. Language simply works in an ambiguous way. If I wrote down 'fly' on a blank page, it could mean to fly, or a zipper on your trousers, or the insect. There is no reason to believe it refers to one more than it does to the other. In a more complex way, all texts act in the same way.

Far be it from me to argue with a lawyer about law, but as far as I know, the focus of a legal judgement is whether the action in question breaks a set of rules beyond reasonable doubt, not "more likely" than another possibility (unless you are Bush or Blair; b.t.w. you are already watering down your wording from 'this =this' to 'this is more likely to = this'). As opposed to legal trials, where juries decide based on one such set of rules, literary theory has varying, competing sets of rules with which to analyse texts, just like there are varying sets of legal rules around the globe which often contradict one another. To pronounce a judgement as definitively as yours is like taking one country's legal system, or one religion, and saying it is definitively the right one.

In any case, your interpretations are interesting, but highly subjective, by which your assertion that it is the definitive reading of a text suffers greatly. To assert that Frost's ladder in 'After Apple Picking' is a hard-on is certainly possible, but where is the evidence that this is the only way to see the ladder? What about the interpretation, suggested by many critics (but not one decent critic suggesting theirs is the only possible reading) that it is about the act of writing poetry? Is this intepretation not also viable? Like the 'fly' on the white page, the poem, like any text, is an image or collection of images. We, as the reader, then make connections between these images. You have made one string of connections. Many others are possible. I suggest reading some good recent works on literary theory before embarking on these essays.

By the way, if you look around a little, you will find plenty of previous critics who have suggested that 'Porphyria's Lover' can be interpreted as being related to euthanasia, just like saying that 'After Apple Picking' can be interpreted sexually is hardly "in opposition to the mainstream literary world".

Back to top

 

 

 

J.T. Best
New Member


Joined: 05 Nov 2005
Posts: 8

Posted: Fri Apr 07, 2006 8:24 pm    Post subject:

 


In a civil trial it is 'the greater weight of the evidence' another version is the mere 'preponderance of the evidence' standard which is also 'more likely than not'. Proof beyond a reasonable doubt is criminal and not applicable at all to our civil disagreement here. However, you do argue with persuasion and your comments are well received, mostly because they are well thought out, but 'After Apple Picking' is a completely different creature by way of poetic interpretation. The sexual connotations I point out therein come from a different level of the poem. Its written word, surface level, story is unequovically about picking apples. On the other hand the surface level of 'Porphyria's Lover' is about Porphyria's death, the reason for which is more likely than not, euthanasia. No one to my knowledge ever said any more about 'Apple Picking' than it had sexual connotations and I felt those connotations, which do seem to exist, ought to be explained. I could find no authority stating Porphyria's Lover is about euthanasia. Please provide a few citations. Even if they do exist in some nook and cranny they are certainly not in the forefront of the poems interpretation. The traditional forefront has to do with depraved sexuality and that is manifestly incorrect and ought to be changed which is very, very hard to do as you can see.

Back to top

 

 

 

J.T. Best
New Member


Joined: 05 Nov 2005
Posts: 8

Posted: Sat Apr 08, 2006 11:38 pm    Post subject: To Bohemian

 


Please accept my apologies if you feel I am pressuring you but I was very serious about requesting citations of authority supporting you comment that others have advanced the euthanasia argument relative to the death of Porphyria. Please provide them if you can.

Back to top

 

 

v.......

Reader


Joined: 07 Feb 2006
Posts: 19
Location: Southwest (Terrell, Tx)

Posted: Sun Apr 09, 2006 5:29 pm    Post subject: A departure

 


Mr. Death functioning as an agent of euthanasia:

Question: Does euthanasia require two people? Is it possible for euthanasia to be a solitary process? Is suicide a form of unassisted euthanasia?
When the body is racked by disease and death looms, does death achieve
personification? Does the personification of death make the transition easier?


The poem:
A consumptive (or some other type of wasting disease) has a rendezvous with an unknown entity at a site, that may be the consumptive’s home, but the author’s oppressive diction drives the impression that this is an isolated site choosen for the event that will follow.
Cold, exhausted, the consumptive builds a fire. She calls to an entity,
placing his arm around her waist
(Th entity can hear, but never speaks.)
The rendezvous becomes amorous (Rather, the author’s words push that interpretation.) The author describes the victims intense longing for release in amorous terms in a series of metaphors, which to the living, define romantic love, but her passion is for release from the ravages of her disease, not a romantic encounter. Only death can provide the release sought, and her passion for release is intense.
Note romantic love is not “forever,” death is “forever.’
The desire for release is far greater than romantic love, she seeks ‘forever, which is not available in human form.
Death is ‘surprised’at her intensity for release, and provides the desired assistance.

The consumptive is dispatched, without malice and without pain.
The victim does not struggle, cry out in pain; she is in the process of receiving the gift that Death can bring.(If the event occurred as described,
there would be elements of pain-thus, the description of death is an allegory provided solely for mortals to grasp: Regardless of how horrible the concepts of death may be, there are events that make death’s arrival
a desired event. One does not cry out or resist.)
I am surprised at the crude methods Death employs, with millenniums to
practice his art he should have a degree of finesse. The author reminds the reader that death is crude, whether desired or not, it is the final interruption of all things known before. Death is to be avoided, until exhaustion, pain renders death as the only alternative.

There are far too many syntactical designs placed in the poem for the murdered to be mortal, too many open-ended descriptions, too many elements of strangeness to ascribe the murderer as mortal. Death is quite real, but he is not a mortal; he is an agent of euthanasia and will remain so for those in great pain.

The lady expired.
Was she murdered by a lover, or was she assisted in
her demise by Mr. Death?
Do the lines address our fear of being alone as we dissolve in the unknown?
The lines are successful because they raise questions and the questions
are more interesting than the answers.
Who was present at her death is open

 

 

 

 

Enter supporting content here