Toads

Question 1

What are the 2 ideas within the poem?

Answer 1

1. The speaker hates and critiques the nature of work
2. The speaker inevitably accepts that work is a reality/important for the way of life

Question 2

1 - ‘why should i let the toad work _ on my life?’

Answer 2

squat - rheatorical questioning = questions himself and his ideology + frustrating

Question 3

1 - ‘six days of the week it __ with its sickening poisen’

Answer 3

soils - sibilence = ruins his week, as it buries him with work

Question 4

1 - ‘just for paying a few __!’

Answer 4

bills - hyperbolic = lack of logic + frustration

Question 5

1 - ‘courageous enough to shout, stuff your __!’

Answer 5

pension - anger/frustration with the desire to give up work

Question 6

2 - ‘But i know, all too well, thats the stuff that __ are made on’

Answer 6

dreams - intertextual reference (Shakespeare The Tempest) = mocking the idea of a utopia + starting to see the logic of the nescesitiy of work

Question 7

2 - ‘for somethig sufficiently __ squats in me, too’

Answer 7

toad-like - sibilence + extended metaphor = the pressure of work is inside of him, and he recognises his own complexity with work

Question 8

2 - ‘But I do say it’s hard to lose either, when you have __’

Answer 8

both - balance between feeling the pressure of work, and having the desire/obligation to work