Elizabeth's Bishop "The Fish"

1. Elizabeth's Bishop "The Fish"

2. I caught a tremendous fishand held him beside the boathalf out of water, with my hookfast in a corner of his mouth.He didn't fight.He hadn't fought at all.He hung a grunting weight,battered and venerableand homely. Here and therehis brown skin hung in stripslike ancient wallpaper,and its pattern of darker brownwas like wallpaper:shapes like full-blown rosesstained and lost through age.

3. He was speckled and barnacles,fine rosettes of lime,and infestedwith tiny white sea-lice,and underneath two or threerags of green weed hung down.While his gills were breathing inthe terrible oxygen--the frightening gills,fresh and crisp with blood,that can cut so badly--I thought of the coarse white fleshpacked in like feathers, the big bones and the little bones,the dramatic reds and blacksof his shiny entrails,and the pink swim-bladderlike a big peony.

4. I looked into his eyeswhich were far larger than minebut shallower, and yellowed,the irises backed and packedwith tarnished tinfoilseen through the lensesof old scratched isinglass.They shifted a little, but notto return my stare. --It was more like the tippingof an object toward the light.I admired his sullen face,the mechanism of his jaw,and then I sawthat from his lower lip--if you could call it a lipgrim, wet, and weaponlike,hung five old pieces of fish-line,or four and a wire leaderwith the swivel still attached,with all their five big hooks

5. grown firmly in his mouth.A green line, frayed at the endwhere he broke it, two heavier lines,and a fine black threadstill crimped from the strain and snapwhen it broke and he got away.Like medals with their ribbonsfrayed and wavering,a five-haired beard of wisdomtrailing from his aching jaw.I stared and staredand victory filled upthe little rented boat,from the pool of bilgewhere oil had spread a rainbowaround the rusted engineto the bailer rusted orange,the sun-cracked thwarts,the oarlocks on their strings,the gunnels--until everythingwas rainbow, rainbow, rainbow!And I let the fish go.

6. This seventy-six-line poem is an account of a fishing trip and how it affected Bishop.This is a memory poem.Bishop remembers catching and letting go a large fish. During the time she held on to the fish, Bishop formed a relationship in her mind with the fish. The fish did not show any awareness of Bishop.The poem is set in the sea off Florida.Clearly, Bishop is not an expert at fishing. Her boat was rented

7. In the first four lines, Bishop stated how she caught a huge fish and stared at it beside her boat. She didn’t haul the fish into her boat. Bishop noticed her hook in the fish’s mouth. • In lines five and six Bishop noted that the fish was unusual because it did not resist: ‘he didn’t fight’. This fact should put a question into the reader’s mind: ‘Why did the fish surrender so tamely?’

8. From line seven to line nine, she described how the fish looked as he hung beside the boat:‘He hung a grunting weight, battered and venerable and homely’. The fish was heavy, had injuries from previous fights, seemed holy [‘venerable’] to her and was not attractive to the eye [‘homely’]. • Bishop described the fish’s skin or scales from line ten to line twenty-one.It was brown. It reminded Bishop of old wallpaper. The skin had peeled in places and it had a flowery pattern:‘shapes like full-blown rosesstained and lost through age’.The fish’s skin had tiny shells, known as barnacles, stuck to it:‘He was speckled with barnacles’.These tiny shells were rose shaped:‘fine rosettes of lime’.

9. The fish also had a skin problem. It was crawling with ‘sea-lice’. This is an ugly description. Green seaweed hung from the belly of the fish. • From lines twenty-two to twenty-six, Bishop described the sharp gills of the fish. She stated that they were bloody. The air was ‘terrible’ to the fish. The air caused its gills to  bleed. • From lines thirty-four to forty four Bishop described the eyes of the fish. She compares the fish’s eyes to her own. This comparison shows that she was beginning to see the fish in human terms:‘I looked into his eyeswhich were far larger than mine’.She looked closely. Then she discovered that the fish was a different creature than herself. The eyes were ‘shallower’. She couldn’t look deeply into the eyes of the fish. The colourful parts of the eyes, the ‘irises’, were yellow. They were not clear. You could not look through them. They did not give back a clear reflection. They were like discoloured tinfoil. The eyes were probably clouding over because the fish was dying in the air. The eyes were like white glass that you couldn’t see through:‘old scratched isinglass’.Then bishop noticed that the fish’s eyes moved—though not to look at her. They moved slightly towards the light. The fish did not make eye contact with Bishop.

10. From line forty-five to line sixty-four Bishop described the mouth of the fish, with old broken fish lines stuck in it. The fish looked cross or ‘sullen’. Its lip was like a weapon. On this lip, you could see ‘five old pieces of fish line’. Bishop described the different fish lines in detail. • From line sixty-five until the end of the poem, Bishop went into a stare. She saw the oily colours on the bilge water of the boat as a rainbow. She felt proud:‘I stared and staredand victory filled upthe little rented boat’. • It was a big personal achievement to catch the huge fish. Bishop began to enjoy her triumph. It was a big moment for her. She imagined that her feeling of victory filled up the rented boat. Meanwhile, the big fish was still partly in the water.

11. Bishop provided a detailed picture of the old boat. Many parts of the boat were rusty from use. Bishop, the fish and the boat shared the fact that they were all  battered from life’s struggles:‘the sun-cracked thwarts’.The boat had cracks in it from the heat of the sun.

12. As Bishop stared, her eyes played a trick. All she could see were the bands of colour on the oil slick on the bottom of the boat:‘everything was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow!’ • This repeated word ‘rainbow’ means Bishop had a colourful moment. She saw a new truth. She realised something special. You can call it a moment of vision. She realised that she and the huge fish had something in common. Both of them had struggled. • Both had survived battles. Both had overcome danger. Both of them had enjoyed their victories in difficult moments. Suddenly she felt very close in spirit to the fish. • Then she did something unusual. She released the fish she had caught:‘And I let the fish go’.

13. She felt that like herself, the fish deserved a lucky break. In her view, the fish deserved respect because it had survived so many difficult situations. • The fish was no longer something to have for supper. It was a survivor of life’s battles.  The fish resembled Bishop. In a way, Bishop felt the fish was herself. She didn’t want it to give up. She wanted the fish to survive more than the fish itself wanted to. So she let it return to the sea. 

14. THEMES • The poem shows that nature’s creatures are like humans in their ability to suffer and learn from that suffering. • The poet shows us that something old and ugly has value and is worth respecting. She looks up to the fish. Its wounds make it honourable:‘battered and venerable… I admired his sullen face’. • The poet shows mercy in dealing with a powerless fish:‘and held him beside the boat half out of water’.

15. The poet shows her ability to sympathies' with nature:‘While his gills were breathing in the terrible oxygen’. • The poet appreciates a creature that ignores her:‘not to return my stare’. • Its over all theme is about the feeling of private triumph and moreover the pity and respect for 
others.

16. The Theme of 'True' Beauty or 'Inner' Beauty: Neither her battered boat nor the "venerable" old fish is beautiful in conventional terms.

17. Imagery • The images are mainly factual in this poem. The poem recalls accurately an event that happened in 1938. There are three main groups of factual images. • The first group contains physical images of the fish:- tremendous fish.- mouth.- brown skin. - the big bones and the little bones.- his shiny entrails.- his eyes.- mechanism of his jaw.- his lower lip.

18. The second group contains factual images of the boat:- the little rented boat…- the pool of bilge…- where oil had spread a rainbow…- the sun-cracked thwarts…- the oarlocks on their strings…- the gunnels… • The third group contains factual images of fishing:- my hook fast in a corner of his mouth.- five old pieces of fish-line.- with all their five big hooks grown firmly in his mouth.-A green line, frayed at the end where he broke it. -two heavier lines…-and a fine black thread still crimped from the strain and snap.

19. Metaphor • In this poem, there are many of metaphors. A metaphor compares two different things in order to illustrate one of them. • ‘venerable …’[A metaphor that compares a thing such as a fish to a holy person is called personification.] • ‘seen through the lenses of old scratched isinglass…’[In this metaphor, Bishop makes a strange comparison of the fish’s eyes to white glass that doesn’t let light through. She based this unclear metaphor on something she had seen in her own life.] • ‘victory filled up the little rented boat…’[This is an interesting metaphor. It compares a thought such as ‘victory’ to a physical material that fills a boat.] • ‘everything was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow!’[In this metaphor, Bishop compares the colorful surface of oily water to a rainbow.]

20. Irony • In lines five and six ; He didn’t fight He hadn’t fought at all The poem begins with this unexciting observation that is also ironic because later descriptions present the fish as a great warrior displaying its hooks and severed lines like war medals. • In line sixty-six ; and victory filled up The speaker is presumably filled with “victory” because she has caught this legendary fish, but we recall from the beginning of the poem that “he hadn’t fought at all.” Catching the fish was just luck rather than strength. Is she truly victorious or not? The fact that she lets the fish go at the end might cheapen the sense of victory (victors are boasters by nature), or it might bring that victory to a higher level (the appreciation of beauty outweighs any mundane victory).

21. Simile in "The Fish" his brown skin hung in strips like ancient wallpaper, and its pattern of darker brown was like wallpaper: shapes like full-blown roses stained and lost through age. There are three similes in these six lines, but two of the similes are the same: The fish’s skin is compared twice to wallpaper.. Immediately after these lines, in line 17, she compares the shapes on the fish’s skin to something living (roses), but she qualifies the “full-blown roses” simile with a metaphor that compares barnacles to “fine rosettes.”

22. I thought of the coarse white flesh packed in like feathers Here she compares its flesh to feathers, which come from nature . Like medals with their ribbons frayed and wavering,. In the first similes, the fish was compared to wallpaper, something inanimate; then its flesh was compared to feathers, something from another animal; here the simile links the fish by extension to something human and more familiar.

23. Symbol in "The Fish" He didn’t fight. He hadn’t fought at all. Fish are associated with freedom, because they must be caught before they can be controlled. They are also associated with the mysteries of nature. I admired his sullen face, if you could call it a lip In these two lines, the speaker displays symbolically another contradiction in the fish’s status. It is personified when she admires “his sullen face,” using a gender-specific pronoun (“his” as opposed to “its. Yet a few lines later, as she is describing the fish’s lip, the speaker calls this personification into question.