Belfast Confetti Flashcards
Belfast Confetti: Who is the poet?
Ciaran Carson
Belfast Confetti: Describe the structure and its effect
Enjambament at the end of every line shows poet’s struggle to fit all of his thoughts into a strict form
Caesuras made with punctuation to show poet’s inability to keep a steady flow under the conditions he is in
In some cases (‘And the/Explosion/Itself -‘) the reader may have to look back up the poem in order to understand what is being said, similar to how the poet must be constantly alert
Belfast Confetti: What is significant about the title?
‘Confetti’ has positive connotations of celebration, but the soft alliteration of ‘F’ mimics a bomb about to blow
Belfast Confetti: How is the poet’s confusion shown?
Constant enjambament where he briefly drops his narrative thoughts (‘a burst/of rapid fire…/I was trying to complete a sentence in my head but it kept/Stuttering,’)
The imagery of punctuation (‘an asterisk on the map. This hyphenated line’) shows how he is trying to link what he knows (poetry) to the events around him
The contradiction of ‘I know this labyrinth so well’ shows how his familiar surroundings have been transformed by the psychological effects of The Troubles
‘What is/My name?’ - creates sense of bewilderment, even though the police are asking a simple question
‘A fusillade of question marks’ shows how he feels constantly under attack and therefore cannot comprehend dialogue at this time
Belfast Confetti: What is the difference between the poet, the rioters, and the police?
The police have ‘makrolon face-shields’
The rioters only have ‘nuts, bolts, nails, car-keys’
The poet only has punctuation
Belfast Confetti: What is the effect of the first line?
‘Suddenly as the riot squad moved in, it was raining/exclamation marks’
It begins with impact in order to draw in the reader, and sounds much like a story, but the enjambament breaks this narrative with the introduction of the extended metaphor for warfare
It makes it clear that the poet is out of place and unequipped to deal with the events
Belfast Confetti: What context can be given on Ciaran Carson?
He lived through The Troubles
