Eavan boland Flashcards
(40 cards)
Child of Our Time Alliteration
“Living, learn, must learn from you, dead”
Child of Our Time Personification
“Whose life our idle Talk has cost”
Child of Our Time final line
“Child of our time, our times have robbed your cradle. Sleep in a world your final sleep has woken”
Child of our time inspiration
“This song, which takes from your final cry
Its motive from the fact you cannot listen”
Child of our time What we should have done
“We who should have known how to instruct with rhymes for your waking”
The Famine Road Unsympathetic
“These irish, give them no coins at all; their bones need toil, their characters no less”
Trevalyns letter to Jones in the first stanza reveals his prejudice with racial stereotyping of the suffering Irish people. Trevelyan believes hard work would benefit them more than any charity.
The Famine Road Metaphor for Indirect massacre of the Irish
“Trevelyan’s seal blooded the deal table”
The letter sent by Trevelyan had deathly consequences for the Irish people. The use of “blooded” instead of stained represents the suffering that would go on to be caused by Jones reading out the letter to the famine relief committee
The Famine Road Juxtaposition
“One out of every ten and then another third of those again women”
Juxtaposes the historical famine setting of the first stanza with a more modern one where a woman is informed she is infertile. Initially both stories seem vastly different but the reason for intertwining them soon becomes clear. The poet is attempting to draw an analogy between the physical suffering of the Irish peasants and the emotional trauma experienced by women who cannot bear children.
The Famine Road Rhetorical Question
“After All could they not blood their knuckles on rock, suck/ April hailstones for water and for food?”
The Famine Road Simile showing Desperation of the Irish
“each eyed as -/ as if at a corner butcher - the other’s buttock”
Grotesque suggesting cannibalism
The Famine Road People wont risk tending to a dying man
“No more than snow/ attends its own flakes where they settle/ and melt, will they pray by his death rattle”
The famine Road Womans purpose is to just to take care of her house now
“But take it well woman, grow/ your garden, keep house”
Tone of the doctor becomes arrogant perhaps even patronising as he offers hollow advice.
The Famine Road jones response
“Sedition, idleness, cured in one”
In stanza 7 we see Jones letter to Trevalyn after the implementing the changes he suggested in the first stanza.
Jones is quite smug as he is delighted that the Irish are far too exhausted to even try fight back against their abusers.
The Famine Road Casual Sighting of bodies
“This Tuesday i saw bones/ out of my carriage window”
Creates a cold, detached image of Jones attitudes towards the Irish. He sees them as subhuman and looks upon their deaths with delight
The Famine Road Woman feels no purpose
“Barren, never to know the load/ of his child in you, what is your body/ now if not a famine road?”
This final stanzas differs from the prior stanzas regarding infertility. Instead of a different character talking to the woman, this appears to be her own inner monologue contemplating the news she has just been told. The woman faces hardship and is mistreated by those around her. The speakers for both stories told in the poem have little remorse or sympathy for those suffering, in fact it seems they couldn’t care less.
The Black Lace Fan significance of the fan
“It was the first gift he ever gave her”
The Black lace fan opposites attract
She was always early./ He was late
The Black Lace Fan symbol of longing for love / other person
It was stifling./ A starless drought made the nights stormy
heat = longing for love
stormy = lonely
The Black Lace Fan call back to symbol of romantic tension
“The heat was killing./ She thought the distance smelled of rain and lightning”
The heat represents a longing for love
Whereas the storm represents romantic tension
The Black Lace Fan metaphor for longing for love
“The blackbird on this first sultry morning,/ in summer, finding buds, worms, fruit,/ feels the heat.”
The Black lace fan Blackbird is ready to find love
Suddenly she puts out her wing -/ the whole flirtatious span of it
This moment use of form
“A neighbourhood./ at dusk”
[Emphasises the importance of small and seemingly insignificant things in life]
This Moment best moments in life
“Things are getting ready/ to happen/ out of sight”
Showcases how the best moments can occur at the most unexpected times. We may not realize just how good the moment is until it passes.
This Moment imagery and metaphor for motherly protection
rinds slanting around fruit
