Tennessee is a U.S. state in the southeast with a population of over six million. Its primary industries include agriculture, tourism, and manufacturing. Though now home to larger cities including Nashville, Memphis, and Knoxville, in the past Tennessee has been home to much smaller towns. Known for its impact on country music, Nashville is the home of the Grand Ole Opry and the Country Music Hall of Fame.
"Anecdote of the Jar" []
Tennessee appears in Stevens' poem "Anecdote of the Jar":
I placed a jar in Tennessee, And round it was, upon a hill. It made the slovenly wilderness Surround that hill. The wilderness rose up to it, And sprawled around, no longer wild. The jar was round upon the ground And tall and of a port in air. It took dominion every where. The jar was gray and bare. It did not give of bird or bush, Like nothing else in Tennessee. [1]
Tennessee is traditionally known for its many woods and its unsettled land area, causing some to stereotype it as a "hillbilly" state, particularly in the early twentieth century. Stevens' poem seems to be playing off of this, for when the speaker places a jar in Tennessee, that jar transforms the surrounding wilderness. The jar tames the wilderness, making it "no longer wild," and the jar ultimately takes "dominion every where." What kind of jar would have such power? No matter the answer to this question, the unsettled wilderness of Tennesse forms the crux of this poem. The jar is compelling and powerful when juxtaposed with these surroundings.
References []
1. http://writing.upenn.edu/~afilreis/88/stevens-ancedote.html