"A Descent into the Maelström"

23 March 2022: "'No one ever will know what my feelings were at that moment.'" --The "old" man in Poe's "A Descent into the Maelström"

I was so pleased with my seminar's discussion of Poe's story today--one of those wonderful cases where the students' response to a text makes me like it more. 

In my preparation for the class, I was struck by the line above, particularly the idea that he is telling the story and has a captive audience (both in the story and actual readers) yet he knows he will not be able to describe what he has experienced. The tale that cannot be fully told. The message that can not be fully conveyed. And, at times, that only makes reader and teller want to try harder or at least hear/say more. 

And one of our program's super-stars kind of floored me with her idea that the story-within-a-story doesn't come back around (we end in the 'inner' story) because the inner story takes over, sweeping the frame into it...like the Maleström. 

Needless to say, once again, the best part of the day was teaching this class--and the 204 class this morning (when we talked about Pound).