"The Fish"

Paper Summary:

This paper analyzes Bishop's poem "The Fish," about the sufferings and hardships that a creature like a fish has to endure throughout its life. The author discusses the theme of survival and how the poem focuses on the narrator's feelings and thoughts about the endurance in life of the fish she has caught. The poetic elements are examined, including imagery, symbolism, similes and parallelism. The themes and roles of the primary characters are discussed.

From the Paper:

"The succeeding lines have used imagery as its primary element in describing, and finally establishing, the physical characteristics of the fish. In fact, these lines have pored through every detail of the fish's physical form, and even described the animal's internal parts; the description of the fish's physical form is an attempt to establish the fact that aside from the fish's extraordinary characteristics, the fish is a fine-looking animal, yet, terrible in a way because of the environmental elements that he encountered in his life: "He was speckled with barnacles/ fine rosettes of lime" rags of green weed hung down/ While his gills were breathing in/ the terrible oxygen/ the frightening gills "that can cut so badly"" (lines 16-23). Through imagery, the poet was able to describe the condition of the fish, as well as its beauty and the potential danger that it can give to its captor."

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