Posted by A Study of Poetic Devices in Roethke’s “Dolor”
The poem “Dolor” by Theodore Roethke is a treatise to the misery and endlessness in the lives of people in the labor force. Roethke uses devices such as personification, imagery, and alliteration in this poem in order to more deeply and complexly depict the themes of despair and desolation of the common employee in an office setting. From the beginning of the poem, these themes are clearly conveyed. Even the title, “Dolor,” is indicative of an overwhelming tone of sadness and sorrow. As the poem begins, the personification of everyday objects such as pencils, paperweights, and manilla folders brings them to life in a way that heightens the comparison to the miserable people whom they represent. Roethke’s imagery in the poem includes descriptions of dust, pale hair, and grey faces, which create a sensory portrait of staleness, misery, and bleakness. Alliteration in this poem emphasizes the overwhelming feelings of despair, as seen in the phrases ‘misery of manilla’ and ‘fine film.’ These three elements of poetry bring out the idea of the desolation and suffering in the workplace in a more unique and interesting way.
The first device used by Roethke to advance the poem’s themes of loneliness and depression is personification. The poet takes ordinary objects that could be found in an office or work setting and gives them human emotions. On the surface, this brings the objects to life and gives them importance. On a deeper level, however, the personification of objects in “Dolor” takes humanity away from people by placing objects and humans on the same level. The personification in this poem emphasizes how the office workers and everyday people are just like the objects they use in their daily lives—common, lifeless, and ultimately replaceable. The first example of personification seen in the poem is in the first line. Roethke’s phrase “the inexorable sadness of pencils” (1) draws attention to a common object used for work, but it also describes the commonness of the people who use the pencils as well as their inescapable feelings of sadness. The second line has a similar example of personification, pointing out the “dolor” of pads of paper and paperweights. The use of the word “dolor,” also the title of the poem, reemphasizes the theme of suffering and sadness. Just like the pencils, the pads of paper and paperweights are common office supplies that are personified in this poem as sorrowful and suffering. This makes a connection to the “dolor” of the people working in an office and using these objects. Other examples include “the misery of manilla folders” (3), the living dust (10), and the “lonely reception room, lavatory, switchboard” (5). These feelings of loneliness and misery belong to the people who are working in reception rooms and using manila folders. The personification of these things is a more complex and interesting way of describing the suffering and unhappiness of the common employee.
Along with personification, Roethke uses imagery to craft a portrait of the dreariness of an office and the misery of the people who work there. The imagery especially intensifies the theme of the common and replaceable nature of people by comparing them to the objects. The imagery also serves to evoke a sense of the dullness and desolation of the workplace. The pencils are described as being organized “neat in their boxes” (2). This imagery provides a visual of what daily life is like in a workplace. It is also a metaphor for the way people are organized in cubicles in the office. The people are seen as office supplies, all identical and replaceable. The last five lines of the poem include imagery about dust in the “institutions.” The dust is described as sifting, dropping, dangerous, and glazing. The imagery of dust gives the poem an enhanced feeling of staleness, abandonment, emptiness, and even perhaps death. These descriptive words enhance the themes of the poem by making it more of a visual and sensory experience. Some of the most effective pieces of imagery are in the final line. It describes the dust “glazing the pale hair, the duplicate grey standard faces.” The visual of pale hair and grey faces creates an image of old, tired, miserable workers. Grey faces are also an image of death, perhaps showing an end to their sorrow-filled lives, or perhaps that they are all dead on the inside. This shows that these people have had the life drained out of them. Now they are just going through the motions, doing what they have to do to get by. The words “duplicate” and “standard” in the last line of the poem demonstrate the loss of individuality among the people described. The idea is that the employees of an office are all identical and indistinguishable. In this imagery, people are created and used just as the pencils and paper, and replaced when they no longer work. Imagery is used throughout “Dolor” to intensify the themes of the poem.
Both personification and imagery highlight specific ideas and themes in the poem. Alliteration also does this, but it adds rhythm and places an emphasis on specific, important words that express the major themes of the poem. Roethke uses the words “misery,” “manilla,” and “mucilage” in the third line, repeating the “m” sound for dramatic effect. The “misery of manilla folders and mucilage” is a summary of the poem as a whole. Misery describes the office and the people working in it. Manila folders and mucilage are ordinary things used in an office, just like the employees. The alliteration in this line draws attention to significant ideas and descriptive words that contribute to the overall meaning of the poem. A second example of alliteration is the repetition of the “f” sound towards the end of the poem. This is seen throughout the poem in the phrase “finer than flour” (10), the word ‘sift,’ and in the phrase “fine film” (12). The “f” sound is echoed in words like “finality,” “futility,” and “funeral,” implying dread and death. This “f” sound also draws attention to the important imagery of dust that settles over everything in the office. The alliteration in this poem enhances the sound and meaning of the other devices used, personification and imagery.
Authors Jeff Westfall and James G. Southworth have both analyzed Roethke’s poem “Dolor.” Westfall champions the accessibility of the poem, explaining the connection between the personal and the common. Southworth’s analysis looks at the poem in the context of Roethke’s other poems. In his analysis, Southworth largely agrees with the previous analysis in this paper. “Dolor” is the first poem in a series, including “The Return,” “Last Words,” and “The Cycle.” Southworth writes that in these poems, Roethke captures “the hopelessness, deadness, and monotony of the average life” (328). His analysis concludes that Roethke’s poems are direct and straightforward rather than overly metaphorical or obscure. This analysis gives a wider context but has a similar interpretation of the poem as the original analysis of this essay.
Westfall’s analysis, in comparison, focuses more specifically on the poem “Dolor.” His analysis is similar in some ways to this paper’s original analysis; however, he gives some original perspectives on some aspects of the poem. He discusses the repetition of phrases like “misery of folders” and “duplication of lives” as an “abstraction of the concrete and common” (25). The common objects in the poem are significant in and of themselves, and the repetition of these phrases emphasizes their importance. The original analysis views the descriptions of objects and places as examples of personification and imagery to demonstrate a larger idea. Westfall perceives the ordinary objects and spaces as literal and tangible. Westfall also suggests that the repetition of the phrases like “misery of folders” echoes the idea of repetition, duplication, and tedium in the poem, and is also seen in the word “multigraph.” In addition, Westfall focuses on the despair of the objects and the places, saying that “the external despair closes in and in” (26) at the end of the poem. The original analysis also sees the last line as a final, conclusive statement to the last five lines that build up the imagery of dust and of grey faces. Overall, Westfall’s analysis is in line with this paper’s previous analysis. He also suggests important ideas of his own on how to understand the poem. These two analyses give further understanding of the poem “Dolor” and how to interpret its symbolism and theme.
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