Landscape With The Fall Of Icarus Comparison

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Anne Sexton’s “To a Friend Whose Work Has Come to Triumph”, and William Carlos Williams’ “Landscape with the Fall of Icarus” depict vastly different interpretations of the Ovid tale of “The Story of Daedalus and Icarus” specifically focusing on Icarus himself. Both poems offer their insight into Icarus’ journey, but Sexton shows a much more witnessed, exciting, and triumphant affair, while Williams comes in giving an almost completely opposite version, that shows Icarus’ flight to be unnoticed, dull and, very blatantly, insignificant. Sexton’s poem tells of Icarus flying over the ocean, and mentions his “first flawless moment over the lawn / of the labyrinth” (3-4), along the encouraging advice to “admire his wings” (9) giving us the sense…show more content…
The poem says to “think of the difference [the flight] made” (4) stating that it must have effected Icarus quite a bit evident by his “wondrously tunnelling / into that hot eye” (11-12) showing he was obviously too excited to think of anything more than flying as high as he could. The choice of words in this poem such as “flawless” (3), “quite well” (7), “wondrously” (11) and “acclaiming” (13) give the reader the idea that Icarus is flying his best, and like any boy would, he wonders what he can do and continues to fly upward in a fit of excitement, acclaiming his target. Williams however, takes a different stance and has Icarus’ flight portrayed in a more dull and boring manner. He writes of the “melted / …wings’ wax” (14-15) showing that the writer is almost bored with the child, when he instead could of spoke of the beautiful feathers, or the craftsmanship. Further, he tells of the boy’s death in such a shallow and blunt way that he seems to want to make the reader bored, and with the fact that simply “a splash quite unnoticed / …was / Icarus drowning” (19-21), makes them care less of Icarus’ flight. This strongly shows the lack of excitement, because no one notices his death, let alone his powerful flight, just the dull
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