"On Death, Without Exaggeration"

     I've always been a fan of classic literature. Theres a reason its classic, and modern authors just can't seem to match that. I took a summer term Literature course last year. Before the semester started I sat in my instructor's office reviewing the syllabus and the works we would be studying. One section was titled "Modern Poetry." I immediately started complaining. My instructor smiled at me and said, "Just wait. I'll change your mind."

      He was right...to an extent. I've come to thoroughly enjoy the depth of the works of modern poets like Shane Koyczan and Yusef Komunyakaa. Maybe I like their lack of "political correctness" and their crass, forth front attitudes. That being said, I still struggle with contemporary literature. I can't find the connection in it that I find in classic literature, despite that some of these modern works will one day be considered classics, also.

      Wislawa Szymborska's poem "On Death, Without Exaggeration" is the one piece that has evoked the most curiosity from me this term. When first reading the piece, the reader can't help but wonder if Szymborska is being terribly cynical and sarcastic or if she's is offering an unexplicable hope to her readers. After doing a bit of research on the poet, I've come to see that she is, perhaps, offering both hope and irony on the situation of death. Having spent the majority of her life in Krakow, Poland, and spending the better part of her late teenage and early adulthood in the midst of World War II and the invasion of German troops and government, it is evident that Szymborska became very familiar with war and death. Taking her early life into consideration clarifies and supports my view that she is simultaneously offering hope and irony in the face of death. "On Death, Without Exaggeration" was published in 1986, right in the middle of the Cold War and on the heels of the Korean and Vietnam Conflicts. Szymborska lived through some of the most significant political events of the 20th century, and directly felt the effects of Nazi Germany during the Second World War. It's no doubt that she has the authority to speak "On Death, Without Exaggeration." Death has been a crucial and very personal part of her life on a rather large scale.

     It is perhaps her life and experiences that have drawn me to this piece so much more. She begins the poem by personifying death and continues this theme throughout the poem. She opens: 

          It can’t take a joke,

          find a star, make a bridge.

          It knows nothing about weaving, mining, farming, 

          building ships, or baking cakes

          (lines 1-4). 

While tasks such as "weaving, mining, farming [and] building ships" aren't a part of daily life for many modern readers, these were jobs that were very familiar to Szymborska and were essential to life. By opening the poem with "It can't take a joke" she personifies death, but immediately removes it from the realm of humanity. Laughter is one the most distinctly human qualities. Other animals cannot understand jokes or laugh as humans can. By immediately pointing out that "[Death] can't take a joke" she brings the state of death to life, while insisting that it isn't human, and, perhaps, can't understand what it means to be human. She follows its lack of humanity by saying it couldn't even sustain human life if it wanted to. She follows this theme throughout the next couple of stanzas as she emphasizes how, not only can it not finish its own work (lines 8-12), it cannot even perform its own job effectively.

          Preoccupied with killing, 

          it does the job awkwardly, without system or skill. 

          As though each of us were its first kill. 

        Oh, it has its triumphs, 

        but look at its countless defeats, missed blows, 

        and repeat attempts! 

          (13-20).

 Even in line 15 she has again emphasized that death is more than just a state of being, but it is of a different quality than humanity. This is obvious in her use of "us" as a pronoun for mankind. She's separates this personified state of being from humanity in two letters. I found her personification and alienation of death a very interesting matter, as many authors and poets do personify death, but few have gone to the lengths to ensure that their readers know that death does not have the human qualities of personality, work ethic, and many other traits that make us uniquely human.
   
Perhaps the lines that gripped me most were:
           In our planning for tomorrow,
           it has the final word,
           which is always beside the point
           (5-7).
           ...
          There's no life
          that couldn’t be immortal
          if only for a moment.

         Death
        always arrives by that very moment too late.
        (40-44).
 In these lines Szymborska, again, identifies uniquely human qualities, predominately the will to survive. This directly reflects her early life in Krakow as millions of people fought for their lives, some by sheer will power. Many who were, were not, or were never allowed the opportunity to become immortal through political, artistic, or fame by whatever means were still granted the opportunity to become immortal, if only for a moment, through the memories saved by family and friends. Even death cannot erase memories.

     Szymborska has become known for her simplistic irony, which is evident in her view of death in this piece. She seems to almost be poking fun at death, but eventually offers her hope for humanity, in that mankind has the upper hand on death, because it can never understand what it means to be human and to be willing to fight to live, so that we mall all "be immortal / if only for a moment."