Week 4: "Twenty Love Poems" (Neruda)
Hi everyone! This week I decided to read Pablo Neruda’s Twenty Love Poems. I am normally not drawn to poetry as a whole as I find that sometimes I just get lost in trying to decipher a meaning from the words rather than just enjoying the art in front of me. However, I do still respect this art form greatly and am in awe of writers who can convey emotion and art so beautifully and effortlessly. Nonetheless, this collection of poems was definitely an interesting ride. Some of them I understood right away and others required a second or third read.
Right off the bat these poems go very in depth in describing the womens body. It did feel very much like the woman he was describing was somewhat of an object or physical thing to him rather than a human being. The many poems that were describing her body and breasts left an interesting taste in my mouth, as they felt very possessive and dominant over the woman. The lecture was describing this as well. The quote in lecture from Chris Perriam, described how the woman was equated with the natural world and objects, such as nature and the soil. Although I may not agree with the nature of certain things that happened in the poems, as it felt like the woman was not allowed or was not given a voice or opinion, I do think that Neruda’s choice of language and ability to convey the appearance of the women was very compelling. As I see poetry and writing as an art form, being able to create a visual of the circumstances discussed within novels or poems is very important to me. If authors are not able to communicate this well enough I have a hard time reading the novel or poem itself. So although the content and nature of these poems was controversial, I do have to commend Neruda’s ability to write so passionately and vividly about these stories.
I personally have never written any poetry myself, but I am interested to know from those who have, how does it differ from writing a story or a different creative piece? Do you find yourselves more focused on integrating hidden meaning into the piece, or do you just write what comes naturally? I am wondering about this to see if we can get a better understanding of Neruda’s process when writing. The lecture stated that he was very famous and well acclaimed, and I wonder if that also plays a role in the way that he writes.
It is true that the "rules of the game" of poetry and prose fiction are different. Even the ideas or conceptions of the world are expressed in a different way within each genre, and we will talk about that a bit in class. You have had a very good intuition: writers take advantage of these differences to better get their message across.
ReplyDeleteHi there
ReplyDeleteI think that I am often more focused on finding the more hidden and deeper meaning of writing, as I think that it is something I myself am often aware of when reading others poetry. I think this element of deeper meaning is what gives a lot of literature its dept and something I noticed a lot in Neruda’s work. For example, his metaphors and comparisons of women to the nature hold a deeper insight on his and societies perception of women.