Althouse: "There are certain things — as a spider, a ghost/The income tax, gout, an umbrella for three..."

June 24, 2015

"There are certain things — as a spider, a ghost/The income tax, gout, an umbrella for three..."

"That I hate, but the thing that I hate the most/Is a thing they call the sea...."

Did you know that Lewis Carroll hated the income tax (and, even more, the sea)?

9 comments:

Sharc 65 said...: Here we eat fish
Under the sea, the fish eat us
I know, I know, oh, oh, oh
Under the sea, no one wears hats
I know, I know, oh, oh, oh; 6/24/15, 6:19 AM
Hammond X. Gritzkofe said...: Just lovely. The metre seems more typical of Edward Lear or A.A. Milne.

Poetry should be a "craft," with strong metre and rhyme as well as emotionally moving or witty content. Lacking that it is just schlock like "modern art."; 6/24/15, 6:38 AM
David Begley said...: What is the annual compliance costs of the IRC to the American public in time and dollars?; 6/24/15, 6:43 AM
JackOfVA said...: Under the 1843 Income Tax Act, which was in force when poem was written, the tax rate was 2.9% and tax was only paid by those with an income more than £150 - roughly US$ 200,000 in 2015 terms.; 6/24/15, 6:43 AM
Larry J said...: In 1913, the US tax rates for married filing jointly were:

Income Rate
$0-$20K 1%
$20K-50K 2%
$50K-75K 3%
$75K-100K 4%
$100K-250K 5%
$250K-500K 6%
Over $500K 7%

The Progressives sold the income tax to the rubes as "a tax on the rich" and for the first few years, it largely was. Take a look at this site to see how long that lie lasted. In 1913, a household with an income of $12,000 (quite high for then) paid $120 in income tax. By 1917, it jumped to $575. Government greed knows no bounds.; 6/24/15, 7:11 AM
Ann Althouse said...: "Just lovely. The metre seems more typical of Edward Lear or A.A. Milne."

From the recent New Yorker article about Lewis Carroll:

"As for the anapest, the waltzing metre in which Carroll delighted (“I engage with the Snark—every night after dark— / In a dreamy delirious fight”), it lay dormant for decades, and then burst out in the keen exclamations of Dr. Seuss: “You have brains in your head. / You have feet in your shoes.”"; 6/24/15, 7:43 AM
Gabriel said...: It would be extremely silly to look for considered opinions in the poetry of Lewis Carroll (which I suspect to be Ann's point). It's mostly whatever entertained the kids he happened to around, or in-jokes about Oxford.

It's not hard to find out his serious thoughts, in his letters and diaries and such.

"I believe that when you and I come to lie down for the last time, if only we can keep firm hold of the great truths Christ taught us—our own utter worthlessness and His infinite worth; and that He has brought us back to our one Father, and made us His brethren, and so brethren to one another—we shall have all we need to guide us through the shadows. Most assuredly I accept to the full the doctrines you refer to—that Christ died to save us, that we have no other way of salvation open to us but through His death, and that it is by faith in Him, and through no merit of ours, that we are reconciled to God; and most assuredly I can cordially say, 'I owe all to Him who loved me, and died on the Cross of Calvary.'"; 6/24/15, 7:55 AM
Fernandinande said...: I hate poetry.; 6/24/15, 11:06 AM
William said...: I have never seen nor even heard of an umbrella for three. There's an idea whose time has passed, like photos of nude children to express their innocence.; 6/24/15, 11:11 AM