Bohemian Brouhaha

CENTRAL IDEA: The poem, “The Sick Rose”, portrays in subtle imagery Blake’s mystical idea about innocence and experience. Beauty is sick at the core; vulnerability is the essence of innocence. The path from ignorance and bliss to knowledge and satiety is inevitably a happy marriage -“bed of crimson joy”; yet, it yields destruction or loss predestined. Ironically, the rose, the cynosure, enjoys the rendezvous without being aware of the sickness that characterises it. This visionary idea that Blake represents involves the predicament of feminine beauty in human analogy in the guise of Shakespeare as he makes Hamlet blurt out, ‘Frailty, thy name is woman’!    TITLE: The poem is the point of view of a rose. The rose is a thing of beauty. It is the cynosure that attracts perils. A worm takes an opportune moment to prey on the ‘crimson’ boudoir of the rose. The rose, ironically, seems to be enjoying the passionate love-making of its predator, whose ‘dark’ love is a secret ...

ON JIMMY VALENTINE:  Jimmy Valentine is introduced into the story with the warden declaring him as “not a bad fellow at heart”. A Good Samaritan stems forth from Jimmy as he is said to have many friends both inside and outside the gaol. Even the governor relents and curtails his sentence period. Not only does he suppress his wrongdoings to policemen but he also makes his dear friend aloof from his usual business. He emerges out as straightforward in principle. He craves for the ‘milky’ life as he never touches “hard drink”. His handmade tools vouchsafe his expertise and make him unique among burglars. Moreover, he is capable of being moved deeply by love. He does possess attitude, elegance and mettle; he does exude all of them. He longs love and respectable life, and he risks them, unconditionally, for others. To aver, in brief, Jimmy never fails. Indeed, he cannot. ON BEN PRICE:  Ben Price is a rightful, law-abiding detective. He is on a mission to arrest Jimmy Valentine. He k...