Poetry Appreciation

Count me in! I'll dig out the poem.

Sounds interesting, I will look it out also.

It can be Googled.

www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/singlePoem.do?poemId=7070
Extraordinary.
I don't think we should copy and paste. It is not out of copyright.
I think one thing I like about it is the sensory description of the journey - the camels, the scenery, the difficult camel men, all expressed so vividly.

I'm game as long as it's not like that dreadful programme on Radio 4 on Sunday afternoons. Before anyone posts, I am NOT referring to "Poetry Please" there is a new one where they go and talk to poetry groups who read their own poems and the rest of the group then discuss them.

The group seem to be able to converse reasonably well, but some then adopt that bloody awful "poetry reading" voice. Aaaaarrrrrghhh.

Sorry everyone, as you were.

It is an extraordinary poem.
It goes from almost mundane descriptions of the discomforts of a journey - which are wonderfully achieved - you really can imagine yourself there - to their sense of awe and the way the experience has had an impact on everything around them when they return to their homelands. At least I think that is what it is trying to say - what do others think?

What a good idea, Jess!

Yes, Mishap you're right. It's the almost conversational tone at the beginning that makes the rest of it so real.

How about a touch of Betjeman? (Typically snobbish, I'm afraid.) It is Advent after all!

www.famouspoetsandpoems.com/poets/john_betjeman/poems/787

Hang on Ariadne - I am hoping we have not done with the Magi just yet.
I read this out to DH last night and struggled to not club. Can someone help me with this? I am not religious. And it is the antithesis of sentimental babe in the manger tear jerker.

Phoenix I am with you there on that program. I caught that the other week not good.

There are a lot of good poets and writers who should not read ther own stuff.
Carol Ann Duffy for one I find she has a rather monotonous voice.

www.poetryarchive.org/poetryarchive/singlePoem.do?poemId=11509port

Does anyone remember The Tony Hancock sketch on the subject of modern poetry?

JessM from what I remember of A level E.lit. Circa 1965/6. It's about T.S Eliots journey to conversion to catholicism. He is not the most accessible of poets!
Is rather incomprehensible poetry elitist? I am sure it is possible to write poetry that offers deep meanings but is easy to understand.
Discuss.

Oh, OK. Sorry. Will keep out.

Don't go away ariadne - just we can only discuss one poem at a time - maybe we should have "poem of the week" if there is enough interest.
nellie yes there is obviously a christian theme in it. Do you think the journey is metaphorical? Or just the last part?
That should have read "sorry not to b-l-u-b" - post probably didnt make sense.
So why should this make an atheist want to cry? Come on you lurkers. There must be some more poetry lovers out there?

Yes - a Poem of the Week is a good idea. I am happy to treat The Coming of the Maji as this week's and move on to the Betjeman for next. What do people think?

I am very interested to hear that it represents a religious conversion - I was not aware of that. I am not surprised that it makes an atheist want to cry - that is what good poetry is about. It is like good opera - you do not have to believe the far-fetched plot in order to be moved by the emotion and the beauty of the music.

The repetition of the words "set down this" is the moment for me when the mood changes and I feel he is about to say something important. I puzzle about the last line - what exactly does he mean? That moving on as a person involves leaving your old self behind? That this process is painful? It certainly feels like a cry from the heart and something that is very personal to him.

I share the view that poetry does not have to be obscure to be profound and meaningful. But, I sometimes enjoy stretching my brain by trying to grasp something that is not immediatley obvious to me - that can bring its own rewards. One of the problems with the classic poets is that they make so much reference to myths and legends and the classics in general - it presupposes a level of education that may not be granted to all. And is it of its time - it is likely that the references in current poetry will seem a bit opaque to readers in the future.

ariadne

I agree with jess, a poetry appreciation thread would be good. I think one of the themes of Journey of the Magi is that though it is about the birth of Christ and Christmas is a joyful celebration, Good Friday is also present in our minds. Christ was born so that he would die for us. Apart from the direct reference to death at the end, there are the three trees on the skyline and the gambling and the pieces of silver. I agree it is about a journey of faith but I need to think about that a bit longer! The Magi represent the Gentile world as Christ came for Jews and Gentiles......

The poem's first section is easy to understan, depicting the hardshios of the journey and the thoughts of the Magi on the wisdom of the enterprise.
But the poem’s middle section is less easy to understand. As the journey draws to its close, so the scenery has more warmth and life. The “three trees” evoke the three crosses on Calvary while the “pieces of silver” evoke Judas Iscariot. Our modern Magus is not necessarily happy to have arrived at his destination – “you may say” the place was “satisfactory”, he himself seems not so sure…

In the poem’s third section the old man is sure that the journey was worth the trouble, but it left him nevertheless with a huge question mark: how could a scene of birth, the scene of a new-born child, have left him at the same time with such a sensation of death, of “hard and bitter agony” ?

Because when the Magus got back to his kingdom, he found he could no longer live as he had lived before. He found his own people now “alien” to him, clutching hold of the pagan gods of his old way of life, which could no longer satisfy him, because after meeting the Child he could no longer be a pagan. But he had gone through no rebirth of his own into any new dispensation, so that the whole experience felt only like death. In conclusion, he would not be unhappy to die.

It is intriguing how people of different religious views find different ideas in this poem - the mark of a good poem, in that it speaks to humanity rather than to one group of people. The Christian symbolism is very overt and clearly intentional, but as an agnostic I can read it in another way - as a man who travels and is overcome by meeting ideas and special people and can no longer live his life as he did before. Aloost the idea of being "born again" by being so changed by his experiences. It is similar to the young people who took the hippy trail to the east and learned about other religions and about a less materialistic way of life - they came back and found it hard to fit in, as they had "died" to their old life.

There are lots of Christmas poems and carols that make the same point about birth/death and foreshadow the rest of the story. The carols in particular are very beautiful.

Mishap, your interpretation reminds me of Tennyson's Ulysses: 'I am a part of all that I have met.' He is so changed by his experiences that he can't settle to a static life.

Thank you for your insightful contributions.
Yes I guess when we gaze in awe at a newborn there is a sense of wonder and sometimes a combination of hope and foreboding.
The two turning points seem to be the "satisfactory" line and the "now set down this" repetition. Almost like the toll of a bell.
Does he mean to be ironically understating when he says it was "satisfactory" ?
I guess it could be interpreted as someone sets out in life with a goal, struggles to achieve it and then - what is left once the goal has been achieved? Only death.
Or maybe that when you go searching for something, you may find something else instead.
It reminds me a bit of the Cavafy poem Ithaca. also about a journey, in which he says:

Ithaka gave you the marvelous journey.
Without her you would not have set out.
She has nothing left to give you now.

When I read it the whole death in birth thing jumps out at me as I was present at my GD's birth and 2 days later my mother died unexpectedly - it was hard not to see the ageing and decay that faced even such a new person - it was a very strange experience, as these are not usually the sort of thoughts that you have when a baby is born.

I like the idea of the "set down this" as the tolling of a bell - it is certainly a turning point in the poem.

It is such a popular poem - it clearly speaks to people in different ways. Hearing it read well is quite a chilling experience and has an impact even when you are not totally sure what he wants to say.

That must have been a difficult experience mishap.
I like the echoes:
"A cold coming we had of it" and then to round that section off,
"A hard time we had of it"
What confidence he had too, to start so many lines with an 'and"
The journey part is very real, prosaic, sensory and vivid. You can almost hear the camels farting can't you. Bit like a photographic record almost. (slide show!)
Then a complete change of mood as they descend into the fertile valley. Still visual but bringing in the biblical references for the first time.
The "satisfactory' comment is a kind of anticlimax, big punctuation point. Followed by the sadness of the last section and another anticlimax.
Ah - I was thinking 'epiphany' - that does refer to the Magi doesn't it. It is about a personal epiphany?

You can, if you want to, study and analyse the poem. God knows, there is enough on the net these days to help/totally confuse you.

Or, you can just read the poem, many times, and feel the sadness, and the hopelessness, and the longing in the words.

No doubt there are many biblical references, and different views of what the poet was referring to, but in the end all we really have is the poem. And what it means to each of us individually.

Who knows if the magi longed for an easier death than the one he was experiencing in turning away from his old ways and beliefs. Or whether he found it all to much to contend with, and wanted the more final death of himself.

I don't think it matters. Just experience the poem. And don't try to think too hard.

Wise words JO

Would you mind if I joined you? I'm not particularly clever or articulate but I do love poetry

It is good to hear from you are more length than usual Jo5. That is an interesting point of view. The same argument can be made when it comes to paintings in art galleries. I tend not to read little "blurbs" written by curators and stuck on the wall. I am not sure whether I agree with you re poems or not. It's Head vs Heart. Can you have both, or do you have to choose?