Historical Personage Poem
1. The poem that invokes an historical personage need not be one that looks back to recreate a historical setting. Often the most effective of these types of poems are ones that transplant the historical personage to a different temporal setting than the one he/she originally occupied. The historical personage may have the opportunity to come into contact with individuals he/she may not have had the opportunity to meet. For this reason, it isn't always necessary to recreate the historical personage with complete accuracy. However, this said, the behavior of the historical personage should be recognizable.
2. Another approach to this kind of piece is for the author to reenter the time period of the historical personage. The author, writing in the present, has the opportunity to look back on history with 20/20 hindsight.The author may look back reverently on the personage; however, to do so without exposing other aspects of the personage will make the poem look only like an homage rather than an exploration of an historical character from the privileged perspective of the present.Similarly, one should not simply besmirch the historical personage. The ultimate aim is to create tension between your depiction of the historical personage and the image of the historical personage that already exists.
This assignment is worth 1 point.
Examples:
1. Body And Soul—B. H. Fairchild