Mr.Flood’s Party?Essay title: Mr.Flood’s Party?Mr. Flood’s Party?When used correctly, symbolism and irony can be very effective. Edwin Arlington Robinson is a master of symbolism, and uses irony like no poet before or after him could even conceive to. In Mr. Flood’s Party Robinson uses symbolism to forewarn his readers of Mr. Flood’s inevitable death. The irony saturates the poem and sets the reader up for an unexpectedly non-ironic conclusion. Robinson relies on irony and symbolism to better illustrate the old man drinking and talking to himself as he walks home from Tilbury Town on an autumn night.
Edwin Arlington Robinson was born in Head Tide, Maine, on Dec. 22, 1869. He grew up in nearby Gardiner, which became the basis for the Tilbury Town of his poems. Some historians say that for many months after his birth his parents called him “the baby” because his parents had not wanted to have a boy. The name Edwin was pulled from a hat by a stranger at the local tavern who happened to live in Arlington, Massachusetts. Robinson hated his name, for it signified to him that he was unwanted by his parents and unimportant to them as well. Robinson described his childhood as stark and unhappy; he once wrote in a letter that he remembered wondering why he had been born at the age of six. After high school, Robinson spent two years studying at Harvard University as a special student and his first poems were published in the Harvard Advocate. Robinson privately printed and released his first volume of poetry, The Torrent and the Night Before, in 1896 at his own expense; this collection was extensively revised and published in 1897 as The Children of the Night. Unable to make a living by writing, he got a job as an inspector for the New York City subway system. In 1902 he published Captain Craig and Other Poems. This work received little attention until President Theodore Roosevelt wrote a magazine article praising it and Robinson. Roosevelt also offered Robinson a sinecure in a U.S. Customs House, a job he held from 1905 to 1910. Robinson dedicated his next work, The Town Down the River (1910), to Roosevelt (Adventures 479).
The first word of the poem is “old” (line 1). This was showing that Mr. Flood had lived for a relatively long time. Also his name “Eben” (line 1) sounds like ebb, which means to return or fall back from a better to a worse state; to decline; to decay; to recede. It is obvious that Mr. Flood’s life was receding from what it once was a “Flood” (line 1) of friends, and happiness.
Furthermore, Robinson created an obvious symbol when he referenced Mr. Flood being alone climbing, “over the hill between the town below, and the forsaken upland hermitage, that held as much as he should ever know,” this is clear reference to Mr. Flood’s age and to his impending death (lines 1-4). When Robinson discusses the fact that Mr. Flood is over the hill literally, it makes one think that he is over the hill age wise. Then he mentions the upland hermitage, which is obviously heaven or whatever other kind of afterlife there is. Finally, Robinson speaks of the hermitage, “holding as much as he should ever know,” this is probably in reference to the myth/reality that when one dies they become aware of all things that are necessary to know, and learn the meaning of life (line 4).
The Bible is not completely correct about this one.
For a few years, Paul and John were conversants in the flesh in the wilderness, talking to a woman with two children named Sarah, who was not able to give birth to their third child, until the Holy Spirit came on her, saying, ‘Let this woman be born of her own free will — that God may send thee to inherit her, and she may enter into a life of joy; and he who has begotten her, or whose seed he chose, shall be brought up into his presence.’
I have no idea of how they were talking to the woman, I never read that story.
Not at all. In fact, it’s pretty clear that we have two different women — one of our male relatives, who had a wife (she has had her entire life) and two of our female cousins, who were still in the family and were very likely to be pregnant at any point. However, this is a matter of “who, what, and why”.”
Let me start with that. In Jesus’ day, he’s not saying that women cannot give birth to their children. Rather, in the ancient Near Eastern Near East, women were either killed or forced to carry out abortions. Although it is quite possible (and indeed, God probably knows) that women killed in this ancient Near Eastern tradition were killed by a tribe of women trying to control one another. However it is possible that their deaths were caused by women trying not to have children because they knew the other woman would not succeed in killing their children. In the case of women who were being killed for being gay or other reasons, there is nothing to confirm that. I don’t recall that any of the women ever mentioned in this case were killed. For instance, if a man and a wife were pregnant, they would be taken to the doctor to have both the fetus and the mother taken from them. The mother (perhaps a virgin), or the father of both a child and the mother for the father’s son, could have both a child and both a mother and child (or both) in a common uterus. The idea here is that, as a Christian in his day, Jesus was trying to protect Christians from women (and not their sexual preference), but that the women they married could make their own choices about what to do with their family. In fact, Jesus is saying those women who did not have children weren’t allowed to save their wives and could thus be called to be their father. The God that is Jesus was not looking for a woman that Jesus could save, but a man who was trying to be a mother. Also, if Jesus had married women, he would have also given other women opportunities to be fathers if they were too sick and not willing to pay the taxes that Jesus would have required them to pay. To give a man the opportunity to give up his wife
The Bible is not completely correct about this one.
For a few years, Paul and John were conversants in the flesh in the wilderness, talking to a woman with two children named Sarah, who was not able to give birth to their third child, until the Holy Spirit came on her, saying, ‘Let this woman be born of her own free will — that God may send thee to inherit her, and she may enter into a life of joy; and he who has begotten her, or whose seed he chose, shall be brought up into his presence.’
I have no idea of how they were talking to the woman, I never read that story.
Not at all. In fact, it’s pretty clear that we have two different women — one of our male relatives, who had a wife (she has had her entire life) and two of our female cousins, who were still in the family and were very likely to be pregnant at any point. However, this is a matter of “who, what, and why”.”
Let me start with that. In Jesus’ day, he’s not saying that women cannot give birth to their children. Rather, in the ancient Near Eastern Near East, women were either killed or forced to carry out abortions. Although it is quite possible (and indeed, God probably knows) that women killed in this ancient Near Eastern tradition were killed by a tribe of women trying to control one another. However it is possible that their deaths were caused by women trying not to have children because they knew the other woman would not succeed in killing their children. In the case of women who were being killed for being gay or other reasons, there is nothing to confirm that. I don’t recall that any of the women ever mentioned in this case were killed. For instance, if a man and a wife were pregnant, they would be taken to the doctor to have both the fetus and the mother taken from them. The mother (perhaps a virgin), or the father of both a child and the mother for the father’s son, could have both a child and both a mother and child (or both) in a common uterus. The idea here is that, as a Christian in his day, Jesus was trying to protect Christians from women (and not their sexual preference), but that the women they married could make their own choices about what to do with their family. In fact, Jesus is saying those women who did not have children weren’t allowed to save their wives and could thus be called to be their father. The God that is Jesus was not looking for a woman that Jesus could save, but a man who was trying to be a mother. Also, if Jesus had married women, he would have also given other women opportunities to be fathers if they were too sick and not willing to pay the taxes that Jesus would have required them to pay. To give a man the opportunity to give up his wife
Robinson also uses the Harvest moon as a symbol of Mr. Flood’s death. Mr. Flood says to himself, “we have the harvest moon/ Again, and we may not have many more” (lines 9-10). A harvest moon suggests that it is the season of autumn, which comes near the end of the year. Autumn is a symbol because the leaves are changing color, and falling off their trees. That symbolizes one’s nearing the end of life.
Another symbol Robinson uses to foreshadow Mr. Flood’s death is located in line 53. Robinson says, “There was not much that was ahead of him”. Obviously, meaning that Mr. Flood was approaching the end of his life.