basking shark Flashcards
“so who’s the monster”
the writer uses this rhetorical question to emphasize his lack of confidence as to who is the superior specie. the speaker now considers humanity to be truly monstrous despite not looking like it, which contrasts with the scary shark who is the actual victims of humans.
“sail after sail”
the shark is elegant and beautiful which contrasts to the start of the poem which shows the shark as an inanimate, bulky being without feelings or intelligence or importance.
” swish up the dirt”
the onoatopia of “swish” suggests that water also alludes to the idea of the displacement of his previous thoughts of the shark. his tought are being swished away by the water.
the word choice “dirt” represents the ugly human preception of the shark and other species they do nit believe have evolved, the speakers dirty thoughts are being washed away and he has come to a realisation that humans are no the superior specie.
“is all the clearer”
the speakers mindset is all clearer now, his peception of nature has changed, he had an epiphany that although it seem that humans are the supreem specie animal, they are not.
“matchbox brain”
just as a match box doesn’t have a ;large capacity to hold something so to does the shark’s brai struggle to hold onto information, suggesting that ths shark is dumb.
“roomsized monster”
just as something roomsized is enormous and takes a lot of space so to the shark takes a large amount of space.
this contrasts with a matchbox brain as it seem as thought such a large animal woud have a large brain, it doesn’t.
what peon does basking shark link with( and their themes)?
aunt julia- nature
brooklyn cop- humanity
hotel room 12- humanity
assisi- apathy, humanity
“slounge”
the word choice suggests that the shark is clumsy and uncordinated
“centuries back”
enjambment emphasises how long it took humans humans to evolve, but the poet is traveling back in his mind to the old day before humans evolved, comparing humans to the shark befor we evolved.
“he displaced more than water”
the shark has caused him to questin his his place in evolutio, he begins to question whether heis better than the shar, there is a change in his mindset towards the shark.
