Captain- Dissapointment Flashcards
About
- them of disappointment emerges a the speaker nostalgically recalls his youth. Through a mix of vibrant memories and disenchanted tine the poem explores the speakers disillusionment with adulthood
- poem is a dramatic monologue
-written in the style of a stream of consciousness mimicking his speech and flowing seamless;y from past to present.
‘Do way diddy diddy” “baby love” and “oh pretty woman” “fizzimg hope” “ clever smell of my satchel” “gargling woth vimto”
-songs encapsulate a period of excitement and optimism “fizzing”
-use of sensory imitate “gargling, clever smell”
Bring these memories to life evoking youthful world filled with possibility and hope
- persona past self is filled with curiosity and confidence demonstrate by his eagerness to answer questions “sir…correct:
-however as the poem unfolds the vibrant past feel increasingly remote and unattainanble
“Stale wife” “boss” “thick kids”
Shifts from energetic memories to “…”
-stale reflects a relationship that’s lost its spark it contrasts with fizzing
-mirrors his broader disappointment in how life has turned out
-sense of resignation is intensified by his attempts to recapture his past by reciting “dusty springfeils hits” to his wife only to realise these moments fail to reignite the passion and excitement he once felt
“The captain. The one with all the answers”
- seems disconnected from the confident sortited boy who once navigated life woth ease
-when he recalls ‘…’ he revealed a longing for his former self
-the self assured describe person has now faded into a figure of uncertainty
-his life seems mundane and repetitive lacking sene of purpose
“My country i want it back”
-underscores this easier for a return to his past
Suggesting that the life he lives now fees foreign almost a if he lost his identity along the way
“Name the prime minister of Rhodesia”
-poem also reflects on the broader cultural and social disappointment of adult hood”
_ attempts to connect with his children fall on deaf ears hilghting the generational disconnect
-he is disappointed that his children lack his knowledge and experience which also symbolise the disappointment with the changing world around him
“As wide as a child who went missing”
-Implies he lost his way straying from the promising path he envisioned in his youth
- he ha lost his innocence
- the child has been kidnapped by adult hood
“Mascot gonk” “blazer” “badge” and “first chord of a hard days night”
-contrast starkly with his current life, emphasising how his dreams and ambitions have faded over time
- final image of his children “wincing” as he quiz them reinforces this theme showing how the passage of time can lead to a disconnect between past and present, between who he was and who he has become.
“I want it back”
Longing encapsulates a. Universal desire to reclaim lost potential and reconnect with the vigour of youth even as it remains beyond reach
- poem portrays the inevitable disappointment tat can arise when one is forced to confront the reality of their unfulfilled life
Context
-“top of the form” was a popular quiz show for secondary school kids
-the poem is noticing for its evocation of the popular culture of 1964 when Duffy was nine and probably watching the programme.
-reflect the choices made and the pain of diaaspoinment
-moors murders
Critics
-duffys style in the poem aroused convtriversy amounts literally critics
-on one hand there are joking references to popular culture which forms contextual landscape of the poem
-this to some critics was “not serious” and a dumbing down of poetry to its lowest denominator.
“ insight into such disturbed minds”
