Margaret Atwood

1. Margaret Atwood Kelsey Williams "You need a certain amount of nerve to be a writer."

2. Growing Up • Born on November 18, 1939 in Ottawa, Ontario. • Her parents were of Nova Scotian decent. • She was the daughter of a forest entomologist [branch of Zoology that deals with insects].

3. College • She received her bachelor’s degree from Victoria college [Toronto] in 1961. • Her mentor, Northrop Frye, recommended she pursue a graduate degree at Radcliffe College. While she was there the college joined Harvard University. • Her experiences there helped her feminist views and opposition to the Americanization of Canadian culture.

4. Marriage • She married Jim Polk in 1968, but they were divorced in 1973. • Later she got together with Graeme Gibson, a fellow novelist; in 1976 they had a daughter, Eleanor Jess Atwood Gibson.

5. Awards • Her first publication was a book of poetry, The Circle Game;it received the Governor General's Literary Award for Poetry. • As a productive poet, novelist, feminist and activist, she is a winner of the Booker Prize and Arthur C. Clarke Award, and she was a finalist for the Governor General’s Award.

6. Literary Background post·mod·ernadj.   Of or relating to art, architecture, or literature that reacts against earlier modernist principles, as by reintroducing traditional or classical elements of style or by carrying modernist styles or practices to extremes

7. Literary Terms • Repetition: a symbol is a word or object that stands for another word or object. The object or word can be seen with the eye or not visible. • Free Verse: Verse composed of variable, usually unrhymed lines having no fixed metrical pattern • Symbolism: the practice of representing things by symbols, or of investing things with a symbolic meaning or character.

8. You're sad because you're sad.It's psychic. It's the age. It's chemical.Go see a shrink or take a pill,or hug your sadness like an eyeless dollyou need to sleep.Well, all children are sadbut some get over it.Count your blessings. Better than that,buy a hat. Buy a coat or pet.Take up dancing to forget.Forget what?Your sadness, your shadow,whatever it was that was done to youthe day of the lawn partywhen you came inside flushed with the sun,your mouth sulky with sugar,in your new dress with the ribbonand the ice-cream smear,and said to yourself in the bathroom,I am not the favorite child.My darling, when it comesright down to itand the light fails and the fog rolls inand you're trapped in your overturned bodyunder a blanket or burning car,and the red flame is seeping out of youand igniting the tarmac beside you heador else the floor, or else the pillow,none of us is;or else we all are. “A Sad Child” By Margaret Atwood

9. “A Sad Child” Repetition of the word sad Shortness of words makes it more dramatic-sounding. “eyeless doll” symbolizes being unable to see “hug” symbolizes embracing your sadness You're sad because you're sad.It's psychic. It's the age. It's chemical.Go see a shrink or take a pill,or hug your sadness like an eyeless dollyou need to sleep.

10. “A Sad Child” Well, all children are sadbut some get over it.Count your blessings. Better than that,buy a hat. Buy a coat or pet.Take up dancing to forget.

11. “A Sad Child” Your sadness is like a shadow, it always follows you Forget what?Your sadness, your shadow,whatever it was that was done to youthe day of the lawn partywhen you came inside flushed with the sun,your mouth sulky with sugar,in your new dress with the ribbonand the ice-cream smear,and said to yourself in the bathroom,I am not the favorite child

12. “A Sad Child” Darkness, night time My darling, when it comes right down to it and the light fails and the fog rolls in and you're trapped in your overturned body under a blanket or burning car,

13. “A Sad Child” blood and the red flame is seeping out of you and igniting the tarmac beside you head or else the floor, or else the pillow, none of us is; or else we all are.

14. This is the one song everyone would like to learn: the songthat is irresistible:the song that forces mento leap overboard in squadronseven though they see the beached skullsthe song nobody knowsbecause anyone who has heard itis dead, and the others can't remember.Shall I tell you the secretand if I do, will you get me out of this bird suit?I don't enjoy it heresquatting on this islandlooking picturesque and mythicalwith these two feathery maniacs,I don't enjoy singing this trio, fatal and valuable.I will tell the secret to you,to you, only to you.Come closer. This songis a cry for help: Help me!Only you, only you can,you are uniqueat last. Alasit is a boring songbut it works every time. “Siren Song” By Margaret Atwood Three-line stanza

15. “Siren Song” hypnotizing This is the one song everyone would like to learn: the songthat is irresistible:

16. “Siren Song” si·ren   [sahy-ruh n] –noun 1. Classical Mythology. one of several sea nymphs, part woman and part bird, who lure mariners to destruction by their seductive singing. 2.a seductively beautiful or charming woman, esp. one who beguiles men: a siren of the silver screen. the song that forces mento leap overboard in squadronseven though they see the beached skulls the song nobody knowsbecause anyone who has heard itis dead, and the others can't remember.

17. “Siren Song” With the imagery she gives us, it leads us to believe that the speaker is a bird. Shall I tell you the secretand if I do, will you get me out of this bird suit? I don’t enjoy it heresquatting on this islandlooking picturesque and mythical with these two feathery maniacs,I don't enjoy singing this trio, fatal and valuable. I will tell the secret to you,to you, only to you.Come closer. This song

18. “Siren Song” Repetition of words is a cry for help: Help me!Only you, only you can,you are unique at last. Alasit is a boring songbut it works every time

19. “The Moment” The moment when, after many yearsof hard work and a long voyageyou stand in the centre of your room,house, half-acre, square mile, island, country,knowing at last how you got there,and say, I own this,is the same moment when the trees unloosetheir soft arms from around you,the birds take back their language,the cliffs fissure and collapse,the air moves back from you like a waveand you can't breathe.No, they whisper. You own nothing.You were a visitor, time after timeclimbing the hill, planting the flag, proclaiming.We never belonged to you.You never found us.It was always the other way round. By Margaret Atwood

20. “The Moment” life The possessive pronoun “you” indicates that you are in an intimate, and familiar place I feel that this is referring to the feeling you get after you overcoming an obstacle The moment when, after many yearsof hard work and a long voyageyou stand in the centre of your room,house, half-acre, square mile, island, country,knowing at last how you got there,and say, I own this,

21. “The Moment” is the same moment when the trees unloosetheir soft arms from around you,the birds take back their language,the cliffs fissure and collapse,the air moves back from you like a waveand you can't breathe.

22. “The Moment” No, they whisper. You own nothing.You were a visitor, time after timeclimbing the hill, planting the flag, proclaiming.We never belonged to you.You never found us.It was always the other way round.