Morning at the Window


 

Morning at the Window by T. S. Eliot

They are rattling breakfast plates in basement kitchens,
And along the trampled edges of the street
I am aware of the damp souls of housemaids
Sprouting despondently at area gates.    


The brown waves of fog toss up to me
Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,
And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts
An aimless smile that hovers in the air
And vanishes along the level of the roofs.

T.S.ELIOT

He was born on 26th September 1888. He was a published and editor and a great poet.  He is a prominent figure in English-language modernist poetry. He could not participate in many physical activities as he was suffering from hernia.  As he was alone he was infatuated with literature.  He began to write poetry when he was 14.  His first published poem was “A Fable for Feasters.”  After his graduation from Smith Academy, he attended Milton Academy.  He studied at Harvard College to obtain Master of Arts in English Literature. He married Vivienne Haigh-wood a Cambridge Governess.

 His “the love Song of Alfred Prufrock” in 1915 considered far out.  Then it was followed by “The Waste Land” 1922 “Ash Wednesday” 1930.  His well-known plays were Murder in the Cathedral”, “The Cocktail Party.  He was a Nobel Prize winner for literature in 1948 for his contribution to the literature world.  Eliot died of Emphysema in London on 4th 1965. His ashes were taken to St. Michael and All Angles’ Church, East Coker. The Quotation from his poem East Coker “In my beginning is my end. In my end is my beginning.

 

Summary of the poem

The poem is about the miserable life of slum people. The speaker from his window could imagine emotionally the poverty of the people who lead a depressing lives in slum and their feelings. The poor people make sound with their plates early in the morning.  They have to go to work early
and work till late so as to earn to feed the family.  Sun or rain frost or fog they have to go early to work.  He brings out the plight of the house maids who come at the city with no identity and life.  They are very sad.  No smile on their faces.  They smile vanishes over their roofs.    

 

Detail Analysis

First stanza

“They are rattling breakfast plates in basement kitchens,

And along the trampled edges of the street

I am aware of the damp souls of housemaids

Sprouting despondently at area gates.”

 

The first stanza describes the day today life of the poor people of slum.  The speaker says he could hear the sounds of the plates in the morning in the kitchens in the basements as they have to go to work early.  They have to go to work early and work so hard to feed the family.  The poet feels for them emotionally.  

The agony of the housemaids walking slowly down the edges of the street reveals their painful life.  They with no enthusiasm come of the gates. 

 

 

Second stanza

“The brown waves of fog toss up to me
Twisted faces from the bottom of the street,
And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts
An aimless smile that hovers in the air
And vanishes along the level of the roofs.”

Second stanza describes the passersby from the window.  The poet is at the window and watches the passersby.  A gloomy place covered with pollution shows the painful faces now and then from the bottom of the street, a person with muddy skirts with no smile passes by.  The smile has been
taken from everyone who struggle hard daily.  The smile has been ripped off even from their roofs. 

Literary Devices

In the first stanza the poet starts with the sound effect, onomatopoeia for example the sounds of the plates in the kitchen located in the basement. “Rattling breakfast plates” the poet brings visual imagery of their rush of their work so the readers could realise the hard struggle of their life. The first letter in the breakfast, basement is the use of alliteration which gives an effect to feel.  And tear from a passer-by with muddy skirts” readers could visualizes the state of the poor people.

Metaphor describes the suffering and sad state and desperation of the people.  For example “the damp souls of housemaids” and again basement denotes and symbolize poor life conditions. Also the Twisted faces which compares to unhappy faces.

“The brown waves of fog toss up to me” the fog denotes the pollution of industrialization and working on the dusty road.

Personification is to describe the state of ill mind. The struggle life of the people.  For example “fog toss up to me” 

The title gives a paradoxical meaning. The term “Morning” describes the positive feelings but the whole poem does not give any pleasant things to feel.  It paint the suffering of the poor people.

The form is nine lines with urban back ground with no rhyming pattern.  The tone of the poem is feeling for the poor and expresses the feeling of the poor.  Very simple and sympathetic.

The theme of the poem is hard struggle of the poor people.  Urbanization and polluted environment and industrial pollution and the suffering of the people in such environment.  The diction of the poem indirectly conveys the agony of the poor people.

Thus the poem is full indirect images to bring out the poverty and the ill effects of the industrialization.    The poem focuses is on the poor people who struggle hard to face their day today life.  The poem evokes our sympathy by his feelings for the people whose life is a challenge.

thank you

 

 


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