Right here, two significant questions will be addressed. Two questions that relate the movie we recently had the luxury to savour, the Dead Poets Society, to our all important learning objective of poetry. Ms.Lees' English class was instructed to describe what message about poetry the movie conveys to the watching audience, and what each student thinks about poetry.
In regards to the first question, it is crystal clear the the events taking place in the movie are parallels to the origins of poetry as we know it. In the movie, John Keating (Robin Williams) is the new English teacher at Welton Preparatory School. He uses unorthodox methods of teaching by Welton standards, such as ripping off textbook pages he deemed inaccurate and misleading, like the introduction of a poetry textbook instructing students how to apply mathematical formulas to measure poetry's greatness. Furthermore, he uses football (soccer) to try to teach his students, walking in a courtyard to find one's own pace and style, and standing on table tops to see from a different outlook. On top of that, he provided the necessary items for the resurrection of the outcasted and controversial Dead Poets Society, much to the dismay of the principal. All these factors inspired Keating's students to "seize the day", taking opportunities that they find. For example, Todd Anderson was no longer the timid kid he once was, but is now vocal about his opinions. Neal Perry, with his new found passion for acting, landed a role in Shakespearean play A Midsummer Night's Dream, disobeying this father's restrictions. Even Knox Overstreet found the courage to pursuit his love Chris, risking a smack down from her boyfriend.
Similarly to the plot of DPS, poetry as we know it went through a rocky start. Like a snowball rolling downhill, gaining size, speed and strength as it progresses, the Renaissance was swiftly gaining momentum. With that came the rebirth of interest in the fine arts, literature and humanity. This led to a new kind of literature, including poetry, that no longer only discusses religious issues, as it has been for centuries, and a whole new horizon of topics became prominent, like love, magic and comedy. A parallel to Keating's unorthodox methods of teaching, the Renaissance saw radically different approaches to poetry than the conventional religious content. How Keating's students reached success is a parallel to how the change in literature and arts during the Renaissance led to a golden age of humanity in terms of creativity and philosophy.
Of course, with new, different things and innovation comes the conservative critics who fear change. The rise of different poetry and the success of Keating's students did not come smoothly. After centuries of religion related literature, there was a taboo for the likes of Shakespeare's works. Shall I compare Thee to a Summer's Sun would have been the equivalent of pornography. Similarly, Neal's passion for acting was strongly oppressed by his father, leading to Neal committing suicide.
The movie, as well as the roots of poetry we study, tells us that poetry is used as a tool for self expression, and that as humans we should not be confined by the norm, but be fearless of being different and unique. Even though there will be challenges, we should remain persistent in being ourselves. The movie depicts poetry as our way of being unique, that each poem is interpreted differently because we are all unique. Even though no character in the story actually wrote poems to express himself, by connecting poetry's roots, to the stories of each character, we can see that poetry is a tool, for non-conformity.
Proceeding to the next question, it gets personal. I used to study Mandarin poetry back in Indonesia. Most of them describe scenery with great vocabulary. Others are about a certain moral, like humility and selflessness. All those years I have thought that poetry, including English, was just a fancy method to describe things, with all emphasis on rhyme scheme and vocabulary, with minor emphasis on meaning. As I arrived here all I cared about accomplishing in poetry is making it rhyme. However, now I can see clearly that poetry doesn't have to be fancy and sophisticated, it's all about self expression. The message is the most important. I have always thought that poetry can be marked, can be scored, much like the author of that poetry text book in the movie said. However, I now comprehend that that cannot be any further from the truth, as John Keating believes. I still don't feel much joy and entertainment from reading poetry as I would seeing Chelsea FC beat the daylights out of Manchester United, but I understand now that poetry is for humans to be themselves and not be confined by the norm, as the movie portrays.
