Duffy: Themes Death Love Relationships Speaker/Persona Emotions Regret Loss Setting Isolation Honesty How do the poems connect to these themes? Main ideas portrayed Quotations Similarities and differences between the poems

Scottish Texts: The10 Mark Question

Success Criteria Learning Intention To understand how to structure the final question for the Scottish set texts. 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. Success Criteria

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)

Possible secondary texts? 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.