Working Revision Flashcards
Paper 2 Section A Revision
The title Working potentially refers to which two types of work?
The work in the coal mines and his work as a poet.
Why does the speaker make use of consonance in the first two lines of Working? (knacker, cwt, corf)
The harsh sounds represent the suffering of the miners.
How are fricatives ‘fluffy’ into ‘scuffed’ used in the fourth line of Working?
It representes how something nice has been destroyed. The added consonance in scuffed highlights the damage.
chick’s back, the eggshell, that ____ white’
sunless
You’ve been underneath too long’ can refer to what two ideas?
Being in the mines. Her story being buried and ignored. It is his job as a writer to speak for her.
How is Harrison critiquing his own poetry in ‘this sonnet for the bourgeoisie’?
He considers his work to be insignificant. Writing for the people who contributed to her suffering.
How does Harrison attempt to give the mistreated girl more significnace in the second stanza?
He names her. ‘Patience Kershaw’.
Who was Patience Kershaw?
A real life miner in 1842 in Halifax. A report on her led to the banning of women and children under 13 from the mines.
What does Harrison refer to in the second stanza of Working to also create sympathy for the subject?
Her age - fourteen
Which quotation shows Harrison critiquing the pointlessness of his poetry after reading about Patience?
this wordshift and inwit’s a load of crap’
th’art ______ summat as wants raking up.’
nobbut
Why does the metre become more regular in the final four lines of Working?
It shows the speaker calming down and coming to a more rationale conclusion.
Which quotation brings out the idea of the voiceless working class in Working?
hardship held its tongue’
What does ‘breaking the silence of the worked-out gob’ reveal about Harrison’s conclusion?
That his poetry does have purpose in speaking for those who cannot.
