Angry Boys Gwen Harwood Summary

All the news we hear, whether it’s on television, in class or even a conversation will always have conflicting and different beliefs, theories and responses. For example last night my husband and I were watching the premier of “Angry Boys” a mockumentary by Chris Lilley. He described the series to be a comment on "what it means to be a boy in the 21st century by putting representations of the male of the species under the microscope." To me the program sounded intellectual when in fact it consisted of a variety of comedic representations ranging from the racist “Gran”, a juvenile prison officer to Nathan and Daniel” identical twins (one of whom is deaf). As we sat on the lounge watching the program our laughter peeled from the room in tandem to each other; we didn’t agree on what was or wasn’t humorous.
Chris Lilley obviously wants characters within the scene to be perceived as humorous and from last night I can now appreciate that not everyone will have the same response to a text. We all react in our own unique way bringing our various life experiences to the piece. A composer’s intent for a text often differs from the audience’s response.
Another example of differing responses to texts is offered in Gwen Harwood’s poem, “At Mornington”.
While I perceive the poem to be one that reflects on her youth and reminisces on the wonderful memories she shared with her family and the feeling of protection and safety gained from them, others may read it differently. For example a colleague of mine proposed the idea that Harwood was now an older women, depressed and trying to find or remember a time in her life when she was in fact happy, that she is trying to escape the inevitability of death by escaping to her youth. Either way her poems offer the responder a variety of readings, which, I think, offer her work an integrity that is not eroded by
time.

Gwen Harwood was an Australian poet who wrote most of her poetry between the 1950’s and 1960’s. During this era, Australia was entering a time of change. The women’s liberation had spread, and the traditional, stereotypical ideals of what it means to be a woman, wife, mother etc. were beginning to be challenged. Through Harwood’s poetry “At Mornington” and “Father and Child” we are able to see Harwood’s values and attitudes she obtained. “Father and Child” reflects some of Harwood’s feminist ideas that in her personal context challenged existing values, such as men overriding women. The fact that the persona disobeyed her father by stealing his gun to perform such a selfish and horrific act to an “innocent owl” alone challenges the ideals of the innocence of young women.
This era was currently familiar to the values and religious views Harwood shared. The poem “ At Mornington” reflects how much religion was apart of her life. The biblical allusion of “Peter walking on water” compared to her naive belief as a child that you could “balance” on water. It mostly focuses on the motif of water, with the cleansing process of Baptism, implying and emphasizing the importance and greatness of God. This idea coincides with that of her context.
The idea and importance of family is most likely never going to differ in any context. In both poems “At Mornington” and “Father and child”, the importance of family to her is highly valued. Both explore and share memories of her youth, with her family, and both also suggest some form of regret and send a disguised message of how important it is to appreciate what you have.

A friend of mine is a psychoanalyst and as such values the role dreams play in our lives and as a result her reading of the poem “At Mornington” (and if you have read other poems by Harwood you will notice it is similar to her others) offers an invitation into a deeper meaning, and conversely for me the meaning was enclosed within the contextual understanding of her references to pumpkins and Halloween as metaphors for life. The persona often shifts to the past focusing on her joyful childhood memories. The fact that she does this creates the idea that she may have regrets now and wishes she could return to the innocence and safety of her youth. Given that Halloween is perceived as the celebration of lost souls, those awaiting their rite of passage of heaven, her references to this time of year for me are seen to serve a greater purpose then I originally recognized. I see now that she may have been religious or spiritual woman as she discusses the idea that souls “linger” or are eternal. Her references to Halloween I perceive as symbolic of the transformation between life and death, as emphasised in “avenues of death” and the situational context of the graveyard. I now see Harwood as comparing herself to the lost souls of Halloween finding herself in a transitional state in her life where she is confronted with the in inevitability of death yet buoyed by memories of childhood innocence. The Halloween reference gaining further currency as it also becomes evident of the beginning of autumn. Autumn itself if associated with Halloween nationally.
Autumn has often been thought as melancholy as people become lethargic with the conclusion of summer and the creeping up of winter. This can be symbolic of Harwood’s aging and incapability to put a stop to time. The repetition of the water motif is seen as a metaphor of her life as a child, suggesting that she was free and pure. It is also one of Harwood’s focuses as it shows her fear for the progression of time, another constant theme throughout her poetry.

“At Mornington” recounts on Harwood’s memories of childhood. It illustrates a strong sense of family and the innocence and purity of her youth. The imagery of this is when she “leapt” and “was caught” by a wave and “tossed around like a doll”. The fact that she is a child, and the naïve belief that she has the ability to “walk on water” highlights that she believed she was indestructible.
I then explores the power of memory, whilst continuing with the motif of water. This water imagery is passed throughout the poem as the land “arose out of earth’s seamless waters”. She describes her father’s rich smile as “ as light in a sea-wet shell” signifying she respected and admired him. The sudden contrast of the memory of childhood shifts to the entrance of “quick of autumn grasses” symbolizing the reality of age creeping up to you and our eventual death. The persona is accepting the reality of death with the passage; “two friends stand respectively and at peace among the avenues of death”. The use of present tense establishes the present context. Autumn is the season of decline and reinforces the passage of time and again their approaching death. The cemetery they are in is comforting with the gravestones “parting the quick of autumn grasses”. This idea is increased again by the reference to the “wholeness of day” that they must share together. This idea is finally reinforced with the reference to floods, signifying our memories flooding toward us.
The following stanza is centralized around the metaphor of a pumpkin vine, being a “parable” of herself, relating to her own journey of seeking a deeper understanding. Imagery of intense growth of the vines are contrasted against death and mourning. The persona discovers a link between herself and the pumpkin, as she remembers (in her childhood) pumpkins that grew “above their humble station” and flourished. Su Langker, a English teacher from Sydney Boys High School, states the poem to be “ the past and present intertwining”...” the pumpkins growing in defiance of nature, mirroring that child leaping into her fathers arms”.