Prompt: We’ve noticed that many of our readings comment on modern society as a place that is at once hopeful and problematic: “All Watched Over by Machines of Loving Grace” posits a utopian future, but undercuts it with irony; “Howl” walks the line between meaning and futility; “Slouching Towards Bethlehem ”exposes the rift between how the hippies characterize their lives and how they actually live them; “A Supermarket In California” presents technological progress as a kind of alienation (though one potentially redeemable through poetry). Take one of these, or any other text we’ve read for class, and explain how the text characterizes contemporary life. Be sure to focus not just on what the text says, but how it says it: how do the text’s
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As literary critics, we can analyze and evaluate Ginsberg’s free verse artistry in “A Supermarket In California” to argue the estranging nature of contemporary society and the potential for redemption through art. Ginsberg has the speaker of the poem wander through free verse, exploring his thoughts, and the streets, imagining he encounters Walt Whitman in a supermarket. Throughout his aimless stroll, the speaker poses weighty questions regarding the value of technological improvements in America. The questions have no answers, but Ginsberg uses word choice, structure, and symbols to present contemporary life as a new existence in which we are losing access to the past. Ginsberg effectively forces us to contemplate the impact of this new world for ourselves, and by including Whitman in the poem, Ginsberg allows the speaker to explore the values of the transcendentalists and their pursuit of a truer self as a way to redeem himself in this new alienating …show more content…
The speaker refers to the supermarket as artificial and “neon”; he is horrified by, “Aisles full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes!” (XX). Ginsberg describes the families of this America as violating what he believes to be the natural order of behavior, implying as America has moved away from natural and organic and towards processed and preserved a fascination with consumerism has developed. Throughout the poem he continues his characterization of the modern America by emphasizing the silliness of walking through a supermarket. At the end of the poem, Ginsberg calls on, “the lost America of love”(XX) when questioning what he will do. By describing a lost America, there is an implication of an ideal America. Through his word choice, implying that there is an America of love, Ginsberg creates an instant dichotomy comparing then to now. America used to be something greater, but its current direction is isolating to
As literary critics, we can analyze and evaluate Ginsberg’s free verse artistry in “A Supermarket In California” to argue the estranging nature of contemporary society and the potential for redemption through art. Ginsberg has the speaker of the poem wander through free verse, exploring his thoughts, and the streets, imagining he encounters Walt Whitman in a supermarket. Throughout his aimless stroll, the speaker poses weighty questions regarding the value of technological improvements in America. The questions have no answers, but Ginsberg uses word choice, structure, and symbols to present contemporary life as a new existence in which we are losing access to the past. Ginsberg effectively forces us to contemplate the impact of this new world for ourselves, and by including Whitman in the poem, Ginsberg allows the speaker to explore the values of the transcendentalists and their pursuit of a truer self as a way to redeem himself in this new alienating …show more content…
The speaker refers to the supermarket as artificial and “neon”; he is horrified by, “Aisles full of husbands! Wives in the avocados, babies in the tomatoes!” (XX). Ginsberg describes the families of this America as violating what he believes to be the natural order of behavior, implying as America has moved away from natural and organic and towards processed and preserved a fascination with consumerism has developed. Throughout the poem he continues his characterization of the modern America by emphasizing the silliness of walking through a supermarket. At the end of the poem, Ginsberg calls on, “the lost America of love”(XX) when questioning what he will do. By describing a lost America, there is an implication of an ideal America. Through his word choice, implying that there is an America of love, Ginsberg creates an instant dichotomy comparing then to now. America used to be something greater, but its current direction is isolating to