Havisham By Carol Ann Duffy

Overview This poem comes from a collection of Duffy’s poems called ‘The World’s Wife’, in which she considers the often neglected women behind some of the most iconic male figures from history, literature and legend. The speaker in this dramatic monologue* is the fictional Miss Havisham from Charles Dickens’ novel Great Expectations. Jilted by her lover on her wedding day, Miss Havisham spends the rest of her life in her decaying wedding dress, surrounded by the preparations for her wedding, grooming her beautiful niece, Estella, to take revenge on all men. Duffy’s poem gives psychological depth to this character. The title of the poem, her unmarried surname, reveals her self-loathing and bitterness at being denied the epithet of ‘Mrs’ and being forced to live the rest of her life as a spinster. The title also empowers the character; it takes away the stigma attached to ‘Miss’ and refuses to define her with her spinsterhood. The poem concentrates on her nature, her feelings, her psychological and sexual nature, rather than her social status. *a poem in which a single character speaks, often to convince their listener, and what they do not say can often be as important as what they do, as they may not tell the whole truth

Setting The setting of the poem is not specified, but since in the novel Great Expectations, Miss Havisham does not leave her house, we can assume that she speaks from inside her crumbling, decaying mansion surrounded by cobwebbed, faded furniture and her mouldering wedding feast. As we read, imagine her as an old, embittered woman, frail and wasted within a yellowing, stained wedding dress. http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=P2V6gTuxE58

Themes The key theme in this poem is the corrosive nature of hatred on the human psyche. In giving Miss Havisham a voice outside of Dickens’ novel, the poet is able to crystallise perfectly how one single event of rejection can utterly shatter and destroy a person. The mood is bitter and caustic throughout as Duffy clearly conveys how quickly love can quickly turn into hatred and violence. The wedding imagery: the cake, the dress and the honeymoon, are all used to reinforce how quickly experiences and events associated with joy can be soured and become toxic symbols to feed and nourish hatred instead of love.

Techniques When writing about poetry, it is vital to mention the technique you are discussing. Consider: Imagery Contrast Structure (punctuation, repetition and enjambment) Word choice The senses Think also of the tone that is created through these techniques, and how they help Duffy to explore her character and theme more effectively.

Form and Structure The poem is written in four unrhymed stanzas. Duffy has said that she enjoys the way stanzas help her to concentrate and fix her ideas more effectively, and has described them as being almost like mini-canvases. The lack of rhyme and presence of enjambment help to create a more defined voice in the poem. Here, Havisham’s voice is choppy and stilted, which shows the lack of order and structure to her thoughts and conveys her broken mind effectively. There is also no fixed meter to the poem. This, along with the occasional, slightly off-kilter half rhymes and assonance, help to reinforce this lack of logic and the erosion of the speaker’s psyche.