The Emigree

Question 1

Form and Structure

Answer 1

-First-person.
-The last line of each stanza is the same (epistrophe): reinforces the overriding positivity of the
city and of the poem.
-The first two stanzas have lots of enjambment ʹ
convey freedom. The final stanza has lots of full-stops
ʹ conveys the fact that she is now trapped.

Question 2

ambiguous meaning - either she
left when she was a child or the city was a child (it was
vulnerable and she feels a responsibility towards it).

Answer 2

“I left it as a child”

Question 3

theme of sunlight
enlightenement
refraim emphasises her overiding impression. she saw clearly back then

Answer 3

“sunlight clear”
“impression of sunlight”
“tastes of sunlight”
“evidence of sunlight”

Question 4

metaphor suggesting her rigid positive and bright memeories

Answer 4

“bright filled paperweight”

Question 5

military metaphor and personification

simile suggesting there is a huge gulf between the narrator and the city

Answer 5

“time rolls its tanks

and the frontiers rise between us, close like “

Question 6

The personification of the city, she has a maternal love for the city, it is romantic and
passionate lover

Answer 6

The personification of the city:
hair and love (she has a maternal love for the city)
and it is romantic and
passionate lover)

Question 7

childhood vocabulary = memory

simile - toy to comfort her

Answer 7

child’s vocabulary I carried here

like a hollow doll

Question 8

huge affection

child playing with a pet

Answer 8

it lies down in front of me docile as a paper

Question 9

ironic use of free (democracy)

the double meaning of dark:
her skin tone
which metaphorically made her whole prospect dark

the subject of racism “accuse”

Answer 9

They accuse me of being dark in their free city

Question 10

form

Answer 10

regular 8 line stanza
confinement

enjambment = desire to before and memory

last lines = end stopping, the new city is a prison

faint memory to specific memory