Brendon Gallacher Flashcards
Subject of Brandon Gallacher by Jackie Kay
- The narrator of Brendon Gallacher tells the story of her childhood friend, the eponymous character, and describes his entire childhood.
- Only towards the end of the poem do we realise that Brendon Gallacher is imaginary.
- When the narrator’s mother - and the reader - discovers this, Brendon dies. The poem is at least partly autobiographical: the location and details about the narrator’s father describe Jackie Kay’s own life.
Form and structure of Brandon Gallacher by Jackie Kay
- Brendon Gallacher is an elegy, a mournful or sombre remembrance of the dead, sometimes associated with funerals.
- In this case you have to decide whether you think the elegy is for Brendon himself, or for the innocence of the idea of him or for a lost childhood. Remember that the poem is written as a memory, not as an immediate response to grief.
- The poem is very regular in form with five stanzas of five lines each.
- The lines in each verse are approximately the same length, with similar numbers of syllables.
- There is a diminishing effect towards the end of the poem, where the lines of the final two stanzas are shorter, which may reflect the exposure and death of Brendon Gallacher.
Sound of Brandon Gallacher by Jackie Kay
- Every line ends in a half or full rhyme with Brendon Gallacher’s last name throughout the poem. This is a simple scheme although surprisingly difficult to achieve, and it creates a sense of unity without undermining the idea that the narrator’s voice is that of a child.
- Dialect words, or words spelled differently to indicate a Scottish accent, occasionally creep in. So characters sit by the “burn” (river) and have a “wee holida” rather than a ‘little holiday’.
- There is a lot of repetition in this poem, particularly of the phrase “my Brendon Gallacher”, which becomes almost a refrain.
- The narrator almost never says his name without the word “my”, and when her mum says the name, she adds “your” to the beginning. The repetition of the possessive pronoun emphasises the idea that Brendan belongs to the narrator, and emphasises the theme of loss and longing for something that is gone.
- When the name Brendon appears without the surname or the “my” in the last line, as just “Oh Brendon”, the impact is much greater: losing the refrain highlights the loss of her imaginary friend.
- The sound “oh” in the last line is also repeated, adding to the feeling of lament.
Imagery of Brandon Gallacher by Jackie Kay
- The character of Brendon Gallacher is associated with life outdoors. When the narrator’s mum suggests having him “round to dinner”, the narrator makes excuses - understandably since he doesn’t exist! But the only time he comes indoors is in the final verse when he’s ‘died’, suggesting that the fantasy of him doesn’t mix with the reality of the narrator’s own life.
- Brendon Gallacher is pictured as an exotic, glamorous figure, removed from the dull domesticity of the narrator’s life. He’s “Irish” rather than Scottish, and his father is a “cat-burglar”, not just a thief.
This description makes Brendon Gallacher’s background seem slightly unbelievable from the outset. - Kay uses pathetic fallacy to create a sense of the fateful day when Brendon Gallacher ‘died’: the rain that was “pouring” could reflect tears, or be used to create an ominous atmosphere.
- There is also the suggestion that the narrator meets with Brendon in the “open air” but if it’s raining she wouldn’t be able to go out, so perhaps the rain contributes to his end.
- Brendon Gallacher is vividly imagined in the poem, which is rich in details about his character and the places that he and the narrator go together. At the beginning those details are factual but not visual; it is only at the end of the poem, when we know that he is no longer real, that we get to really see Brendon Gallacher, with his “spiky hair/his impish grin, his funny, flapping ear”.
- The vivid late physical description gives more impact to his death, and strangely makes him seem real.
Attitudes, themes and ideas of Brandon Gallacher by Jackie Kay
- The poem juxtaposes and contrasts fantasy and reality to create a sense of escapism.
- Brendon Gallacher gives the speaker a chance to get away from her own life, up to the river, and talk about or imagine his life, which seems very different to hers.
- The conversation with her mother draws on this contrast, as her mum gives the mundane details of how she finds out that Brendon Gallacher doesn’t exist by “talking to Mrs Moir” and checking the details of his address.
- The theme of escapism gives a clue to what the poem laments - grief described in the final line is perhaps not for an imagined friend, but for the opportunity that he presented, or for the idea of her childhood.
- The poem is spoken through the voice of a child, and is very realistic; childhood presented to the reader as simple and sympathetic - although the author is adult, she is not judging or satirising (mocking) her six-to-eight year-old self.
Example comparisons to Brandon Gallacher by Jackie Kay
The Horse Whisperer:
- Both poems are looking back to the past and have a regretful tone.
- Both narrators have a secret that they keep from others, but in Brendon Gallacher the illusion is over when the secret is revealed, whereas in The Horse Whisperer he keeps his secrets.
- Both poems have a strong emotional bond within them - between the narrator and Brendon Gallacher, and between the horse whisperer and his horses.
The Clown Punk:
- Both poems create a strong impression of a character, with some vivid visual descriptions, although Brendon Gallacher is not visually described until the last stanza.
- There’s a twist at the end of both poems, which end with the eponymous characters being in some way dismissed.
- The Clown Punk is real, whereas Brendon Gallacher is imaginary, but Brendon seems more real in his relationship with the narrator.
How is the narrative voice created in Brendon Gallacher by Jackie Kay?
The narrative voice is childlike, despite the fact that an adult narrator is looking back to their childhood.
This is created by simple sentence structures, which are often one sentence per line, with full stops, emphasising this simplicity.
There is a conversational voice created by the direct speech that is reported, as if the character is relating some gossip.
Some non-standard spelling suggests the Scottish roots of the character.
There is a mournful tone to the voice created in the last line by the repetition of the “oh” and the use of just “Brendon” instead of the full name which is used everywhere else in the poem.
Context of Brandon Gallacher by Jackie Kay
Jackie Kay is a Scottish writer of mixed ethnicity.
She was born in Edinburgh in 1961 and adopted by a family from Glasgow, where she grew up.
She often draws on her childhood and family situation in her writing.
Her work has strong, simple images and she often uses repetition, associated with the theme of loss.
Music is a strong influence on the rhythm and style of Kay’s work.
