Scene Description
Four students sit around a table in a library. The students’ books, digital devices, and notebooks are out on the table. While they talk, other students work quietly in the background.
Transcript
00:00 Troy: Anyway, look, I think that the humor in this poem
00:02 sis, well, sophisticated.
00:04 Mikaela: Ah, how so?
00:05 Troy: Well, in the beginning it’s got you thinking that,
00:08 well, it’s a ghoulish, scary ghost story and by the end,
00:11 it’s got you laughing.
00:12 Ashley: Ok, even I have to admit that the second time I read
00:15 through the poem, in the first stanza,
00:17 when Sam McGee says he’d rather live in hell…right…because it’s
00:22 That’s funny, right?
00:24 Mikaela: Yeah. “He’d often say in his homely way that ‘he’d
00:28 sooner live in hell.’” So, it’s like the first time I read
00:31 that, I thought aww, poor guy, but then I realized that it’s
00:36 Spenser: Ok, well, what about the line “Then I made a hike,
00:40 for I didn’t like to hear him sizzle so.” That’s gross,
00:45 but it’s really funny!
00:46 Troy: Service takes a really spooky premise here.
00:50 He takes a man’s dying wish to have his remains cremated
00:53 and turns it into a campfire joke.
00:55 Ashley: Ok, but how?
00:57 Mikaela: I think it’s part of the contrast between tone
01:02 Like, Ashley, your note about the sing-song rhyme;
01:06 it makes things light, right?
01:07 Ashley: Yeah, for sure.
01:08 Troy: No, I think there’s more to it than just that.
01:10 Spenser: There’s something really freeing about being able
01:12 to make light of something so heavy.
01:15 Mikaela: Which is exactly what service
01:17 does at the end of the poem.
01:19 The narrator is all scared and he goes to check
01:21 on the cremation and there’s Sam McGee all happy!
01:26 I mean, “‘Since I left Plumtree, down in Tennessee,
01:29 it’s the first time I’ve been warm.’” It’s a joke.
01:32 Ashley: So, Service is laughing at death.
01:35 Spenser: Yeah, and pointing out that bravery and laughter have
01:39 Troy: You know, I’d say that’s a pretty timeless lesson.