The Bitter World of Spring (pg. 164)

1. The Bitter World of Spring (pg. 164) Emily Feller Samantha McGuire Sarahi Gonzalez

2. Opening Activity • Discuss what you think the poem is about and talk about where you had gotten that meaning. Discuss with the other members of your group. (5 minutes)

3. Thesis • Williams Carlos Williams uses the imagery in The Bitter World of Spring associated with spring to communicate the difficulties of a poet writing a piece of poetry that is both full of deep meaning and easily comprehended by the readers and audience.

4. Stanza One and Two Repetition: • the Color: • White • Black • Red • Brown Vocabulary: • Recedes: go further away from a previous position • Mottled: mark with spots or smears of color • Inverted: put upside down On a wet pavement the white sky recedes mottled black by the inverted pillars of the red elms, in perspective, that lift the tangled net of their desires hard into the falling rain. And brown smoke is driven down, running like water over the roof or the bridge-

5. Stanza One and Two Cont.. Structure: • Both stanzas each have four lines • Third line of each stanza has only five words which is shorter than other stanzas Sound: • Line Seven • I think it means that brown smoke is coming down as fast as water goes down a roof of the bridge Tone: • Sad • Depressed • Careless • The title “The Bitter World of Spring” Imagery: • Nature • Wet pavement • Sky • Rain • Smoke • Water On a wet pavement the white sky recedes mottled black by the inverted pillars of the red elms, in perspective, that lift the tangled net of their desires hard into the falling rain. And brown smoke is driven down, running like water over the roof or the bridge-

6. Stanza #3 • Keeper’s cubicle. And, as usual, The fight as to the nature of poetry -Shall the philosophers capture it?- Is on. And , Casting an eye Key Terms (that you may not have known) • Cubicle: A small space or compartment partitioned off. • Philosophers: a person who offers views or theories on profound questions in ethics, metaphysics, logic, and other related fields.

7. Stanza #3 • Keeper’s cubicle. And, as usual, The fight as to the nature of poetry -Shall the philosophers capture it?- Is on. And , Casting an eye Structure • Differs from all over stanzas. While in the other ones, the first and last lines are the longest in the stanza, this one the two middle lines are the longest. • Enjambment: When a sentence breaks into the next line • punctuation: Williams hardly ever uses punctuation and you notice here he uses a lot of it. It is to emphasis the question he is asking about whether or not the reader will understand the poetry.

8. Stanza #3 • Keeper’s cubicle. And, as usual, The fight as to the nature of poetry -Shall the philosophers of capture it?- Is on. And , Casting an eye Sense • POV: 3rd person omniscient • Mode/tone: Questioning/wondering • Diction: “The fight as to the nature of poetry”Comparing poetry to nature.

9. Stanza #3 • Keeper’s cubicle. And, as usual, The fight as to the nature of poetry -Shall the philosophers of capture it?- Is on. And , Casting an eye Senses • Sound: Alliteration: When words have the same beginning Example: Capture and casting

10. Stanza #3 • Keeper’s cubicle. And, as usual, The fight as to the nature of poetry -Shall the philosophers capture it?- Is on. And , Casting an eye Style • Literary devices: “The fight as to the nature of poetry” Simile to compare poetry to nature.

11. Stanza #3 • Keeper’s cubicle. And, as usual, The fight as to the nature of poetry -Shall the philosophers capture it?- Is on. And , Casting an eye Purpose This stanza in itself I believe has pretty much majority of the poems overall meaning within it. This poem is about a poet having trouble writing a piece of poetry that is both full of meaning and easy for the readers to understand. “The fight as to the nature of poetry -Shall the philosophers capture it?-” That is what I believe to be the most important fraction of the poem.

12. Stanza #4 • And, casting an eye down into the water, there, announced by the silence of a white bush in flower, close under the bridge, the shadascend, • Shad: A type of fish that comes from Europe and North America, that migrates up stream to spawn & is also used for food. • Ascend: To move, climb, or go upward; mount

13. Cont. • Literal meaning: -And looking down into the water and to be notified by the silent movement of a white bush in flower under right under the bridge the fishes come out. • Image: Could see fish going upstream, water splashing. • Colors: Blue- Water, White- flowers

14. Stanza #5 • midway between the surface and the mud, and you can see their bodies red-finned in the dark water headed, unrelenting, upstream. • Sound: Rhythm- Alliteration: Unrelenting upstream • Red-finned: A type of fish. • Ex:

15. Cont. • Literal meaning: -Looking down and seeing the red-finned fish swimming upstream in the dark struggling but still going. • Image: A red-finned fish stuck in between the mud and water and others going upstream with difficulty. • Colors: Blue-Water, Brown-Mud, Red- the fins of the fish, black-dark • Mood/tone: persistence (“unrelenting” )

16. Interpretation! • Thought that the fish and there persistence to continue going upstream represents the poet not giving up even though he’s struggling too much to continue writing the poem. • The period at the end of his poem represents an ending meaning the poet finally achieving to write a poem with meaning and it easily understood it is also very rare to see a period at the end of William Carlos Williams!

17. Overall Literal interpretation • Standing outside on a stormy cloudy day looking at the sights of nature. The elm trees are on fire and had turned to ashes (inverted). Rain falls into the smoke from the fire and the water is dripping down a roof of a bridge. Look down and are able to see (Shad) red fish swimming by upstream.

18. Deeper Meaning • This poem is about a poet’s struggle to write poetry. They have trouble coming up with meaningful pieces of literature that are also easy to understand to the reader. It is also about their persistence and their ultimate achievement from their struggles.

19. Closing Activity • Reflect about a time when you thought you were unable to achieve a goal and in the end were able to through persistence. Write it down on a piece of paper.After this discuss about your experiences with other people within your group. If you are comfortable enough, feel free to share your story with the whole class in our class discussion.