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Give - Analysis Using SMILE – AQA Poetry (GCSE English Literature)
So we look at the poem “Give” by Simon Armitage; a very punchy and powerful poem.
First of all, we got the enjambment/Caesura at the top here. So they’ve got the word
‘dear’ on “Of all the public places, dear”. Then the enjambment there just make
us hold on that word and makes us think why is the person addressing us in that way or
addressing the person is talking to in that way. The reason is because it is a play on
the words of a film and same in the next stanza as well.
We’ve got Caesura down here which we break up these lines in the last stanza which kind
of afraid, is broken and just shows that this person is maybe finding hard to keep together
and that’s to keep things very concise and very punchy to kind of withhold their feelings
and that’s how it feels.
This is broken the whole way through in very, very short stanzas. Perhaps this reflecting
the state of the asker and showing that they are not just very comfortable. The first two
are kind of jokey and he kind of builds a little from that. Obviously, we see the tone
change from this almost happy and joyful here and almost this kind of intense asking down
here or pleading down here at the bottom. It is broken the whole way through so that
you don’t really get a real sense of who it is. We get a lot more of their tone and
their feeling throughout than we do of their actual persona or of their ideas.
We got a dash used here to show excitement when as he’s mentioning the things that
actually done; the more complex items that are done.
“For coppers”, you get the idea of dancing and singing; silver is one more and the gold.
The dash there just really helps us to think about the grandiosity of what they’re actually
about to do. Obviously, it gets higher and higher.
We see the structure of the first person the whole way through. This is the person talking
to us. Obviously, that gives a reflection on what they’re trying to say and that’s
reflected obviously by the repeat use of “I” all the way through.
One of the meanings, one of the things first of all is the poverty. “I’m on the street,
under the stars”. Obviously, that has given us an indication of what kind of person within
and also when he actually says the “I”, the reference was being done. The only thing
the “I” references is the dancing or the singing. They are not massively challenging
items in the way the rest are coming are and he says that’s what he does and he only
receives coppers for it and he does receive poverty. It is almost a hierarchy kind of
there, amongst street performers.
We get the idea there again of the extent of what one may do, first of all, one might
do for money. First, where you got the idea there of all the different people and what
they do as street performers to earn money. Perhaps they might be homeless, etc., or the
street performing too.
Money for people’s attention and it is aiming people, but moreover, you’ve got the idea
of what someone will do down here where, “I’m on my knees.” Obviously, this person here
is begging whereas as in the beginning, they are actually trying to be almost humorous
by almost using these filmic references from Casablanca. The idea there is from the film
Casablanca.
Then we got this idea here of social responsibility. It makes us think, “Well, what do we do
to help people?” Maybe the message coming through is that if we did our little bit and
all gave like our coppers, etc. to try to look after people, then perhaps there wouldn’t
be people in this situation. Perhaps that point is being made.
The image we get is the homelessness. “I’m on the street, under the stars.” “On the
street” there is in terms of begging and poverty living. And “under the stars”
is referencing people who seem just to have brighter, grander lives that him. The stars,
in a little sense, is where he is sleeping at night.
We also got the idea of the religious imagery which comes from, “It’s not as if I’m
holding out for frankincense or myrrh”. Obviously, religious images because of the
gifts that are given to baby Jesus in Christian theology. The idea there is he is trying not
to ask for the world. He is not asking for something that only happened once in a lifetime.
He is not holding himself as that special. He just wants something to, here again, “change”,
which leads to the idea of social responsibility that we have mentioned earlier.
We got the person begging on the image, etc. Basically, we know this is a public scene
and he is choosing to do something there and it’s coppers that he normally gets and he
actually asking the person for something. He says, “I beg of you.” Obviously, he
is on his knees. This is quite desperate, desperate plea.
Moving on then to the language, we got “I” repeated the whole way through which kind
of makes “I” repeated the whole way which make us very empathetic with the reader because
the opinion is to us directly and can’t be met with words and the number of times
“I” is repeated is actually quite a lot considering. It makes it very personal that
they are talking to us.
We also got the build of value and the language. The way we beg for coppers, for silver or
for gold. We see that’s a kind of an interesting build. So we get an insight into some of the
hierarchy of the street performers, etc. and who makes the most money.
The word ‘dear’ here right at the beginning, I know this could be part of his act. What
I mean by act in this person isn’t begging or isn’t in need. I just mean that maybe
he kind of goes for trying to entertain and obviously, we get that from the fact that
he says that he dances and sings and maybe his reference to kind of film here or kind
of being charming. This word is kind of very interesting again. It offers a great contrast
with how he is at the beginning. He’s kind of lost the warmth and charm right there and
at the end, he is left begging.
We also got the monosyllabic last couplet which again, the language of which is very
desperate, “You give me tea. That’s big of you.” That’s all monosyllabic, so it’s
really just kind of dropping to a really baseness in language, as well as baseness in request;
again, sad.
What kind of things actually makes us think about then? With the class and the effect
on us and things that we can extend, well, giving to others obviously and what they may
need and how they can be helped, etc. in the society. The lives of the poor and what kind
of conditions are they actually in and how they live. A warning perhaps that we need
to try to do something in society so that more people don’t end up like this. It gives
idea of change of moods. Maybe something can be effect and something where our mood changes
very quickly as this person actually undergoes here from the very top to the bottom.
Analysis Using SMILE – AQA Poetry (GCSE English Literature)
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