“Elizabeth Bishop’s use of an attractive observational style enhances her ability to communicate various revelations and reflections in her work. Discuss the extent to which you agree or disagree with this statement. Back up your points with appropriate reference to the poems.“
I strongly agree with the statement that Elizabeth Bishop uses an attractive observational style that enhances her ability to communicate various revelations and reflections. In this essay, I will use her poems, The Fish, First Death in Nova Scotia, The Prodigal and The Filling station to show how her unique observations reveal so much to us about the human condition.
First Death in Nova Scotia is a poignant poem told through the eyes of the young Bishop, as she comes to terms with the death of her young cousin, Arthur. Her description of the stuffed loon standing on ‘his white frozen lake,’ highlights the innocence of the young girl, who thinks that ‘since Uncle Arthur fired a bullet into him, he hadn’t said a word.’ The idea that she believes that the loon has just stopped talking reveals to us how she sees death is temporary rather than final.
She describes the young boy’s coffin as ‘a little frosted cake,’ a metaphor that causes the reader to contrast the innocence of youth with the brutality of death. The fact that it is being said by the young girl makes it more heart-breaking. The imagery of the speaker putting ‘one lily of the valley’ into the dead boy’s hand is also striking and the fact that she ‘was lifted up,’ makes it more gut-wrenching. We are seeing the loss of innocence and the realisation of death in real time, an experience that unfortunately comes to us all at some point.
Bishop’s use of simile is apparent in the fourth verse when she says Arthur was, ‘all white like a doll that hadn’t been painted yet.’ This is a unique way of describing the paleness of death but also serves as a reminder that those who die often look like they are simply sleeping, highlighting the fragility of life and the thin line that separates life and death. The loss of innocence of the young Bishop is clearly illustrated in the final verse when she asks, ‘how could Arthur go, clutching his tiny lily, with his eyes shut up so tight and the roads deep in snow?’ She is questioning the euphemisms of death she has been told and she now realises the finality of death. This poem illustrates perfectly how Bishop uses unique observations to reflect on how we deal with death.
While FDINS reveals many things about death, The Prodigal highlights the stubborn nature of humans when faced with difficult life choices. Bishop uses vivid imagery and description to personify the horrid conditions that the speaker is living in at the beginning of this poem. She tells us that, ‘the brown enormous odor he lived by was too close with its breathing and thick hair for him to judge.’ Personifying the smell in this way and showing how the speaker can no longer smell it, illustrates how humans can get used to their surroundings, no matter how bad they are.
It is clear that the speaker is in a difficult situation, living among the pigs in the same way as the biblical prodigal son that the poem alludes to. We are told that he is ashamed of his drinking, ‘he hid the pints behind the two by four.’ Bishop uses the sunrise to symbolise that the prodigal is content with his surroundings, as ‘the burning puddles seem to reassure,’ which makes him think, ‘he almost might endure his exile yet another year or more.’ However, the second verse sees the sun go down, and the light is replaced with darkness, as the bleak nature of his existence becomes apparent once more. Bishop observes how the animals sit contentedly ‘beneath their overhanging clouds of hay,’ while the prodigal is busy at work. The contrast between the isolated speaker and the animals is clear when Bishop uses a clever simile to show that the animals are, ‘safe and companionable as in the ark.’
Despite the harsh conditions he lives in, the speaker endures the pain instead of admitting his problems and going home. It is only when he feels the bats’ ‘uncertain staggering flight,’ that he begins to think differently. The comparison with the bat is a perfect analogy because like the bat, the speaker has no control over the direction of his life. We are told at the end that, ‘it took him a long time finally to make up his mind to go home.’ This last line is a reflection of how stubborn people are and how our own ego stops us from doing the right thing.
The Prodigal is about redemption and second chances and so too, is Bishop’s famous poem, ‘The Fish.’ The speaker in the poem tells us that she has caught a ‘tremendous’ fish and that when she held him beside the boat, ‘he didn’t fight, he hadn’t fought at all.’ This is significant as it appears that the fish had given up and was no longer willing to fight.
Bishop uses her unique observation skills to describe the fish although they cannot be classed as attractive observations as she describes the fish as disgusting and old. He uses a simile to highlight how old the fish is, when she says, ‘his brown skin hung in strips like ancient wallpaper.’ She also tells us that he was ‘infested with sea-lice.’ These observations are quite unattractive and she then goes on to describe the insides of the fish as she contemplates cutting him up, as she says ‘the dramatic reds and blacks of his shiny entrails.’
Her observations completely change when she notices that there are five hooks in the fish’s mouth, which shows that he has been captured five times and has managed to get away each time. Bishop now observes the fish with a newfound respect as she describes him like a war veteran with ‘medals with their ribbons frayed and wavering.’ Here we see how she views the fish as someone who has been through the wars and has always come out fighting. She describes him as ‘a five haired beard of wisdom,’ and her entire outlook has changed. We see the poet using pathetic fallacy when she tells us that ‘everything was rainbow, rainbow, rainbow, and I let the fish go.’
These observations help Bishop to highlight her revelations about life and about humans. We see how the fish is left with scars from the past, that Bishop overlooked initially. She didn’t realise the battles that this fish had gone through. This reveals how humans often don’t see the invisible scars from the past that people carry and how we judge without knowing all the facts. Bishop was an alcoholic and was probably judged harshly over the years, but how many people were aware of the turmoil in her life and the bereavements that she suffered as a child? The Fish highlights how we are quick to judge but with careful observation and reflection, we may see things in a different light. The poem illustrates the importance of not judging on appearances alone.
This theme is also explored in Filling Station, where the speaker is initially repulsed by the dirty nature of a family filling station. She begins the poem by telling us, ‘Oh, but it is dirty! Oil soaked, oil permeated,’ showing that everything is covered in oil.
She observes that ‘father wears a dirty oil-soaked monkey suit that cuts him under the arms,’ suggesting that it no longer fits and highlights a lack of care for his appearance. The same can be said for the ‘grease impregnated wicker sofa,’ which sits on the porch with a ‘dirty dog, quite comfy.’ The word ‘comfy’ suggests a change in her attitude as she sees that the family are comfortable in their surroundings, despite the level of dirt and grease.
But it is when she observes the doily, the taboret and the begonia that she becomes confused with the situation. She feels that such items do not belong in the dirty filling station and she is left with a series of questions that highlight her confusion. ‘Why the extraneous plant? Why the taboret? Why, oh why the doily?’ Her observations create a clear contrast between these homely feminine items and the ‘oil-soaked’ surroundings.
These observations cause her to reflect that ‘somebody loves us all.’ This reflection, which she uses to end the poem illustrates the power of love, which often goes unnoticed and unseen by the rest of society. This could be a nod to the unseen work often done by mothers who carry out household chores when we are not looking or it could be a reflection that even when people are not with us physically, they are there spiritually, which would fit with Bishop’s experience of living her life without her parents. Her revelation that ‘somebody loves us all’ is a comforting thought to those that feel lonely. There is also another revelation that our initial impressions of people and places are often wrong and we need to observe people and places in more detail to see the full picture.
Throughout the four poems we have discussed we can clearly see that Bishop’s attractive observations lead to moments of revelation and reflection as she reveals to us that humans are too quick to judge, are slow to admit our faults and we deal with death in strange ways.
Total Score Calculation
Purpose: 14/15
Coherence: 14/15
Language: 14/15
Mechanics: 5/5