РефератыИностранный языкMoMosquito By John Updike Essay Research Paper

Mosquito By John Updike Essay Research Paper

Mosquito By John Updike Essay, Research Paper


The Mosquito By John Updike This poem by Updike describes an ordinarily dull and


bland, if not even annoying pest and one of his dealings with such a creature.


This pest is of course a mosquito, which seems to have made its way into his


bedroom, looking to make a meal out of him. The main point that I think this


poem is trying to convey is that sometimes ordinary or dull occurrences can be


made into a game, and had fun with. No one likes mosquitoes, but when you think


of one as an opponent and it is either kill, or be killed, then you can


understand the mosquito?s point of view. The speaker, who is Updike himself,


seems to want to convey a melancholy affect with the use of his nonchalant


language, as when he makes the mosquito a woman. Who knows, or even cares what a


mosquito is, when it is bugging you, you just want it dead. Which is what he


wants, but the tone remains laid back and lazy. It almost has a sarcastic or


ironic twinge to it. It makes this huge melodrama out of something that is quite


ordinary. Yet he professes the mosquito?s innocence of wrongdoing. All she


wanted was a necessary meal, lest she die, she had to drink of his ?fragrant


lake of blood.? The diction of the poem is just wonderful and spectacular.


When he says ?fine wire of her whine she walked,? we all know that he is


describing how a mosquito hums along and winds through the air, with no direct


course, but the picture it creates in your mind is very clear. When he uses


?ominous? in the second line, it foreshadows some deep, dark thing to come.


The word fragrant in the second stanza reveals that the mosquito probably cannot


see him, but only smells his delicious blood, as one smells a home cooked meal


from one?s bedroom, down the hall. When he describes himself as a ?lavish


field of food,? the word lavish jumps out at you. Once again saying that she


in fact did not want to hurt anyone, but only to feast on this wonderful meal


before her. He compares himself with her as if they were raging in some game or


battle; he calls them ?opponents.? He uses ?thread? and ?fine wire?


to describe her movement, almost as if she were a puppet. He gives her human


characteristics by saying she has a ?nose,? and saying that she was


?thankful.? He says his death movement was ?cunning and strong,? as if


it took some great skill to kill a mosquito. He describes himself as a ?Gargantua,?


as if to say that his opponent never really had a chance. He describes his skin


as a ?feast,? reinforcing the fact that she was only out to get a meal. She


was ?Lulled? by his blood, as if it had sung her a lull-a-by, as if his


blood was a self-defense mechanism, to put to sleep those who would attack him.


The only remorse he had was a ?small welt,? and a welt is a small enough


thing in its self, I mean, its not a bruise or anything, and a small welt, well,


that?s hardly a welt at all. He describes himself as a ?murderer? and the


mosquito as ?murdered,? because she was, in fact, innocent of any


wrongdoing. All that she was doing was getting herself a meal, and he had killed


her for it. There is much great imagery in this poem. To star

t off with, when he


describes the flight of the mosquito as walking on a fine wire, we actually see


this insect walking on a fine wire, and can see that to be true in our minds


from past experiences. The mosquito?s camouflage is obviously darkness, and


when she betrays this, she does so with the hum of her wings, or her voice as in


line 3. All that he was to her was a ?fragrant lake of blood.? This helps to


put the reader in the shoes of the mosquito. All that she saw was like, to us,


this big lake of coke. What crime is it to go and take a few gulps of the coke


lake then? Once again, he compares his body to a big pile of delicious food.


Just imagine your favorite food. Now imagine Shasta Lake drained, and filled


with this food. This is what she sees. Now imagine that you are about to die


from starvation. As her ?nose sank thankfully in,? as if she did not get it


she would die. Would you jump into the Shasta Lake size bowl filled with life


giving food? He describes his deadly action as if he were some mighty warrior,


?cunning and strong.? He sees himself as this big, strong, superior being,


which of course he is, but he just got you feeling all sad and sorry for the


poor little mosquito. He describes her as a ?lover,? furthering your pity


for this poor insect. He describes how his blood had almost seduced her, so that


he could murder her in the end. He had killed her so ruthlessly, and efficiently


that he was almost proud. You can imagine him swallowing his ?small welt of


remorse? like a lump in his throat. In the last line you picture him with his


arm around a dead loved one, sleeping peacefully, which is what he wants you to


think, but, suddenly, you realize, it was only a mosquito. There are no similes


in this poem, but many metaphors. Updike compares the mosquito to many things:


?a traitor to her camouflage, A thirsty blue streak, an anchor, a lover, a


fleck of fluff upon the sheet,? and finally, ?the murdered.? He also uses


many metaphors to describe himself: ?a fragrant lake of blood, a reservoir, a


lavish field of food, A cunning, strong Gargantua,? and lastly a


?murderer.? He uses these to draw the reader into having feelings for both


sides of the story. If Updike uses any symbolism in this poem, it is very


little, or none at all. The only symbolism that I could gather from this is that


the mosquito represents some sort of group of repressed people, and Updike


himself is the one doing the repressing, and disregarding the value of life. The


way that the author uses syntax is wonderful, yet not fully understood, at least


not by me. The first and third lines rhyme as do the second and fourth. He tries


to continue this pattern throughout the poem, and is pretty successful, only


deviating a little bit. His use of syntax to portray himself as big and strong


and overpowering is strongly contradicted by how he depicts the mosquito as


small and delicate, he even refers to it as a woman. The sentences are always


two lines long, except in the fourth stanza, where he runs on about how his


blood had seduced the mosquito. There are no sentence fragments. All his


sentences flow smoothly together and form a nice rhythm.

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