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Those Winter Sundays
Those Winter Sundays
Those Winter Sundays
warm, I would talk in a different manner with him. I did not know why I behaved like that;
neither was I knowing the value of love and sacrifices made.
By the poemThose Winter Sundays, the poet wants to criticize the way he treated his
father in his childhood. The lines clearly indicate the distance and absence of proper
communication between the poet and his father. The lines What did I know, what did I
know/
of love's austere and lonely offices? expresses the regret of the poet towards his father
as a grown man. This is not a rhythmic poem and starts with a simple line indicating the
tone and mood the poem is set in. The title Those Winter Sundays also sets a
mentality that its cold because its winter and that its Sunday and also, that the events
took place in the past. As the poets father is introduced, its set that he is the main topic
of the poem. The first line Sundays too my father got early implies that the poets
father was a hard working man who is not ready to take a proper sleep, though the day
was Sunday, but decided to continue his duties towards his family. The Blueback cold is
a spectacular example of blistering cold of an unheated house which can also be felt
lying in the bed. It is palpable that the poets father was a very hard worker by the lines,
with cracked hands that ached from labor in weekday weather. In lines 3 through 5,
the fathers effort and pain are then focused upon. No one ever thanked him a simple
literal line expresses the feeling for a caring man who did so much for others, yet no one
appreciated it.
The poet would lie in the bed hearing all the hard work done by the father as described
in the lines, I'd wake and hear the cold splintering, breaking. The poet was aware of all
the hard work his father was doing despite of the pain then with cracked hands that
ached as expressed in the literal line. He would hear the breaking of woods as the
speakers father tries to rekindle the fire in the stove to warm the house in those winter
mornings. Figuratively, the child hears the cold itself was breaking off. This contributes
to the dramatic image of the poem. Then when the house was warm enough, the father
would call his son to get up, and the son would reluctantly comply. He would rise and
dress. The line, fearing the chronic angers of that house, is the line that requires some
interpretive power. Many will get misguided from the line fearing the chronic angers of
that house thinking that the poem is about child abuse by a father. If the angers are
literal and belong to people, they not only refer to the father but to that house, meaning
anyone else living the residence
Despite of the fact that the father was doing his best for the family, the son was not
talking enthusiastically with the father Speaking indifferently to him. This creates a
contradiction, whether the poet was intentionally talking indifferently or he was not
aware of the values of the sacrifices made by the father. What did I know, what did I
know/of love's austere and lonely offices? as said by the poet clarifies the contradiction
that the poet was aware of the hard work of the father but being a child, he was not able
to understand the true values of the sacrifice.