Compare how Fanthorpe and Scannel present the viewpoint and concerns of a child to us in "Half-past Two" and "Hide and Seek"

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Tracks 2 – Coursework essay

Compare how Fanthorpe and Scannel present the viewpoint and concerns of a child to us in “Half-past Two” and “Hide and Seek”

The poems “Half-past Two” and “Hide and Seek” both convey to the reader the experiences and concerns of a child. The essence of each poem is to exhibit our child-like tendencies and then reflect on them in a more mature fashion. Consequently they both show our interpretation of things as children and how differently we perceive them as adults. Furthermore both poems have a much greater symbolic meaning, emphasising the sense of unknowing and fear. The most evident theme illustrated within both poems is that of loneliness; the child who is left by his friends in “Hide and Seek”, and the child left in detention by his teacher in “Half-past Two”.

“Half-past Two” concentrates on the idea of time and the way a child interprets it. The associative time the child uses is demonstrated with the compounded words “gettinguptime”, “timeyouwereofftime”. We can view this as Fanthorpe’s attempt to “give a voice to the voiceless”. The child, although not pre-linguistic, is not practised in the use of regular time and hence must use time by thinking of things connected with it.  The focus of the poem is usually viewed as being the child’s very basic conception of time in comparison with his inability to associate with the almost “alien” abstract time that the adults in his environment repeatedly use. This is illustrated recurrently within the poem and is emphasised by the child’s use of capitals:

“Once upon a schooltime

He Did Something Very Wrong

(I forget what it was)”

The use of capital letters here, demonstrates that the child has recognised he has done wrong but is mentally incapable of latching on to what it is that he has done, conveying to the reader that the child feels what he has done is important to adults but not necessarily to him. The word “Time” is also given capital letters, this is significant in that the child recognises that time is important but again does not know why. This infers to us that the child’s experience of the world is harsh and very unfair as if only they had more knowledge, something they cannot achieve themselves, then they would have more of an understanding about the world and not commit the “wrongs” they do. Furthermore, we also recognise that the child refers to his teacher as “She” again using capital letters. This illustrates the child’s need for a figure of authority at certain times and also that the child may be afraid of her:

“He was too scared of being wicked to remind her”

The use of “She” in capital letters initiates the idea that the teacher is almost god-like in comparison with the time when she leaves him  and the child refers to her as something far less great, “scuttling in”. Through the use of scuttle we see that clearly the child’s opinion and respect for his “god-like” teacher has diminished as a result of her leaving him alone in detention and not teaching him the concepts of adult time.

However, from the outset there is a clear sense of respect towards the teacher. We must also recognise that the child knows he has misbehaved, he realises that the teacher is cross and through the removed poetic voice his confusion and terror are illustrated. He is “scared of [her] being wicked” to such an extent that he does not reveal to her that “she hadn’t taught him time”

Again Fanthorpes idea of “giving a voice to the voiceless” creates the impression of a concerned though confused child, demonstrated by the fact that the child does not speak throughout the poem. Through his silence we are introduced to another theme of the poem; children often suffer injustice even when it is not their own fault. “She hadn’t taught him time”.

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In the following stanza we feel that the child is becoming petulantly defensive of what little knowledge of time he has. He does this by telling us the times he knew in a stream of consciousness:

“He knew a lot of time: he knew

Gettinguptime, timeyouwereofftime,

Timetogohomenowtime, TVtime”

The register in which the child speaks here can be viewed as sulky and irritable, the words themselves are jumbled and show that his fear of not knowing time is beginning to overtake his logical thinking. The way in which Fanthorpe runs these words together is similar to the ...

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