Eat me by Patience Agbabi Flashcards
FIRST LINE: “When I hit thirty, he bought me a cake”
LAST LINE: “There was nothing else left in the house to eat”
Cyclical structure - In the beginning he provided her food however, towards the end there was nothing for her to eat because he was no longer around to provide
“eat me. And I ate”
Commanding verbs - Passive obedience from the woman, she mindlessly follows his orders.
The man is controlling and dominant.
“I hit thirty”
“I hit thirty-nine”
“soon you’ll forty”
Repeat reference of age shows continuous cycle of blindly following instructions over a period of time
“watch me swell like forbidden fruit”
Simile - expresses her obesity
Biblical Allusions - Adam and Eve in the Garden of Eden.
The man is the snake tempting Eve to eat the apple
The woman is Eve following the snakes deceptiveness
“I was his jacuzzi”
“His breadfruit”
“His desert island”
Personification - she doesn’t acknowledge herself as a human being. This is evident of her being mentally manipulated by her partner and brainwashed. It is representative of her being brainwashed.
Repetition of personal pronoun “his” - she is his property, belonging and possession she has no true identity
“too fat”
Repetition - emphasize to degrade her and make her feel worthless and unlovable
“multiple chins, masses of cellulite”
Grotesque imagery - Juxtaposed with lewd aroused male voice
“I like big girls, soft girls, girls I can borrow inside”
Listing - Shows the relationship is one sided and only his desires matter.
“beached whale on a king-sized bed”
“tidal wave of flesh”
“he drowned”
“I drowned his dying sentence out”
Motif - The sea or a large body of water to represent her physically large body
“I allowed him to stroke”
Verb - Pre-power shift
Poem’s Semantic field
Food and relationships
This poem is a
Dramatic monologue
Summary
Foodie, feeder relationship where the woman is encouraged and commanded by her partner to eat in order to fulfil his sexually deviant desires. He dies in the end and she no longer has anything to eat. One sided lust.
Themes
- Power/Control
- Abuse emotionally
- Sexual objectification/Dehumanizing
- Gender
- Gluten and greed
Poets agenda
-The poet attempts to subvert ideas about socially acceptable weights of women. This poem goes against social norms. The poet expresses colonial power and addiction.
- make awareness on the different types of relationships
-the idea of a man overpowering a woman in order to continue with his control over her, however this is reversed by the end of the poem suggesting a change in the power dynamic.
-The discussion of the idea of body imagery is solely based on the female rather than the male, which can be seen as reflecting the stereotypical societal attitude towards this subject.
- The sexual nature of their relationship is a taboo subject which could reflect societal discomfort with topics of this nature.
Alice in Wonderland Context
The poet uses the allusion of ‘Alice in Wonderland’ where Alice eats a cake that says ‘Eat me’ and then becomes enormous
Readers Feelings
shocked as this relationship is unnatural
There is enjambment throughout the poem
Representative of how she doesn’t think before she does what she is told
Mood/Tone
quite disturbing/absurd
