Identify the speaker or narrator of a text Poetry

Essential Questions Who is the speaker of a poem? Who is the narrator of the text? What the difference between the speaker and the narrator?

Vocabulary Theme: The author's message or lesson in the story.

Launching the Thinking identify who would say the following phrases: “Go clean your room!” “Strike 3 you’re out!” “Please sharpen your number 2 pencils.” “Stop touching me!” how were you able to draw conclusions as to who said each phrase?

How to Tell Who the Speaker Is in a Poem The speaker is the voice or "persona" of a poem. One should not assume that the poet is the speaker, because the poet may be writing from a perspective entirely different from his own, even with the voice of another gender, race or species, or even of a material object. The reader or listener must do more than just hear the voice of the poem to identify the speaker. It is important to examine the other elements of the poem, such as the situation, structure, descriptive details, figurative language and rhythms to help determine the speaker’s identity.

Step 1 Read the poem all the way through once without stopping to ask questions. Write down an immediate impression of the speaker in the poem: What kind of speaker do you imagine in your “mind’s eye”? Jot down anything that comes to mind. This is your first impression of the speaker.

Step 2 Read the poem again, making notes in the margins; ask the question, “What is this poem about?” Pay attention to the title; it often hints at the situation or meanings of the poem. Underline words or images repeated by the speaker; repetition creates emphasis, and emphasis reveals the concerns and attitude of the speaker toward the subject of the poem.

Step 3 Determine the “situation” of the poem: What is happening when the poem begins? What is the subject the speaker is addressing? Describe the setting portrayed in the descriptive images: Are they taken from nature or the city, a specific location or a generalized setting?

Step 4 Examine the kinds of language used by the speaker: Is it formal or colloquial, as in everyday speech? Are there references to any particular situation or to an internal state of mind? Notice the focus of the speaker: What is he or she paying attention to?

Step 5 Determine the overall emotion of the poem: Is the speaker reflective, excited, nostalgic, worried, angry, optimistic? Analyze the language for words that suggest moods: colors, sounds and images. Describe the rhythm of the speaker’s voice to help determine his or her attitude: Is the rhythm gentle and flowing or choppy and curt?

Step 6 Write a brief description of the speaker’s physical appearance, age, gender, social status and any other details that help bring the speaker to life. If the details in the poem are not specific about these characteristics, use the context of the poem to speculate.

Step 7 Review the notes taken during your analysis of the poem and draw some conclusions about the speaker. Write a brief character sketch of the speaker based on the notes taken from the close reading of the poem.

Examples of figurative language in poetry simile - a comparison that uses the words like or as, or a verb like seems or appears to draw two objects or images into a relationship. Example 1:     Your eyes are as blue as the sky.                     You eat like a bird.

Example 2: "Harlem" (Langston Hughes)                            What happens to a dream deferred?                             Does it dry up                             like a raisin in the sun?                             Or fester like a sore-                             And then run?                             Does it stink like rotten meat?                             Or crust and sugar over-                             like a syrupy sweet?                             Maybe it just sags                             like a heavy load.                             Or does it explode? Hughes uses five different similes in this poem.  He compares unfulfilled dreams to a raisin, a sore, rotten meat, a syrupy sweet, and a heavy load.  Through these similes, Hughes paints a picture of a dream that is cast aside, and lies rotting and decaying.                             

metaphor - functions the same way simile does, except that the comparison is more implied and the words like or as are omitted. Example 1:    Your cheeks are red cherries Example 2:       "Fame is a Fickle Food" (Emily Dickinson)                             Fame is a fickle food                             Upon a shifting plate                             Whose table once a                             Guest but not                             The second time is set.   Whose crumbs the crows inspect                             And with ironic caw                             Flap past it to the Famer's Corn--                             Men eat of it and die.  In this example, Dickinson's entire poem is a metaphor about fame. She compares fame to a food that is given to a man only once, and causes death. Unlike the first example, she uses all nine lines of the poem to expand her metaphor.

Example 2: "The Wind" (by James Stephens) personification - a type of metaphor that gives living qualities to inanimate objects or abstract ideas; or human qualities (feelings, thoughts) to animals.  It gives non- living things and animals the ability to think, feel emotions, or have human relationships. Example 1:    The moon smiles. Fires rage.                         The wind vexes the lake and the waves crash angrily. Example 2:    "The Wind"   (by James Stephens) The wind stood up, and gave a shout;          He whistled on his fingers, and Kicked the withered leaves about,          And thumped the branches with his hand, And said he'd kill, and kill, and kill;          And so he will!  And so he will! Stephens' poem personifies the wind as a cruel, abusive man.  Though he never says directly that the wind is a man, it is apparent through his word choice, and the actions that he attributes to the wind (standing, shouting, whistling, speaking, etc).

Example: From "A Bird came down the Walk" alliteration - the repetition of the same consonant sounds at the beginnings of words that are near each other in a poem. Example:  From "A Bird came down the Walk"       "Than Oars divide the Ocean,        Too silver for a seam--        Or Butterflies, off Banks of Noon        Leap, plashless as they swim."        (Emily Dickinson)