The City Planners by Margaret Atwood (Sahaj)

Summary
The city planner uses awesome imagery to portray the suburbs' fundamentally
flawed nature. The speaker starts with describing his drive in the peaceful
neighbourhood. Just looking at the neatly arranged homes, roofs, and driveways
makes the speaker feel insane. She occasionally sees a hint of human nature
resisting the city planner's plan, but these moments are currently few and far
between. A garden hose that is curled and a paint blob are among them.
The poem's second half, in which Atwood describes the city planner's efforts to
create a new suburb amid what might be interpreted as climate change, is even
more metaphorical than the first. They wander aimlessly, drawing flimsy lines
that appear to be wooden borders on fading white walls.

Themes:
'The City Planners' by Margaret Atwood explores issues of society, power, and
the future. In these brief seven stanzas, she portrays a world that is destined to
disintegrate and then be rebuilt. The city planners create insane streets with
perfectly constructed homes and roads. The grass cannot grow because every
roof faces the same direction. The entire world must fit into the same organised
box. However, Atwood's speaker seems to be more attentive to this world than
other characters do. She is aware that the structure's foundation is weak and that
eventually it will all crumble and sink into the ground.

Analysis:
"The City Planners" is a poem by Margaret Atwood that explores the theme of
urban planning and its impact on the natural world. The poem is divided into
four stanzas, each of which offers a different perspective on this theme.
The speaker describes the city's layout with accuracy and precision in the first
stanza. The speaker may find this kind of order oppressive and monotonous
based on the phrase "streets that follow like a tedious argument" that is used in
this passage. The word "rows" is used repeatedly to highlight how uniform the
city's layout is and how little diversity it represents.
The order of the city and the chaos of nature are contrasted in the second stanza.
With "the trees withered, the houses brown and silent," and "the river with its
cargo of dead negroes, cows, and chicken coops," the stanza's vivid imagery
conveys a sense of degeneration and destruction. These pictures demonstrate the
harm that urban planning can do to the environment.
The third stanza introduces the notion that city planners are unaware of the
environmental effects of their plans. The word "blind" implies that the planners
are purposefully unaware of the harm they are doing. The phrase "the bright,
thin walls of money" emphasises the notion that profit, not environmental
consideration, is the driving force behind urban planning.
The speaker criticises the city planners' view of progress in the final stanza.
What offends us is the sanities," is a phrase that suggests that the speaker finds
the planners' ideas of progress and order to be oppressive and constrictive. The
poem's concluding line, "We die, forever seeking roads," emphasises the notion
that progress is a never-ending cycle that inevitably results in destruction.
Overall, "The City Planners" is a powerful critique of urban planning and its
impact on the natural world. The poem's vivid imagery and carefully chosen
language create a sense of decay and destruction that highlights the destructive
impact of urban planning on the environment. At the same time, the poem offers
a critique of the vision of progress that motivates urban planners, suggesting
that their narrow focus on profit and order ultimately leads to a cycle of
destruction and decay.

Literary Devices:
The poem "The City Planners" by Margaret Atwood employs a number of
literary strategies to convey its meaning and atmosphere. A few of the poem's
major literary devices include:
Atwood describes the monotony and uniformity of the suburban landscape with
vivid imagery. She speaks of the "perfect rows" of homes and the "neat plots"
of grass, for instance. This imagery conveys the monotony and conformity that
define the poem's world.
Irony: The poem employs irony to question the planners' worldview. The
repeated use of the phrase "how to live in it," for instance, suggests that the
planners are attempting to impose a way of life rather than allowing people to
live as they see fit. Ironically, the planners' description as "logical" and
"intelligent" implies that they lack creativity and imagination in their view of
the world.
Atwood employs a number of symbols to communicate the poem's theme. The
"perfect rows" of homes and the "neat plots" of grass, for instance, represent the
planners' desire for consistency and order. The metaphor of the "grey concrete"
suggests that the world of the poem lacks life and vitality. The "neat frontier"
also represents the planners' desire to subjugate and rule nature.
Personification: The poem gives the planners and their tools a sense of agency
and power by giving them human characteristics. The "gods" who are "marking
the landscape" and "rearranging the furniture," for instance, are how the
planners are referred to. The "grids" and "straight lines" of the machines are
personified as well, coming to life.

The Rooms by Charlotte Mew (Sahaj)

Summary
The speaker opens the first section of "Rooms" by recalling some rooms she has
stayed in over the course of her life. One in Geneva, one in Paris, and perhaps
one that smelled like seaweed. The latter is where she has an extramarital
relationship (perhaps a reference to her sister who she cared for while dying of
cancer). The room serves as a metaphor for Mew's overall limitations
throughout her life as well as the dark times that eventually lead to the poem's
conclusion and her wish for the only form of freedom she can imagine: death.

Themes:

The theme of confinement is primarily explored in "Rooms" by Charlotte Mew.

In order to show how confined and in charge she, or at least her speaker, was
throughout her life, the author uses the image of a room. She kept finding
herself in depressing and disappointing rooms as she moved from place to place
before arriving at the one she's in right now. one that is battered by the tide and
has a seaweed odour. She is lying there with another person who is also trapped.
The speaker in Mew is constrained in every way a woman could have been in
the 19th century.

Analysis:
"Rooms" is a poem by Charlotte Mew that explores themes of loneliness,
isolation, and the passing of time. The poem is divided into three stanzas, each
of which focuses on a different aspect of the speaker's life.
The first stanza describes the speaker's childhood home, which is now empty
and abandoned. The language used in this stanza is very evocative, with vivid
descriptions of the rooms and the objects within them. The repetition of the
phrase "all empty, still" emphasizes the sense of abandonment and loneliness
that the speaker feels.
The second stanza focuses on the speaker's present situation, as she reflects on
her own life and her feelings of isolation. The imagery in this stanza is more
abstract, with references to "waves that leap/ Out of darkness, to white forms
that pass" suggesting a sense of movement and change. The final lines, "But no
one sees me, no one hears me/ Yet in a short while, I shall be free," suggest that
the speaker is resigned to her isolation but also hopeful for a future release from
it.

The final stanza returns to the theme of the passing of time, with the speaker
imagining her own death and the eventual decay of the abandoned house from
the first stanza. The use of the phrase "all dead and gone" emphasizes the
finality of death and the idea that everything eventually fades away.
Overall, "Rooms" is a poignant exploration of themes that are central to Mew's
work, including isolation, loneliness, and mortality. The vivid imagery and
carefully chosen language combine to create a powerful sense of loss and
longing.

Literary Devices:
1. Metaphor: The rooms in the poem serve as a metaphor for the different
stages of the speaker's relationship. For example, the "first room"
represents the beginning of the relationship, while the "last room"
represents its end.
2. Symbolism: The different objects in each room also serve as symbols for
different aspects of the relationship. For example, the "cupboard with its
cruel key" in the second room represents the secrets and hidden pain of
the relationship.
3. Imagery: The poem uses vivid imagery to create a sense of nostalgia and
longing. For example, the "little forgotten dusty smell" in the fourth room
conjures up a sensory memory of a forgotten past.
4. Personification: The rooms themselves are personified throughout the
poem, giving them a sense of life and personality. For example, the "last
room" is described as "cold" and "hollow," suggesting the emptiness of
the relationship's end.
5. Allusion: The poem makes an allusion to the biblical story of Samson and
Delilah in the fifth stanza, using it to underscore the theme of betrayal
and the destructive power of love.
6. Repetition: The phrase "and yet" is repeated throughout the poem,
emphasizing the conflicting emotions of the speaker as she remembers
her past relationship.