Download

Dreamstime

Cetacean
Peter Reading (1946-2011)

Blue Whale © NOAA Photo Library Flickr

 The Poem RS Overview

Out of Fisherman’s Wharf, San Francisco, Sunday, early, 14 A whale watching vessel sets out from the California
our vessel, bow to stern, some sixty-three feet, 11 coast and sees the magnificent site of a pod of Blue
to observe Blue Whales – and we did, o! the Farallones. 13
Whales emerging and then diving back under the
water.
They were swimming slowly, and rose at a shallow angle 14
(they were grey as slate with white mottling, dorsals tiny 16
and stubby, 14
Reading focuses on the subtle beauty of the whales

with broad "at heads one quarter their overall body- gargantuan bodies and the harmony and elegance of
lengths). 14 their motions.
12
They blew as soon as their heads began to break the 11 Mini Glossary
surface.
Cetaceans – a group term describing lrge aquatic
The blows were as straight and slim as upright columns 16
15
mammals, including dolphins, porpoises and, in our
rising to thirty feet in vertical sprays.
2 case, whales;
Then their heads disappeared underwater, and the lengthy, 6 Farrallones – a small group of uninhabited islands off
rolling the coast of San Francisco;
expanse of their backs hove into our view – about twenty 10
mottling – spots or smearings of colour;
feet 14
dorsals – the small fin on a whale’s back;
longer 3
tail stocks – the middle part of a whale’s tail that runs
than the vessel herself.
12 down to the flukes;
And then then the diminutive 3 flukes – the two fins or lobes at the end of a whale’s
dorsals tail.
showed brie"y, after the blows had dispersed and the 15

heads had 14

gone under.

Then they arched their backs, then arched their tail stocks
ready
for diving.

Then the "ukes were visible just before the creatures

vanished,
slipping into the deep again, at a shallow angle.

Whale tail - stock leads up and inbetween the two 4ukes.

Blue Whale © Gregory “Slobirdr” Smith Flickr

Analysis
Context Peter Reading was a prolific British poet who published 26 collections of poetry
between 1970-2010.A His work is characterised as being anti-romantic, ugly and
real, but usually with a huge dollop of humour, mockery or satire at the heart of
poems. He described himself as a misanthrope (someone who dislikes people) and
this is often reflected in his work.

Prior to being a poet he worked as a teacher of Art History, before quitting to

pursue his poetry while working a menial job weighing trucks filled with animal
feed. Although his poetry was well received, it didn’t pay the bills particularly well,
so he continued to work as a weighbridge operator for 22 years. Only in the 1990s
did his poetry start to support him and he was given a one year writing residency
in 1999 by the Lannan Foundation based in Texas, US.

Our poem comes from his 2002 collection, Faunal. The collection explores his real
and imagined experiences with animals and reflects on the way that human
relationships with animals are detrimental to them. Given that this was written in
and around the time he was based in the US there is a good chance this could be
based on a real experience, but I cannot confirm that.

The events of the poem take place off the West coast of the US and the Farralones
are a small collection of islands close to the coast of San Francisco. These islands
are very small and uninhabited, but are famed for their sea life and the fact they
were used as a dumping ground for radioactive waste by the US throughout the
1950s-70s. However, our focus is very much on the wildlife. Gray, Humpback and
Blue whales are frequently spotted there in the summer and autumn. Reading
specifically describes Blue Whales, which are the largest animal known to have
existed on earth.

Listen to Peter Reading reading the poem here (between 13.18-14.51.):

https://podcast.lannan.org/2014/02/01/faunal-by-peter-reading-audio/

Themes Reading explores the beauty of Blue Whales surfacing from the sea around the
Farrallones. This natural beauty comes in two forms, the awe-inspiring scale and
magnitude of the creatures, but also their delicate subtleties. The poem puts this
beauty in contrast with human civilisation through the title and the opening
stanza.

Content The poem tells the narrative of a successful whale watching trip. There is some sense
of sacri#ce made in the early hour and the day of the voyage, but the key element of
this stanza is the continuous stop start nature, which makes the description of the
voyage unpleasant and unsatisfying to read and to the ear.

However, the rhythm is immediately corrected or smooth for the rest of the poem as it
focuses on the whales rather than details of the trip. Reading focuses on the subtle and
delicate motions and features of the creatures before moving on to recognise the awe
inspiring size and power of the whales when they send water thirty feet in the air from
their blowholes and when their full size is compared to the ship he is aboard. He then
moves back to describing the elegance of their movement and creates a sense of
being captivated by every little thing they do.

The whales are diving in the poem and as they arch their heads downward they expose
head, back and then tail in turn before disappearing into the deep.

Language If the poem is about Blue Whales then why the hell doesn’t he just call it Blue
Language If the poem is about Blue Whales then why the hell doesn’t he just call it Blue
Whale(s)? The term cetacean is used as a grouping word for aquatic mammals, so

and not just Blue Whales or even just whales, but also dolphins and porpoises. Reading’s

Techniqu use of the term seems to relate to a theme running through the poems in Faunal,

es
which is to describe animals in scientific terms, Latin names used to distinguish
and categorise animals. He does this in order to critique the human thought that
we are above other animals and can categorise or label them as if we own them.

I think it also serves another purpose. If I tell you I’ve seen a whale, you’d probably
shrug your shoulders and continue about your day. However, if I tell you I’ve seen a
cetacean you would stop and question me, the name makes it sound like some sort
of mythical beast or legend. The awe conveyed in the poem suggests that this is
something he wants us to sit up and notice or be impressed by.

The opening stanza is ugly. It reads like bullet point instructions provided on a
ticket for the whale watching experience. Comma after comma after comma has
the impact of breaking up the stanza and creates an opening dissonance. This is
later juxtaposed with the harmony of the subsequent stanzas that focus on the
whales.

As well as establishing the meat and potatoes of the narrative (where, when and
why), this stanza also establishes that the poetic voice places value on the
experience. Although the stanza feels tired and uninspired due to the lack of
rhythm, we establish the sacrifice of going on ‘Sunday, early’ that demonstrates
that he feels it is worth disrupting sleep and his free time. In addition, the word
‘observe’ puts the poetic voice into a position of respect as if implying that he is
going to learn from these creatures (teachers might question this understanding of
the idea of observation).

I find it telling that the first thing that Reading focuses on about the whales is
nothing to do with their scale. We are not immediately led to appreciate them
simply because they are the largest creature in existence, but for their subtle
beauties and elegance. In the fourth line we have the very soft and graceful
sibilance of ‘swimming slowly, and rose at a shallow angle’ that depicts the motion
as calm and majestic as opposed to powerful or gargantuan. This depiction and
imagery is continued throughout the poem with motions described using gentle
verbs such as ‘rolling’, ‘arched’, ‘disappeared’ and ‘slipping’ creating a semantic
field of grace and elegance. This is juxtaposed with our own expectations of what
makes them awe-inspiring creatures.

The second stanza continues to focus on the detail of their skin with ‘white
mottling’ (or spots) and their ‘tiny and stubby’ dorsals demonstrating an
appreciation of the finer detail rather than just considering the whale as a mass of
grey. Their is a second reference to ‘diminutive dorsals’ which uses alliteration to
again draw our attention to the finer details and beauty of the whales.

In the third stanza Reading finally focuses on their size and power, but even here
the sense of elegance and grace is not lost. If you imagine the huge heads of the
whale coming to the surface you might think of a violent disturbance of the sea’s
calm, but instead they ‘began to break the surface’ conveys an idea of gradual
emergence rather than a sudden splash. They ‘blew as soon’ as they emerged and
the water spouts were ‘as straight and slim as upright columns’. This simile
conveys an image of perfection and compares the beauty of this simple act with
some of humanity’s finest classical architecture. The alliteration of ‘straight and
slim’ conveys a rhythmic exactness and harmony that mirrors the exactness of the
whales motion. As they emerge they immediately spout, painting the whales as
being in control and ordered. Thus we are again appreciating the whale for its
elegance as opposed to its mass.

However, Reading doesn’t want us to miss the awe-inspiring scale. First we see the
spouts are ‘rising to thirty feet’, which gives us an impressive image of this
powerful jet reaching five times the height of the average person and no doubt
double the height of the boat he is observing from. As the whales begin to dive they
expose the ‘rolling expanse of their backs’, which conveys for the first time and
idea of their size. We use the word ‘expanse’ to describe a large continuous area of
something: an expanse of forest, of land, of space. By adding the word ‘rolling’ as
well as conveying the motion it suggests that the expanse is even vaster than can be
seen as we have some areas going below the water level, while others rise out of it.
Notice here the verb ‘hove’, which is the past tense of heave. This suggests a great
force or effort behind the movement, which once again suggests the size, weight
and mass of the whales, but also conveys the motion as being slow and thus feeds
into the sense of grace in the imagery.

Reading ends the fourth stanza by comparing the whales to his vessel. The whales’
backs are ‘twenty feet longer’ suggesting that it is hugely impressive. We have
already established that the ship is ‘sixty-three’ feet, so the whale stands (or rather
floats) somewhere between eighty and ninety feet. This links back to the idea that
this poem or the wider collection is somewhat critical of humanity as the scale
serves to show how insignificant and unimpressive humans and human
engineering are in comparison to this wonder of the natural world.

We do not linger on the scale though. Immediately after this ship vs whale
comparison, Reading returns to the smaller features and describing the gentle
motion of the whales’ movements. I won’t examine each of the verbs used (I
mentioned them above as a semantic field), but will just repeat that they establish
the creatures as being graceful and elegant in opposition to ideas about their
strength, power, size and mass. Note that the verbs ‘arched’ is repeated in the sixth
stanza, which again serves the same purpose, but also connects with the simile
linking the whale to columns, now the whale is linked to the arches of classical
architecture.

The poem ends with the image of only the whales’ tails above the surface. Again
rather than reference the power of the tail we see the subtly of its motions in focus.
It is termed as ‘tail stocks’, which refers to the middle part of the tail, where it is
connected to the rest of the body and where the power is generated from.
Additionally, in the final stanza, Reading refers to the ‘flukes’, showing an
appreciation of the way that the tail is not just one thing, like a dogs, but two
conjoined stocks or lobes that make it look similar to a bird’s wing span. This level
of detail is meant to guide the audience into a greater appreciation of the creatures,
not simply for their reputation as the largest creatures in existence.

The final line is also worth a pause. Reading juxtaposes the vastness of the ocean
that hide the whales with, once again, the elegance of the animals. They are
‘slipping into the deep again’, showing a smooth motion and they do so at a
‘shallow angle’ further suggesting the grace of the motion. Deep here hints at the
scale of their ocean home, but despite their size they are never framed in the same
way.

You probably also wondered about the repetition of ‘then’. If my Year 7s included
this many then’s in a story I would crucify them (and often do). However, I’ll let
Reading get away with it because it serves to highlight how mesmerised he is with
their every move. Every single motion is detailed from the emergence to the diving
beneath the water and the use of a simple connective here simply establishes a
sense of continued focus and uninterrupted awe.
 Structure There are a couple of key things to appreciate here.

Firstly, the opening stanza stands as a contrast to all the others. This relates to the
fact that it is describing human actions and preparations for the trip. The overuse
of commas creates a real dissonance that stands as a stark contrast to the elegant
depiction of the whales in motion. Although the other stanzas are not regular, they
are not disrupted and harmony is created through the use of alliteration (‘d’s, ‘b’s)
and sibilance.

Another thing to note is the syllable count and rhythm of individual lines. In
general these are quite long for a piece of poetry, with lines generally between 11-
16 syllables. However, there are a few examples of very short lines that stand in
contrast. The impact of this is to reflect the appreciation for both scale and the
smaller, subtler details about the whales.

Tone After the matter of fact, ugly opening stanza, the poem establishes a tone of serene
appreciation and awe at the natural image confronting the poetic voice. The grace
of the whales comes across in the reading of the poem, but there is also an
eagerness of the poet to take it all in conveys by the repetitive connection between
different stages of the whales motion and the overall narrative.

! "

← Previous Post Next Post →

2 thoughts on “Cetacean”

TAMMYORJ
NOVEMBER 2, 2019 AT 7:33 AM

Brilliant analysis. The best I have read on Cetacean poem.

Reply

MR SIR
 NOVEMBER 4, 2019 AT 7:07 AM

Thanks for the positive comment, glad I could be of help.

Cheers,

Mr Sir

Reply

Leave a Comment
Logged in as marinoseliades. Log out?

Type here..

Post Comment »

This site uses Akismet to reduce spam. Learn how your comment data is processed.

Copyright © 2020 CIE Literature | Powered by Astra WordPress Theme