Feminine Gospels

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Duffy employs many techniques within this expansive poem. Yet, one that appears consistently throughout is a caesura. Indeed, Duffy uses caesura within Map-Woman to control the speed of reading, some parts slowed by the employment of caesura. These slight metrical pauses allow Duffy to emphasize certain moments. Indeed, ‘waiting to start’, is encased in caesura, grammatically isolated. The two pauses around this phrase, caused by a caesura, lead to a slower reading, reflecting the character waiting through her youth until she is old enough to leave. Duffy controls the rhythm, using caesura to place emphasis on many key moments within ‘ The Map Woman‘. As with all of Duffy’s work which I have read to date, her vocabulary has been carefully selected to create startling imagery, and originality prevails: ‘The sky was unwrapping itself, ripping itself into shreds’ (from ‘The Woman Who Shopped’). So much emphasis has been placed upon all of the senses, and the generational scope too is nothing short of masterful. Although the punctuation within the stands varies, one thing to note is simply the length of this poem. In the anthology, only Beautiful and Laughter of Stafford Girls’ High reach similar lengths. This could be to reflect the expanse of information contained in a map. Duffy uses the symbol of a map to represent someone’s whole identity. Therefore, the extensive amount of information given can reflect the intricacy of an individual life. Duffy focuses on those small moments which end up having such a dramatic influence on one’s life. Key features: monosyllabic and harsh consonant sounds, asyndetic listing, declarative sentences, cross-line rhyme, caesure Finally, Duffy discusses the Princess of Wales, Diana. Lady Di was known as the “People’s Princess”, is a much-loved figure in the U.K. In 1981 she engaged Prince Charles and married later that year. After the couple’s separation in 1992, the media sought details of their marital difficulties. Diana was viciously hunted by the media, eventually dying in a car crash while fleeing the paparazzi in 1997. Her funeral was televised and brought in 32.10 million viewers in the U.K., with millions more watching around the world.

Duffy’s Sub spans over 7 stanzas, each measuring an equal 10 lines. There is no rhyme scheme within the poem, Duffy instead of creating a metrical rhythm through the use of enjambment and internal rhyme. ‘Feminine Gospels’ has internal rhyme throughout, with this poem being no different, Duffy uses this technique to connect ideas while also speeding up how the poem is read – perhaps reflecting the intensity of the situations Duffy imagines herself in. The complete regularity within the poem could be a reflection of how women have been excluded from these historic events, the monotony of form reflecting the unchanging exclusion. One could argue that using a 7 stanza structure bears reference to the 7 days of the week, Duffy uses this idea to suggest that female exclusion from history is an occurrence that happens every day.

The fourth section discusses Princess Diana. This is the most structurally confined section of the text, being written in quatrains. These carefully planned stanzas could reflect the pressure on Diana to conform to the stereotypes of a princess. Her life was measured and directly compared to other royals, the pressure on her immeasurable. Duffy emulates this pressure by confining the structure to a particular style – representing Diana’s entrapment through the form and structure of this section. The second section, depicting Cleopatra, is built from lengthy stanzas. Each of these long-form stanzas reflects major parts of the ruler’s life. The length of this section could be emblematic of her long reign, Duffy remembering the success of Cleopatra. Even when discussing Cleopatra’s death, it is contained within two words, only a slight mark on the incredible reign she had. Duffy emulates her success through the extended stanzas, containing an element of Cleopatra’s longevity through this style. Although not visibly seen, her influence is felt across society as she ‘ruled and reigned.’ There is a sense of mythical to this style of ruling, with Queen Elizabeth being idolized through Duffy’s mythic semantics, ‘some said’ playing into the narrative of a legendary figure. The poem comprises three eight-lined free-verse stanzas. There is no regular formal metre and no rhyme scheme, although Duffy uses internal rhyme, for example “old”, “gold” and “cold” in stanza one. The enjambed line endings create a flowing narrative.

Elizabeth 1 never married, keeping her status as an eligible virgin as a political bargaining tool in national and international politics. In this way she cleverly kept control of competing aristocratic families in England. Internationally she remained aloof, refusing to align herself with any single foreign monarch, thereby maintaining power and independence. Last poem in the collection, suggests she has done all she can do, and the struggle for feminism is down to other people. Theme of death could also represent the passing of patriarchal dominance. The ‘starlike sorrows of immortal eyes’ is oddly wounded. Duffy could use this to suggest a melancholic pang to the character. Perhaps Helen, in her godly position, understood the great burden that beauty had placed upon her. Firstly, Duffy begins this section with a premonition by the end, ‘dead’. The caesura following this word adds emphasis, creating an unsettling moment of pause. Diana, apart from her fantastic activism and philanthropy, is also known for how badly she was treated by the press. Her death came in a car crash while fleeing from the press, perhaps signaling ‘dead’ as her final resting state. It is hard to imagine a poem Duffy couldn't write: a haiku? Please. Dactylic battlesong? Easy. In 'The Laughter of Stafford Girls' High', she takes straightforward narrative poetry and produces that rare thing - a long poem you don't want to end. A brilliant tale of a school transformed by a giggling epidemic, it sings because of her language (sky 'like Quink', the 'passionate cold/ of the snow'), her humour and, most of all, her ability to pin down a lifetime in half a line and, in a few more, tell private, dramatic, dazzling stories on which others would lavish a novel.

Comments

It is within the fourth stanza in Duffy introduces the first ‘law’ of Elizabeth’s, ‘Childhood’. Duffy states that Queen Elizabeth created a society in which ‘a girl’ would feel safe wherever she was, ‘no girl growing’ without being protected. The consonance of /g/ across ‘girl growing’ reflects the sense of ageing, with the extended sound being emblematic of growing and changing. The longest poem in the book is "The Laughter of Stafford Girls' High" and Duffy clearly enjoyed writing it. At one level the poem is a tour de force of sparkle and fizz. A mysterious giggle grows ineluctably into an all-consuming merriment that destroys the whole structure of grammar school propriety. Those who went to such a grammar school, as I did, will recognise the discipline and the drudgery, and recall the passionate longing to escape shared by teachers and students alike. At the same time it is hard to keep out of mind Searle's St Trinian's, or even the hearty attachments of Angela Brazil's captains and head girls. I found the poetry lay mainly in the asides: a teacher on a cold night, watching her own breath, a moment of loving abandon, an evocation of "The world like Quink outside". For all its accomplishment, this was not my favourite poem in the collection. The final image of this section focuses on ‘little bird inside a cage’, representing the trap that beauty is. Helen’s whole life was marred by the prosecution of men, trapped due to her physical features. The final image of a ‘cage’ symbolizes this oppression, Helen’s life is destroyed due to her beauty. One of the key themes within Beautiful is Duffy’s exploration of women in history. History is a major theme that Duffy discusses within ‘Feminine Gospels’. This poem uses history to suggest that women have been exploited since the beginning of time, both in fantasy and real life. Duffy exposes the horrors of this exploitation, discussing how it often leads to pain and death. Women are oppressed at the hands of men, both individuals and making up larger forms of society.