Duffy: Themes

Death
Love
Relationships 1. How do the poems connect to
Speaker/Persona these themes?
Emotions 2. Main ideas portrayed
Regret 3. Quotations
Loss 4. Similarities and differences
between the poems
Setting
Isolation
Honesty
 Scottish Texts:
The10 Mark Question
 Learning Intention
• To understand how to structure the final question for the
Scottish set texts.

Success Criteria
• To be able to structure your own answer to an unseen
question.

• To be able to choose relevant material from the seen and

unseen poems.
 How to answer the Q…
• All Questions are worth 10 marks and should be
structured using bullet points and headings.

• Use the headings:

• Commonality (2 marks)

• Primary Text (2 marks)

• Secondary Text(s) (6 marks)

 (1) Commonality
Use a paragraph to explain what the commonality is between the primary and
secondary texts. Try to give details.

E.g. Identification of theme (1) Some comment/explanation (1)

OR
E.g A way in which the characters/personas are similar/different (1) Some
comment/explanation (1)

I would recommend giving an example/quote from the extract AND the

secondary text to secure both marks.
 (2) Primary Text

Analyse a relevant example from your primary text. Try to

avoid using examples that you have covered in the textual
analysis questions.

E.g. Reference to text/quote (1) + comment (1)

 (3) Secondary Text

Focus on one or two other poems. Analyse two relevant

quotations from your second poem, and one relevant quotation
from your third. Always link back to the question at the end of
each bullet point.

E.g. Reference to text/quote (1) + comment (1) (x3)

 Practice Question
Text: “Originally”

• Discuss how Carol Ann Duffy uses

contrast in this poem and at least one
other to highlight the poems’ main
concerns.
(10 marks)
 Practice Question
Text: “Originally”

• Discuss how Carol Ann Duffy uses

contrast in this poem and at least one
other to highlight the poems’ main
concerns.
(10 marks)

Possible secondary texts?

 Possible routes…

• Contrast between personas’ personalities.

• Contrast between settings.
 My Answer: Persona

Commonality
Both poems explore a contrast of personality in the speaker or persona of the poem.
This is particularly clear through the changes which occur when the person moves
between two separate places explored in the poem.

* In “Originally”, we are shown the contrast between a young Duffy, unwilling to

accept her new life in a foreign community, and an older Duffy, a woman who
accepts that change is a natural part of life and believes it must be embraced.
“Now, Where do you come from? strangers ask. Originally? And I hesitate.”

* In “War Photographer”, we are shown the contrast between the calm, dutiful
photographer in the war zone and then the vulnerable, troubled man back home in
peaceful England. “Solutions slop in trays beneath his hands, which did not
tremble then though seem to now.”
 Primary Text

* “I stared
at the eyes of a blind toy, holding its paw.”

* Clear contrast between Duffy as a child and as an adult. As a young

girl, Duffy was afraid to move city as she disliked the change and felt
she would never fit in. This toy represents Duffy herself: blind to the
road ahead and seeking someone to comfort her and hold her hand.

* “But then you forget, or don’t recall, or change”

* As an adult we see the change in her beliefs. The more mature Duffy
realises that moving on is a natural part of life and must be accepted.
Duffy uses this contrast to explore the theme of childhood as we see
a clear change in her; she has gone from uncertainty to acceptance
that things must chance and we must leave things in our childhood
behind.
 Secondary Text
* ”as though this were a church and he
* a priest preparing to intone a Mass.”
This simile compares him to a priest. His job is a calling - although he has to witness
horribly sad things, he must do the job for the sake of others. He seems like a strong, calm
individual at the beginning of the poem as he prepares to develop pictures.

* “All flesh is grass.”

* He appears to be determined to remain detached from the horrors witnessed by
accepting that all bodies must return to the ground eventually. Biblical reference again
ties him to the image of a priest, hinting that he remains unaffected by what he sees.

* “Solutions slop in trays

beneath his hands, which did not tremble then
though seem to now.”
* We see the clear contrast to this strong facade when the alliteration draws our attention
to his weakness while developing pictures. Clearly, the horror of what he has witnessed
affects his mentality. After holding it together for so long, he allows himself to have a
moment of weakness when reflecting.

* Duffy use the photographer to explore the theme of apathy as he feels the need to do
this job to inform people of the horrors others are experiencing while we enjoy the
comforts of our home.
 My Answer: Setting

Commonality

Both poems explore a contrast between settings/surroundings. We are shown the

personas’ different reactions to each setting.

* In “Originally”, we are shown the contrast between the comfortable childhood

world which young Duffy once inhabited and the new, scary, unknown world she
is forced to emigrate to: “as the miles rushed back to the city,the street, the house,
the vacant rooms where we didn’t live any more.”

* In “War Photographer”, we are shown the contrast between the calm, peaceful
setting of rural England and the chaotic, dangerous world of the war zones he
travels to. “Rural England. Home again to ordinary pain which simple weather can
dispel.”
 Primary Text
* “Your accent wrong. Corners, which seem familiar,
leading to unimagined, pebble­-dashed estates, big boys
eating worms and shouting words you don’t understand.”

* Clear
contrast between Duffy’s safe childhood home and the new dangerous
estate she inhabits. She feels that she does not fit in with these surroundings as
everything she describes seems foreign to her or the opposite of what she’s used
to.

* I remember my tongue
shedding its skin like a snake, my voice
in the classroom sounding just like the rest.”

* After a few years, her new world is now a setting to which she blends in very
well. Imagery comparing losing her accent to a snake losing skin shows how easily
she assimilated into this setting. Theme - Identity does not come with a place and
gets harder to pin down the older you get and more things you experience.
 Secondary Text

* “to fields which don't explode beneath the feet

of running children in a nightmare heat”
Word choice of “nightmare” emphasises how unpleasant the war zones are
and the idea of bombs exploding beneath children is put in to shock us.

* “A hundred agonies in black and white

from which his editor will pick out five or six
for Sunday's supplement.”
Word choice of agonies shows how much people are suffering abroad -
sets up for the casual disinterest of the editor who has a safe, relaxed
life and doesn’t need to worry about the sheer number of people suffering.

* ”The reader's eyeballs prick

with tears between the bath and pre-lunch beers.”
Focus on the comforts of our homes to contrast to the danger and
uncertainty of theirs. Duffy explores the theme of apathy as she shows
how little we care as we are perfectly happy with our own lives.
 Other practice questions
1. By referring to “Havisham” and to at least one other poem by
Carol Ann Duffy, discuss her ability to surprise the reader with
unexpected ideas and/or unexpected language.
2. Discuss how Carol Ann Duffy uses the closing lines in Mrs Midas
and at least one other poem to highlight the poem’s central concerns.
3. Discuss how effectively Carol Ann Duffy explores the theme of
love in Valentine and at least one other poem.
4. Discuss how the theme of loss is explored by Carol Ann Duffy in
the poem Mrs Midas and at least one other.
5. By referring to “War Photographer” and at least one other
poem, discuss how Carol Ann Duffy conveys the feeling of isolation.