Derek Walcott: Goats and Monkeys

Poem Title

Original Publication

CP Page no

Goats and Monkeys

 

The Gulf and Other Poems, London: J. Cape, 1969  

83-84

Allusion to Classical figure Chaos, Pasiphaë, Minotaur, Eurydice, Sibyl

Allusion to Classical place Cyprus, the Cretan labyrinth

Classical/post-Classical intertexts Shakespeare’s Othello, the Bible

Further Comment The poem repeatedly pairs white, Western, female characters from myth and literature (Pasiphaë, Eurydice, Desdemona) with black/Arab, sometimes bestial, male figures.