Comparative Essay
Comparative Essay
In both of Bruce Dawe's poems, "Homo Suburbiensis" and "Up the Wall", he deals with contemporary Australian issues as it portrays the difficult domestic life of everyday working class Australians in Australian suburban settings. The poem "Homo Suburbiensis", embodies the idea of an ordinary man all alone in his garden with use of parody and metaphor. In the other poem, "Up the Wall", Dawe uses cliché and repetition in the housewife's dialogue to illustrate a stereotypical housewife suffering from seclusion. Essentially, both poems target the idea of isolation, ordinary, common residents living in a suburban setting.
In "Homo Suburbiensis", the title leads us to consider that the man is not an individual but a metaphor for all the everyday working class Australians. The man is a metaphor for ordinary people as it is effectively shown with the use of plural in the title "Homo Suburbiensis", a new fictitious species Dawe invented to classify the man. This emphasises suburban residents and the same common routine they live every day. His use of parody in the title also mocks the traditional species classification of human, the homo sapiens. The average, dull, boring tone used throughout the poem further demonstrates the poem of an ordinary common man with many frustrating problems.
Dawe examines the everyday life of a common Australian housewife in "Up the Wall", with the use of cliché in the title. The poem's title reminds us of the cliché of being driven up the wall, usually used to describe someone in a situation of desperation. It often occurs in a domestic setting, as in being driven up the wall by the rant from her children which is carving the mother's mind up . This is significant as the phrase "Up the Wall" is an overused expression, similar to the housewife's life as she is stereotypical and common. Dawe often draws on such clichéd phrases in his poetry, especially when he is examining and satirising social and cultural behaviour.
In both of Bruce Dawe's poems, "Homo Suburbiensis" and "Up the Wall", he deals with contemporary Australian issues as it portrays the difficult domestic life of everyday working class Australians in Australian suburban settings. The poem "Homo Suburbiensis", embodies the idea of an ordinary man all alone in his garden with use of parody and metaphor. In the other poem, "Up the Wall", Dawe uses cliché and repetition in the housewife's dialogue to illustrate a stereotypical housewife suffering from seclusion. Essentially, both poems target the idea of isolation, ordinary, common residents living in a suburban setting.
In "Homo Suburbiensis", the title leads us to consider that the man is not an individual but a metaphor for all the everyday working class Australians. The man is a metaphor for ordinary people as it is effectively shown with the use of plural in the title "Homo Suburbiensis", a new fictitious species Dawe invented to classify the man. This emphasises suburban residents and the same common routine they live every day. His use of parody in the title also mocks the traditional species classification of human, the homo sapiens. The average, dull, boring tone used throughout the poem further demonstrates the poem of an ordinary common man with many frustrating problems.
Dawe examines the everyday life of a common Australian housewife in "Up the Wall", with the use of cliché in the title. The poem's title reminds us of the cliché of being driven up the wall, usually used to describe someone in a situation of desperation. It often occurs in a domestic setting, as in being driven up the wall by the rant from her children which is carving the mother's mind up . This is significant as the phrase "Up the Wall" is an overused expression, similar to the housewife's life as she is stereotypical and common. Dawe often draws on such clichéd phrases in his poetry, especially when he is examining and satirising social and cultural behaviour.