The Violets Gwen Harwood Summary

“The Violets” by Gwen Harwood is a lyrical poem that deals with a woman who is going through a dark period in her life and she looks to her childhood memories, in particular, her parents for sustenance and support. The poem consists of many themes one of which include memory of childhood, the persona of the poem is going through a rough patch in her life and uses her childhood memories The persona concludes, in the present, that neither time nor death can take away our precious memories or those people or places that belong in those memories. Throughout the poem, the tense shifts between past and present as the speaker reaches back in time to a childhood memory, in order to make sense of the present. Another theme that was highlighted was the importance of memories, this is an important theme because due to the retained power of rejuvenation and reflection that memories hold. The violets is a lyrical poem and it

Eugenia Collier, the author of the short story Marigolds makes great use of literary devices such as imagery, diction, flashback, and juxtaposition in a way that creates a voice for the narrator that conveys both the regret over, and possibly the longing for her childhood. The diction, that is, the vocabulary choice is expertly combined with imagery, or the unique descriptions and sensory details, in order to allow the reader to formulate the experiences and the surroundings of the narrator's childhood in their imaginations. Flashback is used to allow the narrator to not only explain how she viewed the events of her past as a child, but to compare these views with her adult feelings of the same events. Juxtaposition aids in further explaining the connection between the setting and emotions of the main character, creating a better picture of the narrator’s life. These elements all combine to construct a narrative that effectively conveys the coming of age theme.

“At Mornington” is about the acceptance of death and the transient nature of life. The poem conveys the richness and complexity of life ranging from naïve confidence of the child to the mature wisdom of the woman who gains fulfilment from a moment of shared friendship and can look calmly into the future. The poem is littered with biblical references and other literary techniques to outline this idea of a constant time and its effect and the change this has on a person’s identity and their reassessment. These concepts are further expanded upon in the first stanza and is utilised in

The setting and time period of this story supports the adventurous innocence of its youthful characters, as well as enriching the story’s momentous and climactic confrontation between the forward-looking Mona, and her more traditional mother, Helen.

In ‘I kneel to pick frail melancholy flowers among ashes and loam’ a tone of loneliness and sadness is established as the persona enters. Harwood describes the violets as ‘frail’ and ‘melancholy’, terms that arn’t usually associated with flowers. This is also explored in the juxtaposition of ‘ashes’ and ‘loam’. Ash is symbolic of death and decay which contradicts the ‘loam’, symbolic of life and birth. The persona’s dark and unpleasant perceptions reveal their uncertainty and state of mind. The present tense indicates the persona’s adulthood and their sense of longing and unsatisfaction conveyed through the nostalgic delivery of

Throughout ‘At Mornington’, Harwood uses descriptions, “night fell”, and similes, “the piece of this day will shine like light” when referring to the power of memory. During ‘The Violets’, Harwood uses imagery such as “ambiguous light” and metaphors such as “unreturning light” and “blurring darkness” to portray time’s ability to pass, and the way that you cannot regain time that is lost. During ‘The Violets’, Harwood also uses the metaphor of the “melting west” to represent a closing day, capturing the vivid colours of the natural phenomenon through the use of evocative imagery. Indeed, the second poem of the diptych of ‘Father and Child’ is ‘Nightfall’. These references to darkness, light and the closing of days can all be seen as symbolic of life, death and the transience of time, as when one day ends and night falls, the transience of that moment will be held in one’s memory regardless of the moment never being able to be relived.

Most of the time there is a moment in life where one realizes they have lost all innocence and gained some compassion.  “Marigolds” shows how one young girl transferred from a child to young adult through her life experiences.  Throughout this story another young, but at the same time old in her prime, lady’s experiences are revealed:  the author’s.  In this short story, “Marigolds,” Eugenia Collier’s subconscious is unmasked through symbolism, diction, and Lizabeth’s actions.

My favorite part of this book is in chapter thirteen, towards the end. In chapter thirteen

The setting of Alice Walkers short story” The Flowers” is important for us, the readers to obtain a perspective of how life was like growing up for a 10 year old African American girl by the name of Myop. The title of the story is “The Flowers.” When you think about flowers, you instantly compare them to being beautiful, pure, and innocent. The title of the “The Flowers” is a symbolism that correlates to Myop who is the protagonist of the story. Myop is just like a flower in the beginning of the story. She’s a pure and innocent child but that pure innocence changes when she discovers something that’ll change her life forever.

Gwen Harwood poems such as The Glass Jar and Prize-Giving illuminate concerns fundamental to human experience including life, death, spirituality and human fall from innocence explored abstractly through the prism of childhood experience. The use of binary opposites, metaphors, similes, musical motifs and biblical allusions allow for a multiplicity of responses and readings highlighting mythological, psychological, Freudian and feminist interpretation.

Gwen Harwood’s poetry endures to engage readers through its poetic treatment of loss and consolation. Gwen Harwood’s seemingly ironic simultaneous examination of the personal and the universal is regarded as holding sufficient textual integrity that it has come to resonate with a broad audience and a number of critical perspectives. This is clearly evident within her poems ‘At Mornington’ and ‘A Valediction’, these specific texts have a main focus on motif that once innocence is lost it cannot be reclaimed, and it is only through appreciating the value of what we have lost that we can experience comfort and achieve growth.

In “Marigolds” a young girl is growing up during the Great Depression. For Lizabeth, the narrator, everyday is a challenge. As she transitions from an innocent, naive child to an aware, yet unsure young woman, the smooth road she’s been traveling on suddenly becomes bumpy and unfamiliar when a fit of anger taken out on her neighbor marks Lizabeth’s growing up. “All the smoldering emotions of that summer swelled in me and burst- the great need for my mother who was never there, the hopelessness of our poverty and degradation, the bewilderment of being neither child nor woman and yet both at once…”, (Collier, “Marigolds”). All of the emotions that Lizabeth has been holding in spill out of her in an audacious, violent action that will exile her childhood; the destroying of Miss Lottie’s prized marigolds.When Lizabeth realizes with remorse what she’s done, she gains the heavy burden of adulthood. “In that humiliating moment I looked beyond myself and into the depths of another person. This was the beginning of compassion, and one cannot have both compassion and innocence”, (Collier, “Marigolds”). When Lizabeth conveys that Miss Lottie had planted marigolds as a show of passion and hope, she becomes compassionate towards Miss Lottie, ridding her of her childish innocence. While “Hard on the Gas” is minimally worded, the meaning of the poem speaks volumes. The poem conveys growing up, and the fact that the road to adulthood is not, in fact, smooth. “Rush, rest, rush, rest”,

     Frost moves onto autumn and shows what little life is left begins to wither and fall, or as he put it in the first line of the third set ?Then leaf subsides to leaf.? The playful spirit of the young is lost in time as age quickly pours what seems like endless duties upon adults. Things once learned are forgotten and the sun creeps slowly below the horizon. Time once again takes it toll on all things living

In this “Autumn” chapter, Claudia MacTeer uses flower imagery to describe how she and Frieda respond to their environment. This metaphor calls attention to the importance of nurture and environment for these young children, especially during these formative years of childhood. Like flowers, we depend on our environment for sustenance, so in turn, Pecola Breedlove, Soaphead Church, and Louis, Jr., inherit the legacy of self-loathing and Claudia and Frieda MacTeer inherit the legacy of self-worth.

The narrator and main character is Violet, which feels like we almost can feel what she can see from her eyes. The text doesn’t tell how old Violet is but we can clearly hear that she is just a child. For example when she saw an old and got scared, then she suddenly hides behind her mother’s legs. She is an innocent and very honest girl. She doesn’t really say a lot, but