The Writer

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1969

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Download PDF

Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Form and Meter

Unusually for this poet, “The Writer” is written in free verse without any rigid poetic structure or meter. However, the poem is divided into consistent tercets, or three-line stanzas—11 in total, making 33 lines. There is no formal rhyme scheme, although the poem utilizes rhythmic verse that keeps each line flowing into the next in place of the poet’s usual end rhymes.

Each stanza opens with a short line, follows with a longer line, and closes with another short line. The lines range from approximately eight syllables to 14 syllables. This pattern of short-long-short gives the poem a visual appearance of waves on the sea, supporting the extended metaphor of the house as a ship. It also mirrors the natural ebb and flow of creative inspiration and the writer’s life, one of the central themes of the poem.

Extended Metaphor

“The Writer” uses extended metaphors throughout the poem, beginning with the very first line: “In her room at the prow of the house” (Line 1). Here, the speaker compares his house to a ship. Specifically, the girl’s room is at the “prow” (Line 1), or the very forwardmost tip that cuts through the water and leads the rest of the boat forward.

The phrase “the windows are tossed with linden” (Line 2) suggests a tossing of sea foam outside the window. The image continues when the speaker uses a simile to describe the “commotion of typewriter-keys” as “a chain hauled over a gunwale” (Lines 5-6). Not only does the imagery support the extended metaphor of the house as a ship, it also suggests a launching point for the daughter’s story. When a chain is hauled across the gunwale of a ship, it usually means that the anchor is being raised so the ship can begin its journey. Here, the typewriter keys serve as the device that launches the story into motion.

The speaker considers the “cargo” his daughter carries (Line 8), again alluding to the goods that would be carried on a merchant or trading ship. In this instance, the cargo is the accumulated hopes, dreams, and fears within the girl’s mind. The speaker wishes her “a lucky passage” (Line 9), which contains the dual meaning of a metaphorical passage through the sea and a literal passage through life.

In the second half of the poem, the speaker turns his attention to a memory of a trapped bird within the daughter’s room. While the bird, unlike the ship, is a literal figure, it is used in this context as a metaphor for the entrapment of the creative mind. The room offers both creative potential and the frustration of creative limitation. The poem uses the bird as an extended metaphor to illustrate the way both of these contrasting aspects can exist within the same space.

Assonance and Consonance

Although the poem doesn’t use a formal rhyme scheme or meter, it effectively makes use of repeated vowel and consonant sounds to enhance the sense of rhythm and musicality. In the opening tercet, the line “prow of the house” (Line 1) uses parallel “ow” sounds to create an internal slant rhyme. The following line, “Where light breaks, and the windows are tossed with linden” (Line 2), uses repeated T and D sounds that act as a chain that links each word together. The hard consonants continue in the line, “From her shut door a commotion of typewriter-keys” (Line 5), using Ts, Ds, and Ks that mimic the clattering sound of the typewriter. The poet uses these hard vowel sounds as a form of onomatopoeia, creating a sound that echoes the action being described.

In the third stanza, the auditory sounds of the poem become softer as the speaker reflects on his daughter’s journey. Here, the poem favors Y, S, Sh, and L sounds that create a more nostalgic, soft-focus quality. As the daughter continues in her creative process, the vowel and consonant choices slow down or speed up the sound of the poem: “The whole house seems to be thinking” (Line 13) uses long, broad vowels, while “she is at it again with a bunched clamor / Of strokes” (Lines 14-15) uses short, snappy sounds to convey the rushed typewriter keys.

Other stanzas continue to use repeated sounds that enhance rhythm, such as the repeated S in “stole” and “sash” (Line 18); repeated W in “watched” and “wild” (Line 21); alliteration in “Batter against the brilliance” (Line 23); S sounds in “spirits” and “suddenly sure” (Lines 26-27); and reincorporating the repeated W in “window,” “world,” and “wish(ed)” (Lines 29, 30, 32, 33).