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Premier Announced today that schools be opening in the Fall
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Viking Questions to be corrected Thursday
For those of you done the Viking questions early, in PowerSchool I have put your marks and the questions, if any, that you didn’t get full marks on. Feel free to answer those questions again to get full marks.Corrections of the Poem questions on Friday?
Journal Friday
More Middle Ages, big time, next week.
The Cremation of Sam McGee
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
Now Sam McGee was from Tennessee, where the cotton blooms and blows.
Why he left his home in the South to roam 'round the Pole, God only knows.
He was always cold, but the land of gold seemed to hold him like a spell;
Though he'd often say in his homely way that "he'd sooner live in hell." 2
On a Christmas Day we were mushing our way over the Dawson trail.
Talk of your cold! through the parka's fold it stabbed like a driven nail.
If our eyes we'd close, then the lashes froze till sometimes we couldn't see;
It wasn't much fun, but the only one to whimper was Sam McGee. 3
And that very night, as we lay packed tight in our robes beneath the snow,
And the dogs were fed, and the stars o'erhead were dancing heel and toe,
He turned to me, and "Cap," says he, "I'll cash in this trip, I guess;
And if I do, I'm asking that you won't refuse my last request." 4
Well, he seemed so low that I couldn't say no; then he says with a sort of moan:
"It's the cursèd cold, and it's got right hold till I'm chilled clean through to the bone.
Yet 'tain't being dead—it's my awful dread of the icy grave that pains;
So I want you to swear that, foul or fair, you'll cremate my last remains."
A pal's last need is a thing to heed, so I swore I would not fail;
And we started on at the streak of dawn; but God! he looked ghastly pale.
He crouched on the sleigh, and he raved all day of his home in Tennessee;
And before nightfall a corpse was all that was left of Sam McGee. 6
There wasn't a breath in that land of death, and I hurried, horror-driven,
With a corpse half hid that I couldn't get rid, because of a promise given;
It was lashed to the sleigh, and it seemed to say: "You may tax your brawn and brains,
But you promised true, and it's up to you to cremate those last remains."
Now a promise made is a debt unpaid, and the trail has its own stern code.
In the days to come, though my lips were dumb, in my heart how I cursed that load.
In the long, long night, by the lone firelight, while the huskies, round in a ring,
Howled out their woes to the homeless snows— O God! how I loathed the thing.
And every day that quiet clay seemed to heavy and heavier grow;
And on I went, though the dogs were spent and the grub was getting low;
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I'd often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin. 9
Till I came to the marge of Lake Lebarge, and a derelict there lay;
It was jammed in the ice, but I saw in a trice it was called the "Alice May."
And I looked at it, and I thought a bit, and I looked at my frozen chum;
Then "Here," said I, with a sudden cry, "is my cre-ma-tor-eum."
Some planks I tore from the cabin floor, and I lit the boiler fire;
Some coal I found that was lying around, and I heaped the fuel higher;
The flames just soared, and the furnace roared—such a blaze you seldom see;
And I burrowed a hole in the glowing coal, and I stuffed in Sam McGee.
Then I made a hike, for I didn't like to hear him sizzle so;
And the heavens scowled, and the huskies howled, and the wind began to blow.
It was icy cold, but the hot sweat rolled down my cheeks, and I don't know why;
And the greasy smoke in an inky cloak went streaking down the sky. 12
I do not know how long in the snow I wrestled with grisly fear;
But the stars came out and they danced about ere again I ventured near;
I was sick with dread, but I bravely said: "I'll just take a peep inside.
I guess he's cooked, and it's time I looked"; ... then the door I opened wide.
And there sat Sam, looking cool and calm, in the heart of the furnace roar;
And he wore a smile you could see a mile, and he said: "Please close that door.
It's fine in here, but I greatly fear you'll let in the cold and storm—
Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee, it's the first time I've been warm."
There are strange things done in the midnight sun
By the men who moil for gold;
The Arctic trails have their secret tales
That would make your blood run cold;
The Northern Lights have seen queer sights,
But the queerest they ever did see
Was that night on the marge of Lake Lebarge
I cremated Sam McGee.
This poem has a distinct rhythm, a Da Da DUM Da DUM Da Da DUM pattern, and it is slow. Very easy poem to read and follow along.
This poem has internal rhyming, that is lines that rhyme within themselves. See the bold.
The trail was bad, and I felt half mad, but I swore I would not give in;
And I'd often sing to the hateful thing, and it hearkened with a grin.
It also has a rhyming scheme, AA,BB, or rhyming couplets. See the red.
I have numbered the stanzas for you, so . . .
Correct student answers as examples in red below
1, Stanza 3, find a simile.
stabbed like a driven nail
2. Stanza 4, find a personification
stars were dancing heel and toe. The object is stars and the author says that stars can dance.
3. Stanza 9, find a metaphor
quiet clay
4. Stanza 12, a personification and a metaphor. Hint, check line 2 & 4 of the stanza
heavens scowled-personification
greasy smoke smoke in an inky cloak-metaphor- i guess he’s cooked,
5. Line 1, there is something like an oxymoron or paradox in the term 'midnight sun.' How does the poem, starting off with something that doesn't seem possible, but actually does happen, prepare the reader for the ending?
The poem at the start tells us that the ending will be the same way kind of impossible. At the end the man wakes up from being dead because ehe is finally warm.
It prepares the reader for sam McGee to come back to life when being cremated.
It prepares the reader by saying that anything is possible.
The “ midnight sun” oxymoron at the start of the poem prepares the reader for the ending by giving an example, even though not a clear one, of something that happens in the poem. Throughout the poem Cap is trying to fulfill his promise to his friend, to cremate him because he doesn’t like the cold. Basically Sam Mcgee gives a mission to Cap, to find warmth in the terrible cold, and to cremate him, which seems impossible since their in the Arctic, but it happens. Just like the “ midnight sun”, seems impossible but happens.
its symbolizing that something very "wierd" is going to happen
because its telling you people have done weird things in "midnight sun" and it wants you to keep that line in the back of your head while reading the poem
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