A level poem summary sheet on 'Death of a Young Women by Gillian Clarke' including notes on stanza by stanza analysis, form, structure, techniques, themes and overviews. Perfect for A level revision of Gillian Clarke poetry or perfect even for templates on how to analyse poetry.
CONTENT: The poem is about the untimely illness and death of a young women and the hollowness
but necessity for those left behind to move on and find new meaning for their lives
THEMES: Death, Youth, Grief
Key points for Essay:
Death is presented as harsh and cruel
Death is presented as an injustice
Death is presented as a release and freedom
Grief is presented as a form of death – part of people dies when another dies
Grief is presented as a subjective experience
STANZA BY STANZA ANALYSIS:
1st Stanza:
The directness and abruptness of the first line ‘she died on a hot day’ adds a cold and impersonal
tone to the poem and also juxtaposes the girl's death with the heat of the day further emphasising
its untimeliness. The image of the stretched white skin tightening no further implies youth and
vitality but also the end to this youth. The metaphoric comparison of the woman to a yacht
emphasises her beauty and youth once again but also her inability to endure harsh conditions. The
colour blue also connotes sadness adding a melancholic tone to the poem. The idea of the women as
a boat on sea suggests a sort of calmness and isolation. The plosives ‘breath blew’ and sibilance of
‘sail slackened’ could be used to mimic the soft breathing of the women imitating her last breath.
‘Opaquely’ suggest a lifelessness and darkness within the eyes of the women. This is a very bleak
image as the eyes are connoted as gateways into a person’s soul so the fact that they are now
opaque could be emphasising the darkness, possibly a symbol of death, which is hovering over her
soul blocking those gateways from giving or receiving light. The ‘wrong place to find those who
smiled’ could be implying in that these smiles were failed attempts to bring some joy and happiness
but that this was no place for such smiles. The Juxtaposition of silent conversations could be alluding
to the grief and sadness that caused an inability to actually talk and so silence itself began to feel like
a conversation. It could also be implying that conversation were had via other means such as hand
signals in order that the young woman would not hear.
2nd Stanza:
The ‘difference’ the poet could be referring may be the difference between how the poet was
affected by her loss and how the young woman’s family was affected by it once again implying this
distance and impersonal attitude to the death which could be used to express the idea the grief
cannot be understood by those who do not feel it. ‘The people’ we can imply are family however the
lack of this title given once again takes away all comfort and sympathy from this poem. The adjective
‘broken’ emphasises the damage, pain and loss experienced during grief and the idea of being left in
pieces, unwhole and incomplete. The choice of the verb ‘wept’ effectively invokes the feeling of
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