Originally? Flashcards
“red room”
Imagery/alliteration
Suggestion of train travel, alteration draws our attention. Ambiguous description = shows her young age. Red has conditions if anger = tells us this is not her decision.
“fell through feilds”
Word choice/ alliteration
“Fell”emphasises lack of control = implication of a loss of home and dense of where she belongs. Alliteration draws our attention.
“turn of the wheels”
Imagery
Emphasises distance = we have come across them mid journey. Could also be symbolism of Duffys mind = thoughts are whirling which shows her confusion.
“bawling”
Word choice
Means a child cry = suggests brothers distress at leaving, congrats and emphasises Duffy silence.
“as the miles rushed back to the city”
Personification
Emphasises her own desire to return. “Rushed” suggests speed = shows how strong get desire to return is.
“the vacant rooms
Where we didn’t live anymore”
Enjambment
Separates the family from the rooms = creates distance between the family and their house. See the realisation that the house is no longer her home. Sense of loss of identity and confusion.
“blind”
Word choice
Reflects the fears and anxiety of Duffy as she has no idea where she is going, she is blind to her future.
“All childhood is an emigration”
Metaphor
Comparing childhood to emigration. Just like emigration is full of travel and change, so it’s childhood full of change and uncertainties. When people emigrate they often leave their behind too behind again = realisation that this is what her parents intend.
”, resigned,”
Parenthesis/ word choice
Means to accept defeat or hopelessness = she has accepted that this has happened, no matter how unhappy it has made her. Emphasised by the parentheses
“your accent wrong”
Short sentence
Draws our attention to the idea of Duffy taken to a place where she sounds different = feels alienated and settled conscious. She never thought about her accent before. Confusion.
“seem”
Word choice
Expresses her inability to navigate through new landscape = reinforces confusion from earlier. The semi- familiarity makes missing her home city worse = raises get hopes only to destroy them at each corner.
“big boys
Eating worms”
Idea that eating worms is symbolic to growing up. We can tell Duffy is disgusted = not only physically moved from one culture to another but had emotionally matured enough to know what the worms symbolise. A misplaced route out passage.
“shouting words you don’t understand”
Not only do the big boys eat worms but they also speak differently from back home = feelings of alienation.
“My parents anxiety stirred like a loose tooth
In my head”
Simile
Contrasts mother’s optimism at beginning. Comparing parents anxiety to a loose tooth. Just like a loose tooth just sits there while you niggle at it, so her parents anxiety is lurking in the back of her mind. She is taking on more adult worries = lots of childhood.
“I want our own country”
Italics
Duffy is talking out loud for the first time = sense of individual identity as she grows up which she is now voicing. This seems like a prisoner response to parents anxiety = sure is pointing out whose fault it is.
“But”
Indicates change = this verse is about assimilation, contrasts verse two which was about the impossibility of fitting in.
“change”
Word choice/ part of a list
List explains how assimilation happens; naturally and without realisation = she is beginning to forget her old home. Tells us how normal assimilation is. Forgetting is a part of growing up.
“seeing your brother swallow a slug”
Imagery
Reminds us of the big boys eating worms. She no longer feels the same level of disgust. Assimilation is obvious here, she and her family have become part of the culture.
“skelf”
Scottish word for splinter = she still has a relationship with her heritage, they are still a part of her. Tells us no matter how much she assimilates her roots are still a part of her = it is this Scottish side that feels ashamed at what her brothers have become
“shedding its skin like a snake”
Simile
Her changing voice and language is being compared to a snake shedding its skin. Just like a snake needs to shed it’s skin to survive as it’s way of life, so has Duffy’s voice changed to help her fit in with everyone else.
“sounding just like the rest”
Word choice
Duffy is feeling very ordinary and mundane now that she has assimilated and her voice has changed. Irony here is that before she wanted to fit in but now she feels dull and normal.
“I lost a river, culture, speech, sense of first place
And the right place?”
List
Emphasises the sheer amount of memories and parts of her identity that she lost. All these symbols she lost represent her old home. She’s asking herself if younger Duffy was naive enough to think that was all she lost.
“Originally?”
Rhetorical question
Opens up themes of identity and belonging. She knows she cannot answer the question, like most people for her there is no one answer. This is something we can all relate to = Duffy is appealing to he reader
“And I hesitate”
Short sentence
Emphasises the fact that Duffy does not know the answer, even all these years later. Suggests she feels she could have answered before the move but the home is not the only part of her now.
