Hitting Rossetti on old Perceptions

In his chapter about Dante Gabriel Rossetti, Hollander strives to show how this Romantic poet has power enough to make the modernists second guess themselves in dismissing his ilk. And so it's another survey and study of how one poet goes to work.

Again, as was the case with Whitman, I find myself confronted by something that deserves a second look. That Rossetti also translated medieval texts makes me all the more curious. Though, it sounds like Italian texts were his forte, and I don't get the impression that he translated any epic romances (perhaps that's simply my work).

Tandem Time!

Aha! I was totally right! Radiant Historia's two timelines are building upon one another almost entirely in tandem. There's still challenge in figuring out when to finish what sidequests, but the main plot is unfolding around a reciprocal building of the two timelines.

What leads me to say this?

I needed to progress down the soldier timeline to learn sword dancing to progress down the special agent timeline. Now, to continue down the soldier timeline, I need to learn some sort of "Keen-Eyed" technique in the special agent timeline.

It's good to be right!

Though, this might mean that there is only one boss to the game. This is where the spoilers come in...(after the jump cut).

Drops of Snow?

The way Hollander writes about Walt Whitman's wordplay and the textures within Leaves of Grass makes his poetry sound incredibly compelling. Writing as someone who's never seriously read any Whitman, I'm definitely going to have to go back and check out one of the several editions of the collection to see what all the fuss is about.

Though, reading about Whitman's writing poetry for America on various levels or in various ways makes me wonder who the equivalent is for Canada.

Charles Sangster was quite popular around Confederation (classed among the Confederation Poets, in fact). E.J. Pratt wrote an epic about the Canadian Pacific Railway, giving voice to an important national unifier for Canada. Leonard Cohen captured (and still ensnares) hearts and minds with his works. Irving Layton's another candidate, too, writing poetry that was direct and blunt.

But has there been a poet whose been acknowledged as having written the Canadian poem, or poetry collection? Could such a claim ever be made, given Canada's priding itself on diversity, bashfulness, and unobtrusiveness?

Building Towers of History in Tandem

Rather than frittering away time trying to get Kiel to show Stocke sword dancing during the game's Prologue, I decided to carry on. I had figured that the game's (so far) dual timeline probably works like two evenly matched racers: one pulls ahead while the other lags and vice versa, over and over again. It seems that my figuring is right.

Upon moving into the next part of the game's story, Kiel has asked Stocke to train him, and after the marching orders are given, Rosch pulls Kiel aside so that he can travel with the main group and learn from Stocke along the way.

One thing that I'm noticing about Radiant Historia, though, is that the story and the time travel mechanic are at odds.

You might have to back track every now and then to push the story forward down the parallel path, but in so doing you retread the same dialogue and interactions several times over. It's as if two towers are being built in tandem as one project: Holding up construction of the one holds up construction of the other, which in turn holds up the whole project.

I'm also a little bugged by the game's forcing you to rework your way through what was the explored overworld map each time you travel back in time. Nonetheless, the potential of each of the game's timeline forks having their unique boss and ending is enough to keep all of necessary retreading from annoying me too much.

What a Thing to Inspire a Workshop

For all of his worry about bad poetry and all of his concern about the current state of poetry, Hollander at least ends the second section of The Work of Poetry on a positive note. Because of all of the schools of verse there are that many more people writing verse, and there are also that many more critics of poetry, but nonetheless, true poets will emerge as they always do.

For a chapter that's titled "Oh Heavy Verse! The Shopwork of the Workshops," he really doesn't give much depth to his discussion of writing workshops. Outside of saying that poetry is something people come to on their own, and that workshops are generating people with tin ears and poor poetic senses, he makes no true points.

Nonetheless, as narrow as this narrow-sounding chapter might be, it has me feeling very self-conscious of my own poetry (or should I call it verse?). I write in a kind of half formal, half free verse mode most of the time, and frequently use half rhymes or assonance rather than full rhymes. But if variety and tone are central to poetry, I at least have those - at least.

Link's Awakened

The Nightmare boss at the end of Link's Awakening is an absolute bitch. I haven't had my heart racing and my body deking from side to side like that during a handheld Zelda boss fight for far too long.

Before that boss fight, in a great example of anti-climax, I didn't need to draw up a map or anything to get the Nightmare's key in Turtle Rock. I needed a regular key, which I already had, and to find the stairs leading to the boss door. Handily doing both within minutes and then being convinced (and later having it confirmed) that the Wind Fish's Egg wasn't a full dungeon, I figured I might as well just finish the game. So, I did.

Upon finding the Egg to be a puzzle, I called up Ulrira. His tip agreed with my tuition and I ran over to the library.

Already prepped with paper and pen at hand, I wrote down the way through the Egg maze, and rushed off to the Egg. Burning all of the enemies along the way, of course.

However, the greatest puzzle of all (mostly because there was no companion to pull me aside and say - "Ganon's weak to your sword spin!" Or, "The Giant Bot sure does look like it'd hate thickener...") - the Nightmare boss nearly did me in.

Thankfully, completely aware of what I had with me, and armed with my knowledge of Zelda bosses up to this game (and that I had one of Crazy Tracy's potions), I battled on.

The menu screen was called up for a few quick time-outs and to get my bearings, and, after switching Roc's Feather in for the shield and my bow for the sword, I jumped and dodged and shot until the Nightmare boss's final form (which reminds me of Vaati's (in The Minish Cap), actually) was arrowed to death. The Nightmare boss called me out for ruining its plan of dream domination, and I briefly met the Wind Fish before waking us both up with the eight instruments.

I'm glad that Marin was the last we see vanish (before the whole island is shown disappearing, at least), and the Wind Fish's flying over Link suggests that it was a very real dream indeed.

Now, though, I'm left wondering two things: How is the ending different if you finish the game with zero deaths? And, just how long was Link passed out while clutching those two logs for buoyancy?

I may never learn the answer to the latter, but the answer to the former will be discovered once I've cleared the rest of my game backlog. For now - consider The Legend of Zelda: Link's Awakening completed!

A Wider 'Net

My inability to relate to what Hollander has to say remains. After writing about his poetic generation, Hollander spends follows with a discussion of Wallace Stevens and a bunch of other poets he read growing up. Needless to say, I'm only familiar with a handful - particularly because I've read medieval and early modern stuff so much more than anything after the 19th century. 

Romantics, Medievals, and Renaissance poets are my foundation (roughly in that order), and reading Hollander's chapter here has really shown me that that sort of a base can work. It's something that I just need to find others to relate with about.

Taking a wider view, though, I think the breadth of my reading reflects a greater ease of access. A lot of Hollander's anecdotes about what he read involve getting books from friends and such. I've more often been on the other side of that exchange, but having the internet's definitely had an incredible impact on people's abilities to read a greater variety of anything by anyone. 

This variety definitely leads to what Hollander would consider bad poetry, but I think it also helps to keep it in check. After all, as more people are able to read more, more people are able to read more bad poetry and thus are equipped to avoid it.