on her blindness Flashcards
How is the title significant?
The title is an adaptation of a sonnet by John Milton, titled ‘On His Blindness’. The poem speaks about how through blindness, Milton ultimately felt closer to God, an idea that Thorpe rebuffs
‘My mother could…
…not bear being blind, to be honest’
What is the AO2? ‘My mother could not bear being blind, to be honest’
The use of plosive alliteration emphasises his forceful rejection of artificial ideas about suffering. ‘To be honest’ highlights the poem as a stark and brutally frank depiction of suffering
How is formal language used?
‘One shouldn’t say it’, ‘one tends to hear’ - repetition of formal pronoun suggests there is a sense of reserved formality and detachment to how we discuss death and suffering
‘catastrophic…
…handicaps are hell’
What is the AO2? ‘those who bear it like a Roman’
The simile suggests that the poet is rejecting the notion that illness is linked to ideas of strength, courage and determination, rejecting a stoic attitude
How is parenthesis used in the poem?
‘(try it in a pitch black room)’, ‘(a fortnight back)’ - both sets of parenthesis create a more personal and less generic tone
How is colloquial language used?
‘If I gave up hope of a cure, I’d bump myself off’ - colloquial expression juxtaposes the seriousness of what is being described, emphasised by ‘no built in compass’
‘but it must…
…have been the usual sop’
What is the AO2? ‘but it must have been the usual sop’
The onomatopoeiac phrase presents his words as generic, empty and meaningless
What is the AO2? ‘the locked in son’
The speaker feels trapped by his inability to emotionally connect to his mother
‘the long…
…slow slide had finished in a vision as black as stone’
What is the AO2? ‘the long, slow slide had finished in a vision as black as stone’
Suggests that suffering is drawn out, which is also partly communicated by enjambment. The use of the simile conveys permanence and the unchanging nature of suffering
What is the AO2? ‘golden weather, of course’
There is a cruel irony in that the mother cannot see the vibrancy and beauty of the season, emphasised by ‘ablaze with colour’
How does the mother respond to her son’s observation of the season?
‘it’s lovely out there’, showing how the mother continues to keep up the facade that everything is ok
‘it was up to…
…us to believe she was watching, somewhere, in the end’
What is the AO2? ‘it was up to us to believe she was watching, somewhere, in the end’
The speaker and his family have to believe his mother has passed to a better place, the pretence of the mother must now be adopted by the family
