The Emigree

Question 1

Form

Answer 1

• Regular stanza length of 8 lines to reflect speakers’ way of imposing order on the chaos and refusing to be overcome by the negativity of the conflict.
• Last stanza is 9 lines as if she doesn’t want to leave. She is enjoying it, so it is longer than other stanzas.

Question 2

Opening

Answer 2

“There once was a country…memory of it is sunlight clear…November…I am told”
* November is late Autumn so not much sunlight. Suggests that she has blocked out the gloominess.
* Metaphor for unhappy political events. “I am told” suggests she is too small to know much about her home than what people tell her.
* “Sunlight” connotation of warmth and “November” of bitterness and negativity.
* “once” suggests the country has been lost. It’s like a storybook opening.

Question 3

SOAPAIMS

Answer 3

“Branded by an impression of sunlight… taste of sunlight… evidence of sunlight”
* “branded” and “sunlight” is juxtaposition. Branded is a painful image.
* Repetition of “sunlight” shows that she loves this place, and it overpowers the negativity. Or the repetition may suggest the speaker has an almost dream-like picture of the past
* The country has “branded” her. It left marks on her. Metaphor for only remembering positive things. But “branded” could suggest that she has been changed by her experiences.
* It could indicate that she is an outsider because of the country she is from. Or that she is owned by her childhood memories, and you can’t escape the past.

Question 4

Structure

Answer 4

• Free verse with enjambment, caesura, and no rhyme scheme.
• It reflects the chaos in the place she loves or perhaps the loss of power the speaker has as she can’t go there. The danger is shown through the chaotic disorganised free verse.

Question 5

Ending

Answer 5

“My city hides behind me. They mutter death, and my shadow falls as evidence of sunlight”
* Ambiguous lines and contrast the tone of the rest of the poem.
* “They mutter death” implies oppression from her city and the evil and hatred. There is a darkness in her city and doesn’t want to remember, she is trying to forget as she wants the image of utopia. This may be why it ends with “sunlight” as she tries to enforce the utopian idea.
* Contrast between “shadow” and “sunlight”. She is still casting a shadow is evidence that her original upbringing was positive, and she carries happiness with her
* Alternatively, the shadow follows death, and she has been killed which is why they use “dark”. But the death would be worth it as her life is the positivity of her culture and her city.
* “They” suggests that the country is rejecting the migrant from settling there or may be the tyrants trying to punish her as she is against the regime. But both show her saving the city and saving the memory of it.