Greates Gift Ever essays

Greates Gift Ever essays Theodore Roethke was born to Otto and Helen Roethke in Saginaw, Michigan, in 1908. He had one sister named Helen June. His father was a floriculturalist and greenhouse owner, which was where Theodore spent a lot of time as a young boy. His impressions of the natural world contained there would later profoundly influence the subjects and imagery of his verse. As a child, he was hardly one who would have been expected to become a major American poet. For example, Theodores relationship with his parents was not one that could be described as nurturing and loving. He especially did not have a good relationship with his father. Otto had terrible mood swings which caused a tremendous strain on his relationship with Theodore. His mood swings would escalate with the consumption of alcohol, thus creating a very unhealthy and unsafe environment for his son. No matter how bad things became, Theodore seemed like he could always handle his fathers awful drunken and abusive side. Several years later, he was able to express, through his writings, the pain he endured emotionally and physically during his childhood. The environment through which he travels displays hostility, though he has obvious feelings of sympathy for the smallest creatures, whose size and innocence resemble his own (Mills 25). When Theodore was only fourteen, his father passed away due to cancer and he inherited his fathers business as a result. However, the tragic death of his father did not keep him from accomplishing his dream to become a poet and author. It has even been said that the death of his father gave him the ambition, desire, and strength to follow his own path and ultimately fulfill his destiny. As Mills states, however it came about the choice was fortunate because it marked out the route his poetic imagination was to take, and one likes to think, even urged him on his way by revealing the similarities existing bet...