the Emigree

Question 1

What poems can you do a comparison with memory, individual experiences and loss in

Answer 1

• kamikaze
• poppies
• London

Question 2

key quotes

Answer 2

• there once was a country … i left it as a child
• the bright, filled with paperweight
• it may be at war, may be sick with tyrants
• i am branded by an impression of sunlight
• i have no passport, there’s no way back at all
• time rolls its tanks and the frontiers rise between us
• i comb its hair and love its shinning eyes
• they accuse me of being dark in their free city
• my city hides behind me

Question 3

language and themes

Answer 3

• each stanza with sunlight , the city is continually described using gleaming, illuminated language
• the speaker is nostalgic about the city she left and nothing is seeming able to change her positive memory of it even if its war torn
• the city seems to have been taken over by a group of tyrants and the use of semantic field of war and conflict suggests the city ids restless.

Question 4

what happens in this poem

Answer 4

• the poet describes leaving her country behind when she was a child. she hears bad news about the country but never forgets her child like image of it.
• the country now appears to be war torn.
• she realizes as an adult that her childhood image is false and she cannot return to the city no.
• its not clear whether the city is imagined

Question 5

form, structure and context

Answer 5

• emifree is a french noun relating to the verb to emigrate. consider the following : migrate , emigrate and immigrate and think about the rumens chose emigree as her tittle.
• the poem is composed of three stanzas but it lacks any sort of regular rhyme or rhythm.
• the emigree’s relationship with her homeland takes the form of a first person account.
• remember the poetic voice can be a construct. it is not directly autobiographical.