Night of the scorpion comparison
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Introduction
Night of the scorpion and vultures both use description in a surprising way the authors both use the description to lead you to certain conclusions, they both then use a sudden change of description to make you change that conclusion making the ideas in the poem even more thought provoking. The title night of the scorpion makes readers think about the dangerous and harsh nature of scorpions. But Ezekiel presents the scorpion as more of a victim rather than evil in the beginning, he makes us feel sympathy for the scorpion by describing it as "driven" into the hut by "ten hours of steady rain." "Driven suggests that going into the hut is a last resort for the scorpion and that he just wants to be dry and out of the rain so he crawls "beneath a sack of rice." ...read more.
Middle
The poem is in fact not about the death and how vultures scavenge but about an idea that love can be found in unexpected places. Sunrise is 'sun break' and it's grey. There is no anticipation that this will be a happy or sunny poem and then, unexpectedly, moves his "bashed in head" to nestle affectionately against his mate." Both poems use unexpected changes of mood to engage the reader with the ideas of the poems. You start off feeling sympathy for the scorpion, but are left thinking perhaps this really is a diabolical creature. With the vultures, we feel that they represent something depressing and violent and yet we are surprised by the affection between the two birds. ...read more.
Conclusion
Both poems describe fathers who are in some ways are the same both show love for their family and both do things that aren't admirable, In night of the scorpion the father panics and goes back on his morals by trying "every curse and blessing, powder, mixture, herb and hybrid" You can see that Ezekiel is disappointed because his father seems so helpless. In vultures the commandant kills people and runs a concentration camp "Human roast clinging rebelliously to his hairy nostrils." Finally both poems explore love, Vultures explores how love can be found in the most unlikely of places while night of the scorpion explores the love a mother has for her child and the love a husband has for his wife. ...read more.
This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our GCSE Comparing poems section.
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