Mr. Housman's Message
Mr. Housman's Message - meaning Summary
Mortality as Ironic Shrug
Pound’s short poem treats death and human suffering with bleak, nearly comic resignation. It juxtaposes plain statements about mortality and violence with a wry suggestion to behave as if already dead. Rural images and a tossed-off geographic contrast (London vs. Shropshire) soften the tone into ironic detachment. The repeated exclamations of "woe" sound ritualistic, turning fatalism into a communal, almost performative acceptance of life’s inevitabilities.
Read Complete AnalysesO woe, woe, People are born and die, We also shall be dead pretty soon Therefore let us act as if we were dead already. The bird sits on the hawthorn tree But he dies also, presently. Some lads get hung, and some get shot. Woeful is this human lot. Woe! woe, etcetera. . . . London is a woeful place, Shropshire is much pleasanter. Then let us smile a little space Upon fond nature's morbid grace. Oh, Woe, woe, woe, etcetera. . . .
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