Four Critics’ Perspective of Theodore Roethkes Elegy for...

Four Critics’ Perspective of Theodore Roethkes Elegy for Jane More than forty years after her untimely death, Jane Bannick breathes again--or so it seems while reading about her. Janes unfortunate death in an equestrian accident prompted one of her professors, the poet Theodore Roethke, to write a moving poem, Elegy for Jane, recalling his young student and his feelings of grief at her loss. Opinions appeared almost as soon as Roethkes tribute to Jane, and passages about the poem continue to appear in articles and books. Recent writings by Parini, Ross-Bryant, Kalaidjian, and Stiffler disclose current assessments. According to Parini, Janes death is not the subject of the poem; rather, her death presents an occasion for†¦show more content†¦Roethke describes Jane in terms of flowers and birds; he reveals her joy and sadness through natural things. These earthly things also reveal the speakers sadness at Janes death. Janes lost presence and Roethkes sorrow receive expression through the concrete world. My sparrow, you are not here, Waiting like a fern, making a spiny shadow. The sides of wet stones cannot console me, Nor the moss, wound with the last light (14-17). In the final stanza, Roethke again addresses Jane in the terms of non human endearment as my skittery pigeon (19), but his final expression of loss comes in terms of a unique human relationship: neither father nor lover. Roethke succeeds in capturing an individual person, his feelings for her, and his sense of loss at her death. This poem, one of the best of the few poems in which Roethke tried to capture an individual, according to Ross-Bryant, owes its success to Janes association with nature and the final statement of the poets love (74-75.) According to Kalaidjian, the poem follows patterns used by Walt Whitman and D. H. Lawrence. Roethke follows their patterns of enumerative catalogues in triadic structures or patterns marked by three elements or grammatical forms (23). Stiffler points out that Roethke acknowledged their influence on Elegy for Jane in his essay Some Remarks on Rhythm