The Cathedral Builder - John Ormond
The Cathedral
Builder
John Ormond
They climbed on
sketchy ladders towards God,
with winch and pulley hoisted hewn rock into heaven,
inhabited the sky with hammers,
defied gravity,
deified stone,
took up God's house to meet him,
and came down to their suppers
and small beer,
every night slept, lay with their smelly wives,
quarrelled and cuffed the children,
lied, spat, sang, were happy, or unhappy,
and every day took to the ladders again,
impeded the rights of way of another summer's swallows,
grew greyer, shakier,
became less inclined to fix a neighbour's roof of a fine evening,
saw naves sprout arches, clerestories soar,
cursed the loud fancy glaziers for their luck,
somehow escaped the plague,
got rheumatism,
decided it was time to give it up,
to leave the spire to others,
stood in the crowd, well back from the vestments at the consecration,
envied the fat bishop his warm boots,
cocked a squint eye aloft,
and said, 'I bloody did that.'
John Ormond Thomas
Summary of the poem
The single line poem Cathedral Builders was broken into 26
lines in order to understand the meaning of the entire poem. The poet observes a group of builders
building a cathedral step by step. The entire poem analyses all aspects of the
builders their public and private life. The poet describes the builders as superhuman
who do their building process in the daytime. The poet brings biblical
reference to the Tower of Babble of the Old Testament. The last few lines conclude the poem by
describing ordinary life of the superhuman builders. They spend the night with their family, with
their wife and alcohol. Their diversions
are just their smelly wife and the alcohol.
They lead a miserable life. They fight with their wives and their
children. They lead a dull life. Every day is a struggle for them. The poet points out the builders of the God’s
cathedral should have peace in their life, but they lead a painful life.
Detail Analysis of
the poem
“They climbed on sketchy ladders towards God,
with winch and pulley hoisted hewn rock into heaven,
inhabited the sky with hammers,
defied gravity,
deified stone,”
The first stanza describes
the builders at work. The workers
climbed up on the ladders. They climbed
the ladders towards the top of the cathedral.
They carry heavy stones, the tireless work of the builders is described
by “hewn rock into heaven” “H” sound
brings out their efforts to complete the work to make the cathedral divine.
“Defied gravity” the builders use the scientific technology to make the stone
into deified stone which questions the presence of God. But the builders do
their tireless services in completing the spiritual work of Deifying stone to
worship HIM.
“took
up God's house to meet him,
and came down to their suppers
and small beer,
every night slept, lay with their smelly wives,
_-_exterior,_quarter_view_2.jpg)
quarrelled and cuffed the children,
lied, spat, sang, were happy, or unhappy,”
They work in the God’s house and make the
cathedral holy and divine for worship but they come down to take their dinner
with a small beer and sleep with their smelly wives, the poet describes the
natural life style of the ordinary builders.
Their hard work and their leisure time both contradict. They do holy work as building the cathedral
but they lead a very ordinary life with poverty and struggles. They get into family feuds, they punish their
children for their naughtiness, spat and sang happily or when they are in pain.
The poet with simple language brings out their poverty stricken life. there is no change in their life styles as
they work in the holy cathedral and construct to make it a divine place for
worship.
“and
every day took to the ladders again,
impeded the rights of way of another summer's swallows,
grew greyer, shakier,
became less inclined to fix a neighbour's roof of a fine evening,
saw naves sprout arches, clerestories soar,
cursed the loud fancy glaziers for their luck,”
This part of the poem shows the everyday
work of the builders. They take the ladders again to do the work. They become old and weak and they could not
continue their work and let others to do their life’s work. The poet says even the builders become less
inclined to fix their neighbor’s roof. With their hard work they made the made the
cathedral raising up to the sky taking a divine shape, but now they are too
weak to continue the work. They curse
the glass workers as they don’t have to work so hard as the builders who carry
the ladders up and down every day to build the cathedral. The poet brings out the natural and real
feelings of the desperate builders.
“somehow escaped
the plague,
got rheumatism,
decided it was time to give it up,
stood in the crowd, well back from the vestments at the consecration,
envied the fat bishop his warm boots,
cocked a squint eye aloft,
and said, 'I bloody did that.”
The sufferings of the
builders are described in this part.
Since they climb up and down the ladders to do their work they get join
pains and rheumatism. After completing
the work they are supposed to leave the place to the elite ones as they don’t
need any more there. On the day of the
consecration of the cathedral, the builders who are now old stand among the crowd
just as others. Their works are not
appreciated and acknowledged. They are
now old and hungry and they envy the fat bishops his warm boots. The poet brings the social discrimination
among rich and the working class. They are not given importance even though
they have given their sweat and pain to build.
But they can say proudly “I
bloody did that”. Their anger is
expressed with pride. They are proud to
say that they build the holy place.
Their works might not be valued historically but he stands tall in front
of the cathedral with pride. The human
creativity makes the stone into a holy place.
Literary Devices in
the Poem
The poem is one long sentence and has been divided into
several parts for a deep analysis.
The whole poem is about the builders of the cathedral who
find their life very hard and they sweat a lot to earn for their family. Their struggles for a decent survival is
unimaginable.
The poet uses satire to bring out their hardships in the poem
“They climbed on sketchy ladders towards God”
They build only the
cathedral to make it a holy place for all.
But they are far from religion as they don’t have time to think about
god. For they struggle every minute for
their survival.
Visual images bring their hard works to the
readers even though they are not appreciated and acknowledged. “Climbed on
sketchy ladders towards God,”
and
came down to their suppers
and small beer, very
simple day to day action.
every night slept, lay with their smelly wives,
quarrelled and cuffed the children,
lied, spat, sang, were happy, or unhappy,”
natural life style of the Builders.
No fabrication.
Readers could feel the life style of the builders. It also symbolizes their hard life.
A simple Alliteration to give a powerful effect of the builders who are not
recognized by any. “Hoisted hewn rock
into heaven”
Allusion “somehow escaped the plague” indirectly tells killing of a huge number of people during
medieval period.
Metaphor “took up God's house to meet him, god’s house key. The builders work in great heights and it has been described
as if they are touching the sky the house of God.
“Warm Boots” refers
to the comforts of the rich who are going to occupy the cathedrals to worship
ignoring the hard work of the builders.
“Deified stone” an ordinary stone turns into a divine one as it becomes the part of the holy cathedral.
The title gives us the hint to go into the poem with a clear focus. The title gives the theme of the poem and the difference of the rich class and the working class. The poem is not about the cathedrals and their beautiful structures. But the poem says about the hard life of the builders and how they are ignored by the society.
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