Icarus Reading and Interpretation

Reading and Interpretation Exercise pg. 36

1.      The subject of the first line is the Old Masters.

2.      No, usually the subject is in the beginning of the sentence not the end. Poetry mixes up words sometimes.

3.      Auden is trying to say that life goes on despite events that cause suffering.

4.      Auden’s argument is that people turn away from other peoples’ problems if it doesn’t have anything to do with them. They turn their heads from disaster.

5.      Auden conveys this message by giving evidence from the picture showing that people turned their heads when Icarus fell from the sky.

6.      Auden’s evidence is from the painting; just take a look at how little Icarus is compared to the rest of the painting.

7.      The title is not written in English, it is written in French

8.      The Old Masters include; Brueghel, Davinchi, Rembrandt, Michael Angelo, etc.

9.      The Old Masters is capitalized to show respect for that narrow group of prodigies.

10.  In this poem Auden made it flow by starting general, and becoming more specific throughout the poem.

11.  Breughel’s Icarus is the painting.

12.  The thesis he is arguing is that people turn away from disasters especially if it does not include them. I agree with that statement completely because I see it happen. For example, the other day someone was stuck on the side of the road and I was stopped in traffic. I was stuck there for about 5 minutes and saw at least 20 cars pass this car stuck on the side of the road but no one stopped to help because the problem did not involve them.

13.  He argues that statement because the time period he lived in was full of human suffering; for example the concentration camps were during his time period.

14.  Auden’s living in Europe did affect the way he viewed humans reactions to human suffering because he saw how the Jews were treated and how no one did anything to try to stop it.

15.  Auden says the Old Masters were never wrong when it comes to understanding suffering in their art because like him they went through and saw pain and suffering from when they lived.

16.  The Old Masters are held in high esteem because they are able to connect with pain and suffering and then turn around and portray those emotions in their art work.

17.  That is the case because they can sympathize and empathize unlike other people who turn away.

18.  Yes, Auden’s presence in the museum does affect his views about what he sees. He is in a museum where only the Old Masters art work is which is manipulating his views to see pain and suffering.

19.  Auden uses Brueghel’s Icarus to support his thesis by saying something in his poem that he saw in the picture “how everything turns away quite leisurely from the disaster; the plow man turns away.”

20.  Auden was not always in his lifetime accepted or treated right so you can see why he believes the way he does and why he sympathizes with the Jews.

21.  Different styles of art done by the Old Masters may create a variation of interpretations of the Old Masters.

22.  The picture conveys a visual meaning by showing a story that you can read. It is possible to make a picture readable by putting in specific details that may be from a certain time period. Shadowing, picture, context, perspective and other things all help to tell a story or show meaning without using words.

23.  The color and composition provide the correct meaning to the picture by being light and dark in certain areas that are supposed to stand out. It has a gloomy feel to it that tells you that no one cares about each other.

24.  Icarus is in the corner of this painting painted very small for the purpose that he is hard to see and shown as insignificant.

25.  He is so small, to show that he is not important.

26.  People are responding to his tragedy like nothing happened, they are ignoring him.

27.  The people’s response to Icarus is exactly what Auden said it was; ignorance.

28.  Auden’s interpretation was a good interpretation because it was right and the whole the point of the painting.

29.  The painting is different than how Brueghel showed it because in the story at least one person cares about Icarus; his dad.

30.  Ovid’s view of why people would ignore Icarus is because of the time period he was living in.

31.  Ovid’s time period was full of human torture. It was the same time period as the Jewish concentration camps.

32.  This affected his story telling because it made him have a metaphoric opinion about people that was/is not always true.