'Cousin Kate' is set in the countryside. The cottage maiden says "I was a cottage maiden, hardened by sun and air". This tells me that she was used to being outside and wasn't protected. The poem also says that the lord watched Kate at work. It says "he watched your steps along the lane, your work among the rye." This tells me that both the maid and Kate were farm workers and so, not very well off.
The poem creates an idea of the maids' feelings in 'Cousin Kate'. The maid says "contented with my cottage mates" this is slightly simple language; this is before she meets the lord. This tells us that before the maid met the lord she was very happy with her life and not worried about anything.
A good example of imagery in, "Cousin Kate," is, "…he wore me like a silken knot, he changed me like a glove…" This line shows us how little she meant to him and he cast her aside when he was done with her as one would an old glove just thrown away. They also are both forms of a metaphor, silken knot could imply being slippery and able to come undone. In the first stanza of the poem imagery is created when the narrator says “flaxen hair?” flaxen is a pre twentieth century word and it means a person to have long, blonde and elegant hair is also signifies being a women of innocence telling the reader that she wouldn’t have done something like this before the lord found her out. She loved him so much she wanted to prove to him before marriage, and he took advantage. A question mark is also used at the end of that line, I think that Rossetti used this so that we know the narrator is questioning why me? She is confused and wondering why was she so naïve of being a pretty women.
The setting of 'The Seduction' was very different. The actual seduction was not very glamorous at all. The poem says "he led her to the quiet bricks of Birkenhead docks". The poem tells us that he led her there so they could not be seen, it also is based in Liverpool. We are also told that the boy sat down in the darkness maybe to hide his reflection from the water, I think this shows he is a very alienated person. Another phrase used to describe the setting is "the Mersey, green as a septic wound" this is a simile letting us know of the horrible things that are about to happen, it also sounds like a chemically medicated thing and that it is dirty and an unwanted just like what is happening to this poor unfortunate girl. All these things give us a good idea of the setting; it gives a good description so that the reader is able to create an image. We are also told that the girl sits facing the "frightening scum on the water" these images are not very pleasant, I think that the scum on the water could be her reflection, scum being her and frightening being her feelings, she seems scarred and this line indicates anxiety “ she chattered on” this also tells us of her drunkenness.
McAuley includes much imagery in her poem, "The Seduction." The poem is ironic because although it is called 'the seduction,' there are very little signs of a seduction. The man is just making use of the girl. This is evidenced by the way he mutters, 'little slag.' The imagery used signifies how distasteful the seduction really is, "…his eyes as blue as iodine…" Iodine may be blue but it also stings, thus having a double meaning. Similarly. "…his kisses tasted of nicotine…" hardly makes it sound romantic. Just pictures this boy smoking, maybe try to cloud over with the smoke what is happening.
The phrase "woe's me for joy thereof" tells me that the maid was upset because she didn't have fun anymore. She feels that the lord has taken away her life and the fun she used to have with her friends. The maid is now full of sadness also from “to grow more fair, than I”.
Later in the poem, the maid says "now I moan an unclean thing". The maid feels that she has been spoilt or at least tainted by the lord. Before she met him the maid was clean and pure. "Even so I sit and howl in dust" it tells me that the maid was very upset by being rejected by this man. The word howl refers to animal imagery, possibly a wolf; it gives her an animal urge to be violent. This helps us to understand just how upset the maid is, and how she sounds when she cries. This is an example of personification is in “The Seduction” in the first stanza there is another of personification “far from blind windows” Is like an human with animal eyes far away from reality, in the same stanza is “you sit in gold and sing” these two lines both implies that the narrator is just a “thing” she isn’t human only an animal , yet Kate is like a lovely bird “who sits in gold and sings” , I think that Rossetti chose a bird as they are beautiful animals maybe meaning towards Kate and also the last line of the 4th stanza says “wing” I feel that that also points to “Cousin Kate” being a bird.
Both poems at this stage have told about the settings the characters and are just about to continue to the regret of what happened.
The poet, Eileen McAuley describes the girl's emotions in "The Seduction" quite similar to the way Christina Rossetti describes the maiden's emotions in "Cousin Kate" Firstly the girl is nervous "she giggled drunk and nervous"
As the boy continues to give her more drink (alcohol) she becomes less in control of herself and "relaxes" more. "She fell in love" this suggests that while under the influence of alcohol she believed that she loved the boy.
The maiden in "Cousin Kate" experienced loved to, however her 'love was true', not like the girls. After realizing what had happened, the girl experienced hurt and sadness just like the cottage maiden. While the maiden 'howls in dust' "the girl sobbed in the cool locked darkness of her room" as well she feels betrayed by the promise of it all. She never thought that her experience would be the way that it turned out to be. She had dreamt of a perfect romances like that were promised in her magazines. “And she ripped up all her my guy and her Jackie photo-comics …/ bright paper, like confetti, strewn” this more girl got promised many things by these girl comics, this is an ironic marriage simile, confetti symbolizes weddings and the promises made of love a future. Her dreams to be happy ended, “on the carpet”. She is starting in the 9th stanza to realize what she has lost “cheated by the promise of it all” she has bitter regrets; she learns not to trust any man again. In the last stanza it says “and better now to turn away, move away, fade away” this tells me that the writer put that there to show that she is moving away from society, they are strong resentful words. I also noticed that there is a sentence going back to the past reminding herself about the good old days, when she was young .It is the howl of the 12th and 13th stanza. It in the 12th stanza it says “picture” I feel that the poet used that so that it shows the post and her sense of innocence and childhood. I find that in the 11th stanza, I believe a mini oxymoron could have been used it is of a “s” sound, for example “stammer”, and, “softly”, and, “sickened” and then lastly also a repeated word of “stupid stupid” I find that this “s” sounds is because she now realizes that she was hiding be hide the truth, and she starts to face reality.
Just as the girl the maiden also felt betrayed because she had pictured her love, life with the lord to last eternally but it did not. Exactly like the maiden felt anger for the lord. Both males in each poem promised things, gave signals to things that women feel love towards, a males sleeps around and get away with it, a women or a girl can not get away with it. "I could have spit in his face", this lady, the maid, suddenly goes into a phase a violence, she is obviously jealous of Kate that she has her love what she thought was love wasn’t, it got blown away and the bird that is Kate flew it away and the false love went “your love was writ in the sand”, this is a metaphor, she has turned unreasonable and hypocritical and turning into a green-eyed fool. She realizes that having sex before marriage was what drove her true love away.
The girl feels anger in the climax where…she flings her high white shoes….At the wall. This symbolizes that she was sophisticated but now all she is ,is “truly truly frightened” The repetition here make it double as if she is suicidal and wants it all to end.
Females are looked down upon; the cottage maiden is treated as an "outcast thing" as if not human. In “The Seduction” neighbor’s gossip about the girl saying that she “looked the type” I think that the reader is feeling that this girl is a slag and that it was her fault to trust this drunken boy.
The way that the poet portrays the lord in "Cousin Kate" is very similar to the way the boy in “The seduction" is portrayed. The created image of the boy is dishonorable, 'bad boy' of the class. "The Seduction" talks about how he "should be at school" this indicates that he plays truant he is uneducated and is only out for what he can get. He is not respectful. This shows that the boy is vulgar this is also shown by the line "he spat into the river", also I feel that “with me dads magazines” gives the impression that he looks at porn that is owned by his father, this tells me that his father is uneducated and gives a bad intuition on his son. Again the lord shows disrespect towards the maiden, as he sees her as no more than a toy, "a plaything" with no consideration for her feelings. In stanza three of "The Seduction" all the boy talks about is topics that interest him and sport for him, this gives me the impression that he is trying to be impressive by talking about things he likes and knows. He is inconsiderate that he doesn’t want to know about her. The use of words like "he led her" indicates that he is dominant over the situation as she follows him without question.
This is a similarity to the lord, as he "lured" the maiden to his home; this also suggests that he to was the dominant character over the situation. In "The Seduction" the way the boy "swiftly contrived a kiss" the girl depicts that he knows just what he wants from her and is not hesitant on getting it. Again similarity is reflected in "Cousin Kate" Once the lord has the cottage maiden wrapped around his finger, the line "woe for me joy thereof" shows that the lord has known what he has wanted from the maiden all along and he got it.
The structure of The Seduction is as four lines per verse. It is as an ABCB style rhythm , an example of this is for the first verse, here are the endings for each line, ‘morning’, ‘docks’, ‘city’ and ‘blocks’. Cousin Kate on the other hand is in a more complicated rhythm, it moves in the order ABCBABAB, here are the endings for the first verse, ‘maiden’, ‘air’, ‘mates’, ‘fair’, ‘out’, ‘hair’, ‘out’ and ‘care’.
As you can see, in both poems there is rhyme, whilst each verse in “The Seduction” is in 4 short lines; “Cousin Kate” stretches out into double that with 8 lines per verse. In total “The Seduction” is much longer than “Cousin Kate” in terms of lines. It has many more than “Cousin Kate”, I think this is because it is giving more of a sense of time then “Cousin Kate” is , I have an example of this “ three months gone” , they jumped a couple of months to go into when it is too late to get rid of the baby. Also there is 15 stanzas in “The Seduction” I think that the reader feels that is because of the age of the girl when she fell pregnant as she was 15, also it could sense that it is when she felt that her life is over. The regularity in rhyme in “Cousin Kate” is through out the poem, I feel that the writer did this so that it shows that the maid will not let him change her life, she has more will power. The structure is as normal it has it stanzas 6 of them, with the title at the top. The main focus of the poem is in the title, the main topic is given off from this. “Cousin Kate” is a simple and short yet effective title the poetic voice of the poem could then mean that the person is simple, the educational voice is simple therefore realizes to the reader why simple eighteenth century words have been used. I noticed that in only one of the poems there is an iambic pentameter beat through out the poem, this obviously means that the maid is or was deeply in love with the lord. In both poems there is basic use of punctuation, the usually commons and full stops have been used.
I found many interesting repeated words and alliterated words firstly in “Cousin Kate” I noticed that in the second stanza “shameless shameful” it is alliterated I also thought the repetition shows her big emotions obviously of shame, I find it also gives the feeling of everyone else about what they feel for her. In the 3rd stanza, it continuously repeats the word “you”, it seems as the maid is jealous and blaming everything on Kate, the next stanza here is a metaphor “he lifted you from mean estate, to sit with you on high” I feel that Rossetti put that in there to show that the maid is not very well off money wise, and that she is being replaced for change of class, it shows that the lords wants Kate because she could have high class values.
In the last stanza of this poem I feel it is most important, it starts off with a metaphor along with enjambment. “Yet I’ve a gift you have not got, and seem not like to get” the word ‘get’ could means in the olden days beget which mean end of , not to have that sort of thing , she is telling Kate that I have a baby and you will never get one. I think that the writer put that in the poem so that the maid could have a little bit hope left, Kate can’t have a baby. Imagery then follows “for all your clothes and wedding-ring, I’ve little doubt you fret, my fair haired son , my shame, my pride” along with enjambment that bring strength to the voice, gives it a strong point to the poem and she knows that the bitterness inside of her has made her strong from anger to bring her shame/pride up. He is happier to see Kate unhappy then be with a man who will fool another women.
In McAuley's poem the second half contrasts with the first. The first half talks about the actual night of the seduction making it sound meaningless. The second half of the poem talks about lost dreams and the fact that her life has been ruined and all for nothing. The tone is slightly different in "Cousin Kate." The poem starts as a lament, and the girl making she sound the victim. These changes in the last verse. Kate may have a ring on her finger and the respect of the community but the girl in the poem has something Kate does not have. She has the gift of life, she has her son.
I feel the messages in both poems are similar; they both got fooled by promises and a male. Unlike "Cousin Kate," the girl in "The seduction" does not fall for her seducer because of his charm or possessions but by the use of alcohol. We get this from such lines as, "…as he brought her more drinks, so she fell in love…" In both poems the man takes advantage of the woman but by different methods. Also in both poems it is the woman who has the ever-lasting reminders.
Despite the gap of nearly one hundred and fifty years between them, I think that the poems are still very similar. They both describe the social stigma surrounding teenage pregnancies and unmarried mothers. They both show that despite the situation, it is always the woman who ends up with the blame. The narrator in 'Cousin Kate' was labeled an 'outcast thing' and the girl in 'The Seduction' was whispered about, even though it was the boy who had taken advantage of her. Even though a hundred and fifty years had passed since 'Cousin Kate' had been written, people still had the same ideas about teenage/single mothers. The attitude I pick up from these poems is that it is looked down on for women to become single mothers, and it is wrong for women to have sex with a lot of people, but for a man it is acceptable, and no label or shame is placed upon him.
I have found 'The Seduction' easier to understand, mainly because the language is simpler and the images described are more modern. However I prefer the imagery used in 'Cousin Kate' because I feel it is more original and interesting. I prefer phrases such as "his plaything and his love" and "he wore me like a silken knot" to his "eyes as blue as iodine" and "green as a septic wound". On the other hand, I think the symbolism used in 'The Seduction' is very effective, i.e. the confetti and the high white shoes.
I feel that the main reason I prefer 'The Seduction' is it's easier to relate to for my age group. It is very hard to imagine what it would be like to be singled out by a great lord and then to be left for her cousin and having the lords baby on the way. I find it much easier to relate to 'The Seduction' as It could be easier to understand how it must feel to have a 'one night stand' and then become pregnant as I myself am a teenage, the other poem is written by a women who left by a lord and to modern day that wouldn’t happen.
Verity Treverton-Jones 11e