Feminine Gospels Test Questions
with Answers
The Map-Woman - Answer-Themes: Bodies, Place, Identity, Memories, Insecurity,
Control
- Extended metaphor of skin as a map for her past. Identity is on her skin, it's almost an
accessory rather than something deeply buried within her personality
- Metaphor of a journey; she has something to escape from.
- A woman's path/route is mapped and cannot be diverted from
Quotes:
- "She covered it up with... and fingertip-sleeved" - becomes increasingly concealed -
skin bears a weight
- "Broad if she binged, thin when she slimmed" - verbs of change juxtapose
permanence
The places you have been imprint your identity -
- "But - birthmark, tattoo - the A-Z street-map grew, a precise second skin"
You carry the past with you - "But the map was under her stockings"
Memories are oppressive - "She sponged, soaped, scrubbed; the prison and hospital
stamped on her back"
"Or spacemen in 2001 floating to Strauss" - references to 2001 film Space Odyssey,
hints at the idea of escapism - her identity may keep her from truly leaving but she still
has the capacity to imagine possible adventure.
Everything is prescribed - "And wonder who you would marry and how and when and
where you would die"
Patriarchal society - "Duck and dive down Nelson and Churchill and Kipling and Milton
Way until you were home." - Male names suggests that it is a patriarchal influence that
guides her way home - larger male influence over her decisions.
"When she showered, the map gleamed on her skin" - sense of pride. Arguably, she
doesn't want to reinvent herself, she just craves something new.
, HMT link: woman's body used against her/disempowers her, patriarchal influence,
desire for change
The Diet - Answer-Themes: identity, social expectations, insecurity, power, passivity
- Extended metaphor of the diet to represent social pressures on women; elements of
magical realism (also used in Angela Carter's collection of short stories 'The Bloody
Chamber') present readers with a true experience of anorexia
AO2:
- Explores the impact of abiding by societal norms.
- Metaphysical poem - uses the protagonist's smaller size to allude to her 'hiding' away
from society
- Extended metaphor of the diet - represents social pressures on women, including, but
not limited to, eating disorders
"No sugar, no salt, dairy, fat, protein, starch or alcohol" - asyndetic listing, coupled with
hyperbole - suggests a mocking of diet culture, emphasises restriction
Poem develops from dream to nightmare, tone changes from glorifying of dieting "the
diet worked like a dream" to portraying grotesque nature of it "guns for hips" - metaphor
connotes violence -war against society and its unrealistic expectation of women's
beauty
Increasing loss of control - "she was gulped, swallowed, sent down the hatch" -
passivity, consumed, entrapment
- ironic dark humour: "she loved flesh and blood", "she was skin and bone"
- sibilance highlights her further demise and her need to become smaller "she starved
on, stayed in, stared in the mirror, svelter, slimmer"
-Duffy uses imagery of "women...mothers to all these" to create a sense of female
empowerment as 'The Long Queen' is able to nurture + help these women grow
throughout the cycle of life that is presented in the poem
'Childhood...Blood...Tears...Childbirth"
Free verse - dysfunctional mindset
AO3:
- Rising influence of the media is often blamed for creating a huge amount of pressure
on young women leading to anxiety and other mental illness
- 'airbrushing' culture leads to self-esteem problems
