Assisi - Norman McCaig The dwarf with his hands on ...

Assisi - Norman McCaig

The dehumanising of The dwarf with his hands on backwards Tourists
the beggar is tragic - sat, slumped like a half-filled sack follow priest,
Makes Dwarf seem on tiny twisted legs from which rather than St
more like an object sawdust might run, Francis
than human; outside the three tiers of churches built
grotesque. in honour of St Francis, brother
of the poor, talker with birds, over whom
he had the advantage
of not being dead yet.

Long and A priest explained Beautiful frescoes
complex first how clever it was of Giotto (painting on a wall or
sentence, to make his frescoes tell stories ceiling done by
contrasted with that would reveal to the illiterate the goodness rapidly brushing
short compound of God and the suffering watercolours onto
sentence. of His Son. I understood fresh damp or partly
the explanation and dry plaster) =
Tourist’s interest the cleverness. unattractive
in what the Priest suffering.
is saying distracts A rush of tourists, clucking contentedly, *ILLITERATE NOT
them from his NECESSARILY
teachings, which THE ONES WHO
are sat right in NEED THIS
front of them; MESSAGE*
Tourists are
portrayed strongly fluttered after him as he scattered
as brainless
chickens here. the grain of the Word. It was they who had passed

the ruined temple outside, whose eyes

wept pus, whose back was higher

than his head, whose lopsided mouth

said Grazie in a voice as sweet

as a child's when she speaks to her mother

or a bird's when it spoke

to St Francis.

Key

The dwarf with his hands on backwards - Pathos

- Pathetic

- Deformed

Sibilance - Beggar

sat, slumped like a half-filled sack- simile
Slumped – Suggests Dwarf has given up on life and is bored of begging. Gives a sense

of helplessness.
half-filled sack – inanimate object; suggest Dwarf is not like human

tiny twisted legs - incomplete

- half formed

- Ineffectiveness of his legs emphasised
from which/ sawdust might run – extended metaphor
sawdust – sawdust = off cuts

- left-overs

- no one cares about it

- malformed

outside the three tiers of churches

built - Juxtaposition

- Dwarf juxtaposes tall, grand,

magnificent church

- Incongruous (looks out of place)

- Church is being built in honour of St

Francis who represented simplicity
- The Church’s magnificence =

inappropriate

he had the advantage of not being

dead yet - dark humour

- Masks the point that the beggar

is not yet dead and that life is

temporary.

- Transient nature of life.
-Soul advantage that he has – he is

still alive.

→ Not a real advantage

-If he dies he will be completely

forgotten about

-Therefore not an advantage
→ underlines the fact that it’s a

disadvantage

-St Francis = ongoing immortality

- Juxtaposes with moral life of

Dwarf.
yet – enjambment (the continuation of meaning, without pause or break, from one line

of poetry to the next) places word at the end of verse.
A priest explained – seen also by his role. Now two clear categories created – Beggar

and Priest.
explained – didactic role (the priest’s message is being dictated ‘I know this, you

don’t’, attitude.)

clever - works of art

- if it reveals goodness so effectively, needs no explanation?
- Don’t need priest to explain → does job itself.

Stories - usually fictional

- In the past?

- Emphasises distance between speaker and message
to the illiterate 1. Sense of hierarchy – patronizing → literal is illiterate

2. Illiterate viewed as a homogeneous group

3. sense of needing help the weaker/poorer; without seeing real need
→ concept of understanding religion in an abstract manner, instead of

actually acting on these principles.
→ They understand the need to help but don’t do it! Hypocrisy!

the goodness/of God
suffering/of His Son – line breaks delay idea of WHO is good, and suffering: sense of
anticlimax low-level irony → idea that there’s a slight sarcastic pause, therefore

emphasis on God and Son.
→ Implication: a) goodness and suffering is present here too

b) religion doing nothing to address this

c) priest more interested in Giotto than being genuinely Christian
(don’t stretch this point too far)
suffering/of His Son- idea that it’s important to recognise suffering, yet when

presented with suffering, cannot see it.
→ suffering is obvious yet without context and explanation, tourists are blind to it.

I understood – full stop creates a CAESURA (pause).
→Pause created in the middle of a line.
explanation and/the cleverness – line breaks emphasise the uninteresting/not
challenging nature of what’s being conveyed.
→childish, mocking tone

- mocking the priest

- irony

rush- homogeneous group, moving quickly
tourists – role based identification → Anonymous
clucking contentedly – tourists compared to chickens
→ symbolic of man’s inhumanity - mindless activity

→ ‘bird brain’ – brainless/small intellect

→ Alliteration – connotations of inane clucking

contentedly - happy/self satisfied

- Unconcerned with state of the beggar, focused on their own satisfaction

- Uninterested in actually SEEING what is going on.

fluttered - moving without purpose

- allowing themselves to be led by the priest without necessarily thinking about

what they are doing
him – 1. Christ

2. Beggar → should be but isn’t because tourists are institutionally blind!

3. Priest

scattered - extended metaphor
- Intellectually ‘feeding’ the minds of the tourists
- Throwing carelessly → no responsibility for where it lands
- Priest saying words but they are basically meaningless because he doesn’t

really care
→ Ignoring beggar completely meanwhile

- Ironically juxtaposes St Francis who genuinely does care where Priest does

not care.
he scattered/the grain of the Word – Priest like farmer feeding Chickens (tourists)

→ Like the grain which chickens eat – greedy and hungry for more grain ie, want
more of the priest’s teachings instead of noticing the needs of the beggar who is sat right

next to them.
It was they – inverted sentence
they – separates poet from the tourists
→ indicates poet’s attitude to the beggar is different than tourists’.
→ portrays tourists as brainless.
passed – tourists completely ignoring beggar
the ruined temple - depicting beggar as useless or physically “ruined”
- conveying the selfishness of society – as they care more about the
suffering of Christ – preaching about it – than they care about the suffering of

the beggar.
whose eyes/wept pus – suggests ugliness of Dwarf – perhaps ugly on the inside?
→ ‘eyes are the windows of the soul’
whose back was higher/than his head – perhaps making fun of Dwarf – his only purpose

to be made fun of.

said Grazie in a voice as sweet - beauty comes from unexpected source

- In many ways, he is a better representation of the
church than the priest or the church, ‘built in his
honour’.

- Beggar better representative of St Francis than the

priest.

- Anticlimax

- Despite all horrific deformities, there is beauty
inside.

Events

Disabled beggar outside a church
Being ignored by all around him, especially tourists
→ most likely, Christians
→ should be more charitable
→ surprising, as he is sitting outside a church
→ Church of St Francis – BROTHER TO POOR
→ Francis emphasised simplicity and poverty

Themes

Isolation of disabled
Social injustice
Hypocrisy of the church
Social injustice
Fate’s injustice
Related to story of the Good Samaritan
Appearance and Reality – Façades

Atmosphere

Sad, contemplative
Slow pace
Narrative account of an every day event
→ This guy’s everyday life, being ignored, instead of being praised and recognised for his
genuine goodness.

Language

Every day speech – builds towards whole tragedy of this poem.
Underwhelming language, making an overwhelming, poignant point.
Blunt, graphic language.

Contrasts

Deformed beggar and elaborate church *juxtaposition*
→Emphasised ugliness of beggar, makes him seem more grotesque.

Actions of St Francis and a) church created

b) religion in modern world.
- Teachings have not been followed
- Dwarf perceived as freak and isolated from society and charity

What the priest preaches and what he practices – “scattered the grain of the Word”, but did

not eat it?
- Misses “love thy neighbor”.

Appearance and reality of dwarf = sweet voice = internal goodness
→ in some way good, despite the prejudice which is placed on him
→ appears hideous, internally nice
- redeeming quality