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Post by gluey on Sept 7, 2009 20:30:59 GMT -5
Pat on the back?
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Post by gluey on Sept 21, 2009 22:07:30 GMT -5
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Post by Rowenna on Sept 23, 2009 19:09:24 GMT -5
Finally read Little Johnny White.
Hah, I was waiting for my book to be done before I read anything, and now school starts tomorrow. I guess that's how the world works.
Anyway, it's an interesting poem. I'm trying to figure out what white represents, but I'm not sure. The use of the poem sort of exudes a tone of deception, since white usually represents purity, which can't be the case. On deception, I get the feeling Johnny is supposed to be attaching to other things that are white, whether or not he likes it and whether or not it makes him happy, though he makes himself look happy in the meantime. It could be a poem about separation and enforced identity. I don't know, I do feel like I'm reaching a bit. The story itself was quite nice, though.
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Post by gluey on Sept 23, 2009 19:30:51 GMT -5
White does not have a consistent meaning. You have to look at the context of each use...often it is deceptive, but also it is devoid of color...bland. The special contrasts are "brown eyes" and "blue campus" and "red spots". The brown eyes hold Johnny's attraction, they have color (even though many prefer blue, but obviously blue is used for a different context, and green eyes to me go somewhere completely different); everyone else's eyes are 'white'. The blue campus is big...vibrant...nobody cares, implying that there is far more going on, and far more people; Johnny sinks into obscurity and unimportance. The fact that she is a "little white girl with little brown eyes" is meant essentially literally. I mean, you can see her as 'bland' but the brown eyes make her stick out regardless. She also is a part of that little white town. Particular contexts where white is bland: "felt all the white coming back" and "life was not so little or white". And in the end, white is vanity: the white screen, the white girls, the white world, and especially the white tears. The white knife is bitterly ironic in a way. Red is a vivid contrast and brings color finally into Johnny's life, by ending it. But the 'little white girl with the little brown eyes never knew that her little white presence' (in context of the greater world) 'killed Little Johnny White'. It is important that he is not little white Johnny; it adds a sense of inevitability about his conflict, kind of how you said "attaching to other things that are white". Furthermore: her little white presence, while nothing in the greater context of things, clearly was absolutely crucial to Johnny, so that has a tinge of irony also.
So, ultimately, nothing you said is entirely wrong...that's my full analysis of...my poem. It's weird, because when I read it, I'm seriously like "Wait, I wrote that?"
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Post by gluey on Sept 23, 2009 19:36:03 GMT -5
White can also imply inconsequential, where little is not used. Kind of like...connective connotation between the two. Which is now a literary term, dubbed by me.
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Post by Rowenna on Sept 23, 2009 23:23:33 GMT -5
Cool. Well, I have to say, you've definitely improved mucho over the years. And, I have to say, I actually really do like that poem. It has a really nice rhythm. Okay. I'm going to post this, but I'm not begging anyone to read it. Maybe sneak a peak... get a feel for it... my newest book that I promised myself I'd finish before the summer was over. I actually managed it, right on the last day. Crepuscolo: Stairway To Heaven www.fictionpress.com/s/2211427/1/Crepuscolo_Stairway_To_Heaven
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Post by gluey on Sept 24, 2009 0:20:20 GMT -5
Bahaha I've improved much. No nuts Sherlock. Hahaha. That is one of my favorites I've written. Second only to Teen Out For Walk Fatally Hit, and that's just cause that one hits home so hard. Well, Little Johnny White does too because it has its basis in the events of my life but...yeah. I will read yours when I find time (if ever...no me gusta el colegio).
Edit: lollllll sh*t becomes nuts.
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Post by gluey on Sept 26, 2009 23:51:29 GMT -5
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Post by Rowenna on Oct 9, 2009 18:53:01 GMT -5
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Post by gluey on Nov 3, 2009 21:10:51 GMT -5
The poem, I really liked. Something really compelling about the loneliness of the speaker.
There's something syntactically that almost bugs me - I mean, this is poetry so anything can be regular/irregular etc., but in the line "I miss holding hands, interlocking fingers"...I mean it's not that I don't like the sentence. It's just that every other line is structured as "I miss ______ that never happened" except that one. I mean I don't think it disturbs flow...it doesn't bug me that much...it's just a consideration. But yeah great closing line. Why did you put a big line between the rest of the poem and the last line?
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Post by Rowenna on Nov 4, 2009 19:11:10 GMT -5
Thanks! The line is because, with normal formatting, the poem is supposed to be single spaced with a double space at the end to emphasize a shift--kind of like what you see in sonnets, at times. Stupid fictionpress won't let me, so for all things intended to be double spaced, I introduce the less satisfying, but still workable line.
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Post by gluey on Nov 5, 2009 8:02:42 GMT -5
Yes it will! Actually it took me a while to figure out how to manipulate it but if you go in and edit the actual document, you can get single spacing by pressing shift and enter at the end of the line. You have to go through and delete all line breaks first though, but you can get the effect you want, if what you're thinking of is what I'm thinking of.
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