Joey Maganini

Period 2

Mr. Krucli

March 10, 2006

Imagery

Imagery A

Consider:

The many men, so beautiful

And they all dead did lie:

And a thousand thousand slimy things

Lived on; and so did I.

Within the shadow of the ship

I watched their rich attire:

Blue, glossy green, and velvet black,

They coiled and swam; and every track

Was a flash of golden fire.

---   Samuel Taylor Coleridge, “The Rime of the Ancient Mariner”

Discuss:    

1. These stanzas from the “the Rime of the Ancient Mariner” show the Mariner’s changing attitude toward the creatures of the sea. What is the Marine’s attitude in the first stanza? What image reveals this attitude?
2. What is the Mariner’s attitude in the second stanza? Analyze the imagery that reveals this change.

In the first stanza the mariner refers to the men as beautiful. He uses the visual and tactual image of thousands and thousands of slimy things to describe the monsters. The image of the slimy monster suggests a creature that is frightening disgusting and horrific.

The mariner’s attitude changes to one of awe and fascination in the second stanza. Visual images such as “rich attire,” coil and swam” and “flash of golden fire” demonstrate the fact that the speaker has now turned his attention away from the dead men and noticed the fascinated beauty of the sea monsters.

Imagery B

Consider:

And now nothing but drums, a battery of drums, the conga drums jamming out, in a descarga, and the drummers lifting their heads and shaking under some kind of spell. There’s rain drums, like pitter-patter but a hundred times faster, and then slamming-the-door-drums and dropping-the-bucket drums, kicking-the-car-fender-drums. Then circus drums, then coconuts falling-out-of-the-trees-and-thumping-against-the-ground drums, then lion-skin drums, then the wacking-of-a-hand-against-a-wall-drums, the-beating-of-a-pillow-drums, heavy-stones-against-a-wall-drums, then the thickest-forest-tree-trunks-pounding-drums, and then the-mountain-rumble-drums, then the little-birds-learning-to-fly drums and the big-birds-alighting-on-a-rooftop-and-fanning-their-immense-wings drums…

- Oscar Hijuelos, The Mambo Kings Play Songs of Love

Discuss:

1. Read the passage. How does Hujuelos create the auditory imagery of drumming? In other words, how do the words imitate the sounds they represent?
2. Hujuelos repeats the word then eight times in the passage. What does this repetition contribute to the auditory image of the drumming?

Hujuelos creates an auditory imagery of drumming through clever everyday sounds that imitate drum noises. “The pitter-patter of rain drums” and “coconuts falling-out-of-the-trees-and-thumping-against-a-wall-drums”. These examples directly relate to the sounds they make through auditory details also known as an aunomonopia.

When Hujuelos repeats the word “then” eight times it is trying to make a drum-like beat or pattern throughout the paragraph. When one ends another begins… and so on.

Imagery C

Consider:

She looked into the distance, and the old terror flamed up for an instant, then sank again. Edna heard her father’s voice and her sister Margaret’s. She heard the barking of an old dog that was chained to the sycamore tree. The spurs of the cavalry officer clanged as he walked across the porch. There was the hum of bees, and the musky odor of pinks filled the air.

Discuss:

1. Although the narrator “looks into the distance,” the images are primarily auditory. What are the auditory images in the passage? What mood do these images create?
2. The last sentence of this passage contains an olfactory image (the musky odor of pinks full the air). What effect does the use of an olfactory image, after the series of auditory images, have on the reader?

The auditory images that are used in this passage are “the fathers voice” “the barking of the old dog” and the “spurs of the Calvary officer” shows the mood of the passage moves from slightly tense to calm at the end.

The use of the olfactory image after the series of auditory images sets the last and final mood of the passage ending up calmed by the smell. “the musky odor of the pinks” gives the reader a sense of calmness and peace after the abrupt tenseness in the beginning.

Imagery D

Consider:

It was a mine town, uranium most recently. Dust devils whirled sand off the mountains. Even after the heaviest of rains, the water seeped back into the ground, between stones, and the earth was parched again.

              -Linda Hogan, “Making Do”

Discuss:

1.)      What feelings do you associate with images of dusty mountains and dry earth?

2.) These are two images associated with land in the third sentence. Identify the two images and compare and contrast the feelings these images evoke.

The feelings that I associate with the images of the dusty mountain and the dry earth are barren and dry land and abandonment.

Even with the most nourishment with water it is always soaked up and dried out and nothing can ever forill the need of water.

Imagery E

Consider:

                 A woman drew her long black hair out tight

                 And fiddled whisper music on those strings

                 And bats with baby faces in the violet light

                 Whistled, and beat their wings

                 And crawled head downward down a blackened wall

                 And upside down in air were towers

                 Tolling reminiscent bells, that kept the hours

                 And voices singing out of empty cisterns and exhausted wells

-          T.S. Eliot, “ The Waste Land”

Discuss:

1.)      Paraphrase the image of the first two lines. What mood does the image create?

2.)      List the auditory images in these lines. How do these images help create the mood of the passage?

The first two lines creates a dark mood and colorful background and a dark castle atmosphere.

“the tolling reminiscent bells, that kept the hours.” And the whistling and beating of the wings.” Gives the auditory details about the castle.