The Golden Age: 6. The Poet Summary & Analysis

In a flashback Frank recalls his time at the IDB; it’s a big hospital in the middle of Perth, much larger than the Golden Age. Most of the patients are young adults with a penchant for dark humor; young and precocious, Frank quickly becomes a favorite and roams the wards in his wheelchair, carrying messages and helping set up pranks on the nurses. He’s unsupervised and no one makes him go to school; in this sense, the hospital reminds him of the refugee hostel where he and his parents stayed in Vienna, where they were “saved, but not yet back into real life.”

Exploring the hospital one day, Frank stumbles on a room filled with “iron lungs,” breathing machines that keep completely paralyzed polio patients alive. Remembering his own experiences in confinement, he flees, but returns the next day and sees that one of the patients is a teenage boy. The boy tells Frank he’s composing a poem about the ceiling, called “The Snowfield,” and a recites a couple lines. He introduces himself as Sullivan Backhouse and approves of Frank’s name, which he says is “apposite.” Frank doesn’t understand what this means.

Frank returns to the ward every day, disregarding formal visiting hours, and the two boys discuss poetry. Sullivan informs him that poetry doesn’t have to rhyme or be about heroes. He especially admires the First World War poets, who didn’t glorify the war but wrote about everyday experiences, even about being in the hospital. Frank likes this approach to art because it’s different from Ida’s “theatrical [and] deliberate” reverence for music, which he feels sets his family apart from other Australians.

Before polio, Sullivan was a popular prefect and captain of the rowing team at a boy’s college. He has many siblings and a big house by the river. Frank associates Sullivan with a grand house he once saw, and with the wholesomeness and serenity of old paintings.

A dignified man with an important government job, Sullivan’s father, Mr. Backhouse, often visits. He’s kind to Frank and asks him how he likes Australia, but Frank sees it’s an effort for him to concentrate on anything but Sullivan. It’s also hard for him to see mobile children in wheelchairs while his son is completely paralyzed.

Frank notices that Sullivan always has a joke or story ready for these visits; he’s cheerfully taken on the responsibility of keeping up his father’s spirits. On the other hand, Frank deeply resents the responsibility of making his parents happy. He knows how upset they are at having to bear another tragedy after escaping from Hungary, but he doesn’t want to be “their only light.”

Another day, Sullivan muses to Frank that real life only happens when one is alone. He references a woman named Sister Addie, a nurse at the Golden Age, commenting that “all her thoughts are for others,” but that he wonders what her thoughts are like when she’s in her own room, without her uniform. Most of the time, Sullivan is cheerful when Frank visits, but sometimes he sits in silence while he’s composing a poem or after he’s had a bad night. Frank often transcribes Sullivan’s poetry for him.

Eventually, Sullivan gets to spend some time each day out of the lung. He and Frank sit on the verandah strapped to recliners. Sullivan tells Frank his onset story. He was in an important rowing race but felt so hot and sick he dived into the river and suddenly realized he couldn’t move his legs. His teammates had to drag him out of the water. Even though it was terrifying, Sullivan looks back on the day with a sort of fondness, since he loved school and was very close to his friends. While they ferried him to shore, the beginning of a long poem called “On My Last Day on Earth” occurred to him. Everything he writes now is part of that poem.

Sullivan’s dramatic story makes Frank ashamed of his own onset, which he feels emblematizes the “loud, raw, over-intimate tragicomedy” of his own family. He refused to go to school because of a terrible headache, then fought with Ida who said she would lose her new job if she stayed home to take care of him. When Ida finally realized how feverish Frank was, she ran down the street to the phone box yelling and cursing. Meyer had to carry him out of the house while the neighbors watched. In the midst of all this, Frank thought savagely that this would teach his parents not to depend on him for happiness.

One night during his stay in IDB, Frank wakes up to thunder and lightning. He realizes the power is out and worries about the iron lungs, which run on electricity. He wheels to the door and sits anxiously in the rain; suddenly, he sees the nurses running in pajamas to the iron lung ward and knows everything will be alright. The next morning, he finds out they hand-pumped the lungs for hours.

Sullivan says Mr. Backhouse wants to publish the rhyming poems that he wrote before polio. Sullivan wants to call the collection “On My Last Day on Earth,” but his father disapproves of this title. He tells Frank he’s working on a new poem, one line of which is “in the end, we are all orphans.”

The next day, Sister Addie tells Frank that Sullivan spiked a fever during the night and died suddenly. His iron lung is already missing, taken away for cleaning. Frank encounters the devastated Mr. Backhouse and is impressed by his dignified, understated grief. Even though most of Frank’s family were murdered during the war, this is the first loss he’s experienced more personally.

Frank looks at Sullivan’s poetry, which he’s transcribed on a prescription pad. He knows it’s up to him to finish “On My Last Day on Earth.” He calls Meyer and tries to tell him this but can’t communicate his thoughts well. After hanging up, he lies down in bed, looking up at the ceiling as if he is dead as well.