A Certain Lady by Dorothy Parker
Love, passion, and pain goes on in our lives, feelings we cannot avoid, and feelings that many writers have turned into poetry. In Dorothy Parker's poem "A Certain Lady", there is a woman as the speaker of the poem. We do not know much about her which makes her just a certain lady, like the authors' title for this poem. This certain lady never acts herself around a man, a man she seems to have affection for, but love. She expresses no happiness when she is around him but neither when he is away. I used two images of a flower. Both flowers are totally different from each other, one is bright and alive and the other one is dry and sad, and I imagine this lady to be like the two of them. She portrays a woman she is not, while hiding her inner feelings deeply in her soul. The certain lady uses the beauty, the elegance, and the freshness of a red and lively flower, but in the inside her feelings are blurry, she is not as lively and happy as she pretends to be around the man she wants to please. Her facade is mostly to please him, but she does it without receiving or expecting anything in return. The speaker never mentions a flower, but I see her as an image of it. the two flowers contrast with each other. The speaker reveals only one side of that flower, but the other one is kept hidden from everyone around her, especially the man. The ideas about the lady can be concrete because we know what she is thinking and doing, but also it can be abstract since we are not sure about what her real feelings are, we only assume that there is sadness in her for some of the things she says, such as, "nor can you ever see the thousand little deaths my heart has died", but apart from the few things she let us know we cannot see how deep that sentiment is. When she uses sarcasm as she talks, I imagine she uses it to hide her real feelings, she expresses as if she did not cared, and even tries to dismiss when he mentioned his adventures to her. She hides every emotion by saying it all sarcastically. The speaker is really effective at expressing her ideas and the two image representations enhance her facade and her inner soul in the poem. A Certain Lady, a flower that shines with beauty and flirt to those who praise it, a flower that lies because by the time you want to look at it again it has changed and its petals have started to fall and dry. A Certain Lady, a flower of two faces.
First of all, I really like how you chose these two pictures to compare the a Certain Lady to a dead rose and a lively rose. Also based on your point towards this poem I believe you are right, that this Certain lady has two different sides of herself. Sometimes she sad and then next thing you know she try's to be this perfect women for a specific person. I think it is all sarcasm as well because we do know what she is thinking and doing but it can be abstract because we do not know how her real feelings are. Based on your ideas, I liked how you put a good point by explaining what can a women she is trying to really be when in reality this certain women is trying to be someone that she is not. Overall, good job you actually made me think twice about this Certain Lady.
ReplyDeleteI found that you using two pictures was a great idea. I agree how the woman speaking in "A Certain Lady" was both of these images. She acted as the red rose, vibrant and alive, but inside, the lady was like the dead flower. She did not ever tell him of her suffering, and kept that dying aspect of her hidden. I would say then that this woman had feelings for this man, but she never purely reflected them. Her sarcasm is reflected by the red flower as well, for she is lively by being sarcastic. There are only a couple of grammatical errors, but I like and agree to your writing here.
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