The Kraken Poem by Alfred Lord Tennyson
The Kraken
Below the thunders of the upper deep,
Far far beneath in the abysmal sea,
His ancient, dreamless, uninvaded sleep
The Kraken sleepeth: faintest sunlights flee
About his shadowy sides: above him swell
Huge sponges of millennial growth and height;
And far away into the sickly light,
From many a wondrous grot and secret cell
Unnumbered and enormous polypi
Winnow with giant fins the slumbering green.
There hath he lain for ages and will lie
Battening upon huge seaworms in his sleep,
Until the latter fire shall heat the deep;
Then once by men and angels to be seen,
In roaring he shall rise and on the surface die.
At school im supposed to write a story relating to this particular poem
I'm a fan of Joseph Campbell's, who said that if you want to understand myth, learn to read poetry. I took this advice into my senior English classroom, where I taught this poem the first time in a pathetic, literal fashion. In the second class in which i was reciting the poem, dawn broke on marble head, as i realized that I had missed the point of the poem, which is nothing but a metaphor for the unconscious, just a Joe would have interpreted it. After many apologies, I taught it a second time in the first class. The beauty of the poem is that it can be interpreted from a Western or an Eastern perspective, from using Western psychiatry to reach the depths on one's psyche to using meditation or yoga to do the same. poetry is hard work, but worth the effort.
No, it's about the Kraken. It's about mystery and the ocean, and about the things which will only be revealed in the second coming. Myth, contra Bettleheim, is not about psychological truths but aesthetic truths. The Kraken is not a symbol for the unconscious, but the unconscious and the Kraken (like other unknown and hidden but probably real giant sea monsters) are symbols for all hidden and mysterious things which may never be known.
This poem has not been translated into any other language yet.
I would like to translate this poem
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11/28/2024 5:31:08 PM # 1.0.0
Thank you for posting this. Is the spoken track computer-generated? I ask this because the word " uninvaded" seems to be oddly prounounced as " you-nin-vay-did."