Originally Flashcards
“We came from our own country”
The use of plural pronouns (‘we’ and ‘our’) suggest the shared nature of the experience and how all of the family feel unsettled by the move.
A strong sense of connection to Scotland, and the home they have left behind is established through “our own country”
“in a red room”
She is describing the interior of the train;
The colour red can also symbolise anger which suggests that she is annoyed with her parents for uprooting her
red has connotations of danger, symbolising how she feels insecure during this journey and clearly feels unsettled by the move
“which fell through the fields”
The alliteration draws our attention to the words “fell” and “fields”
– the word-choice of “fell” is important as the image it creates has associations of not being in control, highlighting how, as a child, Duffy has had no involvement in the decision to move and feels impotent.
“My brothers cried, one of them bawling Home,
Home,”
Unlike their mother, it is clear that Duffy’s siblings are distressed by the move.
The word-choice of “bawling” suggests that they are wailing loudly, repetitively and will not stop.
The repetition of the word “Home” indicates that they are constantly mentioning, complaining or crying about having to leave their home.
Repeating the word also suggests that the home that they have left behind is constantly on their minds and the only subject of conversation in the car. The word home is also to emphasise it even more.
“the miles rushed back to the city,
the street, the house, the vacant rooms
where we didn’t live any more.”
The use of a list here draws attention to the sheer amount of everything they have left behind and how desolate the children feel because of this. By reversing the journey it indicates how desperate they are to be going in the opposite direction to the one in which they are travelling.
By writing “miles rushed back”, the poet creates personification to help emphasise the fact that the children have no say over what is happening and that they are victims of forces beyond their control highlighting their sense of powerlessness and resentment. It also suggests how quickly their thoughts are returning to the city, street and house that is so familiar to them.
The word-choice of “vacant” to describe the rooms creates a transferred epithet as the word is actually being used to describe the poet and how she feels, i.e. empty and lacking interest in her mother’ attempts to cheer her and her brothers up.
“I stared at the eyes of a blind toy, holding its paw.”
The way that the poet is holding the paw of her cuddly toy draws attention to her feelings of insecurity and how she is desperate for comfort.
The word “blind” is also symbolic, connecting to the idea that the poet, like the toy, cannot see clearly when it comes to the future and what will happen in the weeks, months and years to come.
lifelessness of toy
trying to find comfort in her toy
“All childhood is an emigration.”
This stanza opens with a short, emphatic sentence which introduces a central theme in the poem – the idea that childhood is a time of constant change and is a metaphorical journey because we are always moving from one stage to the next, never getting enough time to feel truly settled.
metaphor; childhood is always changing
“Some are slow, leaving you standing, resigned, up an avenue where no one you know stays. Others are sudden.”
The sentence structure here is very clever. The first sentence – describing the slow nature of some changes we go through as children– is deliberately broken up with commas, making it slower to match what it describes. However, this is immediately followed by a short, abrupt sentence which introduces the idea of change during childhood which is more unexpected, dramatic and rapid. Again, the sentence structure matches what it describes.
The word-choice of “resigned” also connects to the idea that children have to accept change, get used to it and adapt. She uses an example of getting lost in the streets surrounding her new home to represent this type of experience which we slowly overcome and get used to. The word-choice of “avenue” introduces two appropriate ideas – one is that it refers to a type of street that the poet got lost down. However, an avenue is also a way of approaching a problem and finding a solution. This connects to the idea children face new experiences, having to work out how to solve issues or overcome obstacles caused by change.
“Corners, which seem familiar,
leading to unimagined, pebble-dashed estates, big boys
eating worms and shouting words you don’t understand.”
The sentence structure here is fragmented and complicated, representing the poet’s sense of disorientation as she gets lost in her new neighbourhood.
The word-choice of “unimagined” to describe the estates and the houses that she encounters hints that she had quite a secure childhood up to that point and was protected. It also suggests that the area that she has moved to is rougher than what she was previously used to.
The “pebble-dashed estates” relate to a form of plastering that is traditionally associated with local authority or council housing in the Northern parts of the country, again hinting that the area and children in it were potentially more street-wise and uncouth than what Duffy encountered in her early years in Glasgow.
The picture she creates of them “eating worms” reinforces this impression.
The style of these lines is deliberately simplistic and even childish – especially the sue of “big boys”. This helps create empathy for the poet as she describes this strange and unsettling new area in a way that reminds us of her age at the time.
When Duffy describes the older boys “shouting words you don’t understand” it works on different levels.
- It could suggest that their accent or the dialect they are using makes it difficult for Duffy to make sense of what they are saying, adding to her sense of isolation and insecurity.
- It could also suggest that they are using expletives or sexual terms to shock her and this connects to the theme of loss of innocence which is explored through the poem, caused by her move into this new neighbourhood.
- The use of second person (“you”) directly addresses the reader and attempts to force us to become involved in the poem and recollect similar experiences from our own childhoods
“My parents’ anxiety stirred like a loose tooth
in my head.”
The simile compares the poet’s awareness of her parents’ anxiety to a loose tooth which suggests that she is always aware of the fact that her mother and father – who are traditional sources of security for children – are unsettled and clearly worried about the challenges facing them and their children as they try to adjust to the move.
Like a wobbly tooth, her insecurity and awareness of how her parents are feeling is something that is constantly irritating her and nagging away at her.
“But then you forget, or don’t recall, or change,”
The use of a conjunction (“But”) at the start of both a line and a stanza reinforces the idea that there is a change in direction in the poem. The final stanza moves on to describe how Duffy and her family adapted to their new surroundings before pondering general ideas relating to identity.
“and, seeing your brother swallow a slug, feel only
a skelf of shame.”
Her brother’s action is used to provide an example of how her family start to adjust. In some ways, they are losing their innocence and becoming more wild, but the brother is clearly adjusting his behaviour to allow him to fit in with the boys in the neighbourhood and clearly seems to be enjoying shocking his peers, emphasising how he is becoming happier in his new home.
The image created through the use of “skelf” is important.
Firstly, it suggests that the shame that the poet feels at seeing her brother is small, like a splinter, and something that she is only slightly aware of, like a skelf under your skin. This suggests that she, too, is losing her innocence and becoming used to the sights she is experiencing in her new surroundings.
Secondly, the word “skelf” is part of the Scots dialect, which symbolises how she still has the country of her birth as a strong element in her identity, so much so that she instinctively uses Scottish words to describe and process what she is seeing. Therefore, the incident she describes and the way she describes it, are both used to represent how she is beginning to change and adapt but how she has not totally lost her essential Scottish-ness.
“I remember my tongue
shedding its skin like a snake, my voice
in the classroom sounding just like the rest.”
The simile comparing the loss of her accent to a snake shedding its skin suggests a sense of shame. Snakes are traditionally associated with being untrustworthy and betrayal. Therefore, the snake imagery creates the impression that she feels that, by losing her Scottish accent, she feels that she is betraying her heritage and not remaining true to herself.
The idea that she starts to sound “just like the rest” suggests that Duffy feels that, by losing her Scottish accent and beginning to speak like her classmates, she has lost an aspect of her identity that made her special.
Her description of her classmates as “the rest” also creates a bitter tone and the idea that she still does not feel a strong connection with her peers, highlighting that Duffy still felt a sense of isolation even after she began to adjust how she spoke and behaved.
sibilance, like hissing of snake
“Do I only think
I lost a river, culture, speech, sense of first space
and the right place?”
‘space and place’ rhyme emphasise she starting to doubt if she ever cared that deeply about the move
The word-choice of “lost” to describe these things suggests that she feels a sense of grief and loss over the way that these elements of her life were left behind forever.
The “sense of first place and the right place” suggests how hard it was for her to adjust to the move and how she felt disorientated and isolated.
“Now, Where do you come from? strangers ask. Originally? And I hesitate.”
The poem concludes with more questions, again highlighting how Duffy is no nearer to finding answers to the questions that she has been asking about identity and the way that childhood experiences and places shape us.
The short, emphatic final sentence finishes the poem with a doubtful tone. This creates a situation where she is still not totally secure in her sense of identity.
- she cannot give a definite answer when asked about her origins.
