manhunt

Question 1

who was the manhunt written by?

Answer 1

Simon Armitage

Question 2

what are the three main themes of the manhunt?

Answer 2

• love and relationships
• pain and suffering
• effects of war

Question 3

what are the possible links?

Answer 3

• mametz wood (war and its effects/suffering)
• a wife in london (war and its effects, relationships
• Dulce et decorum est (war and its effects and suffering)
• cozy apologia (love and relationships)
• the soldier (war)
• she walks in beauty (love + how the lover’s body is presented)

Question 4

what is the poem about?

Answer 4

• written from perspective of wife (Laura Beddoes) getting to know her husband (eddie Beddoes)
• describes husband’s scars
• describes psychological effects of the war on Eddie

Question 5

why is the title the manhunt?

Answer 5

its a bit of a pun - manhunt means to literally search for and capture someone (usually a criminal), the wife is searching for her husband who seems figuratively lost to her

Question 6

what is the opening couplet?

Answer 6

After the first phase, / after passionate nights and intimate days

Question 7

what are the annotations for the first couplet?

Answer 7

the couplet could be the start of a traditional love poem, echoes the first stages of a new relationship and suggests the couple are reconnecting - shows the closeness between the husband and wife

Question 8

what are the two couplets that start the same?

Answer 8

‘only then would he let me trace / the frozen river which ran through his face,’
and
‘only then would he let me explore / the blown hinge of his lower jaw’

Question 9

what does the repetition of ‘only then would he let me …’ in the second and third couplets emphasise?

Answer 9

it emphasises that the soldier’s recovery is slow and painstaking

Question 10

what do the full rhymes in the first three couplets show?

Answer 10

it shows the closeness of the soldier and his wife and it sounds positive so it sounds like they’re making progress

Question 11

what are the annotations of the verbs ‘trace’ and ‘explore’ in the second and third stanzas? (and just generally the verbs in the couplets)

Answer 11

the verbs reflect the activities of the wife as she conducts her ‘search’, suggesting careful treatment of her husband, and may also imply that he is no longer familiar to her

Question 12

what does ‘the blown hinge of his lower jaw’ suggest?

Answer 12

the use of the metaphor suggests the jaw is broken physically and metaphorically. this may suggest that he is no longer open with her, perhaps unable to talk about his feelings and experiences

Question 13

what is the couplet describing his collar-bone?

Answer 13

‘and handle and hold / the damaged, porcelain collar-bone’

Question 14

what are the annotations of ‘the damaged, porcelain collar-bone,’?

Answer 14

the use of the metaphor implies that he is fragile and delicate. porcelain is often hard but can chip easily and is cold to the touch - possibly a reminder of the ‘frozen river which ran through his face’

Question 15

what is the couplet about his shoulder blade?

Answer 15

and mind and attend / the fractured rudder of shoulder-blade,

Question 16

what are the connotations of ‘and mind and attend’

Answer 16

‘mind’ and ‘attend’ are often related to medical attention, so it suggests the wife is attempting to heal her husband’

Question 17

what are the annotations of ‘ the fractured rudder of shoulder-blade’?

Answer 17

the ‘fractured rudder’ suggests that he can’t ‘steer’ himself - she has to guide him

Question 18

what is the couplet about his lung?

Answer 18

and finger and thumb / the parachute silk of his punctured lung

Question 19

what are the annotations of ‘the parachute silk of his punctured lung’?

Answer 19

parachutes are used in the military, but a broken parachute is useless - possibly how he feels about himself

Question 20

what do the images of the soldier’s damaged body highlight?

Answer 20

how fragile he is, and the fact that his body is broken down into a series of separate, broken objects suggests that war dehumanises people

Question 21

what idea does the repeated structure of ‘and handle and hold’, ‘and mind and attend’, and ‘and finger and thumb’ convey?

Answer 21

the two verbs in each stanza conveys the idea that she takes an active part in helping the soldier get better (and maybe the full rhyme at the final couplet suggests it helps?)

Question 22

what is the couplet about his ribs?

Answer 22

only then could i bind the struts / and climb the rungs of his broken ribs,

Question 23

what are the connotations of ‘only then could i bind the struts’?

Answer 23

• the personal pronoun shows wife is actively involved in husband’s recovery
• figurative language suggests she’s patching him up and helping him get stronger again

Question 24

what are the annotations of ‘and climb the rungs of his broken ribs’?

Answer 24

• comparing his ribs to rungs of a ladder implies that his recovery is a slow step-by-step process
• shows the wife’s effort

Question 25

what is the coupet about his heart?

Answer 25

and feel the hurt / of his grazed heart

Question 26

what kind of rhyme is there between 'hurt' and 'heart' and what could it reflect?

Answer 26

it's a half-rhyme, which could reflect that she's partially understood the link between his physical and emotional pain but there's still a way to go

Question 27

what are the annotations of 'of his grazed heart'?

Answer 27

double meaning - literally injured and metaphorically as he is unable to connect with his wife

Question 28

what are the two couplets about the bullet?

Answer 28

skirting along, / only then could i picture the scan, // the foetus of metal beneath his chest / where the bullet had finally come to rest.

Question 29

what are the annotations of 'the scan' and 'the foetus of metal'?

Answer 29

metaphor comparing the bullet to a foetus suggests that his experiences are now a part of him, and it could suggest that being injured is as life-changing as having children, and it also suggests that the 'foetus' feeds off him and takes his energy (and maybe that if it was left untreated it could grow into a bigger problem?)

Question 30

what is the coupet that links back to the 'frozen river'?

Answer 30

then i widened the search, / traced the scarring back to its source

Question 31

what is the annotation of 'traced the scarring back to its source'?

Answer 31

it is an extended metaphor - the wife has found the source of the 'river', she's moving closer to the cause of his suffering, but it also shows how he's still not better

Question 32

what are the two last couplets?

Answer 32

to a sweating, unexploded mine / buried deep in his mind, around which // every nerve in his body had tightened and closed. / Then, and only then, did i come close.

Question 33

what are the annotations of 'to a sweating, unexploded mine'?

Answer 33

- image of a sweating bomb shows the tension and stress that his memories cause, he may not have dealt with some parts of his experience bc the mine is 'unexploded' - the metaphor implies the source of the problem is mental not physical and threatens to cause problems at any time, perhaps the wife is trying to diffuse him, also highlights wife's care by the discovery of the problem and she has to tread carefully to not trigger his PTSD

Question 34

what are the annotations of 'buried deep in his mind'?

Answer 34

his emotional injuries are hidden - it's difficult to get to this part of him and that PTSD changes the way he thinks and reacts

Question 35

what does the enjambment of 'which // every' across the stanzas do?

Answer 35

it gives the poem a sense of movement and reflects the wife's desire to keep making progress, even if it's slow

Question 36

what are the annotations of 'Then, and only then, did i come close'?

Answer 36

- 'only then' is repeated four times in the poem which suggests that it is a slow process - it is the only sentence that lies on one line which gives emphasis to the wife's realisation that her husband's psychological scars are worse than his physical ones

Question 37

what is the rhyme of the last stanza and what does it do?

Answer 37

the last lines don't fully rhyme which gives the poem a muted ending - the speaker has made progress but can only 'come close'

Question 38

what parts of his body are described as injured in the poem? (and what order?)

Answer 38

- face - jaw - collar-bone - shoulder-blade - lung - ribs - heart - mind

Question 39

what are the main feelings/attitudes of the poem?

Answer 39

- love - patience - pain

Question 40

what are the annotations of 'every nerve in his body had tightened and closed'?

Answer 40

suggests he is cut off from other people

Question 41

what does the rhyme breaking down do?

Answer 41

shows the distance between the couple and reflects the theme of brokenness

Question 42

what war did Eddie Beddoes fight in?

Answer 42

the Bosnian war

Question 43

what was Eddie Beddoes' job before the war?

Answer 43

UN peacekeeper