Sunday, November 11, 2012

Snapping Beans Analysis

Snapping Beans Analysis- from presentation

This narrative poem tells the story of a speaker and her grandmother. The grandmother asks the speaker about college, to which the speaker lies and says “its fine”. The diction in this story is informal and the speaker is a girl. The girl is still trying to get used to college, but is having some obvious problems adjusting, as pictured when she speaks of crying at night. Based on the speaker’s thoughts about college life, the speaker has yet to get accustomed to what she has seen. There are interesting images of the scenery in this poem, too. The differences of the speaker’s description of her college life and the images of the grandmother sitting on the porch with cornfields spread out in front of their house, is evidently shown throughout the poem. The end of the poem is one big metaphor. The “hickory leaf” symbolizes the speaker. As the leaf is blowing loose, it symbolizes the speaker going to college. When the leaf is hanging and “summer green”, it symbolizes the speaker being home for summer. The speaker had to leave her family and go to college to grow up on her own. The relationship between the grandma and the speaker is an interesting one. The both obviously love each other, but the speak lies and hides her pain. The grandma is traditional and religious. The speaker does not want to upset the grandma or bring up things that will again upset the speaker. Being with her grandma is relaxing and calming and away from the stresses of her college life.
Lisa Parker does a great job at narrating their relationship, and showing imagery through her story-telling format. 

Matt Sandelands
from presentation on 11/6/2012

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