Introduction
Poetic world is the most expressive and variable one. Poets try to handle people their thoughts and vision of the world through their poetic words. Poetry is the most expressive type of literature. Small lines comprise lots of feelings and emotions that sometimes it strikes me that few lines could contain so much information. Poetry is symbolic, so some notions named in the poems should not be perceived directly. These symbols fulfill poetry with the meaning, which is rather difficult to achieve through direct and concrete words.
‘We Wear the Mask’
‘We Wear the Mask’ by Paul Laurence Dunbar and ‘Crusoe’s Journal’ by Derek Walcott are the poems which are going to be analyzed. Poets always try to express their thoughts in poems. Reading poem of this or that poet, people try to find the poets’ personalities there, as every poem is the heart and soul of the author. Paul Laurence Dunbar in his poem tried to deliver his understanding of the people’s nature to the reader. The title of the poem strikes people’s attention and gives the understanding what is the main idea of the poem.
The whole poetry of Dunbar comprises the thematic of black people’s lives. The poem pictures a hard destiny, where black people should smile through tears. People have to show that everything is perfect, that they are happy with their destinies, but in reality
With torn and bleeding hearts we smile,
And mouth with myriad subtleties. 1
African people have been slaves for many years and they have used to that as they were given this idea from the very childhood. The times have changed, people are not dependant any more, but the mask on their faces stays as the reminder about difficult life of a slave.
Exploring the phrase ‘myriad subtleties’ deeply, we should consider the meaning of every word separately. ‘Myriad’ means a very large number of something. ‘Subtlety’ is something small but very important. The meaning of the whole phrase should be carefully considered through the main idea of the poem. The poem is about people’s hiding their emotions. The face of people is smiling and the heart and soul are ’torn and bleeding’2. The peculiarity of this phrase in this very poem is that the author wrote about black people, their sufferings and their hard life. The side viewer could think that everything was great: people were smiling and the life seemed to be perfect, but nobody new how difficult it was for black people to hide their sufferings, to hide their emotions under the mask of delight.
‘Myriad subtleties’ is the expression on person’s face, when he/she wants to hide emotions which fulfill his/her heart. This phrase underlines the main idea of the poem ‘We Wear the Mask’ by Paul Laurence Dunbar very clearly, it brings that symbolism in the poem, the absence of which would sound plain.
There were a lot of reasons why black people were hiding their real feelings from the rest. History plays the main role here. Black people were slaves and they were afraid to complain as they we afraid to behave disobediently. Black people did not show their real emotions to each other, without mentioning whites, who they were really afraid.
Black people had to hide pain which they suffered under the mask. They had to hide irritation and offence under the mask of happiness. Fear was the main reason for that mask. Black people, slaves were afraid to be punished severely. Black people’s master could do anything with a slave as he/she was his property.
‘Crusoe’s Journal’
Derek Walcott took the name of Crusoe as an archetype, he needed the hero who was familiar to lots of people in order to spread his ideas in the society. Crusoe was the ideal person. Derek Walcott often uses archetypes in his poems in order to spread his ideas to the society.
The notion of ‘myriad subtleties’ is raised in the poem ‘Crusoe’s Journal’ by Derek Walcott. The first sight on the poem do not allow us to unite the topics of these two poems of different authors, but a more detailed analysis pushes us to this idea. ‘Crusoe’s Journal’ by Derek Walcott is very symbolic. The first reading suggests that the poem is about Crusoe, a person who suffered from shipwreck and had to live on the island for some time. The real meaning of the poem is the autobiographical description of Derek Walcott’s life. “‘Crusoe’s Journal’ creates a dwelling place for his autobiographical self in the way the act of writing (graphe) brings autos and bios (self and life) complexly together”3.
The author of the poem pays much attention to the landscape, where ‘the castaway mask is Walcott’s way of experiencing his landscape at this stage, and this experience leads to a deep sense of void and negation’4. The whole poem is the mask. Reading the poem, we may come to conclusion that the author feels sorry for Crusoe and his life on the Island. But it comes to my mind that the author seeks for such a position, that he wants to appear alone on the island where no one can disturb him.
Crusoe’s Journal is the description of the social position of Derek Walcott, his desire to be alone. Like Crusoe, Derek Walcott has to wear the mask of delay and happiness in order to support the inner spirit. Crusoe was alone on the island and he had to use all his imagination to stay alive, to make his soul live. The same concerns Derek Walcott: he has to wear the mask on his face, as he does not like the way he lives.
Crusoe’s island in Derek Walcott’s poem is an imaginary island, the place where he could take off his mask and live his life. ‘The Crusoe’s mask also facilitates the poet’s reflections at this time on the limitations, the challenges and the virtue of the art of writing and the imagination’5. At the same time, while Derek Walcott dreamed about the place where all masks could be taken off, Crusoe used the mask of civilized person in order to remain a person, not to become an aboriginal in those circumstances.
The poem of Derek Walcott comprises lots of topics, which are given in the shade of other notions. These notions are like a mask for the deeper issues. Crusoe may be regarded as the figure which ‘foregrounds the struggle to construct a tradition’6. This means that Derek Walcott wanted to show Western tradition as the dominant among the others. This gap is seen in the last words of epigraph ‘Between me and there is a great gulf fixed’ (Walcott). Walcott belongs to western culture with all its peculiarities and Crusoe is the person who is burdened, dominated by this western superiority.
Civilization and slavery is also raised in the poem by Derek Walcott.
like Christopher he bear
the Word to savages,
its shape an earthen, water-bearing vessel’s
whose sprinkling alters us
into good Fridays who recite His praise,
parroting our master’s
style and voice, we make his language ours
converted cannibals
we learn with him to eat the flesh of Christ.7
The problem of colonization still exists in our life and people should pay attention to that. Crusoe associates himself with ‘a cannibal from a race of backward sub-humans’8. These lines contain a strong irony, which is that ‘cannibal eats not only the flesh of Christ, but the body and blood of his own self and people’8. People, who colonize other territories, absorb the traditions and the culture of colonized territories. Derek Walcott emphasizes that not only colonized territories suffer from it, but those who occupied these territories also lose their own culture.
The poem ‘Crusoe’s Journal’ by Derek Walcott is the combination of lots of themes and notions. The poem is a symbol as a whole and dwells upon lots of other symbols which may be interpreted in different ways. The poem comprises lots of archetypes which aimed to deeper the meaning of the poem by using famous people. The poem is about the colonization, about slavery, about culture and
traditions, about faith and people’s social masks. As it was stated above, Walcott created an imaginary island, an island where he wanted to appear one day. That island is asocial. There is no one there and that fact attracted Derek Walcott’s attention.
The poem is full of ironies, in some cases these ironies sounded rather sarcastically. The opinion may be formed that the poem is the picture of modern society with all their illnesses, vices. Derek Walcott writes that till ‘intellect demands its mask’9, till that time society will walk through the life with false faces, with false impressions on these face. It is really easier to live when people do not see your real soul. People see your happy face and think that everything is good, what is actually a lie.
Conclusion
‘We Wear the Mask’ by Paul Laurence Dunbar and ‘Crusoe’s Journal’ by Derek Walcott are two poems which have some common features. Slavery is the main common topic for these poems. People’s sufferings are very difficult to sustain, but slaves did not have right to complain.
In sum, modern people always wear masks. Their faces express ‘myriad subtleties’ and the other feelings are hidden under them. Modern people wear masks as they want to do that. Black people did not want to wear that mask and people had to wear it. Pain and offence fulfilled their heart but they could do nothing, they just had to suffer it with the impression of “myriad subtleties” on their faces. Slaves did not have any rights, they did not have the right to talk and especially to complain. So, black people just had to wear the mask and to smile in order nobody could see their real feelings.
Works Cited
Baugh, Edward. Derek Walcott. Cambridge University Press, 2006.
Dunbar, Paul Laurence. The Complete Poems of Paul Laurence Dunbar. Echo Library, 2008.
Fan, Kit. “Imagined Places: Robinson Crusoe and Elizabeth Bishop.” Biography 28.1 (2005).
Hamner, Robert D. Critical perspectives on Derek Walcott. Lynne Rienner Publishers, 2000.
Ismond, Patricia. Abandoning Dead Metaphors: The Caribbean Phase of Derek Walcott’s Poetry. Kingston, Jamaica: University of the West Indies Press, 2001.
Thieme, John. Derek Walcott. Manchester University Press, 1999.
Walcott, Derek. Crusoe’s Journal. Web.