FG Poem Summaries Flashcards
The Long Queen
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Structural Features
Context
AO5
The Long Queen
Poem summaries: presents a patron saint of women, on the bais of Queen Elizabeth I
Themes:
* Motherhood - “No girl was born who wasn’t the Long Queen’s child” “Lie on birthing beds, push till the room screamed scarlet + children bawled + slithered into their arms”
* **Female suffering **- “When a girl first bled to be insignficant, no cause for complaint”, “Tears”
* **Female empowerment/solidarity **- “taken Time for a husband” (time is personified to emphasise it’s importance over men) “Women, girls, spinsters, hags” (asyndetic listing)
Language
* Semantic field of tales (“stories, true or flase” “gossip, scandal or anecdote, secrets” “teller of tall tales”)
* Amplified by anaphora of phrase “some said” - mystery, encourages reader to question the **rumours we’ve heard about women **
* Life cycle presented in the four assertions/ laws: **childhood, blood, tears, childbirth - idea that women are united by ‘universal law of feminity’
* Summative and syncretic language
* Women who are powerful are destined to be miserable - woman’s lack of children and sadness under the crown “Cold weight of the crown”
* “Pain when a girl first bled to be insignificant” - suggests the importance of having children, dye to a woman’s cycle being presented as insignificant
* The Queen is presented as the queen of women - she is maternal and is presented as the mother of her country**
Context: Queen Elizabeth I, ‘virgin queen’ - ‘married her country’. Marriage was expected for women in 16th century.
New Historicist AO5: Duffy subverts the** typical renaissance idealisation of Queen Elizabeth I** and women by allowing women to** break free of patriarchal ties**
The Diet
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Structural Features
The Diet
Poem Summary: Depicts** insecurity within women**, struggling to keep identity when conforming to societies demands. Explores the maxim ‘inside every fat woman is a thin one trying to get out”
Themes:
* Identity
* Media/society
* Female Body
Language
* “The wind blew her away”, “seed small”, hypophora ‘What passed her lips? Air,/water’ portrays women as externally linked to natural regardless of if they are pressured by or excluded from society - thus the feminine seems eternally linked to nature
* Asyndetic listing-theme of restriction, breathless pace depicts sense of struggle (sibilance=hissing of media)
* Semantic field of death, violent metaphor “had guns for hips”,”her skeleton preened under its tight flesh dress” - emphasises the severity of anorexia
* Fairytale allusions to Alice in Wonderland - unlike Alice she won’t return to her true self
2nd Half=fanatastical imagery of the girl shrinking shifts to **imagery of binging **
* Each stanza finishes with a short line which continues to the next stanza- reflects starvation
* Terms of address: ‘Anorexia’s true daughter’, ‘tiny others’, ‘the Fat Woman’ - sees people defined by their size
Structure
* Cyclical structure-ends up in same body showing impossiblity of society’s expectations
* Enjambment, internal rhyme + listing - fast and deliberately irritating tone - adds to sense of fantasy
Anon
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Structural Features
Context
Anon
Poem Summary: Speaker explores the experiences of undefined women. Explores idea that anonymous female writing is often hidden/ unidentified female writers
Themes:
* Feminine voice-not expressed verbally through ‘pen’ ‘passed on like a baton’
* Feminine inheritance-social or cultural presence which has gone unrecorded across time but eternal - ‘down through the years’
* Female role in society - **anaphora of ‘maybe’ **(‘maybe a nurse, a nanny,/maybe a nun’) - all jobs are caring for another - lack of independence
* Yet inanimate desk personified ‘it cleared its throat/as though it had something/to get off its chest’. Social pressure cause women to ‘packed it all in,/ the best verb, the right noun’ despite **superlatives showing talent **
Language
Indefinite pronoun “she” - unidentified, symbolic of female recording thoughout history **
* Extended metaphor/allegory for women across time as one **
* Play on words (“Anon”)- symbolic personification of abstract concept + impossibility to overcome issue - women have been neglected despite being incredibly important voices
* Personification of the “skull on a shelf” - imagery of concealment, representative of all women
* Similie “how she passed on her pen like a baton” - past writers passing on responsbility to next gen of women
* **“Nonny” **- nonsense expression - **foolish not to listen to women **
Structure
* Humorous tone + informal style
* Written in anecdotes
* Simplistic word play - opposing serious subject - playful tone
* Ony Anon + Sub use 1st person in first half of collection
* Dashes reflect how **women’s voices are regulalry cut off **
Context: Female writers often had to use pseudo names to get published or would have their books banned - women were denied education so often had to **pass things down orally **
The Woman Who Shopped
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Context
The Woman Who Shopped
Poem Summary: Duffy exlores **dehumanising effects of consumerist society **when material goods are viewed as **more important than human interaction **
Themes:
* Consumerism
* Female Body
* History
* Tranformation
Language
* Crossing over time periods (transcends) representation of all women **
* Repetition of verb “wanted” **combined with **sematic field of gambling **
* **Extended metaphor - her becoming the source of her acquisitions **
Sexual imagery - poem ends with vulgur term “crowds would queue overnight at her cunt”
Structure
* Caesura -** inability to stop shopping, overwhelming fast pace
* NO puncutation throughout + lack of rhyme conveys manic, obsessive tone reflecting speaker’s mind, after volta pace slows (sense of permanence**)
* Volta-abruptly shifts to darker surreal imagery of the woman **hyperbolically transforming into a shop **
* 4 Line Stanzas - controlled, suggesting the rigid, compulsive nature of shopping
Context - **Attacks commodifcation of beauty through capitalism **
White Writing
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Structural Features
Context
AO5
White Writing
Poem Summary: Speaker creates their own ceremony to marry their same sex lover. Autobiographical narrative showing the** struggle of being accepted as a homosexual individual**
Themes:
* Marriage
* Female Empowerment
Language
* Motif/refrain- “I write them in white” - colour connotations of purity but also of** invisibility + secrecy = opportunities are metaphorically invisible**
* Links to ephemeral imagery ‘words on the wind’, ‘inked water in moonlight’ - could reflect how lesbian relationships have no place in traditional society thus not recognised.
* Light imagery - “your soul a flame”, “see last gold sun” - romantic imagery depicts a passionate love despite **society’s restricitons/prejudices **
Structure:
* Free verse-no rules or boundaries
* Quatrains - systematic feel - wedding ceremony
* Each stanza references to the challenges faced: restriction on love, lack of religious support, lack of laws from gov, lack of advice from education + parents, criticism of media
* Quatrains represent stable foundation of relationhsip- society doesn’t need to give couple stability
* Irregular rhyme - future is unstable
* Repetition of “I write them white” - homosyllabic statement - plays on words
Context = LGBT people are criminalised - ** 74 countries still illegalise homosexuality**. Duffy draws from personal expience to highlight the ongoing injustices that still exist in our society
A05: Helene Cixous wrote ‘In White Ink’ - due to how women’s voices are unheard within society. Cixous presents the idea that ‘women write in white’ - there** ideas have always been present, but not recorded**
Loud
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Strutctural Features
Context
AO5
Loud
Poem Summary: a woman’s voice become a powerful force against ‘the News’ - may be metaphor for women (possibly autobiographical) success in their careers and thus soceity
Themes:
* Female voice
* Female empowerment via transformation
Language
* Begins with news report-violent imagery of war, captures attention same way headlines do
* Similie “like a firework, with a terrible sulphurous crack” - aural + violent imagery of finding voice
* Personifies the media - criticism of its priorities then personifies her voice “stomp[ing] through the city” in a fairytale setting
* Natural imagery throughout - rage of indivudal woman is a force of nature-addresses taboo of being loud
Structure
* Cyclical-nothing changed, still a lack of female voice in politics
* Women not given a voice despite their efforts in a deteriorating society
* Listing-chant getting louder + faster parallel to female voies getting stronger
Context: Women’s voices have been suppressed throughout history - Feminist AO5 - female emancipation from a patriarchal society
*Marxist AO5 *- there is an emotional disconnect between people in the news and those who watch it.
Tall
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Strucutral Features
Context
AO5
Tall
Poem Summary: The difficulty of female upward social mobility, the inability for women to fit in, or that empowering oneself can mean a sacrifice as well as gain. Duffy constructs a fabe like character designed to parody the** social theory of reflexivity**
Themes:
* Female empowerment + transformation
* Female isolation
Language
* Leit motif - “like a christening gift” **religious offering is offered as explanation for tallness, puts pressure on “woman” to live up to potential
* Links to religious imagery** (simile** ‘like a christening gift**’,‘she knelt as if she were praying for rain
* The protagonist is presented as a god like figure due to unnatural height
* “She stooped low + caught their souls in her hands as they fell from the burning towers - contextual links to 9/11
Structure
* “Day one,day two,day six” = echoes creating of the earth suggests woman is a gift from nature
* Enjambment and monosyllabic sentences
Context = Tallness is stereotypically masculine + viewed as positive. Feminists believe** all women have been classified as ‘other’ + suffer stigmatisation** in their daily lives
Postmodernism AO5 - aware of societal pressures, abstract ideas, conflict with identity
Feminist AO5 - Conceit of a woman’s height as a representation of status
The Virgins Memo
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Structural Features
Context
The Virgins Memo
Poem Summary: A short note written from the perspective of the virgin Mary giving advice to her son Jesus. **Questions male creation
**
Themes:
* Motherhood
* Religion
Language
* Parenthesis “(text illegible)” “(untranslatable)” - hints at illiteracy - women are voiceless + uneducated.
* Links to Bible + how it’s easily misread/distorted
* “Giraffe” - Freudian perspective, phallic symbol (masculine)
* “Memo”- insignificance contrasted by “gospel” - reflect female desire to **challenge deep rooted misogyny **
* Overwhelming **negative language **- reflects way women were treated
Structure
Inconsistent pace stuttering sections where enjambment speeds up
* Stream of consciousness style - **lack of grammar
* Memorandum - idea of passing thought** also makes poem seem less important
* Sections are illegible (how easily women’s voices are ignored) + vaired short lines (women ridiculed for speaking at large)
Context = Challenge traditional male ideas that** women should be denied a voice **- **challenge deep rooted misogyny ** - lack of women presented in the Bible
Work
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Strucutral Features
Context
A05
Work
Poem Summary: Duffy tells of a woman who endures to** care for her multiplying children**. Though capable, as sole providers for children women are put under excessive pressure, shows how women are both responsible for + victims of production.
Themes:
- Self sacrifice: the speaker is willing to work ‘to the bone’ to care for her children, willing to ‘put in/a 90-hour week’ and** ‘scattered the teeth in her head for grain’**
- Transformation: the children multiply from ‘one’ to ‘a thousand more’ to ‘a billion’ and mother transforms from individual to matneral deity figure
- Capitalism: ‘she worked at home’ to ‘she worked outside’ then Industrial Revolution work ‘was factory gates’ - she later goes on ‘she built streets’ ‘‘cities grew’
Language
* Lexical field of domesticity (“washing, ironing, sewing”) - women weren’t expected to work in public domain but always work in private sphere
* Contrasts later imagery “she trawled the seas, felled trees, grazed beef” - global scale, hints at environmental effects of production
* Parrallels of “to feed two” “to feed fifty” “to feed more,more” “her offspring swelled”- metaphorically transforms into mother of the world and sacrifices herself
* Hyperbole hints at speed of population growth
* Deathly imagery in final quatrain “sicken, died, lay in a grave, worked, to the bone” = ends not with celebratory view of motherhood but a result of a womans hard work. Only passive in death. Shows she is a victim as well as responsible for destruction
Structure
* Relatively quick pace (rhymes in close proxmity, rapid listing +** enjambment reflects speed of population growth**)
* Transcending time = women going throughout history + doing jobs for everybody
Context:** Increasing pressure** it takes on as a result of unsustainable expansion and development - current level and pace of development is dangerous and destructive
*Marxist AO5 *- working class have been overworked + how working-class women have been forced to take on the burden of unpaid labour to keep society running
Gambler
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Strucutral Features
Context
Gambler
Poem Summary: The process of writing poetry is expressed through gambling
Themes:
* Gender equality: feminine poetry is equated to masculine gambling
Language
* Italicised repetion of “Indiannectar. Indiannectar.” - italicised repetition + pause = indluging in language
* Conceit of gambling as the process of writing poetry: ‘names she ticks’and ‘she sits […] writing the poems of bets’- makes the poem metafictional
* Semantic field of poetry: ‘sound of words’, ‘the form’ “breath of a word” “two syllables”
* Frequent proper nouns: ‘Indian Nectar’, ‘Heiress of Meath, Birth of the Blue’ all real life horses but may be utilised for their connotations of stereotypical feminine gender roles . BUT speaker only puts money on those associated with men
Structure
* Unequal line lengths-represents **inequality of wins **+ loses in gamblling, could also hint at inequality of men + women
* Commentary tone = lack of punctuation + enjambment creates a fast pace = excitement
* Enjambment - the feminist movement is a natural process that cannot be stopped
Context: The suffragettes fought for women’s right to vote. Emily Davison jumped in front of a horse- died to fight for their rights
History
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Strucutral Features
Context
AO5
History
Poem Summary: Examination of modern polemic neglect. Physcial personifcation of female history allows Duffy to deduce that it’s** non- existent**
Themes:
* Time/History as** cyclical and fated- anaphora** of ‘how the saints whistled and spat in the flames,/how the dictator […] blew out his brains’
* Frequent internal rhyme ‘brains’ ‘trains’
* Feminine Abuse
Language
* Hyperbole = the persona, an elderly lady, has given up every domestic grace + has decayed into slovenly living + dying health (“nightdress smelling of pee”) - grotesque imagery mixed with domestic imagery (vulnerability)
* Personification of history (‘she was History”) biblical allusion anchors reader into history
* “His mother” = only female figure but even she acts as **passive observer **
* Asyndetic listing of wars “Babi Yar, Vietnam”
* Persona shifts her nostalgic visions to **more modern events **
* “She woke up again, cold, in the dark, in the empty house” - violent dynamic verbs, haunting reality of persona (elderly left to die alone)
Structure
* Enjambment + caeasura = endless suffering, creates stuttering rhythm (internal rhyme)
* Centuries - represents centuries of **evil and suffering unleashed **by men = women’s suffering
Context = Female persona observes historical acts of savagery but even in her dreams she doesn’t intervene, remains passive. Duffy attempts to share blame with women + motivate to make change
New Historicist AO5 - critique of the past + aware of isolation
Sub
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Strucutral Features
Context
AO5
Sub
Poem Summary: Woman undertakes the roles of men in historically significant events, allowing Duffy to argue women could have done the same with additional suffering but were denied the opportunity
Themes
* **Female empowerment **
* Unity between genders as a solution
Language
* Positive female imagery = menstruation motif (“cup-tampon” “blood and soap suds mingled to pink”, **“precious egg”) - suffering as minor entity
* Metamorphisis = omnisicnet protagonist becomes “Ringo” -mocking tone, diminishing significance of the male achievements
* Maternal imagery - “I felt the first kick of my child”, “motherhood kept me busy at home” **- restrictive, **not regarded as achievement next to male events (juxtaposes masculine sporting imagery**)
Structure
* Upbeat tone in term of collection as it comes to end of 1st section -celebration of female achievement
* Each (conventional) **stanza represents woman’s life experiences **developing (“time of the month” “motherhood” )
* First Person - only one woman in the world
Context = Exclusion of women within history . Alludes to **1921 when women were banned from playing football**. Motherhood not being regarded as an achievement - it holds women back, but **fatherhood doesn’t stop men flying
**
New Historicist AO5 - stream of consciousness + alienation
Beautiful
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Strucutral Features
Context
AO5
Beautiful
Poem Summary: Series of women appear to be manifestations of the same being, defined only by their ability to excite the desire of men. Four famous women depicted embody beauty
Themes
* History/time
* Female body
* Tranformation
Language
* Motif of “beauty is fame” (shifts slightly for each woman-“beauty is fate” “tough beauty”) alludes to destined suffering that descends on a woman famous for beauty **
* Media - onatmatopeoic “cameras gibbered away” before brief sardonic phrasing/course aggressive language “give us a smile cunt”**
Structure
* Single narrative as if all the same character presents archetype of sought after feminine beauty, significance of male gaze across history hasn’t changed
* Free verse, sudden use of clear tetrameter **
* Frequent internal rhyme, crowding of caesura’s + listing = hectic pace**
* Mock epic form
**
Context:
1. Helen of Troy = known as ‘the face that launched a thousand ships’
2. Cleopatra = Sleeping with Caesar (political alliance/gain) + Anthony (romance, love, attraction). Snakebite - her tragic ending
3. Marilyn = Arthur Miller (sense of person not coping**). Like Helen - no one really knows truth of her story
4. Diana = Broke AIDs stigma - moral figurehead as well as beautiful - “the people’s princess”
New Historicist AO5: **Subverts the concept of beauty **as proposed in Petrarchan sonnets
The Map Women
Key Themes
Key Language Features
Key Strucutral Features
Context
AO5
The Map Woman
Poem Summary: Deals with ideas about personal growth and identity, using an extended metaphor of a womans skin being etched with a map of her past
Themes
* Identity
* Female Suffering
* Female body
Language
* Extended metaphor of a map-representing the woman’s identity which is tied to **specific places and buildings **
* Stanza 12: Nature (“her skin slough[ing] likes a snake’s” - amplified by sibilance - symbolism of her finding own **sense of individuality **
* Asyndetic listing of clothing -desperate to hide her identity
* Shifts to luxrious imagery (“satin, silk”) but they’re peripheral + meaningless can’t escape self (“the map perspire under”)
Structure
* Free verse -** internal rhymes + half rhymes** (conveying a barely contained imagery)
* Anapestic tetrameter - rapid driving pace (galloping tempo)
* Enjambment = shows freedom within the poem which constrasts constraints explored
Context = Proper nouns – “The Beatles”, “Dustin Hoffman” these cultural references of pop culture are from the post-war era of the 50s and 60s
New Historicist AO5 : Metaphysical - poem is a conceit. Thomas Hardy - used landscape to reflect the story. Is the Map-Woman the landscape or is the landscape her?
Postmodernism AO5 - pastiche, response to gender roles, deals with isolation.
