e.e. cummings

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e.e. cummings

• ingenious and insightful analysis by chloe viner

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his life and back round

• e.e. cummings or edward estlin cummings was born
  right here in our neck of the woods, cambridge,
  ma. in 1894. His father, also an edward cummings
  was professor of sociology and political science
  at harvard University. in 1900 he became an
  ordained minister.
• as a child, e.e. cummings attended Cambridge
  public schools and lived during the summer with
  his family in their summer home in Silver Lake
• Cummings got his b.a. and m.a. in english and
  classics at harvard. cummings was not only a poet
  he was also a painter.
• in ww1 cummings volunteered to be an ambulance
  driver in france, and had the horrific experience
  of being interned in a prison camp because he was
  anti-war and wrote a letter about it, which was
  intercepted. He wrote a book about this
  experience entitled the enormous room.
• as you all probably know cummings is most famous
  for his strange use of form.
• cummings used punctuation, spelling and syntax,
  in a way that was completely revolutionary.. !
• when he died at the age of 68 in he was the
  second most widely read poet in the united
  states, second only to robert frost.

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since feeling it first
                                    

• since feeling is first
• who pays any attention
• to the syntax of things
• will never wholly kiss you
• wholly to be a fool
• while Spring is in the world
• my blood approves,
• and kisses are a far better fate
• than wisdom
• lady i swear by all flowers. Don't cry
• --the best gesture of my brain is less than
• your eyelids' flutter which says
• we are for eachother then
• laugh, leaning back in my arms
• for life's not a paragraph
• And death i think is no parenthesis

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my interpretation of the poem

• to me this poem is a deep interpretation of love
  and the inadequacy of human expression.
• also he is saying that emotion is preeminent and
  is more meaningful than intellectualization.
• the first stanza implies that anyone who is too
  wrapped up in the syntax of things will never
  understand true love.
• the second stanza is more complicated but pulls
  across the same basic message that kisses are a
  far better fate than wisdom almost as if saying
  it is ok not to understand love, because it is
  worth the experience.
• the line life is not a paragraph implies that
  life is not something that can be easily put
  forth and understood. The last line that death is
  not a parenthesis is saying that death may not be
  an expanding part of life, as parenthesis expand
  something. there for we should make the most of
  life.
• to me cummings use of punctuation emphasizes the
  meaning of this poem that life is not a paragraph
  and is not clearly structured with periods and
  commas but rather a jumble of things.

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who knows if the moons

• who knows if the moon's a baloon,coming out of a
  keen city in the sky--filled with pretty people?
  (and if you and i should get into it,if they
  should take me and take you into their baloon,
  why then we'd go up higher with all the pretty
  people than houses and steeples and clouds go
  sailing away and away sailing into a keen city
  which nobody's ever visited,where always
              it's                     Spring)and
  everyone's in love and flowers pick themselves

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My interpretation of the poem

• this poem is a fantasy dream full of vivid
  imagery. but also conveys the meaning of a out
  of body experienced in a dream like way.
• wed go up higher with all the pretty people
  expresses how life would be if everyone was able
  to achieve a picture of their dream reality.
• In this world of fantasy everyone is content as
  everyones in love and flowers pick themselves.
  cummings uses the line in the sky-filled with
  pretty people to convey a dream world both in a
  literal and symbolic way. While the person is
  reaching their ideal experience or dream,, the
  imagery is also similar to that of an actual
  dream state.
• a balloon, coming out a keen city could be
  symbolic of expanding your views as one literally
  expands their vision in a hot air balloon.

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form the shape of the poem

• turn to page 897 in your text
• e.e. cummings uses free verse/open-form poetry.
  Open form poetry avoids restrictions and
  traditional patterns, something that cummings is
  famous for.
• Cummings also specialized in visual poetry/shaped
  verse by arranging his words into patterns that
  were visually pleasing or emphasized the meaning
  of his poem.

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e.e. cummings, a timeline

• 1894 e.e. cummings was born
• 1916 cummings graduated from Harvard
• 1922 cumming's published his book the enormous
  room
• 1920s cummings paintings and drawings
  exhibited in New York City
• 1923 cummings published his book of poems
  tulips and chimneys
• 1924 cummings Married elaine orr
• 1925 cummings divorced elaine orr
• 1929 cummings Married anne barton
• 1932 cummings divorced anne barton
• 1950s cummings began reading his poetry to
  audiences
• 1952-53 cummings held the charles eliot norton
  lectureship
• 1955 - poems earned a special citation from the
  national book award committee
• 1959 cummings received a two-year 15,000 grant
  from the ford foundation
• 1962 - cummings' died
• 1968 cummings book of complete poems was
  published
• this information was compiled from
  http//www.geocities.com/blondelibrarian/literarye
  xplorer/authors/eecummings.html

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the end