Perrine Poetry Blog

                While I have to admit that I was unsure as to whether or not I would agree with Perrine on his opinions of how to best approach the interpretation of poetry, I found after reading the article very carefully that I do agree with his view of the interpretation of poetry in most aspects. I began reading the article with the same opinion that many students seem to have: what gives Perrine the right to tell me that the meanings I derived from a poem are wrong? That is not to say that I think my best guesses at what the poems we read this week actually meant were right; in fact, I’ll be the first to admit that I came to class on Thursday with the utmost confidence that my interpretations of the symbolism and meanings of the poems were entirely off-base. Despite this, I do agree with Perrine that, while many interpretations of a poem may exist, only one can be considered the most correct; however, I strongly disagree with Perrine’s use of the words “correct” and “incorrect” in this article. I absolutely agree that not all interpretations of a poem are legitimate: if someone were to tell me that they believed Blake’s poem “The Sick Rose” was about a giraffe eating leaves off of a tree, I would tell them they were crazy. Perrine was right to assert that a legitimate interpretation of a poem must account for every detail without being contradicted by any detail whatsoever, and the best interpretation “relies on the fewest assumptions not grounded in the poem itself” (Perrine, 1). Furthermore, Perrine truly substantiated the legitimacy of his approach to interpreting poetry when he analyzed each of the poems that we read last week. For example, I never in a million years would have ascertained that Emily Dickinson’s untitled poem concerned a sunset (I was one of the many people who thought it addressed a garden and a breeze), and reading Perrine’s analysis of each slight detail of the poem, such as the fact that the word “daffodil” was singular rather than plural, was incredibly interesting. Also, I am confident that no amount of analysis on my own would ever had led me to discover that Melville’s “The Night March” was referring to the stars rather than an army corps. Ultimately, then, even if I was not expecting to agree with Perrine’s techniques to analyzing poetry, I now have to admit that I find his criteria to be accurate and successful.

                I did notice one particular aspect of Perrine’s article that I strongly disagreed with, however: his use of the words “correct” and “incorrect” to describe the many different interpretations of poetry. Again I will reiterate that I do realize that some interpretations of poetry are essentially wrong: someone cannot read Walt Whitman’s “An Army Corps on the March” and legitimately argue that Whitman was discussing which entrée to order at his favorite restaurant. However, I have always loved literature and poetry for the fact that, unlike science or math, the material is very subjective and can be perceived by many different people in a variety of ways. The fact that one person can draw comfort from a poem while another person can sense joy, or that a poem can call to mind a pleasant experience to one person and a lonely experience to another is one of the aspects of all literature that I have always loved the most. Consequently, the fact that Perrine conveys the idea that an individual is “wrong” if he perceives Dickinson’s poem to be about a garden rather than a sunset somewhat offended me. After reading Perrine’s analysis of the poem, I have no doubt that Dickinson truly was writing about a sunset, but I would not consider someone to be “wrong” just because they viewed the words differently than another. Perrine ascribes the interpretation of any poem that is most closely in accordance with the author’s intended topic to be the “right” interpretation; however, in my opinion, this invalidates the interpretations that other scholars, students, and readers may bring to the table, and I do not think that any reasonable interpretation should be discounted simply because it may differ from what concept Dickinson tied to her words. I tend to agree with T.S. Eliot that if an interpretation of a poem suits an individual even if it is not the interpretation that the poet had intended that that is completely acceptable. I am not in any way trying to detract from Perrine’s strategies in interpreting poetry; in fact, I was grateful that his ingenious insights finally allowed me to understand the true meanings of the poems we read last week; moreover, I even intend to use his strategies in examining details and avoiding assumptions grounded outside of the poem itself in my future interpretations of poetry. I only wish that Perrine has not used the words “correct,” “incorrect,” “right,” and “wrong” so frequently, for they made me feel as though any interpretation of a poem that was not in accordance with the author’s intention was invalid or not insightful.