I just finished reading Hans Christian Andersen's "The Shadow" about a man who travels to a warm climate, and while he's there, he loses his shadow. He was sitting on his balcony and couldn't help but notice the building across the street. It looked like nobody lived in it, but there were beautiful flowers that grew there that had to be constantly watered. That night he made his shadow go into the door (which was ajar) in that opposite building to find out who lived in that house. But the shadow never came back.
A few years later the man has moved back north and someone knocks at his door. He answers it but doesn't recognize who it is. It turns out that the man at the door is actually his shadow. The shadow slowly becomes more of a man, and the shadow's man slowly falls into the role of the shadow. The shadow eventually becomes so much more humanlike that he establishes himself as a man. And when the original man threatens to tell everyone that the man is actually a shadow, no one believes him. And the shadow has him executed.
One thing that struck me that really made this story relevant to our class was that when the shadow went next door the thing that he found living there was poetry. And it was through reading all the poetry in the world that the shadow learned and became more like a man. "I remained there three weeks, and it was more like three thousand years, for I read all that has ever been written in poetry or prose; and I may say, in truth, that I saw and learnt everything."
This statement seems to convey the idea that you become more human when you read. Reading brings you knowledge that you might not ordinarily receive. When the shadow enters the door, the room he goes into is filled with light and fire. I remember Shelley and Emerson using fire images to describe the creative process and poetry. Poetry seems to act as the illuminating light which dispells any darkness or ignorance.
A few years later the man has moved back north and someone knocks at his door. He answers it but doesn't recognize who it is. It turns out that the man at the door is actually his shadow. The shadow slowly becomes more of a man, and the shadow's man slowly falls into the role of the shadow. The shadow eventually becomes so much more humanlike that he establishes himself as a man. And when the original man threatens to tell everyone that the man is actually a shadow, no one believes him. And the shadow has him executed.
One thing that struck me that really made this story relevant to our class was that when the shadow went next door the thing that he found living there was poetry. And it was through reading all the poetry in the world that the shadow learned and became more like a man. "I remained there three weeks, and it was more like three thousand years, for I read all that has ever been written in poetry or prose; and I may say, in truth, that I saw and learnt everything."
This statement seems to convey the idea that you become more human when you read. Reading brings you knowledge that you might not ordinarily receive. When the shadow enters the door, the room he goes into is filled with light and fire. I remember Shelley and Emerson using fire images to describe the creative process and poetry. Poetry seems to act as the illuminating light which dispells any darkness or ignorance.
1 comment:
Very nice, Devon. I like this connection to the story. I wonder, does this then mean that people who don't read poetry are less fully human than the rest of us? (Let's even retain a broad definition of poetry beyond what we read in English classes?) Is it possible for someone to be happily human in a way that we would not judge, and yet that person has no poetry? Is poetry (or lets even go so far as to say "the experience of beauty") essential to our humanity, or is it optional.
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