Service makes use of a pun on the word “grisly” (calling to mind the grizzly bear) as he describes the narrator’s wait in the snow while the fire burns up Sam’s remains. Conflict (nature) it is bitter cold-Sam thinks he may die and does not want to be buried in ice. There appears to be some confusion as to why Sam left his warm Southern home. Reread the bolded lines from Stanza 2 of the poem. The Cremation of Sam McGee By Robert W. Service About this Poet Born in Lancashire, England to a bank cashier and an heiress, poet Robert William Service moved to Scotland at the age of five, living with his grandfather and three aunts until his parents moved to … A 12-minute short film, directed by Bob Jacobs, was released in 1982 by The Film Farm and distributed by EBE. Service represented tensions between nature and culture, and he claimed to espouse nature before all. FRANK BIDART In other verses, like “The Shooting of Dan McGrew,” several speakers are active in telling the tale. Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows. Service does this well in the ballad form, and it’s for all the reasons discussed above that the poem is known as an important work of literature. The Cremation of Sam McGee "The Cremation of Sam McGee" is among the most famous of Robert W. Service's (1874–1958) poems. It was published in 1907 in Songs of a Sourdough. sung by Europeans in the early fourteenth century. Service was never a miner. … 342-348. Sam’s last wish was for his friend Cap to cremate him, and Cap doesn’t quit until Sam’s promise is fulfilled. Both poets were very conscious of the language they used, often incorporating slang and jargon in their poetry. XVII, No. Encyclopedia.com. Peter Viereck’s “Kilroy” appeared in his first collection of poetry, Terror and Decorum: Poems 1940–1948, published…, c. 1789 Cap has lashed the frozen corpse to the sled as he continues on his journey across the frozen land. For Service, these mini-choruses set the tone and establish the mood of the verse they bracket. As you read “Courage” and “The Cremation of Sam McGee,” think about the overall tone of each poem. Edward Hirsch, for example, reads the Yukon ballads as a closed structure opposing Dionysian and Apollonian (body and mind) elements in human behavior. When they arrive at “the marge of Lake Lebarge” the narrator finds an old, derelict steam boat, an image of death and ruin. From the finding of Sam’s corpse in stanza 6 to Cap’s wandering just after stuffing Sam into the fire, the poem does not mention the cold. Correct answers: 2 question: The cremation of Sam McGee Based on the tone of the poem, the speaker would most likely describe the Arctic setting as A. paradise B. Kirkpatrick, St. James Press, 1991. Why is it such a successful poem even so many years later? Sources Look back through the poem and notice the many descriptions of the setting. Themes What information do we early in the poem that is important to the plot? The Gale Group, 1990, pp. All the Arctic cold of the beginning of the poem has given way to humor and the warmth of Sam’s personality. Vol. They become icons of the north woodsman who lived by a special code of honor and duty to keep one’s word. Yukon Territory in 1800's, Sam and Cap travel by dog sled looking for gold. He says “he’d ‘sooner live in hell’,” but this land of gold holds him “like a spell.” Interestingly, it is “the land of gold,” not the gold itself, that has this strange hold on Sam McGee. Kellner, Bruce, “Robert Service; Overview” in Reference Guide to English Literature, 2nd ed., edited by D. L. Kirkpatrick, St. James Press, 1991. Cinematic adaptations of some of his poems received mixed reviews. “a folk tale of unquestioned natural vitality.” Phelps further distinguished between readers with literary pretensions (who dismissed Service’s sentimentality, metronomic rhythms, simplicity, and limited range) and those who used these same criteria to praise his verse for being memorable, recitable, and sympathetic to ordinary people. He married Germaine Bourgoin on June 12, 1913. His experiences, real or imagined, provided material for the best chapters of his autobiography and inspired the Mackenzie River ballads of Rhymes of a Rolling Stone (1912). Use a camping supplies catalog (such as L.L.Bean’s or Cabela’s) to determine weight as well as cost. The deathly cold is but one element. After Sam … CRITICAL OVERVIEW Then, copy and paste the text into your bibliography or works cited list. Wiles teaches and writes in the shadow of Vermont’s Green Mountains. By 1931, the family had moved to Nice, France. Encyclopedia.com. “There are strange” (the anapest foot) “things done” (the iambic foot) “in the midnight sun” (a second set of an anapest foot followed by an iambic foot). They understood him, and knew that any verse carrying the by-line of Robert W. Service would be a lilting thing, clear, clean and power-packed, beating out a story with a dramatic intensity that made the nerves tingle.”. The poem tells a story of Cap (the speaker of the poem) and his mushing companion, Sam McGee. While they are important to the telling of the story, they are not directly connected to it. Compile a list of what a modern day prospector might need for a six-month journey into the Yukon wilderness. In turn, this makes the actions of either the speaker of the poem or the character Sam McGee more immediate, memorable, and the reader is grounded in the plot of the poem with the characters. Throughout the poem, Cap is active, moving across the ice and snow. Sam McGee is a man from Tennessee who finds himself in the snowy tundra of Alaska searching for gold. Instead, they offer background or other information that helps the reader understand the literary work more completely. Peter Viereck 1948 INTRODUCTION He is described as “horror-driven” in stanza 7; he curses “that load” in stanza 8; he talks of the “quiet clay” growing “heavy and heavier,” and that he “felt half mad.” He even refers to the corpse as a “hateful thing” at the end of stanza 9. And at one important moment even McGee’s corpse seems to speak. Ignoring the eight-line opening, the poem follows a regular pattern of four-line stanzas composed of two rhyming couplets. coo/ and calm.. 12. The very fact that days and nights are much different than they are in the lower 48 creates an atmosphere of disorientation. Service used this same publication practice in other verses, including “The Ballad of One-eyed Mike.” Such stanzas function like the choruses of ancient Greek dramas. 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