Winner of the Canadian Book Club Award in 2022 in the category of poetry, North Star Heart is a compilation of free or open verse poetry by N4.5 Stars
Winner of the Canadian Book Club Award in 2022 in the category of poetry, North Star Heart is a compilation of free or open verse poetry by Natasha Silva, a British Columbian of Portuguese descent. In the style of Pablo Neruda, the poetry communicates not only the thoughts and dreams of the poet but also gives the reader a wonderful experience of British Columbia, its scenery and forests and all-around natural beauty.
from the girl who loves the forest more than herself
It's the forest I tell my graveyard secrets to. The trees gather the words in the folds of their branches, pass them from cedar to Douglas fir to pine.
The mountain peaks draw energy from the darkest parts of me, transform marred memories to ones of bliss and uplift me to cumulus cloud stratus. The vistas manipulate heartbeats. They speed up so fast I can fly almost as high as the whiskey jacks on Cypress.
The sun sets over the valley, the blue of the Fraser, iridescent against the dying light. The breeze blows my secrets through the evergreens and that burning sky tattoos the tree line to my retinas. (These secrets won't die with me.)
Personal and evocative and beautiful, it's a poetry book that I can highly recommend....more
"When in April, and it hasn't yet rained, And the drought of March has again sustained Another year of our eternal spring; Then old Santa Ana begins to s"When in April, and it hasn't yet rained, And the drought of March has again sustained Another year of our eternal spring; Then old Santa Ana begins to sing That fiery yet most familiar tune How Los Angeles always feels like June ...."
Though modelled on the classic, The Canterbury Tales, in The Brubury Tales we are not confronted with pilgrims, but seven security guards who work at the Holiday Inn in L.A. Six men and one woman make up their team, as they perform their duties during the unsettled times of the Los Angeles race riots. The prologue introduces each of them: Leo Kapitanski, Alex Loma, John Shamburger, Joseph Dator, J.T. (the narrator), Rolla Amin, and Darrin Arita or "The Feet".
As Christmas is approaching, each guard is lobbying for vacation time during the holidays, but Leo Kapitanski, their security chief, comes up with a unique idea. Each one of the guards must tell a tale, and the guard who crafts the best tale, will be awarded with the time off.
Leo is the first to tell his tale and exhibits some fine alliterative verse, reminiscent of the style of the Pearl poet (Sir Gawain & the Green Knight):
"Those were tumultuous times in Olde Yellowfield: When widespread war had wracked the west; As Pestilence and plague plundered through the east; And silky southern skies, soot-saddened into shade As burnt and billowing breaths of northern brush Did daily darken the heavens in dismal doom! And for years was Olde Yellowfield yanked to black By those soot-stacks that steadily stole the sun. Olde Yellowfield was new Blackfield, banned from light ..."
Yet not everyone appreciates such poetical talents, and The Feet protests over this "literary crap". So Leo agrees to tell another tale full of vice, since no one can appreciate a story well-told, because:
"'In today's world where television rules, Personally, I blame the public schools.' But Leo disagreed a little bit, 'Takes a village to raise an idiot.'"
Leo's tale weeps full of sorrow and distress, ringing with shades of lost chances and bitter regret, as a man tries to navigate the paths of life and love and fails miserably, a red stain left on his attempt, an unendurable burden on his heart.
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There are seven tales in all, in a variety of settings and time periods, covering a number of different issues with respect to love, marriage, betrayal, regret, and death, yet hope resonates in these explorations of life's struggles and victories. Humour is also woven into the fabric of the narrative, delivered with an adeptness that gives a sublime harmonization with the other serious themes. Though each tale has a modern twist, they bear resemblance to stories of Dostoyevsky, Boccaccio, Saki, Poe, O'Henry, Dickens, Twain, the Bible, Dante, Gilman, Crane, Anderson and Bierce, and it's a veritable treasure hunt, to sift through the narrative to see if one can spot these recognizable classics. There even is a remake of Omar Kayyam's The Rubaiyat, which is very cleverly done. In another twist to the story, the author himself makes an appearance as the supervisor. There is an abundance of literary wealth within this book, and one can imagine the work as a tapestry; each thread you pull leads to a new idea, or allusion, or theme, working singly and yet together to form a unique and complex whole.
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With regard to the poetic structure, it's mostly comprised of couplets in iambic pentameter, echoing very much of Chaucer's style and tone. Yet there are variations in poetic style at certain points during the tales which helps to give a different flavour to the stories. The author is also is very adept at changing the voice of the characters, each one sounding like an individual and making it very easy for the reader to step into their world.
This read was part of my The Canterbury Tales/The Brubury Tales Project for 2015, and I think I can say that it was my favourite project of the year. Not only was I pleasantly surprised at the enjoyment that I received from Chaucer's merry and sometimes, raunchy tale, I was blown away by The Brubury Tales and the talent and aptitude of its author. A great project, all around!
This was my fourth read and it just gets better every time. A concept of xenia is mandatory. So happy to once again step into the world of the ancientThis was my fourth read and it just gets better every time. A concept of xenia is mandatory. So happy to once again step into the world of the ancient Greeks!...more
C.S. Lewis does it again. Not only does he supply enlightening commentary to accompany a reading of Paradise Lost, but he touches on a number of otherC.S. Lewis does it again. Not only does he supply enlightening commentary to accompany a reading of Paradise Lost, but he touches on a number of other books and subjects, conveying fascinating information in an extremely accessible narrative.
A Preface to Paradise Lost is a compilation of Lewis' Ballard Matthews Lectures, which he gave in 1941 to students at the University College of Northern Wales. Lewis' expertise was Medieval and Renaissance literature, and while reading this book, it is apparent that he is in his element, as he covers not only Paradise Lost but also gives the reader an introduction to the genre of epic and insights into how to read it.
Lewis' initial chapters --- more than one-third of the book --- cover epic poetry, both primary and secondary, and he provides numerous examples contrasting the two, from The Odyssey, The Iliad, Beowulf, The Aeneid and, of course, Paradise Lost, to further the readers' understanding. Next, in a lecture titled, The Unchanging Human Heart, he deals with how to read a poem (or book), which is perhaps my favourite lecture of all. How do we deal with the gulf between our era and the author's? Do we read only for what is relevant to us, or do we attempt to engage with the author? Lewis deals with both approaches:
"A method often recommended may be called the method of The Unchanging Human Heart. According to this method the things which separate one age from another are superficial ……. if we stripped [off the superficialities] …… we should find beneath … an anatomy identical with our own ….. we shall find the Unchanging Human Heart, and on this we are to concentrate.
I held this theory myself for many years, but I have now abandoned it. I continue, of course, to admit that if you remove from people the things that make them different, what is left must be the same, and that the Human Heart will certainly appear as Unchanging if you ignore its changes ……. [thus] our whole study of the poem will then become a battle between us and the author in which we are trying to twist his work into a shape he never gave it, to make him use the loud pedal where he really used the soft, to force into false prominence what he took in his stride, and to slur over what he actually threw into prominence ……….. I do not say that even on these terms we shall not get some value out of our reading; but we must not imagine that we are appreciating the works the old writers actually wrote ……
Fortunately, there is a better way. Instead of stripping the knight of his armour you can try to put his armour on yourself ………. I would much rather know what I should feel like if I adopted the beliefs of Lucretius than how Lucretius would have felt if he had never entertained them. The possible Lucretius in myself interests me more than the possible C.S. Lewis in Lucretius ……
To enjoy our full humanity we ought, so far as is possible, to contain within us potentially at all times, and on occasion to actualize, all the modes of feeling and thinking through which man has passed …….. Only thus will you be able to judge the work 'in the same spirit that its author writ' and to avoid chimerical criticism. It is better to study the changes in which the being of the Human Heart largely consists than to amuse ourselves with fictions about its immutability ………."
Finally Lewis delves into Paradise Lost, but instead of summarizing the chapters, Lewis concentrates on expounding on particular characters and certain themes. He explores the poem's theology, hierarchy, Satan, Satan's followers, the angels, Adam and Eve, unfilled sexuality, and the Fall. Addressing some of the controversies over the poem, Lewis deals with the difficulties with his typical logical summations and a sprinkling of dry wit. And while mostly praising Milton's achievement, he does not hesitate to point out perceived flaws in the work, and while doing so, gives the reader a more profound comprehension of the challenges of Milton's task.
While amazingly thorough, Lewis' writing is simple, clear and understandable. His lectures encourage the reader to read critically, and his explanation of Milton's worldview is not only helpful, but necessary, to gain a good understanding of the poem. While being very readable, this guide is the definitive "go-to" book for tackling Paradise Lost for readers who want to go in-depth with their study. ...more
Samuel Johnson declared that Paradise Lost is "a poem …… which respect to design may claim the first place, and with respect to performance, the seconSamuel Johnson declared that Paradise Lost is "a poem …… which respect to design may claim the first place, and with respect to performance, the second, among the productions of the human mind ….." It is a poem about the rebellion in Heaven and the ejection of the fallen Angels; it is about the Garden of Eden, the deception of the snake, and the fall of Man. But it is much more than all these points, separately and as a whole. Just as Satan falls into the depths of the burning pit of Hell, Milton delves into the depths of the human Soul and conversely soars to the heights of the God of Heaven, weaving a tapestry of images and profundity that will leave the reader amazed and speechless. Initially, the reader believes he is following Milton's lead, not realizing until later that he is part of the tapestry itself and Milton's words have become part of his soul.
In this poem, Satan's actions are especially shockingly compelling as we follow his fall from Heaven, his brash, swaggering leadership of the fallen angels, and then his quest to best God to get his spiteful, yet senseless, vengeance. We think of Hell as a place, full of fire and brimstone, burning and torment, and while Milton gives Hell a location in this poem, it is much more than that. Satan carries Hell inside him. It torments him, not only with thoughts of rage and hate and revenge, but almost more effectively with thoughts of despair, regret and impossible hope. Conflicting emotions scrape and tear at him incessantly. For him, Hell is not external; it is an internal condition from which he cannot escape.
Milton's superlative crafting of the character of Satan has led many people to believe he was perhaps too successful, making Satan the most exciting and heroic character of the poem. William Blake stated that "the reason Milton wrote in fetters when he wrote of Angels and God, and at liberty when of Devils and Hell, is because he was a true poet, and of the devil's party without knowing it". It is certainly true that Milton intimately understood "the devil's party". Like us all, he experienced sin within himself and within others: rage, treachery, deceit, the desire for power, etc. And with his astonishing talent, he was able to craft a character that is perhaps the most Satan of all the Satans in the history of literature. Milton's Satan is capable of tricking not only Adam and Eve and angels, he is able to trick the reader of Paradise Lost as well, in such a subtle manner that certain readers admire his bravado, respect his machinations, and feel sorry for his plight. While Milton's brilliance in this area of the poem is breath-taking, it is also unsettling. C.S. Lewis in his lectures on Paradise Lost, approaches this issue in a dexterous manner, saying that if the reader chooses to admire Satan, he must only realize what he is admiring:
"No one had in fact done anything to Satan; he was not hungry, nor over-tasked, nor removed from this place, nor shunned, nor hated ---- he only thought himself impaired. In the midst of a world of light and love, of song and feast and dance, he could find nothing to think of more interesting than his own prestige …..
……… Satan lies about every subject he mentions in Paradise Lost. But I do not know whether we can distinguish his conscious lies from the blindness which he had almost willingly imposed on himself ……
……. What we see in Satan is the horrible co-existence of a subtle and incessant intellectual activity with an incapacity to understand anything. This doom he has brought upon himself; in order to avoid seeing one thing he has, almost voluntarily, incapacitated himself from seeing at all. And thus, throughout the poem, all his torments come, in a sense, at this own bidding …..
……. the design of ruining two creatures (Adam & Eve) who had never done him any harm, no longer in the serious hope of victory, but only to annoy the Enemy (God) whom he cannot directly attack ……
……. From hero to general, from general to politician, from politician to secret service agent, and thence to a thing that peers in at bedroom or bathroom windows, and thence to a toad, and finally to a snake ------- such is the progress of Satan. This progress, misunderstood, has given rise to the belief that Milton began by making Satan more glorious than he intended and then, too late, attempted to rectify the error. But such an unerring picture of the 'sense of injured merit' in its actual operations upon character cannot have come about by blundering and accident. We need not doubt that it was the poet's intention to be fair to evil, to give it a run for its money ---- to show it first at the height, with all its rants and melodrama and 'Godlike imitated state' about it, and then to trace what actually becomes of such self-intoxication when it encounters reality."
Yet in spite of the beautiful images painted amid the stark reality, Milton seems to rush the end of the poem, packing the whole Old Testament into the last two books and surprisingly uses a more direct narrative instead of showing the reader with his usual subtle yet beautiful verse. Lewis remarks on the lack of genius in the last books in comparison to the earlier wonderful artistry of the poem:
"It (Paradise Lost) suffers from a grave structural flaw. Milton, like Virgil, though telling a short story about the remote past, wishes our minds to be carried to the later results of that story. But he does this less skillfully than Virgil. Not content with following his master in the use of occasional prophecies, allusions, and reflections, he makes his two last books into a brief outline of sacred history from the Fall to the Last Day. Such an untransmuted lump of futurity, coming in a position so momentous for the structural effect of the whole work, is inartistic. And what makes it worse is that the actual writing in this passage is curiously bad. There are fine moments, and a great recovery at the very end. But again and again, as we read his account of Abraham or of the Exodus or of the Passion, we find ourselves saying, as Johnson said of the ballad, 'the story cannot possibly be told in a manner that shall make less impression on the mind'. ………. If we stick to what we know we must be content to say that Milton's talent temporarily failed him ……."
Yet even with its flaws, Paradise Lost is an epic that is at once majestic, beautiful, poignant, tragic and instructive. It opens a window into the Biblical story of the fall, allowing the reader to live the experiences and emotions first-hand. What a task Milton took on and how well he succeeded! I predict this read be my favourite of the year. My feeble summary only covers the surface of its significance; you will only have to read it yourself to discover its grandeur!
Further reading: A Preface to Paradise Lost - C.S. Lewis
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