“Aunt Jennifer’s Tigers” Critical Thinking Questions
Answer each question in complete sentences on a separate piece of paper or upload to Google Docs/online platform and type directly on the document. Either is fine with me. Each question is 10 points each, as answers should show depth and analysis. In total, this is a 50-point writing assignment.
1.This poem, though short, is dense in meaning. It is a two-sided poem, one side being negative, one at least tentatively positive. Each side has its own key image; each image sets a vivid tone; each image is used metaphorically. Not only that, but there are also more people present in the poem than first may meet the eye. So let's do the "down side" of the poem first. To do that, read the whole poem, then focus on the middle stanza and the first two lines of the last stanza, exactly half the lines in the poem. There are several images there, images which draw on vision and also on touch or feeling. The key one is hinted at in line ten: When dead, her "terrified hands will lie / Stillringedwith ordeals she was mastered by" (my added italics).What image in the middle stanza is echoed by the word from line ten which I placed in italics? Now shift gears to the "up" side of the poem. In the first stanza, the speaker of the poem describes some actual, tangible object, something you could hold in your hands. It contains images of tigers, and it is something Aunt Jennifer made herself.On a literal level, what sort of object is being described? Hint: notice the references to sewing.
2. Now let's focus ontone.In the middle stanza, the more negative part of the poem,what emotions are portrayed by the imagery there, especially by the key image you identified in #1? Now look at stanza one, and at the last two lines of the poem in stanza three. Notice how the tigers "prance," and how they "do not fear the men," and how, at the end, they "go on prancing, proud and unafraid."Contrast the tone created here with the first tone you identified.
3. Now let's look for figurative meaning in the two key images for both the negative and positive sides of the poem. In regards to the more negative image, a wedding ring is of course not literally heavy enough to have "massive weight" or to be a burden in that sense.So in what metaphorical way can a wedding ring "sit heavily" upon one's hand, and what state of mind is thus being described? Now, switch again to the more positive image, the tigers.Describe the state of mind that the tigers stand for. Hint: These two states of mind are almost entirely opposite.
4. On one level, it can be seen that both states of mind which are represented by the opposing images are parts of Aunt Jennifer's own personality. If that is all there is to the poem, however, then ultimately it is a sad poem, despite the upbeat mood of the last two lines, because so what if the tigers are still "proud and unafraid"? They are just images, while Aunt Jennifer, we are told, will die "still ringed with ordeals she was mastered by." So are we missing something, or is this indeed a "downer" of a poem? Yes, there is one key element as yet unrecognized, and it is this: There is a third person in this poem.Who is the third person? Hint: Who would refer to the woman as "Aunt Jennifer"? Now then, a question which builds upon that answer:Who will get the stitched panel or embroidery of the tigers, after Aunt Jennifer's death?
5. You should be able to guess that I myself do not think that "Uncle" will get the embroidered image of the tigers in their "world of green." (And by the way, I think the gender of the poet hints that the recipient will be female, not male; a woman's customary greater interest in such things as embroidery reinforces this guess.) So assuming that you have understood who will get the embroidery, now answer this question:Considering the tone and the metaphorical meaning of the image of the "proud and unafraid" tigers in the face of the "massive weight" of her marriage, could Aunt Jennifer intend to convey a message to the person who is bequeathed that embroidered tapestry?What is the message? If you can state that message, then you have stated the theme of the poem. Hint: It will be a "Do as I say, not as I myself did" sort of message.