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The Poor

The Poor. Thesis: Williams elevates the struggle of those who can only appreciate what they can afford. He uses imagery and analogy to clarify a broken sense in society. The poor is only increasing around the world and left unseen. Overall Interpretation.

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The Poor

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  1. The Poor Thesis: Williams elevates the struggle of those who can only appreciate what they can afford. He uses imagery and analogy to clarify a broken sense in society. The poor is only increasing around the world and left unseen.

  2. Overall Interpretation • Poverty has been a large issue in any community. • “It’s the anarchy of poverty” (1) • “overwhelmed the entire city” (20) • The poor thinks on what is really needed. They must grab what is necessary. • “It fits the dress of the children” (7-8) • “reflecting every stage and custom of necessity-” (9-10) • There is a difference between the way people live (free or strict) to what people have (power or poverty.) • “Chimneys, roofs, fences of wood and metal in an unfenced age and enclosing next to nothing at all: the old man in a sweater and soft black hat who sweeps the sidewalk-”(11-16)

  3. Senses: Meaning and Language • Allegory: Objects within the poem are representations of a person’s own meaning behind it. • “the dress of the children” (8) • How the children must live. • Denotation/Connotation: • “the old man…who sweeps the sidewalk” (14-16) Dictionary definition: cleans by brushing away dirt; move swiftly and smoothly V.S. Associated definition: moves like a broom that goes back and forth, grabbing onto things. • Diction: Williams depicts an appropriate symbol to what is happening in a certain moment. • “yellow wooden house indented • among the new brick tenements” (3-4) • old V.S. new • Purpose/Effect: The readers understand that the poor cherish every little bit that they can have. Williams does not want to show pity but to not label the unfortunate as “nothing.” Williams controls the readers imagination, by using sensitive words in the poem, creating a vision of reality. He also describes his fascination of meaningful history “delights me, the old.” • Mood: Playful; Creative • “yellow wooden house” (3) • “oak branches in full leaf” (6-7) • “his own ten feet of it in a wind” (17-18) • Point of view: First-person • Speaker: Spectator • Theme: Awareness to the poor, the unfortunate, and the unappreciated. • Tone: Determined; Vigilant; Descriptive; Watchful

  4. Senses: Imagery and Symbols • Colorful tactile and visual imagery: • “the old yellow wooden house indented among the new brick tenements” (2-4) Tough material with color. • “Chimneys, roofs, fences of wood and metal” (11-12) Hard and strong house features. • “the old man in a sweater and soft black hat who sweeps the sidewalk-” (14-16) Descriptive tactile imagery. • The old yellow wooden house symbolizes poverty as being left behind and the brick tenements represents society moving on without looking back, only ahead. • The old man represents poverty itself, he is “his own ten feet of it in a wind that fitfully turning his corner has overwhelmed the entire city.”

  5. Group Activity • How does the final stanza reveal the meaning of the poem as a whole? Please use references to support your idea.

  6. Style: Poetry Techniques • Stream of consciousness when describing the difference between the way people live and what they have • Juxtaposition: • Lower society=blue • Higher society=red It’s the anarchy of poverty delights me, the old yellow wooden house indented among the new brick tenements (1-4) reflecting every stage and custom of necessity- Chimneys, roofs, fences of wood and metal in an unfenced (9-12) his own ten feet of it in a wind that fitfully turning his corner has overwhelmed the entire city

  7. Structure: Form, Organization and Pattern • Enjambment: • It’s the anarchy of poverty/ delights me, the old/yellow wooden house indented/ among the new brick tenements (1-4) 1st stanza • Or a cast-iron balcony/ with panels showing oak branches/in full leaf. It fits/ the dress of the children (5-8) 2nd stanza • Syntax: • Complex separation of sentences • Symbiotically “reflecting every stage and custom of necessity-”

  8. Structure: Form, Organization and Pattern • Symbolic pattern: • Last lines of each stanza: among the new brick tenements (4) the dress of the children (8) wood and metal in an unfenced (12) hat who sweeps the sidewalk- (16) overwhelmed the entire city (20) • Three commas on lines 2 and 11. • One period on line 7. • Two dashes on line 10 and 16. • One colon on line 14

  9. Sound: Musicality and Auditory Techniques • Rhythm: • A sense of rhythm through even line lengths, separating the meter by each two lines. • End-Rhymes: • “poverty” “balcony” “necessity” “fitfully” and “city” (1, 5, 10, 18, and 20)

  10. Related Poems by William Carlos Williams • Similar rhythm pattern and enjambment, with the use of imagery. • “Classic Scene” • “Autumn” • “A Bastard Peace” • “These” • Historical Context: • Published from The Complete Collected Poems 1906-1938 (1938)

  11. Conclusion • Williams imagery techniques gives a great understanding of the rich and the poor society as a sense of distrust and disconnected community.

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