Toads Flashcards
What is the main technique used in Toads
Extended Metaphor
‘Why should I let the toad work __________ on my life’
squat
What technique is used here - ‘six days of the week it soils/with its sickening poison’ (Toads)
sibilance
Although the speaker in Toads resents work, how does he feel about those that don’t - ‘lecturers, lispers/losers, lob-lolly-men, louts’?
He mocks them via Larkin’s use of alliterative listing
Towards the end of Toads, the speaker realises that ‘something sufficiently ‘________ - _________ squats in me’
toad-like
The speaker in Toads ultimately decides that work is a necessary part of human existence - how could this link to Larkin’s own life?
Despite being a poet he continued to work as a librarian, even twice rejecting the prestigious position of poet laureate.
What technique is used here - ‘their unspeakable wives are skinny as whippets’? (Toads)
similie
In Toads, why does Larkin refer to ‘unspeakable wives are skinny as whippets’?
He is dehumanising and mocking those that don’t work; although Larkin’s narrator resents the restrictions of work, he also looks down on those that don’t.
How does Larkin use an intertextual reference in Toads?
In the line ‘that’s the stuff/That dreams are made on’ he refers to the Shakespeare play The Tempest.
Why does Larkin employ an intertextual reference to The Tempest is his poem Toads - ‘that’s the stuff/That dreams are made on’
These philosophical lines are spoken by the magician Prospero, who dreams of a utopian world. Larkin’s speaker is therefore perhaps mocking the notion of a perfect society.
What does the word ‘blarney’ mean that is used in the poem Toads?
It means to speak in a flattering or persuasive way - the speaker mocks an existence of such insincerity.
‘The ________ and the __________ and the _________’ (Toads)
fame/girl/money
Why does Larkin employ listing in the line ‘the fame and the girl and the money’?
He is perhaps intending to mock such generic and superficial ambitions.
