Ashley Huten Discussion Leading

Discussion Leading

Sharon Olds

 

 

 

 

 

 

"Sharon Olds was born in 1942 in San Francisco. She was, in her own words, raised as a "hellfire Calvinist." After graduating from Stanford she moved east to earn a Ph.D. in English from Columbia University. Olds describes the completion of her doctorate as a transitional moment in her life: standing on the steps of the library at Columbia University, she vowed to become a poet, even if it meant giving up everything she had learned. In one respect, Olds’s imaginary sacrifice of her graduate education was an essential precondition for her artistic development. As a graduate student Olds had struggled to emulate the poets she studied. The vow she made--to write her own poetry, no matter how bad it might be--freed her to develop her own voice." - Jacque Kahn

 

 

"That Year"

 

"I recognized it like my fathers face, the face of the guard turning away-or worse yet turning toward me"

 

-Do you thinkg she's comparing her father to the guards from Aushwitz because she is comparing the way he treated her and her mother, the way that the Jewish population got treated ? If so, do you think if they weren't a Jewish raised Family that there still would have been any comparison within her poem?

 

"The Language of the Brag"

 

"I have done what you wanted to do Walt Whitman, Allen Ginsberg"

 

-The beginning was all about her tight, strong, excellent, and marvelous body, then quickly and sternly switch's into her birth canal with mucus, swelling, blood, and feces, what point do you feel that Sharon Olds is trying to porve by explaining excellence and then ranting about how "she has done what men have wanted them to do"?

 

-Olds refers to our bodies as "heroic" which is a very powerful word. My personal interpretation was that we, as women, truly do have a marvelous power, to bring another human being into the world, how would you interrpret her definition of heroic?

 

"The Girl"

 

"Every night she prays for the sould of her best friend and then tahnks god for life". Sharon Olds states this at the end of this dreadful hard to read poem. What do you think the significance of the placement of this line was within the poem?

 

"Sex Without Love"

 

"Wet as the children at birth whose mothers are going to give them away".

 

-Many interpretations of this could be made, why do you think this line is so significant in exagerating trying to make, which is to not have sex without love?

 

 

Joy Harjo

 

 

 

"Fire"

 

-This poem is reflects a way to prove that as women we can't be alone, but that we have other things in life to keep us strong and it's not necissarily the stereotypical "need" for men, which is what many would have been first to think after reading the first two lines of the poem. Joy however, goes into speaking about nature and being one with her beliefs. Knowing her background what meaning do you think these things portray? Do you have a specific item, habits or beliefs that make you feel one with and strong and independent?

 

"Deer Ghost"

 

"I dont care what you say. The deer is no imaginary tale I have created to fill this house because you left me."

 

-What significance do you think the deer has to the poem? Do you think that the wondering ghostly deer is being compared to herself or to the partner who left her?

 

"The City of Fire"

 

"And you have made a fire in every room"

 

-Joy Harjo has brought up and spoken about "fire" in all of her poems so far. What do you believe these fires are resembling, what is your own personal interrpretation of the fires?

 

"Heartshed"

 

"It doesn't mean going backwards. Our bones are built of spirals."

 

-In terms of relationships what do you feel the point that she's trying to get across within this specific line? Do you think she's being optimistic or pessimistic and do you agree with her or disagree?

 

 

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