Those Winter Sundays
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Those Winter Sundays is a poem written in 1962 by American author Robert Hayden, while he was teaching as an English professor at Fisk University. This poem is one of Hayden's most recognised works, together with another poem entitled The Middle Passage.[1]
The poem is also part of a book called Collected Poems by Robert Hayden edited by Frederick Glaysher.
The poem is about a son that expresses remembrance of his father, realizing that despite their distance there was love between the two. The author's words suggest that the son feels sorrowful and recognizes he never returned his father's love.
| Those Winter Sundays | |
|---|---|
| by Robert Hayden | |
| Written | 1962 |
| Country | United States |
| Language | English |
| Subject(s) | Family and Personal Relationships |
| Genre(s) | Poetry |
| Form | Three Stanzas |
Background
The poem Those Winter Sundays is about the boyhood of Robert Hayden. He was born in an African-American family and given to the neighbours at age two because his mother could not care for him anymore after she and Robert's father separated.[2] Robert's foster parents fought verbally and physically, due to this fact he didn't appreciate his foster parents' love as he should. Through maturity he regretfully learned that he neither knew nor appreciated the sacrifices every parent makes out of parental love.[3]
Themes
The main focus of this poem is the love of parents for their children, but this kind of love can be easily misunderstood by the latter, as it isn't about being kind and saying lovely words but instead are all the sacrifices that parents do for love, providing their sons the necessary for leaving, keeping the house warm and whatever they are able to supply. It often happens that this can pass unnoticed to the childrens because they give everything for granted, but they will figure that out once they will be grown up. The poem reflects how Hayden's perspective of his father's love has changed, and his understanding of it has actually gotten deeper by years gone by.[4]
Title
The author wants the title to imply a sense of old age and exhausted behaviour. Indeed he is reminding us about those cold and dark Sundays during his youth. The poem is featured by a several presence of alliteration and narrative of many and many similar Sundays that seemed an enormous obstacle. Even if this poem narrated a boring and unhappy moment of his life he remembers these memories cause their coldness and their quiet.
Symbols
One of the main symbols with which the poem is concerned with is the symbol of temperature. At the beginning, it makes the reader aware of the cold temperature through the use of words such as "blueblack cold". However, soon in the poem it becomes warm and words such as "fires blaze" enhance this image.[5] This represents the difference in temperature outside and inside the house reflecting the author’s relationship with his father, Robert Hayden's father. The relationship with his father is a cold relationship as he does not see his father as a warm and cheerful man. The image of cold also evokes solitude and emotional distance.
The sentence, "No one ever thanked him" summarises the main idea of the poem itself: the way the father works to keep the family safe and warm without any appreciation.[6] Another symbol found in the poem is the symbol of the "good shoes". As the titles reminds us, it is a Sunday, a religious day. This shows how the father cares about his appearance like he cares about keeping his family warm and protected. The author tells the readers that his father had "driven out the cold", an image which evokes a shepherd's behaviour with his herd. This can be linked to the idea of the Good Shepherd, a biblical reference.
Structure
Those Winter Sundays contains 14 lines in 3 Stanza. This makes it look like a typical Sonnet even though it isn't, it neither has a rhyme nor a regular iambic pentameter. Looking at the first line in matter of metrical pattern, you see that it hasn't got one. In comparison the second line is in a metrical pattern. Both lines are 10 syllables long. The third line does not come close to this and it doesn't have a rhyme.[7] If you have a look on the words blueblack and cracked, the ck sounds are outstanding, this repeating of ck is a consonance. All this Soundplays are a big poetic device.[8]
There are two internal rhymes, "splintering, breaking" in line 5 and "banked, thanked" in line 6. Then there are two alliterations, "Weekday weather" line 4 and "When the rooms where warm" line 7. Furthermore there is a repetition in line 13 "What did I know". And last but not least there are several imageries like "Blueblack cold" line 2 and "Cracked hands that ached" line 3.[9]And in the lines 2-5 the author uses cacophony.[10]
Style
“Those Winter Sundays” is characterized by the typical elements of a Sonnet. There are fourteen lines, and these are divided into three different stanzas of five, four, and five lines respectively. Most of the lines are not in iambic pentameter but they are as long as the lines of classical sonnets.[11] Hayden, using a synesthesia, allows the reader to picture the speaker’s house into a cold environment throughout the word "blueblack," which allude to the image of a frozen corpse.[12]
Bibliography
References
- ^ Biography.com Editors. "Robert Hayden Biography". The Biography.com website. A&E Television Networks. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
{{cite web}}:|last1=has generic name (help) - ^ Biespiel, David (2018-09-27). "Robert Haden: Those Winter Sundays". Poetry Foundation. Poetry Foundation. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
- ^ Landau, Daniel. "Daniel Landau: Robert Hayden's Those Winter Sundays: A Child's Memory". Modern American Poetry. Modern American Poetry. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
- ^ "Those Winter Sundays Theme of Love". www.shmoop.com. Retrieved 2018-09-27.
- ^ MWESTWOOD - Certified Educator. "How does imagery, metaphors and/or similes contribute to the meaning of "Those Winter Sundays"?". eNotes. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
- ^ Connie, Smith (2017-09-15). "Analysis of Those Winter Sundays by Robert Hayden". Poem Analysis. Retrieved 27 September 2018.
- ^ "Analysis: Form & Meter". Shmoop. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
- ^ "Understanding "Those Winter Sundays"". Youtube. SixMinuteScholar. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
- ^ Doyle, Andrew. "Those Winter Sundays". Prezi. Andrew Doyle. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
- ^ Brinkman, Bartholomew. "Those Winter Sundays". Modern American Poetry. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
- ^ Hayden, Robert. "Those Winter Sundays". Encyclopedia.com. Retrieved 28 September 2018.
- ^ mjc. "Those Winter Sundays: a Study Guide". Retrieved 2018-09-28.