I Am Not A Myth Poem Analysis

In the poem “I am Not a Myth,” the author Matthew Hittinger uses sensual symbols of the rich and glamorous to examine the tension between Old Hollywood and New Hollywood. The enjambment, the (feminine?) sounding endings to each stanza and the (constant rhyme scheme?) in the poem highlights the cycle and materialism of fame. The speaker in the poem is the well-known film actress, Marlene Dietrich, who is commenting on the night she meant Marilyn Monroe. Hittinger adds this piece of information to set the scene and give the reader the background knowledge they would need to understand the conflict in the poem. Marlene Dietrich was a popular German film actress in Berlin and Hollywood during the 20s and 30s. When Marilyn and Marlene met in 1955, Marlene was already older and not the young beauty she was at the beginning of her career. This is a direct …show more content…
The poem acts as a warning from an elder film actress with experience to a younger naïve scarlet. Hittinger uses intense detailed imagery and symbols to create this image of what the life style of a scarlet is like. The speaker, Dietrich, gives us direct markers of to whom she’s refereeing to in the text when she states, “you arrived, tipsy, a bit chartreuse/ a subdused platinum angel.” Monroe had a bit of a reputation of representing this sociality party girl, which was a life style that Marlene was very aware of because she played into that narrative in the 1920s in Berlin. The imagery of the “platinum angel,” is an allusion to the iconic platinum blond hair that Marilyn Monroe wore throughout her life. In this same line we are introduced to the “white mink,” that will create paradox and be