Icarus
In the poem “Icarus” by Edward Field, a mythological character is placed in a contemporary setting of the modern world. Field uses figurative language, irony and perspectives in the poem to give the myth a modernized view. A shift occurs and what was once right created an immense impact in Icarus’s life. The poem mirrors the myth by the prison escape, and the plummet to the death of Icarus, but states what has happened after his alleged “death”.
A witness to Icarus’s break out of prison “ran off to a gang war” (line 5) gang war referring to a cruel, urban setting where the witness could not be located by policemen to the case of Icarus’s “usual drowning” (line 3). Police had “filed and forgotten” (line7) the case because it was the least of their troubles as most modern police do today, while cases can be put into file and appealed years later. The last two lines of the first stanza talks about him swimming to a city and renting a house and tending a garden. Icarus went off to a new city to have a fresh start and live a normal life because Icarus was ashamed of his past and his failure.
Icarus was no longer Icarus but “That nice Mr. Hicks the neighbors called him” (line 10). Icarus is beginning his new life putting his past in the shadows. “The gray, respectable suit Concealed arms that had controlled huge wings” (line 11-12) under his plain disguise he held a past that no one will understand. “And had he told them they would have answered with a shocked, uncomprehending stare” (line14-15) if people knew who Mr. Hicks really was there would be a dead silence. Icarus felt he shouldn’t make his past known by his neighbors “No, he could not disturb their neat front yards” (line 16) he couldn’t burden the people by his morbid past life.
Field uses a rhetorical question at the end of the second stanza asking “can the genius of the hero fall” (line 19) and he becomes someone “of the merely talented” (line 20); Icarus, someone so powerful reduced to almost
A witness to Icarus’s break out of prison “ran off to a gang war” (line 5) gang war referring to a cruel, urban setting where the witness could not be located by policemen to the case of Icarus’s “usual drowning” (line 3). Police had “filed and forgotten” (line7) the case because it was the least of their troubles as most modern police do today, while cases can be put into file and appealed years later. The last two lines of the first stanza talks about him swimming to a city and renting a house and tending a garden. Icarus went off to a new city to have a fresh start and live a normal life because Icarus was ashamed of his past and his failure.
Icarus was no longer Icarus but “That nice Mr. Hicks the neighbors called him” (line 10). Icarus is beginning his new life putting his past in the shadows. “The gray, respectable suit Concealed arms that had controlled huge wings” (line 11-12) under his plain disguise he held a past that no one will understand. “And had he told them they would have answered with a shocked, uncomprehending stare” (line14-15) if people knew who Mr. Hicks really was there would be a dead silence. Icarus felt he shouldn’t make his past known by his neighbors “No, he could not disturb their neat front yards” (line 16) he couldn’t burden the people by his morbid past life.
Field uses a rhetorical question at the end of the second stanza asking “can the genius of the hero fall” (line 19) and he becomes someone “of the merely talented” (line 20); Icarus, someone so powerful reduced to almost