A Wife In London - Thomas Hardy

Question 1

Wife feels trapped - AWIL

Answer 1

“she sits in tawny vapour” - pathetic fallacy
“webby”
She is isolated and trapped by herself without her husband

Question 2

Husband’s diminsihing hope - AWIL

Answer 2

“warning taper” - loses hope in his own safe return as he weakens/dies but his wife is still holding onto hope
- could be what’s keeping him afloat

Question 3

Shock she feels - AWIL

Answer 3

“knock cracks smartly” - startles the reader as it is abrupt
“he - has fallen - in” - parenthetic dashes to create disruption and emphasis
“though shaped so shortly” - sibilance to draw attention to important moment. Deeply troubling. Something life changing is delivered in such a small, unfeeling letter

Question 4

Cruel view after his death - AWIL

Answer 4

“II - the irony” - creates separation as if her life is a play and we are watching it for enteratinment - shows how normal it was
“the fog hangs thicker” - she feels worse than yesterday

Question 5

Pathos - AWIL

Answer 5

“new love that they would learn” with “home planned jaunts” in “summer weather”
ironic as he is dead already and cannot experience this. visceral image of grief and emptiness after loss exacerbated by the arrival of this letter

Question 6

unforgiving nature of war - AWIL

Answer 6

“his hand, whom the worm now knows”
realistic, somber image
he has fallen, not been buried
war has ruined two lives, not just one

Question 7

Context - AWIL

Answer 7

• Smog in industrial revolution was yellow-brown colour and could cause respiratory problems
• British soldiers were fighting in the 2nd boer war when this was set (1899-1902)
• “far south land” - south africa