"Stand and live": tropes of falling, rising, standing in Robert Lowell's Lord Weary's Castle

Given the title "At The Altar," the "gold table" may be read as a sacrilegious allusion to the table at the altar fashioned for the Temple by Solomon: "And Solomon made aU the vessels that pertained unto the house of the Lord: the altar of gold, and the table of gold, whereu...

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Published inConnotations (Münster in Westfalen, Germany) Vol. 17; no. 1; pp. 29 - 60
Main Author Kearful, Frank J
Format Journal Article
LanguageEnglish
Published Münster The Connotations Society for Critical Debate / Waxmann Verlag GmbH 01.01.2007
Waxmann Verlag GmbH
Subjects
American literature
Poetry
Rhetorical figures
Stafford, Jean (1915-1979)
New York
Massachusetts
New England
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Summary:Given the title "At The Altar," the "gold table" may be read as a sacrilegious allusion to the table at the altar fashioned for the Temple by Solomon: "And Solomon made aU the vessels that pertained unto the house of the Lord: the altar of gold, and the table of gold, whereupon the shewbread was" (1 Kings 7:48).21 The speaker's giddiness turns to silliness, and Old Testament to New Testament sacrilegious allusion, as he conflates Easter, the Star of Bethlehem, a star on top of a Christmas tree, and the children's verses, "Twinkle, twinkle litile star / How I wonder what you are. / Up above the world so high, Like a diamond in the sky. First published in the July 12, 1946 issue of the Catholic magazine Commonweal, it grants voice to those, the young especially, who fell "hugger-mugger in the jellied fire. [...]the agitated plea, "Raise us, Mother," making her more than merely an intercessor on "Rising-day." [First published in The Listener 82 (4 September 1969): 302-04.]
ISSN:0939-5482