The Manhunt, by Simon Armitage Flashcards
What does the title suggest?
suggests a chase or searching for something or that he is lost
images of delicate materials
‘porcelain’ and ‘silk’
suggests beauty and vulnerability
handled with care –> can break easily
images of broken body parts
‘grazed heart’ and ‘broken ribs’
suggests human casualties of war and the vulnerability of mind and body
Quotes that show pain is still growing mentally and physically
‘foetus of metal’ and ‘unexploded mine’
suggests potential to still explode or permanent scaring
final words
‘only then, did I come close’
suggests it is a journey through his pain and healing and their reconciliation as a couple
she is finally close to metaphorically ‘catching’ him
her search is not fully successful
emphasises the impact that war has on relationships
Who?
about a soldier, who has returned home from a war, and has sustained serious injuries at war
speaker is in the perspective of the soldiers wife
What?
The poem explores the physical and mental effects of living with injuries sustained when on active service in the armed forces
When? Where?
returned home
after the soldier had been in the midst of the war
1990s Bosnian war
Why?
to show the impact of war and how grief creates distance
Context
- told from the perspective of a soldier’s wife
- deals with the ideas of Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) and its impact on the soldier and those around them
- Modern warfare
- About Eddie Beddoes and wife Laura
- Eddie was a UN peacekeeper in the Bosnian conflict in the 1990s
Points to make on structure
- poem is organised into couplets
- initially these couplets rhyme –> ‘first phase…intimate days’
–> perhaps reflecting the couples harmony when they were first reunited - as the poem progresses the rhyme scheme falters, reflecting the increasingly disjointed nature of their relationship
What does ‘trace’ and ‘explore’ and ‘handle and hold’ reflect?
- The verbs reflect the activities of the
wife as she conducts her “search”,
suggesting careful treatment of her
husband’s injured body and mind - It may also imply that he is no longer
familiar to her.
‘blown hinge..
..of his lower jaw’
What does ‘blown hinge of his lower jaw’ suggest?
- The use of the metaphor suggests that the jaw is physically and metaphorically broken
- This may suggest that he is no longer open with her, perhaps unable to talk of his feelings and experiences
What does the ‘fractured rudder of shoulder-blade’ suggest?
The ‘fractured rudder’ suggests that he can’t ‘steer’ himself – she has to guide him.
Analysis on ‘parachute silk of his punctured lung’
Parachutes are used within the military, however a broken parachute is useless
Perhaps this is a reflection of how the man feels about himself
Analysis on ‘unexploded mind’
The metaphor of “a sweating, unexploded mine buried deep in his mind” implies that the source of the problem is not physical but mental
–> and threatens to cause problems at any time
Perhaps the wife is trying to diffuse him
The importance of the wife’s care and delicacy is highlighted by her discovery of this problem
–> she has to tread carefully as to not
trigger PTSD
What does the repetition of ‘only then’ suggest?
repeated four times perhaps this suggest that it is a slow process to get him to open up
