Duffy and Larkin Context

Question 1

What about Duffy’s life may explain her preoccupation with identity?

Answer 1

Three- quaters Irish, Born in scotland and brought up predominately in England - which may explain her concern with identity

Question 2

What happened when Duffy was 6?

Answer 2

She moved to stafford and much of her concern with childhood alienation derived from her experience of being uprooted from and moving to a very different culture

Question 3

What is the significance of the mean time anthology name?

Answer 3

• echo of greenwhich mean time - a universal measure of time -> themes of the poem have universal relevance
• simply linking all of her poems to the passage of time.

Question 4

When was Mean time Published?

Answer 4

1993

Question 5

What changes were occurring to education in Duffy’s youth?

Answer 5

British state schools had been divided into grammar school which can an academic education to children who passed 11+ and comprehensive schools.

Question 6

Duffy as a feminist rewrites stories that had deeply embedded anti-female prejudices?

Answer 6

Duffy rewrites Havisham, giving a sense of agency and power of her story

Question 7

What does Zeitgeist mean?

Answer 7

Zeitgeist is the spirit , mood or atmosphere of a period of time.
> Cultural References to the 1960s and through capturing the grammar school culture and meritocracy ideal of the 60 Captain could be described as zeitgeist poem.

Question 8

What is 1960’s Britain associated with ?

Answer 8

1960s Britain is associated with a rise in youth , and popular culture , as well as civil rights and protest movements. The 2nd wave of feminism broke out during the 1960s , and was associated with Sexual liberation and freedom.

Question 9

What are some examples of Duffy’s dramatic monologues ?

Answer 9

Havisham , and The Captain of the 1964 Top of the Form team

Question 10

Did Duffy go to a convent school?

Answer 10

St Josephs Convent School and Duffy was raised as a Roman Catholic

Question 11

What has it been stated that Duffy does to her life and poetry?

Answer 11

It has been stated that Duffy uses most of her own life within poetry

Question 12

Where was Larkin born?

Answer 12

In coventry

Question 13

What was Larkin’s mother and Father like?

Answer 13

Father was a more dominant influence, with Eva being quite a nervous, passive person in comparison

Question 14

What literary trend did Larkin become associated with

Answer 14

The Trend became known as ‘the movement’ and it’s desire was to return to traditional forms in verse and avoid the experimentation and obscurity of expression found in much pre-war British poetry.

Question 15

Arundel Tomb context:

Answer 15

The inspiration for ‘An Arundel Tomb’ came during a New Year holiday in early 1956, when Larkin visited Chichester Cathedral with his long-term partner, Monica Jones.

Question 16

Love songs in age context:

Answer 16

the poem was written after a Christmas visit to his widowed mother 10 years this point - his father died when he was young.

Question 17

Home is so sad context

Answer 17

1958, Larkin returned to visit Mum.

Question 18

Wild oats context

Answer 18

Larkin met a woman called Jane Exall (the ‘bosomy English rose’) and her friend, Ruth Bowman (‘her friend in specs ).

Question 19

Monica Jones

Answer 19

when working univeristy leciester her met - lasted until his death. got in a relationship with maeve and mackereth simultaneously with monica jones

Question 20

what did Amis Larkins friend say about larkin’s perspective?

Answer 20

he was one who found the universe a black and hostile and recognised very clearly the disagreeable realities of human life.

Question 21

Nostalgia in Captain poem

Answer 21

Then, he ‘lived in a kind of fizzing hope’, the past-tense phrasing suggesting excitement that was never truly realised. Indeed, his crystal clear recall of the songs, tastes, smells and vivid sights of the past (‘pink pavements/that girls chalked on, in a blue evening’) all contribute to the sense that his present is a flat and nebulous disappointment in comparison.

Question 22

Unhappiness in captain and miss havisham

Answer 22

While the captain of the Top of the Form team and Miss Havisham are made miserable by ‘mean time’ moving on without them,

Question 23

What was Larkin’s religious belief?

Answer 23

Aethist

Question 24

post war context (larkin)

Answer 24

> Increasing urbanisation and the increasing number of industrial centres (due to the new towns act 1946) resulted in the loss of rural England
Larkin used his poetry to portray the changing social climate of the 1950s and elicit a sense of regret/tragedy/lament for the lost countryside

Question 25

James Naremore - Larkin often comments on contemporary life. #faith healing #sunny prestayn

Answer 25

'Larkin presents himself as a skeptical, less deceived observer of contemporary life'

Question 26

Philip Larkin in his diary - Bitter views on marriage. #whitsun wedding #self's the man #talking in bed #love songs in age #afternoons

Answer 26

'Let me remember that the only married state I know (i.e that of my parents) is bloody hell. Never must it be forgotten'

Question 27

Motion - views on deat #ambulances #nothing to be said #take one home for the kiddies #days

Answer 27

"Death, in Larkin's view, is an utterly comfortless blank.

Question 28

Motion - views on Love #love songs in age #wild oats #self's the man #whitsun weddings #talking in bed #arundel tomb

Answer 28

"none of Larkin's poems registers the achievement of complete calm success in love"

Question 29

Martin Amis: views on life

Answer 29

Larkin is anti-life

Question 30

Larkin - Bryan Appleyard

Answer 30

"Larkin is a hopeless and inflexible pessimist"

Question 31

Larkin - on love being stronger than death

Answer 31

" love being stronger than death is a sentiment ... only justifiable if love can stop dying, which, of course, it cannot.

Question 32

Jody Allen-Randolph - Differences between Larkin and Duffy.

Answer 32

'She has an optimistic side that Larkin did not, most visible in her many love poems'

Question 33

Calvin Tomkins - Duffy's aim is to communicate

Answer 33

"With a lot of artists, the mystique is to baffle their readership. She never does that. Her aim is to communicate'

Question 34

Deryn Reese-Jones - Duffy is not a straightforward feminist poet.

Answer 34

Duffy moves beyond 'a straightforward feminist poet' and shows 'the difficulties that patriarchy present to both men and women'

Question 35

Duffy suffering + joy in love #first love #crush #Havisham #disgrace #adultery

Answer 35

"there's a persistent sense in her work that love involves as much suffering as it does joy"

Question 36

Duffy on love poems #first love #crush #Havisham #disgrace #adultery

Answer 36

"challenges and alters power relationships by making women both the subject and object of love poems"

Question 37

Duffy - Kathrine Viner #first love #crush #Havisham #disgrace #adultery # pluto #beachcomber #captain

Answer 37

"Duffy's poetry was filled with lost loves and yearning for the past"

Question 38

British council

Answer 38

"writes in everyday conversational language"

Question 39

Rees-Jones / Duffy / Catholicism #Good teachers

Answer 39

"The effects of her Catholic upbringing have been of obvious importance"

Question 40

Booth / Larkin / religion #water #arundel tomb #faith healer

Answer 40

"the laureate of a post-Christian, secular England"

Question 41

McEwan, Duffy - voice #havisham

Answer 41

voice to previously marginalised or silenced figures"

Question 42

Duffy - loss #first love #pluto #havisham

Answer 42

"Tender treatment of the theme of loss"

Question 43

Gordon Brown, Duffy - emotions

Answer 43

stretched our imaginations by putting the whole range of human experience into lines that capture the emotions perfectly"

Question 44

There is a nostalgia for childhood that runs through her poetry

Answer 44

Forbes

Question 45

Woods - Duffy - Time - #havisham #Pluto #Captain?

Answer 45

Duffy explores how time is inevitably cruel

Question 46

Carol Ann Duffy

Answer 46

“The poems in Mean Time are about the different ways in which time brings about change or loss... The effects of time can be mean.”

Question 47

Jane Dowson

Answer 47

“At the heart of Carol Ann Duffy’s poetry is the continual acknowledgment and exploration of the limits of language.”

Question 48

Fowler - Duffy delves into the complexities of infidelity and emotional turmoil. #adultery

Answer 48

“Duffy is openly controversial.

Question 49

Larkin political views:

Answer 49

Larkin held conservative, traditionalist views and was skeptical of social progress, Opposed to radical social change; he mourned the loss of traditional structures and certainties.

Question 50

Larkin views on marriage:

Answer 50

While not overtly critical, Larkin is quietly ironic about modern marriage, viewing it as a loss of individuality and a product of social conformity.

Question 51

How do larkin's political views link to sunny prestatyn?

Answer 51

Implies a disdain for permissive culture and sexual liberalisation

Question 52

How do Larkin's political views link to Mr bleaney?

Answer 52

Mr Bleaney: Could be read as a quiet despair at what post-war modern life and industrialisation has reduced people to,

Question 53

What are Duffy's political views?

Answer 53

Duffy is openly left-wing, feminist, and supports social equality. As the first female and openly LGBTQ+ Poet Laureate, she often uses poetry to challenge power structures.

Question 54

Afternoons context:

Answer 54

> Larkin presents a bleak view of domestic life after the surface-level progress of the post-war welfare state, depicting women are trapped by domestic demands > Larkin’s belief that modern society robs people of agency. > Larkin’s skepticism toward marriage as a traditional institution reflects his disillusionment with the post-war trend of family-first ideology.

Question 55

Self's the man context:

Answer 55

> post-war consumerism was rising, marriage -> a social expectation > colloquial, conversational language and a regular metre to mirror everyday speech. > The poem critiques how life becomes about providing and consuming, rather than real emotional connection. > Larkin’s skepticism toward marriage as a traditional institution reflects his disillusionment with the post-war trend of family-first ideology.

Question 56

Faith healing context:

Answer 56

> even as religious revival movements gained popularity - rise of American-style evangelism and the commodification of emotional experiences > Larkin’s melancholic humanism: he doesn't believe in God, but he knows people desperately want to and find comfort doing so.

Question 57

larkin and death:

Answer 57

> Larkin is often haunted by the inevitability of death — not just as a personal end, but as the erasure of meaning.

Question 58

existential nihilism

Answer 58

The belief that life has no inherent meaning and that death renders all efforts ultimately pointless.

Question 59

Larkin's views - existentialism:

Answer 59

Heavily influenced by existentialism, particularly the idea that time exposes the emptiness of human pretensions.

Question 60

How did post war changes affect Larkin's poetry?

Answer 60

> Britain’s post-war government introduced welfare reforms. -> Young mothers benefit from modern comforts and housing, but are depicted as trapped in domesticity. >1950s and early 60s: rise in advertising, mass-produced goods. Larkin critiques this shift as superficial, vulgar, and spiritually hollow. > Though many believed in a better, fairer Britain, Larkin’s tone is often quietly bleak, suggesting that real emotional or spiritual fulfilment remains elusive

Question 61

duffy is openly left-wing, feminist, and supports social equality - how does this relate to love poems

Answer 61

- makes women and their experiences and sexuality the subject of poems, significant in a society with presents female sexuality as taboo - seen as a reclamation of female desire - feminist: give voice to female desire, sexual agency, and emotional complexity. - delves into unconventional forms of love, such as infatuation, crush - presenting female emotional turmoil - psychological realism, portrays love as multi-dimensional - gendered expectations in love and desire, often presenting women who are sexually assertive and emotionally independent,

Question 62

adultery context

Answer 62

could be linked to unfaithfulness she experienced during her relationship with Adrien Henry

Question 63

Duffy and philosphy

Answer 63

Duffy studied philosophy and became particularly interested in Ludwig Wittgenstein. He believed the purpose of philosophy was to find explanations that allowed people to picture the world.