Word Choice Quotations Flashcards
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “combs my nostrils” to show his discomfort.
Gives a sense of the pervasive power of the smell, and his feeling of being invaded, showing his discomfort.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “green and yellow corridors” to show his discomfort.
Colours have connotations of sickness, which further stresses the poet’s discomfort in these surroundings.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “corpse” to show his distress and the painful emotions he is facing.
Holds little relation to life, suggesting the finality of death. The harshness of the sound (with a guttural ‘c’ and plosive ‘p’) shows the poet’s distress and the painful emotions he is facing.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “heavenward” to show he is trying to avoid his emotions.
Incongruous with the poet’s beliefs (or lack thereof) as Norman MacCaig was an atheist. Simply an example of the narrator using humour to avoid his emotions.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “miraculously” to emphasise his lack of ability to cope with his emotions.
This suggests the narrator’s admiration for the nurses’ abilities while showing his own worry about the way he will cope with his emotions.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “farewells” to show his lack of ability to cope with his emotions, and his current desire to believe in an afterlife.
The ending of the stanza on this word draws attention to it, which underlines the purpose of his visit. Defined as “good wishes on parting”, the word is suggestive of the possibility the people will meet again, and that those departing are going on some kind of journey. This, perhaps, shows the narrator’s desire to believe in an afterlife, especially at such troubling times.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “white cave” to show his isolation.
Holds connotations of isolation through confusion or sensory blankness (e.g. ‘white noise’)
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “not guzzling but giving” to describe his feelings about the administration of the intravenous drip.
The horror of the “glass fang” image is continued in the word “guzzling”, but is then reversed by the positive word “giving”. The use of the guttural ‘g’ sound in the alliteration conveys the harshness of the narrator’s interpretation; he clearly sees the process as intrusive and pointless.
‘alliteration’, use of the same letter or sound at the beginning of adjacent or closely connected words.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “clumsily… dizzily” to show that he is overcome by his emotions.
This shows the narrator is overcome by his emotions, leaving him dazed and confused.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “fainter” to show his upsetness.
Showing the woman’s vision is blurred; the patient can see the narrator getting fainter with distance. Also, a pun, since the narrator may be so upset he is starting to feel faint.
Describe how the writer uses word choice in the phrase “fruitless fruits” to show the feeling of the pointlessness of the visit and his lack of ability to help.
The final words are an oxymoron: how can fruit be fruitless? This captures the narrator’s despair at the pointlessness of the woman’s death being prolonged, as well as at his inability to help; bringing the fruit has been “fruitless” (pointless)
‘Oxymoron’, a figure of speech in which apparently contradictory terms appear in conjunction.
