I have to admit that I approached reading the short story with a lot less trepidation than when I approached the poetry we read. I usually view short stories as much easier to read and to understand. I approach them with the intent of being amused, instead of a fear that I will not comprehend what they are trying to say, as with poetry. Of course, now that we have been through the English-200 poetry unit I am a lot more confident in my skills when it comes to reading a poem. However, I still enjoy reading short stories more.
While reading the Lottery I did have to use some of my earlier-learned poetry skills. I found that I needed to re-read certain parts of the story, three or even four times, before I really understood what was going on. I also had to re-read certain paragraphs to keep all of the different characters straight. Often, during the poetry unit, I would need to go back and look at certain verses and lines more than once. I quickly learned that it is not easy, and sometimes not even possible, to grasp a poem’s meaning with just one quick skim through. The same theory applies to The Lottery as well. Also, I found myself noticing the imagery of the story, something I would not have previously thought to do. For example, I loved how Jackson set the scenery in the beginning of the story, when she writes, “The morning of June 27th was clear and sunny, with the fresh warmth of a full-summer day; the flowers were blossoming profusely and the grass was richly green.” The poetry unit taught me to better appreciate the pictures painted by the words of poetry, and short-story, authors.
2 comments:
I completely agree with the whole needing to re-read everything in poetry. I think that is probably a requirement for poetry. Everytime I re-read something it seems to shed new light on what it is that I'm reading. I suppose it only makes sense that re-reading something in a short story as well, would only give further insight into what the author is trying to say.
I agree about the need to read and reread poetry several times to understand the meaning of the poem. I also agree that imagery is used effectively in both types of writings and that because of the poetry we were exposed to it makes it easier to pick out what imagery is and how it is used.
Post a Comment