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Witnessing an insane performance of "Do not go gentle into that good night"
I was an English major in college, which was probably a foolish decision, since I have always been obsessed with making money, and I have never been interested in working as an English teacher. But I went to a community college, so it cost pretty much nothing, at least.
I took this one class called "Performing Poetry" with Professor Caraway. It was at 8:00 in the morning, which was an unthinkably early hour for me at the time… But Professor Caraway had made it pretty clear that there was not going to be any real homework or even a final exam—it was just going to be us all performing famous poems theatrically for the rest of the class. In the end, I decided it was too easy of an A for me to miss, so I spent that semester dragging my zombie ass to class to act out some poems…
Professor Caraway was very serious about poetry. She had this philosophy that poetry was meant to be performed; to be communicated out loud from one person to another. That's how it was done in the old times, and that's how it should be done today. It was how poems gained meaning, she said.
Then she had us all go around and introduce ourselves, and tell the class our favorite poem. I don't think many of my sleepy brethren were prepared to announce what their favorite poem was. They were all saying "umm" a lot, and like four or five of them said "The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost. I watched Professor Caraway's eyes thin into dubious slits…
When it was my turn, I announced that "Love Calls us to the Things of this World" by Richard Wilbur was my favorite poem, and that seemed to cure Professor Caraway's doubts a bit. But I was glad she didn't ask me to share my favorite line...
Then the lady next to me introduced herself. She was older than the rest of us—50 or so—and she had big, crunchy bangs and thick glasses. She said her name was Gurli, and she was from Denmark. She had come to America twenty-five years ago to marry her husband, and now she was divorced. She said her favorite poem was "The Raven" by Edgar Allen Poe, "because the Raven just won't stop interrupting!!" She laughed heartily, thinking on the bird.
Every eye in the classroom looked curiously at Gurli…
It actually ended up being a pretty fun class. I only had to bear the excruciating torture of waking up at 7:45 for like 20 minutes, because Professor Caraway made sure to get our engines up and running. She started every class with stretching and yelling exercises, and sometimes she even brought coffee. After warming up, we would start performing poems. Professor Caraway would assign us our poems a few days in advance, so we could prepare a little bit, but it truly didn't matter if you prepared at all. As long as you went up there, and read off the page, and made it clear with your body and face that you were feeling the meaning of the poem, Professor Caraway was satisfied.
We all pretty much got the gist, except for Gurli. She would do the most contrived, obvious interpretations of the poems. If the word "open" was in a poem, she would act out opening a door, even if there was nothing about doors in the poem. And for whatever reason, she affected a herpy-derpy caricature of a Scandinavian accent for every poem she read. Professor Caraway was very encouraging and nice, but it was clear that Gurli was not quite getting it the way the rest of us were.
I sat next to Gurli, and we actually became pretty good class buddies, so I tried to help her out. "Don't look down at the page so much," I told her, "that way you'll be able to let your face do some of the acting, and express what the poem means to you in your heart"
"Hmm…I'm going to memorize my next poem!" Gurli said earnestly.
The next class, Gurli went up to the front, but she did not bring any paper with her. She had a big smile on her face, and she looked determined. She opened her mouth and started reciting, from memory, "Do not go gentle into that good night" by Dylan Thomas.
I don't know if you all know of this poem, but it is a devastatingly sad poem. It's about a son begging his father not to die.
The way Gurli chose to interpret this poem was absolutely fucking insane. To this day I cannot fathom what was going through her head when she decided to perform it the way she did. She treated it like some sort of pre-school singalong. She smiled crazily throughout the whole thing, nodding and mouthing the words slowly as if inviting the rest of the class to join in. Then when she would get to the line "rage, rage against the dying of the light"—which is repeated several times throughout the poem—she would ball her fists up, stomp her feet, and shake her head, as if having a temper tantrum, and then laugh her ass off for several seconds before starting the poem again.
When Gurli was almost finished, I risked a glance back at Professor Caraway, who was sitting in the back like she always did during performances. Her face was unfathomable. It was as if every fiber of her being was focused on making the blankest face she possibly could. She was witnessing the death of a beautiful poem, and despite her efforts, her eyes showed it…
When Gurli finished, she bowed and then winked over in my direction. Some of the other students and I clapped politely.
To this day, I still think about that travesty of a performance. And whenever I read "Do not go gentle into that good night," I can't help but to read it in Gurli's crazy, laughing voice…
#entertainment
source
I was an English major in college, which was probably a foolish decision, since I have always been obsessed with making money, and I have never been interested in working as an English teacher. But I went to a community college, so it cost pretty much nothing, at least.
I took this one class called "Performing Poetry" with Professor Caraway. It was at 8:00 in the morning, which was an unthinkably early hour for me at the time… But Professor Caraway had made it pretty clear that there was not going to be any real homework or even a final exam—it was just going to be us all performing famous poems theatrically for the rest of the class. In the end, I decided it was too easy of an A for me to miss, so I spent that semester dragging my zombie ass to class to act out some poems…
Professor Caraway was very serious about poetry. She had this philosophy that poetry was meant to be performed; to be communicated out loud from one person to another. That's how it was done in the old times, and that's how it should be done today. It was how poems gained meaning, she said.
Then she had us all go around and introduce ourselves, and tell the class our favorite poem. I don't think many of my sleepy brethren were prepared to announce what their favorite poem was. They were all saying "umm" a lot, and like four or five of them said "The Road Not Taken" by Robert Frost. I watched Professor Caraway's eyes thin into dubious slits…
When it was my turn, I announced that "Love Calls us to the Things of this World" by Richard Wilbur was my favorite poem, and that seemed to cure Professor Caraway's doubts a bit. But I was glad she didn't ask me to share my favorite line...
Then the lady next to me introduced herself. She was older than the rest of us—50 or so—and she had big, crunchy bangs and thick glasses. She said her name was Gurli, and she was from Denmark. She had come to America twenty-five years ago to marry her husband, and now she was divorced. She said her favorite poem was "The Raven" by Edgar Allen Poe, "because the Raven just won't stop interrupting!!" She laughed heartily, thinking on the bird.
Every eye in the classroom looked curiously at Gurli…
It actually ended up being a pretty fun class. I only had to bear the excruciating torture of waking up at 7:45 for like 20 minutes, because Professor Caraway made sure to get our engines up and running. She started every class with stretching and yelling exercises, and sometimes she even brought coffee. After warming up, we would start performing poems. Professor Caraway would assign us our poems a few days in advance, so we could prepare a little bit, but it truly didn't matter if you prepared at all. As long as you went up there, and read off the page, and made it clear with your body and face that you were feeling the meaning of the poem, Professor Caraway was satisfied.
We all pretty much got the gist, except for Gurli. She would do the most contrived, obvious interpretations of the poems. If the word "open" was in a poem, she would act out opening a door, even if there was nothing about doors in the poem. And for whatever reason, she affected a herpy-derpy caricature of a Scandinavian accent for every poem she read. Professor Caraway was very encouraging and nice, but it was clear that Gurli was not quite getting it the way the rest of us were.
I sat next to Gurli, and we actually became pretty good class buddies, so I tried to help her out. "Don't look down at the page so much," I told her, "that way you'll be able to let your face do some of the acting, and express what the poem means to you in your heart"
"Hmm…I'm going to memorize my next poem!" Gurli said earnestly.
The next class, Gurli went up to the front, but she did not bring any paper with her. She had a big smile on her face, and she looked determined. She opened her mouth and started reciting, from memory, "Do not go gentle into that good night" by Dylan Thomas.
I don't know if you all know of this poem, but it is a devastatingly sad poem. It's about a son begging his father not to die.
The way Gurli chose to interpret this poem was absolutely fucking insane. To this day I cannot fathom what was going through her head when she decided to perform it the way she did. She treated it like some sort of pre-school singalong. She smiled crazily throughout the whole thing, nodding and mouthing the words slowly as if inviting the rest of the class to join in. Then when she would get to the line "rage, rage against the dying of the light"—which is repeated several times throughout the poem—she would ball her fists up, stomp her feet, and shake her head, as if having a temper tantrum, and then laugh her ass off for several seconds before starting the poem again.
When Gurli was almost finished, I risked a glance back at Professor Caraway, who was sitting in the back like she always did during performances. Her face was unfathomable. It was as if every fiber of her being was focused on making the blankest face she possibly could. She was witnessing the death of a beautiful poem, and despite her efforts, her eyes showed it…
When Gurli finished, she bowed and then winked over in my direction. Some of the other students and I clapped politely.
To this day, I still think about that travesty of a performance. And whenever I read "Do not go gentle into that good night," I can't help but to read it in Gurli's crazy, laughing voice…
#entertainment
source
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