[continued from previous message]   
      
   relevant to the analysis.  Whether Dad is alive or not doesn't change   
   Grownup George's feelings toward him.   
      
   >> In short, the bulk of the narrative is based on real life memories from   
   >> its author's childhood.   
   >   
   > All my poetry is "based" on my memories, but (as I've told you) my   
   > memories include much more than direct experience). In this case, I   
   > mainly used my own memories of my childhood because they worked. I   
   > certainly had issues with my father as a teenager when I lived there,   
   > and for a small time after I ceased to do so, and I wanted to make Bob's   
   > issues no different from mine.   
      
   Everyone's poetry is based on their memories to some extent.  However,   
   when you set the poem in your house, and base the characters on yourself   
   and your family members (to some extent), the poem becomes *more*   
   autobiographical than a poem you wrote set in a foreign land that you'd   
   never been to.  Again, I point out the fact that "David Copperfield" was   
   a work of fiction -- but that the parallels to Dickens' own life make it   
   autobiographical to a large degree.  "The Adventures of Tom Sawyer" is   
   similarly based on people and events from Mark Twain's childhood --   
   although Twain has taken a great deal of artistic license regarding   
   them.  It is not an autobiography (he wrote one of those as well), but   
   it is largely autobiographical.  It also provides the reader (or   
   analyst) with a clear picture of *how* he looked back on his childhood.   
      
      
   >> Why then all the fuss about my having called it "autobiographical"?   
   >   
   > Because you not only repeatedly insist that it's "autobiographical" when   
   > you've been told it wasn't, you try to draw conclusions about me from   
   > it. (One particularly funny example of that, which I have to mention, is   
   > a claim you made that I call you and "Dr." NastyGoon malicious trolls,   
   > not because I perceive the two of you as malicious trolls, but because I   
   > perceive you as "parent figures" and I'm calling you both trolls just to   
   > somehow get revenge on my real parents. "Psychobabble", as I've said.)   
      
   There is nothing malicious in examining your story from an analytical   
   standpoint.  This is the approach that Marie Bonaparte took when writing   
   "The Life and Works of Edgar Allan Poe: A Psychoanalytic   
   Interpretation."  Since stories (and narrative poetry) and dreams arise   
   from the same part of our psyche, it's not only natural, but can prove   
   highly rewarding, to approach fictional works as if they were the   
   author's dreams.  And when those works have a clear autobiographical   
   basis (by which I mean "creative fiction" based on one's life -- like   
   "David Copperfield" and "Tom Sawyer"), the rewards from taking a   
   psychoanalytical approach to them are even greater.   
      
   Yes, we were having a little innocent fun by addressing one another as   
   "Dr.," but there were hardly any malice to be found there.  Nobody   
   thinks that you are actually our patient, George.  Nor were we trying to   
   convince anyone of such.   
      
      
   >> It's a typical Straw Man argument intended to divert the discussion from   
   >> examining the psychological aspects of the narrative, and to falsely   
   >> represent an attempt to provide an in-depth analysis of the poem as a   
   >> personal attack upon himself.   
   >   
   > Not at all. Seeing the poem as "autobiographical" allows you to present   
   > your so-called analysis of Bob as an analysis of me, and try to justify   
   > your own "attacks" on me. As you often do, want to label the poem   
   > "autobiographical"  (just as you want to call Bob "George") as if, a la   
   > Orwell, the words you use somehow prove your arguments.   
   >   
   >> Good old paranoid, perpetually persecuted George.   
      
   Please consider the above observation to be repeated.   
      
      
   > And, since that last line of yours was what your "analysis" was meant to   
   > establish, and your only reason for your undertaking it in the first   
   > place, it's a good place to conclude this post.   
      
   Not at all.  No one is out to get you, George.  That's what you need to   
   understand.   
      
   I examined your poem from a psychoanalytical perspective as I feel it   
   that best means of approaching a poem about childhood abuse and how it   
   can have psychological repercussions in one's adult life (pent up rage,   
   wanting to torch one's childhood home, requiring psychiatric care).  And   
   that was my only reason for doing so.   
      
   --   
      
   --- SoupGate-DOS v1.05   
    * Origin: you cannot sedate... all the things you hate (1:229/2)