The Emigree Flashcards
Poet of The Emigrée
Carol Rumens
Context of Emigrée
Links to modern day refugee crisis
Rumen born in London and lived in Wales and travelled around Eastern Europe. The aspect of her life reflected in her writing is about foreign customs, culture and language
Poem contained in 1993 ‘Thinking of skins’ centred on political consciousness in E Europe
Language stanza 1 (Emigrée)
“There once was a country” temporal dexis at the start creates a childlike tone to the poem highlighting the speaker retaining her child memories of the place
“Sunlight-clear”-theme of sunlight repeated shows how she hopes for her country to get rid of tyrants
“Bright filled paper weight”-perfect city trapped (tourists buy paper weight the city doesn’t belong to her and the paperweight holds her still)
“Branded by an impression of sunlight- Juxtaposition of positive and negative imagery of “sunlight” with “branded’ usually painful and aggressive (long term pain)
Lamgauage stanza 2 (The Emigrée)
“The child’s vocabulary”-theme of language used shows how the speaker wants to retain her childhood
“Like a hollow doll”- simile of doll and mentioning of “child’ vocabulary” (native language) = sense of fragility valuing her native tongue however she doesn’t remeber it much (hollow) shown by “spills grammar”
‘I shall have every coloured molecule”- shows how she wants to retain her childhood memories of her country - “coloured” childlike imagery show how she treaures it
“It may by now be a lie”- her foreign tongue is forgotten (banned)
“Tastes of sunlight”- imagery of sunlight
Language stanza 3 (The Emigrée)
“I have no passport”- place doesn’t exist (can’t go back)
“City comes to me” , “lies down” , “takes me dancing” personification of the city as if in a relationship highlights the importance of the city to the speaker
“It combs its hair and love its shining eyes”-taking care of the city (like a doll-childish) trying to retain her memories of her city through the doll
Repetition of “they”- makes it seem threatening - a group wants to marginalise her native language/people
“Shadows fall as evidence for sunlight”- Original upbringing positive carries sunlight with her
Structure used in the poem (Emigrée)
Disorganised structure features such as enjambmemt “child vocabulary I carried her like a hollow doll” represent the chaos in the country
Organised stanza length imposes order on the chaos- positivity of childhood over negativity of tyrants
Enjambment “through the city of walls”- “of walls” seperated to signify how walls are seen to be isolating connotations of entrapment
Caesura and free verse af the end of the last stanza - shows the chaos of the city
Extra stanza length shows her ability to not let go of her childlike imagery of the city
Episteophe of sunlight repeated at the end of each stanza shows how she want to hold onto her childlike imagery
Form used in the poem (Emigrée)
Dramatic monologue, 1st person singular- imagery of isolation)
Imagery arresting (banned, circle me , no way back) and lots of symbolism (sunlight, doll city)
Long sentences , free verse , ireegular metric pattern , stanza length and no rhyme scheme reflects the chaos the city is in right now (lacks order)
Similarities with Checking me out history and Emigrée
Voilent connotations of “Bandage up me own with me own history” conflict betwen the speakers culture by colonisl rule. Similarly Rumen does this by the aggressive undertone of “I am branded by an impression of sunlight”
Emotional significance to cultural identity repetiton of “dem tell me” shows his anger whereas in Rumens she retains her childlike lexis of “ I comb jts hair and love its shining eye”
Differences with checking me out history and Emigrée
Asgard demonises his childhood using an angey tone and seperation of stanza to show his edjcation was not sufficient. In contrast to rhis , Rumen uses imagery of sunlight- “an impression of sunlight”, “the wite streets of sunlight”, “it tastes of sunlight” to present her childhood imagery of the city
Themes of The Emigrée
Sense of isolation
Sense of lack of identity (cultural)
Power of memory
Power of humans/ war
