Tygers in the Damndest Places

--> Literature can encounter us in the damndest places. The preset notion is it  is guaranteed to find us within the confines of a class, a library, maybe the Internet (when we close down Facebook, Reddit, Twitter, etc). My predisposition was that literature is there when I am looking for it. I never thought I would encounter it in the midst of watching cartoons. However, Fox Network proved me very wrong, though I would come to realize it until this week.

          While watching Batman: the Animated Series back in 1992, I encountered a strangely hypnotic poem that held fast in my mind. I can still hear Kevin Conroy, voice of Bruce Wayne/Batman in the series, saying the opening lines to William Blake’s poem “The Tyger.” I was thirteen at the time and had no idea who William Blake was, but the words: “Tyger! Tyger! Burning bright / in the forest of the night” haunted both my waking and sleeping dreams for years after.

            Twenty-two years later, I can’t tell you much about the episode itself. Those words, however, still give me chills. I have quoted the first couplet countless times over the last two decades and I was pleasantly surprised that the remaining line similarly spellbound me. I read it aloud to my partner several times over the last two days, trying to find the proper way to intone each syllable. I suppose, some part of me hoped that if I did it right, I might encounter a “tyger” of my own, forged wholly by the words set down by Blake 220 years ago (I also can’t help notice the similarities in the years since I first encountered the poem, and when the world first encountered it). Alas, no “tyger” has graced my apartment, or my car, or the hallways and byways I travel during the day. I still haven’t relented in my desire to find the proper method to read this poem. 

            I have to admit, despite my love for the English language and the methods by which it can be used to evoke emotions, images, and experiences that seem to transcend barriers like time and space, I have never held much enthusiasm for poetry. At times, I have found individual poems that will jump out at me and grab on to some part of my mind (or rather my heart or soul) and just resonate with me. And this is one such poem. Not only has it remained firmly engrained in my mind longer than many of my fellow classmates have been alive, it has never ceased to move my and excite my mind, heart and soul.  It reminds me to keep my ear out – whether I am watching a cartoon, surfing the ‘net, or talking with folks, Literature is out there and it will find you in the damndest places.

(Batman: the Animated Series, Episode 42, “Tyger, Tyger.” First aired October 30, 1992)