The Dance
"Every artwork exists to evoke pleasures that are easier to feel than to describe." (Vendler, 73). William Carlos Williams defies the nature of this statement in his poem, "The Dance", which is a description of Brueghel's artwork "The Kermess". To analyze the poem as pleasure, one must analyze the poem's rhythm, rhyme, structure, images, argument, poignancy, wisdom, and the development of new style or language in the poetry; just as to analyze artwork, one must analyze lines, curves, use of space, structure, the image itself, and the development of new art style. Through his poem one can actually visualize, and feel, the pleasurable effects of the painting without having to actually view the painting. William Carlos Williams' "The Dance" is a free verse poem. Vendler notes that "[e]ven in free verse. . . we often hear the same rhythms recurring" (Vendler, 74). Although Williams does not use conventional rhythms we see some aspects of rhythm evident in "The Dance", where the emphasis is placed on similar words throughout the poem, namely action words and festive, almost musical, terms. This emphasis on happy, joyous terms provides the basic underlying theme to the poem. Williams
Images, Argument, Wisdom & Poignancy Finally, Williams uses a square structure to his poem, just as if it were "framed". When viewing the painting, "The Kermess", one gets the feeling that the scene wants to flow out of the frame. One feels there is a party proceeding where it cannot be seen. In Williams' poem, the line endings want to flow out of their "frame", giving the off balance feeling of a party occurring outside of the frame of the poem - "...Kicking and rolling about / the Fair Grounds, swinging their butts, those / shanks must be sound to bear up under such / rollicking measures, prance as they dance..." (8-11). In reading the poem one gets the idea the dancers want to dance, prance, rollick, and frollick right off the page.
Some common words found in the essay are:
Williams' Dance, Carlos Williams, Kermess Descriptive, Fair Grounds, Finally Williams, According Vendler, Brueghel's Kermess, , Dance Williams, Structure Vendler, william carlos, rhythm rhyme, poem williams, william carlos williams, carlos williams, / fair grounds, williams poem, structure vendler, kicking rolling, depicted brueghel's, wash impound, fair grounds swinging, measures prance dance, / sided glasses, sided glasses,
Approximate Word count = 855
Approximate Pages = 3 (250 words per page double spaced)
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