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Les Murray Critical Advanced Essay

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Some say that every text has a use by date and whereas some believe that every text is dateless. The idea that every text has its use by date is incorrect, and in this essay, we will argue against this idea. If a text is written from a long period of time ago it does not mean that it still won’t be interesting today, as the events and themes used in the text can still be relevant to today’s time. And these texts are what we can call universal. A universal text allows us to compare, contrast and also reflect on the themes and context of the past to the current time. Hence, these texts provide us an understanding about a particular time by the themes, context or events mentioned in the text and we can therefore use these concepts as a …show more content…

In referring to today’s society, this existence is still evident and we can see a similarity between Murray’s insight and the society today. They are still the same, the city life is still busy with working people and not much communication or emotions are being shared amongst one another. “Only the smallest children and such as look out of Paradise come near him and sit at his feet, with dogs and dusty pigeons”. In this line of the poem, it suggests that the weeping man is a prophet and the ‘smallest children’ are his disciples, furthermore suggests that the weeping man is Jesus Christ. The ‘smallest children’ represent innocence and that they are not corrupted by the world. The use of mentioning the ‘smallest children’ also gives an indication that they have emotions and spirituality and in contrast to the older people, they still look out at the rainbow. As a rainbow is symbolic of religion, spirituality, emotions and is considered to be something ‘magical’. Throughout most of the poem, it is evident that, Murray’s key to this dark side of human existence is through spiritual enlightenment and this is clear in the line “...and I see a woman, shining, stretch her hand and shake as she receives the gift of weeping...” Here in this line suggests that the woman is reaching out for salvation and through the suffering of the weeping man, people are getting redemption. This line also is an allusion to how Jesus Christ had sacrificed himself

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