Ernest Lawrence Thayer - Casey at the Bat

CASEY AT THE BAT

The San Francisco Examiner - June 3, 1888

by Ernest Lawrence Thayer

The outlook wasn't brilliant for the Mudville nine that day:

The score stood four to two, with but one inning more to play,

And then when Cooney died at first, and Barrows did the same,

A pall-like silence fell upon the patrons of the game.

A straggling few got up to go in deep despair. The rest

Clung to the hope which springs eternal in the human breast;

They thought, "If only Casey could but get a whack at that--

We'd put up even money now, with Casey at the bat."

But Flynn preceded Casey, as did also Jimmy Blake,

And the former was a hoodoo, while the latter was a cake;

So upon that stricken multitude grim melancholy sat,

For there seemed but little chance of Casey getting to the bat.

But Flynn let drive a single, to the wonderment of all,

And Blake, the much despised, tore the cover off the ball;

And when the dust had lifted, and men saw what had occurred,

There was Jimmy safe at second and Flynn a-hugging third.

Then from five thousand throats and more there rose a lusty yell;

It rumbled through the valley, it rattled in the dell;

It pounded on the mountain and recoiled upon the flat,

For Casey, mighty Casey, was advancing to the bat.

There was ease in Casey's manner as he stepped into his place;

There was pride in Casey's bearing and a smile lit Casey's face.

And when, responding to the cheers, he lightly doffed his hat,

No stranger in the crowd could doubt 'twas Casey at the bat.

Ten thousand eyes were on him as he rubbed his hands with dirt;

Five thousand tongues applauded when he wiped them on his shirt;

Then while the writhing pitcher ground the ball into his hip,

Defiance flashed in Casey's eye, a sneer curled Casey's lip.

And now the leather-covered sphere came hurtling through the air,

And Casey stood a-watching it in haughty grandeur there.

Close by the sturdy batsman the ball unheeded sped--

"That ain't my style," said Casey. "Strike one!" the umpire said.

From the benches, black with people, there went up a muffled roar,

Like the beating of the storm-waves on a stern and distant shore;

"Kill him! Kill the umpire!" shouted someone on the stand;

And it's likely they'd have killed him had not Casey raised his hand.

With a smile of Christian charity great Casey's visage shone;

He stilled the rising tumult; he bade the game go on;

He signaled to the pitcher, and once more the dun sphere flew;

But Casey still ignored it and the umpire said, "Strike two!"

"Fraud!" cried the maddened thousands, and echo answered "Fraud!"

But one scornful look from Casey and the audience was awed.

They saw his face grow stern and cold, they saw his muscles strain,

And they knew that Casey wouldn't let that ball go by again.

The sneer is gone from Casey's lip, his teeth are clenched in hate,

He pounds with cruel violence his bat upon the plate;

And now the pitcher holds the ball, and now he lets it go,

And now the air is shattered by the force of Casey's blow.

Oh, somewhere in this favoured land the sun is shining bright,

The band is playing somewhere, and somewhere hearts are light;

And somewhere men are laughing, and somewhere children shout,

But there is no joy in Mudville--mighty Casey has struck out.

Casey at the Bat by Ernest Thayer
From the Baseball Almanac - http://www.baseball-almanac.com/poetry/po_case.shtml

It all started in 1885 when George Hearst decided to run for state senator in California. To self-promote his brand of politics, Hearst purchased the San Francisco Examiner. At the completion of the election, Hearst gave the newspaper to his son, William Randolph Hearst.

William, who had experience editing the Harvard Lampoon while at Harvard College, took to California three Lampoon staff members. One of those three was Ernest L. Thayer who signed his humorous Lampoon articles with the pen name Phin.

In the June 3, 1888 issue of The Examiner, Phin appeared as the author of the poem we all know as Casey at the Bat. The poem received very little attention and a few weeks later it was partially republished in the New York Sun, though the author was now known as Anon.

A New Yorker named Archibald Gunter clipped out the poem and saved it as a reference item for a future novel. Weeks later Gunter found another interesting article describing an upcoming performance at the Wallack Theatre by comedian De Wolf Hopper - who was also his personal friend. The August 1888 show (exact date is unknown) had members from the New York and Chicago ball clubs in the audience and the clipping now had a clear and obvious use.

Gunter shared Casey at the Bat with Hopper and the perfomance was nothing short of legendary. Baseball Almanac is pleased to present the single most famous baseball poem ever written.

"Love has its sonnets galore. War has its epics in heroic verse. Tragedy
its sombre story in measured lines. Baseball has Casey at the Bat."

- Albert Spalding

	The "audio moment" below is the actual voice of De Wolf Hopper and you will hear some slight variations in his delivery. Casey at the Bat - DeWolf Hopper - 1906 Victor First Prize Record http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8fTrc9Cymk When William De Wolf Hopper performed the poem at Wallack's Theatre, on Broadway and 30th Street in New York City, players from the New York Giants and Chicago White Stockings were guests in the auditorium. Ernest Lawrence Thayer actually wrote three versions of Casey at the Bat — the first printing, a self-corrupted version, and the revised version.

Wikiepedia Info on Poem - http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casey%27s_Revenge#Sequels

"Casey at the Bat: A Ballad of the Republic Sung in the Year 1888" is a baseball poem written in 1888 by Ernest Thayer. First published in The San Francisco Examiner on June 3, 1888, it was later popularized by DeWolf Hopper in many vaudeville performances.

The poem was originally published anonymously (under the pen name "Phin", based on Thayer's college nickname, "Phineas"). The author's identity was not widely known at first. A number falsely claimed to have authored the poem, and Thayer's efforts to set the record straight were often ignored.

Sequels

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Casey%27s_Revenge#Sequels

"Casey's Revenge", by Grantland Rice (1907), gives Casey another chance against the pitcher who had struck him out in the original story. It was written in 1906, and its first known publication was in the quarterly magazine The Speaker in June 1907, under the pseudonym of James Wilson^[17]. In this version, Rice cites the nickname "Strike-Out Casey", hence the influence on Casey Stengel's name. Casey's team is down three runs by the last of the ninth, and once again Casey is down to two strikes—with the bases full this time. However, he connects, hits the ball so far that it is never found, and the final stanza reads:

Oh! somewhere in this favored land dark clouds may hide the sun;

And somewhere bands no longer play and children have no fun;

And somewhere over blighted loves there hangs a heavy pall;

But Mudville hearts are happy now--for Casey hit the ball.

In response to the popularity of the 1946 Walt Disney, Disney released a sequel, "Casey Bats Again" (1954), in which Casey's nine daughters redeem his reputation.

In 1988, on the 100th anniversary of the poem, Sports Illustrated writer Frank Deford constructed a fanciful story (later expanded to book form) which posited Katie Casey, the subject of the song "Take Me Out to the Ball Game", as being the daughter of the famous slugger from the poem.

In 2010, Ken Eagle wrote “The Mudville Faithful,” covering a century of the Mudville nine's ups and downs since Casey struck out. Faithful fans still root for the perpetually losing team, and are finally rewarded by a trip to the World Series, led by Casey's great-grandson who is also named Casey. 

Casey’s Revenge Grantland Rice (first published in The Nashville Tennessean, 1907) Grantland Rice (November 1, 1880 – July 13, 1954) was an early 20th century American sportswriter known for his elegant prose. His writing was published in newspapers around the country and broadcast on the radio. There were saddened hearts in Mudville for a week or even more; There were muttered oaths and curses—every fan in town was sore. “Just think,” said one, “how soft it looked with Casey at the bat, And then to think he’d go and spring a bush league trick like that!” All his past fame was forgotten—he was now a hopeless “shine.” They called him “Strike-Out Casey,” from the mayor down the line; And as he came to bat each day his bosom heaved a sigh, While a look of hopeless fury shone in mighty Casey’s eye. He pondered in the days gone by that he had been their king, That when he strolled up to the plate they made the welkin ring; But now his nerve had vanished, for when he heard them hoot He “fanned” or “popped out” daily, like some minor league recruit. He soon began to sulk and loaf, his batting eye went lame; No home runs on the score card now were chalked against his name; The fans without exception gave the manager no peace, For one and all kept clamoring for Casey’s quick release. The Mudville squad began to slump, the team was in the air; Their playing went from bad to worse—nobody seemed to care. “Back to the woods with Casey!” was the cry from Rooters’ Row. “Get some one who can hit the ball, and let that big dub go!” The lane is long, some one has said, that never turns again, And Fate, though fickle, often gives another chance to men; And Casey smiled; his rugged face no longer wore a frown— The pitcher who had started all the trouble came to town. All Mudville had assembled—ten thousand fans had come To see the twirler who had put big Casey on the bum; And when he stepped into the box, the multitude went wild; He doffed his cap in proud disdain, but Casey only smiled. “Play ball!” the umpire’s voice rang out, and then the game began. But in that throng of thousands there was not a single fan Who thought that Mudville had a chance, and with the setting sun Their hopes sank low—the rival team was leading “four to one.” The last half of the ninth came round, with no change in the score; But when the first man up hit safe, the crowd began to roar; The din increased, the echo of ten thousand shouts was heard When the pitcher hit the second and gave “four balls” to the third. Three men on base —nobody out —three runs to tie the game! A triple meant the highest niche in Mudville’s hall of fame; But here the rally ended and the gloom was deep as night, When the fourth one “fouled to catcher” and the fifth “flew out to right.” A dismal groan in chorus came; a scowl was on each face When Casey walked up, bat in hand, and slowly took his place; His bloodshot eyes in fury gleamed, his teeth were clenched in hate; He gave his cap a vicious hook and pounded on the plate. But fame is fleeting as the wind and glory fades away; There were no wild and woolly cheers, no glad acclaim this day; They hissed and groaned and hooted as they clamored: “Strike him out!” But Casey gave no outward sign that he had heard this shout. The pitcher smiled and cut one loose —across the plate it sped; Another hiss, another groan. “Strike one!” the umpire said. Zip! Like a shot the second curve broke just below the knee. “Strike two!” the umpire roared aloud; but Casey made no plea. No roasting for the umpire now —his was an easy lot; But here the pitcher whirled again—was that a rifle shot? A whack, a crack, and out through the space the leather pellet flew, A blot against the distant sky, a speck against the blue. Above the fence in center field in rapid whirling flight The sphere sailed on —the blot grew dim and then was lost to sight. Ten thousand hats were thrown in air, ten thousand threw a fit, But no one ever found the ball that mighty Casey hit. O, somewhere in this favored land dark clouds may hide the sun, And somewhere bands no longer play and children have no fun! And somewhere over blighted lives there hangs a heavy pall, But Mudville hearts are happy now, for Casey hit the ball.

Gerard Manley Hopkins - 8 Select Poems

The Windhover

To Christ our Lord

I caught this morning morning's minion, kingdom
of daylight's dauphin, dapple-dawn-drawn Falcon, in
his riding
Of the rolling level underneath him steady air, and striding
High there, how he rung upon the rein of a wimpling wing
In his ecstasy! then off, off forth on swing,
As a skate's heel sweeps smooth on a bow-bend: the hurl
and gliding
Rebuffed the big wind. My heart in hiding
Stirred for a bird, - the achieve of, the mastery of the thing!

Brute beauty and valour and act, oh, air, pride, plume, here
Buckle! AND the fire that breaks from thee then, a billion
Times told lovelier, more dangerous, O my chevalier!

No wonder of it: shèer plòd makes plough down sillion
Shine, and blue-bleak embers, ah my dear,
Fall, gall themselves, and gash gold vermilion.

Spring and Fall

To a young child

Margaret, are you grieving
Over Goldengrove unleaving?
Leaves, like the things of man, you
With your fresh thoughts care for, can you?
Ah! as the heart grows older
It will come to such sights colder
By and by, nor spare a sigh
Though worlds of wanwood leafmeal lie;
And yet you will weep and know why.
Now no matter, child, the name:
Sorrow's springs are the same.
Nor mouth had, no nor mind, expressed
What heart heard of, ghost guessed:
It is the blight man was born for,
It is Margaret you mourn for.

Binsey Poplars

(Felled 1879)

My aspens dear, whose airy cages quelled,
Quelled or quenched in leaves the leaping sun,
All felled, felled, are all felled;
Of a fresh and following folded rank
Not spared, not one
That dandled a sandalled
Shadow that swam or sank
On meadow and river and wind-wandering
weed-winding bank.

O if we but knew what we do
When we delve or hew -
Hack and rack the growing green!
Since country is so tender
To touch, her being so slender,
That, like this sleek and seeing ball
But a prick will make no eye at all,

Where we, even where we mean
To mend her we end her,
When we hew or delve:
After-comers cannot guess the beauty been.
Ten or twelve, only ten or twelve
Strokes of havoc unselve
The sweet especial scene,
Rural scene, a rural scene,
Sweet especial rural scene.

As Kingfishers Catch Fire

As king fishers catch fire, dragonflies draw flame;
As tumbled over rim in roundy wells
Stones ring; like each tucked string tells, each hung bell's
Bow swung finds tongue to fling out broad its name;
Each mortal thing does one thing and the same:
Deals out that being indoors each one dwells;
Selves -- goes itself; myself it speaks and spells,
Crying What I do is me: for that I came.

I say more: the just man justices;
Keeps grace: that keeps all his goings graces;
Acts in God's eye what in God's eye he is --
Christ. For Christ plays in ten thousand places,
Lovely in limbs, and lovely in eyes not his
To the Father through the features of men's faces.





Andromeda

Now Time’s Andromeda on this rock rude,
With not her either beauty’s equal or
Her injury’s, looks off by both horns of shore,
Her flower, her piece of being, doomed dragon’s food.
Time past she has been attempted and pursued
By many blows and banes; but now hears roar
A wilder beast from West than all were, more
Rife in her wrongs, more lawless, and more lewd.

Her Perseus linger and leave her tó her extremes?—
Pillowy air he treads a time and hangs
His thoughts on her, forsaken that she seems,
All while her patience, morselled into pangs,
Mounts; then to alight disarming, no one dreams,
With Gorgon’s gear and barebill, thongs and fangs.





Duns Scotus' s Oxford

Towery city and branchy between towers;
Cuckoo-echoing, bell-swarmèd, lark-charmèd, rook-racked, river-rounded;
The dapple-eared lily below thee; that country and town did
Once encounter in, here coped and poisèd powers;

Thou hast a base and brickish skirt there, sours
That neighbour-nature thy grey beauty is grounded
Best in; graceless growth, thou hast confounded
Rural rural keeping—folk, flocks, and flowers.

Yet ah! this air I gather and I release
He lived on; these weeds and waters, these walls are what
He haunted who of all men most sways my spirits to peace;

Of realty the rarest-veinèd unraveller; a not
Rivalled insight, be rival Italy or Greece;
Who fired France for Mary without spot.





At the Wedding-March

God with honour hang your head,
Groom, and grace you, bride, your bed
With lissome scions, sweet scions,
Out of hallowed bodies bred.

Each be other’s comfort kind:
Déep, déeper than divined,
Divine charity, dear charity,
Fast you ever, fast bind.

Then let the March tread our ears:
I to him turn with tears
Who to wedlock, his wonder wedlock,
Déals tríumph and immortal years.





Brothers

How lovely the elder brother’s
Life all laced in the other’s,
Lóve-laced!—what once I well
Witnessed; so fortune fell.
When Shrovetide, two years gone,
Our boys’ plays brought on
Part was picked for John,
Young Jóhn: then fear, then joy
Ran revel in the elder boy.
Their night was come now; all
Our company thronged the hall;
Henry, by the wall,
Beckoned me beside him:
I came where called, and eyed him
By meanwhiles; making my play
Turn most on tender byplay.
For, wrung all on love’s rack,
My lad, and lost in Jack,
Smiled, blushed, and bit his lip;
Or drove, with a diver’s dip,
Clutched hands down through clasped knees—
Truth’s tokens tricks like these,
Old telltales, with what stress
He hung on the imp’s success.
Now the other was bráss-bóld:
Hé had no work to hold
His heart up at the strain;
Nay, roguish ran the vein.
Two tedious acts were past;
Jack’s call and cue at last;
When Henry, heart-forsook,
Dropped eyes and dared not look.
Eh, how áll rúng!
Young dog, he did give tongue!
But Harry—in his hands he has flung
His tear-tricked cheeks of flame
For fond love and for shame.
Ah Nature, framed in fault,
There ’s comfort then, there ’s salt;
Nature, bad, base, and blind,
Dearly thou canst be kind;
There dearly thén, deárly,
I’ll cry thou canst be kind.

Gerard Manley Hopkins - "Pied Beauty," Biography, Background & Structure

Pied Beauty

Glory be to God for dappled things -

For skies of couple-colour as a brinded cow;

For rose-moles all in stipple upon trout that swim;

Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls; finches' wings;

Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough;

And áll trades, their gear and tackle and trim.


All things counter, original, spáre, strange;

Whatever is fickle, frecklèd (who knows how?)

With swíft, slów; sweet, sóur; adázzle, dím;

He fathers-forth whose beauty is pást change:

Práise hím.

Gerard Manley Hopkins, 1918







The Poetry Foundation

http://www.poetryfoundation.org/bio/gerard-manley-hopkins

"Gerard Manley Hopkins is one of the three or four greatest poets of the Victorian era. He is regarded by different readers as the greatest Victorian poet of religion, of nature, or of melancholy. However, because his style was so radically different from that of his contemporaries, his best poems were not accepted for publication during his lifetime, and his achievement was not fully recognized until after World War I."

Wikipedia

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Gerard_Manley_Hopkins

Biography

Gerard Manley Hopkins, S.J. (28 July 1844 – 8 June 1889) was an English poet, Roman Catholic convert, and Jesuit priest, whose posthumous fame established him among the leading Victorian poets. His experimental explorations in prosody (especially sprung rhythm) and his use of imagery established him as a daring innovator in a period of largely traditional verse.

About The Poem

"Pied Beauty" is a curtal sonnet by the English poet Gerard Manley Hopkins (1844–1889). It was written in 1877, but not published until 1918, when it was included as part of the collection Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins.

Background

In the poem, the narrator praises God for the variety of "dappled things" in nature, such as cattle, trout and finches. He also describes how falling chestnuts resemble coals bursting in a fire, because of the way in which the chestnuts' reddish-brown meat is exposed when the shells break against the ground. The narrator then moves to an image of the landscape which has been "plotted and pieced" into fields (like quilt squares) by agriculture. At the end of the poem, the narrator emphasizes that God's beauty is "past change", and advises readers to "Praise him".

This ending is gently ironic and beautifully surprising: the entire poem has been about variety, and then God's attribute of immutability is praised in contrast. By juxtaposing God's changelessness with the vicissitude of His creation, His separation from creation is emphasized, as is His vast creativity.

This turn or volta also serves to highlight the poet's skill at uniting apparent opposites by means of form and content: the meter is Hopkins's own sprung rhythm, and the packing-in of various alliterative syllables serves as an aural example of the visual variety Hopkins describes.

eNotes

http://www.enotes.com/pied-beauty

Background

The British poet Gerard Manley Hopkins is often described as an early modern poet ahead of his Victorian time. This is perhaps why, while he wrote “Pied Beauty” in 1877, in common with most of his other poetry, it was first published twenty-nine years after his death. It appeared in the first collected edition of his poems, Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins, edited by Robert Bridges (1918). The poem subsequently appeared in the second complete edition of Hopkins’s poetry, published in 1930. As of 2006, “Pied Beauty” was available in Gerard Manley Hopkins: The Major Works, edited by Catherine Phillips (1986).

“Pied Beauty” is one of the first poems that Hopkins wrote in the so-called sprung rhythm that he evolved, based on the rhythms of Anglo-Saxon and ancient Welsh poetry. His aim was to approximate the rhythms and style of normal speech, albeit speech infused with a religious ecstasy and enthusiasm that are characteristics of his poetry.

The poem also embodies Hopkins’s innovative use of condensed syntax and alliteration. It is written in the form of a curtal or shortened sonnet, another of Hopkins’s stylistic inventions. Thematically, the poem is a simple hymn of praise to God for the “dappled things” of creation. God is seen as being beyond change but as generating all the variety and opposites that manifest in the ever-changing world. Hopkins is best known as a nature poet and a religious poet, and “Pied Beauty” perfectly exemplifies both these aspects of his work.





Sparknotes

http://www.sparknotes.com/poetry/hopkins/section3.rhtml

Summary

The poem opens with an offering: “Glory be to God for dappled things.” In the next five lines, Hopkins elaborates with examples of what things he means to include under this rubric of“dappled.” He includes the mottled white and blue colors of the sky, the "brinded" (brindled or streaked) hide of a cow, and the patches of contrasting color on a trout. The chestnuts offer a slightly more complex image: When they fall they open to reveal the meaty interior normally concealed by the hard shell; they are compared to the coals in a fire, black on the outside and glowing within. The wings of finches are multicolored, as is a patchwork of farmland in which sections look different according to whether they are planted and green, fallow, or freshly plowed. The final example is of the“trades” and activities of man, with their rich diversity of materials and equipment.

In the final five lines, Hopkins goes on to consider more closely the characteristics of these examples he has given, attaching moral qualities now to the concept of variety and diversity that he has elaborated thus far mostly in terms of physical characteristics.The poem becomes an apology for these unconventional or “strange”things, things that might not normally be valued or thought beautiful. They are all, he avers, creations of God, which, in their multiplicity, point always to the unity and permanence of His power and inspire us to “Praise Him.”

Form

This is one of Hopkins’s “curtal” (or curtailed) sonnets, in which he miniaturizes the traditional sonnet form by reducing the eight lines of the octave to six (here two tercets rhyming ABC ABC) and shortening the six lines of the sestet to four and a half. This alteration of the sonnet form is quite fitting for a poem advocating originality and contrariness. The strikingly musical repetition of sounds throughout the poem (for example, dappled, stipple, tackle, fickle, freckled, adazzle) enacts thecreative act the poem glorifies: the weaving together of diverse things into a pleasing and coherent whole.

Commentary

This poem is a miniature or set-piece, and a kind of ritual observance. It begins and ends with variations on the mottoes of the Jesuit order (“to the greater glory of God” and “praise to God always”), which give it a traditional flavor, tempering the unorthodoxy of its appreciations. The parallelism of the beginning and end correspond to a larger symmetry within the poem: the first part (the shortened octave) begins with God and then moves to praise his creations. The last four-and-a-half lines reverse this movement, beginning with the characteristics of things in the world and then tracing them back to a final affirmation of God. The delay of the verb in this extended sentence makes this return all the more satisfying when it comes; the long and list-like predicate, which captures the multiplicity of the created world, at last yields in the penultimate line to a striking verb of creation (fathers-forth) and then leads us to acknowledge an absolute subject, God the Creator. The poem is thus a hymn of creation, praising God by praising the created world. It expresses the theological position that the great variety in the natural world is a testimony to the perfect unity of God and the infinitude of His creative power. In the context of a Victorian age that valued uniformity, efficiency, and standardization, this theological notion takes on a tone of protest.

Why does Hopkins choose to commend “dappled things” inparticular? The first stanza would lead the reader to believe that their significance is an aesthetic one: In showing how contrasts and juxtapositions increase the richness of our surroundings, Hopkins describes variations in color and texture—of the sensory. The mention of the “fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls” in the fourth line, however, introduces a moral tenor to the list. Though the description is still physical, the idea of a nugget of goodness imprisoned within a hard exterior invites a consideration of essential value in a way that the speckles on a cow, for example, do not. The image transcends the physical, implying how the physical links to the spiritual and meditating on the relationship between body and soul. Lines five and six then serve to connect these musings to human life and activity. Hopkins first introduces a landscape whose characteristics derive from man’s alteration (the fields), and then includes “trades,” “gear,” “tackle,” and “trim” as diverse items that are man-made. But he then goes on to include these things, along with the preceding list, as part of God’s work.

Hopkins does not refer explicitly to human beings themselves, or to the variations that exist among them, in his catalogue of the dappled and diverse. But the next section opens with a list of qualities (“counter, original, spare, strange”) which, though they doggedly refer to “things” rather than people, cannot but be considered in moral terms as well; Hopkins’s own life, and particularly his poetry, had at the time been described in those very terms. With “fickle” and “freckled” in the eighth line, Hopkins introduces a moral and an aesthetic quality, each of which would conventionally convey a negative judgment, in order to fold even the base and theugly back into his worshipful inventory of God’s gloriously “pied”creation.

SHMOOP

http://www.shmoop.com/pied-beauty/

In A Nutshell

"Praise the LORD.
Praise the LORD from the heavens,
Praise him in the heights above."

That's not Gerard Manley Hopkins, but it sounds a little like "Pied Beauty," doesn't it? The quote comes from the Book of Psalms in the Bible. It's a "hymn to creation," just like "Pied Beauty." The Psalms inspired this genre, which makes a very simple argument: the world is great and amazing, so God must be too. Some of Hopkins's best poetry celebrates the creations of nature in all their quirky majesty. For example, check out "God's Grandeur," which you can also read about on Shmoop.

Hopkins wrote "Pied Beauty" in 1877, the same year that he was ordained as a Jesuit priest. He is known today as one of the great innovators of English poetry, and particularly for his use of "sprung rhythm." (We'll explain more about "sprung rhythm" in "Form and Meter.")

Hopkins was born in England and lived during the reign of Queen Victoria, often called the Victorian period. His poems are beloved by people of all stripes and "stipples" (pun!) who think that oddness makes the world that much more praise-worthy.

With only a few exceptions, Hopkins did not publish his poetry during his lifetime. The first collection of his work, including this poem, became available to the public in 1918, almost thirty years after his death.

Why Should I Care?

In the history of artists who praise nature, Gerard Manley Hopkins stands out from the crowd. There are two conventional approaches to appreciating nature. The first is to be so bowled over that you can't say anything at all: "Did you see that sunset!? Like…I can't…it's so….wow!" The second is to appreciate nature only insofar as it seems like a nice, organized system: "I love trees that are symmetrical and evenly spaced, waterfalls that fit perfectly on the mountainside, and even the way a snail's shell makes a perfect spiral."

Hopkins takes a different approach. He eloquently loves nature for its quirks, the way you might love someone for his or her big ears. Many writers who glorify nature try to make the world more orderly and manageable than it really is. Rather than ignoring the off-kilter parts of reality, Hopkins zooms right in on them. He would walk into your house and say something like, "Hey, I love how your picture looks a little crooked. Nice work." And you would wonder if he were kidding. But you would soon realize that, no, he is not.

Much of "Pied Beauty" focuses on spots, dots, and speckles in particular. These are the "pied" things from the title. We typically think of spots as our enemy. We have spot removers for our clothes, and when we clean a room really well we call it "spotless." For Hopkins, "spotless" would be a sad state – if it were possible. Fortunately, the word is an exaggeration – a figure of speech. For just when you think you have every last speck of dust cleaned from a room, a ray of sunlight will suddenly come down through the window, lighting up all the tiny floating specks in the air, and you'll be frozen with wonder. You might even say to yourself, "Hey, I could write a poem about this."

Summary

http://www.shmoop.com/pied-beauty/summary.html

The speaker says we should glorify God because he has given us dappled, spotted, freckled, checkered, speckled, things. (This poem says "dappled" in a lot of different ways.)

The speaker goes on to give examples. We should praise God because of the skies with two colors, like a two-colored cow. And the little reddish dots on the side of trout. And the way fallen chestnuts look like red coals in a fire. And the blended colors of the wings of a finch (a kind of bird). And landscapes divided up by humans into plots for farming. And for all the different jobs that humans do.

In short, the speaker thinks we should praise God for everything that looks a bit odd or unique, everything that looks like it doesn't quite fit in with the rest.

All these beautiful, mixed-up, ever-changing things were created or "fathered" by a God who never changes. The speaker sums up what he believes should be our attitude in a brief, final line: "Praise Him."





The Cummings Study Guide

http://www.cummingsstudyguides.net/Guides3/Pied.html

Type of Work

"Pied Beauty" is a lyric poem praising God for his variegated creation. The author, Gerard Manley Hopkins, called the poem a curtal sonnet, meaning a shortened or contracted sonnet. A curtal sonnet consists of eleven lines instead of the usual fourteen for the standard Shakespearean or Petrarchan sonnet. Besides being a lyric poem in the form of a curtal sonnet, "Pied Beauty" may also be classified as catalogue verse because it presents a thesis followed by a list of examples (catalogue) that support the thesis.

Composition and Publication

Hopkins completed "Pied Beauty" in 1877. The London firm of Humphrey S. Milford published it in 1918 in Poems of Gerard Manley Hopkins.

Theme

The theme of the poem is this: Nature in its variety--including streaked, spotted, and multicolored skies, fields, nuts, fish, birds, and other animals--is a gift of God for which we all should be thankful. One may interpret this theme to include human beings, with their many personalities, moods, idiosyncrasies, occupations, cultures, languages, political systems, skin colors and other physical attributes, and so on.

Meter: Sprung Rhythm

The meter of "Pied Beauty" is sprung rhythm, a term coined by Hopkins to describe a metric format that permits an unlimited number of unstressed syllables in each line to accompany stressed syllables. A metric foot in sprung rhythm usually contains one to four syllables. Hopkins intended sprung rhythm to mimic the stresses occurring in ordinary English speech.

Structure

Hopkins begins and ends the poem with a call to praise God for the gifts He has given us. Between these calls, he presents two short lists and a comment about the beauty of God. The first list uses concrete and specific language (skies, the cow, trout, chestnuts, finches, and farm fields); the second list, abstract and general language (things counter, original, spare, strange, fickle, etc.). The comment notes that the beauty of God, unlike the beauty of creation, does not change. Thus, Hopkins structures the poem as follows:

1. A call to praise God for his gifts.

2. A list of gifts in specific language.

3. A list of gifts in abstract language.

4. A comment about the immutable beauty of God.

5. A call to praise God.

Rhyme

The rhyme scheme of the poem is as follows:

Lines 1-6: ABCABC

Lines 7-10: DBDC

Line 11: C

Tone

The tone is exuberant and spirited. The poem is a song of joy.

Summary of the Poem

Glory to God, the speaker says, for giving the world spotted, streaked, and multicolored things. Blue skies, for example, may display streaks of white or gray--or the colors of the sunset. In this respect, skies are like cows, which may be brown with streaks or patches of another color. And then there are the speckled trout and the fallen chestnuts with open hulls that reveal kernels with an intense color resembling the glow of burning coal. Consider also, the speaker says, the multicolored wings of the finches and the farmland with patches of green contrasting with plowed or fallow patches of brown. And what of the variety of tools and kits and equipment that dapple the workplace of men?

There are many varieties of odd and strange things in the world--some of them original, one of a kind. The qualities of these fickle things may be freckled with opposites. Swiftness may be freckled with slowness, sweetness with sourness, brightness with dimness.

But He who brings forth dappled things is not Himself dappled. He is changeless, ever the same.

Praise him.

Pied Beauty By Gerard Manley Hopkins Text and Notes Glory be to God for dappled1 things— For skies of couple-colour2 as a brinded3 cow; For rose-moles4 all in stipple5 upon trout that swim; Fresh-firecoal chestnut-falls;6 finches’ wings; Landscape plotted and pieced—fold, fallow, and plough; 5 And all trades, their gear and tackle and trim.7 All things counter, original, spare, strange; Whatever is fickle, freckled (who knows how?) With swift, slow; sweet, sour; adazzle, dim; He fathers-forth8 whose beauty is past change: 10 Praise him. Notes 1...dappled: Spotted, speckled, pied; multicolored. 2...couple-colour: Two colors. 3...brinded: Brindled; having a brownish yellow or gray coat with spots or streaks of a darker color. 4...rose-moles: Reddish spots on the skin. 5...stipple: Pattern of spots. 6...Fresh . . . falls: Fallen chestnuts with shells that opened. The exposed nuts resemble glowing coals. 7...trim: equipment. 8...fathers-forth: Creates, begets.