NOBODY LOSES

ALL THE TIME

E.E. CUMMINGS
EDWARD ESTLIN CUMMINGS
• 14/10/1894 – 03/09/1962
• Styles as ee cummings.
• American poet, painter, essayist, author and playwright.
• Associated with modern free-form poetry.
• Often used idiosyncratic syntax and lowercase spellings – poetic
expression.
• Transcendentalist – prayed for strength to be his essential self:
‘may I be I is the only prayer – not may I be great or good or
beautiful or wise or strong.’
NOBODY LOSES ALL THE TIME

• A narrative piece.
• Ironic: Uncle Sol is a failure – but
he is very successful at failing…
therefore he cannot lose all the time
– he wins, when it comes to losing.
• Parody? Deliberate exaggeration
to create humour (darkly
humorous, in this case).
Read the poem on page 117
Form of Key argument: not all
entertainment nobody loses all the time the time.
which combined
comedy, singing, DICTION: Destined to fail?
i had an uncle named
acrobats, dancing,
puppets, trained Sol who was a born failure and
animals. Acts nearly everybody said he should have gone
were extremely into Vaudeville perhaps because my Uncle Sol could
exaggerated. sing McCann He Was a Diver on Xmas Eve like Hell Itself
Uncle Sol is
which
talented? Uncle AMBIGUITY:
Sol is a joke? may or may not account for the fact that my Uncle uncertain of the title
of the song/when he
Sol is a talented Sol indulged in the most inexcusable sang/how he sang.
singer/performer of all to use a highfalootin phrase
(tongue-in-cheek SIMILE or part of the
or serious), yet he
luxuries that is or to title of the song? If it
chooses farming. wit farming and be needlessly is a simile, then does
Poem shows the added DICTION: pompous or pretentious – Uncle Sol sing well?
Domino Effect of does this make sense when you think
this choice. of farming?
Note the continuous
efforts. Not initially
deterred by failure.
my Uncle Sol’s farm
failed because the chickens
ate the vegetables so
my Uncle Sol had a
chicken farm till the
IRONY: to the skunks ate the chickens when
chickens, the vegetable Hard ‘c’ – this is the final
farm was a success. To farm failure for Uncle
the skunks, the chicken
my Uncle Sol
Sol. Subtle shift.
farm was a success. To had a skunk farm but
the worms (link to final the skunks caught cold and
Sibilance: subtle shift to
stanza), the cold/germs died and so an ominous tone which
were a success, as was my Uncle Sol imitated the links to Uncle Sol’s
the failure and
subsequent death of
skunks in a subtle manner suicide?
Uncle Sol.
DICTION: record NOTE: this is not subtle! DICTION: choice to
player (like a describe the
gramophone). Links or by drowning himself in the watertank funeral? Celebration
back to Uncle Sol’s but somebody who’d given my Uncle Sol a Victor of life? Funeral
singing. Victrola and records while he lived presented to more successful
him upon the auspicious occasion of his decease a than Uncle Sol?
scrumptious not to mention splendiferous funeral with
tall boys in black gloves and flowers and everything and
i remember we all cried like the Missouri SIMILE: Missouri River.
when my Uncle Sol’s coffin lurched because Other meanings?
somebody pressed a button
(and down went IRONY in name: Sol means
DICTION: reader’s Brackets: ‘sun’ in Latin. The sun is a life
my Uncle
expectation – afterthough giver, now he gives life to
potential for another Sol t? Shift worms? Eternal cycle of the
failure – climax or back to sun = Uncle Sol’s cycle of
anti-climax? and started a worm farm) Uncle Sol? failure?
Note: is this the point of success for Uncle Sol? He finally achieves something in death? He failed
in farming throughout his life and now he returns to the failure in death?
Gradually increasing line length apart from last
line. These are things Uncle Sol does well, but..

Gradually decreasing line length as the poet

moves towards the decision to farm…

Hardly any change in line length: repeated

failures discussed here…

Slightly increasing line lengths. Death of Uncle

Sol and success of funeral…

Gradually decreasing line lengths. Note in

particular the final lines: lines ‘go down’ as
coffin is lowered into ground.
THINGS TO CONSIDER:

• What is the tone of the poem?

• How do you think the poet feels about his Uncle Sol?
• To what extent do you think it is an example of
parody?
• Is there a message to this poem? If yes, what could
the message be?