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The Snow Man

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119:, leading from a relatively objective description of a winter scene to a relatively subjective emotional response (thinking of misery in the sound of the wind), to the final idea that the listener and the world itself are "nothing" apart from these perspectives. Stevens has the world look at winter from a different point of view. When thinking of winter, one might think of a harsh storm. One might also think snow and ice to be a nuisance. Stevens wants people to see the opposite view. He wants the world to look at winter in a sense of optimism and beauty. He creates a difference between imagination and reality. See " 130:
B.J. Leggett construes Stevens's perspectivism as commitment to the principle that "instead of facts we have perspectives, none privileged over the others as truer or more nearly in accord with things as they are, although not for that reason all equal." This principle that "underlies
108:) or indeed about substances in the world apart from the perspectives that human imagination brings to "the nothing that is" when it perceives "junipers shagged with ice", etc. There is something wintry about this insight, which Stevens captures in 173:
Stevens. H., p. 432: "The incessant job is to get into focus, not out of focus. Nietzsche is as perfect a means of getting out of focus as a little bit too much to drink." (Letter from Wallace Stevens to Henry Church, December 8,
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falls short of conforming to that principle, implying a condition of `the world about us' that is distinct from the perspectives we bring to it.
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thought" is central to Leggett's reading. It may be observed that Stevens's remark in the passage quoted above from
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by writing, "The world about us would be desolate except for the world within us."
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Stevens. H. Letters of Wallace Stevens. 1966: University of California Press.
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Serio, John. "Introduction". 2007: Cambridge Companion to Wallace Stevens.
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Frogs Eat Butterflies. Snakes Eat Frogs. Hogs Eat Snakes. Men Eat Hogs
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Cy Est Pourtraicte, Madame Ste Ursule, et Les Unze Mille Vierges
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The Necessary Angel: Essays on Reality and the Imagination
64:Nothing that is not there and the nothing that is. 627:Jasmine's Beautiful Thoughts Underneath The Willow 96:Sometimes classified as one of Stevens' "poems of 815: 243: 515:The Curtains in the House of the Metaphysician 229: 236: 222: 60:For the listener, who listens in the snow, 277:The Paltry Nude Starts on a Spring Voyage 201:Early Stevens: The Nietzschean Intertext 43:The spruces rough in the distant glitter 41:To behold the junipers shagged with ice, 718:Thirteen Ways of Looking at a Blackbird 48:Of any misery in the sound of the wind, 816: 182:The Collected Poems of Wallace Stevens 115:The poem is an expression of Stevens' 57:That is blowing in the same bare place 767:The Revolutionists Stop for Orangeade 648:The Bird with the Coppery, Keen Claws 217: 46:Of the January sun; and not to think 36:Of the pine-trees crusted with snow; 13: 487:Anecdote of the Prince of Peacocks 466:On the Manner of Addressing Clouds 34:To regard the frost and the boughs 14: 850: 683:Two Figures in Dense Violet Night 184:, New York: Vintage Books, 1954. 494:A High-Toned Old Christian Woman 753:The Surprises of the Superhuman 704:Hymn from a Watermelon Pavilion 473:Of Heaven Considered as a Tomb 438:Anecdote of Men by the Thousand 361:Hibiscus on the Sleeping Shores 557:Disillusionment of Ten O'Clock 452:Floral Decorations for Bananas 333:Nuances of a Theme by Williams 203:. 1992: Duke University Press. 167: 158: 149: 125:Nuances of a Theme by Williams 53:Which is the sound of the land 39:And have been cold a long time 32:One must have a mind of winter 1: 732:The Man Whose Pharynx Was Bad 571:The Virgin Carrying a Lantern 382:Homunculus et la Belle Etoile 187: 62:And, nothing himself, beholds 50:In the sound of a few leaves, 445:The Apostrophe to Vincentine 396:From the Misery of Don Joost 389:The Comedian as the Letter C 7: 711:Peter Quince at the Clavier 697:To the One of Fictive Music 669:Colloquy with a Polish Aunt 501:The Place of the Solitaires 91: 10: 855: 760:Sea Surface Full of Clouds 592:Six Significant Landscapes 417:The Worms at Heaven's Gate 284:The Plot Against the Giant 21:"The Snow Man" (1899 film) 18: 834:Poetry by Wallace Stevens 257: 78:'s first book of poetry, 16:Poem from Wallace Stevens 550:Tea at the Palaz of Hoon 536:The Emperor of Ice-Cream 529:Depression Before Spring 480:Of the Surface of Things 410:Last Looks at the Lilacs 403:O Florida, Venereal Soil 340:Metaphors of a Magnifico 142: 19:For the short film, see 326:Le Monocle de Mon Oncle 270:Invective Against Swans 739:The Death of a Soldier 634:Cortège for Rosenbloom 319:The Load Of Sugar-Cane 67: 55:Full of the same wind 29: 613:Palace of the Babies 599:Bantam in Pine-Woods 127:" for comparisons. 781:Anatomy of Monotony 606:Anecdote of the Jar 578:Stars at Tallapoosa 508:The Weeping Burgher 347:Ploughing on Sunday 298:Domination of Black 137:The Necessary Angel 110:The Necessary Angel 368:Fabliau of Florida 312:The Ordinary Women 206:Stevens, Wallace. 811: 810: 788:The Public Square 459:Anecdote of Canna 74:" is a poem from 846: 774:Lunar Paraphrase 543:The Cuban Doctor 375:Doctor of Geneva 238: 231: 224: 215: 214: 210:. 1942: Vintage. 175: 171: 165: 162: 156: 155:Stevens, p. 169. 153: 106:epiphenomenalist 102:George Santayana 854: 853: 849: 848: 847: 845: 844: 843: 839:Modernist poems 814: 813: 812: 807: 725:Nomad Exquisite 662:The Wind Shifts 424:The Jack-Rabbit 263:Earthy Anecdote 253: 251:Wallace Stevens 242: 190: 179: 178: 172: 168: 163: 159: 154: 150: 145: 94: 76:Wallace Stevens 68: 66: 63: 61: 59: 58: 56: 54: 52: 51: 49: 47: 45: 44: 42: 40: 38: 37: 35: 33: 28: 24: 17: 12: 11: 5: 852: 842: 841: 836: 831: 829:American poems 826: 809: 808: 806: 805: 798: 791: 784: 777: 770: 763: 756: 749: 742: 735: 728: 721: 714: 707: 700: 693: 686: 679: 672: 665: 658: 655:Life Is Motion 651: 644: 637: 630: 623: 616: 609: 602: 595: 588: 581: 574: 567: 564:Sunday Morning 560: 553: 546: 539: 532: 525: 518: 511: 504: 497: 490: 483: 476: 469: 462: 455: 448: 441: 434: 427: 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Index

"The Snow Man" (1899 film)
Wallace Stevens
Harmonium
epistemology
George Santayana
epiphenomenalist
perspectivism
Gubbinal
Nuances of a Theme by Williams
Nietzschean
v
t
e
Harmonium
Wallace Stevens
Earthy Anecdote
Invective Against Swans
The Paltry Nude Starts on a Spring Voyage
The Plot Against the Giant
Infanta Marina
Domination of Black
The Snow Man
The Ordinary Women
The Load Of Sugar-Cane
Le Monocle de Mon Oncle
Nuances of a Theme by Williams
Metaphors of a Magnifico
Ploughing on Sunday
Cy Est Pourtraicte, Madame Ste Ursule, et Les Unze Mille Vierges
Hibiscus on the Sleeping Shores

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