Before You Were Mine By Caroline Ann Duffy

Question 1

What happens in the poem

Answer 1

Narrator looking at an image of her mother when she was younger
Narrator imagines her mother before she was born
Realises that her mother was glamorous and loving before she was born.

Question 2

Form of the poem

Answer 2

Made up of 4 equal stanzas

Consistent form reflects steady passage of time and inevitable changes that time brings

Question 3

Structure of the poem

Answer 3

Begins and ends with her mother on a pavement-clear decision between before and after

Question 4

How si possessive language presented

Answer 4

When the narrator was born she took control of her mother and her freedoms
Reversal of the usual stereotype of parents holding back their children

Question 5

Suggestions of colloquial language

Answer 5

Creates an imaginary conversation with her mother -close, familiar relationship

Question 6

“My loud ,possessive yell”

Answer 6

Demanding child

Question 7

“My hands in those high-heeled red shoes,relics,”

Answer 7

Portrays the contrast between teenage years and motherhood

Question 8

“Stamping stars from the wrong pavement”

Answer 8

Suggests the daughter took her mother on the wrong path

Question 9

Compare poem to

Answer 9

Mother any distance (admiration of family )