1. 1. BY D. H. Lawrence SNAKE
2. 2. ABOUT THE POET
3. 3. David Herbert Richards Lawrence (11 September 1885 2 March 1930) was an English novelist, poet, playwright, essayist, literary critic and painter who published as D. H. Lawrence. His collected works, among other things, represent an extended reflection upon the dehumanizing effects of modernity and industrialisation. In them, some of the issues Lawrence explores are emotional health, vitality, spontaneity and instinct. Lawrence's opinions earned him many enemies and he endured official persecution, censorship, and misrepresentation of his creative work throughout the second half of his life, much of which he spent in a voluntary exile which he called his "savage pilgrimage. At the time of his death, his public reputation was that of a pornographer who had wasted his considerable talents. E. M. Forster, in an obituary notice, challenged this widely held view, describing him as, "The greatest imaginative novelist of our generation.Later, the influential Cambridge critic F. R. Leavis championed both his artistic integrity and his moral seriousness, placing much of Lawrence's fiction within the canonical "great tradition" of the English novel.
4. 4. THE POEM
5. 5. A snake came to my water-trough On a hot, hot day, and I in pyjamas for the heat, To drink there. In the deep, strange-scented shade of the great dark carob-tree I came down the steps with my pitcher And must wait, must stand and wait, for there he was at the trough before me. He reached down from a fissure in the earth-wall in the gloom And trailed his yellow-brown slackness soft-bellied down, over the edge of the stone trough
6. 6. Someone was before me at my water- trough, And I, like a second comer, waiting. He lifted his head from his drinking, as cattle do, And looked at me vaguely, as drinking cattle do, And flickered his two-forked tongue from his lips, and mused a moment, And stooped and drank a little more, And rested his throat upon the stone bottom, And where the water had dripped from the tap, in a small clearness, He sipped with his straight mouth, Softly drank through his straight gums, into his slack long body, Silently.
7. 7. Being earth-brown, earth- golden from the burning bowels of the earth On the day of Sicilian July, with Etna smoking. The voice of my education said to me He must be killed, For in Sicily the black, black snakes are innocent, the gold are venomous. And voices in me said, If you were a man You would take a stick and break him now, and finish him off. But must I confess how I liked him, How glad I was he had come like a guest in quiet, to drink at my water-trough And depart peaceful, pacified, and thankless, Into the burning bowels of this earth?
8. 8. Was it cowardice, that I dared not kill him? Was it perversity, that I longed to talk to him? Was it humility, to feel so honoured? I felt so honored. And yet those voices: If you were not afraid, you would kill him! And truly I was afraid, I was most afraid, But even so, honoured still more That he should seek my hospitality From out the dark door of the secret earth. He drank enough And lifted his head, dreamily, as one who has drunken, And flickered his tongue like a forked night on the air, so black, Seeming to lick his lips,
9. 9. And looked around like a god, unseeing, into the air, And slowly turned his head, And slowly, very slowly, as if thrice a dream, Proceeded to draw his slow length curving round And climb again the broken bank of my wall-face. And as he put his head into that dreadful hole, And as he slowly drew up, snake-easing his shoulders, and entered farther, A sort of horror, a sort of protest against his withdrawing into that horrid black hole, Deliberately going into the blackness, and slowly drawing himself after, Overcame me now his back was turned
10. 10. I looked round, I put down my pitcher, I picked up a clumsy log And threw it at the water-trough with a clatter. I think it did not hit him, But suddenly that part of him that was left behind convulsed in undignified haste. Writhed like lightning, and was gone Into the black hole, the earth-lipped fissure in the wall-front, At which, in the intense still noon, I stared with fascination. And immediately I regretted it. I thought how paltry, how vulgar, what a mean act! I despised myself and the voices of my accursed human education.
11. 11. And I thought of the albatross And I wished he would come back, my snake. For he seemed to me again like a king, Like a king in exile, uncrowned in the underworld, Now due to be crowned again. And so, I missed my chance with one of the lords Of life. And I have something to expiate: A pettiness.
12. 12. The poem begins about an encounter with a snake on a hot day when the poet was in his pajamas and was going to fill his pitcher. The snake was ahead of the poet and it was there to drink water from the trough. When the poet came towards the Carob tree, spreading its strange scent, he saw the snake and had to stand and wait. The poet stood there watching the snake which slithered down from the crack in the earthen wall and slipped over the edge of the trough of water. The poet describes the snake as having a soft yellow-brown belly. Lawrence stands there watching the snake as the snake sips the water that is dripping from the trough SUMMARY
13. 13. The snake stood there sipping water from the trough which was entering his mouth straight and into its gums. The poet waited and watched over the snake. The snake then lifted his head, looked at the poet vaguely, flickered his two-forked tongue, stopped for a moment and then drank a little more. The poet then goes on to describe that very hot day of July in the city of Sicily and Etna with the smoky volcano that aggravates the heat. The poet then hears a voice of his education that tells him to kill the snake as black snakes in Sicily are not poisonous as yellow snakes are. That was a yellow bellied snake. The voice in his head provokes him by saying that if he was a man, he would have taken a stick and killed the snake. Finish him off is what the voice urged him to do. But the poet confesses that he liked the snake. The poet was glad that the snake paid a visit to his water-trough. The snake went back into the burning bowels of the earth without thanking him.
14. 14. The poet questions himself that was it cowardice that kept him from killing the snake? Or was it his obstinacy that urged him to talk to it? The poet contemplates if it was his humility that made him feel so honored. A voice then challenges him that if he was not afraid, he would have killed the snake. The poet confesses that he was truly afraid. He was afraid that he let the dangerous snake to go and feelings of honoUr that the snake sought the poets hospitality. The poet describes the pacified snake in these lines who lifted his head, drank water as if he was drunken state, flickered his tongue, licked his lips and looked around like god and slowly turned his head. After quenching his thirst, the snake climbed back the wall and disappeared into the earth.
15. 15. As the snake was slithering back into the hole, the poet suddenly felt a sense of protest and horror and hastily he puts down his pitcher, picks up a log and hurls at the water trough where the snake was stranded. The snake was unhurt. The poet saw its slow retreating body of the snake, disappearing into the hole from where it once appeared. The poet regrets for his foolish act of trying to kill the snake. For a moment, his emotions were different and he hated himself and the voices that urged him to do so. He despised the accursed human education. The poet thinks of the albatross and wishes that the snake would visit him again
16. 16. The snake seemed like a king to the poet, a king in exile and the one who lost his crown waiting to be crowned again. The poet regrets that he missed to spend time with one of the lords of life. He is left with something to expatiate and that is his pettiness.
17. 17. ANALYSIS D.H Lawrence has used a simple, lucid, colorful, descriptive and imaginative diction in the poem. All these elements make the poem picturesque. The verses of Snake are unrhymed and written in free verse. The first segment of the poem talks about the arrival and description of the snake, the second talks about the drinking from the water trough. The third segment is about the poets feeling and his sudden desire to kill the snake. In the final segment, we find the poets remorse.
18. 18. POETIC DEVICES Alliteration: Alliteration is the close repetition of the consonant sounds at the beginning of words to facilitate narration. Simile: A simile is a figure of speech in which two dissimilar objects are compared and the comparison is made clear by the use of terms like like, such as and so on.
19. 19. Allusion: Allusion refers to some mythical character. Here the Sicilian July and Albatross are examples of allusion. Personification: Personification is a figure of speech in which inanimate objects or abstract ideas are given human attributes or feelings. The soft yellow-brown bellied snake is personified throughout the poem. Sometimes like a human drinking water from the trough, licking its lips turning it head or sometimes as the king, the lords of life.
20. 20. THANK YOU