Historical Context
In the tapestry of the 1970s, America found itself entangled in a web of skepticism. From the haunting echoes of the Kent State shootings in 1970, through the murky corridors of the Watergate scandal from 1972 to 1974, and the curtain falling on the Vietnam War between 1965 and 1973, to the chilling Three Mile Island incident in 1979 and the gripping Iran hostage crisis the same year, doubt colored the nation's consciousness. This skepticism questioned the righteousness of U.S. expansionism and the potential for transformative change within domestic affairs. It revealed a growing disenchantment with large governmental structures, a sentiment that would, by the 1990s, splinter into critiques of corporate control over government from the left, and fears of infringement on individual rights by an internationalized government from the right. Viewed from different angles, the seventies were a decade of transition, shifting from the fiery extroversion of the sixties to the withdrawn introspection of the eighties. Skeptics of the era's uniqueness sometimes lump the years from 1965 to 1975 together as "the sixties," dubbing the seventies the "five-year decade."
The decade also saw a shattering of conventional political beliefs, crystallized in the United States' humbling defeat in the Vietnam War—one that the Nixon administration attempted to obscure with the facade of a 1973 "peace treaty." This conflict forced a national reckoning with long-held certainties: the idea that the U.S. boasted the world's premier form of government, and that its brand of corporate capitalism was the ideal economic system for a disparate and inefficient global landscape. By the 1970s, it was apparent to Nixon that the strategy of communist containment, the Cold War, and the Vietnam War were overstretching American resources, hampering competition with non-military powerhouses like Japan and Germany, and creating a domestic battleground with law enforcement and anti-war protesters at odds. The American alliance of big business and government had to relinquish its grand global ambitions and refocus on maintaining competitiveness at home if it wished to remain stable and prosperous.
The seventies were marked by a cultural shift towards introspection, earning the moniker "the me decade," a term popularized by author Tom Wolfe in 1976. This inward turn was mirrored in magazines, novels, pop music, television, and films that brimmed with themes of human sensitivity and emotion. A preoccupation with looking good, feeling right, and eating healthy took root, transforming into a ritualistic obsession for many. Folk singers turned from protest anthems to introspective ballads. The psychologist Heinz Kohut turned his clinical gaze to the narcissistic personality, while John Ashbery's Pulitzer Prize-winning poetry collection Self-Portrait in a Convex Mirror explored similar themes. Cultural critics like Christopher Lasch and Daniel Bell critiqued the period's narcissism, and artists like Vito Acconci and Lucas Samaras gave it visual expression through innovative self-portraiture.
Amidst this self-focus, however, lay a paradox—an emerging environmental movement gaining momentum. Some argue that modern environmentalism was truly born with the first Earth Day in 1970, overshadowing Rachel Carson's pivotal 1962 publication, Silent Spring . While the "me decade" mindset often cast nature as a mere spectacle or health threat, Americans began to acknowledge the environmental damage inflicted on plants, animals, and the land—illustrated by events from Love Canal to Three Mile Island and countless oil spills, including one of the largest near Trinidad and Tobago, spilling 97 million gallons. The public's response was substantial: organizations like Earthfirst!, Greenpeace, Worldwatch, The Cousteau Society, the League of Conservation Voters, the National Resources Defense Council, and Ralph Nader's PIRGs sprang into action. The federal government signaled its commitment by creating the Environmental Protection Agency in 1970, enacting the Endangered...
(This entire section contains 632 words.)
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Species Act in 1973, and bolstering the Clean Air and Water Acts in 1977. Yet, the powerful anthem of environmental activism in the seventies was tempered by the enduring legacy of self-focus—a mindset that continued to shape American life well beyond the decade.
Literary Style
The Rhythmic Flow of "Music Lessons"
The poem "Music Lessons" defies traditional boundaries, embracing free verse—a form unshackled by rhyme, save for the conclusive harmony in its final couplet. Devoid of a regular meter, it nonetheless echoes the structured rhythm of 4/4 time, a familiar cadence in the musical world, by weaving together four quatrains. Enjambment dances through its lines, particularly in lines 6-7 and 7-8. Why this choice? In A Poetry Handbook (1994), Mary Oliver muses, "We leap with more energy over a ditch than over no ditch." This technique infuses "Music Lessons" with a seamless flow, as every line, except the last, skates past the full stop. It mirrors the unyielding pace of music, film, or dance—arts that compel us to follow their rhythm without pause, unlike the leisurely control offered by traditional reading or fine art viewing. "Music Lessons" demands our attention, mimicking the coercive pull of a poem performed aloud, akin to the immediate captivation of heard melodies or watched movies.
The Alluring Soundscape Within "Music Lessons"
The poem resounds with sibilant sounds, their whispers and hisses intertwining to form a cohesive auditory experience. Perhaps this sonic fabric emerged organically during its creation, then deliberately woven to unify the piece. These sibilant sounds connect with the subtle vibrations of piano strings, an instrument central to the poem's theme. Occasionally, assonance graces the lines with phrases like "rock over rock to the top" or "neat green," creating pleasurable sound patterns that captivate the reader's ear.
The Essence of Free Verse
To truly grasp the essence of "Music Lessons," one must explore Mary Oliver's insights on free verse, as articulated in A Poetry Handbook. She states, "The free-verse poem sets up, in terms of sound and line, a premise or an expectation, and then, before the poem finishes, it makes a good response to this premise. This is the poem's design. What it sets up in the beginning it sings back to, all the way, attaining a felt integrity." Such a dialogue between expectation and realization characterizes not only free verse but also metrical poetry. However, Oliver highlights a shift in the tone of free verse, a response to the cultural transition from oral recitations to solitary readings prompted by the advent of printing. In this solitary realm, Oliver notes, "What was needed was a line which, when read, would feel as spontaneous, as true to the moment, as talk in the street, or talk between friends in one's own house.... Speech entered the poem. The poem was no longer a lecture, it was time spent with a friend. Its music was the music of conversation." Thus, free verse bridges the gap created by modern life's solitude, offering the companionship of a poem that speaks as naturally as a trusted friend.
Compare and Contrast
1979: An illuminating study emerged, unveiling a troubling link between even the faintest traces of lead in children's blood and diminished intelligence scores. This revelation ushered in a pivotal change, leading to the prohibition of lead-based paint in 1980 and a gradual tightening of acceptable blood lead levels. Meanwhile, Europe had already banned lead back in the 1950s.
June, 1999: A legal storm swept across the U.S. as multiple cities filed lawsuits against companies for incorporating lead in house paints. Armed with legal expertise honed in battles against tobacco giants, these cities argued that paint manufacturers knowingly endangered public health with their hazardous products.
1979: In a dramatic turn of events, Shah Mohammed Reza Pahlevi sought refuge from Iran on January 16, entrusting Shahpur Bakhtiar with the reins of a newborn democratic government. However, the political landscape swiftly shifted when Ayatollah Rhuollah Khomeini returned on February 1, seizing control. The world watched as Iran captured 66 American hostages at the Tehran embassy on November 7, detaining 52 for a staggering 444 days—a crisis that extracted concessions from the U.S. and tarnished both American prestige and the Carter presidency.
June, 1999: A sea of mourners swarmed the mausoleum of Ayatollah Khomeini, marking the solemn tenth anniversary of his passing with profound reverence and remembrance.
1979: Amidst the serene Pennsylvania countryside, a near-catastrophe unfolded at the Three Mile Island nuclear plant on March 28. Equipment failures combined with human errors led to the partial meltdown of the reactor core. Fortunately, a disaster akin to Chernobyl's was narrowly averted. However, the incident prompted authorities to evacuate pregnant women and children from the vicinity. This event precipitated a halt in new orders for nuclear plants in the U.S., canceling those slated since 1973.
1999: A beacon of scientific insight shone as a preeminent U.S. scientific organization unveiled research endorsing Nevada's Yucca Mountain as a viable site for the long-term storage of spent nuclear fuel. The study highlighted the improbability of water infiltration, based on extensive geological analysis of the site's past.
1979: The world of jazz mourned the loss of Charles Mingus (b. 1922), a towering figure in composition, band leadership, and bass, whose profound influence reverberated through the music world.
1999: In a triumph of creativity and dedication, Melinda Wagner, a devoted mother, wife, and composer from New Jersey, was honored with the Pulitzer Prize for music, joining the pantheon of great American artists.
Bibliography and Further Reading
Sources
Alford, Jean B., "The Poetry of Mary Oliver: Modern Renewal Through Mortal Acceptance," Pembroke Magazine, Vol. 20, 1988, pp. 283-88.
De Mott, Robert, "Recent Poetry: 'The Night Traveler'," in Western Humanities Review, Vol. XXXIII, No. 2, Spring, 1979, pp. 185-186.
Graham, Vicki, "Into the Body of Another: Mary Oliver and the Poetics of Becoming Other," Papers on Language and Literature, Vol. 30, No. 4, Fall, 1994, pp. 352-72.
Oliver, Mary, New and Selected Poems, Boston: Beacon, 1992.
Oliver, Mary, A Poetry Handbook, San Diego: Harcourt, Brace, 1994.
Scully, James, ed., Modern Poetics New York: McGraw-Hill, 1965.
Wakoski, Diane, "Oliver, Mary," in Contemporary Women Poets, edited by Pamela L. Shelton, Detroit: St. James, 1998, pp.270-271.
For Further Study
Runciman, Lex, "Knocking on Nature's Door: Religious Meaning in Twentieth
Century U.S. Poetry," Literature of Nature, Patrick Murphy, editor,
Chicago: Fitzroy Dearborn, 1998.
This essay has a section devoted to Oliver discussing her notion of nature as
"an ever-renewing and endlessly elemental present."
Oliver, Mary American Primitive, Boston: Little Brown, 1983.
This collection of Oliver's poems won the Pulitzer Prize and is primarily
concerned with pastoral subject matter.
Oliver, Mary, House of Light, Boston: Beacon, 1990.
This volume contains poems of air and seaside and is dominated by poems about
birds.
Oliver, Mary, Rules for the Dance: A Handbook for Writing and Reading
Metrical Verse, Boston: Houghton Mifflin, 1998.
While the title of this book is self explanatory, the book also includes a
hundred pages of poems that serve as examples. The book is written clearly and
simply for those without a background in technical language about metrical
verse.
