Wikipedia:Reference desk/Archives/Language/2009 April 30

= April 30 =

Could someone explain this poem to me?
"What are Years" by Marianne Moore. www.hearts-ease.org/library/contemporary/moore/1.html I'm having a hard time understanding this one. Thank you! —Preceding unsigned comment added by Darkleg (talk • contribs) 01:58, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Nope, sorry. The beautiful thing about art, such as poetry, is that it is different for each person.  I can't explain it to you; only you can do that.  If you have specific questions about literal meanings or something like that, then that's a different story.  Just look at it with an open mind; you can't interpret it wrong if you make a serious effort. -- Falconus p  t   c 03:09, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I guess I can try to point you in a certain direction, but again, it's my interpretation. I think it is discussing how joy counteracts all of the guilt and sin inherent to mankind.  That may not be an official interpretation; it may be.  If you get really stuck, I suggest typing the title into Google, and seeing what the "mainstream" interpretations are.  I hope that helps.  Sorry if I sounded snippy in my first response; I didn't mean it that way.  -- Falconus p  t   c 03:13, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * What did you mean? Are you unaware of the vast and ancient discipline known as literary criticism, which for millennia has concerned itself with precisely this matter? People have been talking about poems for as long as poems have existed. We may not be able to explain "what a poem is saying", since poems are not cryptograms to be deciphered, but criticism can certainly tell us a lot about what poets are doing. L ANTZY T ALK 11:54, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

It may help you to know that in line 8 "encourage" should be "encourages", in line 9 "it's" should (of course) be "its," and in line 12 "accededs" should be "accedes" (and that, in each stanza, the first and third line should be indented and the last two lines should be indented twice as far). If one is going to violate copyright on one's Web site, one should at least have the courtesy to reproduce the material accurately. Deor (talk) 05:34, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Yes, indeed. What's worse is when people rip a song, stick it on the internet, and say it's by an artist different than that which it is.  The Jade Knight (talk) 09:23, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

My original judgment would be that it's a poem about accepting our mortality courageously. Just as a bird in a cage accepts its imprisonment and still sings, we should not worry about our limited years and in this surrender to time paradoxically find a greater power. Which is odd, because most Moore poems really don't seem to be about anything (except maybe about poetry.) --Maltelauridsbrigge (talk) 14:23, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * Well, to me literary criticism is just an individual's interpretation. It can be useful, which is why I offered the advice to go to Google, but for the purpose of "understanding" a poem, it just never seemed like anyone could understand a poem for me, and nor can I understand a poem for them.  That's all I meant.  I stand by the statement that no serious attempt at interpreting a poem can be wrong.  I didn't mean that offensively, which is why I apologized after I wrote it. -- Falconus p  t   c 20:27, 30 April 2009 (UTC)

Being a Nazi
If you call some German in English, 'Nazi', do you mean his ideology or is it just a derogative word for German? Like 'Hun' can also be a derogative word for 'German'.--80.58.205.37 (talk) 11:02, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * The speaker's intentions are really known only to the speaker. I imagine some people use it as a generic derogatory word for German, especially if they know it's far more likely to actually get a rise out of the person so addressed, because it's very unfair and almost always inaccurate than less loaded insults like "Hun" and "Kraut". —Angr 11:14, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * I think calling someone German is a big enough insult in and of itself —Preceding unsigned comment added by TURNITIN1 (talk • contribs) 11:18, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * You're thinking of the Belgians. L ANTZY T ALK 11:38, 30 April 2009 (UTC)
 * (s)he was not thinking. Well, it's good to let one's brain rest, but then, it is a good rule to let tongue and fingers rest as well, in the meanwhile... ;-) --pma (talk) 13:24, 30 April 2009 (UTC)


 * I doubt it's very commonly a derogatory term for a German. Other than the literal usage to mean someone who actually adheres to Nazi or neo-Nazi ideology, more often, it's a term for an unbending and harsh authority figure, a megalomaniac, or some other such person. (Soup Nazi, "my manager's a Nazi", that kind of thing.) It can also be used in an exaggerated way to refer to a person whose beliefs, etc, are in some way similar to or connected with the Nazis - e.g. someone who has a thing for Nazi-era collectibles or a white supremacist of any shade. --PalaceGuard008 (Talk) 23:51, 30 April 2009 (UTC)


 * Nazi-comparisons (including references to the Gestapo, Aryanization, etc., but also including more subtle allusions) are occasionally made in the world of politics, sports, and media. One more or less recent example was Berlusconi's insult of Martin Schulz in 2003 (see article for quote).
 * In sports, particularly in football, where the whole world loves to hate the German national team, such comparisons are frequently heard in private or in stadiums, and occasionally even made in public. Certain French media reacted strongly to the the Schumacher-Battiston incident at the 1982 World Cup, and printed words such as "Nazi" or "Gestapo" according to German Wikipedia. According to the same article, the German and French heads of government gave a joint press-conference to smooth the waves. In both cases, Schulz and Schumacher, the Nazi reference had nothing to do with ideology and everything to do with insult. ---Sluzzelin talk  06:03, 1 May 2009 (UTC)

I have, on occasion, heard it used to means Germans, but only by idiots. The worst experience was when I introduced someone in her late 20s to a middle class British man in his 60s and mentioned that she was German. The moron said "oh, you're a Nazi". The fact she was obviously born in the 1970s had apparently passed him by. So did the fact that much of her family had been murdered by the Nazis - she was left speechless and very, very angry. An embarassing situation. But such experiences are rare. I think generally in the UK if the term is used it's because of the person's politics, not their nationality. --Dweller (talk) 15:55, 5 May 2009 (UTC)


 * I once worked for a person of Jewish descent (as he always put it), born in the thirties I guess, who thought it funny to describe any fair-haired goy – such as his partner, or me – as a Nazi. Come to think of it, his sense of humor was hit-or-miss in general. —Tamfang (talk) 22:23, 10 May 2009 (UTC)