ICEBERG MODEL: MY PAPA'S WALTZ BY THEODORE ROETHKE

 

Behaviours

From this poetry we can find a habit that the characters often do, as:

·         1^st stanza, 1^st line

The whiskey on your breath  

The word whiskey shows that the father on this family often drunk when he’s home

 

·         2^nd stanza, 1^st – 2^nd line

            We romped until the pans  

Slid from the kitchen shelf;

The word romped shows that the father and the child always playing along together

 

·         2^nd stanza, 3^rd – 4^th line

My mother’s countenance

Could not unfrown itself.

 

            The word countenance shows that the mother often mad when her

husband and child playing around the kitchen

 

·         3^rd stanza, 4^th line

            My right ear scraped a buckle.

            The word scraped shows that sometimes the father abuses his child

 

4^th stanza, 3^rd – 4^th line

                Then waltzed me off to bed   

Still clinging to your shirt.

 

These two sentences show that although the father abused his child, the child still accept and get along with his father

 

 

Beliefs

Father figure on My Papa’s Waltz is the highest position on the family. This concept is called patriarchy – rule of the father. Patriarchy means a general structure which men have higher power than women. In this poetry the father get easily to abuse his child without his wife’s resistance.

 

 

Values

This poetry has two main points, love and fear. The child loves his father but he also afraid of him because he is such an abusive father.