A Minor Role (U A Fanthorpe)
Title and opening
• Minor role – not main part, but important and necessary they are there.
• Side-lined, not fully understood, relegated to role of invalid
• Stage = an established metaphor for public pretence (e.g. famous Shakespearean
‘All the world’s a stage’ monologue in As You Like It) – theatre of life, public face
that we present to the world
• Distance and perspective, we are in audience. Slow motion introspection in
moment of tragedy.
Form
• Poem takes the form of a dramatic monologue. Sense of conversation and implied
listener.
• Use of blank spaces
• Lists:
o Present participles (stanza 2) - on-going monotonous routine, continual
cycle of tasks
o Imperatives (stanza 3) - internal monologue, giving herself a talking to and
ordering her life by seeing it as a series of tasks
o Emotions (stanza 4) - suppressed reaction
• Stanzas 1, 2 and 3 ascending length – begins in a broad exposition of role, then
enters personal realm of her true experiences and becomes a cathartic outpour.
• Isolated final line – emphatic, weighted (see last heading)
Voice and context
Poem deals with attitudes towards terminal illness and death and the pretences
surrounding it, harsh truth in the face of societal pressure to uphold civility and feign
concealed, noble suffering.
About the author:
• Was an English teacher, but then worked as a clerk in a psychiatric hospital (first
volume of poetry Side Effects is about patients)
• Inspired many other poets including Carol Ann Duffy
Tone:
• Theatrical vocabulary (see title)
• Use of speech – presents phatic conversation and detached niceties of public
sphere, and internal monologue of processing each day
• Sense of routine and monotony (lists, present participles)
• Talking to herself and trying to maintain order (stanza 3 after space)
, Tone is sometimes bitter and angered in emotion, jealous of the healthy and the way in
which life goes on. Often uses bleak irony, expression of her true emotions and tearing
down of social pretences. Accustomed to negative emotions (‘all the genres of misery’) –
psychological impact of illness. Poem ends on a note of defiance and renewed self-worth.
Possible themes
• Experience of illness
• Attitudes towards suffering
• Truth vs reality
• Pretence and evasion
• Societal pressures and expectations
• Public performance vs private emotions
• Roles in society
Theatrical language (title, opening stanza, ending stanza)
• "I'm best observed on stage" - stage is a metaphor for life to explore pretences and
the public face of suffering. 'Observed' - distance and perspective, in audience.
Looking in on herself, slow motion introspection in a moment of tragedy.
• "Endless / exits and entrances" - enjamb reflects continual flow of monotonous
routine. Usually 'entrances and exits', instead exits is first – role reversal, final exit
of death.
• "With my servant's patter, / Yes sir. O no, sir." - submissive and subservient,
controlled by both the disease (earlier 'spear' - psychological battle against illness)
and social expectations, takes away choice, speech is archaic and theatrical.
• "If I get / These midget moments wrong, the monstrous fabric / shrinks to
unwanted sniggers" - derogatory tone emphasized by allit, belittles 'monstrous
fabric'. Idea of 'fabric of society' - social pressures, social expectations of noble
suffering and not complaining.
• "Not the star part." - white space before it- weariness of this life's routine. Returns
to idea of 'minor role'.
• "And who would want it?" - rhetorical question creates an address to society as a
whole and attitudes towards illness, lack of choice and control.
• "I jettison the spear, / the servant's tray, the terrible drone of Chorus" - minor
character throwing down props, rejection of society and the lack of importance
given to her position. In Greek tragedy, omniscient 'chorus' narrate the downfall of
the characters – reflects the intrusively onlookers of illness, intrusion of public into
personal suffering.
• "Yet to my thinking this act was ill-advised,/ It would have been better to die." -
lines spoken by Chorus in Oedipus Rex (theatrical connection to play, ancient –
invalids as a continual part of life) at the point when terrible history and present
collide (Oedipus has blinded himself, fate of suffering). Internal reflection and
going over the past, society dictates the role of the invalid. Next line: "No it
wouldn't!" (exclamatory defiance – see 'private emotions' heading) parallels to
Oedipus' reaction: "I will not believe that this was not the best that could have
been done. Teach me no other lesson".
