aunt julia Flashcards
Themes of aunt julia (10)
isolation, regret, frustration, loss, nostalgia, death, nature, places, strength of relationships, history/tradition
“i could not answer her–I could not understand her”
shows language barrier,
repetition
emphasises helplessness and frustration
affectionate tone- emphasises deep bond shared
“–” extends idea of inability to understand
“i can see her strong foot”
present tense- such a fond impression he can look back on
“hers was the only house where i’ve lain at night in the absolute darkness of a box bed, listening to crickets being friendly.”
Idea of safeness and secure even in primitive accommodation-nostalgia
language barrier overcome by instinctive bond
idea of darkness and friendly crickets-contrast
“she was brown eggs, black skirts and a keeper of threepennybits in a teapot”
metaphor of connection to landscape
hard life-didn’t have much cash
personification-objects and garments that evoke image of her
“aunt Julia spoke Gaelic/very loud and very fast.”
repetition from 1st line in poem
very extroverted
different as gaelic is uncommon-language barrier
“she lay silenced in the absolute black of a sandy grave”
regret-too late to have a convo with her
loss-she is dead
frustrated that they could never talk
sinister unsettling tone-contrast to darkness and box bed-shifts from “darkness” to “black” suggests bleak void of death
“but i hear her still, welcoming me”
nostalgia- of her friendliness and extrovertedness
“paddling with the treadle of the spinningwheel
while her right hand drew yarn
marvellously out of the air.”
no punctuation- to be read quickly- creates idea of long time to spin yarn- creates sense of movement associated with AJ
“marvellously”-deeply impressed by aunt
long vowels to be stretched out
“she was buckets and water flouncing into them
she was winds pouring wetly round house-ends”
series of nature based metaphors and items in a home
appears larger than life-so connected to landscape- becomes apart of it
personification-landscape with wind and water
By the time i had learned a little, she lay
too late to talk-learned gaelic but not in time
darker tone of poem- sinister and unsettling
