Re: The Dwarf Beneath The Mountain // Rob

On Sep 28, 7:04 am, Sherrie Lee <sherriel...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:
On Sep 28, 7:00 am, George Dance <georgedanc...@xxxxxxxx> wrote:





On Sep 28, 3:26 am, Sherrie Lee <sherriel...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sep 27, 7:05 pm, George Dance <georgedanc...@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sep 25, 1:31 pm, Sherrie Lee <sherriel...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sep 25, 3:51 pm, George Dance <georgedanc...@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sep 25, 12:40 pm, Sherrie Lee <sherriel...@xxxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sep 25, 3:17 pm, George Dance <georgedanc...@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sep 25, 11:18 am, Sullivan the Poet <sullivanp...@xxxxxxxxxxxxx>
wrote:

On Sep 25, 5:50 pm, George Dance <georgedanc...@xxxxxxxx> wrote:

On Sep 25, 6:51 am, Rafael Corazon <P...@xxxxxxx> wrote:

The Dwarf Beneath The Mountain

The dwarf beneath the mountain fears the light
because it once cast out his crooked shade
so now he speaks through crevices and cracks
that twist towards the world yet block the sun.

The dwarf beneath the mountain hates the world
because it does not love him but that truth
is far too painful even in the dark
and so he claims it has abandoned God

and since his one true deity is made
in his own dwarfish image from the night
it has no time for simple charity
and it cannot forgive the joyful day.

The dwarf pretends to be an oracle
and hopes his endless venomed muttering
will seep out through the stones into the streams
and stop the breath of every single soul.

The dwarf beneath the mountain is a fool
for even if he closed all other eyes
he still could never walk outside for fear
of being seen by some abandoned mirror.

Rob

[...]





[...] The argument seems to need to address that which
defines Art.

A big hunk of it has be reflected in the editing. That's like Rob's
poem. One would have to wonder, however, if this "dwarf" type has it
in himself to edit the mirror. Then again, he hides himself. I don't
know why he has to be a dwarf except for syllable count and sound. Why
couldn't he be a hermit?

Because a hermit isn't different enough. That's important because:

As I read it, the dwarf is like the Devil. A person feels anger, hate,
frustration, etc., and sometimes anxiety and unhappiness as a result
(as those are most unacceptable emotions, which can get one punished).
So he makes up or reifies some external thing to be the source of the
hate: a devil or a dwarf - that gives him an acceptable outlet for his
hate, as he can now hate it. The trick for that to work is for the
person to not realize that he's hating his own emotions, and for that
the external thing should be as different from the person as
possible.

I took the voice of the poem to be the mirror who was there to reflect
the characteristics of the dwarf and who felt the dwarf would not come
out for fear of this mirror's (who was abandoned) reflecting these
characteristics.

The mirror said nothing about any acceptable feelings because it
reflected only that which it projected upon the dwarf as if the mirror
was some all seeing thing (which it acts as the omniscient voice of
the poem).

True; but at least it is clear, to both of us, that the poem is not
reflecting the dwarf's feelings, but projecting those feelings onto
him. Insofar as the poem is a mirror (and to some extent they always
are), it's reflecting the speaker's feelings, not the dwarf's. Why
that happens is my own theory, of course; all the poem shows is that
it does happen.

The mirror states that the dwarf hides, "speaks through crevices and
cracks". That is something concrete (but how can the mirror be sure it
is the dwarf's voice and not some imitator's voice? it only hears it.
it cannot "see" a voice.)



OK; but where you say "mirror", I'd say "speaker." I say, though, that
that comes to the same thing: the speaker intends his poem to be a
mirror on the dwarf, showing all the nastiness that Shorty (the dwarf)
is so desperate to conceal.

But you've spotted the flaw in that yourself: the dwarf is inside the
mountain, where the speaker (Big Guy) cannot see him. And what cannot
be seen, cannot be reflected either. So Big Guy can't hold up a mirror
and show us Shorty; all he can do is tell us about the Shorty. Which
is all that does occur in the poem: no showing, just teling and
telling and telling ...


The mirror hears what it thinks is the dwarf's voice claiming "(the
world) has abandoned God". The mirror, again, is hearing a voice that
it identifies as the dwarf's voice.



Right. The fact that the dwarf is heard (but not seen) is further
evidence that the poem isn't a mirror by which we see the dwarf, but
only some talk about dwarves.


The next piece of evidence is the endless muttering. The sense
involved is hearing. There is no touching or seeing. The mirror
depends on its hearing and comes to its opinions this way.



Yes. Again, hearing but no seeing.


Now maybe the dwarf does behave as oracle with something very wise to
offer, perhaps as a warning to protect something it values, and it is
the mirror who sets out to destroy the faith that is necessary to
accept the pronouncement based on little evidence. The mirror's job is
to discredit that which might be doing the discrediting. Who to
believe?


Once one recognizes there are two characters in the poem - the dwarf
or Shorty, and the "mirror" or Big Guy, that's a natural question. I'm
impressed that you got that from the poem; I honestly don't think that
even the author got that, that he thinks the poem's all about the
dwarf.


The dwarf who seems to be hiding? or the mirror whose weapon
is to discredit something based on that something's hiding? Of course
it totally begs the question that makes the claim that something must
be believed to be protected. Is the mirror to be believed that the
dwarf hides in the shadow for protection against being seen (by some
abandoned mirror)? By walking out of the shadow, the mirror would no
longer be abandoned; it's implied.



At face value, there's no ambiguity in the poem; by its words, Shorty
is completely evil etc.: he fears the light, hates the world, is a
fool, et al. But there's no reason to accept any of that at face
value; one can always read more critically, as you've done (as
usual).


Shorty is hiding, and muttering his imprecations - but he's certainly
not muttering that he fears the light, hates the world, et al - all
that is coming from Big Guy. And while Big Guy purports simply to be
holding up a mirror and showing us Shorty, he's in fact telling us
things - hate, fear, foolishness - that in fact can't be seen, but
only told. (You can't see someone fearing the light, for example; all
you can do is see someone staying in the dark, and judge and say that
he fears the light.

So, as soon as one goes past a face-value reading, Big Guy's
"observations" about Shorty have to be seen as nothing more than Big
Guy's opinions of Shorty. Nothig is revealed by the mirror; there is
no actual mirror.


Let's pretend a soldier's gone AWOL but turns himself in within the
time frame set out for such things. Charges are reduced to desertion
(or however the military handles it...apply these terms in order to
understand something).


I'd reverse them; IIRC, desertion is the more serious (punishable by
death), while AWOL is the lesser charge, could simply be getting back
to base late.


The soldier no longer is seen to have abandoned
his duty (contract), and the military reduces the charges and applies
less severe consequences than the soldier would have received had he
"been caught". There is a system of cause and effect in place likely
spelled out in advance via concrete evidence (paper contract). If an
agreement was made over the phone, say, and this was not recorded,
it's one word against another word. Only the parties involved know
their offenses. Only the parties involved know who was better at
keeping his word, who worked hardest to show "good faith" in the face
of something large -- the mountain. Usually in these types of
situations, it comes down to self-preservation which is why the poem
is defensive by taking an offensive stance.


Indeed; both Shorty muttering about God, and Big Guy ranting about
Shorty's hate and evil, are trying to recruit supporters (which is why
somewhere on this thread I suggested that they could be Osama and
Dubya.) The question for the reader, as you say, is: Whom to
believe?


It has to be circular that
way in order to say, The only way to know is to see it for one's self;
and can you be sure of what you have just seen? If the dwarf is
afraid, that's what he fears -- not the truth, but the lie.



Reading the poem superficially, accepting what it says as TrVth
revealed (by the mirror), there's no question who to believe: Shorty
is the liar, as he tries to hide what he knows and pretend something
else. Get past that, though, and one realizes that Big Guy is the one
being deceptive: he has no mirror, and can't show the reader anything
about Shorty; all he can do is tell us his opinion of Shorty in 20
lines of mean-spirited rant.




[...]




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Relevant Pages

  • Re: The Dwarf Beneath The Mountain // Rob
    ... that comes to the same thing: the speaker intends his poem to be a ... mirror on the dwarf, showing all the nastiness that Shorty ... So Big Guy can't hold up a mirror ... and show us Shorty; all he can do is tell us about the Shorty. ...
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  • Re: The Dwarf Beneath The Mountain // Rob
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  • Re: The Dwarf Beneath The Mountain // Rob
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