The Illiterate

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1958

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more.

Download PDF

Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Related Poems

“A Wasteland Sonnet” by William Meredith (1953)

This sonnet was published in the August 1953 issue of Poetry Magazine, alongside “The Illiterate.” The poems share the sonnet form, although “A Wasteland Sonnet” is written with the rhyme scheme ABAB ABAB CDE CDE, with significant off-rhyming, a different variation on the Petrarchan sonnet than “The Illiterate.” This poem also has allusions to a literary work, poet T. S. Eliot’s The Waste land and his view of the myth of the Fisher King. Its subject matter is again about love. Like “The Illiterate,” its conclusion includes a sentiment that acts as plea, “Stay with me just this lifetime, or until / [no] one can maim me, even I myself” (Lines 13-14).

“Starlight” by William Meredith (1958)

This poem appears in the same collection as “The Illiterate,” and uses the ABABCC rhyme scheme. Looking at the sky, the speaker wonders at the stars and the naming of constellations, as well as man’s hubris, and how man may be “dark and ignorant, / Unable to see here what our forebears saw” (Lines 7-8). In the conclusion, the speaker notes that if they could name a constellation, it would be easy to understand. Here, as in “The Illiterate,” unknown vastness gives way to specific definition in the figure of another.

“Tree Marriage” by William Meredith (1987)

“Tree Marriage” is a love poem written by William Meredith to his long-term partner Richard Harteis (Harteis, Richard. Marathon: A Story of Endurance and Friendship Norton, 1989). While “The Illiterate” discusses a relationship that might just be about to begin, here Meredith depicts a long-term relationship, with a “web / of love and habit” (Lines 8-9). Still, the speaker worries about the relationship’s solidity. The poem ends with a plea in which the speaker asks for a pair of trees that will stand in for the couple. The unknowable future, also discussed in “The Illiterate,” is present here as well.

Further Literary Resources

William Meredith Foundation website (2023)

While different parts of the website are more current than others, there is a biographical sketch located here as well as a listing of Meredith’s honors and awards. Under the “Archive Library” are several letters regarding Meredith, by Richard Harteis and others. Janet Gezari’s letter notes that “several of his more celebrated contemporaries—Robert Penn Warren, John Berryman, and Robert Lowell—relied on his responses to their poems and drafts of poems,” a fact that speaks to his literary importance. Some of his poems are included, and some audio files of him reading work, including “The Illiterate.”

“William Meredith Remembered: A Poetic Legacy” by Audrey Black (2019)

Black’s article for The College Voice, Connecticut College’s Student Newspaper, details Meredith’s poetic legacy, noting his accolades and his pioneering spirit as the first openly gay Poet Laureate Consultant to the Library of Congress. At a memorial in 2019, writer Richard Harteis (Meredith’s partner), former student poet Michael Collier, and colleague Blanche McCrary Boyd spoke of Meredith’s influence and his “deep respect for the power of language.” Boyd also notes that Meredith “was someone who believed in happiness. He believed in being cheerful about the world…He was about showing up for people.” His natural sympathy for other people, for rendering what they cannot articulate, is evident in “The Illiterate.”

“Rhetorical Contract in the Lyric Poem” by Linda Gregerson (2006)

Poet and scholar Linda Gregerson analyzes the construction of “The Illiterate” in a 2006 article for The Kenyon Review. She also touches on the possible allusion Meredith makes to Shakespeare’s Dark Lady sonnets (175) and indicates that the poem may have content that suggests gay love. This article can be read for free at The Kenyon Review website if you sign up for a free account.

“Two loves have I” by William Boyd (2005)

This article covers Shakespeare’s Fair Youth and Dark Lady sonnets and tries to suggest some historical corollaries. Boyd explains some of the background for the Fair Youth sonnets and includes some excerpts that show the debatable content. He contrasts them with the destructive nature of lust in the Dark Lady sonnets. This information may help clarify Meredith’s line about the “dark girl” (Line 11) that appears in “The Illiterate,” which critics think may allude to Shakespeare.

Listen to Poem

Jason Schneiderman reads “The Illiterate” by William Meredith

American poet Jason Schneiderman hosts this episode of The Slowdown, the podcast of the Poetry Foundation. Schneiderman positions Meredith as a gay author and explains how he uses “the figure of illiteracy not to pin down what it meant for him to know love, but to open up the space where love might be seen in all its confusions.” The poem is read at the 4:12 timestamp.