Orignally - Duffy Flashcards
“We came from our own country”
~ “we and our” - plural pronouns. Suggests group or family who are going through this together. shared experience.
~ Word choice – “own” shows the possession - speaker seems attached to what is being left behind.
“in a red room”
~ alliteration – red room is actually a car.
~ sounds childlike – doesn’t understand what is happening
“which fell through the fields “
~ suggests speed. Lack of control.
~ speaker is not happy or comfortable, all is happening too fast.
“mother singing our father’s name”
~ enjambment, ambiguity.
~ singing usually connected with happiness: fact that she is singing father’s name suggests he is not is there and it is not clear where he is.
“My brother’s cried one of them bawling”
~ Brothers very unhappy, unhappy to move or other reason?
~ “bawling” - loud and constant complaining.
“Home, home”
~ italics, enjambment
~ longing for home.
~ highlight how upset and desperate brothers are.
“Miles rushed back”
~ personification
~ reflects how speaker feels - wishes to return home. She seems envious.
“The city, the street, the house, the vacant rooms.”
~ list and word choice.
~ helps convey all left behind.
~ makes loss seems greater.
~ as location becomes more specific, it focuses on the home left behind and the life she lead in the now “vacant” rooms.
~ word “vacant” reminds us of emptiness she feels.
“I stared”
~. Using “stared” and not “look” suggests she is focused on her toy, perhaps because it reminds her of home, but it also makes her seem more sad and detached.
” at the eyes of a blind toy.”
~ personification and symbolism.
~ toy reflects how she feels - doesn’t know where she’s going, can’t see the way.
~ associate eyes with understanding – as though she is seeking comfort and reassure from the toy but is getting nothing.
” all childhood is an emigration”
~ metaphor and caesura.
~ childhood is a journey like a journey we move through changing stages.
~ highlights extreme changes which occur as you go through life.
~ caesura helps to highlight idea of reaching and and then a new stage – a change
“Some are slow, leaving….. You know stays.”
~ alliteration- hard hiss sound adds sense of dragging.
~ sentence length and structure.
~ long sentence suggests difficult journey which takes time.
~ continues arms extends metaphor - Childhood can seem like a long, complex journey.
“Others are sudden”
~ simple, short sentence.
~ abrupt. Reflects what we often feel - that changes in life happen quickly and unexpectedly.
“You accent wrong”
~ suggests speaker feels out of place as her accent is wrong - unlike everyone around her.
~ another phase of childhood - feeling out of place.
“Seem, unimagined, don’t understand.”
~ each word suggests a sense of unfamiliarity or uncertainty.
~ suggests move brings confusion - like our progression through childhood
“Big boys”
~ alliteration.
~ harsh, plosives sounds.
~ feels aggressive like the boys are.
~ perhaps move makes speaker feel intimidated.
~ Also represents how childhood can be scary.
“My parents anxiety stirred like a loose tooth in my head”
~ simile - suggests something irritating, always there, something you can’t ignore.
~ whole family affected by move.
~ could also reflect the concerns parents feel as their children grow.
~ place pressure on child too, something they feel constantly hindered by.
“I want our own country.”
~ italics used to show direct speech.
~ links back to opening line, suggest speaker still hasn’t moved on and still feels connection with her past.
“Forget, or don’t recall, or change”
~ similar to previous list.
~ shows there are many changes, but also difficult to explain or “pinpoint”.
~ Suggests confusion felt .
“Swallow a slug”
~ sibilance.
~ links back to aggrieved behaviour of the big boys but now suggests they are beginning to fit in.
“A skelf of shame.”
~ dialect and alliteration.
~ “skelf” - Scottish word for splinter.
~ old ways still linger with her.
~ uses Scottish word as if suggests she still keeps some of her roots
“My tongue shedding its skin like a snake.”
~ simile
~ a change, adapting to suit a new environment.
~ speaker starting to sound like her. “Shedding” her Scottish vocabulary, finally fitting in.
“I only think.”
~ introduces uncertainty.
~ seems speaker is not sure about what she misses- about what has been left behind.
“A river, culture… The right place?”
~ list - before, list suggested a lot lost. This time items seem more significant, speaker seems to care less, more dismissive.
~ river Clyde, Scottish speech.
“Where do you come from?/ originally?”
~ italics.
~ different questions show speaker conflict. Is where you come from the same place as you were born?
“And I hesitate.”
~ conjunction and short sentence.
~ feels like quick, uncertain response. Not sure where they belong.
