Wedges in Toomer's "Seventh Street"

In many of the stories in Toomer’s Cane, symbols are used to express important themes or ideas. “Seventh Street” is no exception. The use of “wedges” to represent the Black culture prevalent on Seventh Street is no doubt one of Toomer’s most important examples of metaphor and symbolic metonymy.

While the wood may represent the city itself, the wedge of Seventh Street splits the city – this probably refers to the ongoing racial separations that existed in the early 20th century. It is described as “crude boned” and “soft skinned,” possibly signifying a sarcastic understanding of the deeper beauty of Seventh Street and Black culture in general. Toomer writes that “wedges are brilliant in the sun,” an analogy to the literature and music produced by the African-American community. For Toomer, these art forms, when allowed to rise above the racial tensions, have the ability to escape the traditional bounds of race. However, they will rust and lose their beauty if they become stuck in the “soggy wood” of culture clash.

Blood in "7th Street"

The most obvious metaphor in "Seventh Street" is blood, specifically "black reddish blood." This blood represents southern blacks who have been in an immigration movement up to Washington DC in this time period. The white people who already lived in DC are represented by the "white and whitewashed wood of Washington." The narrator seems to describe the whites living in DC negatively, describing the wood as stale and soggy causing wedges to rust. This sogginess may or may not be caused by the blood. The cause is not stated.

The phrase “who set you flowing?” is used repeatedly, as if to say “Why are you here? Who invited you?” Then the blood is described as running down Seventh Street (probably a black neighborhood in this time) into all the neighborhood buildings. This describes blacks as they assimilate into and dominate Seventh Street in all aspects of the community. This is significant because “white and whitewash disappear in blood.” This disappearance could imply “white flight” (the idea that white people leave areas that people of other racial backgrounds begin to take over). Or it could bring up the age old dichotomy of white v. dark representing purity v. impurity. In other words people of other ethnicities (represented through color) corrupt the pure (white) society already in place, removing its purity altogether.

The narrator refers more negatively to the blacks through comments about drinking blood. He implies alcoholism through the statement “Blood suckers of the War would spin in a frenzy of dizziness if they drank your blood. Prohibition would put a stop to it.” The use of “prohibition” specifies alcohol is involved, and the narrator describes some effects of drunkenness in the people who hypothetically drank the black red blood. Then the narrator says, “God would not dare to suck black red blood. A Nigger God! He would duck his head in shame and call for the Judgement Day.” The use of the word “Nigger” implies a low view of blacks, but God’s rejection of blacks implies the inferiority of blacks to whites, even in God’s eyes. The narrator implies not only that God rejects blacks and is ashamed of them, but that He would end the world if he “drank the blood” of black people. I would assume drinking the blood means associating with and accepting black people.

Making Music on "Seventh Street"

            

As I read Jean Toomer’s “Seventh Street,” I am drawn in by the musical quality of the prose poem/poem, mostly through Toomer’s use of repetition.  A quatrain opens the piece and closes the piece.  Toomer utilizes repetition throughout, with phrases like, “Who set you flowing?” and “black red blood,” seemingly rising through the narrator’s unconsciousness and onto the paper.  I felt that the piece itself mimicked the “unconscious rhythms” that the narrator mentions with the repetition of key phrases and the use of the quatrain.  But the music implied does not uplift the reader; if I were to transpose this to a song, it would most certainly be in a minor key.  The reader is kept in a cycle of despondence with phrases like “stale soggy wood,” “blood suckers,” and “crude-boned” keeping the mood dark.

But why does Toomer choose to open and close his prose poem with the quatrain?  The stanza gives the reader the impression that life on Seventh Street is quick: Cadillacs “whiz” down the street, presumably controlled by drivers who spend quick, with the money burning holes in their pockets.  I think the stanza also lends a cyclical quality to the piece.  Toomer chooses the word “eddying,” which implies a circular movement. “Seventh Street” swirls, eventually comes back to where it started, with the reader left to imagine that the rich, blood-red life on Seventh Street will continue in contrast to its surroundings for some time to come.   

It's just a street past Sixth, and then you're there...

Jean Toomer’s Seventh Street is littered with interpretive symbols, and colorful imagery. It depicts the street itself, and focuses on the intense dichotomies of black and white, as well as the economic and social statuses of the inhabitants. Of these, the most noticeable is the “black reddish blood” (Toomer 41), and the flowing of said blood that ensues. The blood appears several times within the short prose/poem, contrasting sharply with the “whitewashed wood” (Toomer 41).

The blood is thrust onto the wood of Washington, symbolizing a covering of government that cannot be ignored. It is almost an attack; the thrusting implies force and combustion. As the blood overtakes the wall, the white is overcome by black. This black flow continues to overtake the rest of the street, implying a complete domination of culture. There are attempts to end this consumption (prohibition), but the pouring is too much. As the assimilation nears its completion, it mirrors smoke billowing near buzzards, a sign of deceased white culture being dissected.

Seventh Street

The symbols I would like to focus on in Jean Toomer's Seventh Street are the "silken shirts" and "zooming Cadillacs". Cadillacs and silk shirts can be considered forms of luxury, however, they seem very out of place within the context of Seventh Street. Toomer makes it seem as if they do not belong on Seventh Street. I believe that the Cadillacs and silk shirts are representations of superficiality. In what we have read in Cane thus far, there is a difference in the country/rural life and the city life. This new lifestyle on Seventh Street is heavily influenced by materialism. With all of the "theaters, drug stores, restaurants, and cabarets" it is possible for one to feel the pressures to become "cultured" within the city. However, Toomer is saying that all of this luxury portrayed by the people on Seventh Street is fake. Although they may drive luxury vehicles and wear fine clothing, ultimately their pockets still hurt, and their social status will never change.

The Pillowman in The Pillowman

I was greatly intrigued by Katurian’s short story about the Pillowman, and why McDonagh chose it as the namesake of his entire production. I did not understand the story the first time I heard it, nor the second time, but only after it was explained to me by a friend. After putting some thought to it now, though, and looking at how it applies to the rest of the play, I’ve come to hold a little stronger grasp of it.
In Katurian’s story, the Pillowman is a character whose job it is to convince young children to commit suicide before they become adults. He assumes that all children are unhappy- and if happy, only deceivingly so- and that their unhappiness will only grow as they grow older, until eventually as thoroughly unhappy adults they will take their lives anyway. He sees it as his mission to rescue them from the tragedies of life. Unfortunately he is often unsuccessful, a fact that breaks his heart over and over again. He realizes that in order to keep his own heart from breaking thus he must go back in time and convince his own young boy-self to erase the possibility of adulthood tragedy by burning himself, the Pillowman, to death. It’s quite gruesome. But when he does this, he hears the piercing cry of the thousands of young children who never would receive the refreshing comfort of his soft and happy-looking Pillowman-self, and would go on to die later in life unhappy and alone. He disappears in smoke to the shriek their cries.
Since the play is titled The Pillowman, this story must in some clever way reverberate throughout it. Its theme of unhappy children is obvious: none of the characters in the story- Katurian, Michael, Michael’s three victims, Tupolski, and Ariel- has a pleasant, happy-go-lucky childhood with a good ending. The Pillowman’s assumption is right. However, he doesn’t seem to come to life in any individual character. Obviously none of the characters fully takes on the job of “designated Pillowman,” for none of them frequently goes back in time to convince young children to die. However, there are bits of Pillowman-personality in many of them.
For example, Katurian does kill Michael with the intent of saving him from later torture and brutal execution. And both Ariel and Tupolski have devoted their lives to protecting children from the sad tragedies of life. In these aspects of their lives these characters possess the vulgar heroism of the Pillowman. In other aspects they possess also his final irony. For Katurian’s murder of his brother only serves to come against him later as providing the authorities a reason to burn his stories, and Tupolski and Ariel, despite their best efforts, at the end of the day are still left with grief and tragedy on their hands.
The message of Katurian’s short Pillowman story- that is, the futility of attempting to dispel unhappiness from the world- thus becomes the message of the greater story as well. It’s a strange twist, and a strange method to reinforce a theme, but it certainly works. After watching The Pillowman there was hardly a feeling of hope or happiness within me.
(After doing some research I found that McDonagh very likely wrote the play immediately after the September 11, 2001, attacks in New York and Washington D.C. Perhaps he was trying to convey that initial overwhelming dismay and disbelief in the goodness of the world. If so, this he quite convincingly achieved.)

Structure

I liked the structure of the play and the way that the scenes were arranged and broken with the two intermissions. McDonagh creates a lot of dark humor throughout a lot of his works and this performance was a great example. At the end of the scene 2, in the audience I herd a lot of people laughing at some part and others commenting on their laugher. “Why is he laughing at that doesn’t he know that they are talking about a little kid being tortured?” This type of reaction is what I believe McDonagh wanted from the audience he wanted them to see two sides of this play. One side being that there are little kids being killed because of someone’s writings and another side where the audience is thinking and understanding that there is another meaning behind this play. Now McDonagh is notorious for not talking about his play. So we will never really know what his meaning is, he allows the audience to take his work and make whatever of it. This is why Prof. Abbott arranged two intermissions. He wanted to let the audience take a break from the content of the play. In the script the play is not written with two intermissions but with some set complications and content of the scenes the breaks give the audience a chance to regain themselves before being thrown into another moral challenging scene. This break can also be seen with the production of In Brudge, and other work by McDonagh. In this film the break from the content comes with the midget. When ever the midget comes into the scene the contest changes and hilarity ensues.