According To T.S.Eliot Poem by Douglas Scotney

Douglas Scotney

Douglas Scotney

Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia. Resides in Adelaide

According To T.S.Eliot



Undertaking the trip to New Holland
left Cook with no few comparisons
with more sensual downward journeys
he had imagined or encountered.

It came as no surprise
when a thoroughbred researcher
found Cook had made jokes
about 'down under' on the journey,

and, for his own delectation,
had compiled a list of comparisons
which he could not help sharing
with a close poet friend,

of whose existence his wife
may have had no suspicion at the time,
though the poem that friend wrote
from Cook's list, 'Down Under,1770',
was found, by the thoroughbred,
to have been amongst her papers:

so she must have found out,
even if it was after the Sandwich Isles,
when all hope vanished
of a confrontation with James.

This, however, is not giving the woman
capacities of enlargement.
she may well have agreed with her husband
that she was altogether too serious
and that he needed dalliance as well;

as she knew only too well
from her studies of the poet Donne
whose dalliances had been crucial
to the enlargement of the possibilities of lyric verse,
according to T.S.Eliot.

Wednesday, October 2, 2013
Topic(s) of this poem: history
POET'S NOTES ABOUT THE POEM
New Holland=an early name for Australia
James Cook=first English man to find and explore east coast of Australia.
'Down Under' probably even predates Cook.
COMMENTS OF THE POEM
READ THIS POEM IN OTHER LANGUAGES
Douglas Scotney

Douglas Scotney

Toowoomba, Queensland, Australia. Resides in Adelaide
Close
Error Success