Topical Guide 766
Mark Dorset
Allusion, Resonance
What a Piece of Work I Am, Chapter 56:
SHE GLANCED AT HER WATCH and said, “Each of my several cycles of popularity was characterized by a different set of ambitious lovers.”
“Ambitious lovers?”
“Yes. Greg and all the others. They all wanted something—”
“I thought you said earlier that they all wanted only one thing.”
“Do I seem to contradict myself? Very well, I seem to contradict myself. In fact, though, I don’t. They all did want only one thing—”
She used the pause.
“—but it took many forms.” The impish look, a raised eyebrow.
Laughter.
Walt Whitman, “Song of Myself”:
The past and present wilt—I have fill’d them, emptied them.
And proceed to fill my next fold of the future.Listener up there! what have you to confide to me?
Look in my face while I snuff the sidle of evening,
(Talk honestly, no one else hears you, and I stay only a minute longer.)Do I contradict myself?
Very well then I contradict myself,
(I am large, I contain multitudes.)I concentrate toward them that are nigh, I wait on the door-slab.
Who has done his day’s work? who will soonest be through with his supper?
Who wishes to walk with me?Will you speak before I am gone? will you prove already too late?
What a Piece of Work I Am, Chapter 56:
“Some wanted me to listen to them. Some wanted to tell me what to do. Some wanted me to tell them what to do. Some wanted me to introduce them to a wider audience—and so on.” A long pause, a sigh, a distant look. “But of all of them, the best, and the worst, was a thin blond boy, younger than I, named Terrence.”
Eurythmics, “Sweet Dreams (Are Made of This)
A. E. Housman, “Terence, This Is Stupid Stuff”:
Terence, this is stupid stuff:
You eat your victuals fast enough;
There can’t be much amiss, ’tis clear,
To see the rate you drink your beer.
[…]
Ale, man, ale’s the stuff to drink
For fellows whom it hurts to think:
Look into the pewter pot
To see the world as the world’s not.
And faith, ’tis pleasant till ’tis past:
The mischief is that ’twill not last.
Oh I have been to Ludlow fair
And left my necktie God knows where,
And carried half way home, or near,
Pints and quarts of Ludlow beer:
Then the world seemed none so bad,
And I myself a sterling lad;
And down in lovely muck I’ve lain,
Happy till I woke again.
Then I saw the morning sky:
Heigho, the tale was all a lie;
The world, it was the old world yet,
I was I, my things were wet,
And nothing now remained to do
But begin the game anew.
Therefore, since the world has still
Much good, but much less good than ill,
And while the sun and moon endure
Luck’s a chance, but trouble’s sure,
I’d face it as a wise man would,
And train for ill and not for good.
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