The manhunt - Simon Armitage Flashcards
“After passionate nights and intimate days”
The loving, sensual language throughout may reflect the intimacy of husband and wife. However ‘after’ reflects how it is now in the past and they no longer can have a loving experience as of now
Repetition of “after”
The use of the anaphora gives emphasis to the suggestion something negative will happen
“Blown hinge”
He is compared to a “hinge”. He is rendered an object further emphasising the belittlement of soldiers and there presence while enhancing the injuries and metal injuries he has suffered
“Damaged, porcelain collar-bone”
The use of the metaphor ‘porcelain collar – bone’ implies that he fragile and delicate and that he needs to be handled with care. ‘Porcelain’ is often hard, but can also chip easily and is cold to the touch. Perhaps it is a reminder of the ‘frozen river which ran through his face.’
“fractured rudder”
The ‘fractured rudder’ suggests that he can’t ‘steer’ himself – she has to guide him.
“parachute silk of his punctured lung”
A broken parachute is useless. Perhaps this is a reflection of how the man feels about himself.
“Grazed heart”
Could be taken as literal and metaphorical. His heart is tarnished suggesting he love is and his emotions in their relationship
“Unexploded mine”
The metaphor of “a sweating, unexploded mine buried deep in his mind” implies that the source of the problem is not physical but mental, illustrating the physiological problems post-war
“only then, did I come close”
“Close” demonstrates that she was never fully able to connect with him, and the shortness of the line depicts how her conquest to refine her husband is incomplete and she can never fully grasp the trauma that has taken over him
‘Manhunt’, ‘trace’, ‘explore’, ‘search’
There is a semantic field of searching. It creates an overall theme of incompletion, reflecting the soldier’s damaged identity following his role in war.
Structure
The poem is made up of a series of couplets, mostly unrhymed. This creates a sense of fragmentation, which matches the confused feelings of the soldier’s wife
