To Elsie

“To Elsie” was written when William Carlos Williams was 40 years old, although it was still one of his earlier works; unlike many other poets, Williams lived out the majority of his poetry career later in life. The title refers to a real person, Elsie Borden, who was a nursemaid with a mental disability sent by an orphanage to work for Williams and his family. The poem then takes on an autobiographical quality as the speaker refers to “some hard-pressed / house in the suburbs— / some doctor's family” (Lines 38-40). The first-person pronouns as the speaker considers their place in the world reflect Williams’s own new understanding.

Williams was raised in a comfortable, middle-class environment and was given opportunities that many of those alluded to in “To Elsie” never would. However, his role as a community doctor allowed him insight into a wide range of lives. He saw births, deaths, arguments, reconciliations, and tensions of all kinds that would go on to inspire his poetry. This gave him perhaps a more comprehensive and compassionate view into other social classes than he would have had otherwise. This poem explores the “depraved” and the “degenerate” from the

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