Unseen

Poetry Analysis

FIVE STEPS

1. What is the poem about?
a. Subject
b. First person [I]or second person[you] or third person [he]
c. Who is the poem addressing?
2. Identify the purpose theme or message
a. What is the poet saying or why have they written the poem or what ideas
are they using
b. Is to get an emotional response from the reader? Or just a response or put
across a message or opinion
c. There could be multiple purposes
3. Explore the emotions moods and feelings
a. What are the different emotions or feelings in the poem
b. Identify the mood (general atmosphere
c. How are different techniques used to show the emotions?
4. Identify the techniques used in the poem
a. Pick the techniques used to show how they create emotions moods or
feelings
i. Form – rhyme and rhythm [sonnet, changes in length of lines or
stanzas]
ii. Structure – the order of ideas in the poem as well as any changes in
mood or tone
iii. Poetic devices – metaphors, alliteration, personification and
enjambment
iv. Imagery – language that creates a picture in your mind so includes
metaphors and similes
b. Why has the poet used these techniques and what effect to they create?
5. Include your thoughts and feelings about the poem
a. Examiners want to know what you think of a poem and how it makes you
feel
b. Think about how well the poem gets its message across and what impact it
has on you
c. Try not to use ‘I’. [so instead of I felt sad that the narrators brother died,
say It makes the reader feel the narrators sense of sadness at the death of
his brother.]
d. Think if there are any other ways the poem could be interpreted


Sample exam question:

Read ‘Ninetieth Birthday’ What is the poem saying about old age and people’s

attitude towards it? How does the poet put this across?

1
 Ninetieth Birthday

You go up the long track
That will take a car, but is best walked
On slow foot, noting the lichen
That writes history on the page
Of the grey rock. Trees are about you
At first, but yield to the green bracken
The nightjar’s house: you can hear it spin
On warm evenings; it is still now
In the noonday heat, only the lesser
Voices sound, blue-fly and gnat
And the stream’s whisper. As the road climbs,
You will pause for breath and the far sea’s
Signal will flash, till you turn again
To the steep track, buttressed with cloud.

And there at the top that old woman
Born almost a century back
In that stone farm, awaits your coming;
Waits for the news of the lost village
She thinks she knows, a place that exists
In her memory only.
You bring her greeting
And praise for having lasted so long
With time’s knife shaving the bone
Yet no bridge joins her own
World with yours, all you can do
Is lean kindly across the abyss
To hear words that were once wise.

(R. S. Thomas (1913 – 2000)

Lichen – a combination of fungus and alga that grows on trees and rocks
nightjar – a type of nocturnal bird (i.e. active at night)
spin – the nightjar’s call sounds like the whirr of a spinning-wheel
buttressed – supported to make it more stable (usually on buildings like cathedrals)
abyss – a bottomless pit

2


Make an essay plan before you start

1. Short plan you only have five minutes
2. Focus on three to four key quotes from the poem
3. Don’t forget to write about what the poet says and how he says it


1. Introduction 2. Old age lonely/isolated
• Subject – journey
to visit old lady on • Quiet – no people,
her birthday personification of nature
• How old people • “lost village”
are viewed • Waiting for visitors, people
reluctant to visit

3. People’s attitudes
6. Conclusion
• Not valued – “that”
• Sad tone Attitudes to old Age women
• Old people • Patronizing – “lean
misunderstood kindly” “praise for
& dismissed having lasted so long”
• • Two stanzas – journey &
meeting. Change mood

5. Journey of life
• Journey is a metaphor for
life – irregular rhythm, 4. Distance between old and young
walking up hill
• Different world – “no bridge..”
• “time’s knife…” – near
• Imagery – abyss between old &
death
young
• Rhyming couplet emphasizes
this