When I Heard the Learn'd Astronomer

When I heard the Learn's Astronomer

Walt Whitman

WHEN I heard the learn’d astronomer;
When the proofs, the figures, were ranged in columns before me;
When I was shown the charts and the diagrams, to add, divide, and measure them;
When I, sitting, heard the astronomer, where he lectured with much applause in the lecture-room,
How soon, unaccountable, I became tired and sick;	5
Till rising and gliding out, I wander’d off by myself,
In the mystical moist night-air, and from time to time,
Look’d up in perfect silence at the stars.

I enjoy reading Walt Whitman’s "When I Heard the Learn’d Astronomer" for the mere feeling it brings me. I haven’t tried to read too far deep into it, fearing that the meaning will not satisfy me, or it will ruin my emotional response. So. . . here goes nothing. The poem seems to be from the point of view of a student, or “lesser” who finds respect in the learn’d astronomer. Through mathematical proofs and displayed data I see that the astronomer is a man in search of answers. However, it is not theoretical or philosophical truths this man searches for. These are physical answers. The astronomer feels the need to share this knowledge and so the speaker is “shown” by the astronomer, graphs that are supposed to prove a point. I’m not sure how I feel about this. The cynic inside of me always feels uneasy at the thought that the only way to learn is to accept the reality from someone else. The speaker is at the complete mercy of the astronomer. While it’s possible that what the astronomer speaks is true, it’s impossible to know for sure, as all knowledge we gain from the world is passed down by those who have experienced it longer. Those who are already shaped by it, and are, even if unintentionally, paired with bias because of it. Still, the astronomer is met with “applause”, showing that despite the possibility that these may be lies, others have joined and collectively decided to agree that this is the truth they are wiling to give their lives over for. This appears to be too much for the speaker, as he is forced to leave. The feeling that he experiences is “unaccountable”. An ironic word, as the speaker is in this environment where everything can be explained and accounted for, the speaker still finds doubt and an inability to understand his reality. Perhaps it’s a cyclical process, as it leaves the speaker “tired and sick”. He ventures out alone. Oh no. See at the beginning of this poem, I found comfort in the message it sent to science, but now the phrase “wandering off by myself” reminds of the Allegory of the Cave. Even though reality is the majority’s perception, that does not mean it is correct. In the Allegory of the Cave, the wall shadows are the reality for most of the prisoners and yet they are incorrect and ignorant of the truth. Only one fortunate soul is able to wander away from the accepted reality and find true enlightenment. Even if the next step is enlightenment, that doesn’t seem to be the focus for the rest of the poem. The speaker becomes sick of overanalyzing and realizes how impossible it is to entirely understand the universe, and so he settles for enjoying nature for what it is - Beauty without reason or purpose. He walks into the “mystical” or inexplicable night-air, and stares that the stars. While he sits in silence, perhaps a nihilistic argument, or disconnection from God, the speaker is still able to appreciate the perfect silence of the stars. There’s no attempt to explain them, as he doesn’t feel pressured to accept another’s idea of reality, the speaker just enjoys the existence of figures in the sky that are far greater than himself. So going into the poem, I just liked the neat language of the charts, columns, and diagrams, and the space imagery that ends in fulfillment. It gave me trust in science. Now, I’m left with with a minor existential crisis. If there’s a message that is to be pulled from the poem, is seems to be along these lines: It’s a waste of time to try and explain the environment around you. Time wasted that could be spent enjoying its existence.

To have squeezed the universe into a small ball...

This week I returned, once again, as I do almost every other month, to my casual viewing of Apocalypse Now, Francis Ford Coppola’s Vietnam epic that’s essentially the movie adaptation of the novella Heart of Darkness. I’d like to spend my time describing the similarities between the two. What first stands out to me worth discussing is Marlon Brando’s Kurtz, and Joseph Conrad’s vision of the antagonist. In Apocalypse Now,  Kurtz is portrayed as a rouge general, who has gone insane. He beings to fight his own war with the natives against the government’s orders. His physical appearance is meant to mirror his excess of power. His bulk-ness verges on being overweight. Because of the costuming and shadowing it was hard for me to distinguish if Coppola wanted me to view Kurtz as unhealthy overweight or towering strength. Curiously, in the novel, Kurtz is depicted as something skeleton-like. Conrad blatantly compares Kurtz’s head to a skull of ivory. While contextually, Kurtz’s skinny weight can be blamed to his unnamed disease, it’s began apparent to me that Kurtz is shriveled and hollow because of his own excess. This draws an interesting parallel between symbols of excess. Now, realistically the reason why Marlon Brando was so fat was because he showed up to filming obese. He had weight problems. But for the sake of literary merit, Coppola decided that Marlon wouldn’t be sent home. Despite the excess, even if Coppola’s Kurtz appears full, Kurtz is a hollow man. Because of excess, there’s no humanity left, and so there’s only a structural store front that’s supposed to resemble a human. Watching the movie after reading the seventh chapter of Grendel, I spot an interesting comparison to Dennis Hopper’s character, the insane American journalist who decides to stay with Kurtz, and the slightly schizophrenic Grendel. Both obsess over twisted logic in rules that define their worlds. Hopper reveals his true disconnect from reality when he speaks cinema’s craziest dialogue:  “this is dialectics, simple dialectics. It is very simple dialectics: 1 through 9, no maybes, no supposes, no fractions. You can't travel to space. You can not go to space with fractions. What do you land on: on one quarter or 3/8th? What do you do when you go to venus or something. Thats dialectic. Physics. Dialectic logic is: there is only love or hate”. Similarly to Grendel, Grendel speaks of conics and keeping a steady balance of everything. The photojournalist holds to the belief that there are no compromises to the truth. There are only absolutes - there can only be polar outcomes. With two such absolutes, there’s almost a balance established between truth and lies. A line that is drawn straight down through reality, where there’s no complex truth. There’s a balance that’s been set in place, a balance that cannot change despite varying opinions and emotions regarding what the truth should be. Both of these characters seem to crack over their obsession for the truth. For enlightenment. While the journalist claims to have had his “mind expanded” by Kurtz, he’s limited himself because within all humans there is a limit. Grendel has difficulty following the Dragon’s logic - it can’t be helped. Both characters are representative of how incompetent humans are to understanding the entire universe; who can blame them? Instead of swimming in ambiguity, theses two characters have chosen a different path. An oversimplification of the truth. They’ve enclosed their minds in limited options as to what the truth can be. Grendel preaches existence’s meaninglessness. The journalist preaches there are only absolutes. One either loves something, or hates it. Ignoring all of the complications show how the character’s minds are receding back into ignorance. 

Winesburg, Ohio and The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock

There lies a close parallel between the character of George Willard in Winesburg, Ohio, and J. Alfred Prufrock in “The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock”. Both male characters face sexual frustration, and disconnect from those around them. In order to describe the disconnect, they both seem to stem from the feeling that they cannot be understood, or they wish to touch or be touched by a woman in some way that communicates intimacy, a need they don’t get from exclusively communicating verbally. At Winesburg, Ohio’s peak, “Sophistication” correctly describes in words what this need exactly is. George wants to “be touched by the hand of another. . . he believes that a woman will be gentle, that she will understand. He wants, most of all, understanding” (Anderson 217). In contrast to the loud, industrious city George's dream wit take him next, George wants a gentler feeling. A more soothing one that comes from a female. Just speculating, the reason as to why he’d think that it would be more accessible coming from a female is the tender motherly feeling females are able to provide. I don’t have a lot of evidence to support that, but generally, woman have been shown in literature to be more in touch with their emotions that man are. Being able to fill the need for something and making it more comfortable to exist in a jarring world leads to understanding. Being able to locate that need, empathizing over how it feels, and being able to fix it is complete understanding. Alfred Prufrock meets the same roadblock of communication when he exclaims that what he has said in an attempt to connect and receive comfort is “not what I meant at all”(Eliot 97). Prufrock, having similar needs and the lack of a leading female role in his life, pushes him to reach out and ask for help. Disconnect follows as he isn’t able to articulate the feeling. This failure of verbal communication shows how touch is the most important mode of understanding, as words fail for both characters when they attempt to get what they want. This leads Prufrock to worry about social pressures, such as his appearance and his manner of speech at parties. George feels awkward around Helen when they converse. With the lack of physical touch, both characters face a difficultly of connection. Since physical touch involves actions, rather than words, it’s hard to understand why it wells up positive feelings like comfort. Both characters rely too heavily on words to communicate what they are feeling. The poem is titled as a love song for some intended. Prufrock is limiting himself from the beginning, as he can explain only as much as his capacity for forming the lyrics will allow. George Willard is a reporter and makes his living off of using words to communicate, and yet he fails at getting what he wants. In “Teacher”, Kate Swift advises that George must learn what people are thinking about, as to what they verbally say (Anderson 145). Because of these two character’s heavy reliance on speech, they are paralyzed from acting out their physical needs. Without engaging people physically, the characters cannot access the primal need for understanding that cannot be understood.  

Regarding "Vagueness" - Guilty as Charged

I think that every month I need to release a rant from my body about what’s on my mind concerning themes and literary analysis. Don’t get me wrong, I love analyzing literature, but my mindset is constantly changing regarding what I enjoy about it. I’ve been noticing what I like more and more when it comes to what I read and watch. It’s even been affecting my writing. I prefer it when a story is extremely specific and narrows the themes it’s trying to get across to the audience. It conveys more developed and interesting ideas than vague literature does. I’m going to be using that term a lot. Vague literature is a story that chooses broad narrative structures just for the sake of encasing hundreds of possible themes to remain relevant. For the sake of elaboration, in its simplest/dumbest form, vague literature looks like this: This is the story of a man (Oh he represents mankind as a whole) and this man, who’s name is withheld, (his name isn’t important because his true identity is mankind and his fear of the unknown is because of his need to control his own fate) does a literal biblical action or a forced allusion to one of Shakespeare's work to complete the story. Being a huge fan of Winesburg, Ohio, I was disappointed when I discovered some vague details regarding the Garden of Eden. Many characters sit under trees. Well I guess that that means Anderson was comparing them to Adam and Eve, and the tree houses the fruit of knowledge. The problem that I see in this is that it limits the possibilities that an author can say. I’ve spoken with peers who share this same concern. It’s as if we develop a logical pathway from the garden of eden, to a universal theme that’s kind of hackneyed “I’m looking at you, sin in the pursuit of knowledge” and as soon as we stumble upon an image that just barely resembles the allusion we’re trying to force the text to connect to, all deep thinking stops, and we immediately parrot the “universal truth” we’ve agreed on before hand. I’m guilty of doing this myself. I’m writing about this because I’m upset that I’ve done this myself. It’s lazy analysis, and I leave unfulfilled from a text. Specific stories have so many concrete details that they make it harder for a vague “truth” to finish the puzzle. This may limit some of the possible interpretations, but perhaps it’s for the better. Instead of getting a general society this and society that, I get specific themes that I may not have considered before. That is after all, the purpose of literature. To convey different truths and perspectives, not to repeat the same universal themes in altered ways. Personally, the most enjoyment I’ve received from analyzing literature comes from stories that are more developed and less vague. When an author has gone out of their way to make their work specific, they usually have more to say. 

I met a traveller from an antique land...

Ozymandias

Percy Bysshe Shelley

I met a traveller from an antique land

Who said: "Two vast and trunkless legs of stone

Stand in the desert. Near them on the sand,

Half sunk, a shattered visage lies, whose frown

And wrinkled lip and sneer of cold command

Tell that its sculptor well those passions read

Which yet survive, stamped on these lifeless things,

The hand that mocked them and the heart that fed.

And on the pedestal these words appear:

`My name is Ozymandias, King of Kings:

Look on my works, ye mighty, and despair!'

Nothing beside remains. Round the decay

Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,

The lone and level sands stretch far away". 

In the spirit of Breaking Bad’s series finale, and all of its splendid closure, I’m going to take a look at “Ozymandias” a poem, coincidentally, by Percy Bysshe Shelley. Notice how I did not say “ironically”. The poem opens with “I met a traveller from an antique land” (1). The speaker of the poem is retelling the words from a traveller who is retelling his tale to the speaker. Up front, there are echoes of frame narrative at play, which is also coincidental, seeing how Percy‘s wife, Mary, told her narrative through frame narrative. The traveler describes seeing “two vast and trunkless legs of stone / stand in the desert. Near them, on the sand, / Half sunk, a shattered visage lies” (3-4). This great figure that the statue was built in representation no longer stands. Instead, its feet lay planted into the ground, but the torso has collapsed under its own weight. This can be representative of the stubbornness of Ozymandias. While he held a steady ground for his empire, he couldn’t handle himself, and succumbed to the inevitable gravity his pride challenged. His feet stand, planted in what he believed was his, and yet the traveller looks around to find that Ozymandias has only claimed sand and dirt. Sand is a symbol that shows up whenever something is fleeting. Sand rarely belongs to a set territory and is roughly considered a solid mass. The million grains of sand that give it its mass, and still it is without definite form, characterize the ambiguous side of nature. The sand can then be representative of Ozymandias’ empire. The sand represents the thousands of souls that perished at the cost of Ozymandias’ power. And even after their departure from earth, they are lost souls, without a home and forced to roam the vast desert. Ozymandias’ broken face shows how delicate and weak his rough intimidating exterior was. He was only a human. The pedestal the traveler describes is Ozymandias’ declaration, “My name is Ozymandias, king of kings: / Look on my works, ye Might, and despair!”(10-11). This is immediately juxtaposed with the empty wasteland this crumbled statue occupies. This shows how empty Ozymandias threats were. Despite the threat that his pride displayed, it was no more than just that - a threat. Even if he possessed power during his occupation, his mere mortality meant nothing compared to the vastness of time.  That leads me to observing a certain “broken hourglass image”. Sand measures a set amount of time in an hour glass. Usually the end of this time is death, but the absence of an hour glass, and the ever bearing presence of the sea of sand puts time in a new perspective. By setting the poem in the desert, Shelley emphasizes how Ozymandias is lost in an ocean of time. A man, who possessed true power, is now nothing more than a cautionary tale, observed only rarely by a wanderer without a home. This is Percy’s way of warning humans of their ego. Power destroyed Ozymandias.

I wasn't prepared for that.

9/22/13

I just returned from the High museum, and experienced a feeling I never knew existed. It was supposed to be a simple day. My grandmother who was visiting wanted to see the The Girl with the Pearl Earring exhibit while she was in town, and I obliged, for I was interested in viewing the artwork with an analytical lens. The landscape paintings and portraits blew me away, as I searched on each canvas for a brush stroke. It was slightly depressing, knowing that the Renaissance housed some of the greatest talent our generation may never see in such a copious revival again. I can’t speak for the future. The basis for this post originated when I stumbled upon a certain painting titled, “View of A Lake with Sailing Ships”. I started crying. In the middle of an art museum, I was crying and I didn’t know why. The majority of the painting is swallowed by the sky. I’ll post the picture below. It was the colors that affected me emotionally though. The focus seems to be placed on two objects that appear immediately in the foreground. There are two vessels, shrouded by the shadow of an enormous cloud. The faces of the sailors on board are masked in darkness. The larger ship has its back turned, as if it’s sailing away, while the small dinghy is left behind. Upon further analysis of my emotions, I discover that the painting embodies adventure for me. The infinite sea compared to the even vaster sky accentuates the feeling of a awe-full world. Perhaps I connected to it because I saw myself as a passenger on that ship. Off in the distance, the other ships bathe in sunlight. With senior year ending, I think I see high school as one large cloud, comparatively to the openness of college and the possibilities that the future hold for a high-school graduate. When I cried, I felt feelings of loss. To me, it feels as though I’m leaving behind so many friends and loved ones, once I embark on this adventure. Seeing the two fishermen stuck on the small boat, doomed to their condition of...well...fishing, made me think they were the ones I was leaving behind. Adventure comes at a loss. The road of adventure really is a lonely one, especially if everyone else around you is comfortable with their situation, or have no interests to aspire for “greatness”. These themes are common in Frankenstein. Robert Walton embarks on a grand expedition to the arctic circle, but admits he has no friends. He is alone because moral isolation results from rebellion. Rebellion from the “system”. In Plato’s Allegory of the Cave, only one man is allowed to leave the cave. Upon returning, they come back forever changed. It’s that feeling of adventure in such a vast world where failure is an even greater possibility than success. When I saw the painting, I think I felt scared of how great it was. It was the feeling of adventure that struck such a feeling of forlorn in me. I’m not sure, I’ll leave it up to you. Just don’t call me strange if it doesn’t evoke a single feeling of sadness or melancholy. 

Tintern Abbey in Frankenstein

Mary Shelley alludes to "Tintern Abbey" after praising Victor's better half to show the true purpose of Henry Clerval. An innocent character from Victor's childhood, Clerval's purpose, other than to symbolize one of Victor's last connections to his past - that of which he abandons and is left unidentifiable from his natural form - isn't clear. In context, the allusion occurs when Wordsworth's speaker is looking back on his past. In Frankenstein's narrative context, Victor is recalling Henry Clerval: his past. Shelley choses to stop right before the line "That time is past" (Wordsworth 84). That time IS past. Time is frequently referenced to as water. The waterfall, and the water or time that falls from it, is lost forever. Mary uses this passage to enhance the hopelessness of how permanent Victor's change is. This chemical reaction that has transpired in Victor is immutable. At first, I thought the allusion to "Tintern Abbey" was paralleling Victor's past. As a child, his quest for knowledge lead him down the calm river of time in his childhood, where he met with the point of dropping off. I read this symbolism as birthing imagery, as Victor anticipated his expected birth by the sound of the rushing water and dropped off into the gloomy woods. It could also be read as Victor falling from Mount Olympus, and like Prometheus, Victor is banished to the material world where he suffers. However, Shelley does not use this passage to describe just Victor. Clerval is a foil for Victor. He represents the beauty Victor could have bestowed if he had learned to appreciate nature for what it is. The allusion develops Clerval's character even more. As others would view this awful waterfall with a superficial appreciation, Clerval loves this sight with his being. This innocence, an almost prepubescent child that contrasts with the parental Victor, cannot escape the terror of development. He too is dropped off from this cliff and into the gloomy woods. The odd aspect is the " haunting passions" he faces. It is natural to crave independence from the creator. After all, Wordsworth argues "there is no need of a remoter charm" (82). Someone as clean as Clerval is lured to this dropping off point. To descend from this heavenly, safe place, into a physical and depressing world does not seem to affect Clerval. This point of dropping off, where development takes place, is where Victor and Clerval branch. Victor's arrogance leads him to believe he is greater than nature. After his mother's death, Victor turns to nature for support. Eventually, he leaves nature and defies the gods by creating life. Clerval drops off too. Almost in a sense, puberty; however, Clerval keeps his appreciation of nature. It is his mother. In "Tintern Abbey", this memory of a thunderous cataract, a possible danger that nature inflicts on Wordsworth, is for a specific purpose. A certain "tough love". Wordsworth writes that the "sad music of humanity, Nor has nor grating though of ample power to chasten and subdue" (94) describes the power of nature. To chasten is to sometimes inflict suffering or strain to teach. Instead of rebelling against his parental guidance like Victor, Clerval uses these memories and sticks with nature so he can grow from it. Clerval is the man after accepting humiliation from nature while Victor is the man who decided not to return to his Abbey. Victor is the man who is "flying from something that he dreads" (72). Victor never contemplated or learned from nature because he chose not to participate in it, while Henry, a far more well off character accepted his position and acknowledged how important nature was in the development of his childhood.