Prayer Before Birth

Louis MacNeice

Louis MacNeice

1907-1963

• Louis MacNeice born September 12, 1907, in Belfast, Ireland.

• Attended Oxford University: classics and philosophy.

• 1930 accepted post as classics lecturer, University of Birmingham.

• 1941 joined BBC as a staff writer and producer.

• MacNeice found an audience for his work through British radio.

• MacNeice was as mistrustful of political programs as he was of philosophical systems.

• Was candid about the ambiguities of his political attitudes.

• Chose to live the majority of his adult life in London

• MacNeice frequently returned to the landscapes of his childhood.

• Took great pride in his Irish heritage.

• 1963, on location with a BBC team, went into mineshaft to check on sound effects. Caught pneumonia.

• He died on September 3, 1963

• He was 55 years old.

ContextSocial & Historical

Written in 1944

Bombing of London

War grinding to climax

Literary and Cultural

“The writer today should be not so much the mouthpiece of a community…as its conscience, its critical faculty, its generous instinct.”

-Louis MacNeice, 1946

“Prayer Before Birth”

Genre:Poetry; free verse

Audience:1944: citizens also experiencing WWII

Subject:The pre-natal prayers of the unborn child to protect it against the horrors of the contemporary world of 1944

Purpose: (context related)1944: possibly cathartic expression of MacNeice’s fears of the state of war-torn Europe

2014: possibly as warning against a return to apocalypse (world war)?

I am not yet born; O hear me.Let not the bloodsucking bat or the rat or the stoat or the

club-footed ghoul come near me.

I am not yet born, console me. I fear that the human race may with tall walls wall me,

with strong drugs dope me, with wise lies lure me, on black racks rack me, in blood-baths roll me.

I am not yet born; provide me With water to dandle me, grass to grow for me, trees to talk

to me, sky to sing to me, birds and a white light in the back of my mind to guide me.

I am not yet born; forgive me For the sins that in me the world shall commit, my words

when they speak me, my thoughts when they think me, my treason engendered by traitors beyond me,

my life when they murder by means of my hands, my death when they live me.

I am not yet born; rehearse me In the parts I must play and the cues I must take when

old men lecture me, bureaucrats hector me, mountains frown at me, lovers laugh at me, the white

waves call me to folly and the desert calls me to doom and the beggar refuses

my gift and my children curse me.

I am not yet born; O hear me, Let not the man who is beast or who thinks he is God

come near me.

I am not yet born; O fill me With strength against those who would freeze my

humanity, would dragoon me into a lethal automaton, would make me a cog in a machine, a thing with

one face, a thing, and against all those who would dissipate my entirety, would

blow me like thistledown hither and thither or hither and thither

like water held in the hands would spill me.

Let them not make me a stone and let them not spill me. Otherwise kill me.

Key features: overview

Structure:• Eight stanzas• Free verse• No end line rhymes (but does have internal ones)• Shape significant – reminiscent of Psalms (sung prayers)• Repetition of “First line” as a ritualistic refrain;

statement, then imperative tense command• Verbs on each first line: hear; console; provide; forgive;

rehearse; hear; fill – indicate focus of the verse• Ends with final command

I am not yet born; O hear me.Let not the bloodsucking bat or the rat or the stoat or the

club-footed ghoul come near me.

I am not yet born, console me. I fear that the human race may with tall walls wall me,

with strong drugs dope me, with wise lies lure me, on black racks rack me, in blood-baths roll me.

I am not yet born; provide me With water to dandle me, grass to grow for me, trees to talk

to me, sky to sing to me, birds and a white light in the back of my mind to guide me.

I am not yet born; forgive me For the sins that in me the world shall commit, my words

when they speak me, my thoughts when they think me, my treason engendered by traitors beyond me,

my life when they murder by means of my hands, my death when they live me.

I am not yet born; rehearse me In the parts I must play and the cues I must take when

old men lecture me, bureaucrats hector me, mountains frown at me, lovers laugh at me, the white

waves call me to folly and the desert calls me to doom and the beggar refuses

my gift and my children curse me.

I am not yet born; O hear me, Let not the man who is beast or who thinks he is God

come near me.

I am not yet born; O fill me With strength against those who would freeze my

humanity, would dragoon me into a lethal automaton, would make me a cog in a machine, a thing with

one face, a thing, and against all those who would dissipate my entirety, would

blow me like thistledown hither and thither or hither and thither

like water held in the hands would spill me.

Let them not make me a stone and let them not spill me. Otherwise kill me.

Key features: overview

Language:•Use of “O” in supplication to “God”•Biblical language: imagery, sentence structure•Modern lexis•Sounds emphasised•Only one simile throughout•Present tense used: “I am not yet born”•Many imperative verbs used “console me.”

Verse 1: positioning the readerI am not yet born; O hear me.

Let not the bloodsucking bat or the rat or the stoat or the

club-footed ghoul come near me.

Analysis

• Monosyllables in 2nd line

• Pace rolled on as a result

• Listed mammals are associated with evil

• Images of hell and deformity

• Childhood nightmares

Summary:

The first fear refers to all the frightening things of

the night, both real and imaginary.

Verse 2: fear of coercion

I am not yet born, console me.

I fear that the human race may with tall walls wall me,

with strong drugs dope me, with wise lies lure me,

on black racks rack me, in blood-baths roll me.

Analysis

• Assonance creates rolling, inevitable pace

• Internal rhyme “Wise lies lure me….black racks rack” create a fearsome chant-like quality; ritualistic quality of the soothsayer

• Oxymoron “wise lies” enforces idea of trickery

• Imagery staggeringly graphic “blood-baths roll me”

• All echoes the context of 1944/War

Summary:

Next is the fear of being closed in by lies

and persuasion, being led by drugs,

tortured both mentally and physically, and

being made to participate in warfare and

other massacres.

Verse 3: the vision of a better worldI am not yet born; provide me

With water to dandle me, grass to grow for me, trees to talk

to me, sky to sing to me, birds and a white light

in the back of my mind to guide me.

Analysis

• No words more than two syllable: language of innocence

• Mystical white light hints at a pure vision

• Joyful contrast from previous verses and provides shock of next verses

• Whole poem full of personal pronouns: I, me, my, which provides the intimate feeling of confession

• Dandle - to dance an infant in the lap/on the knees – creates a family image

Summary:

The poet makes a plea for the good

things of life which today are fast

disappearing: clean water, love,

forests, birds and purity ("white

light") as a guide.

Verse 4: forgiveness for future actionsI am not yet born; forgive me

For the sins that in me the world shall commit, my words

when they speak me, my thoughts when they think me,

my treason engendered by traitors beyond me,

my life when they murder by means of my

hands, my death when they live me.

Analysis

• Most overly Biblical language so far: “forgive; sins; shall commit” sustains and deepens the confessional like content

• Strong sense of inevitable betrayal, and conspiracy

• “for the sins in me the world shall commit” = a sense of original sin in all of us, but it is the pre-existing world that will produce (“engender”) these sins.

• Strong use of paradox = “my death when they live me”

Summary:

The child asks for forgiveness for all the sins that the

world is going to make him commit in the future: his

wrong words, his evil thoughts, those times when he

is led to commit treason, the times when he will be

forced to kill other people ultimately for his own death

of spirit, because he has been forced to give into

these social pressures.

Verse 5: desire to act with guidance

I am not yet born; rehearse me

In the parts I must play and the cues I must take when

old men lecture me, bureaucrats hector me, mountains

frown at me, lovers laugh at me, the white

waves call me to folly and the desert calls

me to doom and the beggar refuses

my gift and my children curse me.

Analysis

• Extended Stage metaphor: the roles to navigate in life; none pleasant

• “Lecture, hector (internal rhyme), frown, laugh, refuses, curse = visceral verbs

• “Folly, doom, beggar refuses my gift = lexis generally of rejection and humiliation

• Tone: ‘If life is to be this bad, is it worth it?’ – pessimistic? Resignation?

Summary:

The child asks to be guided into the part he

must act in this dramatic performance of life

so that he is able to perform his role correctly,

and that he be given all the right clues on how

to react when important people lecture him or

laugh at him. Note the metaphor of the stage.

Note too the extended personification:

mountains frowning, deserts calling, etc.

Verse 6: protection from tyrantsI am not yet born; O hear me,

Let not the man who is beast or who thinks he is God

come near me.

Analysis

• Technically, whole verse is one sentence

• Acts as a warning

• “…the man who is beast…or thinks he is God…”

• Strong echoes in tone of Revelations (final book of new testament) or Prophet Ezekiel (old testament)

• A clear contemporary reference to Hitler as beast, and his delusional nature as thinking he is God.

• 3 lines = almost a hiatus before the final descent into chaos and death

Summary:

A plea is made that tyrants and

autocrats (like Adolph Hitler) may not be

allowed to come near him.

Verse 7: chaos; the metaphor of the machineI am not yet born; O fill me

With strength against those who would freeze my

humanity, would dragoon me into a lethal automaton,

would make me a cog in a machine, a thing with

one face, a thing, and against all those

who would dissipate my entirety, would

blow me like thistledown hither and

thither or hither and thither

like water held in the

hands would spill me.

Analysis

• War destroys the soul and character: become “a thing”

• Abstract nouns dominate: strength, humanity, entirety

• One cannot be spilled literally…figurative simile for the Soul?

• Repetition suggests a desperate pleading

Summary:

He asks for the strength not to become a killing

machine ("lethal automaton") or just a part in a

machine ("cog in a machine"): he pleads that he

be not allowed to become inhuman ("a thing") or

something that is completely at the mercy of

others ("blow me like thistledown hither and

thither") or spilt as if he were just water.

Verse 8: denouement

Let them not make me a stone and let them not spill me.

Otherwise kill me.

Analysis

• All monosyllables, except the adverb “otherwise” = unambiguously simple, primary language: reverberates with finality

• Horrific idea that the pre-natal child would elect for death instead of life…but the life described is worse than death.

• Line and half line gives the poem terminal impact.

Summary:

His final plea is that his heart may not

turn to stone, or his life be wasted.

Failing that, he would rather be

aborted right away.