11P Course Outline

SCHEDULE OF LESSONS Year 11 Oz Poetry unit 2000

1. Definitions of key devices. Recognising devices.

Use a SELF TEST with answers. Consult Poetry Analysis.

2. The poet's CRAFT:

See Gill's "Killing a Whale", Stewart's "Leopard Skin"(p. 46), Wright's "Metho drinker" (handout).

3. GENRES: Read pp. 11-12 and exercise. View videos pp. 6-7, 13-14.

4. The BALLAD genre:

Compare Noyes' "The Highwayman" (another text of it with images), with Lawson's "The Roaring Days", Paterson's "Clancy of the Overflow". Links to his other poems. About ABP.

5. Writing APPRECIATIONS:

See model (p. 40). Learn to use SPECS and SLIMS.
Write a journal entry in response to Kendall's "Bell Birds".

First exercise model: "Gifts" and "Woman to Man" compared.

6. A poem's SETTING: Poetry Situates Historical Periods:

Australian poetic periods pp. 15-19; Campbell's "Men in Green".

Second exercise: Compare Lawson's Past Carin' with Porter's Your Attention Please

7.Identifying POINT OF VIEW

View "True Australians" video with extracts from Paterson's "Mulga Bill" with historical commentary.
Read Kendall: "The Last of His Tribe" p. 21 and write a journal entry.

8. Poetry of Henry Lawson: "The Roaring Days" journal report.

9. Poetry of Oodgeroo Noonuccal:"We are going" , "Now and Then."

10. Meet Bruce Dawe: in"Homecoming", and"Life-Cycle"

11. Meet Colin Thiele "The Improvers" (p. 46) and appreciation.

12. Meet Kenneth Slessor. "Sensuality" Views on The Outback.

13. Meet Judith Wright: pp. 28 - 30

"Bullocky" p. 27, and "Trapped Dingo".
Comparison exercise "The Sliprails and the Spur" with "Bullocky."

Discussion of "Eli Eli"

14. Meet Les Murray "Recourse to the Wilderness", and "Poetry and Religion".

15. Assessment: see Criteria Sheet distributed and read Sample exam answers .

Click here for enrichment and extension challenges.

Preparing for the assessment task

FOR REVISION: Explain the following phrases that could occur in a critique:

1. "... clusters his metaphors round a central theme .....'

2. " anthropomorphises the mountains ...."

3. " ......breaks the regular rhyming pattern at the climax...."

4. "..... challenges readers with apt oxymorons...."

5. "This neologism is quite effective."

6. " onomatopoeic sounds feed the ear as eye delights in sight rhymes"

7. "... many rhyming couplets"

8. " ... an insistent rhythm throughout..."

_______________________

PRACTICE EXAM QUESTIONS 90 minute examination, 600-800 words

1. Choose ONE of the following poems from Australian poets you have studied, and write a considered appreciation of about 600 words in paragraphs. Remember to name the poem and the poet you choose. You will need to critique the poem, by analysing both its form and content, locating it within its historical context and identifying themes in it typical of that poet.

2. Compare and contrast TWO Australian poets whose styles, content and themes appeal to you.
ADVICE for writing critiques:

Read both poems thoroughly
List similarities and differences.
Decide a theme for your analysis - here: death in Australia's hostile environments
Draft your critique using the suggested grid on the criteria sheet.
Have regard to:

Type of poem brings a package of characteristics - e.g., elegiac tone.
Dramatic situation - time and place
Point of view - poet's involvement, tone, attitude?
Poetic diction - ease or difficulty in accessing the theme
Sound/Tone - craft of the poet
Imagery/Allusion/Symbolism - language, impressions, connotations
Rhythm - patterns offer predictability/stability, lack of suggests what?
Mood - crafted? how conveyed?

MORE FREE ADVICE

Avoid patronising statements like:
"it's a credit to the poet she was able to achieve the pathos she did"

Your enjoyment is not the reference criterion. Avoid:

"I appreciate the poem and the message."

"Esson's style doesn't grab me."

Further, do not use contractions except in dialogue.

In analytic essays, be more specific. Avoid woolly statements like:

1. "Esson took a negative angle"
Does this mean: he was critical of events, or he took sides 
in a well known debate, or he was pessimistic, or what?
2. ". . this contrast makes for interesting conversation."
Chance to make the point about comparisons and typicality is lost.
3. "Both poems had something to offer to the reader."
This is not praise but damming with faint praise.

Be sensitive to choose the right word. Consider these mis-targetted words:

"fetid scene of crime"
"looks at Australia uniquely"
 "an unurbaned landscape"
Use OED dictionary words please. No neologisms.

Edit your expressions:

"society is prejudice to her people." (!)

ideallic or idyllic?

'a low moralled society' = what?

Be self-critical. Avoid awkward expressions such as:

"Death doesn't seem to hold any extreme stance in everyday life 
at the time of each poet's writing yet features heavily in both."
"It makes us glad that there is such beauty in the world which we live in."

Adopt a dispassionate scholarly voice:

Don't say "you" say  "what we now call" or similar
Answer questions you pose.  Posing questions is not analysis.

Claims must be substantiated:

"'The Victims' is easily establishable (sic) as one of his works."

Focus on the topic as the controlling idea of your essay.  It might be entitled:

"Moving with the Times: How Australian poets reflect contemporary 
preoccupations in Australian life."

PREPARING YOUR CRITICAL-ANALYTIC ESSAY: "How the poem represents 
different eras of Australian life."
Locate the poems along these descriptive scales:

rural.............................................urban concerns/setting
poet speaks as one of a group...............poet speaks as an individual
colonial ......national......multicultural.........international outlook
optimistic ...............critical.................cynical tone
issues typical of the era.........................atypical of that era
typical of that poet .............................random, unique, one off
expressed a societal view or value .............individual view or value
takes a 'masculine' view........................'feminine' view.

Say who the readers of these poets are, what they were experiencing, 
what they valued and expected.   
Complete the sentences with relevant historical information:

"Colonial Australians valued ..................."
"Post war Australians expected ................."
"Post Vietnam Australians viewed ..............."
"Post-modern Australians see ..................."
"Contemporary Australians would value .........."
   etc.

Situating poets' attitudes in their society: Identifying Different Poets' Attitudes on the same theme

A poet conveys an attitude to his or her subject matter in the poem in
the content and the form.

The content is what is said:
e.g., This poet criticises roadbuilders as no more than the highwaymen of old for ravaging the earth and showing little sensitivity about heritage issues.

This poet celebrates the challenge, poignancy and fragility of new love.

The form is how it is presented, the packaging of the gift of the poem:

This poet uses the form of the sonnet to explore his feelings about this issue and crafts our response through a series of powerful images that gradually crescendo through the octet to the sestet ës punchline.

The form of the poem also communicates; it converys

how serious the poet is about his purpose (tone, mood)
how focused the poet is about his subject matter
how challenging of the reader he is (stanzas, regular or free verse, use of standard forms like ballad, sonnet, etc.)
how playful the poet is (diction, images, novel juxtapositions, etc).
how much sympathy the poet has for the subject matter
how distant the poet is from his own society, readers (localized words, unfamiliar images, snatches of autobiography, etc.)
how over ambitious the poet is (The Last of his Tribe).

G. Smith 4/9/01


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