‘If you stood where I stand,
He’d not have won me with his love,
Nor bought me with his land;
I would have spit into his face
And not have taken his hand.’
The word lured suggests that the lord only wanted the girl for the pleasure: he wanted any girl; it just so happened that it was she. The word also suggests deception on the part of the lord. The poet makes us feel sorry for the woman, who is putting herself down because she is unhappy with herself. The poet in fact makes us feel, at the end of the poem, that the narrator is the stronger of the two women in the poem. In the last verse the narrator tries to put a good spin on a bad situation, she feels happy that she has a child, and knows that things could be worse: Cousin Kate cannot even have a child. The difference between the two women is that in 'Cousin Kate' the girl ends up being happy with what she has got: a child. It is something that is a joy to her and brings her happiness. In contrast, in 'The Seduction' the child is a burden to the girl, she refers to the pregnancy as a ‘Septic wound…’ which is how we know that she does not really want the child, because of what peoples reactions will be.
In 'The Seduction' the main picture that is painted about the boy is that there is no respect involved, he just wants her for the pleasure. We can tell that he has no respect because he mutters ‘little slag’. It is also unromantic and the poet’s words create this feeling because he ‘fumbles’ in the bag for the vodka: he has it all planned. She paints a bleak picture because she says how dark it is, they are right beside the river with the frightening scum on it. She says how he brought her more drinks, which tells us that she was getting more and more drunk. The way the poet words the story makes us feel sorry for the girl at the end of the poem because we don’t know what she is going to do, if she’s going to do something rash like harm herself. Because of the way the poet words the last two stanzas it enables us to relate to what she is going through.
At the start of 'Cousin Kate' the mood is that of a happy one in a happy setting:
‘I was a cottage maiden,
Hardened by sun and air,
Contented with my cottage mates,
Not mindful I was fair.’
This mood soon changes to one of self-disgust of how she could have let something like this happen to her, but the mood at the end of the poem changes to one of triumph: she has a child which is something cousin Kate cannot have:
‘Yet I have a gift you have not got,
And seem not like to get’
‘…My fair-haired son, my shame, my pride,
Cling closer, closer yet,
Your father would give lands for one
To wear his coronet.’
For the first half of 'The Seduction’ the mood is one of drunken happiness:
‘She giggled, drunk and nervous…’
‘She had nodded, quite enchanted…’
‘All wide blue eyes…’
‘…She stifled a giggle…’
But for the remainder of the poem she has become pregnant and regrets all that happened that night. The mood becomes one of anger, self-pity and unhappiness and scared.
‘She sobbed in the cool, locked darkness…’
‘…She was truly frightened…’
‘…Stupid, stupid promises…’
‘So she cried…’
I thought that the poems gave a realistic view on teenage pregnancy, for the times that they were written in. in 'Cousin Kate' it is realistic in that, the narrator would have been treated as an outcast and an unclean thing. This is mostly due to the historical era in which it was written in. During the 1800s, a child outside of wedlock was frowned upon and her neighbours and friends would have treated the bearer of the child as an outsider. In 'The Seduction', the girl is a typical modern girl: into fashion magazines and things of that nature. Society now would treat her a lot better than at the time of 'Cousin Kate' but she would still be aware of the passing remarks, stereotypes and sweeping generalisations that people would that people would have made about her.
I prefer 'The Seduction' to 'Cousin Kate' because I can relate to the situations and the references that are made in it, e.g. ‘Ian Rush, McGuigan, vodka etc.’ I feel that I can relate to the situation because it is a frequent occurrence in the world around me today. Times have changed considerably between 'Cousin Kate' and 'The Seduction'; teenage pregnancy isn’t as frowned upon now as much as it was in the 1800s, society would now try to help these girls, but there are still a good number of people who would change their views on a girl because of it. The girl in 'The Seduction' realises this fact and thinks of various ‘backdoors’ out of the problem.
