In Mrs Tilcher's Class Flashcards
“You could travel up the Blue Nile with your finger”
“You” - Personal pronoun– creates a chatty tone/engages the reader
“Travel up the Blue Nile” - Metaphor – compares children’s journey growing up with an adventure along the Nile. Long sentence – mirrors the long journey children take through childhood.
“while Mrs Tilscher chanted the scenery”
“Chanted” - Word choice - Happy, singing voice of Mrs T. Connotations of casting a spell
“Tana. Ethiopia. Khartoum. Aswan.”
List of one word sentences - mimic the patient way that Mrs T pauses after saying things in class
“That for an hour, then a skittle of milk”
“That for an hour,” - Chatty tone - Also shows day is broken down.
“skittle of milk” - Metaphor - compares milk bottles to bowling pins, suggests fun and excitement of time spent in Mrs T’s class.
“and the chalky Pyramids rubbed into dust.”
“chalky Pyramids rubbed into dust.” - Suggests magical, passing of time, something ending and being lost
“A window opened with a long pole.”
Personification poem from imagination to reality.
“The laugh of a bell swung by a running child.”
“The laugh of a bell” - Personification - projecting the child’s laughter onto it, which creates a happy atmosphere, establish an uplifting and carefree world, where children are free to grow and find themselves within a nurturing setting.
“This was better than home. Enthralling books.”
“This was better than home.” - Short sentence - suggests safety/Happiness Informal tone.
“Enthralling books.” - Word choice - suggests interested/absorbed by the learning/literature. Short sentence emphasises the strength of their feeling.
“The classroom glowed like a sweetshop.”
Simile – temptation, wonder and delight, trigger interest and imagination
“Sugar paper. Coloured shapes. Brady and Hindley faded, like a faint uneasy smudge of a mistake.”
“Sugar paper. Coloured shapes.” - Short sentence/list – describe setting, transport to magical world.
“Brady and Hindley faded, like a faint uneasy smudge of a mistake.” - Juxtaposition of security and danger of the moors murderers. Simile – power of loving environment, removes fear.
“Mrs Tilscher loved you. Some mornings, you found she’d left a good gold star by your name.”
“good gold star” - Word choice - suggests positive atmosphere, sense of magic, link to setting. The kids want to earn her approval.
“The scent of a pencil, slowly, carefully, shaved.”
List of adverbs - prolong the line, mimicking the slow act of sharpening a pencil, a universal memory of childhood
“A xylophone’s nonsense heard from another form.”
“xylophone’s nonsense” - Personification - implies that it hasn’t been mastered yet but sounds fun and appealing.
“Over the Easter term, the inky tadpoles changed from commas into exclamation marks.”
“Over the Easter term,” - Word choice - a time of growth and regeneration, signals a turning point in the poem and the speaker’s growth.
“inky tadpoles changed from commas into exclamation marks.” - Metaphor – represents children growing up. Punctuation links to growing up and links to setting and learning.
“Three frogs hopped in the playground, freed by a dunce,”
“Hopped” - Word choice – games and enjoyment.
“Dunce” - Word choice – stupid person, old fashioned.
“followed by a line of kids, jumping and croaking”
“Jumping and croaking” - Word choice – link to boys’ voices breaking through comparison to frogs.
“away from the lunch queue. A rough boy told you how you were born.”
“A rough boy told you how you were born.” - Word Choice - suggest sheltered background, snobbish behaviour, immature, lack of knowledge of the world. Links to growing up and gaining knowledge of sex. Enjambment emphasises the shock and horror felt.
“You kicked him, but stared at your parents, appalled, when you got back home.
“You kicked him,” - short sentence - evokes her disbelief and perhaps her fear of the unknown Word choice suggests violence, childish reaction, unable to deal with feelings effectively at this stage in the speaker’s development.
“Appalled,” - Word choice - and parenthesis places the word in the middle of the line, adding emphasis to her horror as her familiar and safe world disintegrates in front of her eyes. Complex sentence to highlight the complex thoughts of the reader.
“That feverish July, the air tasted of electricity.”
“Feverish july” - Transferred epithet
“Air tasted of electricity” - synothesia - her senses are muddled
“A tangible alarm made you always untidy, hot, fractious under the heavy, sexy sky.”
“Untidy, hot, fractious” - List - emphasises rising emotions.
“Heavy. Sexy sky.” - Sibilance - Rising sexual awareness of the kids.
You asked her how you were born and Mrs Tilscher smiled, then turned away.”
“Mrs Tilscher smiled,” - distancing over time, doesn’t have every answer.
“Then turned away” - Sentence structure - Enjambment breaks the sentence over two lines to add a pause and emphasise Mrs T’s reaction to the question.
“reports were handed out.”
“Reports” - marks the end of term.
“You ran through the gates, impatient to be grown.”
“Impatient to be grown,” - Tone - anticipation for what’s to come
“as the sky split open into a thunderstorm.”
“Sky split” - Word choice - alliteration, pathetic fallacy
“Into a thunderstorm” - Word choice - referring to the turbulent times of adolescence ahead.
