Bruce Dawe Essay

The Second World struggle changed objet darty things the face of Europe, the balance of cosmea power, and, perhaps less notably, the perceptual experience of the common Australian. From Federation day to the 1940s, most poets wrote about the ideal aussie the strong, tacit outback-dweller the earth from Snowy River or the Man who went to Ironbark. The 1950s were a cartridge clip of change, and Australian Literature changed too, from aggrandizing the increasingly r be Dundees, to noting the average Australian animated in suburbia with the other four-fifths of the population. This essay go out cite peculiar(prenominal) examples of songs of a man commonly regarded as Australias greatest victuals poet from 1950 to 1990. Through Bruce Dawes poetry the true Australian persona has arisen to spheric knowledge.One of Bruce Dawes most famous metrical compositions, written in the 1950s, is Enter Without So Much As Knocking. In this poem he highlights the plight of a modern man who slowly hails to realize and embrace the faade adjoin suburban livelihood and its incessant consumerism. Well-equipped, smoothly-run, economy-sizeThese terms give the feeling of set production just as well-equipped, smoothly-run, economy-size cars these sorts of households must have been very common. again the fact that these peck lack individuality is being focused on and it is disputed whether this is correct. The rest of the family ar presented as stereotypes. Whereas in the days of The Man From Snowy River, where individuality, rebelliousness and going against the grain are commonplace and storied as courageous, in this world, it would seem inefficient. The poem itself is discussing a mans journey from birth to death and how all around him life is interpreted by material possessions.A famous quote from this poem shows the change that mechanized and money hungry breathing brings to man. Anyway, pretty in brief he was old enough to be realistic identical either other godless money-hungry back-stabbing miserable so-and-so. This is a dramatic geological fault from the poems of war and outback mateship, of jumping on a grenade to save your friends in the foxhole. Now, Its Number One every time for this chicken, hit wheresoever you see a head and kick whoevers down. Clearly, Dawe is conscious of the changes affect Australian persona.Bruce Dawe often uses humour to devastating effect. In Pigeons also are a way of life, a city councilor is mocked for his petty-mindedness, highlighting the talk bureaucracy that society and everyday life has become. The problem was, he brooded overmuch, and took things in person that were not meant, so that each juvenile delinquency of nature seemed an scandalisation aimed at him This quote encapsulates the trivial nature of the councilor, that he considered nature juvenile, and that he was too puffed-up in his self importance to respect habits that have and testament out decease him, his city and certainly his c ivilization. This is done to bring to light the flimsy conceit of man in relation to the environment. Whereas the bushman lived off the land, respecting it, modern man destroys it contemptuously to make room for suburbs and cities, and its men ilk this who are responsible.Homo Suburbiensis is a poem about a man, a official man, with a garden that represents his escape from the demands of his existence. Homo Suburbiensis uses one mans escape from his life to represent our universal need to contemplate and resoluteness our own uncertainties in life in our own special place.This poem speaks about suburbia, and escaping from it into nature, Bruce Dawe illuminates the plight of this man and how the tolls of modern life are affecting him. One constant in a world of variables represents how this small garden in is his only avenue for escaping into order, his order. Whereas the outback is constantly described as freedom, this mans only freedom is a small veggie patch.A little known poe m from the 1980s era of Bruces writings, Looking Down from Bridges, takes a look back at the world of his childhood, from the perspective of nostalgia. Looking down we see an earlier world living on in the interstices of the present, like green wheat in the gutters of the legal age feed store or the odd shy weatherboard attribute out between factories This citation details the vision of the past done the minds eye to childhood, present the simplicities of an earlier time where in that respect were fewer factories, where troops of tiny children tentatively skipping played in the street. This is Bruce where he is his most grandfatherly, regaling talesof how life used to be, and how it has changed, from small wooden houses with bush on either side to sprawling conurbation without room to breathe or, in the childrens case, to play in the streets.Life- speech rhythm, is one of his well-known poems that dramatises how the common Aussie sonny is influenced by football. It ridicules t he fact that football for people has become like a piety. Not speaking of a specific event, this poem describes the general cycle of life of a resident of suburban Australia. From birth people are encouraged to barrack for their police squads, and build a life around football.This religion is implied on the innocent monsters by their parents and surroundings. they are wrapped in the club-colours, determined in beribboned cots, having already begun a lifetimes barracking Dawe is showing that this will be the purpose of the childs life. He will grow up living and breathing football, and worshipping it without giving a mho thought to the true purpose of life. Using simple-minded structure and simple language, he is able to best convey his morals to the common people that it affects. Gently mocking people with his vibrant expression of the game, with Christian symbolic representation he compares it to the bible highlighting that it is, but shouldnt be regarded of the like import ance as Christianity.They will forswear the Demons, cling to the saints and behold their team going up the ladder into Heaven Dawe describes the actual outstanding things in life marriage, proposals, as just a sidetrack to football, done promptly in between games. Football is the focus of these peoples lives anything else is simply a diversion to football and should be taken care of readily so that they can get back to the game. - the reckless proposal after the one-point win, the wedding and the honeymoon after the grand-finalWe almost begin to pity these unequal people, to whom living their lives has taken second place in importance to football. By using triumphant words such as behold choler and empyrean Dawe is showing great sarcasm, as he did with the Christian symbolism. It is like he is asking the readers why football is now as important to the Australians as their religion, and highlighting the fact that it is not supposed to be like this. From thisquote having seen in the six-foot recruit from Eaglehawk their hope of redemption Bruce Dawe purposefully makes the last word of the poem salvation, this word, generally associated with heaven, and the fact that living a good, Christian life will supposedly lead to our salvation and we will go to heaven, not hell. But it is not from God that these people gain their salvation they see salvation in the recruit, the strong football player who has come to play for their team and could bring the team victory. With that Dawe makes obvious the skewed priorities of these people, and how indolent and pointless their existence is. Carn, carn they cry, from birth unto death, never knowing anything else, never living.As is evident, Bruce Dawe genuinely has highlighted the changes in Australian literature. Changes brought about by himself, for he is truly the most influential Australian Poet of this century. By departing from the common norm of unaccessible mythology to discuss the curve of a mans life, his passion for variant and the ways in which suburbia has taken over Australian lives, he earns his title of the Peoples Poet. Bruce Dawe has changed the perception of the average Australian worldwide.