Brearley School - Brearley Book Yearbook (New York, NY)

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ENGLISH COMPOSITION A Critical A pprecialion of The Lady In The Lake As I have not lately read The Lady In The Lake, I shall or will find it terribly difficult to write a critical appreciation of this poem. But, on the other hand, nevertheless, a critical appreciation is awfully difficult to write anyway and so maybe mine will not be so much worse than somebody else. The Lady In The Lake is a good poem. It is a good poem because Scott, who wrote it, is a good writer and Scott is a good writer because he is in the Oxford Book of English Verse which is a good book. Having given my opinion of Scott and his poetry I shall or will go on to specifically discussing The Lady In The Lake. The background of The Lady In The Lake is very good. It is an awfully good background. If I were to see that background I should or would know it among a thousand. There is a lot of good descriptions about the background. An example of this is: The stag at eve had drunk his fill Wliere danced the moon on Monan's fill. and: Come one, come all, this rock shall fly From its firm base as soon as I. The plot is good. It is a frightfully good plot. It is almost as good as a good movie. That is to say, I, myself, personally was thrilled by it. It is terribly melodramatic. There are some awfully dramatic scenes in it. Drama is when if you don't just walk around the stage saying things, but if one does something much more subtle, such as saying: Come one, come all, this rock shall fly From its firm base as soon as I. It is all about a girl named Ellen and a man named Fitzjames and a man named Malcolm Graeme and a man named Roderick Dhu and some other men. These men are all madly in love with Ellen. I can only give this brief summary of the plot because I am getting sleepy. The metre is very good. It is very suitable. It is an excellent metre. It is fast because in a poem like The Lady In The Lake you want to go fast because one has only a short time to read it in and would not stay up all night to read U91

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SPENSERIAN STANZAS A-downe the river banke the boates ' chugge, Y-passing ever uppe and downe they go, The loathlie garbage barge and swinking tugge, Some moving swiftlie, others e'en more slow, And al the while the river stronge doth flow. Oftimes the fogge outside the wall is rent By steamer looming bigge, anon a low And lonlie cry up-from its funnelles sent Shrieks loudlie through the fogge its wilde and sad lament. Then cometh eek a straunge and cleadlie sound As dying rattle from a dragon's maw That maddened sinks from many a bloudie wound, Y-covered with his blacke and stinking gore. The faireste youths that sleepe their bookes o'er Rise uppe y-white of face and deadlie pale. What might this mean, this clamour which before E'en do the very lords and sages quaile, That rattleth al about like deadlie storm of haile? And when bright Phoebus settleth in the west, And murkie blacknesse cloudeth every streete, Forth from the walls each gorged and haggarcl guest Doth go, with mental nourishmente replete, And each into the dimnesse doth retreate, And fadeth full right willingly away, But still the river murmureth at the feete Of those blacke walls and danke, as if to say, E'en let the prisoners free. Tomorrow comes another day. WWC realize that the spelling of this word is Chaucerian. NFO: the benefit of Miss Carey and the very young, the deadlie sound is the riveting which went on across the way in 1930. l58l

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it anyway and it is very long and he wants to get through in a short time. It is made of four iambic feet. An iambic foot is when if you have one syllable and one short syllable and Miss Whiton says la LA. Pope says iambic feet are wounded snakes which blow soul-animating strains, alas, too few!! Iambic feet are used a great deal in the English language because, of course, the English language is very extensive and has a great deal of feet, but on the whole they use iambic feet, because people like to say la LA, only sometimes they say LA la and then it is a trochee. An example of iambic feet are: The stag at eve had drunk his hll Where danced the moon on Monan's till. and: Come one, come all, this rock shall Hy From its firm base as soon as I. These lines are very spirited and one hears them quoted a great deal. On the whole, considering everything, Marmion, I mean Tbe Lady In The Lake, is awfully well handled, I mean it is a good poem. THE WORMS THAT TURNED SCENE: The Biology room of a Tuesday morning. An air of tenseness hangs over the students who watch Miss Littell transferring worms from a central vat to individual pans. They shudder when Miss Littell straightens a worm with her own bare hands. Polly: What an awful smell. Min Littell flooking upj: What did you say? Polly: I said, What a disgusting odor. Mira' Littell: Polly, the word disgusting is not at home in a Biology Labora- tory. Girls, I know this odor is unpleasant but it is not the worms. It's only formaldehyde. Sybil 1 What's that? Helen: It's what's in Formamint tablets. Sybil: What's it do? Helen : I don't know. I suppose it helps the worms not to decay. Sybil: Do Formamint tablets help us not to decay? rm