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I have my father’s voice - van Wyk Analysis
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This is an in-depth analysis of I have my father’s voice by van Wyk.
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I have my father’s voice - van WykBackground
Chris van Wyk (1957 - 2014):
- Born in Soweto
- Family forced to move because of Group Areas Act
- Grew up in Riverlea, Johannesburg
- Used writing and storytelling to expose the ills of apartheis, but in a gentle
and often humorous way
- Won the Olive Schreiner Prize in 1980 for the poetry anthology that includes
‘I have my father’s voice’
I have my father’s voice: Analysis
- The poem is a tribute to van Wyk’s father—the poet inherited his anger (or
political consciousness) from his father, but the poet has more ability in
expressing his anger constructively through poetry
- The poet explores his relationship with his father in the poem, but he also
uses the poem to comment on what is involved with being a poet: it requires
anger, discipline and a way with words
- The poem explores a young man’s sense of identity
- Showcases how an individual’s sense of self is shaped by his
relationship with his parents, even when he is an adult.
- The speaker is the poet himself as the poem is about poetry
- The Speaker contemplates how his childhood was influenced by his father to
mould the person he has become
Title:
- A statement or declarative sentence that implies that the speaker has
inherited a character trait, a physical connection to his father
- Suggests that the speaker inherited good qualities from his father, not bad
qualities like anger.
- The title is suitable because the poet describes his inheritance throughout
the poem as consisting of his father’s anger rather than as monetary
inheritance or property.
, When I walk into a room
where my father has just been
I fill the same spaces he did
from the elbows on the table
to the head thrown back
and when we laugh we aim the guffaw
at the same space in the air.
Before anybody has told me this I know
because I see myself through
my father's eyes.
When I was a pigeon-toed boy
my father used his voice
to send me to bed
to run and buy the newspaper
to scribble my way through matric.
He also used his voice for harsher things:
to bluster when we made a noise
when the kitchen wasn't cleaned after supper
when I was out too late.
Late for work, on many mornings,
one sock in hand, its twin
an angry glint in his eyes he flings
dirty clothes out of the washing box:
vests, jeans, pants and shirts shouting
anagrams of fee fo fi fum until he is up
to his knees in a stinking heap of laundry.
I have my father's voice too
and his fuming temper
and I shout as he does.
But I spew the words out
in pairs of alliteration
and an air of assonance.
Everything a poet needs
my father has bequeathed me
except the words.
Structure:
- 7 Stanzas
- Free verse (no rhyme scheme)
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