A memorable literary work that I’ve read this year was Li-Young Lee’s poem “Persimmons”. I had an interesting experience reading this poem because I got to see this situation unfold through someone else’s point of view; never have I read a literary work that I could deeply relate to as much as I did in this poem and to the author. Li had to learn a new language and change in order to understand it, he had the conflict is the language barrier that Lee encounters in his life and the theme of assimilation in a new social environment. The single major conflict in the poem was the language barrier between Lee and other people. From personal experience I know it’s hard to adjust in a new social environment, especially when there is a vast difference in something as important as language. From Kindergarten to Second grade I was placed
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Walker/
Slapped the back of my head/
And made me stand in the corner/
For not knowing the difference/
Between persimmon and precision. (Lee 1-5) (743)
A vague memory of mine is the time when I couldn’t express what I wanted to say to my classmates in Second grade, I simply forget the word and froze, some of the kids even laughed. Even though it was hard for me to transition from my native language to a different and perplexing one, I still managed to slowly but surely assimilate English to my daily life as the years went on.
A significant theme in “Persimmons” was assimilation, integration or adaption to a new idea. Lee’s assimilation to the English language was slow and arduous, but he manages to speak and understand it with the best of his ability. My theory is that his grasp of the meaning of words and English sayings was misconstrued by his lack of proper knowledge about English culture: Other words/ that got me into trouble were / fight and fright, wren and yarn./ Fight was what I did when I was frightened, /
Fight was what I felt when I was fighting/
Wrens are small, plain birds, / yarn is what one knots with.
Walker/
Slapped the back of my head/
And made me stand in the corner/
For not knowing the difference/
Between persimmon and precision. (Lee 1-5) (743)
A vague memory of mine is the time when I couldn’t express what I wanted to say to my classmates in Second grade, I simply forget the word and froze, some of the kids even laughed. Even though it was hard for me to transition from my native language to a different and perplexing one, I still managed to slowly but surely assimilate English to my daily life as the years went on.
A significant theme in “Persimmons” was assimilation, integration or adaption to a new idea. Lee’s assimilation to the English language was slow and arduous, but he manages to speak and understand it with the best of his ability. My theory is that his grasp of the meaning of words and English sayings was misconstrued by his lack of proper knowledge about English culture: Other words/ that got me into trouble were / fight and fright, wren and yarn./ Fight was what I did when I was frightened, /
Fight was what I felt when I was fighting/
Wrens are small, plain birds, / yarn is what one knots with.