Material Flashcards
1
Q
What is the extended metaphor used in Material?
A
Handkerchiefs
2
Q
“Hanky queen”
A
- oxymoronic metaphor
- highlights mother as both respected and down to earth
3
Q
Why is “paper tissues” from “late night garages” juxtaposed with “things of cloth” for “waving out the trains”?
A
- speaker contrasts temporary and generic modern world with a romantic and meaningful past
4
Q
“Spittled and scrubbed against my face”
A
- sibilance highlights the embodiment of the mothers hands-on and practical love
5
Q
“Farm” up her sleeve “where dried up hankies fall in love”
A
- highlights mother as a nurturing, loving figure
6
Q
“Greengrocer George with his dodgy foot” and “Mrs White, with painted talons”
A
- refers to the pat
- past was defined by community and friendliness
- this is later contrasted with the generic and impersonal modern world
7
Q
When and why is the regular structure broken in Material?
A
- broken when reminiscing the past (stanza’s 5 and 6)
- octave stanza structure and regular rhyme scheme disappears
- speaker becomes lost in the evocative memories of the bygone era
8
Q
“Nostalgia only makes me old”
A
- although looking back is seductive speaker finds her own place in the modern world
9
Q
How is there a shift in the final stanza of Material?
A
- short in voice as the speaker imagines her mothers words
- “this is your material // to do with, daughter, what you will”
10
Q
What does the regular rhyme scheme suggest?
A
- suggestive of a more formal era
- perhaps also suggesting the constraints that the past still has on the speaker
