Dead Poets Society

This is a very good movie and I watched it in my gr 9 English class. My teacher agrees with Keating(Williams) that there is no rating or PIG to poetry.

A movie starring Robin Williams, which deals with an English teacher who instills in his students (at an exclusive New England prep school) a love for poetry and romanticism.

I would argue it has little to do with poetry, featuring almost none, and more to do with the misplaced worship of Robin Williams' character, which beaome more and more of a motif as his movies became worse and worse (the nadir being, of course, Patch Adams).

I don't much like Friends, but I loved the one where someone said Dead Poets Society inspired her to change her life... because she never wanted to waste two hours of precious life like that ever again.

DPS isn't that bad... while it ain't great cinema (and viewed through the lens of time, hasn't held up as well as its initial positive reviews might indicate), there are far worse ways to waste two hours of your precious life.

KEATING: Gentlemen, open your text to page twenty-one of the introduction. Mr. Perry, will you read the opening paragraph of the preface, entitled "Understanding Poetry"?
PERRY: Understanding Poetry, by Dr. J. Evans Pritchard, Ph.D. To fully understand poetry, we must first be fluent with its meter, rhyme, and figures of speech. Then ask two questions: One, how artfully has the objective of the poem been rendered, and two, how important is that objective. Question one rates the poem's perfection, question two rates its importance. And once these questions have been answered, determining a poem's greatness becomes a relatively simple matter.

Keating gets up from his desk and prepares to draw on the chalk board.

PERRY: If the poem's score for perfection is plotted along the horizontal of a graph, and its importance is plotted on the vertical, then calculating the total area of the poem yields the measure of its greatness.

Keating draws a corresponding graph on the board and the students dutifully copy it down.

PERRY: A sonnet by Byron may score high on the vertical, but only average on the horizontal. A Shakespearean sonnet, on the other hand, would score high both horizontally and vertically, yielding a massive total area, thereby revealing the poem to be truly great. As you proceed through the poetry in this book, practice this rating method. As your ability to evaluate poems in this matter grows, so will - so will your enjoyment and understanding of poetry.

Neil sets the book down and takes off his glasses. The student sitting across from him is discretely trying to eat. Keating turns away from the chalkboard with a smile. [Revealing behind him the graph on the blackboard, showing the axes of Perfection, Importance, and Greatness, or rather their acronym PIG.]

KEATING: Excrement. That's what I think of Mr. J. Evans Pritchard. We're not laying pipe, we're talking about poetry.

Where is there more information on GETTING the book by Dr. J. Evans Pritchard "Understanding Poetry"???

Based on a cursory search, it doesn't exist; it may have been made up for the purposes of the movie.

Probably it was invented for the film. It's all too easy to imagine that someone, somewhere, has taken such an approach to the topic, though.

Note: Only Dr. Pritchard doesn't exist. This text was taken from Laurence Perrine's book, called Sound and Sense: An Introduction to Poetry. I used that book in high school and I still can't understand how could someone ever have such a narrow view towards poetry.

Actually, it's quite easy to recognise greatness in poetry. Great poetry makes your heart sing, and your brain itch; it makes you want to punch someone in the face, and make sweet love with someone; it fills your soul with the rapture of deep sadness, and the mirth of true fear; it makes your toes roll, and your eyes tap; it reaches out a great strong, hairy, calloused hand, grabs you hard by the scruff of the neck and gives you a violent hugging; it gives you a warm shiver; it gives you the feeling that you just walked over someone else's grave; it makes you feel as if you're watching someone; it makes the hairs on the back of your neck lie down; it makes you alone in a crowd, thronged in a 'phone box; it makes you feel as if everyone everywhere understands you perfectly all the time. You don't know what you like, but you know great poetry when it sees you.

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