1. The Hunchback in the Park

2. About Dylan Thomas
Dylan Thomas was born in Swansea, South Wales. He wrote and spoke in English, even though both his parents spoke fluent Welsh. His father was an English teacher and used to read a lot to him when he was very young. Shakespeare was a particular favourite. Dylan Thomas loved language and did very well in English though not so well in other subjects. He left school at 16 to become a junior reporter for his local newspaper.
His first book of poetry, 18 Poems, published in 1934, was a success and so he moved to London. He also started to drink heavily, a habit which eventually blighted the rest of his short life. Two years later he met Caitlin MacNamara and married her in They were well known for having a stormy relationship. In 1944 they moved from London to a small village called Laugharne in West Wales.
Thomas became well known for his deep, rich Welsh voice. He made more than 200 broadcasts on BBC radio and did speaking tours in America, where he was very popular, partly because he lived up to the stereotype of a maverick poet - intelligent, gifted and passionate but also drunk, reckless and argumentative.
It was on his fourth and last trip to America in 1953 that he died after a prolonged drinking session. When his wife died in 1994, she was buried with him.

3. About the poem
This poem is based around a man, the hunchback in the park, who seems to be a homeless man, staying in a park. The man is physically different from others due to his ‘hunchback’, and also mentally due to being isolated from normal society in the park which he stays in, with no positive interaction with other people. It seems to tell the day of this man on a Sunday who is tormented by local children who make fun of him for his back, and also has to avoid the park cleaner who is picking up leaves. At night, the hunchback dreams of a lady who is healthy and beautiful, but it is only in his imagination.

4. STANZA 1 & 2
In stanza one of this poem, the first line is the same as the title, focusing on the main character within the poem immediately. The poet says he is ‘solitary’, again putting the main points across straight away, telling us he is lonely and by himself. The nature in which he is in is being described in stanza one, triggering the constant description of rural areas and nature within the poem. A bell on Sunday is described as sombre, perhaps because it symbolises the beginning of a new week of suffering for the hunchback. It also suggests he is by a church. The phrase ‘propped between trees and water’ suggests that he isn’t there to stay, and has no set home, but also implies that the hunchback needs support to stay upright due to his disability.
In stanza two, the idea of chains and confinement is brought up for the first time, suggesting that he is metaphorically imprisoned, or perhaps that his injury is holding him back much like chains would. It could also link to the fact that this is a poem describing a memory, and the hunchback is very much confined within the memory of Thomas, and the perception of him won’t change in Thomas’ mind; he is stuck. It mentioned a dog kennel, suggesting that the hunchback lives like an animal. The poet is introduced in this stanza as a boy sailing a toy ship in a fountain, and the other children are introduced as cruel, as they fill a cup with gravel to taunt the hunchback.

5. STANZA 3, 4 & 5
In stanza three, the hunchback is compared to a pack of birds and to water, creation a link between the man and nature. It says he arrived at the park early to rest, emphasizing how his hunched back affects him. The truant boys from town tease him further in this stanza, chasing him.
In stanza four, the poet describes the rush of children through the park, running and teasing the hunchback. The children are mocking the hunchback by imitating his posture and laughing at the fact he is shaking. The nature of the park is described in a more exotic way, saying that it is a ‘loud zoo’ due to the laughing children. The truant boys are also described to be running away from the park keeper.
In stanza five, the image of a zoo is expanded as the boys are described to be having tigers jump out of their eyes, due to their vivid imaginations. The boys also imagine themselves as sailors at sea. Pretending to be different characters is a typical thing that young children would do with their friends. They are contrasted with the other sedate visitors to the park: the old dog sleeper and the nurses and the swans. The idea of nurses and swans being in the park could be the poet categorizing the different people that passed through the park. The nurses are the ones that are willing to help the hunchback and show compassion, whereas the swans are too proud to show any care towards the man.

6. STANZA 6 & 7
In stanza six, we see the hunchback imagine that there is a woman with him. This creates a link between the truant boys and the hunchback; both have vivid imaginations as the boys previously were pretending to be different people. This also suggests that the hunchback is childlike in some ways as he has such a strong imagination, something that becomes very unrealistic as you get older. He imagines a perfect woman – ‘figure without fault’ – linking to Eve within the bible who was made from a bone of Adam, and this imagined woman was created from the hunchback’s ‘crooked bones’. The hunchback links the woman to nature around him – ‘straight as a young elm’ - showing that he didn’t see a lot of other people that he could compare her to, only the nature and plants around him.
In stanza 7 the young boys are compares to ‘strawberries’ once they have gone home, perhaps symbolising the façade they use when in front of their families in comparison to when they are with their friends. This contrasts to the use of the work ‘wild’. Once everyone has left, the park is described as ‘unmade’ suggesting that the people have left in messy and unclean for the hunchback. The final image of the poem is the hunchback in a kennel, comparing him to a lonely dog.

7. Structure and form
This poem is divided into 7 stanzas in regular intervals, which makes the poem look very regular at first sight. However the punctuation used in this poem is very irregular and minimal, as only three full stops are used in the 7 stanzas. This lack of punctuation could be symbolic for the lack of stability in the hunchback’s life. There is also a lot of enjambment within the poem. An example is:
While the boys among willows
Made the tigers jump out of their eyes
To roar on rockery stones
This not only creates pauses which we are lacking due to the minimal punctuation used, and creates a broken feel to the poem, reflecting that this is a memory that won’t be perfect but will be broken up in some areas.

8. Sounds and imagery
There is some rhyme in the poem: ‘park’ and dark’, ‘rockery’ and ‘mockery’. There is also some half rhyme: stanza one, lines two, three and five, ‘mister/water/enter’. However, there is no regular pattern to the rhyme used, which again may be symbolic of how volatile and unstable the life of the hunchback is. The poem is to be read in a broken up way due to the enjambment used. There is only one piece of dialogue in the poem and that is from the truant boys: ‘Mister… Hey mister’. This shows the boys mocking him, making dialogue very hostile.
The images in the poem evoke sympathy for the hunchback, and the first stanza contains information that sets the tone. From the first line the hunchback is defined by his appearance, not by who he is or his name - and cruelly so. It is almost certain that he is known locally as "The hunchback in the park“ as the narrator refers to him as this very easily and more than once, suggesting that he has no identity. Line two tells us that he is "solitary". We never discover his name, he is just "mister“. This again emphasizes his lack of identity. The rest of the stanza tells us that he is in the park from "the opening of the garden lock" to the "bell at dark". There are no people in sight here; no one is with him.
Bread and water were typically given to a prisoner, and that is what the hunchback is given in stanza two. He is treated just like a prisoner because of his physical difference and thus he has been cast aside by society. This also links to the previous themes of confinement and being locked up or imprisoned within this memory.
The image of the children filling the man's cup with gravel and the description of them mocking his hunched back are simple but powerful and so our sympathy for the main character grows. The references to animals and a zoo makes the boys seem untamed and wild much like zoo animals. In stanza two and again in the final stanza the hunchback is described as having a kennel like a dog, showing that he is being dehumanized.

9. LINKS TO OTHER POEMS
This poem links to ‘give’, as they both describe people who are lonely and homeless. They both describe very sad, lonely days in the lifestyle of two people, however this poem is in 3rd person, creating a more distant connection between the character and the reader, showing the character as an outsider, whereas give uses first person, making it more intimate.
This poem links to Casehistory: Alison (head injury) and to On a Portrait of a Deaf Man as all of them describe people with a disability of some sort who have lost a part of themselves. However in this poem, the hunchback is physically injured and mentally isolated, having lost their youth, in Casehistory: Alison (head injury) the woman has amnesia and has lost her memories and in On a Portrait of a Deaf Man, the one who has the disability was the dead man who was deaf, but the thing that has been lost is both this man and the narrators faith in God.
The poem also links to the clown punk as they both describe somebody who is an outcast and mocked by the local people, each with their own nickname which they are referred to by. Both also use 3rd person to describe them, creating a distance between the reader and the character.

10. task What image are we first presented in the start of the poem
What is the narrator doing at the park? What are the other children doing?
Explain the reason for two similes in the poem.
What is the effect of certain rhymes within the poem?
Why is the hunchback seen as less than a human in the poem?
Explain one difference and one similarity between the hunchback and the truant boys?
How to we still get the feeling that this is retelling a memory?
Why does the hunchback appear to have no identity in the poem?
What are the key themes and ideas in the poem?
Explain the effect of very little punctuation in the poem.