After looking over some examples and reading the required text, I hope that I can contribute to what is expected of this blog.
I read a poem by Shel Silverstein called “Messy Room”. And at first when you read it, it sounds like a mother basically ranting about how her son can’t keep a room clean and goes through every detail of the messy room. The tone of the poem is disgusted and appalled for the fact that this room is just so messy.
However reading to the very end you finally realized it’s not a frustrated mother ranting about her son’s horrific untidiness, It’s the actually person’s room. This person tries to blame, assuming it’s their brothers, but realizes it’s actually their room that’s so unseemly dirty.
Most people can relate to this poem just in the text of at least once in their life they had a room that was completely messy they couldn’t even recognize it themselves. I can even relate to this poem because I’ve had a few times where I looked at my house and thought “Oh my goodness I can’t believe it looks like this…I should be ashamed”. I mean don’t get me wrong I have to have things clean but just getting caught up in working and going to school both full time can distract me from my everyday chores.
Whosever room this is should be ashamed!
His underwear is hanging on the lamp.
His raincoat is there in the overstuffed chair,
And the chair is becoming quite mucky and damp.
His workbook is wedged in the window,
His sweater’s been thrown on the floor.
His scarf and one ski are beneath the T.V.
And his pants have been carelessly hung on the door.
His books are all jammed in the closet,
His vest has been left in the hall.
A lizard named Ed is asleep in his bed,
And his smelly old sock has been stuck to the wall.
Whosever room this is should be ashamed!
Donald or Robert or Willie or—
Huh? You say it’s mine? Oh, dear,
I knew it looked familiar!
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ReplyDeleteOne of my daughter's favorite poems some years ago -- clever bit of rhyming. However, I can't relate. My rooms were never so messy, oh no!
ReplyDeleteHi Annetta,
ReplyDeleteThe point you make about the identity of the speaker could be considered easily from a rhetorical point of view: the author deliberately "fools" the audience, allowing it to imagine a person's viewpoint is being offered; only later in the poem does the author reveal the narrative perspective as being that of the room itself (not realistic, of course, but then, this is Shel Silverstein :)). WHY does the author choose to confuse/deliberately shade the narrative perspective? To produce what effect in the audience? Answering this will give you a strong rhetorical conclusion about this maneuver.