E' E' Cummings Edward Estlin Cummings

1
E. E. Cummings (Edward Estlin Cummings)
2
(No Transcript)
3
April 23, 1902
4
May 3, 1902
5
Life

• Born in Cambridge, Massachusetts, in 1894. He
  received his B.A. in 1915 and his M.A. in 1916,
  both from Harvard.
• During the First World War, Cummings worked as an
  ambulance driver in France, but was interned in a
  prison camp by the French authorities (an
  experience recounted in his novel, The Enormous
  Room) for his outspoken anti-war convictions.
• After the war, he settled into a life divided
  between houses in rural Connecticut and Greenwich
  Village, with frequent visits to Paris.

6
Works

• In his work, Cummings experimented radically with
  form, punctuation, spelling and syntax,
  abandoning traditional techniques and structures
  to create a new, highly idiosyncratic means of
  poetic expression.
• Later in his career, he was often criticized for
  settling into his signature style and not
  pressing his work towards further evolution.
• Nevertheless, he attained great popularity,
  especially among young readers, for the
  simplicity of his language, his playful mode and
  his attention to subjects such as war and sex.
• At the time of his death in 1962, he was the
  second most widely read poet in the United
  States, after Robert Frost.

7
A Selected Bibliography

• Poetry
•      Tulips and Chimneys (1923)     XLI
  Poems (1925)      (1925)     ViVa (1931)
      No Thanks (1935)     Tom (1935)     1/20
  (1936)     Fifty Poems (1941)     1 x 1 (1944)
      Ninety-five Poems (1958)     73 Poems
  (1962)     Complete Poems (1991)
• Letters
•      The Enormous Room (1922)     Eimi
  (1933)

8
(No Transcript)
9
(No Transcript)
10
The Enormous Room

• In print continuously since 1922, The Enormous
  Room is one of the classic American literary
  works to emerge from World War I, in a grouping
  that includes John Dos Passos's Three Soldiers
  and Hemingway's A Farewell to Arms.

11
The Enormous Room

• Drawing on his experiences in France as a
  volunteer ambulance driver, Cummings takes us
  through a series of mistakes that led to his
  being arrested for treason and sent to prison.

12
The Enormous Room

• Out of this episode Cummings produced a unique
  worka story of oppression, injustice, and
  imprisonment presented in a high-spirited manner
  as if it were a lark, a work of new linguistic
  energy that celebrates the individual and opposes
  all structures that stifle him.

13
(No Transcript)
14
fantastic sunset
 marion morehouse 
15
 man astride gutter 
 water lilies and hat 
16
(No Transcript)
17
http//www.eecummingsart.com/gallery.html
18
(No Transcript)
19
From "Iconic Dimensions in Poetry". In Richard
Waswo (ed.) On Poetry and Poetics. ?Gunter Narr
Verlag, 1985.
20
poempicture

• For if we look at his "poempicture" as if it were
  a picture puzzle, we discover to our surprise the
  rough outline of a grasshopper facing right. Thus
  "aThe)l/eA/!p" forms the joint and femur of the
  hind or saltatorial leg, the "S" on the very left
  of line 10, which pricks the invisible vertical
  line of the left margin justification, stands for
  the sting "a" on the very right of the same line
  represents the antenna "r" is the place where
  the rubbing of the leg against the wing, the
  stridulation occurs "rIvIng" indicates the hind
  claw on which the grasshopper lands or arrives
  after a jump ".gRrEaPsPhOs)" represents the
  segmented thorax and the head with its compound
  eye ("0"), leaving "to" for the front claw or toe
  (the curve described by "S/aThe)1/A/!p /(r" may,
  of course, also be seen as a diagram of the
  grasshopper's jump)

21

• in Just- spring        when the world is
  mud- luscious the little lame balloonman
• whistles        far       and wee
• and eddieandbill come running from marbles
  and piracies and it's spring
• when the world is puddle-wonderful

22

• the queer old balloonman whistles far      
  and       wee and bettyandisbel come dancing
• from hop-scotch and jump-rope and it's
  spring and the goat-footed  
• balloonMan      whistles far and wee

23

• l(a
• le af fa
• ll
• s) one l
• iness

24

• Buffalo Bill's
• defunct
• who used to
• ride a watersmooth-silver
• 
  stllion
• and break onetwothreefourfive pigeonsjustlikethat
  
• 
  Jesus
• he was a handsome man
• and what i
  want to know is
• how do you like your blueeyed boy
• Mister Death

25
Buffalo Bill's

• Cummings composed for the typewriter, and indeed
  one authoritative edition of his works reproduces
  the typewriter look of his poems as does the
  above.
• How would you choose to try to render by your
  voice the visual, typewriter-spacing effects
  above? Can they be spoken? If not, are they
  illusory?

26

•   may my heart always be open to littlebirds
  who are the secrets of livingwhatever they sing
  is better than to knowand if men should not hear
  them men are oldmay my mind stroll about
  hungryand fearless and thirsty and suppleand
  even if it's sunday may i be wrongfor whenever
  men are right they are not young

27

• and may myself do nothing usefullyand love
  yourself so more than trulythere's never been
  quite such a fool who could failpulling all the
  sky over him with one smile

28
Marianne Moore

•   M in a vicious world-to love virtueA in a
  craven world-to have courageR in a treacherous
  world-to prove loyalI in a wavering world-to
  stand firmA in a cruel world-to show mercyN in
  a biased world-to act justlyN in a shameless
  world-to live noblyE in a hateful world-to
  forgive

29

• M in a venal world-to be honestO in a
  heartless world-to be humanO in a killing
  world-to createR in a sick world-to be wholeE
  in an epoch of UNself-to be ONEself

30

• love is a place through this place oflove
  move(with brightness of peace)all placesyes
  is a world in this world ofyes live(skilfully
  curled)all worlds

31

• kumrads die because they're told)kumrads die
  before they're old(kumrads aren't afraid to
  diekumrads don'tand kumrads won'tbelieve in
  life)and death knows whie(all good kumrads you
  can tellby their altruistic smellmoscow pipes
  good kumrads dance)kumrads enjoys.freud knows
  whoythe hope that you may mess your pance

32

• every kumrad is a bitof quite unmitigated
  hate(travelling in a futile groovegod knows
  why)and so do i(because they are afraid to love

33

• in time of daffodils(who knowthe goal of
  living is to grow)forgetting why,remember
  howin time of lilacs who proclaimthe aim of
  waking is to dream,remember so(forgetting
  seem)in time of roses(who amazeour now and
  here with paradise)forgetting if,remember yes

34

• in time of all sweet things beyondwhatever
  mind may comprehend,remember seek(forgetting
  find)and in a mystery to be(when time from
  time shall set us free)forgetting me,remember me

35
Listen to cummings' performance of -- in order --

• "a man who had fallen among thieves," ""next
  to of course god america i," "my sweet old
  etcetera" and "since feeling is first," courtesy
  of Harper Audio
• http//www.salon.com/src/ads/popup.html?audiohttp
  //media.salon.com/mp3s/cummings011402.mp3

36

• a man who had fallen among thieves
• lay by the roadside on his back
• dressed in fifteenthrate ideas
• wearing a round jeer for a hat
• fate per a somewhat more than less
• emancipated evening
• had in return for consciousness
• endowed him with a changeless grin

37

• whereon a dozen staunch and Meal
• citizens did graze at pause
• then fired by hypercivic zeal
• sought newer pastures or because
• swaddled with a frozen brook
• of pinkest vomit out of eyes
• which noticed nobody he looked
• as if he did not care to rise

38

• one hand did nothing on the vest
• its wideflung friend clenched weakly dirt
• while the mute trouserfly confessed
• a button solemnly inert.
• Brushing from whom the stiffened puke
• i put him all into my arms
• and staggered banged with terror through
• a million billion trillion stars

39

• "next to of course god america i
• love you land of the pilgrims' and so forth oh
• say can you see by the dawn's early my
• country 'tis of centuries come and go
• and are no more what of it we should worry
• in every language even deafanddumb

40

• thy sons acclaim your glorious name by gorry
• by jingo by gee by gosh by gum
• why talk of beauty what could be more beaut-
• iful than these heroic happy dead
• who rushed like lions to the roaring slaughter
  they did not stop to think

41

• they died instead
• then shall the voice of liberty be mute?"
• He spoke. And drank rapidly a glass of water

42

• my sweet old etcetera
• aunt lucy during the recent
• war could and what
• is more did tell you just
• what everybody was fighting
• for,
• my sister

43

• isabel created hundreds
• (and
• hundreds)of socks not to
• mention shirts fleaproof earwarmers
• etcetera wristers etcetera, my
• mother hoped that

44

• i would die etcetera
• bravely of course my father used
• to become hoarse talking about how it was
• a privilege and if only he
• could meanwhile my
• self etcetera lay quietly
• in the deep mud et

45

• cetera
• (dreaming,
• et
• cetera, of
• Your smile
• eyes knees and of your Etcetera)

46

• 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 better fate
• than wisdom

47

• 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 each other then
• laugh leaning back in my arms
• for life's not a paragraph
• And death i think is no parenthesis

48
(No Transcript)
49
Study Questions

• 1. Cummings's works are an amalgam of lyricism,
  humor, satire, unabashed sex. Document their
  appearance in his poems.
• 2. In "my sweet old etcetera" is "sister isabel"
  knitting socks any different from the Cambridge
  ladies knitting for the Poles? What is the
  function of the repeated "etcetera"? And the
  final "Etcetera"?

50
Links

• http//www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/a_f/cumming
  s/cummings.htm Commentaries on cummings poems
• http//www.nortonpoets.com/cummingse.htm Norton
  Poets

51
Links

• http//www.poemhunter.com/p/t/poet.asp?poet6588
  PoemHunter.com e e cummings