Critical Appreciation - After the Last Bulletins by Richard Wilbur

{tocify} $title={Table of Contents}

Introductory

Richard Wilbur is an American poet of modernity and modernism. His poetry is not about scientific innovations and technology but the main themes dwell upon the pre-occupation of man due to these inventions. After the Last Bulletins is the poem which focuses on the spread of temporal information through newspapers and bulletins, their clash with Nature and recycling of the process of information.

Themes

After the Last Bulletins carry a variety of themes. The first theme of 'Abundance of Knowledge' right in first mono-stich

After the last bulletins the window darken

Newspapers are a vital source of information and knowledge in a specific area or around the globe. But the average audience merely reads it for a short period of time and then cast this papers garbage away. They hold the knowledge temporarily, occasionally and their ignorance is laminated bright in the darkness. Thus the Westernism "holds in perfection but for a little moment".

The second theme prevails about the clash between print media with Nature. Newspapers are frequently renowned as Yellow Press, a term used for the publication of sensational news. Nature does not hide anything in its green bushes. If a danger prevails, it signals the human-kind visibly and abruptly. But newspapers conceal many facts in the veil of their Red Headings. Thus a conflict between Nature and newspapers is winged. These bulletins are battered, flapped, taken and trodden by winds:

Strike at the positive eyes

Batter and flap the positive head

The theme of the insignificance of newspapers can be traced through the comments of a watchman, "Damn you!" as he has to clean the mess on a daily basis. The poet wants to assert the fact that production of newspapers is the wastage of both energy and resources. Surely, they are a source of instant information but their ultimate destination is to rest in gutters. Thus they are far less influential than the literary genius of many artists. "A Tale of Two Cities", "Macbeth" and "Canterbury Tales" are still as fresh as "Month of May" in modern time as compared with a sheet of a sleeping bulletin. Newspapers have the potential of rebirth but with each birth, they meet their death.

Structure

The whole poem is divided into eight quatrains, a stanza of four verses. The rhyme scheme of the poem is odious, the second mono-stich rhymes with the fourth one, thus forming a rhyming structure of abcb. The rhythmic pattern sounds like iambic pentameter. (but I am not sure about it)

Setting and Imagery

The poem is urban in the setting. The poet uses a striking vocabulary of imagery to maximize the view-point of a reader. Darken window, trash, railings, statue, snow, dove and foot-steps are some notable images which enhance the imaginative beauty of the poem.

Conclusion

Wilbur's poetry is loaded with modern subject matter which he has successfully achieved in the very poem as well. Although he has implied a complex diction, yet some colloquial words bring home the true meaning of the poem. Some critics renown him as a rebel and his rebel attitude is visible in this poem. He wants human-beings to act knowledge friendly. The poem ticks all the required checkboxes to interpret the rebellious idea of the importance of literary knowledge over the temporal and feign information in the newspapers.