LOWELL’S POEM “”: THE CHRONICLE OF THE PUBLIC AND THE PRIVATE

Mohammad Tajuddin Assistant Professor,Department of English Language and Literature International Islamic University Chittagong, Bangladesh Email: [email protected]

Abstract

The paper explores the relationship between the public events and the poet’s private issues as presented by Lowell in his poem, “For the Union Dead”. is the most prolific writer of 20th century America. His poem “For the Union Dead” perhaps, is one of the best poems in the 20th century English literature. The supreme poem of Lowell’s career, it is a brilliant fusion of the public and the private themes. Written in free verse, the poem, through different shifting and vivid images of the past and the present, through telegraphic language or rather compressed sentences, contrasts Lowell’s own debased time with the lively and glorious picture of the ideal past of America. In contrast to the debased and devalued picture of the 20th century America of which Lowell was a part or witness, Lowell presents the picture of an ideal past, upon reflecting mainly on a Civil War Memorial dedicated to a civil war Martyr, Colonel Gould Shaw with his “Niggers” soldiers, who sacrificed their lives during the Civil war (1861-65) for great and noble causes or dreams such as equality, economic and racial freedom and unity of the United States of America. But during Lowell’s time people grew selfish due to growing materialism in the 20th century America. Due to the lack of values and ideals, society and the civilization, as Lowell deemed, turned into a sick and decayed entity which was doomed to annihilation. So while presenting a debased picture of history and contemporary America, Lowell also expressed his troubled historical vision and deep private sorrows of mind in the poem, with a sense of loss and nostalgia. The unruly historical forces -- that changed his own town Boston in particular and overall America—created a negative attitude in Lowell’s mind towards history. He was dismayed and shocked at the materialistic change which he thought of as the ominous phenomenon, and not as a sign of development. This paper aims at exploring the issue of the poet’s private mind and its drama with the public affairs in order to understand how Lowell saw his debased time through his historical awareness, along with his own private vision, and produced, at the same time, a note of criticism of the unruly change of history and public events that, according to Lowell, resulted in nothing but unethical materialism and commercialism.

Keywords: For the Union Dead, Gould Shaw, Civil war history, change, Public and private mind, sense of loss, nostalgia, materialism and commercialism

INTRODUCTION the present and past in such a way that the poem becomes an extraordinary example of Lowell‘s th Robert Lowell, the most prolific writer of the 20 artistic craftsmanship and perfection in poetry. To th century America, while addressing the 20 century- narrate and present the debased picture of a decayed people of his own town Boston in particular and the and devalued culture of his time and the effects of whole American in general in his poem, ―For the such culture on his mind and society, Lowell picks up Union Dead‖, combines the dramatic feelings of his a statue or memorial relief of 19th century American private mind and the actual happenings of history of civil war hero, Colonel Gould Shaw with his

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―niggers,‖ placed opposite to the State House of details. In a greater scale the poem ―For the union Boston. Based on the death and sacrifice of Colonel Dead‖, I like to think, presents a picture of universal Gould Shaw and his black soldiers, who fought in the conflict between one‘s individual ideal self and the American civil war (1861-65) in the 19th century, devalued forces of society in any particular historical, Lowell contrasts the glorious past of sacrifice and socio-cultural and political milieu. ideal with the debased present of selfishness and commercialism of the 20th century of which Lowell The poem has been studied thoroughly with some was a part. Observing the civil war relief of Colonel other similar poems of Lowell and the various things Gould Shaw, with a troubled vision of mind and have been analyzed to find out the nature of the sense of loss and nostalgia, Lowell ruminates over relationship between the poets‘ private and the public the ever changing culture and demographic and events. To understand the relationship between the geographic change of his own town Boston against poet‘s personal and the public issues in the poem, the the former canvas of the poet‘s mind that he had text of the poem has been analyzed elaborately, along created during his childhood forty or fifty years back. with socio-political and historical situation and Lowell presents a lot of references to contemporary events in details related with the poem. socio-political events of American history related with civil war and many other things. Lowell, Before writing the paper an extensive study was moreover, goes back to the American history of last made on the life of the poet and his books with a three centuries in order to delineate the decayed view to understanding the relationship of the poet‘s culture of his time or to contrast the past with the private and the public events in a broader scale so as debased, norm less or devalued present due to the to make the endeavor taken in this paper easy and growth of materialism and commercialism. Lowell‘s comfortable with respect to understanding the musing, triggered up by his observation of the civil relationship between the poet‘s private issues and the war memorial relief dedicated to Colonel Shaw and public matters in the poem, ―For the Union Dead‖. his black soldiers; goes back and forth over the Based on the analysis of socio-political and historical shadow lines of long American socio-political history issues related with the poem the paper also has specially the civil war (1861-65) in relation to his analyzed the text of the poem with a critical mind in understanding of his own 20th century America. the context of the related history as well as the life of When he ruminates the poem reveals his own private the poet. mind and its reaction to the historical changes. What makes the poem ―supreme‖ (Perkins, 2006, p.414) in DISCUSSION Lowell‘s career is, perhaps, Lowell‘s capacity of Robert Lowell (1917-1977) was born in a Bostonian mingling too many issues of history at a time in such Brahmin family. Proud of being one of the members a small poem. As a result of the self-revealing of an old New England family and having musing and reflections of the poet over the decayed relationship with cultural heritage of Boston, and present and the ideal past the poem becomes the being relative to one of the renowned poets of his chronicle of the poet‘s private mind and the public time, Amy Lowell, Lowell enjoyed some advantages, events. and he had relationship with many contemporary OBJECTIVE AND METHODOLOGY literary figures such as Randal Jarrell and and others. Though he was born in an old The aim of this paper is to argue the issue of the protestant family, he converted himself into poet‘s private relationship with the public events Catholicism, and by this he presented not only the and to explore it with one of the ‗supreme‘ poems of sense of his rebellion against his family‘s religious the poet‘s career. Though Robert Lowell has written tradition but also revealed his own deep spiritual many poems on public and private themes earlier like crises. A bipolar suffering from manic depressive this one, the poem ―For the Union Dead‖, which is illness Lowell, who grew later disenchanted with regarded as the supreme of Lowell‘s career, has never religion and God, became one of the ―conscientious been explored as this paper explores the issue in objectors‖ and developed a kind of moral authority

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and vision based on both of his personal troubled his own time accordingly. Sometimes, Lowell psyche and the actual happenings outside in society directly depends on contemporary or past historical of America in particular and the world as a whole. He references or facts to judge the present and the future wrote a variety of poems with a variety of themes. of his own American culture and humanity as a His literary career was characterized by ―revision‖ whole. Thus History becomes Lowell‘s concern. and ―changes‖ like his own life (Baym, 1989, American past ‗history‘ and contemporary socio- p.2483). political events offered him plot in the poem, ―For the Union Dead‖ to judge his contemporary society- The year (1943) when the United States of America though the burden of his own family history was entered the Second World War, Lowell composed substantial for him to write poetry as he did not only and published his first book of poems, Land of in but also in other autobiographical Unlikeness. But he got the recognitions as a poet for books such as History, The Dolphin (1973), etc. ever with his publication of Lord Weary’s Castle in 1946. His reputation was more increased by his Perhaps, because of a very chaotic political situations ―groundbreaking‖ book Life Studies (1959), in which and disturbing scenes of killing and murder of the he produced not only ―a new more accessible style‖ innocent civilians especially in Germany, in the (Perkins,2006,p. 406) but also produced a way for a context of Second World War, Lowell developed a new type of poetry called . very negative attitude to history. According to Lowell Sylvia Plath and many other poets were influenced ‗History‘ focused on mania, violence, egoism, lust, by Lowell‘s style of confessional poetry. Though a conquest, cruelty, servility, greed, corruption and ―political-historical theme‖ (Perkins,2006, p.413) suffering from the ancient world to the present day. runs through Life Studies, most of the poems of Life Throughout history, Lowell wants to say, no progress Studies are yet autobiographical, characterized by or advance had taken place and he hopes nothing for sexual obsession, impotency, and restlessness, fear of the future (Perkins: 2006, p. 409-10). The frustrating madness, grotesque psychic realities and suicidal picture of Lowell‘s view of history reminds us of impulses. What is interesting is that Lowell presents W.B. Yeats‘ disturbing vision of change in ―The in Life Studies his personal psychic landscape and his Second Coming‖ and the nemesis of human history relationship with his wives and children, along with and so called idea of ‗progress‘ of human civilization, different sociological and historical themes. just as Lowell presents the same in ―For the Union Dead‖. Yeats sensed the rise of fanaticism and He maintained his reputation by the publications of brutality in the context of Irish struggle of two more brilliant books in the 1960s, For the Union Independence, the Easter Rising and the Civil War. Dead (1964) and Near the Ocean (1967).Though the So Yeats says, ―mere anarchy is loosed upon the private lyrics in For the Union Dead (1964) do not world‖ and the best (people) of the society lacks have generally the same circumstantial detail and the conviction to face the anarchy, while the majority of narration of Life Studies, For the Union Dead was yet people-- the young or old—are restless driven by the the book which contained all original verses of new trend of history. Similarly, Lowell sensed human Lowell after Life Studies. For the Union Dead (1964) corruption, ugly materialism and greed behind the includes a number of poems including the title poem external material changes under the covering of ―For the Union Dead‖ which fuses private and public progress or development in contemporary America. themes (Baym, 1989, p.2484). Lowell also wrote on a Lowell seems to be a little compromising with his number of historical figures in poems like ―Caligula‖ former view of history that history is nothing but the ―Jonathan Edwards in Western Massachusetts‖ and human corruption and greed etc. here in the poem ―Lady Raleigh‘s Lament‖. In the title poem ―For the ―For the Union Dead‖, while at least he contrasts the Union Dead‖ and ―Fall 1961‖ Lowell combined debased present with the glorious ideal past of private and public concerns.(American Poetry sacrifice represented by Colonel Gould Shaw and his Foundation, 2014). Based on his private and public black soldiers in the civil war. concerns and experiences Lowell creates his own historical awareness and he makes an assessment of

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Lowell composed ―For the Union Dead‖ in 1960. It America, after the Second World War, entered a new was also the height of American Civil Rights phase of material progress with rapid movement by the black Afro-American who had industrialization and urbanization from the previous historical connection with those slaves who had agricultural economy. After the economic recession fought for their freedom in the Civil War in the 19th or the famous depression in 1930s in America and century, and thereby they were declared free or throughout the Europe, the Second World War stirred released from slavery based on the historic the American nations more than ever because of ―Emancipation Proclamation‖ of Abraham Lincoln Hiroshima and Nagasaki bombing. Later, American on January 1, in 1883.After the American Revolution civil rights movements in 1960s and 70s with the (from 1776 to 1783) the civil war was one of the incident of American involvement in the Vietnam most important historical events in the American War (1954-75) created waves of socio-political and ―historical consciousness‖(Mcpherson,n.d.).Though economic turmoil. Anti-war sentiment grew among the Declaration of Independence (1776) of American many Americans with the national pride and founding fathers constitutionally declared America as humanitarian consciousness. Also, Lowell who was a free and independent nation with equal rights for the ―conscientious objector‖, the critic of American all, the civil war finally tested the ideas of ―natural foreign policy of war and American government, felt rights‖ that is, constitutional ideas of freedom and an urge to address the people of his time. In the midst values. It was the civil war which decided what was of American material progress, there was still a fear going to be the nature of the union or the future of the of nuclear annihilation; along with the violation of USA--whether it would be one nation based on ideas the rights of black people. So Lowell, with reference of ―natural rights‖ as propounded by the American to people‘s familiar things, contrasts his own founding fathers without slavery and human bondage twentieth century and the ninetieth century with a or would be a divided nation having a separate special focus on the civil war, along with his personal sovereign government for every individual state. and historical concerns and vision in order to address Finally, however, with the victory of the North over his time and his people. While contrasting the two the South slavery was abolished and was established different centuries, along with poet‘s childhood one United States of America. And the very title of memories with present adulthood through different the poem indicates its historical connection with contrasting and vivid images, Lowell, at the same those union soldiers, who fought and sacrificed in the time, presents his private troubled psyche in relation 19th century American civil War (1861-65), between to all historical and public matters. the North and the South states of the USA for the unity of the union. The civil war broke out because of Lowell starts the poem ―For the Union Dead‖ with the North‘s and South‘s disagreements on many reference to the historic marine Aquarium in South issues such as tariffs, state‘s rights etc. notable-- Boston which was established in 1912, and later slavery. But according to the title of the poem, ―For when it was demolished in 1950s, Lowell grew an the Union Dead‖ the Union, (meaning the USA) adult man. The last stanza of the poem ends with established by the deaths and sacrifices of the reference to the same Aquarium mentioned in the numberless union soldiers including the black and the first stanza, but the actual ‗aquarium‘ of Boston white, is dead now, because the dreams of union outside of the poem and the aquarium in the poem soldiers for the free union of ‗equal rights‖ rather carries different connotation in the end. It is (Mcpherson,n.d.) without racial segregation are dead because Lowell always creates a world of his own in the United States of America in the 20th century. based on his observations of actual things and actual The union---of equality, moral values and natural experiences of his Boston. And in between the first rights---is dead now in the time of Lowell. So he stanza and the last stanza there are different time commemorates the civil war of the 19th century to shifts/lines with the rest of the poem related with remind the 20th century people of its value, along different historical events. A reader must follow the with his reflections on the values and ideas for which track of these historical time shifts Lowell has Colonel Gould Shaw and black soldiers sacrificed produced to understand how he connects his private their lives. mind or awareness with all these time shifts at the

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same time, to relate the present. He has done this The season is ill—, through many flashbacks strategies: We have lost our summer millionaire, Who seemed to leap from an L. L. Bean My hand draws back. I often sigh still Catalogue. His nine-Knot yawl was auctioned off for the dark downward and vegetating kingdom to lobstermen…‖ of the fish and reptile. One morning last March, I pressed against the new barbed and galvanized The millionaire became rich from the business of L.L.Bean, a mail-order house, Maine, USA. Whether fence on the Boston Common. Behind their cage, the millionaire committed suicide like many other yellow dinosaur steam shovels were grunting millionaires during the fall of capitalism and as they cropped up tons of mush and grass bankruptcy of the twentieth century USA (Baym, to gouge their underworld garage. 2003) or just died of disease is not mentioned by Lowell. But Lowell presents an image of Lowell himself said, ―I have flashbacks to what I contamination over the landscape saying, ―A red fox remember, and notes on old history.‖(Poetry stain covers Blue Hill‖, as if the place were infected Foundation, 2014).The old South Boston aquarium, and haunted by death and disease. The poem is set in which was once visited by many tourists also the poet Castine, Maine, a New England state where Lowell himself during his childhood, is now a desolate had a summer house. Lowell thus presents in ―Skunk (image of Sahara desert) place without tourists or Hour‖ the death of a lively New England culture with visitors. The word ‗Sahara‘ also foreshadows the the growing urbanization and commercialism as he atmosphere of the poem just as the lines in Macbeth: does the same in ―For the Union Dead‖. A sign of ―Fair is foul and foul is fair…‖ or in Dickens‘s A ―sterility‖(Axelrod,1978) throughout the landscape is Tale of Two Cities: ―This is the best of time this is the very clear while reading the ―Skunk Hour‖ just as the worst of time…‖ reveal something ominous. Sahara sign of desolation or sterility is heightened in ―For indicates ominous decay in the snow or barrenness the Union Dead‖ through the image of ― a Sahara of without life .After many years when the poet visits snow‖ in the first stanza and, ―the aquarium is gone‖ the place; he sees now the ―broken windows‖ and the in the last stanza. What is significant is that the poet ―dry airy tanks‖ of the aquarium signifying the loss (or the ―persona‖ in the poem) is caught up by the of a vibrant culture with an evidence of decay. The sterility and the sense of loss or desolation himself. In outward landscape with the images of broken ―Skunk Hour‖ he writes: ‗I myself am hell‘. Once, windows, together with the reference to cod fish and regarding his personal link with the poems Lowell loss of its ―scales‖, create a sense of loss in the says, ―I am a poem‖ (Perkins, 2006). He also adds consciousness of the poet‘s mind. Once Cod fish was that if poetry were ―I‖, it would be more convincing the means of lively economic activities of the New to the readers. England by which many became rich. With a sense of nostalgia the poet remembers his childhood when he Like his reflection on Nautilus Island of Maine and used to visit the place and ―crawled‖ his nose ―like its change in ―Skunk Hour‖, here in the poem, ―For snail on the glass‖ of the aquarium, with the the Union Dead‖ Lowell definitely becomes critical ―compliant fish‖ to drift bubbles. Like T. S. Eliot, of the urbanization process of cotemporary Boston Lowell virtually presents a picture of waste land, with the growing number of new arrival of where the spirit of life is waning day by day in the immigrants who are changing the old bucolic and context of socio-economic and material changes or so idyllic scenario of South Boston into a very harsh called ―progress‖, but behind the progress there is a chaotic clamor of busy city life with construction decline in people‘s values. Earlier, Lowell presents works by big steam shovels or bulldozers: the grimmer picture of Waste land without people‘s noble purpose or values in his autobiographical or My hand draws back. I often sigh still confessional poem: ―Skunk Hour‖, a poem from Life for the dark downward and vegetating kingdom Studies: of the fish and reptile. One morning last March, I pressed against the new barbed and galvanized

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fence on the Boston Common. Behind their cage, gouge‖) underground garages for the growing yellow dinosaur steam shovels were grunting number of cars in the city. Picture of social decay and as they cropped up tons of mush and grass corruption is intensified when we see that dinosaur is to gouge their underworld garage. replaced by steam shovel just as reptile and snail are replaced by different machinery and cars, instead of When Lowell (often) sighs ―still for the dark horses or cows that moved in Boston Common in the downward vegetating kingdom‖ (meaning lost green 17th century. dark bushy land with different creatures and plants) Throughout the poem runs evidence of Lowell‘s of reptile and fish which he used to experience during ―personal history‖ (Poetry Foundation,2014).Asked his childhood, he reveals not only the deep sorrow of to participate in the Boston Arts Festival in 1960, mind with nostalgia for the lost natural landscape due Lowell recited the poem in the gathering of about to the growing urbanization, but also reveals a four thousand people in the Boston common and he romantic notion of the love of nature and natural was acclaimed by the audience for the recitation. The creatures. Lightly, the evocation of Lowell‘s poem was written in memory of the civil war hero, childhood memory in the poem is similar to the Colonel Robert Gould Shaw whose sister, Josephine, evocation of memory by Dylan Thomas as in his had married one of Lowell‘s ancestors Charles ―Fern Hill‖ and we see similar evocation in the Russell Lowell (who was also, like Gould Shaw poetry of Wordsworth. But unlike the British killed in battle). In this regard, it is an undeclared romantic poets, Lowell is directly concerned with the family poem of Lowell. However, with the public matters like Walt Whitman. From the point of publication of For the Union Dead and The Old view of a modern environmentalist or a naturalist Glory in 1960s Lowell actually ―returned to a Lowell‘s stand against reckless urbanization is very consideration of individual‘s relation to history both clear in his words: ―Last March, I pressed against the in its personal and public dimensions‖ (Poetry new ―barbed‖ and ―galvanized fence‖ on the Boston Foundation, 2014). What Lowell suggests here in the common‖. Creating a sense of mental discomfort in poem is people‘s negligence and indifference to mind by such words as ―pressed‖, ―barbed‖ and history, national heritage and the sacrifices of those ―galvanized fence‖, Lowell declares the presence of who died for a noble and great cause. Lowell thinks hard iron, a symbol of modernism and machinery, that growing materialism and human greed cause this around the Boston Common, the historic park which indifference. When Lowell presents the picture of was established in 17th century and it was an open construction works (―excavations‖) going on in place at that time for people and their horses or cows Boston beside or close to the statue of Shaw, he to move freely. Now Lowell finds the same park in makes some comments and expresses some the 20th century fenced with iron-made ―barbed wire‖ reflections on the situation. Here public events to save it from growing number of city streets and become the occasion for personal reflections: moving people. Lowell creates a deep sense of the pastness of the past and its presence in the poem, Parking spaces luxuriate like civic ―For the Union Dead‖ in contrast to the present over sand piles in the heart of Boston. which he ruminates through the shades of ages. A girdle of orange, Puritan-pumpkin colored girders Lowell ―organizes key images from the past into a braces the tingling Statehouse, pattern which illuminates the present (Baym, 2003, shaking over the excavations, as it faces Colonel p.2484)‖. He does it here, with some vivid imagery Shaw of natural creatures such as ―snail‖ ―reptile‖ and the and his bell-cheeked Negro infantry prehistoric animal ―dinosaur‖. These creatures, which on St. Gaudens‘ shaking Civil War relief, belonged to the ―dark vegetating kingdom‖, have propped by a plank splint against the garage‘s decreased or are no greater in number or not at all earthquake. because of people‘s greed for land and need of human habitation. That‘s why the present is devoid of Upon observing big ―parking spaces‖ full of cars in dinosaur, reptile and snail but full of big bulldozers the ―heart of Boston‖ Lowell mocks at the fragile clamoring behind the Boston Common to make (―to ―civic‖ duty or behavior of the city dwellers with the

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suggestive words ―sand piles‖. ―The tingling from the beginning of the poem with other issues statehouse‖ on the other hand is shaking over the related to his childhood memories and other excavations as the construction works are going on important Bostonian historical heritage such as cod for the modernization of the city and for an urban fish and reference to the historic Boston Common renewal. Opposite to the historic statehouse built in etc. Lowell maintains such style in many other poems 1713, is propped by a plank splint the statue of such as ―The Memory of the West Street and Lepke‖, ―Colonel Shaw and his bell-checked negro infantry‖ ―Skunk Hour‖ and ―The Quaker Graveyard at produced by Irish- American sculptor St.Gauden Nantucket‖. Lowell keeps silent so long about the (1848-1907). The Gould Shaw memorial, which not main issue of his poem and suddenly outbursts or only commemorates the sacrifice of Shaw and his breaks silence in the middle or almost at the last part Negro soldiers who laid down their lives in the civil of the each of these poems. Thus every poem takes war but also presents a model of sacrifice for the multiple dimensions when Lowell makes comments Bostonian, is now propped by a plank against the on different things before and after of the main point ―garage‘s earthquake‖. Lowell reflects over the or theme of his poem. Nonetheless, private and present condition of the statue and how people are public themes remain the dominant affairs. treating it. Once Keats pondered over some imprinted Sometimes, some words and phrases create images on a Grecian urn and wrote his poem, ―Ode ambiguity in the meaning. But such ambiguity on a Grecian Urn‖. Keats presents the beauty of true reveals an extraordinary strength of his perception at art and its permanence rather than what the ancient the same time, so sometimes the ambiguity of his Greek-- women, young boys and men in the picture style is regarded as the beauty of Lowell‘s poems. imprinted on the urn-- were doing. Here unlike Keats, Perkins likes to call Lowell‘s style as Hardship style Lowell is thinking over the statue of Shaw and Negro (2006).Also, influenced by the Metaphysical poets of soldiers not to present the beauty of arts or its the 17th century; Lowell‘s poems are witty, punning, permanence, but the picture of decay and loss during and paradoxical. his time due to growing urbanization and Lowell quotes a Latin epigraph, immediately after the modernization. Here in ―tingling state house‖ title of the poem, inscribed originally on the bronze- ―tingling‖ suggests impermanence and ―earthquake‖ made civil war relief dedicated to Colonel Shaw suggests a threat of destruction. So, the old heritage slightly changing it like: Relinquunt Omnia Servare of history and glorious past will be destroyed or Rem Publicam, which means ―They gave up already under the threat of destruction. It is also an everything for the republic‖. Lowell just pluralizes ironic situation for Lowell that he was critical of the ‗He’ into ‗They’ in the epigraph in order to uplift the Irish immigrants who were responsible for changing sacrifices of the Negro soldiers with that of Colonel the city Boston mostly, but the civil war relief over Shaw, the only white commander of the 154th which he is talking has been made by an Irish- Massachusetts regiment comprised by ―niggars‖. In American sculptor, St. Gaudens. Also, Lowell‘s the height of the Civil war black soldiers were vision of history--personal or public- is bleak and recruited as soldiers after a long time debate. grim. As a bipolar who had several mental Whether or not they were fit for the battles, the black breakdowns and manic depressive illness and who slaves were finally recruited by the North in order to married thrice having disturbing family life, must crush the strengths of the South slave states. The have had deep anxiety and despair. Perkins says, 154th Machasusetts regiment under the command of Lowell‘s poems have the same ―multiple dimensions Colonel Gould Shaw, a white man, was one of such just as T. S. Eliot‘s The Waste Land had expressed many regiments comprising of black slaves as the present and past life of a modern city and also soldiers to fight against the South slave states. So Eliot‘s own despair, conflating a historical, during the Civil Right Movement when Lowell sociological, and personal vision‖ (Perkins, 2006, p. presented the issue of Shaw memorial with its image 404). What is significant about Lowell‘s style here is of black soldiers, it carries a special significance or that Lowell focuses on the name of Colonel Shaw implication in the contemporary socio-political and his memorial in the sixth stanza of the poem context, and presents Lowell‘s own political and when already he has finished almost five stanzas moral stand regarding the civil right movement.

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Black-Afro Americans brought out procession during the war, though he was not known to have against discrimination and racial segregation under participated in the war. Lowell, quoting the portion of the leadership of Martin Luther King, the then William James‘ speech, highlights the ever fresh American clergyman, and Malcolm X, another great memory of the black soldiers in American civil war leader of the time. Both the leaders were the history, at the same time the artistic perfection of the staunchest critics of social and racial discrimination statue, which was one of the specimens of the and American materialism. Perhaps, Lowell extolled beginning of early American sculptures. the white commander Colonel Gould Shaw and the bravery of the black soldiers at the same time, as if Thus, commenting upon some historical facts, Lowell Lowell were trying to say that the black also had the again comes back to his own analysis of the present, contribution to forming the present USA or Union to of his own time revealing his private mind at the ensure equal freedom and economic justice for the same time. Lowell says, ‗Their monument sticks like white and the black(Shepherd,2007). Thus Lowell fishbone in the city‘s throat‘ as if the city people did established the relationship between arts and politics. not want the monument anymore. The civil war However, many of Lowell‘s poetry have such memorial or the ―monument‖ is as intolerable as connection between arts and politics. In the statue ―fishbone‖ in the throat of the people of city. People Colonel Shaw, the white commander, is seen riding want to get rid of it; they want to throw it away. on a horse in the middle, a sword in hand, surrounded People‘s dishonor and disrespect to old heritage and by other black soldiers who are marching on foot sign of history is not a new thing. Thus Lowell carrying muskets on their shoulder. They seem to be presents the picture of the debased present. Then resolute and determined for their cause. Lowell talks Lowell again focuses on the image of Colonel Gould about the consequence of the battle at Fort Wagner, Shaw sitting on the horseback as ―lean as a compass- North Carolina, when the 154th regiment under needle‖. The thin body of the colonel compared to Shaw‘s command fought with the Confederate compass needle perhaps indicates the strict life style soldiers and sacrificed their lives, two months after of the man. It is said that Shaw was a great they had passed off Boston: ‗disciplinary‘ in his profession and during training he would not hesitate to shoot any trainee if anyone Two months after marching through Boston, found guilty. A strong trainer and strong disciplinary half the regiment was dead; as he was he also had control over his health and at the dedication, fitness of the body. Perhaps, Lowell also wants to William James could almost hear the bronze Negroes indicate that the colonel is firmly fixed at his target breathe. like the foot of the compass. It is interesting that, Their monument sticks like a fishbone sometimes, some lines of the poetry of Robert Lowell in the city‘s throat. produce some ambiguous suggestions rather than any Its Colonel is as lean direct meaning. Therefore, from such ambiguous as a compass-needle. suggestions are produced different layers of meaning. This feature of Lowell‘s poems is in abundance in ―Half the regiment‖, meaning half of the black ―For the Union Dead‖. soldiers, died at Fort Wagener Battle with its white commander Gould Shaw in 1863 when they In addition to this, as Lowell moves back and forth confronted the Confederate soldiers during the civil throughout the poem from the past to the present and war. William James, American writer, psychologist vice versa, it easily reminds us of Eliot‘s style in and the famous Bostonian, who in the dedication ―The Waste Land‖. Also, when Lowell quotes Latin ceremony to the Shaw Memorial or at the epigraph as collage at the beginning of the poem or opening/unveiling ceremony of the memorial held on from William James‘s speech, these just prove the May, 31, 1897, spoke the crowd and said, ―He could modern and post modern turn in the poetry of Lowell. almost hear the bronze Negroes breathe.‖ William Just as T.S. Eliot quotes an epigraph from Dante‘s James was one of the witnesses to the movement of Inferno, at the beginning of the poem, ―The Love the 154th Machasusetts regiment through Boston Song of J. Alfred Prufrock‖ or many such allusions

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as collage and in ―The Waste Land‖, Lowell does the Lowell‘s personal reflections on the statue, and also same not only in ―For the Union Dead‖ but also in his sayings ―he has an angry wren like vigilance‖ in ―Skunk Hour‖, ―Man and Wife‖, ―The Quaker relation to Shaw‘s true nature of a real captain of the Graveyard in Nantucket‖ and ―The Memory of West regiment; and his saying ―He rejoices man‘s lovely, street and Lepke‖. Using fragmented lines, quotation, peculiar power to choose life and die…‖ in relation to collages and epigraph is the style of modern poetry as the ideal position of Shaw‘s sacrifice of his life are extensively used by T.S. Eliot. Gilbert says, early in extraordinary. He died for the unity of the union from his career Lowell embraced Eliot and Ezra Pound and real sense of patriotism. Shaw and his noble sacrifice he died with the ―burden of the embrace‖ (Lecouras, is not time bound, ―He is out of bounds now‖ though 2000). Lowell actually was born with modernism not people seems to be neglecting Shaw and his sacrifice. after or before it. However, what makes Lowell Shaw leads his inexperienced black soldiers to death, different from T.S. Eliot is that Lowell presents that is, he knew that he was going to fight a clearly, as he has done in his autobiographical and matchless battle because the opponent confederate confessional poems, his own self, which comes very soldiers were more experienced and stronger than his close to the ―persona‖ in each of his poems. But own 154th regiment comprised of less experienced according to T.S. Eliot‘s Tradition and the Individual slave soldiers. But Lowell says, ―He cannot bend his Talent the poet‘s individuality exists separately from back‖ (retreat) from battle because he is going to the poetry. For T. S. Eliot poet and poetry are two fight and die with his black soldiers not for any separate entities. Moreover, ―For the union Dead‖ has selfish gain but for noble notion and dreams. both the autobiographical as well as confessional qualities which contradict with the poetic theory of Lowell then contrasts people‘s attitude to the T.S. Eliot propounded in the Tradition and the rememebberanc or celebration of the ―sincere Individual Talent. rebellion‖ meaning the American Revolution, and the Civil war with a reference to the ―Grand Army Lowell continues celebrating Colonel Gould Shaw Republic‖, an organization of Civil War veterans for based on his observations and personal reflections of the well being of all members. ―Frayed flags‖ the statue, as he views it with personal feelings. The (distorted or ragged flags) are visible on (―quilt‖, following lines basically highlights the actual covers) the Graveyards of the Grand Army Republic personality and temperament of Colonel Shaw as he and less flags are visible on the sparse of village really was, and also represent Shaw‘s ideal position churches spreading in the green fields. It indicates for which he sacrificed life with other ―niggars‖ with that the memory of the civil war is not being smiling face and enjoys the ‗secret pleasure‘ with his celebrated as it should be or the memory of the war is private mind which no one could understand except distorted or ragged in the people‘s consciousness. for another ideal person. So, Lowell presents Shaw, Also, it indicates that the American Revolution as if he were suffocating for privacy (for that ―secret (―sincere rebellion‖) was rather meaningful and pleasure‖ caused by sacrifice of life for a noble important than the South‘s attempt to fight for cause) and frowning at people‘s negligence on the slavery in the civil war (Shepherds, 2007): contrary: On a thousand small town New England greens, He has an angry wren like vigilance, the old white churches hold their air a greyhound‘s gentle tautness; of sparse, sincere rebellion; frayed flags he seems to wince at pleasure, quilt the graveyards of the Grand Army of the and suffocate for privacy. Republic. He is out of bounds now. The stone statues of the abstract Union Soldier He rejoices in man‘s lovely, grow slimmer and younger each year— peculiar power to choose life and die— wasp-waisted, they doze over muskets when he leads his black soldiers to death, and muse through their sideburns . . . he cannot bend his back.

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Thus the memory of really ―abstract‖ (because they Shaw‘s father did not want to take away his son‘s do not physically exist now) union soldiers who died dead body from the mass grave where the other black in the 19th century civil war is fading day by day. The soldiers (―niggers‖) were buried with him. Lowell statue is going to ―grow slimmer and younger each thinks that or he analyses this situation saying that year‖ because the memory of the ideal past is fading Shaw‘s father actually did not want the black and the each year, being forgotten. It seems to the poet that white segregation as Lowell is witnessing it in the the soldiers are dozing over muskets, though actually 20th century during his time. Lowell thinks that the soldiers are not like dozing in the memorial, they Shaw‘s father did not want ―racial segregation‖ in are rather seen marching on forward. So why does America, just as he did not want a separate grave for Lowell say they are ―dozing‖? By this Lowell his twenty- year‘s old white boy, Colonel Gould perhaps wants to say people walking beside the Shaw. According to Lowell‘s perception Shaw‘s memorial seldom pay attention or indifferent to the father did not want the monument or the memorial in memorial neglected aside. The motionless silent honor of his son, but rather wanted those ideals of memorial statue, with its life-like images looking equality and humanity to live in the society for which forward with head high, creates a sense of pondering his son sacrificed his life in the civil war. Thus of the statue. So it seems to the poet ―the soldiers are Lowell actually presents his position against any musing through sideburns‖, as if they were looking racial segregation and discrimination in the USA into eternity, being completely detached not only during the civil rights movement. What is the value from the clutches of ever-changing time but also of the statue or memorial if the ideals on which the from selfish twenty- century people. memorial is built are not followed by people? Then Lowell, who was a wholehearted anti war Then Lowell relates more historical and personality, contrasts the American civil war (1861- contemporary facts upon which he reflects in relation 65) of the 19th century with the Second World War to the sacrifice of Colonel Shaw, who sacrificed his (1939-45) of his time and says that ―there are no life for a noble cause: statues for the last war here‖, indicating the moral and ideal lacking of the Second World War as Shaw‘s father wanted no monument compared with the American civil war. For Lowell except the ditch, the civil war was fought for some ideals which are where his son‘s body was thrown not the case with the Second World War. The big and lost with his ―niggers.‖ commercial bill board(‗commercial photograph‘) of the Mosler safe company on Boylston street The ditch is nearer. advertising the safe with the picture of ―Hiroshima There are no statues for the last war here; boiling‖, referring to the mushroom-like smoke after on Boylston Street, a commercial photograph Hiroshima bombing, shows inhuman commercial shows Hiroshima boiling mentality. Helen Vender says, ―It is heartless in its appropriation of Hiroshima for commercial purposes over a Mosler Safe, the ―Rock of Ages‖ (1987)‖ It is said that a big iron safe of the Mosler that survived the blast. Space is nearer. Safe Company in the Tokyo central bank survived When I crouch to my television set, the atomic blast. The ―Rock of the Ages‖, a the drained faces of Negro school-children rise like contemporary Christian song, is mockingly applied to balloons. the safe that survived the blast to indicate its toughness. ―The ditch‖ used earlier in the previous When Shaw was dead at Fort Wagner battle, he was stanza refers to the mass grave where Shaw was buried in the mass grave (―the ditch‖) with his black buried with his black soldiers and the actual trench soldiers (―niggers‖) with a sense of hatred by the dug up by soldiers during fighting battle, but here the confederate soldiers though he (Shaw) could have got ―ditch is nearer‖ indicates the fear of nuclear an appropriate burial ritual as the high military annihilation or destruction of the poet. Lowell was official; if Shaw‘s father would claim for it. But one of the ―Conscientious objectors‖, a group which propagated during the World War-II that they had

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full right to reject any law of the government which, if they thought were, morally wrong. Lowell writes to Life is but strife— the USA president ―we are growing a chauvinistic Tis a bubble nation and are going to be the next of nuclear Tis a dream— annihilation‖. So, Lord Weary's Castle, with its And man is but a little boat blending of oppositions to war, to the Puritan ethics, Which paddles down to the stream. and to materialism and greed, is Lowell's finest early volume, one that earned him the Pulitzer Prize in Lowell‘s use of the word ―bubble‖ in the last stanza 1947 (Poetry Foundation, 2014). He does the same creates the same disappointment, writes about the protest against war in the poem, ―For the Union disillusionment of the dreams of Colonel Shaw in the Dead‖. ephemeral and fleeting American materialistic society, where still the black are fighting for their Further, when Lowell says ―Space is nearer‖ it refers right. This not what Colonel Shaw and the black to the launching of the Soviet Sputnik satellite in soldiers fought for in the civil war: 1957 that undermines the US‘s convictions of unshakeable superiority after the Second World War. Colonel Shaw Lowell, perhaps wants to say that when he ‗crouches is riding on his bubble, his television set‘ to watch news, he finds no satellite he waits going up into the space from the USA, but ―drained for the blessed break. faces of Negro school children‖ going up like balloons. Thus Lowell not only refers to the civil Lowell not only expresses his own disappointment right movement in the context of the black‘s fighting but also becomes suspicious of the longevity of the against racial segregation and economic dreams of the union soldiers, including the longevity discrimination in the USA (Shepherd, 2007) but also of the existence and presence of the Shaw Memorial regrets the racial discrimination or American racism in a society like his. prevailing still in the age of science and technology. Just as the aquarium mentioned in the first stanza is With a frustrating image of Colonel Shaw Lowell gone with its ―fish‖ and ―bubble‖ no more, the also, finally brings back, in the last stanza, the former memorial of Shaw will vaporize very soon from the image of the Aquarium, he used to visit during his memory of people. The break of the memorial childhood, and which later was destroyed in 1950s whether by the construction works or not will be when the author grew old and found the place blessing for Shaw to enter the timeless eternity of deserted as Sahara. Now ―Colonel Shaw is riding on ideals rather than being in the temporary city devoid his bubble‖ and ―waits for the blessed break‖. The of ideals, regards Shaw memorial as ―fishbone‖ in its ideals for which Shaw sacrificed his life are going to throat. The famous Tudor Ford car and its huge be in vain, are impossible to be fulfilled in the USA production due to its continuous demands among the which is a society of people‘s devotion to machinery American folk changed the scenario of the American and internal racism. The Shaw memorial, it seems to street of the 20th century. Here, the ―Car‖, which is the poet, is waiting for the blessed break‖. Emily the sign of the contemporary materialistic Dickinson, who belonged to the Calvinistic puritan development in the USA, replaced the ―fish‖ and family, calls disillusionment ―a bubble burst‖. The ―reptiles‖ or animals such as horses etc. that connote metaphor serves to capture the suddenness of or suggests the lost bucolic background, before the disappointment. In the New England puritan poetry huge demographic change of Boston and thereby the as of the poetry of Dickinson, bubble meant the physical change of landscape through construction brevity of life, just as here Lowell uses the word was happened. ―A savage servility‖ of people‘s mind ―bubble‖, Dickinson in the same way uses bubble and passion due to the materialism is seen powerful and ―produces the fragile, ephemeral, fleeting and throughout America reflected by ―giant finned cars‖ insubstantial quality of life in a multiplicity of that nose forward (move forward) like fish in the metaphors‖ (Mahmud, 2009, p.39): street and lanes of the USA in huge numbers. Lowell

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here reflects over the demographic and materialistic writing, my impression is that the thread that strings change going on in the USA with a sense of it together is my autobiography"(Poetry frustration and nihilism. Greed becomes the dominant Foundation.2014). In ―For the Union Dead‖ the poet force behind all these changes according to Lowell. presents also a drama of conflict between the poet‘s Therefore people are enslaved to greed or destructive personal aspirations and the actual tendency of desire like Gatsby in The Great Gatsby. history with its socio-political events. History results in change in different way and different manners in When the poem closes Lowell presents a very people‘s attitude and beliefs and in the physical individual reflection showing his dispirited self like world- geographically and demographically. People Philip Larkin in analyzing the materialistic change. in Lowell‘s time grew materialistic and commercial The poem closes with a ―memorable image of the that contradicts with the ideals of sacrifice and contemporary United States‖ (Perkins, 2006, p. 414): martyrdom of the civil war hero, Colonel Gould Shaw and his black soldiers. However, when History The Aquarium is gone. Everywhere, changes the time and the history itself and brings giant finned cars nose forward like fish; irresistible changes--whether good or bad-- in a a savage servility particular time period, individuals sometimes have slides by on grease. nothing to do but to reflect upon the changes, as Lowell has done in this poem. Lowell cannot produce A Society or Humanity: so materialistic, regressive, a solution to the problems of the materialism and cowed and self-hating: is riding on a bubble and, it people‘s too much greed and their indifference to ―will soon break‖ (Perkins, 2006, p.414). Lowell Shaw memorial but to comment on the changes wants to say humanity without noble ideas and ideals happening during his time. He expresses a deep is doomed to annihilation as he witnessed in the sorrow of mind with a sense of loss reflecting upon Second World War by the Hiroshima and Nagasaki not only the memory of Colonel Shaw and his bombing. So the ideals of Shaw‘s sacrifice, along memorial but also different historical and political with the sacrifice of the Negro soldiers, are public events of the contemporary America and the celebrated and commemorated by Lowell to establish past. Thus the poem becomes, in portraying the some values in Lowell‘ devalued and debased devalued society of materialism lacking in certainty, society. the history of the poet‘s private and the public events CONCLUSIONS making the poem supreme in Lowell‘s career because of its extraordinary mingling/combination of vivid In "After Enjoying Six or Seven Essays on Me," a images of the past and the present that covers 1977 Salmagundi essay, Lowell wrote that "looking virtually history of over three hundred years of over my Selected Poems, about thirty years of America, not only the history of Lowell‘s own time.

REFRENCES www. britannica. com / EB checked / topic / 1. Axellrod, Steven Gould. (1978). On ―Skunk 1193 American - civil - rights - movement. hour‖: Retrived from: http: // www. english. 6. Lecouras,Peter.(2000).The postmodern turn illinois .edumas / poets / gl / Lowell / skunk. htm. inRobertLowell‘spoetry:RetrievedFrom:www.hig 2. Biography, (2014). Robert Lowell. Retrieved hbeam.com. from: http:// www. poetry foundation . org / bio / 7. Mcpherson, Bydn. James. (n. d). A brief robert - lowell. overview of the civil war, Retrieved from: http: // 3. Baym, Nina. (Ed.). (1989). Norton Anthology of www. civil war. org / education / history / civil- American Literature. Vol. 3. 3rd Edition, New war overview / overview. html). York: Norton Company. 8. Mahmud, Masud. (2009). Launched into eternity: 4. Baym, Nina. (edit.). (2003). Norton Anthology of a study of Emily Dickinson‘s poems and letters. American Literature. New York: Norton Dhaka : writers. ink, the university press. Company. 9. Perkins, David. (2006). A History of Modern 5. Carson, Clayborne. (2014). American Civil rights Poetry, Modernism and after. Printed in India: movement, Encyclopedia Britannica http: //

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ABS publishers by arrangement with Harvard University Press, USA. 10. Shepherd, Reginald. (2007, March 28). Robert Lowell and the Massachusetts 55th . Retrived from : http : // Reginald shepherd . blog spot . com / 2007 / 03 / Robert – Lowell – and – Massachusetts - 54th _ 28 . html.

APPENDIX (1) : THE SHAW MEMORIAL, Colonel Shaw with the “Niggers” in the CIVIL WAR RELIEF, on which the poet reflects:

propped by a plank splint against the garage‘s earthquake.

Full Text of the poem: (2) For the Union Dead Two months after marching through Boston, “Relinquunt Omnia Servare Rem Publicam.” half the regiment was dead; at the dedication, The old South Boston Aquarium stands William James could almost hear the bronze Negroes in a Sahara of snow now. Its broken windows are breathe. boarded. The bronze weathervane cod has lost half its scales. Their monument sticks like a fishbone The airy tanks are dry. in the city‘s throat. Its Colonel is as lean Once my nose crawled like a snail on the glass; as a compass-needle. my hand tingled to burst the bubbles He has an angry wrenlike vigilance, drifting from the noses of the cowed, compliant fish. a greyhound‘s gentle tautness; he seems to wince at pleasure, My hand draws back. I often sigh still and suffocate for privacy. for the dark downward and vegetating kingdom of the fish and reptile. One morning last March, He is out of bounds now. He rejoices in man‘s I pressed against the new barbed and galvanized lovely, peculiar power to choose life and die-- fence on the Boston Common. Behind their cage, when he leads his black soldiers to death, yellow dinosaur steamshovels were grunting he cannot bend his back. as they cropped up tons of mush and grass to gouge their underworld garage. On a thousand small town New England greens, the old white churches hold their air Parking spaces luxuriate like civic of sparse, sincere rebellion; frayed flags sandpiles in the heart of Boston. quilt the graveyards of the Grand Army of the A girdle of orange, Puritan-pumpkin colored girders Republic. braces the tingling Statehouse, The stone statues of the abstract Union Soldier shaking over the excavations, as it faces Colonel grow slimmer and younger each year-- Shaw wasp-waisted, they doze over muskets and his bell-cheeked Negro infantry and muse through their sideburns . . . on St. Gaudens‘ shaking Civil War relief,

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Shaw‘s father wanted no monument the drained faces of Negro school-children rise like except the ditch, balloons. where his son‘s body was thrown and lost with his ―niggers.‖ Colonel Shaw is riding on his bubble, The ditch is nearer. he waits There are no statues for the last war here; for the blessèd break. on Boylston Street, a commercial photograph shows Hiroshima boiling The Aquarium is gone. Everywhere, giant finned cars nose forward like fish; over a Mosler Safe, the ―Rock of Ages‖ a savage servility that survived the blast. Space is nearer. slides by on grease. When I crouch to my television set,

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