ANALYSIS

 

 SPACE

 

 When we analyse the space in a text, firstly we have to distinguish between two kinds of space; inner and external space.

 According to the external space, Children’s Time stands for a unique and a very obvious location, which is the city swimming pool. Deena Larsen gives some references to the reader to know where exactly these children are spending their time. For instance the name of one of the nodes is “pools of” and in this stanza the author names the location, the city swimming pool during summer. The fact that the action takes place in this kind of space can suggest that; firstly it is an opened space, no walls, neither restrictions nor rules, no worries. Thus, this poem is mainly narrating children’s activities that take place in a swimming pool and require no obligations but freedom, liberty and happiness such as running, laughing or shoving. This aspect emphasizes, in a way, what childhood is. 

 

Taking into account this, the author uses some metaphors to reinforce this idea of lack of restrictions and free will. For instance in the node called “running” he uses impossible birds to refer to the children, to put emphasis on their energetic and lively behaviour and actions. According to the vocabulary, the author uses vocabulary referred to nature such as water, light or air.  These elements can also reinforce the sensations of lack of restrictions and freedom.

 

Once spoken about external space, we should deal with the internal or inner space within the poem. 

As I said before, all the elements suggest the reader to place the poem in an opened and material space, a swimming pool.  But if we look carefully we realise that the allusions to an inner space are apparent as well.  Each stanza is composed by four lines, but the author makes a distinction between the first three ones and the last one, Larsen puts apart the last line and gives it a different sense. In all the nodes the last line has not the same material meaning as the previous three ones; these last lines appear as a description of each node but with an abstract and more internal meaning. Some examples are an endless time, lives intertwined, endlessly over the slippery tile, going around the world in nothing flat. These allusions imply an enlargement of time, as the time these children are having is endless. But apart from this, these last sentences of each stanza implies a wider space. They place the poem somewhere else apart from the city swimming pool, somewhere far away, not physical space but abstract somehow.

This inner space is full of light, water, wind; it is full of good feelings swimming into an endless time of no rules or worries, as the children’s space. This idea is offered over all by two examples in “past” and “the wind”: going around the world in nothing flat, and thinking of nothing but light.

 

Therefore, this poem offers a contrast between the two kinds of space in the text. In one hand it describes children’s time in the swimming pool, full of laughs, water games, etc. But on the other hand it uses this material space to create an abstract one full of happiness and freedom; which come up from natural elements such as air, water, wind…

 

These sensations of going out to an abstract and wider space from a material one can be interpreted as author own feelings or memories, in a way. Larsen uses the space to look for a way out to express her own memories and to travel away from them; and she does it through describing children’s times in a common city swimming pool.

 

The use of the language is also very characteristic in this text. First, the author combines two kinds of language; in one hand one type of language related to children or more material like “pools of, children, running, laughing and sliding” and on the other hand a natural and abstract kind of language such as “past” and “the wind”. Then, Larsen uses constantly the continuous form in verbs, “running”, “laughing”, “shoving” “jostling”… perhaps to give a sensation of length in time.

 

 

 

BIBLIOGRAPHY

 

LARSEN, DEENA, Deena Larsen’s Hypertext and Electronic Literature Corner, last visited December 9th 2008, (http://www.deenalarsen.net/)

 

LARSEN, DEENA, Children’s Time, copyright 2001, last visited December 9th 2008, (http://www.deenalarsen.net/ children2/)

 

FERNÁNDEZ DE GOROSTIZA SAMPER, Cristina, Entrevista a Deena Larsen, Universitat de Valencia Press, 2002/2003, last visited December 8th 2008, (http://mural.uv.es/fers am/entrevista.html)

 

 

 

 

 

                                             IndexPage                               Introduction                               Conclusion

 

 

 

            Academic year 2008/2009
© a.r.e.a./Dr.Vicente Forés López
© Ana Maiz Rodríguez
amaizro@alumni.uv.es
Universitat de València Press