Poetry and Prose: More than Entertainment

This is another piece examining poetry and prose.

Shirley Jackson in her 1948 short story “The Lottery,” which first appeared in The New Yorker, provokes thoughts and questions about life and conspiracy. Jackson, who is best known for her subtle horror and suspense stories, tells a tale of a small village willing to sacrifice a woman in hopes of having plentiful crops. Edwin Brock, in his 1963 poem “Five Ways to Kill a Man,” exposes the “many cumbersome ways to kill” men and women. Brock, who has served in the Royal Navy, was employed as a police officer, and who has worked in advertising, exposes the cruel and unusual ways to kill human beings. Each type of work provokes thoughts and questions without giving answers, deals with the conspiracies in life and opens imaginations. Poetry and prose may be a source of entertainment, but there is more than amusement in each style of literature. According to the dictionary, poetry is a “rhythmical composition, written or spoken, for exciting pleasure by beautiful, imaginative thoughts,” and prose is “a matter-of-fact, commonplace, dull expression.” Poetry is typically shorter, more meaningful to the writers as well as the readers, and has hidden meanings. Prose pieces have the tendency to be longer, more dense and not as meaningful. Poetry is more successful at provoking thoughts, opening imaginations and dealing with conspiracies.
“The Lottery,” first occurred three years after World War II, in 1948. Jackson discusses the village’s ultimate sacrifice of the “lottery winner” in order to have bountiful crops, and a better land. Jackson, whose husband was Jewish, explains in the plot, the “The Lottery,” has similarities to the background of World War II, in which both show a sacrifice of a certain ethnicity, religious group, or single person, by a group of citizens led by one individual. In Jackson’s writing, she gives subtle examples of the Holocaust. Jackson hints at the ludicrous ways governments and societies tolerate death in the masses. In “The Lottery,” the town holds the annual lottery, which is no ordinary luck of the draw, big prize winning sweepstake. In fact, the winner of this lottery wins no grand prize at all, only death by stoning from the villagers as a sacrifice to gain a superior amount of produce. The unreal tactics of the villagers are comparable to those of the Germans before World War II began. At the end of “The Lottery,” Tessie “held her hands out desperately as the villagers moved in on her,” alike the many ethnicities of citizens killed by the Germans. “The Lottery,” gives many details and examples of the conspiracies in life, and raises many questions without giving answers.
Brock’s “Five Ways to Kill a Man,” is a prime illustration of the many conspiracies in life. The poem explains five ponderous ways that have been used to kill men or women in history. The examples in “Five Ways to Kill a Man,” date from the crucifixion of Christ to the atomic bombing of Hiroshima. In his poem, Brock describes the gruesome and peculiar processes the governments have created in order to kill citizens in the masses. Brock not only exposes the conspiracies behind slaughtering innocent men, women and children, but raises many questions about this topic without giving readers any answers. “Five Ways to Kill a Man,” opens the imaginations of the audience to a whole new perspective of the world’s ways of treating man- kind. Exposing his thoughts about the torturous ways to kill, Brock writes, “Dispensing with nobility, you may, if the wind/ allows, blow gas at him.” Brock explains his feelings of disbelief toward the inhumane procedures taken by the governments to prove a point. “Five Ways to Kill a Man,” opens a wide door for the individual mind to deliberate the schemes behind the government plans.
Poetry and prose pieces are more than a source of entertainment. While both genres of literature examine the conspiracies in life, open imaginations and provoke thoughts and questions without relaying answers, poetry is more successful at doing so. Poetry may seem confusing and hard to read but it certainly does more for the mind than prose pieces. Poetry is an excellent technique to unleash the mind and soul.