Exploration of the Text based on " Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note" by Amiri Baraka

Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note


Lately, I've become accustomed to the way

the ground opens up and envelops me

each time I go out to walk the dog.

Or the broad-edged silly music the wind

makes me when I run for a bus...

Things have come to that.

And now, each night I count the stars,

and each night I get the same number.

And when they will not come to be counted,

I count the holes they leave.

Nobody sings anymore.

And then last night, I tiptoed up

to my daughter's room and heard her

talking to someone, and when I opened

the door, there was no one there...

only she on her knees, peeking into

Her own clasped hands.

image from http://fromthemommyfiles.wordpress.com/category/4-year-old/

Exploration of the Text

1.  What is the mood of the speaker in the opening lines? what images suggest his feelings?

The mood of the speaker in the opening lines shows the emptiness in his heart. He feels meaningless towards his own life, causing him to not care anymore about the surrounding. the images in line 1 “Lately, I’ve become accustomed to the way” indicates that anything that he has done seems like a routine and did not bring happiness anymore in his life.


2. What is the significance of the daughter's gesture of peeking into "he own clasped hand"?

The significance of the daughter’s gesture of “her own clasped hand” is the belief towards God. When the speaker seeing her daughter is pray and asking the God to fulfil her wish when he is in the despair, it gives the impact towards him as he realises that there is God to depend on.

3. What does the title mean? How does it explain the closing line?

The title “Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note” means the short introduction or foreword of the notes that the speaker has written. It explains the emotion of speaker in the closing line "Her own clasped hand" as he realises that there is still hope that left for him.

4. Why does Baraka have three short lines, separated as stanzas? How do they convey the message of the poem?

Baraka has three short lines, separated as stanzas because they show different of emotions highlighted in every stanza in the poem. In line 6 “Things have come to that”, the speaker feels ignorant for everything that he has done as he cannot feels the extraordinary things in his life. Then, in line 11 “Nobody sings anymore”, he starts to give up on his life. He is totally in emotional conflict since he not has any curiosity as before. The last line “Her own clasped hands” indicates the ray of hope on the existence of God that feels by the speaker at the end of the poem.

5. Why does Baraka begin stanzas with "Lately", "And Now", and "And Then"? What do these transition words accomplished?

Baraka begins stanzas with “Lately”, “And now” and “And Then” to signifies the speaker’s emotion based through time. At first, he feels there is nothing that the life can offers him as he feels the emptiness in his heart. Then in second stanza, he stops himself from being curious about anything that occurs in front of him. However, his feeling change as he saw his daughter prays to God in the third stanzas.

6. How does the speaker feel about his daughter? What does she represent to him? 

The speaker feels that his daughter gives him a slight of hope to continue his life. When she clasped pray to God, the act itself represents the existence of God to the speaker. Even though the speaker does not mention about the decision that he made whether he still want to continue to live or not afterward, he actually affected by his daughter’s act.

Works Cited

Schmidt, Jan Zlotnik and Lynne Crockett, eds, Portable Legacies. Boston: Cencage Learning Wadsworth, 2009.

Baraka, Amiri, Preface to a Twenty Volume Suicide Note. Schmidt and             Crockett, eds.