Modern Poetry ∫ The MOD Blog

In “Tea at the Palaz of Hoon,” Wallace Stevens uses the self and the mind as a point of stability in a world teeming with questions and uncertainty. The chaos of the post-war environment is left behind in favor of an exotic, Eastern setting, as is suggested in the title. As the poem begins, the speaker, clad in purple, descends through what is called “the loneliest air” and concludes that in spite of it all, “not less was I myself” (3). This theme of remaining intact and at peace as an individual despite a dark and cynical world spans throughout the poem. It is also notable that the “day” Stevens mentions in this stanza is characterized as a “western day,” referencing the ruin of Europe after the first World War.

The second and third stanzas present an interesting, internal structure of question and answer with the speaker. The speaker asks, “What was the ointment sprinkled on my beard?” in the second stanza and in the third answers, “Out of my mind the golden ointment rained.” This is seen again as he asks “What was the sea whose tide swept through me there?” and then answers himself, “I was myself the compass of that sea.” Here the speaker observes the state of the world and makes an effort to be master of it. Rather than feeling overcome by the tides sweeping himself out to sea, the speaker maintains he is himself the ruler of that sea.

This notion is expounded upon within the final stanza:

I was the world in which I walked, and what I saw
Or heard or felt came not but from myself;
And there I found myself more truly and more strange.

Again, the speaker is shown as feeling in power and control, rather than the sense of helplessness sometimes expressed in Modern poetry. Stevens is coming from a place of strength and inspiration, rather than a sense of defeat or detachment.

I think it is interesting that the world Stevens sees himself so in touch with isn’t the Western world. It is exotic and removed and almost mystical. So perhaps what’s being hinted at is that what can be felt at the “Palaz of Hoon” cannot be attained in the fallout of Western Europe at the time. Perhaps one is only really in control of the realm of one’s own mind. For Stevens, this power of imagination seems to be enough, and the vision of it he presents is certainly appealing.

In “Tea at the Palaz of Hoon” (ANTH 247), Stevens uses imagination to go beyond the confines of reality and create a sort of “haven” within his own mind. However, it does not seem to be an escape from reality, but more a search for one’s self, a philosophical and spiritual adventure within the imagination to reach a greater sense of one’s inner being. The speaker states that he is “not less” (line 1) because of his inner wanderings, but in fact finds some power in the workings of the mind and the things that can be created. He finds agency through this exploration of imagination and its powers, stating that “I was myself the compass of that sea” (9). The speaker is able to control and manipulate everything within his own mind, from the “golden ointment” to the “blowing hymns” (7-8). He concludes with the essential point of the journey, the “finding” of one’s self, and the realization of the power of imaginative creation.

There is, however, a sense of solitude and tension that undermines this revelation throughout the poem, expressing the possibility that all is not as it seems on the surface. For instance, this entire creative journey happens only within the speaker’s mind, and he never truly engages with reality. This could, perhaps, suggest a dependence on the imagination as a means of creativity, and a lack of interaction with reality, or even a disassociation with the real world. The speaker even concedes that others would consider such a deep mental exercise as “what you called / The loneliest air” (2-3), expressing the speaker as a loner, or one who is more comfortable in imaginary worlds than in the real one. On the other hand, throughout the poem he reaffirms that he is “not less” because of this, and seems to consider himself as stronger because he has such power of imagination and creation that others could not fathom.

At the end of the poem, however, the tension is revisited, when the speaker finds himself to be “more truly and more strange” (12). The strangeness of the line offers a hint of the earlier tension, and seems to both affirm and contradict the speaker’s final view of himself. He has reached a “truer” sense of who he is and what his mind is capable of, but the fact that he also finds himself to be “more strange” seems to suggest an oddness inherent within this solitary episode, that something is not entirely okay about delving so deeply into imagination and leaving reality behind. The speaker seems to feel both empowered and unsettled with himself, and it is difficult to understand whether his ingeniousness is something good or bad.

Through his poems, particularly “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” and “Dream Boogie,” Langston Hughes was attempting to communicate the truth about blackness. He was not interested in activism, but simply wished to convey art of, by, and for black people. His poems did not have to follow a particular rhyme, or meter, but simply communicate the sound of black people, in order to prove that it could be beautiful art, and that he was not ashamed of his blackness. While “The Negro Speaks of Rivers” did, in fact, challenge the notion that existed in the 1920’s that African Americans were lower on the evolutionary scale than other humans, the poems that Hughes wrote afterwards made it clear that activism was not his goal, due to his focus on the “low down folk.” Hughes was not interested in the uplift of black people, but instead wished to call attention to their beauty. His focus on blues music asserted his opinion that everything about the blues is a subject of art, while the architects of the Harlem Renaissance were trying to avoid perpetuating were being played in underground clubs surrounded by a supposed drug culture.the image of black people being a part of that “low culture,” including the blues, which were being played in underground clubs surrounded by a supposed drug culture.

In “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” Hughes’ voice becomes a collective “I,” emblematic of all African Americans. He places black people far back into the beginnings of ancient civilization, giving them a prominent role, as much as any other people. He highlights their ancientness, wisdom, and resilience with his allusions to the building of the Egyptian Empire and the charged diction while speaking of his soul, which “has grown deep like the rivers” (4, 12). His use of repetition with this particular line adds emphasis to the concept of black people having wise and beautiful souls, and that they are as much connected to the Earth and to the history of the human population as any other people. The repetition of that collective “I:” “I bathed” (5), “I built” (6), “I looked” (7), “I heard” (8), joins together a string of impossible feats for one man to accomplish, further emphasizing that the “I” is representative of all African Americans throughout history.

 While the architects of the Harlem Renaissance adored “The Negro Speaks of Rivers,” they frowned upon poems such as “Dream Boogie” for perpetuating the “low culture” that blacks were a part of. Hughes uses improper grammar such as “Ain’t you heard” (2, 11), and “Y-e-a-h!” (21) in order to capture the true sounds of black people and the rhythm of their blues music. Like a blues song, “Dream Boogie” tends to sway in and out, swing back and forth, both physically on the page and audibly. In the second-to-last stanza, the quick, short end rhymes seem to mirror beats on a drum or cymbal, with swift exclamatory punctuation. There appears to be no firm structure to the poem at all, further reiterating his goal of simply communicating the sounds of black people, without maintaining some agenda of social uplift.