H Engish Assisi quotes

Assisi Title

* Religious connotations - associated with St Francis
* kindness, selfless, welcoming, generous, grounded, empathetic

Themes

* Suffering (dehumanising, pain, ostracised)
* Poverty
* Hypocrisy of Church

Suffering quotes

* ‘The dwarf’
* ‘hands on backwards’
* ‘sat, slumped like a half-filled sack’
* ‘tiny twisted legs’
* ‘advantage of not being dead yet.’
* ‘the ruined temple outside’
* ‘whose eyes wept pus’
* ‘back was higher than his head,’

Poverty quotes

* ‘hands on backwards’
* ‘advantage of not being dead yet’
* ‘three tiers of churches’
* ‘in honour of St Francis, brother of the poor,’

Hypocrisy of opulent church

* ‘three tiers of churches’
* ‘in honour of St Francis, brother of the poor,’
* ‘reveal to the illiterate the goodness of God and the suffering of His Son.’
* ‘clucking contentedly’ and ‘fluttered after him’
* ‘scattered the grain of the Word’
* ‘they who had passed/the ruined temple outside’
* ‘ruined temple’

Dehumanizing quotes

* ‘dwarf’
* ‘hands on backwards’
* ‘slumped like a half-filled sack’
* ‘tiny twisted legs from which sawdust might run’

MacCaig dry/sardonic humour quotes

* ‘had the advantage of not being dead yet.’
* ‘I understood the explanation and the cleverness.’
* clucking contentedly, fluttering after him’

‘dwarf’

* WC
* The dehumanizing word choice puts emphasis on the difference of appearance of the beggar and describes him more as a creature than a human and displays a lack of respect for the beggar

‘hands on backwards’

* WC ‘backwards’
* Implication of begging, hyperbolic, focus on his deformities and an emphasis on difference and otherness

‘slumped like a half-filled sack’

* Simile
* Limp, collapsing, slouched, incomplete, dehumanizing - lost potential, unfulfilled, drained like a sack
* This dehumanizing simile creates a vivid image of the beggar limp and slouched like he can’t support his own frame and compares him to a sack as he is similarly drained. This comparison to a sack puts an emphasis on his appearance of being unable to support himself and dehumanises him as he is compared to an inanimate object

‘tiny twisted legs from which sawdust might run’

* Sack metaphor continued in description
* Beggar is no longer a man but merely the deformed shell of a human being filled with stuffing
* The lack of movement or animation in the description of the beggar conveys the impression that he has lost any spark of life or vitality

‘three tiers of churches’

* Juxtaposition
* Deformities vs grandeur, poverty vs wealth
* extremity of height & solidity
* hypocrisy of church that claims to be charitable but has such opulence uncaring for beggar, this for beggar in unattainable
* Such architecturally complex building to honour a saint with such simple, plain tastes and philosophies

‘in honour of St Francis, brother of the poor’

* derisive, bitter tone of disgust
* Speaker reveals a fundamental disconnect between what St Francis represented and the way he is now honoured, not through acts of empathy but in the building of lavish, expensive constructions like the basilica

‘reveal to the illiterate the goodness of God and the suffering of His Son.’

* Tone and mood changes from pity for the beggar, to anger towards the church
* Heavy irony emphasises hypocrisy of the priest, supposedly a man devoted to the teachings of the Bible yet who seems utterly unaffected by the sight of the beggar
* The hypocrisy of the Church is revealed through the actions of the guide since priests are supposed to be humble as well as compassionate. This priest is neither and MacCaig implies that intelligence without kindness has no value

‘clucking contentedly’

* Alliteration
* Compares tourists to a flock of chickens who listen with dumb, blind obedience as they ‘fluttered after him’
* Blissfully unaware/ignorante
* The tourists, just like the priest, are oblivious to and unaffected by the plight of the poor beggar

‘scattered the grain of the Word.’

* Extended chicken metaphor, little more than poultry
* Deliberately ironic Biblical allusion to biblical Parable of the Sower. Implying that while the tourists listen to the priest’s words, the true meaning is lost on them and they defer to the priest unquestioningly just as the Church expects its members to defer to it

‘they who has passed/the ruined temple outside’

* Almost accusatory tone regarding the apathetic response from the other tourists to his presence
* Emphasis on WC ‘they’
* Implies the speaker feels no affinity with the others in the group, and they have very different perspectives and attitudes towards the beggar

‘ruined temple’

* A temple is something revered and significant, something that was once beautiful. This church has fallen into disrepair due to neglect much like the man

‘had the advantage of not being dead yet.’

* Speaker wryly notes how, unlike St Francis, the beggar is still alive
* The effects of these lines is to suggest that being alive is the only thing the beggar has in his favour, which is not really an advantage
* The final word ‘yet’ has a sinister effect, suggesting the beggar will not survive much longer like this and there is an inevitability of imminent death

‘I understood the explanation and the cleverness.’

* Cynical and disapproving sarcastic tone
* Dismisses the expertise of the priest with the short sentence

‘clucking contentedly, fluttered after him.’ (dry/sardonic humour)

* Humorous image of tourists compared to chickens, but also serves to highlight the mindlessness and ignorance of the other tourists