First Death in Nova Scotia

Question 1

How has this poem been written? (format, tense, etc…)

Answer 1

The poem is written in free verse, with no rhyme scheme and is in the past tense

Question 2

What is this poem about?

Answer 2

It is an extraordinarily vivid memory of a disturbing experience in which Bishop recounts the circumstances of an even younger cousin’s death. This takes place at the boy’s wake

Question 3

How is a dreamlike atmosphere created in the first stanza?

Answer 3

Fragmented memories of unfamiliar objects add to the dreamlike atmosphere

Question 4

what happens in the first stanza?

Answer 4

‘First Death in Nova Scotia’ begins with an introduction to the setting and location. The speaker’s mother has taken her to a “cold, cold parlor” in which the speaker’s young cousin, Arthur has been “laid out.”

Question 5

What is the significance of this experience in Bishop’s life?

Answer 5

This was her first introduction to death. The poem illustrates how a child’s death can profoundly unsettle other children, prompting their first realization that life comes to a permanent end.

Question 6

What do all the poem’s descriptions stress? (2) (in terms of Arthur and then Bishop)

Answer 6

The poem’s descriptions stress the small size, vulnerability and fragility of Arthur’s body, while capturing the innocent speaker’s struggle to come to grips with his passing.

Question 7

In the cold, cold _______
My mother _____ out Arthur

Answer 7

In the cold, cold parlor
My mother laid out Arthur

Question 8

Below them on the ______
Stood a stuffed _____
Shot and _______ by Uncle
Arthur, Arthur’s _______.

Answer 8

Below them on the table
Stood a stuffed loon
Shot and stuffed by Uncle
Arthur, Arthur’s father.

Question 9

what are chromographs?

Answer 9

coloured copies of pictures

Question 10

what is a loon?

Answer 10

an aquatic diving bird

Question 11

What does the 2nd stanza deal with?

Answer 11

It focuses on the young narrator’s fixation with the stuffed bird. The child becomes increasingly unsettled

Question 12

Why does young Bishop focus on the dead loon?

Answer 12

By thinking hard about the death of this ‘cold and caressable loon’, she is trying to find a possible explanation for death

Question 13

What is the importance of the ‘red glass eyes’ in the stuffed loon?

Answer 13

They fascinate the young girl and provide an escape from the sight of her cousin’s body in the casket.

Question 14

Trace the description of the loon in the second stanza

Answer 14

Somewhere in the child’s imagination, cousin Arthur and the personified bird become closely associated as both share an unyielding cold stillness, suggested by the ‘marble-topped table’ which is compared to a ‘white, frozen lake’

Question 15

quote where the loon and Arthur become closely associated

Answer 15

“On his white, frozen lake,
The marble-topped table.” is describing the loon in the 2nd verse

Question 16

What is the colour of desire?

Answer 16

red

Question 17

Since Uncle Arthur ______
A ______ into him,
He hadn’t said a ______.

Answer 17

Since Uncle Arthur fired
A bullet into him,
He hadn’t said a word.

Question 18

a

Answer 18

a

Question 19

His ______ was deep and ______,
Cold and __________;
His eyes were ____ glass,
Much to be ________.

Answer 19

His breast was deep and white,
Cold and caressable;
His eyes were red glass,
Much to be desired.

Question 20

Describe the appearance of the stuffed loon using quotes

Answer 20

His breast was deep and white,
Cold and caressable;
His eyes were red glass,
Much to be desired.

Question 21

How is Arthur’s body described to be small and fragile throughout the poem? (6)

Answer 21

The speaker’s mother calls Arthur the speaker’s “little cousin,” for example, and he is junior to his father, also named Arthur. The speaker herself describes Arthur as “very small” and “doll”-like, with a “tiny lily” and a coffin like a “little frosted cake.”

Question 22

“Come and say _____-___
To your little _______ Arthur.”

Answer 22

“Come and say good-bye
To your little cousin Arthur.”

Question 23

and given
One ____ of the _______
To put in Arthur’s _______.

Answer 23

and given
One lily of the valley
To put in Arthur’s hand.

Question 24

Arthur’s ______ was
A little ________ _____,
And the ____-eyed loon eyed it
From his white, _______ lake.

Answer 24

Arthur’s coffin was
A little frosted cake,
And the red-eyed loon eyed it
From his white, frozen lake.

Question 25

Give the quote describing Arthur’s coffin and the loon

Answer 25

Arthur’s coffin was
A little frosted cake,
And the red-eyed loon eyed it
From his white, frozen lake.

Question 26

What was young Bishop given to put in Arthur’s hand?

Answer 26

‘one lily of the valley
to put in Arthur’s hand’

Question 27

What is there to note about the mother’s beckoning to Bishop:
“Come,” said my mother,
“Come and say good-bye
To your little cousin Arthur.”

Answer 27

her mother’s insistent invitation is chillingly remote

Question 28

Give a quote to shows young Bishop’s vulnerability in this poem.

Answer 28

“I was lifted up”
she was forced to place the flower in Arthur’s hand.

Question 29

Write a note on the following quote: (refer to imagery)
“Arthur’s coffin was
A little frosted cake,”

Answer 29

This a poignant and childlike image, she compares her cousin’s coffin to a little frosted cake

Question 30

What is unsettling about the 3rd stanza? Quote

Answer 30

The mood turns progressively surreal when the nervous narrator imagines the stuffed bird as a predator (“the red-eyed loon eyed it”)

Question 31

How does Bishop see the loon as in the third stanza?

Answer 31

a predator looming down on the little white coffin

Question 32

How does Bishop describe her dead cousin in the 4th stanza?

Answer 32

Arthur was very small.
He was all white, like a doll
That hadn’t been painted yet.

Question 33

Arthur was very ______.
He was all ______, like a ____
That hadn’t been ________ yet.

Answer 33

Arthur was very small.
He was all white, like a doll
That hadn’t been painted yet.

Question 34

Jack Frost had started to _____ him
The way he always ________
The ______ Leaf (Forever).

Answer 34

Jack Frost had started to paint him
The way he always painted
The Maple Leaf (Forever).

Question 35

He had just ______ on his _____,
A few ____ strokes, and then
Jack Frost had ________ the brush
And left him ______, forever.

Answer 35

He had just begun on his hair,
A few red strokes, and then
Jack Frost had dropped the brush
And left him white, forever.

Question 36

through Bishop’s childlike description of her dead cousin, what theme does this highlight?

Answer 36

childhood innocence

Question 37

How does Bishop convey childhood innocence in this poem?

Answer 37

By using the simplest of language to describe her deceased cousin

Question 38

How is death portrayed in this poem?

Answer 38

As powerful. its description of a bird “shot and stuffed” by his father frames death as violent and pitiless—something that can abruptly destroy vulnerable creatures, including kids.

Question 39

How does the loon appear to be untouched by death and time?

Answer 39

Even though he is cold, he is caressable, even though his eyes are red and made of glass, they are desired. This speaker is seeing a creature that appears to be untouched by death. The loon is frozen in time, untroubled by age or disease or emotion.

Question 40

What does young Bishop’s personification of the loon tell us/emphasise?

Answer 40

She is imbuing the bird with the possibility of speech and action. This may be a childlike fantasy, imagining this animal with the ability to pass judgement, but it emphasises the childhood imagination and innocence she once had.

Question 41

What does a lily symbolise?

Answer 41

The lily of the valley is often used allegorically to symbolize death, it is a proper choice for a funeral.

Question 42

How do the chromographs of the royals contrast Arthur and the setting?

Answer 42

“The gracious royal couples
Were warm in red and ermine;”
Her fantasy’s warmth contrasts with the poem’s prior cold.
“Red and ermine” Are warm colours.
“White” is cold. But this fantasy is only temporary.

Question 43

Why is the Jack Frost imagery significant?

Answer 43

This creative stream of consciousness highlights the child’s efforts to make sense of death’s mysterious reality.
she tries to relate Arthur’s pallor to what little she knows about the world. But to the mature reader, her naive impressions only convey the terrible, pitiable reality of a child’s dead body.

Question 44

What does Young Bishop’s imagination lead to believe the cause of her cousin’s death was?

Answer 44

With a renewed burst of imagination, she creates her own ‘story’ to explain what has happened to him.
His death must have been caused by the winter frost that ‘paints’ the autumn leaves, including the familiar maple leaf.

Question 45

What does Bishop finally imagine her cousin as in the end? What is the predicament?

Answer 45

He was seen to be ‘the smallest page at court’ but how could go when ‘his eyes were shut up so tight, and the roads deep in snow?”

Question 46

They ________ Arthur to be
The _________ page at ______.
But how could Arthur go,
___________ his tiny lily,
With his eyes _____ up so _____
And the roads ______ in snow?

Answer 46

They invited Arthur to be
The smallest page at court.
But how could Arthur go,
Clutching his tiny lily,
With his eyes shut up so tight
And the roads deep in snow?

Question 47

What does the poem’s final image reflect for the first time in Bishop?

Answer 47

The tender image reflects both the child’s naivety and genuine concern for her cousin. ironically, all around are images of immortality - the heavenly royal images of Arthur’s entrance into a new, more glorious life. But the narrator’s enduring uncertainty remains central to the poem.

Question 48

What is the significance of the royal family and Arthur as a page at court in the end? What does this show about Bishop’s thoughts? How is she understanding this?

Answer 48

Again the speaker immerses us in her childhood thoughts and perspective.
Too young to understand better, she associates the pomp and ceremony of the pictures of the British royal family with the ceremony surrounding the death of her young cousin.
She thinks her cousin has been invited to join them, but – not wholly comprehending that his life is over – speculates that Arthur doesn’t seem in fit shape to be a page at the court.

Question 49

What is the emphasis in the last line?
“And the roads deep in snow?”

Answer 49

“The roads deep in snow” reminds us that we’re in the midst of a Canadian winter. It also closes the poem on a chilly image of stasis and frustration, appropriate given that the subject is the death of a child.

Question 50

“And the ______ deep in ______?”

Answer 50

“And the roads deep in snow?”

Question 51

“The ________ royal couples
Were warm in red and ______;”

Answer 51

“The gracious royal couples
Were warm in red and ermine;”