Robert Lowel & John Berryman Essays - Guggenheim Fellows

Robert Lowel & John Berryman Lowell and Berryman Robert Lowell and John Berryman both used their personal experiences as visuals in their writings. Their styles are similar in that aspect. Robert Lowells poem The Drunken Fisherman tells a story about himself fishing, and describes the seen in great detail. Of Suicide, written by John Berryman, is an autobiographical poem about how depressed he is. Berrymans work describes in detail what he thinks about and what was going on in his life at that moment making him feel so depressed. The Drunken Fisherman by Robert Lowell is a poem based on a specific instance, when the writer was fishing. THE DRUNKEN FISHERMAN Wallowing in this bloody sty, I cast for fish that pleased my eye (Truly Jehovahs bow suspends No pots of gold to weight its ends); Only the blood mouthed rainbow trout Rose to my bait. They flopped about My canvas creel until the moth Corrupted its unstable cloth. The first part of the poem explains what he is doing. The writer is fishing for rainbow trout because he likes the way it looks. Lowell states that he is not fishing for money, rather he is fishing for rainbow trout, a fish that likes the taste of blood. When he catches a fish, he puts it in his canvas pouch where it flops about until it is dead. A calendar to tell the day A handkerchief to wave away The gnats; a couch unstuffed with storm Pouching a bottle in one arm; A whisky bottle full of worms; And bedroom slacks: are these fit terms To mete the worm whose molten rage boils in the belly of old age? This part of the poem describes the physical appearance of the subject. He has a calendar to tell what day it is, a handkerchief to swat at the gnats. He is sitting on, or could possibly be, like a couch that is old and weathered. He sits with a bottle of whisky in one arm, and another empty bottle filled with worms in the other. His attire consists of simple, worn pajamas. He asks if this these terms are good enough to be fishing with worms, in his old age. Once fishing was a rabbits foot- O wind blow cold, O wind blow hot, Let suns stay in or suns step out: Life danced a jig on the sperm-whales spout- The fishers fluent and obscene Catches kept his conscience clean. Children, the raging memory drools Over the glory of past pools. He says that fishing used to be good luck. Weather it was hot or cold and in day or night, you could always catch a fish to eat. He goes on to tell how people exploited fishing, particularly the sperm-whale, saying that fishermen used to catch a lot in order to keep there conscious clean of the harm they were doing, so that the money they were making out weighed the guilt. But there children will never be able to escape the memory of the harm their parents caused just for glory. Now the hot river, ebbing, hauls Its bloody waters into holes; A grain of sand inside my shoe Mimics the moon that might undo Man and Creation too; remorse, Stinking, has puddled up its source; Here tantrums thrash to a wales rage. This is the pot-hole of old age. The hot river of blood flows back to the sea, it waters into holes in the earth like a grain of sand that doesnt really mater any more, its just part of the world. It is a part of man and creation that has been plugged up time after time, but that will never stop the rage of the whale. The last line of this stanza brings you back to the seen that was set before, of an old man sitting in his old age. Is there no way to cast my hook Out of this dynamited brook? The Fishers sons must cast about When shallow waters peter about. I will catch Christ with a greased worm, And when the Prince of Darkness stalks My bloodstream to its stygian term... On water the Man-Fisher walks. He asks if there is any way to get out of the life that he has created for himself, he only hopes that his children can find another way. He will find salvation in fishing while he awaits his death. Death comes in all shapes and sizes, his will come in the form of a Man-Fisher. You reap what you sow. John Berrymans Of Suicide is a poem that was obviously written when the author was