Flea Questions 8.26

1.     What happens right before the poem? What happens between the 1^st&2^nd and 2^nd&3^rd stanzas? How does the female character behave and what does she say?

a.     –Directly preceding the poem the flea in question sucked blood from the narrator and began to suck blood from the woman.

b.     Between 1&2 the Flea continues his work on the woman.

c.      The woman squashes the flea in between the 2nd and 3^rd stanzas without compunction.

d.     The female says that neither she now the narrator are now the flea’s prey. She is rather callous and more than a bit scornful of the narrator and his intentions. She eliminates his ace with little effort.

2.     What has already happened between the two characters? What has she denied him? Why has he survived? His objective?

a.     The woman has denied the man entry to her bed.

b.     It was only a mental blow, not a physical one, so the narrator was not in any real trouble.

c.      The speaker’s objective is to seduce the woman into sleeping with him.

3.     What is the speaker’s argument in stanza 1? Is it logical?

a.     The man argues that their blood has already mixed inside the flea, so there is no shame in joining blood in person. It isn’t logical because there is far more to consider when in person rather than unwilling siphoned off someone.

4.     What are: parents’ grudge, living walls of jet? What three things will the woman kill by crushing the flea? What three sins will accompany this?

a.     Parents’ grudge is the loss of her virginity

b.     Living walls of jet refer to the flea’s body

c.      Suicide, homicide, and sacrilege. The first two represented by their respective blood, the third destruction of the marriage bed.

5.     Why/how does the woman triumph? Speaker’s response?

a.     She destroys their bond by killing the flea.

b.     He says her honor is blemished by “killing” the flea. Ironic considering what he is requesting of her.

6.     Actions that follow poem?

a.     Either the speaker uses force on the woman or she leaves him.

7.     “The Apparition” and “The Flea” are two different seduction poems? How so?

a.     The first is morose and serious while the second is humorous and clever.