So for my first commercial project this year I’ve decided I’m going to enter the House of illustration competition. The brief for this year is to create an illustration for each of the 3 poems given to you by the competition. The theme of each poem is love. What I’ll likely do here is analyse them and try to work out what each poem means (they’re all written in quite old style English, you know, proper poem language. Nothing like what I write).
The first poem is the good morrow by John Donne, as far as I can tell this is a love poem that is saying that up until he found the love of his life it felt like everything was dull and grey, almost like he had been sleeping his whole life but his life finally began when he met her and he sees her beauty in everything and his world view is completely revolved around her. It doesn’t actually state whether it’s a woman or not but according to my neighbour Bev who is a die hard John Donne fan he was into the ladies. The initial idea I had for this one was to do a couple lying on a bed maybe or lying on a sleeping bag in a cave (as a reference to the seven sleepers) or maybe where they’re just sitting outside of the cave, where they’re staring into each others eyes and either their heads or their bodies are encased in a bubble and then the background around them is very dull and grey, I was thinking of doing a bit of an apocalyptic scene in the background but I’m not 100% sure how I’d manage that.
The second poem is Wild Nights by Emily Dickinson. There’s a lot of speculation about the meaning of this poem, some argue that it’s an expression of her deeply religious views and her love her god but if I’m honest I’m not getting that from the poem whatsoever. Others argue that this poem is about sexual desire, and while I do think that’s more accurate I don’t think that’s all the poem is about. From what I can see from my research Emily Dickinson had led quite a sheltered life in regards to love, she rejected the conventional duties of a married woman and rebelled against the role of a good and dutiful wife. Emily Dickinson would never be married. She put her energies into her studies until she left in her teens to pursue poetry, living a reclusive life on the family homestead until she died. While she was unlucky in love she had many friends, both male and female, who she regularly stayed in touch with by writing letters, one of which I found to a Susan Gilbert (who would later marry Emily’s brother and become her sister in law) has an interesting tone to it. I’ll post it below, but from this letter I think it’s clear to see that Emily was in fact a lesbian, or at least bisexual.
“I have but one thought, Susie, this afternoon of June, and that of you, and I have one prayer, only; dear Susie, that is foryou. That you and I in handas we e’en do in heart, might ramble away as children, among the woods and fields, and forget these many years, and these sorrowing cares, and each become a child again — I would it were so, Susie, and when I look around me and find myself alone, I sigh for you again; little sigh, and vain sigh, which will not bring you home.
I need you more and more, and the great world grows wider, and dear ones fewer and fewer, every day that you stay away — I miss my biggest heart; my own goes wandering round, and calls for Susie — Friends are too dear to sunder, Oh they are far too few, and how soon they will go away where you and I cannot find them, don’t let us forget these things, for their remembrance now will save us many an anguish when it is too lateto love them! Susie, forgive me Darling, for every word I say — my heart is full of you, none other than you is in my thoughts, yet when I seek to say to you something not for the world, words fail me. If you were here — and Oh that you were, my Susie, we need not talk at all, our eyes would whisper for us, and your hand fast in mine, we would not ask for language — I try to bring you nearer, I chase the weeks away till they are quite departed, and fancy you have come, and I am on my way through the green lane to meet you, and my heart goes scampering so, that I have much ado to bring it back again, and learn it to be patient, till that dear Susie comes. Three weeks — they can’t last always, for surely they must go with their little brothers and sisters to their long home in the west!
I shall grow more and more impatient until that dear day comes, for till now, I have only mourned for you; now I begin to hope for you.
Dear Susie, I have tried hard to think what you would love, of something I might send you — I at last say my little Violets, they begged me to let them go, so here they are — and with them as Instructor, a bit of knightly grass, who also begged the favor to accompany them — they are but small, Susie, and I fear not fragrant now, but they will speak to you of warm hearts at home, and of something faithful which “never slumbers nor sleeps” — Keep them ‘neath your pillow, Susie, they will make you dream of blue-skies, and home, and the “blessed contrie”! You and I will have an hour with “Edward” and “Ellen Middleton”, sometime when you get home — we must find out if some things contained therein are true, and if they are, what you and me are coming to!
Now, farewell, Susie, and Vinnie sends her love, and mother her’s, and I add a kiss, shyly, lest there is somebody there! Don’t let them see, willyou Susie?”
After reading this letter, amongst others, I think it’s clear that Wild Nights isn’t necessarily about sex, but rather a sexual awakening and the realisation of Emily’s feelings towards women. The comparisons with the storm are supposed to be her conflicting feelings about her sexuality, and I think overall the poem is about her feeling lonely as she knows she’ll never be fully able to explore any feelings she may have for another woman, and ultimately what Emily isn’t to be someone’s dull and dutiful wife but in fact what she wants is to experience true and real love with a partner as opposed to being a slave to a man.
So, what’s my idea? I have two rough ones. The first idea is in keeping with the sailing references where there are two boats; one a sort of luxury cruiser type (I don’t know, a fancy one) and one a sort of raft (a crappy one) sailing apart from each-other. A woman is chained to the sail of the raft and crying out to another woman who screams from the balcony of the cruiser as she’s being carried away by a man. Obviously the background will be them surrounded by rough seas in the night. My other idea is to have a sort of portrait where there are two naked women, one is sort of staring off into the distance like she’s in a bit of a trance, maybe stood on a balcony where there are like leaves over grown all over the walls and then a sort of see through ghostly like woman embracing her from behind. I’m not sure how well these fit the poem, but it is supposed to be abstract, so I’ll see how they develop from here on out.
The final poem is The Trick by Imtiz Dharker, who I believe collected the poems for the competitions. Now, the poet says she wrote this about a dream she had, and I’ve read some of other peoples thoughts or reviews of the poem who suggest that it could be erotic, but that’s not what I’m getting from this whatsoever. I think this poem is trying to say that the poet is missing someone and they can only visit memories of them when they sleep. So every night they go to bed and hurry to fall asleep that they can relive the memories with this person. Did this person die? was it just a heavy break up? who knows, but clearly Imtiz cared very deeply for this person and not having them in her life is hard for her. For this poem I was thinking of a person lying on their bed with their eyes closed, crying and clutching a picture frame, or maybe to tie in with the second one I could have another ghostly apperition lying next to them and cuddling into them. While I know the writer is a woman I’m thinking I might make this one two men, because I think it’s only right that when we discuss love we display that love comes in more than just one format. Or I’ll make the John Donne poem an illustration of two men. Same sex relationship transparency is important.
I still need to work out some of the details for this, but as I go through it’ll come to me more.
References:
Popova, M. (2019). Emily Dickinson’s Herbarium: A Forgotten Treasure at the Intersection of Science and Poetry. [online] Brain Pickings. Available at: https://www.brainpickings.org/2018/12/10/emily-dickinson-love-letters-susan-gilbert/ https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/emily-dickinson [Accessed 26 Sep. 2019].
Tafarella, S. (2019). Emily Dickinson, Lesbian?: Her Letter to Susan Gilbert, in June of 1852, Might Tell Us Less Than You Think. [online] Prometheus Unbound. Available at: https://santitafarella.wordpress.com/2008/07/15/emily-dickinson-lesbian-her-letter-to-susan-gilbert-in-june-of-1852-might-tell-us-less-than-you-think/ [Accessed 19 Sep. 2019].
unknown, u. (2019). Emily Dickinson. [online] Poetry Foundation. Available at: https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poets/emily-dickinson [Accessed 19 Sep. 2019].
unknown, u. (2019). How to enter. [online] Houseofillustration.org.uk. Available at: http://www.houseofillustration.org.uk/get_involved/how-to-enter-269 [Accessed 16 Sep. 2019].
Meg Dobson-Armstrong Art 