Mistah Kurz - he dead.
A penny for the Old Guy!
I
We are the hollow men
We are the stuffed men
Leaning together
Headpieces filled with straw. Alas!
Our dried voices, when
We whisper together
Are quiet and meaningless
As wind in dry grass
Or rat's feet over broken glass
In our dry cellar.
Shape without form, shade without color,
Paralyzed force, gesture without motion;
Those who have crossed
With direct eyes, to death's other Kingdom
Remember us - if at all - not as lost
Violent souls, but only
As the hollow men
The stuffed men.
II
Eyes I dare not meet in dreams
In death's dream kingdom
These do not appear:
There, the eyes are
Sunlight on a broken column
There, is a tree swinging
And voices are
In the wind's singing
More distant and more solemn
Than a fading star.
Let me be no nearer
In death's dream kingdom
Let me also wear
Such deliberate disguises
Rat's coat, crowskin, crossed staves
In a field
Behaving as the wind behaves
No nearer-
Not that final meeting
In the twilight kingdom.
III
This is the dead land
This is the cactus land
Here the stone images
Are raised, here they receive
The supplication of a dead man's hand
Under the twinkle of a fading star.
Is it like this
In death's other kingdom
Waking alone
At the hour when we are
Trembling with tenderness
Lips that would kiss
Form prayers to broken stone.
IV
The eyes are not here
There are no eyes here
In this valley of dying stars
In this hollow valley
This broken jaw of our lost kingdom.
In the last of meeting places
We grope together
And avoid speech
Gathered on this beach of the tumid river
Sightless, unless
The eyes reappear
As the perpetual star
Multifoliate rose
Of death's twilight kingdom
The hope only
Of empty men.
V
Here we go round the prickly pear
Prickly pear prickly pear
Here we go round the prickly pear
At five o'clock in the morning.
Between the idea
And the reality
Between the motion
And the act
Falls the Shadow
For thine is the Kingdom
Between the conception
And the creation
Between the emotion
And the response
Falls the Shadow
Life is very long
Between the desire
And the spasm
Between the potency
And the existence
Between the essence
And the descent
Falls the Shadow
For Thine is the Kingdom
For Thine is
Life is
For Thine is the
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
This is the way the world ends
Not with a bang but with a whimper
(The Hollow Men - TS Eliot)
Assignment 2
The assignment was to write the first page of a book, or story, taking into account what we had learned about the importance of conflict and making sure that the reader would want to read page 2! The assignment is here
The tutor's feedback:
Great first line - full of promise
"Water through my fingers" - beautiful, lovely image
Started out quirky, then reinforced the literary qualities
Last sentence of second paragraph gives the game away! The piece starts asking the question as to why the author is a male Brownie, and then proceeds to answer it immediately! So the heart of the mystery is solved! Lose the sentence starting "No six year old boy"
"Excited I was", "Crying there was" - strange grammatical construction, which sounds like Yoda from Star Wars
Second main paragraph: interesting, aditional thread of story being developed. Note how with the removal of the "No six year old boy" line, the author has not yet gone any way to explaining how he became a Brownie. in fact, an additional mystery is being set up which may or may not tie in so now the reader is trying to solve two distinct mysteries and will be trying to spot clues/links that are going to make sense of this
Tutor didn't understand the "Crying there was" paragraph - not clear enough what it means
Mr Prentice is a big character because he has been introduced at the head of a paragraph
"Do my memories deceive me?" This is unnecessary as the tentaive nature of the author's memories has already been mentioned
The emergence of Brown Owl now answers one of the mysteries. Possibly, this mystery could be left even longer while, say, the relationship between Mr Prentice and Mother is explored (with hints of a love triangle, for example) only to resolve into the Brown Owl role ie wrong footing the reader
Need to explore this big, exotic scenario (keeping rhino out of the garden) in more detail - spend a bit of time looking around; tourism for the reader
Final sentence - What?! That came out of nowhere. If this is just a trick, it's a cheap one (not a trick - AFTM!)
Run the risk of infuriating the reader - don't let them make sense of it too soon
