A Note on William Carlos Williams’ Poetry (Part-II)

 

  

 

 

 

The first book of poems (1909) by Williams was conventional and correct in sentiment and diction. In his second book “The Tempers” (1913) his style was imagist in feeling though it was still romantic and allusive. In his third book “Al Que Quiere!” (1917) Williams applied the imagist principle of the direct treatment of the things rigorously. 

Webster Scott said that “Williams was an immensely complicated man…. He was the complete human being and all the qualities of his personality were fused in his writings.” Williams emphasized that poetry should focus on objects and not on concepts. It should move away from abstract characterization of things. Poetry should create visual images and should be tangible or observable.

 

 According to him ideas exist in things since images create an idea of the object and gives it a meaning. To Williams, poetry was a means of gaining access to social realities. It is also an instrument for imagining the future, a shared life free of alienation and exploitation. He wrote,” The outstanding character of poetry is that it cannot exist other than as the revolutionary attribute of a free people.” His early poems shared a number of aesthetic concerns of his contemporary writers especially that of Ezra Pound in conveying imagery through textured language. His early interest in Nature marked the influence of Whitman and Keats. His later poetry was brief, pointed and deceptively simple with complex meaning.

 According to Randall Jarrell, Williams in his writings demonstrates that “he feels, not just says.” His lifelong quest is that poetry should mirror the speech of the American people. He sought “a language modified by the American environment. He sought to express democracy in the language and thought materials of America expressing his point of view. William stressed that poetry must find its primary impetus in local conditions. Richard Ellman and Robert O’clair called him “the most important literary doctor since Chekov, with a deep sense of humanity.”

 

In 1914 his first son, William G. Williams was born who later became a physician like his father. His second son was Paul. H. Williams. Williams was very much interested in painting and this influence is seen in his poetry where he used realistic imagery with clarity and simplicity. As a doctor he practiced during daytime and wrote at night.

 

Williams was influenced by Imagist movement through his friend Ezra Pound and Hilda Doolittle (H.D.). But soon he formed his own opinion different from theirs. In 1920 he published his experimental book “Kora in hell: improvisations”, one of his favorite books. According to Webster Scott, it is an extraordinary combination of aphorisms, romanticism, philosophy, exhortation combined with a few elements of obscenity and reverie.  Pound called it “incoherent” and “Unamerican” and H.D. considered it as “flippant.” Wallace Stevens also complained about the poet’s tantrums. But Williams defended his stand and was determined to continue the advances he had made in American poetry.

 

 In 1923 he published “Spring and all”. In this seven- stanza free verse poem without set rhyme and metrical pattern, he describes the sad state of the society at the end of the World war I. But the poet hopes that the world may enter a more promising future. William believed that change or transformation is not an instant process and it takes time to evolve. Williams wanted new poetry to be based on everyday speech formed by imagination rather than on any metrical compulsions and rules. His poetry differed from that of poets like T.S. Eliot and W.H. Auden who were conventionally technical in their approach.

 

 In 1922 the publication of Eliot’s “The wasteland” overshadowed Williams’ concept of poetic modernism. Williams wrote, “It was a shock to me that he was so tremendously successful.”  He criticized Eliot’s highly intellectual style with its frequent use of foreign languages and allusions to classical and European literature. According to him T.S. Eliot was conforming to rules of classroom English whereas the modern poets are breaking the rules.

 

 In “Spring and all” Williams viewed the same American landscape as Eliot did, but interpreted it differently. Williams’ poetic task was to affirm the self-reliant, sympathetic consciousness of Whitman in a broken industrialized world. Unlike Eliot who described the harsh realities of the world, Williams saw his task as a break through restrictions and generating new growth. The real function of imagination is not to avoid reality but to affirm reality most powerfully. In his later works, his verse grew shorter, more austere and more pointed. After 1923, Williams did not release another book of poetry for ten years. He wrote prose dealing with America.

 

In “The American grain” he tried to examine the founders of the American history. He gave a succinct definition of America and its people. In his “Voyage to Pagany” based on his travel to Europe he assessed the world through the eyes of an American. In short story collection “The knife of the times” dealing with and the depression, he blamed the inadequacies of the American culture for both the economic and emotional plight of American people. In his trilogy “White Mule,” “In the Money,” and “The build-up” he dealt with the problems of an immigrant family in American society. He won national Book Award for his third volume of “Paterson” and “Selected poems.” In 1953 he got Bollingen prize for his literary achievements. William’s last book “Pictures from Brueghel and other poems” won Pulitzer Prize in 1963.

 “The desert music” and “Journey to love” are considered as mature works of Williams. According to Kenneth Rexroth the “Desert music” is an explicit statement of the irreducible humanness of the human being. In this book the poet presented simple, indisputable with calm maturity.” In his poem “Asphodel, That Greeny Flower,” an elegiac epithalamion, the poet confesses his infidelities to his wife and asks for forgiveness. He seeks new life on the verge of his life. W.H. Auden praised this poem as “one of the most beautiful poems in the language.” In the love poems of “Journey to love” the poet presents vignettes of daily scenes in his characteristic rhythms and language. In his poem “reflections on death” he writes that love and imagination are the essence of life. He who loses them is as good as dead. In his play “A dream of love” Williams dramatizes his belief in the conflict between man’s need for emotional renewal in love and the woman’s need for constancy in love.

 He preferred colloquial American English and a humane approach to portray the conditions of the contemporary society. In his modernist epic collage of place “Paterson” in five books (between 1946 and 1958), he gave an account of the history, people, and essence of Paterson, New Jersey. He examined the role of the poet in American society and summarized his poetic method in the phrase “No ideas but in the things.” In his preface to “Paterson” Williams wrote that “a man himself is a city beginning, seeking, achieving and concluding his life in ways which the various aspects of a city may embody … all the details of which may be needed to voice his intimate convictions.”

 

In “Paterson” he explored the myth of American power. He revealed the mixed results of success and industrialization which resulted in creation of widening inequality and city slums. William chose Paterson, New Jersey as the prototype of the American industrial community. He preferred a society of useful manufacturers with competitive energy and moral stamina to lift the burdens of the common citizen and raise the living standards of people with social and cultural benefits. According to Breslin, “The Wasteland” is a kind of anti-epic in which the quest for meaning is entirely thwarted and we are left at the end waiting for the collapse of western civilization. “Paterson” is a pre-epic showing that the process of disintegration releases forces that can build a new world confronting the savagery of the present society and affirming a creative future. Breslin thinks that Eliot’s end is Williams’ beginning. Williams completed five books and he was planning to write sixth volume before his death. “Paterson” was criticized for its mosaic and loose structure with alternating passages of poetry and prose. Yet it is considered as an “Ars Poetica’ for contemporary America. Breslin thinks that “Paterson” has a thickness of texture and a multi-dimensional quality which makes it seem difficult sometimes, but gives a rich and intense experience. Later poets like Allen Ginsberg, Charles Olson, Robert Lowell and Denis Levertov recognized Williams’ greatness and “Revolution of the word” and acknowledged “Paterson” as the modern “Leaves of grass.”

 

 His poetry influenced many literary movements of the 1950’s—the beat movement, the San Francisco Renaissance, the Black Mountain school and the New York School. He had close friendship with Allen Ginsberg, another poet from new Jersey. Williams included several of Allen Ginsberg’s letters in “Paterson.” One of the letters of Ginsberg inspired Williams to write the fifth section of Paterson.” Williams also wrote the introduction to Ginsberg’s book ‘Howl and other poems” in 1956. Williams suddenly had a heart attack in 1948. His health deteriorated with many complaints. He spent some time in Hillside Hospital, New York. He died in his sleep on March 4, 1963. He was buried in Hillside cemetery, Lyndhurst, New Jersey. William’s poetry as a modern poet will be remembered for his precious contribution to the American poetry for its simple language, portrayal of common people in America, and his focus on imagery.

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     31st August 2023                               Somaseshu Gutala

A Note on William Carlos Williams’ Poetry (Part-I)

 

                                           

William Carlos Williams (1883-1963) was a leading poet of the imagist movement. He was a doctor, poet, novelist, essayist and playwright. His poetry is remarkable for its empathy, sympathy and emotional identity with his subjects.” He wrote about the lives of everyday people and the beauty of simple, seemingly unimportant objects in simple American language used by common people.

 According to Randall Jarrell, “there is no optimistic blindness in Williams…. though there is a fresh gaiety, a stubborn or invincible joyousness.” He wrote on American subjects and themes using the living colloquial American language. As a doctor he moved closely with patients and understood the real conditions of his neighborhood and derived inspiration for his poetry and other literary writings. He became an inspiration to the Beat generation poets in 1950s and 60s. Instead of being frank and straightforward with his words, he adopted a suggestive approach as he said “show, don’t tell”. In his poems he portrayed urban landscape, ordinary scenes and conditions of working class and poor people using typical American rhythm and simple language. His focus on imagery and simple language without irrelevant decorations makes his work emblematic of modernism. His poem “Red Wheel Barrow” is considered a typical example of imagism and his style.  

William Carlos Williams was born on 17^th September,1883 in Rutherford, New Jersey. His father, George Williams was born in England and from the age of five he was raised in the Dominican Republic. He introduced his sons to Shakespeare, Dante and the Bible.  His father’s mother was a lover of the theater.  His mother, Helene was from Puerto Rico and was of French origin. She was very much interested in painting.  

The Caribbean culture of the home had an important influence on Williams. His parents spoke Spanish, and this was his prime means of communication. Till he was a teenager English was not his primary means of communication. He did his primary and secondary schooling in Rutherford till 1897. Later he continued his education in a school near Geneva, in Paris and Horace Mann School in New York. He took interest in mathematics and science. Later when he was in High School, he took interest in languages.

But his parents tried to instill rigid idealism and moral perfection in his sons.  They wished that Williams should study medicine. So, in 1902 he joined the medical school of the university of Pennsylvania and graduated in 1906. He went to Leipzig for advanced study of Pediatrics. In 1909 he published his first book “Poems”. After his return from Germany, he married Florence Herman (1891-1976). He stayed in Rutherford with his family and practiced as a doctor in Pediatrics and General Medicine in Passaic general Hospital (later called St. Mary’s General Hospital) for more than four decades. He worked as Chief of Pediatrics from 1924 till death.

 According to his wife, Flossie, “William loved being a doctor, making house calls and talking to people.” He was impressed by poetry of Keats and Walt Whitman. His first major work was modelled on Keats’ “Endymion”. Whitman’s free verse offered ‘an impulse toward freedom and release of the self.” Later he found his mentor Ezra Pound, leaving the influence of the studied elegance of Keats and the raw vigor of Whitman.  Through Pound he was introduced to a group of friends of the poet, Hilda Doolittle (H.D.) and painter, Charles Demuth. He found a sense of liberation from rigid and ordered poetry of his time in Imagist Movement which influenced other genres of art such as in painting (Cezanne), music (Stravinsky) and fiction (Stein). 

The imagists broke from the conventional poetic forms by stressing a verse form of “swift, uncluttered, functional phrasing.” Imagism is an early twentieth reactionary movement against Romanticism and Victorian poetry. The essential purpose is to re-create the physical experience of an object through words unlike Victorian poetry which tended to be narrative in its content. It emphasized simplicity, clarity of expression and precision through the use of visual images. It stressed on clear and sharp language and direct treatment of the subject. No word should be used that does not contribute to the effect of the poem. The poet should concentrate on everything he wishes to communicate into a vivid image rather than use poetic devices and meter to complicate and decorate it. Imagist movement is the first organized modernist literary movement. This trend is reflected in Avant Garde (introducing new and experimental methods in music, art and literature) art and Cubism.  The imagist works were published mostly between 1914 and 1918. The famous Imagist writers of this period are:Ezra Pound, Hilda Doolittle, Amy Lowell, T.E. Hulme, F.S. Flint and William Carlos Williams. 

T.E. Hulme in his essay “Romanticism and Classicism” (1908) wrote that language in poetry is a visual concrete one and images in verse are not mere decoration but very essence. Pound adapted Hulme’s ideas for his Imagist Movement in 1912. He moved away from fixed meters and moral reflections, subordinating everything to what Hulme called “hard, dry image.” Pound defined image as an intellectual and emotional complex in an instant of time. The presentation of such complex gives a sense of freedom from time limits and space. Williams met Ezra Pound during his stay in Pennsylvania and with his help his second book of poems “The tempers” was published by a London Press.

 In 1914 Pound edited and published an anthology “Des Imagistes” including poets like William Carlos Williams, James Joyce, Hilda Doolittle and Richard Aldington. Due to difference of opinion Amy Lowell assumed leadership of Imagist movement and published three anthologies between 1915 and 1917, all called by name “Some imagist Poets.” Lowell also distanced himself from this movement later.  Pound propounded a new philosophy called Vorticism to describe the creative energy of artistic creation. The Vorticists developed an abstract style filled with energy and dynamism. They opposed the ostentatious rhetoric of traditional style and the 19^th century sentimental and imaginative approach but stressed on solid reality. Pound's essay “Vortex” appeared in “Blast” in 1914.The vortex represents maximum energy and mechanical dynamism of the age. The Vorticists preferred control, dynamic energy and rationality without any deviations from the main theme.

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     28th August,2023                         Somaseshu Gutala

 

 

 

 

          

My Stay at “Hotel Golden View”, Shirdi, Maharashtra

Way to "The Golden View" hotel

                                       

Deluxe A.C. Room

View of the Goden Peak of Samadhi Mandir

Paintings hung on corridors walls

 

                                  

Restaurant Sai Nisarg

    

This hotel is very convenient for pilgrims as it is just 200 meters from Shirdi Sai Baba temple. As it is in the heart of the town, one can visit neighboring tourist spots like Sambhaji Park (350 meters), Sai Teerth Spiritual Theme Park (one km) and Sai Heritage Village(2kms) and Wet N Joy water Park (1.5 Kms). This hotel is nearly 3kms from Sainagar Shirdi Railway station, 500 meters from Shirdi Bus Depot and 15 kms from Shirdi airport. The golden peak of Saibaba’s Samadhi mandir can be clearly seen here from the lounge. That is why this hotel is named as “Golden View.” The reception room is quite spacious and beautiful paintings of Shirdi Sai baba and scenes from his life are kept on the walls of the corridors.

There are many restaurants nearby. This hotel was a three-star hotel built in 2017. It has two floors with fifty rooms of different sizes to suit the pilgrims like Standard A.C. Deluxe with double bed, Deluxe Trible bed and Deluxe family room with two double beds. It has got all modern facilities such as A.C. Lift, free wifi, T.V. free parking, safe deposit box, complimentary water bottle, laundry, and room service. There is also Taxi service provided by this hotel for visiting nearby famous places.

 In each room there is a desk and a sofa besides a double bed. The white thermal screening provided by the hotel to shield from bright sunlight though useful obstructs the front view from the room. At night the bright light from street lights is reflected through this screen and one cannot sleep in bright light. So the ambiance of dark night is not seen. So better provide curtains so that the front view is not obstructed and one can sleep without glare of bright light. In the toilet liquid soap is kept in containers. It would be better to supply solid soap. Though kettle, tea and milk powder are kept, some may prefer to drink coffee. So, it would be better to supply a few coffee sachets also. As many pilgrims get up early to go to the temple, coffee and tea should be supplied by 6.00 a.m. to avoid delay in visiting the temples. Room service should be prompt. There is more scope to improve the cleanliness of rooms and supply of fresh, clean bed sheets and towels. 

Just near it, there is Sai Nisarg restaurant which provides South Indian, North Indian and Chinese cuisine. The nearby hotels are: Hotel Sai Amruth, Hotel City Point, Haldi Ram Hotel and Sai Naivedyam. Besides these, there are many eateries providing varieties of food. The check-in and check-out timings are: 11.00 a.m to 1.30 p.m. and from 10.00 a.m. to 11.00 a.m. respectively. The room tariffs are reasonable and the pilgrims will find this hotel very convenient and safe to stay here.

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   22nd August, 2023                                        Somaseshu Gutala

The Flying Angel

  

         

     

              

        

  1.  She called us in with a welcoming smile.

       With a courteous bow, she let us in.

       She flitted to and from with gait agile.

       She flashed her pearly teeth with a friendly smile;     

       A fresh wave of fragrance wafted around.

       Our flight, like a swan, ready to leave the ground.

2.    She helped passengers their baggage to lift.

       She closed the bins above with movements deft.

       She cautioned people with gestures swift.

       She watched everything in proper order set.

       Our flight took off with roaring speed.

       She moved unperturbed to look after our needs.

3.    Like a Japanese doll with ceramic shine

       With her silky hair tied up in curious style

       Dressed in trim, red-colored uniform fine.

       She guided people with disarming smile.

       Her voice sounded soft and sweet like a song.

       In spite of many tasks, she looked unfazed and strong. 

 

4.  She pushed her cart with refreshments moving slow

     While children looked with anxious, hungry eyes.

     Colorful boxes and packets with tempting glow.

     The kids chose what they liked unmindful of the price;

     Compelling their parents to buy against their will.

     She served them smiling with consummate skill.

 

5.  Like a red rose she seemed fresh and bright

     Never she seemed tired with her routine.

     In serving others she found true delight.

     Like a denizen of heaven gliding through skies serene.  

     Like an angel flying with effortless ease

     With polite speech and manners, she doth please.

 

6.  Helping elders with timely help and aid

     She tackled angry ones with courage and restraint.

     She comforted ailing ones and doth guide.

     She attended to every need and complaint.

     When sudden jolts and jerks flustered us with fear

     She seemed to smile in face of death inspiring cheer.

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  17th August, 2023                      Somaseshu Gutala

               

    

    

     

 

 

 

THE INNER FLASH

                        

        

                               

                         

     

                                          

1.   On a long religious tour they wished to go

      They wished to see as many places as they could;

      They made a list of holy places with care;

      All expenses among themselves to share;

      Of their comforts and needs, they struck no compromise

      They studied every detail and thought themselves wise.

 

2.   They booked their tickets well in advance

       They used their clout to get a nearer view

       Of God in sanctum wherever they went

       On clothes and cosmetics, they lavishly spent.

       They had no patience to stand and pray at one place

       They rushed around the temple as if in a race.

 

3.   No time to view the splendid sculptures old

      No time to view the lofty, imposing towers;

      No time to view the pillars and corridors broad

      They quickly cast their look at shining God.

      No time they had to see the temple gate

      They rushed away to visit the next temple in haste.

4.    No time they had to read the temple lore

       No time to do time-consuming religious rites;

       No time to see grand processions or blessings seek

       No time to offer charity to hermits meek.

       No time to view the hills and temple gardens green

       No time to take a holy dip in lakes serene.

 

5.    So many temples they saw as per their plan

       Wasting not a moment of their valuable time;

       Confounded by their visits to many a place

       Which temple where they saw, they could not trace;

       As if in a dream with puzzling sights bizarre

       They felt much tired after touring so far.

 

6.    No sense of satisfaction, it seems, they had;

       No pervading sense of peace and serene mind;

       Ruffled like scattered leaves in a whirling storm

       They moved hither and thither without being calm;

        Except enjoying travel and staying in hotels grand;

        Nothing they felt in their pilgrimage they planned.

 

7.    A vague conglomeration of pictures, their minds;

       Except a few fancy items and gifts, they bought

       Except a few photos in their mobiles, they caught;

       Of local customs and culture, they never thought;

       Have they felt at least a spark of inner flash;

       The spirit of the place without excitement rash?

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      8th August, 2023                           Somaseshu Gutala

 

Note : The attitudes, manners and living ways of modern pilgrims are  indirectly juxtaposed with the older generation people who did not have so many transport facilities, accomodation and varieties of food duringtheir travel to holy temples. The prime deciding factor is sincere devotion, and decent and devout demeanour.