English: Poetry Commentary Haven’t I Danced the Big Dance? By Jack Mapanje :: English Literature

English Poetry Commentary Havent I Danced the enlarged Dance? By Jack MapanjeThe poem Havent I boundd the large-scale dance? by Jack Mapanje concernsthe traditional precipitate dance of a proud tribesman. The modernrepresentation of his dance that he sees at present provokes this nostalgicand senseal response.The speaker, a formal tribal rain dancer, is view back to the timewhen he utilise to dance this traditional dance, and looking at at the newgeneration, dancing only for show, with sadness. The poem is dividedinto common chord stanzas, the two first ones being dedicated to the past,when he was a dancer, and the rifle one to the present. The firststanza talks round the way he used to dance this traditional raindance, in a circle most the drums, with amulets, anklets and snakes.The second stanza is insisting on the energy he countersink into this dance,on how good he was. The third stanza brings us to the present time, straight off that his daughters are doing the da nce, more as an attraction fortourists than as a rattling tradition, and the speaker is not able to showthem the real meaning of the dance.This rain dance is part of the speakers traditions, and he seems tobe genuinely attached to it. He remembers the way they danced it in thearena to the sound of the big drums. They used to wear special clothesand use specific accessories, Skins wriggled with amulets go with ankletsto make the dance seem real and magical, at the identical time. It had areal value for the speaker. However, this dance, in which he had putso much energy into when he was younger, How I quaked the earthHow my skin trembledHow my get it on peakedhad not kept the same value. He talks about the way the newgeneration, his daughters generation, dances the dance now, andemphasised the lack of authenticity it has. He says they just wearbabble-idea-men-masks, to make it look like a traditional rain danceto tourists, while it is not really. He compares the mystic drums heuse d to dance to, with the slack drums his daughters dance to now.Finally, he lets us see to it he would like to show the newgeneration how the big dance is supposed to be danced, what itsoriginal value. However, this helplessness is not the only emotion felt in this poem.At the beginning, the speaker reminisces on the old days, his distinctiondays, both with happiness and excitement and with sadness and regret.As he describes the antithetical characteristics of the dance and the way