Emily the Strange

Pastoral scene of the gallant south The bulging eyes and the twisted mouth Scent of magnolias, sweet and fresh Then the sudden smell of burning flesh. (Abel Meeropol 1903-1986) In The Strange Fruit, Abel Meeropol graphically describes bodies hanging like festering fruit on trees. He strips away the veneer of the beautiful South to expose the horrors that black people suffered. This poem chills me and frustrates me, since racist murderers walked free just because others turned a…

Ashley Castro ENGL 25000 Professor Magnet The poem I chose was “Our lives are Swiss” by Emily Dickinson. I felt many emotions from this poem as categorize them. I ended up with the categories of solitude, disquietude and curiosity. She seems to feel that she is being deprived of this life other than the one she is used to and comfortable with. She mentions in the poem of these curtains and the neglect of making sure they are there. She is seeing past these so called curtains and seeing a…

Emily Dickinson is one of the most complex and misunderstood artists of all time. Students are taught that Dickinson is a woman who went crazy in her room and wrote thousands of talented poems. In reality, she’s a complex and unique person compared to almost all other people that her ideas and lifestyle were misunderstood. Dickinson’s level of writing in her letters and poems made it hard for anyone else to be able to understand her and communicate back effectively. This inability to relate to…

Emily Brontё spent most of her life isolated within the countryside village of Haworth, where Brontё experienced the brevity of life at a very young age. Her mother’s death and those of her family that followed influenced her fascination with mortality. The theme of religious doubt and uncertainty the forefront that inspired her works, including the poem “Plead for Me.” Within the poem, Brontё addresses the topic of morality as the conflict between religion and reason. Brontё’s speaker then…

Jane Eyre was published in 1847 by Charlotte Bronte. The same year, Wuthering Heights was published by Emily Bronte (of course, under their respective pseudonyms- Currer and Ellis Bell). It seems there were more things in common with these books than just the sisters who wrote them. The characters and themes are shared between the two classics. Gothic elements, like the presence of ‘something more’. The supernatural. But, where Wuthering Heights contained explicit proof of the supernatural with…

Which 1980s New Romantic pop group released a song entitled, "Fade to Grey"? Having started out hosting club nights at Billy's nightclub in Soho, founding members Steve Strange and Rusty Egan wanted to tap into the growing New Wave culture of syntho-pop, forming Visage in the late 1970s. Recruiting amongst others, Midge Ure and Billy Curry - whom also performed with Ultravox - the band's first single was a cover of Zager and Evans "In the Year 2525". This record though proved to be a…

Strange Fruit is a poem by Abel Meeropol written in 1939 was written to inform people about racism in an obvious fashion that explains the racism at the lynching in Marion killing two boys and harming another. The two boys were Thomas Shipp and Abram Smith were both African Americans who were lynched by a mob full of generally peaceful citizens who had been induced into mob mentality. Strange Fruit tells how cruel people could be when they are convinced that racism is the way to purge the land…

When I first heard Billie Holiday sing Strange Fruit, I was immediately saddened by her tone. It instantly gripped my attention because she started the song off referring to a “strange fruit.” This reference automatically made me listen closely to see what “fruit” she was speaking of. The next line talked about blood on the trees’ leaves and roots which instantly stirred up feeling of sadness. This song describes the lynching of African Americans in the South. I asked myself, what could a man…

“Black bodies swingin’ in the Southern breeze / Strange fruit hangin’ from the poplar trees” (3-4). The poem “Strange Fruit” by Abel Meeropol was published in 1937. It sets a deep tone on how racism occurred back in the 1930s. Meeropol was an ordinary high school teacher who went on to teach English for seventeen years. He was also a poet and social activist. Meeropol was troubled at the racism going on in America. He was inspired to write this poem after seeing a photograph of two teenagers;…

back to West’s plot line. The integration of Nina Simone’s rendition of Strange Fruit throughout the song brings the reader back to the fragility and vulnerability of the track. The first 47 seconds of the song is probably the most important part, as it is where we are introduced to Nina Simone singing Strange Fruit, a song that addressed lynching in the early 1940’s in America, and a soft piano riff. The selection of Strange Fruit is an important sign towards the goal of the song as a whole.…