Carver: A Life in Poems
by Marilyn Nelson

DISCUSSION GUIDE

“Reading about nature is fine, but if a person walks in the woods and listens carefully, he can learn more than what is in books, for they speak with the voice of God.”
—George Washington Carver

ABOUT THE BOOK
George Washington Carver (1864-1943) earned the respect of both blacks and whites in the rural South by freeing the Southern economy from the environmental ravages of cotton with his innovative agricultural methods, and went on to win the respect of the nation and the world as one of the great inventors of the early Twentieth Century. In a mixture of free-verse and rhymed, metrical verse, Nelson traces the life of this brilliant humanitarian, artist and scientist, beginning with his birth in Diamond Grove, Missouri and ending with his death in Tuskegee, Alabama. Born a slave, Carver and his brother, Jim, were reared by the childless white couple who had owned their mother. With the encouragement of his adoptive parents, Carver left home at age ten in order to find schools which would accept a black student. He spend much of his youth traveling from town to town in pursuit of an education. In this celebration of Carver’s life, Nelson focuses on his character, his work, his faith, his inventions, his commitment to the economic development of his people and of the American South, and his contributions to the development of sustainable agriculture.

DISCUSSION
• Ask students to note the point of view of each poem as they read it. How does changing the point of view round out the reader’s knowledge of Carver’s life? Contrast what others say about Carver to what Carver reveals about himself.

• Read “Out of ‘Slave’s Ransom’” (p. 9). Ask students what a “king’s ransom” is and how it would be different from a “slave’s ransom.” Be sure they understand that “Slave’s Ransom” is the imagined name of the mare that Moses Carver gave John Bentley as a reward for finding the infant George.

• What is Susan Carver giving thanks for in “Prayer of the Ivory-Handled Knife” (p. 11)? What does her giving thanks say about her relationship with George?

• Carver experiences prejudice and bigotry throughout his life, especially when he is seeking an education. In “The Prayer of Miss Budd” (p. 22), the Simpson College teacher says, “I’d known he was enrolled, but still the sight of a sepia boy trembled my foundations, I must admit.” Discuss with students the relationship between her trembling foundations and the allusion to the Christian/biblical description of Christ as the cornerstone the builders rejected. Discuss the meaning of that, and how it relates to Carver, and to all minority peoples.

• Consider the pacifism of Carver and pacifism as a contemporary issue.

* Determine who the speaker is in “Curve-Breaker” (p. 27) and discuss the implied relationship between Carver and Mrs. Liston. What would it have meant for a middle-aged white woman to travel all the way to the university just to sit with a black boy at lunch? What does her action say about her character?

• Read “The Nervous System of the Beetle” (p. 28). Why is Carver laughing? What is an invertebrate? Why is Carver wiping away tears at the end of the poem? What do these tears tell us about Carver?

• Carver was the first black student and faculty member at Iowa State University. Discuss the courage it took for him to pursue his dream of becoming a scientist. How was his life the epitome of courage?

• Describe the prejudice that Carver experienced from his own race. What is the attitude of the narrator in “My People” (p. 34)? How does he deal with professional jealousy from his colleagues when he joins the faculty of Tuskegee Institute? What is his relationship with Booker T. Washington? How is the title “The New Rooster” (p. 64) an appropriate metaphor for Carver’s relationship with George R. Bridgeforth?

• Read “Odalisque” (p.36). Define the word “odalisque.” Discuss the tradition of the odalisque painting. How is this related to “naked ambition”?

• “From an Alabama Farmer” (p. 39) is a Shakespearean sonnet. Discuss the sonnet form and its tradition. Look at a sonnet by Shakespeare. How does the language and subject matter of this poem break away from the tradition? Discuss the last two lines (the couplet). Are there other sonnets in this book?

• Carver is described as being a very spiritual man. Explain the following lines from “Coincidence” (p. 40): “Your life may be the only Bible some people will know,” (a statement which Carver actually wrote). Encourage students to discuss what it means: How can a person’s life be a “Bible” for other people?

• In “Bedside Reading” (p. 41), it is revealed that one of Carver’s most treasured possessions is the bill of sale for his mother. Discuss why this is such an important keepsake for him. What is the significance of Carver moving it “from passage to favorite passage” in his Bible? Ask students to define incandescent light. When was the light bulb invented? What is the story of Abraham and Isaac? Carver said that we can always trust the natural order and the Creator’s love. What is the natural order? Why and how can we trust it? What does this say about Carver’s faith?

• Read “1905” (p.46). Tell students about Newtonian Space. Explain how Einstein’s relativity theory revolutionized thinking about space and time. How are the last lines of the poem related to Einstein’s theory?

• Discuss Carver’s relationship with Miss Sarah Hunt as revealed in “The Sweet-Hearts” (p. 51). To whom is Sarah Hunt speaking in the poem? Why is she asking forgiveness? Explain to your students that Miss Hunt was a very light-skinned Aframerican woman. Discuss the color line within the Aframerican community, which is also alluded to in “My People” (p. 34).

• In “Veil-Raisers” (p. 60), point out the allusion to Emily Dickinson’s poem “I Felt a Funeral in My Brain” in the line about a plank breaking. Discuss the word “sproinged” and the phrase “godliest hour” (as opposed to Dickins’s “ungodly hour”). What does the phrase say about Carver? Point out the fact that Carver got up at 4:00 every morning.

• Discuss the last line of “The Year of the Sky-Smear” (p. 62). What does it mean to “pass”? How is this term related to the comet? Is it an appropriate comparison for Uncle Mose? Why?

• “How a Dream Dies” (p. 66) describes Carver’s grief when Booker T. Washington dies. What brings Carver out of despair in “Out of the Fire” (p. 68)? Discuss how Carver’s despair is related to World War I. Discuss its huge human toll and impact on world culture (destruction of Western world people’s faiths, creation of the “lost generation,” etc.).

• Explain the following passage from “Ruellia Noctiflora” (p. 73): “Where he pointed was only a white flower until I saw him seeing it.” Discuss how having some factual information about something enables us to see it more clearly.

• There is a description of a brutal lynching in “Goliath” (p. 76). Discuss Carver’s advice to his students: “Don’t yield to fear. Fear is the root of hate, and hate destroys the hater.” How are Carver’s words relevant to the terror that is plaguing the United States today? Discuss ways of dealing with fear and hatred. Bring in Franklin Roosevelt’s saying, “The only thing we have to fear is fear itself.”

• Read the poem “Last Talk with Jim Hardwick” (p. 95) and discuss conservationism and the scientific view of life after death and reincarnation. Read the poems at the end of Walt Whitman’s Leaves of Grass in which Whitman tells the reader to “Look for me under your boot heels.”

• Discuss the qualities of a humanitarian. Which poems best portray Carver as a humanitarian?

• Carver once said, “The prefix ’Doctor’ as often attached to my name is a misnomer … I have no such degree.” How does this statement display Carver’s humility? Cite passages from Nelson’s poetry that portray Carver as a humble man.

ACTIVITIES

• Have the class brainstorm adjectives that best describe Carver as a boy, a man, a scientist, and an artist. Then ask each student to write a profile of Carver at one of these stages in his life.

• Ask students to use information gathered from Nelson’s poetry to construct an illustrated timeline that represents the most important events in Carver’s life.

• In “Green-Thumb Boy” (p. 29), Dr. L. H. Pammel says, “We had doubts about giving him a class to teach.” Describe Carver as a teacher. Then ask students to write a tribute that Dr. Pammel might write to Carver for a Teacher Appreciation Day celebration.

• Carver is credited with creating over 325 peanut products. Ask students to identify some of these products, and write an ad campaign for one of them. Much of Carver’s research on peanuts was later transferred to soybeans because many people are allergic to peanuts. Because Carver did not patent his processes, these products are not identified as having been invented by him. Have students go to a supermarket and identify products that are outgrowths of Carver’s inventions (soy cheese, tofu hotdogs, tofu ice cream, soy milk, rice milk, fruit rollups, chocolate and peanut candies, non-dairy creamer, etc.).

• Carver changed Southern agriculture, which greatly affected the economic development in the South after the Civil War. Many of his techniques are used today. Write a paper for the Alabama Farm Journal that traces Carver’s contribution to Southern agriculture. Carver was committed to sustainable agriculture. Discuss sustainability. Why is it important?

• Study Vermeer’s painting The Lacemaker, 1669–1670, Holland, www.louvre.fr/louvrea.htm and Renaissance paintings of The Annunciation (e.g., by Leonardo da Vinci, 1472, Florence, www.arca.net/uffizi/index1.htm, and by Sandro Botticelli, ca. 1485, Florence) www.metmuseum.org/collections) and relate them to Nelson’s poem “The Lace-Maker” (p. 56).

• Read “Chicken-Talk” (p. 57). Explain what Goree Island is and what its history is. Discuss the relationship between John and his wife and between Master and his wife. Discuss the traditional folktales about John’s outwitting Master. Discuss the italicized lines. Who is speaking them? Play a recording of the song “Ain’t Nobody Here but Us Chickens.”

• In “Veil-Raisers” (p. 60), Carver and Booker T. Washington are said to be “Walking our people into history.” Research the stylistic characteristics of ballads, folk songs, and Negro spirituals. Then divide the class into small groups and ask each group to write a ballad, a folk song, or a Negro spiritual called “Walking Our People into History.”

• Read “The New Rooster” (p. 64) and have students discuss the names of chicken breeds mentioned in the poem and what the types of chickens say about Carver and Bridgeforth. Try to analyze the struggle between the two men. Why does Bridgeforth keep insisting on being “manly” and acting “like a man"? Discuss the disappearing eggs, the broken thermostats, the disappearing chickens. Point out that most of this poem is written in blank verse.

• Have students write a speech that Carver might have delivered during his lifetime. For instance, write a speech that he might have written to address the struggle to have black doctors in the black veterans’ hospitals.

• Carver delivered the commencement address at Selma University, Selma, Alabama, on May 27, 1942. In his address, he recited the poem “Equipment” by Edgar A. Guest. Locate the poem (www.coax.net/people/lwf/poem_eqt.htm), prepare it as a choral reading, and perform it for younger children. Preface the reading with a short tribute to Carver. Note that “Dawn Walk" (p. 38) is related to the Edgar Guest poem.

• Carver once said, “It is not the style of clothes one wears, neither the kind of automobile one drives, nor the amount of money one has in the bank, that counts. These mean nothing. It is simply service that measures success.” Discuss the meaning of service. Then have students find out the many opportunities for service in their community. Plan a class service project dedicated to George Washington Carver.

INTERNET LINKS
www.tusk.edu
Take a virtual tour of Tuskegee Institute.

www.nps.gov/gwca/expanded/peanut.htm
Read about uses for the peanut developed by Carver.

www.invent.org/hall_of_fame/30.html
Read a biographical profile of Carver as an inventor.

www.africana.com/articles/tt.080.htm
Read a detailed biography of Carver.

www.cr.nps.gov/museum/exhibits/Tuskegee/intro.htm
Learn about the legends of Tuskegee Institute such as Carver and Booker T. Washington.

www.coax.net/people/LWF/carver.htm
Visit the George Washington Carver National Memorial.

Prepared by Marilyn Nelson, Poet Laureat of Connecticut and Professor of English, University of Connecticut, Storrs, and by Pat Scales, Director of Library Services, South Carolina Governor’s School for the Arts and Humanities, Greenville