Anatomy of a Poem: "The Greatest Show on Earth"
by Brittny Ray
To read the poem, go to:
The Greatest Show on Earth
Recognizing the women to whom the poem 'The Greatest Show on Earth" is
dedicated to is essential to grasping its meaning. Saartjie Baartman, Joice
Heth, Anarcha of Alabama, and Truginini are four figures that represent the
oppression of black women throughout history.
Saartjie Baartman, "The Hottentot Venus," is likely the most recognizable
of the four. She was born into a Griqua family in 1789, and later moved near
Cape Town where she became the servant of a farmer. Upon working there she was
seen by William Dunlop, a surgeon, who was particularly interested in her "large
buttocks" and overly developed labia. Luring her with the promise of wealth
and fame, he took her to England where she was exhibited nude in front of
a large crowd of vulgar spectators who came to gawk and some, for a heightened
fee, actually touched her. She died poor in Paris in 1816 after bouts with prostitution
and alcoholism. Not even 24 hours after her death, her body was cast in wax,
her brain and genitals dissected and pickled, and then put on display in the
Musee de L'Homme, which ironically means Museum of Humanity. Eventually, her
body was taken from public view in 1974 only to be kept in a storage closet
until she was returned to Africa to be laid to rest in May of 2002 (Marais).
Joice Heth, the nurse of George Washington, was born in Madagascar in 1674.
At age 15 she was stolen and sold off to slavery in America to Thomas Buckner.
After being in the possession of several slave owners and outliving most of
her relatives, Heth, then blind and quite feeble, (only 46 lbs), was displayed
around the country as a marvel at the [supposed] age of 161 (The University
of North Carolina at Chapel Hill).
Anarcha was one of three noted slaves that first endured countless operations
under Dr. J. Marion Sims Dossier, inventor of the speculum and the "founder
of modern gynecology" (Brinker). Sims used experimental techniques on many
of his slaves, asserting that black women could endure great measures of pain
without the aid of medicine ''as well as dogs or rabbits"and that "plantation
owners were glad to turn over their slaves to [him] for experimentation"
(Bath). Anarcha was only 17 and underwent over 30 brutal surgeries.
The last of these, Truginini, born in 1803, would eventually become the last
Tasmanian alive after the first Europeans came to their land and began killing
them off for possession of the land. After living through rape and witnessing
the murder and capture of several of her family members, she died in 1876, pleading
"Don't let them cut me up! Bury me in the mountains" (ABC). Unfortunately,
her last wish was not granted and she was buried, then exhumed and her
skeleton put on display until 1947. The "us all" part of Finney's
dedication commemorates all black women who have been objectified, oppressed
and brutalized.
The history behind the poem fittingly works its way in from the beginning with
the title "The Greatest Show on Earth," alluding to the side-show
exhibition experience the four subjects of the poem were exposed to. Finney
makes reference to each of the women in particular stanzas; those to Baartman
are especially evident in the first section of the poem: "...floating in
formaldehyde jelly..." (line 2); "[t]he lilac plumage/ of our petaled
genitalia/ ...all cut away/by pornographic hands..." (lines 11-23); and,
towards the end, "her protruding mass/ steatopygia" (lines 33-34)...
"...African music boxes/ whittled down to perfect/ change purse size..."
(lines 67-69). The word steatopygia comes from the vocabulary of an early pseudoscience
which aimed to prove the superiority of the white race (Drake). It literally
means "large buttocks." Anarcha is referred to in line 46 "...the
speculum hammered out..." and lines 59-60 use Truginini's last words. Finney
also incorporates the poem's theme through repetition, repeating the phrase
"what makes a freak a freak."
The use of figurative language through similes and metaphors undoubtedly gives
the poem its vividness. She describes the women's legs as "broken like
the stirrups of a wishbone" and goes on to complete the traditional relationship
of a splitting wishbone to making wishes. This presents another metaphor, stemming
from the belief that the person who gets the short piece of the bone does not
get a wish and the possessor of the long piece does. In a sense the line
"somebody got their wish and somebody didn't" means that the women
got the short piece and the oppressors the longer, thereby receiving their wish
(wealth from domination of a people). Finney also compares the women's genitalia
to a flower--"lilac plumage petaled genitalia"--and an "African
music box", things that represent beauty and vitality; and by comparing
them to "change purses", she relates them to a thing that can be opened,
closed and used at will. This example also relates to the issue of money and
profit.
Finney's diction is particularly crucial in projecting the intended imagery
and meaning. "[S]terling silver lust" in stanza 8 can be interpreted
as the lust for money, and the reader can actually envision silver coins. The
image of thin bones being dug up is clear as well. In choosing to call the woman
"headless" in stanza 5, Finney emphasizes how these women were merely
body parts on exhibition, without a face or a mind. Her word choice at the bottom
of stanza 6 ("...experimenting with Black women/ but never dissecting their
own desires.") presents a particularly interesting medical or scientific
pun and metaphor for how the white oppressors never analyzed their fascination
for and attraction to black women. The word "normal" in the poem's
last stanza is also important. It symbolizes the superior position the spectators
felt they held--normal being the standard, and the other extreme belonging to
those being exhibited, the freaks. Her use of "we" and "our"
is meant to be inclusive of black women as a whole, and creates the effect of
a chorus of voices speaking, which is far stronger than the solitary "I."
This poem is constructed in free verse, with no particular meter or rhyme scheme. Finney contructs particular stanzas differently for more emphasis, such as the couplets which make up stanzas 2 and 4: "somebody got their wish and somebody didn't" ... "so the normal pay their fifty cents/ to see what makes a freak a freak." She also indents stanza 5: "Go ahead,/ walk around her/..." which mocks the voice of a sideshow ringleader. And in stanza 9, Truginini's last words are italicized. There are some instances of rhyme, alliteration, and consonance, as in the first stanza's "split spread/unanesthetized legs..." and in the second stanza's "wish/ and...didn't" and "size" and "pried" and "desires" in the sixth. Perhaps the poet created "The Greatest Show on Earth" with such structural liberty with the intent of not restricting the memory of these women any more than they had been in life and death.
Works Cited
ABC. "Truginini (1812-1876)" 2004. www.abc.net.au/btn/australians/truginini.htm.
03/30/04
Bath, Rufus. "My Enemy Has a Face." 9 July 2002. http://rufusbath.enemy.org/bitter.htm.
03/30/2004
Brinker, Wendy. "J. Marion Sims: One Among Many Monumental Mistakes."
2002.
www.english.uiuc.edu/maps/poets/m_r/moss/sims.htm. 03/30/2004
Drake, St, Clair. "White Racism and the Black Experience." African
Diaspora and
The World. Eds. Terry Bozeman et al. 11th Edition. Acton, Massachusetts:
Copley Custom
Publishing Group, 2003. 123.
Marais, Etienne. "Saartjie Baartman Tragic Venus."
2002.
http://www.insanetree.com/images/special/saartjie.htm. 03/30/2004.
Thwaites, Alan. "Truginini." 2002. http://www.teachers.ash.org.au/thwaites/trug.htm.
03/30/2004.
The University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. "The Life of Joice Heth,
the Nurse of General
George Washington, (the Father of Our Country), Now Living at the Astonishing
Age of 161
Years, and Weighs Only 46 Pounds: Electronic Edition." 2000.
http://docsouth.dsi.internet2.edu/neh/heth/menu.html. 03/30/2004.