'Summer Solstice, New York City' by Sharon Olds
Thesis: Specific formal elements of the poem Summer Solstice, New York City, which include rhythm, syntax, and metaphors, and the response that these elements trigger in readers work together to reinforce the main problem of the poem, which is value of life, and make it understood better by the readers.
The poem Summer Solstice, New York City by Sharon Olds describes a suicide attempt of a man and the actions undertaken by the police to prevent this suicide. However, to understand the main theme raised in the poem specific formal features and the readers’ response to them should be analyzed. This aim is best achieved by applying two approaches to the literary text analysis: Formalist and Reader-Response criticism.Formal characteristics of a text are the main factors accounting for conveying the message of a literary work. Thus, to understand the meaning of the poem Summer Solstice, New York City these characteristics should be analyzed. The first thing about this poem that catches the reader’s attention is its specific rhythm and rhyme patterns. It is a free verse, which has neither fixed meter, nor end rhymes. Moreover, the organization of the text into lines is also specific, because often the break between lines is seen in unusual places: between an adjective and a noun (“on a cloudy / evening”), an article and a noun (“slung with a / rope”), parts of a complex predicate (“grid was / unfolded”), a subject and a predicate (“and he / stepped down”) (Olds). As a rule these parts of speech and of sentence are not separated, but this rule is broken in this particular poem. Such break into lines shows the dynamicity of the described event and quick change of actions. Moreover, the broken rhythm could identify the mixed up feelings of a man, attempting to commit suicide.
The situation around him changes quickly and he perceives it in a distracted, disturbed and confused way.Such a special division of the poem into lines is connected with its another peculiar formal feature, which is syntax. The whole poem consists of only four sentences. These sentences, however, are long, complex and include a lot of homogeneous sentence members. It seems that all periods were substituted by commas, thus creating an unending sentence. Such syntax reinforces the dynamic character of the situation and works together with rhythm.When talking about formal features of this poem, it is necessary to mention abundance of metaphors and similes used. Such metaphors as “a bullet-proof vest, a / black shell around his own life”, “the man's leg hung over the lip of the next world” and similes “stretched as the sheet is prepared to receive a birth”, “the / red, glowing ends burned like the / tiny campfires … back at the beginning of the world” all pertain to the described scene of a suicide attempt (Olds). These metaphors reinforce the feeling that there is …
