Preface to Joseph Andrews

Preface to Joseph Andrews

Henry Fielding (1742)                            1 AS IT is possible the mere English reader may have a different idea of romance with the author of these little volumes; and may consequently expect a kind of entertainment, not to be found, nor which was even intended, in the following pages; it may not be improper to premise a few words concerning this kind of writing, which I do not remember to have seen hitherto attempted in our language.   The EPIC, as well as the DRAMA, is divided into tragedy and comedy. HOMER, who was the father of this species of poetry, gave us the pattern of both these, tho’ that of the latter kind is entirely lost; which Aristotle tells us, bore the same relation to comedy which his Iliad bears to tragedy. and perhaps, that we have no more instances of it among the writers of antiquity, is owing to the loss of this great pattern, which, had it survived, would have found its imitators equally with the other poems of this great original.   And farther, as this poetry may be tragic or comic, I will not scruple to say it may be likewise either in verse or prose: for tho’ it wants one particular, which the critic enumerates in the constituent parts of an epic poem, namely, metre; yet, when any kind of writing contains all its other parts, such as fable, action, characters, sentiments, and diction, and is deficient in metre only, it seems, I think, reasonable to refer it to the epic; at least, as no critic hath thought proper to range it under any other head, nor to assign it a particular name to itself.   Thus the Telemachus of the archbishop of Cambray appears to me of the epic kind, as well as the Odyssey of Homer; indeed, it is much fairer and more reasonable to give it a name common with that species from which it differs only in a single instance, than to confound it with those which it resembles in no other. Such are those voluminous works, commonly called Romances, namely Clelia, Cleopatra, Astræa, Cassandra, the Grand Cyrus, and innumerable others which contain, as I apprehend, very little instruction or entertainment.   Now, a comic romance is a comic epic-poem in prose; differing from comedy, as the serious epic from tragedy: its action being more extended and comprehensive; containing a much larger circle of incidents, and introducing a greater variety of characters. It differs from the serious romance in its fable and action, in this: that as in the one these are grave and solemn, so in the other they are light and ridiculous; it differs in its characters, by introducing persons of inferiour rank, and consequently of inferiour manners, whereas the grave romance sets the highest before us; lastly in its sentiments and diction; by preserving the ludicrous instead of the sublime. In the diction I think, burlesque itself may be sometimes admitted; of which many instances will occur in this work, as in the description of the battles, and some other places not necessary to be pointed out to the classical reader; for whose entertainment those parodies or burlesque imitations are chiefly calculated.   But tho’ we have sometimes admitted this in our diction, we have carefully excluded it from our sentiments and characters; for there it is never properly introduced, unless in writings of the burlesque kind, which this is not intended to be. Indeed, no two species of writing can differ more widely than the comic and the burlesque: for as the latter is ever the exhibition of what is monstrous and unnatural, and where our delight, if we examine it, arises from the surprising absurdity, as in appropriating the manners of the highest to the lowest, or è converso; so in the former, we should ever confine ourselves strictly to nature, from the just imitation of which, will flow all the pleasure we can this way convey to a sensible reader. and perhaps, there is one reason, why a comic writer should of all others be the least excused for deviating from nature, since it may not be always so easy for a serious poet to meet with the great and the admirable; but life everywhere furnishes an accurate observer with the ridiculous.   I have hinted this little, concerning burlesque; because I have often heard that name given to performances, which have been truly of the comic kind, from the author’s having sometimes admitted it in his diction only; which as it is the dress of poetry, doth like the dress of men establish characters, (the one of the whole poem, and the other of the whole man), in vulgar opinion, beyond any of their greater excellences: but surely, a certain drollery in style, where characters and sentiments are perfectly natural, no more constitutes the burlesque, than an empty pomp and dignity of words, where everything else is mean and low, can entitle any performance to the appellation of the true sublime.   And I apprehend, my Lord Shaftesbury’s opinion of mere burlesque agrees with mine, when he asserts, “There is no such thing to be found in the writings of the antients.” But perhaps I have less abhorrence than he professes for it: and that not because I have had some little success on the stage this way; but rather as it contributes more to exquisite mirth and laughter than any other; and these are probably more wholesome physic for the mind, and conduce better to purge away spleen, melancholy, and ill affections, than is generally imagined. Nay, I will appeal to common observation, whether the same companies are not found more full of good-humour and benevolence, after they have been sweetened for two or three hours with entertainments of this kind, than soured by a tragedy or a grave lecture.   But to illustrate all this by another science, in which, perhaps, we shall see the distinction more clearly and plainly: let us examine the works of a comic history-painter, with those performances which the Italians call Caricatura, where we shall find the greatest excellence of the former to consist in the exactest copy of nature; insomuch, that a judicious eye instantly rejects anything outré; any liberty which the painter hath taken with the features of that alma mater. Whereas in the Caricatura we allow all licence. Its aim is to exhibit monsters, not men; and all distortions and exaggerations whatever are within its proper province.   Now what Caricatura is in painting, Burlesque is in writing; and in the same manner the comic writer and painter correlate to each other. and here I shall observe, that as in the former, the painter seems to have the advantage; so it is in the latter infinitely on the side of the writer: for the Monstrous is much easier to paint than describe, and the Ridiculous to describe than paint.   And tho’ perhaps this latter species doth not in either science so strongly affect and agitate the muscles as the other; yet it will be owned, I believe, that a more rational and useful pleasure arises to us from it. He who should call the ingenious Hogarth a burlesque painter, would, in my opinion, do him very little honour: for sure it is much easier, much less the subject of admiration, to paint a man with a nose, or any other feature of a preposterous size, or to expose him in some absurd or monstrous attitude, than to express the affections of men on canvas. It hath been thought a vast commendation of a painter to say his figures seem to breathe; but surely it is a much greater and nobler applause, that they appear to think.   But to return. The Ridiculous only, as I have before said, falls within my province in the present work. Nor will some explanation of this word be thought impertinent by the reader, if he considers how wonderfully it hath been mistaken, even by writers who have profess’d it: for to what but such a mistake, can we attribute the many attempts to ridicule the blackest villainies; and what is yet worse, the most dreadful calamities? What could exceed the absurdity of an author, who should write the comedy of Nero, with the merry incident of ripping up his mother’s belly; or what would give a greater shock to humanity than an attempt to expose the miseries of poverty and distress to ridicule? and yet, the reader will not want much learning to suggest such instances to himself.   Besides, it may seem remarkable, that Aristotle, who is so fond and free of definitions, hath not thought proper to define the Ridiculous. Indeed, where he tells us it is proper to comedy, he hath remarked that villainy is not its object: but that he hath not, as I remember, positively asserted what is. Nor doth the Abbé Bellegarde, who hath written a treatise on this subject, tho’ he shows us many species of it, once trace it to its fountain.   The only source of the true Ridiculous (as it appears to me) is affectation. But tho’ it arises from one spring only, when we consider the infinite streams into which this one branches, we shall presently cease to admire at the copious field it affords to an observer. Now affectation proceeds from one of these two causes; vanity, or hypocrisy: for as vanity puts us on affecting false characters, in order to purchase applause; so hypocrisy sets us on an endeavour to avoid censure by concealing our vices under an appearance of their opposite virtues. and tho’ these two causes are often confounded, (for they require some distinguishing;) yet, as they proceed from very different motives, so they are as clearly distinct in their operations: for indeed, the affectation which arises from vanity is nearer to truth than the other; as it hath not that violent repugnancy of nature to struggle with, which that of the hypocrite hath. It may be likewise noted, that affectation doth not imply an absolute negation of those qualities which are affected: and therefore, tho’, when it proceeds from hypocrisy, it be nearly allied to deceit; yet when it comes from vanity only, it partakes of the nature of ostentation: for instance, the affectation of liberality in a vain man, differs visibly from the same affectation in the avaricious; for tho’ the vain man is not what he would appear, or hath not the virtue he affects, to the degree he would be thought to have it; yet it sits less awkwardly on him than on the avaricious man, who is the very reverse of what he would seem to be.   From the discovery of this affectation arises the Ridiculous—which always strikes the reader with surprize and pleasure; and that in a higher and stronger degree when the affectation arises from hypocrisy, than when from vanity: for to discover any one to be the exact reverse of what he affects, is more surprizing, and consequently more ridiculous, than to find him a little deficient in the quality he desires the reputation of. I might observe that our Ben Jonson, who of all men understood the Ridiculous the best, hath chiefly used the hypocritical affectation.   Now from affectation only, the misfortunes and calamities of life, or the imperfections of nature, may become the objects of ridicule. Surely he hath a very ill-framed mind, who can look on ugliness, infirmity, or poverty, as ridiculous in themselves: nor do I believe any man living who meets a dirty fellow riding through the streets in a cart, is struck with an idea of the Ridiculous from it; but if he should see the same figure descend from his coach and six, or bolt from his chair with his hat under his arm, he would then begin to laugh, and with justice. In the same manner, were we to enter a poor house and behold a wretched family shivering with cold and languishing with hunger, it would not incline us to laughter, (at least we must have very diabolical natures, if it would): but should we discover there a grate, instead of coals, adorned with flowers, empty plate or china dishes on the side-board, or any other affectation of riches and finery either on their persons or in their furniture; we might then indeed be excused, for ridiculing so fantastical an appearance. Much less are natural imperfections the object of derision: but when ugliness aims at the applause of beauty, or lameness endeavours to display agility; it is then that these unfortunate circumstances, which at first moved our compassion, tend only to raise our mirth. The poet carries this very far;          None are for being what they are in fault, But for not being what they would be thought. Where if the metre would suffer the word Ridiculous to close the first line, the thought would be rather more proper. Great vices are the proper objects of our detestation, smaller faults of our pity: but affectation appears to me the only true source of the Ridiculous.   17   But perhaps it may be objected to me, that I have against my own rules introduced vices, and of a very black kind into this work. to this I shall answer: First, that it is very difficult to pursue a series of human actions and keep clear from them. Secondly, that the vices to be found here, are rather the accidental consequences of some human frailty, or foible, than causes habitually existing in the mind. Thirdly, that they are never set forth as the objects of ridicule, but detestation. Fourthly, that they are never the principal figure at that time on the scene; lastly, they never produce the intended evil.   18   Note 1. Henry Fielding, dramatist, novelist, and judge, was born near Glastonbury, Somersetshire, April 22, 1707, and died at Lisbon, October 8, 1754. Though seldom spoken of as an essayist, Fielding scattered through his novels a large number of detached or detachable discussions which are essentially essays, of which the preface to “Joseph Andrews,” on the “Comic Epic in Prose,” is a favorable specimen. The novel which it introduces was begun as a parody on Richardson’s “Pamela,” and the preface gives Fielding’s conception of this form of fiction.

“Mending Wall”

“Mending Wall”

 

Complete Text

Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it
And spills the upper boulders in the sun,
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing: 5
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made, 10
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go. 15
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
“Stay where you are until our backs are turned!”
We wear our fingers rough with handling them. 20
Oh, just another kind of outdoor game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across 25
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, “Good fences make good neighbors.”
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
“Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’t it 30
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offense.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall, 35
That wants it down.” I could say “Elves” to him,
But it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather
He said it for himself. I see him there,
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed. 40
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father’s saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, “Good fences make good neighbors.” 45 

Summary

A stone wall separates the speaker’s property from his neighbor’s. In spring, the two meet to walk the wall and jointly make repairs. The speaker sees no reason for the wall to be kept—there are no cows to be contained, just apple and pine trees. He does not believe in walls for the sake of walls. The neighbor resorts to an old adage: “Good fences make good neighbors.” The speaker remains unconvinced and mischievously presses the neighbor to look beyond the old-fashioned folly of such reasoning. His neighbor will not be swayed. The speaker envisions his neighbor as a holdover from a justifiably outmoded era, a living example of a dark-age mentality. But the neighbor simply repeats the adage.

Form

 

 

Blank verse is the baseline meter of this poem, but few of the lines march along in blank verse’s characteristic lock-step iambs, five abreast. Frost maintains five stressed syllables per line, but he varies the feet extensively to sustain the natural speech-like quality of the verse. There are no stanza breaks, obvious end-rhymes, or rhyming patterns, but many of the end-words share an assonance (e.g., wall, hill, balls, wall, and well sun, thing, stone, mean, line, and again or game, them, and him twice). Internal rhymes, too, are subtle, slanted, and conceivably coincidental. The vocabulary is all of a piece—no fancy words, all short (only one word, another, is of three syllables), all conversational—and this is perhaps why the words resonate so consummately with each other in sound and feel.

Sons and Lovers

D.H. Lawrence

 

 

 

Overall Summary

The first part of the novel focuses on Mrs. Morel and her unhappy marriage to a drinking miner. She has many arguments with her husband, some of which have painful results: on separate occasions, she is locked out of the house and hit in the head with a drawer. Estranged from her husband, Mrs. Morel takes comfort in her four children, especially her sons. Her oldest son, William, is her favorite, and she is very upset when he takes a job in London and moves away from the family. When William sickens and dies a few years later, she is crushed, not even noticing the rest of her children until she almost loses Paul, her second son, as well. From that point on, Paul becomes the focus of her life, and the two seem to live for each other.

Paul falls in love with Miriam Leivers, who lives on a farm not too far from the Morel family. They carry on a very intimate, but purely platonic, relationship for many years. Mrs. Morel does not approve of Miriam, and this may be the main reason that Paul does not marry her. He constantly wavers in his feelings toward her.
Paul meets Clara Dawes, a suffragette who is separated from her husband, through Miriam. As he becomes closer with Clara and they begin to discuss his relationship with Miriam, she tells him that he should consider consummating their love and he returns to Miriam to see how she feels.
Paul and Miriam sleep together and are briefly happy, but shortly afterward Paul decides that he does not want to marry Miriam, and so he breaks off with her. She still feels that his soul belongs to her, and, in part agrees reluctantly. He realizes that he loves his mother most, however.
After breaking off his relationship with Miriam, Paul begins to spend more time with Clara and they begin an extremely passionate affair. However, she does not want to divorce her husband Baxter, and so they can never be married. Paul’s mother falls ill and he devotes much of his time to caring for her. When she finally dies, he is broken-hearted and, after a final plea from Miriam, goes off alone at the end of the novel.

Characters

Gertrude Morel  -  The first protagonist of the novel. She becomes unhappy with her husband Walter and devotes herself to her children.

Paul Morel  -  Paul Morel takes over from his mother as the protagonist in the second half of the book. After his brother William’s death, Paul becomes his mother’s favorite and struggles throughout the novel to balance his love for her with his relationships with other women.

Walter Morel  -  Gertrude’s husband, a coal miner.

William Morel  -  Their first son, who is Mrs. Morel’s favorite until he falls ill and dies.

Annie Morel  -  Paul’s older sister. When their mother lies dying toward the end of the novel, she and Paul decide to give her an overdose of morphia pills.

Arthur Morel  -  Paul’s younger brother, not central to the plot.

Miriam Leivers  -  The daughter of the family at Willey Farm. She befriends Paul and becomes his first love.

Clara Dawes  -  A friend of Miriam’s, she is a suffragette, who is separated from her husband. She becomes Paul’s second love, and they have a passionate affair.

Baxter Dawes -  Clara’s husband. He fights with Paul, but they later become friends while he is ill.

Mrs. Radford -  Clara’s mother.

Thomas Jordan -  The owner of the factory where Paul works. Paul dislikes him from their first interview because he is rude and makes Paul look foolish. He later fires Baxter Dawes because he knocks him down a flight of stairs.

Louisa Lily Denys Western -  A girl William sees in London, and to whom he becomes engaged. The rest of the family is less than impressed with her when he brings her home, and William shortly becomes sick of her as well.

Mr. and Mrs. Leivers, Agatha, Edgar, Geoffrey, Maurice  -  The family who live at Willey Farm.

Fanny -  A hunchback who works in the finishing-off room at the factory, who likes to have Paul come visit her to sing or talk. She organizes the other girls to get Paul a birthday present.

John Field -  A man with whom Gertrude is friendly when she is nineteen. He gives her a Bible, which she keeps for the rest of her life. From John she learns that “being a man isn’t everything.”

Jerry Purdy -  Walter Morel’s bosom friend. Walter goes for a walk to Nottingham with Jerry, during which he takes the nap on the ground that eventually causes an illness.

Mr. Heaton -  The Congregational clergyman who visits with Mrs. Morel every day after Paul is born. He is Paul’s godfather and teaches him French, German, and mathematics.

Beatrice Wyld -  A friend of the Morel family who ridicules Miriam and flirts with Paul. She eventually marries Arthur when he returns from the army. 

 

 

                                                                                          courtesy: sparknotes.com

 

 

 

The Rape of the Lock, - Alexander Pope

The Rape of the Lock

Alexander Pope

 

 

 

Summary

Belinda arises to prepare for the day’s social activities after sleeping late. Her guardian sylph, Ariel, warned her in a dream that some disaster will befall her, and promises to protect her to the best of his abilities. Belinda takes little notice of this oracle, however. After an elaborate ritual of dressing and primping, she travels on the Thames River to Hampton Court Palace, an ancient royal residence outside of London, where a group of wealthy young socialites are gathering for a party. Among them is the Baron, who has already made up his mind to steal a lock of Belinda’s hair. He has risen early to perform and elaborate set of prayers and sacrifices to promote success in this enterprise. When the partygoers arrive at the palace, they enjoy a tense game of cards, which Pope describes in mock-heroic terms as a battle. This is followed by a round of coffee. Then the Baron takes up a pair of scissors and manages, on the third try, to cut off the coveted lock of Belinda’s hair. Belinda is furious. Umbriel, a mischievous gnome, journeys down to the Cave of Spleen to procure a sack of sighs and a flask of tears which he then bestows on the heroine to fan the flames of her ire. Clarissa, who had aided the Baron in his crime, now urges Belinda to give up her anger in favor of good humor and good sense, moral qualities which will outlast her vanities. But Clarissa’s moralizing falls on deaf ears, and Belinda initiates a scuffle between the ladies and the gentlemen, in which she attempts to recover the severed curl. The lock is lost in the confusion of this mock battle, however; the poet consoles the bereft Belinda with the suggestion that it has been taken up into the heavens and immortalized as a constellation.

Characters

Belinda -  Belinda is based on the historical Arabella Fermor, a member of Pope’s circle of prominent Roman Catholics. Robert, Lord Petre (the Baron in the poem) had precipitated a rift between their two families by snipping off a lock of her hair.

The Baron  -  This is the pseudonym for the historical Robert, Lord Petre, the young gentleman in Pope’s social circle who offended Arabella Fermor and her family by cutting off a lock of her hair. In the poem’s version of events, Arabella is known as Belinda.

Caryl -  The historical basis for the Caryl character is John Caryll, a friend of Pope and of the two families that had become estranged over the incident the poem relates. It was Caryll who suggested that Pope encourage a reconciliation by writing a humorous poem.

Goddess -  The muse who, according to classical convention, inspires poets to write their verses

Shock -  Belinda’s lapdog

Ariel -  Belinda’s guardian sylph, who oversees an army of invisible protective deities

Umbriel -  The chief gnome, who travels to the Cave of Spleen and returns with bundles of sighs and tears to aggravate Belinda’s vexation

Brillante -  The sylph who is assigned to guard Belinda’s earrings

Momentilla -  The sylph who is assigned to guard Belinda’s watch

Crispissa -  The sylph who is assigned to guard Belinda’s “fav’rite Lock”

Clarissa -  A woman in attendance at the Hampton Court party. She lends the Baron the pair of scissors with which he cuts Belinda’s hair, and later delivers a moralizing lecture.

Thalestris -  Belinda’s friend, named for the Queen of the Amazons and representing the historical Gertrude Morley, a friend of Pope’s and the wife of Sir George Browne (rendered as her “beau,” Sir Plume, in the poem). She eggs Belinda on in her anger and demands that the lock be returned.

Sir Plume -  Thalestris’s “beau,” who makes an ineffectual challenge to the Baron. He represents the historical Sir George Browne, a member of Pope’s social circle.

 

 

Canto 1

Summary

The Rape of the Lock begins with a passage outlining the subject of the poem and invoking the aid of the muse. Then the sun (“Sol”) appears to initiate the leisurely morning routines of a wealthy household. Lapdogs shake themselves awake, bells begin to ring, and although it is already noon, Belinda still sleeps. She has been dreaming, and we learn that the dream has been sent by “her guardian Sylph,” Ariel. The dream is of a handsome youth who tells her that she is protected by “unnumber’d Spirits”—an army of supernatural beings who once lived on earth as human women. The youth explains that they are the invisible guardians of women’s chastity, although the credit is usually mistakenly given to “Honour” rather than to their divine stewardship. Of these Spirits, one particular group—the Sylphs, who dwell in the air—serve as Belinda’s personal guardians; they are devoted, lover-like, to any woman that “rejects mankind,” and they understand and reward the vanities of an elegant and frivolous lady like Belinda. Ariel, the chief of all Belinda’s puckish protectors, warns her in this dream that “some dread event” is going to befall her that day, though he can tell her nothing more specific than that she should “beware of Man!” Then Belinda awakes, to the licking tongue of her lapdog, Shock. Upon the delivery of a billet-doux, or love-letter, she forgets all about the dream. She then proceeds to her dressing table and goes through an elaborate ritual of dressing, in which her own image in the mirror is described as a “heavenly image,” a “goddess.” The Sylphs, unseen, assist their charge as she prepares herself for the day’s activities.

Commentary

The opening of the poem establishes its mock-heroic style. Pope introduces the conventional epic subjects of love and war and includes an invocation to the muse and a dedication to the man (the historical John Caryll) who commissioned the poem. Yet the tone already indicates that the high seriousness of these traditional topics has suffered a diminishment. The second line confirms in explicit terms what the first line already suggests: the “am’rous causes” the poem describes are not comparable to the grand love of Greek heroes but rather represent a trivialized version of that emotion. The “contests” Pope alludes to will prove to be “mighty” only in an ironic sense. They are card-games and flirtatious tussles, not the great battles of epic tradition. Belinda is not, like Helen of Troy, “the face that launched a thousand ships” (see the SparkNote on The Iliad), but rather a face that—although also beautiful—prompts a lot of foppish nonsense. The first two verse-paragraphs emphasize the comic inappropriateness of the epic style (and corresponding mind-set) to the subject at hand. Pope achieves this discrepancy at the level of the line and half-line; the reader is meant to dwell on the incompatibility between the two sides of his parallel formulations. Thus, in this world, it is “little men” who in “tasks so bold... engage”; and “soft bosoms” are the dwelling-place for “mighty rage.” In this startling juxtaposition of the petty and the grand, the former is real while the latter is ironic. In mock-epic, the high heroic style works not to dignify the subject but rather to expose and ridicule it. Therefore, the basic irony of the style supports the substance of the poem’s satire, which attacks the misguided values of a society that takes small matters for serious ones while failing to attend to issues of genuine importance.
With Belinda’s dream, Pope introduces the “machinery” of the poem—the supernatural powers that influence the action from behind the scenes. Here, the sprites that watch over Belinda are meant to mimic the gods of the Greek and Roman traditions, who are sometimes benevolent and sometimes malicious, but always intimately involved in earthly events. The scheme also makes use of other ancient hierarchies and systems of order. Ariel explains that women’s spirits, when they die, return “to their first Elements.” Each female personality type (these types correspond to the four humours) is converted into a particular kind of sprite. These gnomes, sylphs, salamanders, and nymphs, in turn, are associated with the four elements of earth, air, fire, and water. The airy sylphs are those who in their lifetimes were “light Coquettes”; they have a particular concern for Belinda because she is of this type, and this will be the aspect of feminine nature with which the poem is most concerned.
Indeed, Pope already begins to sketch this character of the “coquette” in this initial canto. He draws the portrait indirectly, through characteristics of the Sylphs rather than of Belinda herself. Their priorities reveal that the central concerns of womanhood, at least for women of Belinda’s class, are social ones. Woman’s “joy in gilded Chariots” indicates an obsession with pomp and superficial splendor, while “love of Ombre,” a fashionable card game, suggests frivolity. The erotic charge of this social world in turn prompts another central concern: the protection of chastity. These are women who value above all the prospect marrying to advantage, and they have learned at an early age how to promote themselves and manipulate their suitors without compromising themselves. The Sylphs become an allegory for the mannered conventions that govern female social behavior. Principles like honor and chastity have become no more than another part of conventional interaction. Pope makes it clear that these women are not conducting themselves on the basis of abstract moral principles, but are governed by an elaborate social mechanism—of which the Sylphs cut a fitting caricature. And while Pope’s technique of employing supernatural machinery allows him to critique this situation, it also helps to keep the satire light and to exonerate individual women from too severe a judgment. If Belinda has all the typical female foibles, Pope wants us to recognize that it is partly because she has been educated and trained to act in this way. The society as a whole is as much to blame as she is. Nor are men exempt from this judgment. The competition among the young lords for the attention of beautiful ladies is depicted as a battle of vanity, as “wigs with wigs, with sword-knots sword-knots strive.” Pope’s phrases here expose an absurd attention to exhibitions of pride and ostentation. He emphasizes the inanity of discriminating so closely between things and people that are essentially the same in all important (and even most unimportant) respects.
Pope’s portrayal of Belinda at her dressing table introduces mock-heroic motifs that will run through the poem. The scene of her toilette is rendered first as a religious sacrament, in which Belinda herself is the priestess and her image in the looking glass is the Goddess she serves. This parody of the religious rites before a battle gives way, then, to another kind of mock-epic scene, that of the ritualized arming of the hero. Combs, pins, and cosmetics take the place of weapons as “awful Beauty puts on all its arms.”

Canto 2

Summary

Belinda, rivaling the sun in her radiance, sets out by boat on the river Thames for Hampton Court Palace. She is accompanied by a party of glitzy ladies (“Nymphs”) and gentlemen, but is far and away the most striking member of the group. Pope’s description of her charms includes “the sparkling Cross she wore” on her “white breast,” her “quick” eyes and “lively looks,” and the easy grace with which she bestows her smiles and attentions evenly among all the adoring guests. Her crowning glories, though, are the two ringlets that dangle on her “iv’ry neck.” These curls are described as love’s labyrinths, specifically designed to ensnare any poor heart who might get entangled in them.

One of the young gentlemen on the boat, the Baron, particularly admires Belinda’s locks, and has determined to steal them for himself. We read that he rose early that morning to build an altar to love and pray for success in this project. He sacrificed several tokens of his former affections, including garters, gloves, and billet-doux (love-letters). He then prostrated himself before a pyre built with “all the trophies of his former loves,” fanning its flames with his “am’rous sighs.” The gods listened to his prayer but decided to grant only half of it.
As the pleasure-boat continues on its way, everyone is carefree except Ariel, who remembers that some bad event has been foretold for the day. He summons an army of sylphs, who assemble around him in their iridescent beauty. He reminds them with great ceremony that one of their duties, after regulating celestial bodies and the weather and guarding the British monarch, is “to tend the Fair”: to keep watch over ladies’ powders, perfumes, curls, and clothing, and to “assist their blushes, and inspire their airs.” Therefore, since “some dire disaster” threatens Belinda, Ariel assigns her an extensive troop of bodyguards. Brillante is to guard her earrings, Momentilla her watch, and Crispissa her locks. Ariel himself will protect Shock, the lapdog. A band of fifty Sylphs will guard the all-important petticoat. Ariel pronounces that any sylph who neglects his assigned duty will be severely punished. They disperse to their posts and wait for fate to unfold.

Commentary

From the first, Pope describes Belinda’s beauty as something divine, an assessment which she herself corroborates in the first canto when she creates, at least metaphorically, an altar to her own image. This praise is certainly in some sense ironical, reflecting negatively on a system of public values in which external characteristics rank higher than moral or intellectual ones. But Pope also shows a real reverence for his heroine’s physical and social charms, claiming in lines 17–18 that these are compelling enough to cause one to forget her “female errors.” Certainly he has some interest in flattering Arabella Fermor, the real-life woman on whom Belinda is based; in order for his poem to achieve the desired reconciliation, it must not offend (see “Context”. Pope also exhibits his appreciation for the ways in which physical beauty is an art form: he recognizes, with a mixture of censure and awe, the fact that Belinda’s legendary locks of hair, which appear so natural and spontaneous, are actually a carefully contrived effect. In this, the mysteries of the lady’s dressing table are akin, perhaps, to Pope’s own literary art, which he describes elsewhere as “nature to advantage dress’d.”
If the secret mechanisms and techniques of female beauty get at least a passing nod of appreciation from the author, he nevertheless suggests that the general human readiness to worship beauty amounts to a kind of sacrilege. The cross that Belinda wears around her neck serves a more ornamental than symbolic or religious function. Because of this, he says, it can be adored by “Jews” and “Infidels” as readily as by Christians. And there is some ambiguity about whether any of the admirers are really valuing the cross itself, or the “white breast” on which it lies—or the felicitous effect of the whole. The Baron, of course, is the most significant of those who worship at the altar of Belinda’s beauty. The ritual sacrifices he performs in the pre-dawn hours are another mock-heroic element of the poem, mimicking the epic tradition of sacrificing to the gods before an important battle or journey, and drapes his project with an absurdly grand import that actually only exposes its triviality. The fact that he discards all his other love tokens in these preparations reveals his capriciousness as a lover. Earnest prayer, in this parodic scene, is replaced by the self-indulgent sighs of the lover. By having the gods grant only half of what the Baron asks, Pope alludes to the epic convention by which the favor of the gods is only a mixed blessing: in epic poems, to win the sponsorship of one god is to incur the wrath of another; divine gifts, such as immortality, can seem a blessing but become a curse. Yet in this poem, the ramifications of a prayer “half” granted are negligible rather than tragic; it merely means that he will manage to steal just one lock rather than both of them.
In the first canto, the religious imagery surrounding Belinda’s grooming rituals gave way to a militaristic conceit. Here, the same pattern holds. Her curls are compared to a trap perfectly calibrated to ensnare the enemy. Yet the character of female coyness is such that it seeks simultaneously to attract and repel, so that the counterpart to the enticing ringlets is the formidable petticoat. This undergarment is described as a defensive armament comparable to the Shield of Achilles (see Scroll XVIII of The Iliad), and supported in its function of protecting the maiden’s chastity by the invisible might of fifty Sylphs. The Sylphs, who are Belinda’s protectors, are essentially charged to protect her not from failure but from too great a success in attracting men. This paradoxical situation dramatizes the contradictory values and motives implied in the era’s sexual conventions.

In this canto, the sexual allegory of the poem begins to come into fuller view. The title of the poem already associates the cutting of Belinda’s hair with a more explicit sexual conquest, and here Pope cultivates that suggestion. He multiplies his sexually metaphorical language for the incident, adding words like “ravish” and “betray” to the “rape” of the title. He also slips in some commentary on the implications of his society’s sexual mores, as when he remarks that “when success a Lover’s toil attends, / few ask, if fraud or force attain’d his ends.” When Ariel speculates about the possible forms the “dire disaster” might take, he includes a breach of chastity (“Diana’s law”), the breaking of china (another allusion to the loss of virginity), and the staining of honor or a gown (the two incommensurate events could happen equally easily and accidentally). He also mentions some pettier social “disasters” against which the Sylphs are equally prepared to fight, like missing a ball (here, as grave as missing prayers) or losing the lapdog. In the Sylphs’ defensive efforts, Belinda’s petticoat is the battlefield that requires the most extensive fortifications. This fact furthers the idea that the rape of the lock stands in for a literal rape, or at least represents a threat to her chastity more serious than just the mere theft of a curl.

Canto 3

Summary

The boat arrives at Hampton Court Palace, and the ladies and gentlemen disembark to their courtly amusements. After a pleasant round of chatting and gossip, Belinda sits down with two of the men to a game of cards. They play ombre, a three-handed game of tricks and trumps, somewhat like bridge, and it is described in terms of a heroic battle: the cards are troops combating on the “velvet plain” of the card-table. Belinda, under the watchful care of the Sylphs, begins favorably. She declares spades as trumps and leads with her highest cards, sure of success. Soon, however, the hand takes a turn for the worse when “to the Baron fate inclines the field”: he catches her king of clubs with his queen and then leads back with his high diamonds. Belinda is in danger of being beaten, but recovers in the last trick so as to just barely win back the amount she bid.

The next ritual amusement is the serving of coffee. The curling vapors of the steaming coffee remind the Baron of his intention to attempt Belinda’s lock. Clarissa draws out her scissors for his use, as a lady would arm a knight in a romance. Taking up the scissors, he tries three times to clip the lock from behind without Belinda seeing. The Sylphs endeavor furiously to intervene, blowing the hair out of harm’s way and tweaking her diamond earring to make her turn around. Ariel, in a last-minute effort, gains access to her brain, where he is surprised to find “an earthly lover lurking at her heart.” He gives up protecting her then; the implication is that she secretly wants to be violated. Finally, the shears close on the curl. A daring sylph jumps in between the blades and is cut in two; but being a supernatural creature, he is quickly restored. The deed is done, and the Baron exults while Belinda’s screams fill the air.

Commentary

This canto is full of classic examples of Pope’s masterful use of the heroic couplet. In introducing Hampton Court Palace, he describes it as the place where Queen Anne “dost sometimes counsel take—and sometimes tea.” This line employs a zeugma, a rhetorical device in which a word or phrase modifies two other words or phrases in a parallel construction, but modifies each in a different way or according to a different sense. Here, the modifying word is “take”; it applies to the paralleled terms “counsel” and “tea.” But one does not “take” tea in the same way one takes counsel, and the effect of the zeugma is to show the royal residence as a place that houses both serious matters of state and frivolous social occasions. The reader is asked to contemplate that paradox and to reflect on the relative value and importance of these two different registers of activity. (For another example of this rhetorical technique, see lines 157–8: “Not louder shrieks to pitying heaven are cast, / when husbands, or when lapdogs breathe their last.”) A similar point is made, in a less compact phrasing, in the second and third verse-paragraphs of this canto. Here, against the gossip and chatter of the young lords and ladies, Pope opens a window onto more serious matters that are occurring “meanwhile” and elsewhere, including criminal trials and executions, and economic exchange.
The rendering of the card game as a battle constitutes an amusing and deft narrative feat. By parodying the battle scenes of the great epic poems, Pope is suggesting that the energy and passion once applied to brave and serious purposes is now expended on such insignificant trials as games and gambling, which often become a mere front for flirtation. The structure of “the three attempts” by which the lock is cut is a convention of heroic challenges, particularly in the romance genre. The romance is further invoked in the image of Clarissa arming the Baron—not with a real weapon, however, but with a pair of sewing scissors. Belinda is not a real adversary, or course, and Pope makes it plain that her resistance—and, by implication, her subsequent distress—is to some degree an affectation. The melodrama of her screams is complemented by the ironic comparison of the Baron’s feat to the conquest of nations.

Canto 4

Summary

Belinda’s “anxious cares” and “secret passions” after the loss of her lock are equal to the emotions of all who have ever known “rage, resentment and despair.” After the disappointed Sylphs withdraw, an earthy gnome called Umbriel flies down to the “Cave of Spleen.” (The spleen, an organ that removes disease-causing agents from the bloodstream, was traditionally associated with the passions, particularly malaise; “spleen” is a synonym for “ill-temper.”) In his descent he passes through Belinda’s bedroom, where she lies prostrate with discomfiture and the headache. She is attended by “two handmaidens,” Ill-Nature and Affectation. Umbriel passes safely through this melancholy chamber, holding a sprig of “spleenwort” before him as a charm. He addresses the “Goddess of Spleen,” and returns with a bag of “sighs, sobs, and passions” and a vial of sorrow, grief, and tears. He unleashes the first bag on Belinda, fueling her ire and despair.

There to commiserate with Belinda is her friend Thalestris. (In Greek mythology, Thalestris is the name of one of the Amazons, a race of warrior women who excluded men from their society.) Thalestris delivers a speech calculated to further foment Belinda’s indignation and urge her to avenge herself. She then goes to Sir Plume, “her beau,” to ask him to demand that the Baron return the hair. Sir Plume makes a weak and slang-filled speech, to which the Baron disdainfully refuses to acquiesce. At this, Umbriel releases the contents of the remaining vial, throwing Belinda into a fit of sorrow and self-pity. With “beauteous grief” she bemoans her fate, regrets not having heeded the dream-warning, and laments the lonely, pitiful state of her sole remaining curl.

Commentary

The canto opens with a list of examples of “rage, resentment, and despair,” comparing on an equal footing the pathos of kings imprisoned in battle, of women who become old maids, of evil-doers who die without being saved, and of a woman whose dress is disheveled. By placing such disparate sorts of aggravation in parallel, Pope accentuates the absolute necessity of assigning them to some rank of moral import. The effect is to chastise a social world that fails to make these distinctions.
Umbriel’s journey to the Cave of Spleen mimics the journeys to the underworld made by both Odysseus and Aeneas. Pope uses psychological allegory (for the spleen was the seat of malaise or melancholy), as a way of exploring the sources and nature of Belinda’s feelings. The presence of Ill-nature and Affectation as handmaidens serves to indicate that her grief is less than pure (“affected” or put-on), and that her display of temper has hidden motives. We learn that her sorrow is decorative in much the same way the curl was; it gives her the occasion, for example, to wear a new nightdress.
The speech of Thalestris invokes a courtly ethic. She encourages Belinda to think about the Baron’s misdeed as an affront to her honor, and draws on ideals of chivalry in demanding that Sir Plume challenge the Baron in defense of Belinda’s honor. He makes a muddle of the task, showing how far from courtly behavior this generation of gentlemen has fallen. Sir Plume’s speech is riddled with foppish slang and has none of the logical, moral, or oratorical power that a knight should properly wield.
This attention to questions of honor returns us to the sexual allegory of the poem. The real danger, Thalestris suggests, is that “the ravisher” might display the lock and make it a source of public humiliation to Belinda and, by association, to her friends. Thus the real question is a superficial one—public reputation—rather than the moral imperative to chastity. Belinda’s own words at the close of the canto corroborate this suggestion; she exclaims, “Oh, hadst thou, cruel! been content to seize / Hairs less in sight, or any hairs but these!” (The “hairs less in sight” suggest her pubic hair). Pope is pointing out the degree to which she values outward appearance (whether beauty or reputation) above all else; she would rather suffer a breach to her integrity than a breach to her appearance.

Canto 5

The Baron remains impassive against all the ladies’ tears and reproaches. Clarissa delivers a speech in which she questions why a society that so adores beauty in women does not also place a value on “good sense” and “good humour.” Women are frequently called angels, she argues, but without reference to the moral qualities of these creatures. Especially since beauty is necessarily so short-lived, we must have something more substantial and permanent to fall back on. This sensible, moralizing speech falls on deaf ears, however, and Belinda, Thalestris and the rest ignore her and proceed to launch an all-out attack on the offending Baron. A chaotic tussle ensues, with the gnome Umbriel presiding in a posture of self- congratulation. The gentlemen are slain or revived according to the smiles and frowns of the fair ladies. Belinda and the Baron meet in combat and she emerges victorious by peppering him with snuff and drawing her bodkin. Having achieved a position of advantage, she again demands that he return the lock. But the ringlet has been lost in the chaos, and cannot be found. The poet avers that the lock has risen to the heavenly spheres to become a star; stargazers may admire it now for all eternity. In this way, the poet reasons, it will attract more envy than it ever could on earth.

Commentary

Readers have often interpreted Clarissa’s speech as the voice of the poet expressing the moral of the story. Certainly, her oration’s thesis aligns with Pope’s professed task of putting the dispute between the two families into a more reasonable perspective. But Pope’s position achieves more complexity than Clarissa’s speech, since he has used the occasion of the poem as a vehicle to critically address a number of broader societal issues as well. And Clarissa’s righteous stance loses authority in light of the fact that it was she who originally gave the Baron the scissors. Clarissa’s failure to inspire a reconciliation proves that the quarrel is itself a kind of flirtatious game that all parties are enjoying. The description of the “battle” has a markedly erotic quality, as ladies and lords wallow in their mock-agonies. Sir Plume “draw[s] Clarissa down” in a sexual way, and Belinda “flies” on her foe with flashing eyes and an erotic ardor. When Pope informs us that the Baron fights on unafraid because he “sought no more than on his foe to die,” the expression means that his goal all along was sexual consummation.
This final battle is the culmination of the long sequence of mock-heroic military actions. Pope invokes by name the Roman gods who were most active in warfare, and he alludes as well to the Aeneid , comparing the stoic Baron to Aeneas (“the Trojan”), who had to leave his love to become the founder of Rome. Belinda’s tossing of the snuff makes a perfect turning point, ideally suited to the scale of this trivial battle. The snuff causes the Baron to sneeze, a comic and decidedly unheroic thing for a hero to do. The bodkin, too, serves nicely: here a bodkin is a decorative hairpin, not the weapon of ancient days (or even of Hamlet’s time). Still, Pope gives the pin an elaborate history in accordance with the conventions of true epic.
The mock-heroic conclusion of the poem is designed to compliment the lady it alludes to (Arabella Fermor), while also giving the poet himself due credit for being the instrument of her immortality. This ending effectively indulges the heroine’s vanity, even though the poem has functioned throughout as a critique of that vanity. And no real moral development has taken place: Belinda is asked to come to terms with her loss through a kind of bribe or distraction that reinforces her basically frivolous outlook. But even in its most mocking moments, this poem is a gentle one, in which Pope shows a basic sympathy with the social world in spite of its folly and foibles. The searing critiques of his later satires would be much more stringent and less forgiving.

                                                                                                                             courtesy : sparknotes.com

 

Seize the Day, - Saul Bellow

Seize the Day

                                        -Saul Bellow

Plot Overview


Tommy Wilhelm is a man in his mid-forties, temporarily living in the Hotel Gloriana on the Upper West Side of New York City, the same hotel in which his father has taken residence for a number of years. He is out of place from the beginning, living in a hotel filled with elderly retirees and continuing throughout the novel to be a figure of isolation amidst crowds. The novella traverses one very important day in the life of this self-same Tommy Wilhelm: his "day of reckoning," so to speak.


As the novella opens, Tommy is descending in the hotel elevator, on his way to meet his father for breakfast, as he does every morning. However, this morning feels different to Tommy, he feels a certain degree of fear and of foreboding for something that lies in the hours ahead of him and has been building for quite some time.


The reader begins to discover through Tommy's thoughts and through a series of flashbacks that Tommy has just recently been fired from his job as a salesman, he is a college drop-out, a man with two children, recently separated from his wife, and he is a man on the brink of financial disaster. Tommy has just given over the last of his savings to the fraudulent Dr. Tamkin, who has promised to knowingly invest it in the commodities market. Amid all of this, he has, apparently, fallen in love with a woman named Olive, who he cannot marry because his wife will not grant him a divorce. Tommy is unhappy and in need of assistance both emotionally and financially.


In the first three chapters the reader follows Tommy as he talks with his father, Dr. Adler, who sees his son as a failure in every sense of the word. Tommy is refused financial assistance and also refused any kind of support, emotionally or otherwise, from his father. It is also within these beginning chapters that the flashbacks begin. The flashbacks highlight, among other things, Tommy's meeting with the duplicitous Maurice Venice, the talent scout who shows initial interest in a young Tommy and his good looks. Wilhelm, however, is later rejected by the same scout after a failed screen test but nevertheless attempts a career in Hollywood as an actor. He discontinues his college education and moves to California, against his parent's will and warnings.


The chapters that follow focus on Tommy's encounters and conversations with Dr. Tamkin, a seemingly fraudulent and questionable "psychologist," who gives Tommy endless advice and thus provides the assistance he had looked for from his father. Whether Tamkin is fraudulent and questionable as a psychologist, and whether he is a liar and a charlatan is a question that is constantly being posed to us. Regardless, Tamkin is quite charming and appeals to Tommy. Dr. Tamkin claims to be a poet, a healer, a member of the Detroit Purple Gang, as well as claiming a number of other positions and titles. Despite his lies, he gives Tommy kernels of truth that become significant in the novella and for Tommy. Moreover, Tommy entrusts Tamkin with the last of his savings to invest in the commodities market, since Tamkin claims a certain stock market expertise.




Themes
The Predicament of Modern Man


Seize the day is a reflection of the times in which it was written. The novel was written in a post-war world. WWII created several factors that serve as a backdrop to Wilhelm's isolation in the novel, an isolation that represents the feeling of many during the time period.


First and foremost, war creates dissolution and in many cases dislocation because of forced immigration. During the war many people, Jews especially, were escaping the Germans and, thus, fleeing, when they could. Also, American troop and other members of the alliance were disillusioned to see that such horrors could exist. Finally, and in opposition to the above, the war had a positive effect of creating an economic boom. There was also a surge in technological interest in America. The reasons for this serge are two-fold: America was rich and America was involved in a post-WWII cold war with the Soviet Union, since the countries competed technologically. It is in this world that a man like Tommy Wilhelm is lost.


Tommy is an idealist surrounded by the pressures of the outside world. He is isolated and, thus, is forced to turn inward. The urban landscape is the symbol that furthers his isolation, for he is always "alone in a crowd." Bellow wants the reader to understand this isolation and thus has almost the entire novel take place within Wilhelm's head. We experience the back and forth of uncertainty, the wavering of watery thoughts, the sadness and frustration of being that person that is "alone in the crowd."


This isolation and inner struggle is the predicament of modernity. Bellow would not be the only modern master to touch up the subject. For instance, T.S. Eliot had written The Wasteland in which he discusses many of the same subjects as Bellow, albeit in a very different fashion and style. Eliot discusses the "unreal city" which can be compared to the city that Wilhelm feels so uncomfortable within. Eliot also claims that there are many "dead" within the crowds. This symbolic death points to the fact that the modern man seems only to be going through the motions of things. Wilhelm, for instance, at the beginning of the novel, is like a character seemingly dead, both in appearance and in the way he claims he will simply go about the actions of his day. Other similarities between The Wasteland and Seize the Day include the images of "drowning" and "water." Both writers used these images to illustrate a person drowning in life.


Seize the Day is not a regular day in the life of the modern man because it is a "day of reckoning," a day in which someone that is truly dead will give the protagonist a jolt of life. Unlike many modern masterpieces, Bellow has chosen a positive ending for his novel. He has also allowed his protagonist connections with the modern world. In Times Square, for example, Wilhelm had felt connected to the "larger body" of humanity. Furthermore, Bellow complicates the predicament of modernity by adding a very human and positive element. Bellow seems to be saying that the predicament of modern man goes far beyond the typical pessimism, cynicism, and isolation because it has the potential of reaching understanding and love.
The Internal Life of a Human Being


The critic Julius R. Raper, in an essay entitled "Running Contrary Ways," wrote that Saul Bellow's writing marked the end of a tradition of "close-mouthed straight-forwardness," a substituted it with "a confessional literature that feels no shame in being introspective and self indulgent." Bellow is not afraid to have his character talk about feeling and emotions. The way in which he achieves this shift from the sparse Hemingway style that had prevailed to his own is that he takes the reader "inside" the head and emotions of the characters. This shift in style was often called a shift from the "Gentile" literature that dominated to a more hyphenated American style. However, it is important to remember that although Bellow does address the subject of the Jewish-American, he had considered himself "American" writer, not a "Jewish" writer or a "Jewish-American" writer, perhaps because the immigrant experience is so much a part of America itself.


Moreover, the fact that Bellows moves the action inward helps achieve a stylistic feat. However, style is not its only achievement. This internal world becomes complicated and points to the complicated state of the human being. The device helps to outline the role of psychology in the novel, for instance and also helps to pose characters in concordance or dissonance with each other. For example, Wilhelm does not understand the inner life of his father and his thoughts, but he is attracted to the way in which the eccentric Dr. Tamkin thinks.


In short, the internal life of the protagonist allows Bellow to illustrate a world of wavering emotion that would not have been possible otherwise. Being inside the protagonist places the reader in the same position. It gives the reader an understanding of the problems Wilhelm faces, what makes him angry, what makes him frustrated, sad, and lonely. Therefore, throughout the book, the reader has accompanied Wilhelm in his frustrations and in his burdened feelings. In the end, we are also released and reborn in much the same way as Tommy. The reason is both because of literary catharsis and also because the reader has been following Tommy and has no other choice but to join him.
Motifs
Psychology


Throughout the entire novel, the idea of psychology is present as both an illuminating force and one that is to be mocked. Bellow presents this motif through both the characters' names, because they are all the names of famous psychologists, and through the character of Dr. Tamkin, the self-professed psychologist. Furthermore, one of the biggest struggles in the novel is a Freudian one: the Oedipal hatred Tommy holds for his father. However, the character that personifies Bellow's commentary on psychology is Dr. Tamkin.


Dr. Tamkin is both a character that, like the motif of psychology itself, serves as the perfect subject of parody and capable of illumination and truth. He talks about the conflict between the true soul and the pretender soul that is burdened by the forces and demands of the outside world. Bellow does seriously address the issues of the internal world of the human being. However, because Bellow makes fun of Tamkin constantly, it is important to remember that the field of psychology is a part of that problematic "external" world.
Naturalism (the animal)


Almost every chapter in the novel has an animalistic reference. Tommy calls both himself and his father an ass, a bear, and other names. Tommy was also once called "Velvel," by his grandfather (Velvel means wolf). This motif serves many purposes. It may serve to illustrate man's animalist natural tendencies and the internal instincts of a person. It may serve also to show the struggle between naturalism and the mechanical world, a topic that is satirized in Tamkin's poem. And, it may be taken one reference at a time. For example, the fact that Tommy had been called "wolf" can point to his loneliness and his need to "howl."
The City (The Urban Landscape)


The city serves to create the background of crowds and technology in Tommy's world. It serves to illustrate his disjunction with the outside/external world, the world that surrounds him. The city is mentioned at many points throughout the novel: Tommy is constantly claiming his hatred toward it. He would much rather live in the country, as he is unaccustomed to it. However, there are moments when he finds himself at one with the crowds of the city. Thus, this urban landscape can both serve as the dark backdrop of Tommy's life, the very symbol of what he is trying to escape, or it can be a force that allows him to feel solidarity with his fellow man.
Symbols
Water


Water is one of the most important symbols in the book. It is present in every chapter and serves different purposes at different points in the novel. Water because it can be both an unstable element as well as a dangerous one, is used by Bellow to show that his protagonist is seemingly drowning. Water is also unstable and, thus, all of the water imagery points to the fact that nothing is certain and that Wilhelm lives in this world of uncertainty. The "water" is present from the beginning when Tommy seems to be descending into an underwater world that suffocates him. However, in the end, the water turns into a beautiful symbol of rebirth. The tears Tommy cries are tears that, ironically, bring him out of his drowning state.
Clothing


Clothes are pointed to throughout the novel in the descriptions of characters. It appears as a symbol from the beginning when Tommy is discussing clothing with Rubin, the newspaperman at the hotel, they talk about the clothes they are wearing. This is important because it points to the significance of appearances in the novel. Tommy is constantly putting on "layers," trying out roles and is constantly trying to conceal his true self.
Olive


Olive is the woman that Tommy loves. She is the woman he wants to marry but cannot because his wife will not grant him a divorce. His thoughts are constantly drifting toward he and his need for her is shown to the reader by the end of the novel. She signifies love, therefore. The importance of her name is what makes her a "symbol." The name Olive can refer to the symbolic Olive tree that signifies peace. Moreover, this would mean that it is "love," in the end is what brings "peace."


The rest of the novella consists of Tommy and Dr. Tamkin traveling back and forth to and from the stock market, meeting several characters along the way. The novel finally illustrates Tommy's terrible loss in the commodities in which Tamkin has invested Tommy's money. Tommy has lost all of his savings but still has the monetary demands of his family to meet. Furthermore, Tamkin has disappeared. After an attempt to look for Tamkin in his room at the hotel, the novella comes to a close with three climaxes—two minor and one large, final climax.


First, there is the final confrontation with his father in the massage room of the hotel in which Tommy is denied any assistance one last time, as he stands before his naked father. Afterward, Tommy has a loud and almost raving fight with his wife on the telephone in which he claims to be "suffocating" and unable to "breathe." Full of rage, he exits out onto Broadway where he believes to see Dr. Tamkin at a funeral, nearby. He calls out to Tamkin but receives no reply. Suddenly he is swept in by a rush of people and finds himself carried into a crowd within the chapel where the funeral is taking place. It is here that the final climax comes because Tommy finds himself before the body of a dead stranger, unable to break away and he begins to cry and weep. He releases pools of emotion and "crie[s] with all his heart." It is here that the book ends. Other people at the funeral are confused as to who he is, wondering how close he had been to the deceased. The deceased is a stranger but Tommy, however, is left in this "happy oblivion of tears."








Character List
Tommy Wilhelm - The novel's protagonist. Tommy Wilhelm is a forty-four-year-old man who is living temporarily in New York City. He has left the country, which he likes, and has moved to a hotel in New York's Upper West Side to ask for his father's assistance. He is a man who has had many an odd job after a stint in acting but ended up with a steady job in sales. However, he has been laid off from his sales job, he has a strained relationship with his father, he has been separated from his wife, he is in love with a woman he cannot marry, and he has invested the last of his money in a joint investment venture that is bound to failure. It is amid all of this that Tommy finds himself on his "day of reckoning."


Read an in-depth analysis of Tommy Wilhelm.
Dr. Adler - Tommy's father. Dr. Adler is a difficult man who abides by the rules of a previous generation. He is a Jewish-American, who has worked hard during his life to achieve his position in life as a well-established, successful, and admired doctor and/or "professor." He refuses to "carry" his children on his back because he believes they should come to their own achievements, as he is a believer in the American "protestant work ethic." He is rational and straight- laced; he is stern and often harsh; and, most importantly, he does not truly understand his son.


Read an in-depth analysis of Dr. Adler.
Dr. Tamkin - Also resident of the Hotel Gloriana and a "friend" of Tommy's, Dr. Tamkin is a fraudulent and questionable character. He claims to be many things and is constantly giving Tommy psychoanalytical advice. He says he is a psychologist and a poet, and he claims to be a member of the Detroit Purple Gang, the head of a medical clinic in Toledo, the co-inventor of an unsinkable ship, a technical consultant in television, and a widow. His statements are brought into question and although most people seem to distrust him, Tommy is attracted to him. It is with Tamkin that Tommy enters into a joint stock market venture, entrusting the old, East-European, Jewish doctor with the last of his money.


Read an in-depth analysis of Dr. Tamkin.
Margaret - The wife of Tommy Wilhelm. Margaret is separated from her husband. The only view we receive of her is through Tommy. We are told that she is cold, harsh, and unsympathetic. As the mother of Tommy's two boys, she is demanding of Wilhelm, constantly asking, for instance, for monetary support. She refuses to grant Tommy a divorce and has made settlements difficult. She claims that she will not make it "easy" for Tommy to leave. She is a character that we never read in the flesh, for the only encounters we have with her is through Tommy's memory, through Dr. Adler's talks of her, and through the phone conversations she has with her husband.
Maurice Venice - The fraudulent talent scout from Tommy's past. Maurice Venice showed initial interest in Tommy as an actor. However, we later find out that he is the "failure" of a powerful family in the industry. He initially is attracted to Tommy because of his good looks, but later refuses to work with him because of a failed screen test—Tommy's faults, such as stuttering, are magnified on the screen. Later, the reader finds out that Venice had really been a "pimp" and had been running a prostitution ring, using his position as a "talent scout" as a cover.
Olive - The woman with whom Tommy Wilhelm is in love. We never meet Olive, she is only alluded to. She is a Christian but is willing to marry Tommy outside the church after he divorces his wife, however, Margaret will not grant him a divorce. She is described as small, pretty, and dark; a woman who had worked with him at the Rojax Corporation from which Tommy was fired. His office relationship with her may have had something to do with his release from employment. Apparently, Tommy is taken by her and probably truly in love with her. It is mentioned many times that Margaret has ruined things for the couple; but Wilhelm constantly thinks of her and says, toward the end of the book, that he will have to go to Olive, on his knees, and ask her to "stand by [him] a while…Olive loves me."
Catherine - Tommy's sister and Dr. Adler's daughter. Catherine, like Tommy, also changed her name, in her case to Philippa. She is a married woman with a degree, a Bachelors of Science, from Bryn Mawr. Nevertheless, she has aspirations as a painter. Her father will not assist her financially so she can rent a gallery space for an exhibition. Dr. Adler does not have faith in her talent; in fact, he does not believe she has any. Tommy does not seem to have particular faith in her either and he does not seem to care much for the paintings although he attempts to defend her, weakly, in front of his father. Tommy's reaction to his sister, however, may have to do with the fact that he is speaking to his father when she comes up in conversation. She is another character that the reader never meets in the flesh.
Mr. Rappaport - The blind, old man at the stock exchange who cannot see his numbers and is constantly asking for assistance. Mr. Rappaport appears in several chapters as a symbolic figure of "blindness." He asks Tommy for assistance on his venture to the cigar store and Tommy accompanies him. Nevertheless, he tells a story of once being yelled at by Teddy Roosevelt during war that allows Tommy a "moment," one of those fleeting moments in which he feels at one with the world.
Mr. Perls - A breakfast companion of Dr. Adler. Perls is a salesman and a man resented by Tommy for taking the role of what Tommy believes to be that of a "buffer." Tommy resents him because he takes on many of the opinions of his father and because Tommy believes his father has invited him to breakfast so as not to spend time with his son alone.








haracter Analysis
Tommy Wilhelm


Tommy Wilhelm, the protagonist of Seize the Day, is a character in turmoil. He is burdened by the loss of his job, financial instability, the separation of his wife, and his relationship with his father, among other things. He is a man in search of self who the reader is allowed to watch and follow through the course of a single, significant day in his life, a day that is called his "day of reckoning."


Tommy is a complicated and layered character who wears masks and has to peal away his social armor and mask in order to understand himself, at the end of the book. The book begins, "when it came to concealing his troubles, Tommy Wilhelm was not less capable than the next fellow. So at least he thought…" Concealment is an issue at hand. Significantly, Tommy had been an actor, albeit a failed one, as well as a salesman. He had learned to wear masks, play roles, and "sell" himself. However, on the day that the narrative takes place, Tommy must rid himself of all of this and find out who he really is.


Tommy, it is evident, plays many roles. He plays the role of Adler's son, a role that is difficult for him to escape. He cares too much how his father sees him. And, he often becomes the "failure" that he believes his father sees in him. He has been an actor, a hospital orderly, a ditch-digger, a seller of toys, a seller of self, and a public relations man for a hotel in Cuba. He has, therefore, been many characters and never his true self. Beneath his masks, as the reader is privileged to discover through interior monologues, he is truly an introvert trapped in the body of a man who has been forced to be extroverted, he is also sensitive and almost, at times feminine. This femininity is poked at and criticized, however, by his father when he accuses him of having had a relationship with a man from his office.


The novel portrays Tommy as a man who is drowning. The imagery that surrounds him is the imagery of water and he is constantly "descending" and "sinking" into hellish depths. However, the author must bring into question the character of Tommy because although he constantly blames others, such as his father, his wife, or Dr. Tamkin, for his strife and place in life. He must learn to take credit for his own mistakes. He is character in flux, a character that wavers between victimization and a temptation to martyrdom and a self-acceptance, and he wavers too between childishness and maturity. Nevertheless, it is this very fluctuation that will help him on his way to seeking truth because, as Dr. Tamkin says, the path to victory is not a straight line.
Dr. Adler


The most difficult challenge in coming to an understanding of Dr. Adler, Tommy's father is that one must realize, first, that we view Dr. Adler through Tommy's eyes. It is difficult to trust a character's view that is constantly in flux. For instance, his son often vilifies Adler, however, we must bring the villainy into question to truly comprehend the character of Adler.


It is quite possible to see Adler as the critic Daniel Fuchs sees him, for instance. Fuchs claims that Adler is the villain of the novel. He is a man whose thoughts and actions are reduced to money and to "law and order," even to "hoarding." He refuses to help his son time and again and he seems cruel and unsympathetic. However, this may be, again, only because the reader is viewing him through Tommy's perspective. For example when Adler tells his son: "you make too much of your problems…they ought not to be turned into a career," Tommy reads the following: "Wilky, don't start this crime. I have a right to be spared." Furthermore, it is Tommy who often vilifies what his father tells him and, at times, seems even to misunderstand.


It maybe simply that perhaps Adler does not want to have his son remain a "child" forever. Even Tommy claims that he is often times a "kid," when dealing with his father. Perhaps Adler simply thinks that it is time for him to solve his own problems. Adler had provided, as is evidenced in the novel, assistance in the past, while Margaret, Tommy's wife, was in college. It may be that the villainy of Adler is simply caused by a clash of character between him and his son. Adler believes in the protestant work ethic, whereas his son grew up and lives in a different America than that which was once so familiar to Adler. It is a post-war, post-depression, cold war, technological world. Adler believes in power and "success" and in rationalism. He is the "self-made man." In fact, Bellow has given Adler the name of a psychiatrist whose teachings were based on ideas of "power." Tommy, on the other hand, is, deep down, is a naturalist and an idealist.


This is not to say that Adler is not, at times, cruel, it is simply to say that his villainy and seeming tyrannical behavior is to be brought into question considering point of view.
Dr. Tamkin


We must question our picture of Dr. Tamkin, like many of the characters of the novel. He claims to be many things, but what is true is difficult to surmise. He claims that he is a psychiatrist, a healer, a poet, a stock market specialist, that he has tended to the Egyptian royal family and that he is, among other things, a master inventor. He is also an advocator of Reichian philosophy: he believes in juxtaposition. However, there are many truths within his lies. Perhaps also, one might come to understand his "lies" as simply stories or parables. For a man who believes in the power of juxtaposition and the force of opposites working together, a man who believes in flux and in alternative ways of looking at the world, it makes perfect sense for the reader to find truth within his lies. The paradox, itself, is a work of juxtaposition.


In many ways then, one might say that Dr. Tamkin is much like Bellow himself. That is to say that he is an "inventor," a teller of tales and truths, and, therefore, an authorial figure. Significantly, he also takes on the role of a surrogate father for Wilhelm, giving him advice and leading him to an eventual recognition of self.


Dr. Tamkin, whether a liar or not, is an attractive figure. This is not to say that he, along with the psychology and Romanticism he preaches, is not often the subject of Bellow's parodying force. However, it is important to disregard Tamkin, for he always practices what he preaches even if his methods are seemingly "unsound."
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