Mending Wall
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That sends the frozen-ground-swell under it,
And spills the upper boulders in the sun;
And makes gaps even two can pass abreast.
The work of hunters is another thing:
I have come after them and made repair
Where they have left not one stone on a stone,
But they would have the rabbit out of hiding,
To please the yelping dogs. The gaps I mean,
No one has seen them made or heard them made,
But at spring mending-time we find them there.
I let my neighbor know beyond the hill;
And on a day we meet to walk the line
And set the wall between us once again.
We keep the wall between us as we go.
To each the boulders that have fallen to each.
And some are loaves and some so nearly balls
We have to use a spell to make them balance:
‘Stay where you are until our backs are turned!'
We wear our fingers rough with handling them.
Oh, just another kind of outdoor game,
One on a side. It comes to little more:
There where it is we do not need the wall:
He is all pine and I am apple orchard.
My apple trees will never get across
And eat the cones under his pines, I tell him.
He only says, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.'
Spring is the mischief in me, and I wonder
If I could put a notion in his head:
'Why do they make good neighbors? Isn’t it
Where there are cows? But here there are no cows.
Before I built a wall I’d ask to know
What I was walling in or walling out,
And to whom I was like to give offense.
Something there is that doesn’t love a wall,
That wants it down.' I could say ‘Elves’ to him,
But it’s not elves exactly, and I’d rather
He said it for himself. I see him there
Bringing a stone grasped firmly by the top
In each hand, like an old-stone savage armed.
He moves in darkness as it seems to me,
Not of woods only and the shade of trees.
He will not go behind his father’s saying,
And he likes having thought of it so well
He says again, ‘Good fences make good neighbors.'
~Robert Frost (1914)
9 comments:
Frost seems to have not liked hunters and so probably was not too keen on the 2nd Amendment.
Maybe we should think twice about re-introducing all of the DWM's back into academic curricula.
Wall haters accept the need for walls.
You outta see the walls in Mexico. They say "keep out." Shards of broken glass set in concrete around the tops of concrete walls. Now this is definitely not decorative. It makes a statement, Seriously, Keep Out.
See what I mean, Jellybean?
It has a fortress on the cheap quality to it.
Here's what you do to get in. Bend a cheap mattress over the glass and boom you're over the wall.
It's more an ugly antisocial statement than actual deterrent.
But it does straightforwardly acknowledge the requirement for walls. In Mexico.
So don't give us any shit about building walls wherever we like for whatever we see necessary. I happen to hate them, but don't give us shit.
I meant to say, si con permiso, por contrario, tengo una pequeña idea un poco diferente. Doesn't that sound just so gringo-y?
I had an insight today that came about by answering somebody with no idea at all what I'm on about.
Because it was one-on-one face-to-face in a restaurant I could use gesticulation to express and my answer in English followed the gesticulated pantomimed sign. The answer had to do with languages, those down there and these up here.
To show you though, I'd have to show how linguists use meta language to talk about English, that is, language about language, and use those same tools to study Egyptian. Egyptologist use the metalanguage sprung from modern language to discuss ancient language millennia before those languages evolved to the point of generating its metalanguage.
They sound ridiculous discussing pre grammar language in metagrammar terms.
Then there are the phonetic symbols for sounds they're not sure of. But they must have these symbols to convey what they think they are hearing and how they arrive at their translation. Most of their discussion is about how to discuss this. It looks like this:
Hold onto your hat, this is Vyvyan.
Both Erman and Nederhof treat the n=k after the imperative jn with masterly inattention. While Angela's suggestion makes much more sense logically, I think it unlikely that the scribe was so out of it as to write =k instead of =j, which is why I desperately sought for a different solution. On the other hand it is a moot point whether, like my fellow Americans, the AE's drew a hard and fast distinction between "bring" and "take" (there is a tendency here to use "bring"regardless of the direction, which is probably something influenced by German and causes endless confusion to British speakers). The fact that there are two distinct imperative roots for "bring" (jn) and "take" (m) would, however, suggest that direction towards or away from the speaker is intentionally marked.
However, regardless of the semantics, there is the device of the dativus ethicus, or as Gardiner calls it the "reflexive dative" used to add vividness to any imperative, so what is literally "bring for yourself" could be translated as "Do bring!" It is somewhat similar to the untranslatable r=f which often accompanies the imperative.
Vyv.
There is one woman in Britain who answered simply when they introduced themselves. There are 40 people thereabout. She said she worked in a local museum and liked the art. She was curious. And I thought, of the 40, here is my kindred spirit. She's going to put herself in it as if she's a child learning the very birth of grammar while all the others are linguists approaching surgically from remote distance made even more remote on purpose, and hand it all as if with very refined chopsticks. The British girl will just slap it on like mud and she'll learn more and faster and better.
That was the insight by speaking another similar language. You would not believe how much those two overlap. Now who in the world is going to notice these similarities between these two strange languages of signs? Huh? Nobody!
It's a very odd insight, I think. The British girl will not overthink things. She will allow for a lot of stupid shit where the erudite metalanguage people cannot. They do, but it's much more difficult for them to hash it out and force-fit every tiny element. As if all is chiseled in stone.
I'm signed up with the class for notifications, but just lurking. There are three classes that I'm lurking. And right then another non lurking member perked up and identified as another kindred spirit. First I had my insight arose from explaining this using another similar type language buttressed with vocalized English, then the Egyptology student express the same thing.
Orlando says this differently. He wrote today: c/p
I think it's a question of method: should we start from grammar
or context? Egyptian is basically an open language, which means
that the reader must interact actively with the text, not just parsing
it according to sets of rules which, in AE, are definitely not well defined
(and not because of our ignorance, but, I am convinced, because they were
not supposed to be so strict).
I think we should look at the inner structure of AEL more like a story-board
or a movie, its rules very similar to those of film editing (various shots
combined into sequences, shot transitions, reverse shots, etc.). It's the
image that takes the lead: more like poetry than pedestrian prose.
And what I find fascinating is that even everyday "pedestrian" events are
expressed in lively images. Filtering them through "our received sets
of rules" is, in my opinion, a highly questionable procedure.
That does not mean, of course, that we shouldn't follow basic directions;
only that we should approach the texts with a more dynamic attitude,
accepting the fact there is not "one and only one solution", but that
an image may be resolved in various, nonetheless"right" discursive versions.
It's not "aut/aut", but, in many cases, "et/et". So grammar should be used just to discard
patently erroneous renderings, whereas "context" helps in
evaluating which solution could be the most appropriate.
Let's get to our specific instance. The king calls the lector-priest, whom
he considers a "brother", asking him for an advice. The lector-priest,
as a medicine man, or, in this case a psychologist, gives his prescription:
DADA: go on a boat ride on the lake of the Palace!
KING: (does not seem much convinced: what good shall that do?)
DADA: Equip it with the most beautiful women of your Palace,
and then you'll see! The sex appeal of their shapes ,their rowing up and down,
will, no doubt, enliven you.
That is exactly what the king does. He is the one who gives orders,
following Dada's prescription. "apr" as imperative is not
an order, but just a counsel, a hortatory invitation, which the king makes his own:
and, by the way, improves: ordering that the young females be basically naked,
enhancing thus his pleasure.
From a grammatically perspective "apr" (has been equipped /
after a boat has been equipped) is certainly acceptable, but, in my
opinion, it does not fit the context as it should. I look at the scene as a
dialogue, not as a consideration done by the lector-priest:
"You should go on a boat ride, once the boat has been equipped for you..."
That would put aside vividness from the scene, which becomes indeed
lively, with the king fantasizing on shapely women.
Of course, that's my approach.
And I'm thinking, right on, Dude. Just then another perked up in support of the same POV. These people, like me, think modern meta grammar that everyone is so freaking fond of, really is not that useful in comprehending as an ancient scribe understands. It's not at all organic.
The second dude responded in support.
I found Orlando's comments very interesting. From the beginning when I started to study Middle Egyptian, I thought, Did the Ancient Egyptians really have a set grammar and rules.
When the scribes learned to write, did the instructor/teacher say, Okay, today we will be learning the past perfect and later we will be studying the subjunctive. Or are we trying to fit Middle Egyptian into the grammar rules of modern languages.
I'm new at this, just my thoughts. Maybe some of the more knowledgeable in the group could share their thoughts on this.
It's about maintaining human structures against the forces that destroy them, but Frost mocks the thoughless cliche of his neighbor.
This is a very interesting poem in that Frost most likely sympathized with both "something there is that doesn't love a wall" and "good fences make good neighbors." There is no proof of that of course and it appears he tilts toward the "enlightened" position. But a later poem shows how much of the hard realist there was in Frost:
Provide, Provide
The witch that came (the withered hag)
To wash the steps with pail and rag
Was once the beauty Abishag,
The picture pride of Hollywood.
Too many fall from great and good
For you to doubt the likelihood.
Die early and avoid the fate.
Or if predestined to die late,
Make up your mind to die in state.
Make the whole stock exchange your own!
If need be occupy a throne,
Where nobody can call you crone.
Some have relied on what they know,
Others on simply being true,
What worked for them might work for you.
No memory of having starred
Atones for later disregard
Or keeps the end from being hard.
Better to go down dignified
With boughten friendship at you side
Then none at all. Provide, provide!
Some people see a wall. Other people see a safe space.
People want walls to protect themselves.
Its a cliche but a true one. All the rich "open borders" types have walls around their houses.
They just don't want the rest of US to have a wall around our country.
Because THEIR walls, and THEIR security guards protect THEM. And to hell with US.
Robert frost's poem suffers from the "Born in the USA effect"
People forget the actual song - or poem - and just remember a phrase.
In this case "Good fences make good neighbors".
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