Half-past Two

Question 1

Meaning

Answer 1

The poem “Half-past Two” by U.A. Fanthorpe explores a child’s loss of innocence and the disconnect between adult and childhood concepts of time, highlighting the impact of societal norms on young minds.

Question 2

Structure

Answer 2

-Fairy tale opening
- free verse contrasted by regular stanzas
-free Indirect speech
-bracket speech (omniscient narrator)
-capitalisation of words

Question 3

Fairy tale like opening

Answer 3

-Establishes the tone of the poem, as well as presenting it as a traditional morality narrative, with the antagonist being the teacher
-allusion

Question 4

Free verse contrasted by regular stanzas

Answer 4

-Shows how we are trapped within time, whatever we do we can never escape the boundaries of time
-shows the difference between the child and the teacher(he doesn’t know time so he isn’t controlled by it)

Question 5

Free Indirect speech

Answer 5

We get the perspective of the boy but possibly from a later date

Question 6

Omniscient narrator (brackets)

Answer 6

Possibly the inputs of the boy when he is an adult, who narrates the story

Question 7

Capitalisation of words

Answer 7

Highlights the teacher’s authority

Question 8

Imagery

Answer 8

-teacher scuttling
-anaphora, into the
-day dream description

Question 9

Teacher scuttling

Answer 9

-Zoomorphism
-portays her as an animal
-creates a further sense that she in an antagonist
-dehumanises her

Question 10

Anaphora,‘into the’

Answer 10

-Makes the reader read the stanza in a dreamy way highlighting the fact it is a day dream
-anaphoric tetra colon
-impossible to go into a small or noise, and so cause the reader to create impossible visuals in their head

Question 11

Day dream description

Answer 11

-creates an impossible mental image

Question 12

Language

Answer 12

-compound words
-epiphora of time
-‘escaped into the clock less land forever’

Question 13

Compound words

Answer 13

-conveys youth and inexperience
-portrays the child’s perception of time
-shows his reinterpretation of the adult concept

Question 14

Epiphora of time

Answer 14

-monotony
-contasts with previous stanza, feels for rigid less free

Question 15

‘Escaped into the clock less land forever’

Answer 15

-Escaped suggests relief
-clock less land forever, irony clock less forever, shows show even the narrator cannot describe what it is like without time