Call Me an Optimist...

This post, almost a part two of my post The Reality of Hope, will be about the poetry we've been reading in my British Literature class. This week was the Wyatt/Spenser week. We read the modern translations of some of the poetic works of Francesco Petrarch alongside the "translations" (often times more like interpretations) of the same poems by Sir Thomas Wyatt and Edmund Spenser. Following is my analysis of one of these poems (taken from our discussion for class). The poem is one that compares emotional turmoil to a storm, the mind to a ship, and reason to a guide whilst at sea. 

Petrarch’s "Rima 189" seems to be all about the struggles of the mind. We see the war between his logic and emotion, not knowing if he should call the ‘captain’ of his mind his lord or his enemy. We also see the expression of the emotional side of his thought-life (“a rain of weeping, a mist of disdain”). Ultimately this metaphor comparing his mind to that of a ship is full of a gloom that is evident in the final stanza: “dead among the waves are reason and skill; so that I begin to despair of the port.” 

Wyatt’s “My Galley” seems to take it a bit further in the gloom department. His translation uses much harsher wording (“a rain of tears, a cloud of dark disdain”). This translation chooses to just say outright that reason has been drowned, bringing some personification into this poem. The final line is similar, but here too, harsher in the fact that Wyatt has chosen to imply that the despair is continual rather than starting afresh: “And I remain despairing of the port.”

Spenser’s “Sonnet 34” takes the more optimistic point of view compared to the others. Instead of focusing on the storm that is at hand, like the others do, it focuses on the guiding star (“Helice the lodestar”). Also the captain is called the ship’s “trusty guyde.” There is mention of the hope that the star “will shine again… to cleare my cloudy grief.” And, while it ends on a low note it’s the least depressed sounding of all three: “Till then I wonder [full of cares] comfortlesse, In secret sorrow and sad pensivenesse.”

Perhaps you can tell where I am going with this but please humour me. When it comes to my writing, as I've stated in the past it is always my desire to accurately communicate both the "gloom" of reality and the clear days the come with it.  I know that both exist in reality and to what extent they exist compared to each other differs from one life to another. Part of admitting that both occur is admitting that there will be an end to specific instances of suffering. With that of course, on the other hand, is admitting that there will be an end to specific instances of happiness. Of all three translations we read of Petrarch's Rima 189 it is Spenser's which I feel does the best job of communicating that.

I am reminded of a short story I wrote this past summer for my Intro to Creative Writing class. It was written from the perspective of a mother who was observing two of her daughters preparing for their high school prom. This mother throughout her life suffered from brief moments of paranoia and dread. She worried often for her daughter and throughout the plot of the story she recalls various moments in history about her daughter. We see that her daughter is a strong and capable person but she is so convinced that her daughter is unhappy and afraid, like she herself is. Yet in the end the mother is astonished to realize that her daughter is nothing like her at all, her daughter is less like herself than she thought. 

This story is about one brief moment of 'gloom', the mother's incapability to actually see her daughter for who she is. The stress and fear of her life taints her view of others. Yet, through the overarching theme of inherited genes, she begins to see that her daughter, though like her in looks, has a capacity for happiness that is not hindered by the fear that she herself suffers with daily. We aren't told that the mother conquers her own fears, nor that the rest of their life if filled with equally significant discoveries about themselves but we get a glimpse of the two sides of reality. 

Now as I think of it I realize that I maybe didn't communicate all of that very well, that the 'gloom' aspect was too abstract to understand. But the idea was that both bits were intended to be there. I didn't do it nearly as well as Spenser. In his poem we clearly see the presence of first the storm then he says that he sees no reason to despair for his guiding star will eventually be made clear as it always does, but in the end he reminds us, the readers, that even though he is certain of the coming end of the storm that he is indeed suffering with emotional pains. It shows both the reality of momentary pain and the perseverance of hope. This is how real life is. This is how I what I'd like to communicate. 

Thanks for reading!

-Jessica