• Join over 1.2 million students every month
  • Accelerate your learning by 29%
  • Unlimited access from just £6.99 per month

Explore Duffy's Feminist View in The Worlds Wife

Extracts from this document...

Introduction

The poems 'The Worlds Wife' reflect Duffy's own, very feminist, view of the world. Explore this statement using either two or three in detail or ranging more widely across the collection. Carol Ann Duffy was born on December 23rd 1955 in Glasgow and is a very strong feminist, in 'The Worlds Wife' Duffy explores what it is like to be a woman and uses dramatic monologue in many of her poems to convey her thoughts. The speakers of the poems are all female but we also hear the male voice, be it mediated through the female voice. Throughout the collection Duffy casts an ironic eye on heterosexual relationships; she gives the woman the dominating voice and the upper hand. Duffy also explores the anger and even horror involved in failed or dysfunctional relationships, for example the horror of the relationship between the Devil and the Devil's Wife. In 'The Worlds Wife' heterosexuality is rejected, and homosexuality is affirmed. Meaningful relationships tend to be found in communities of women. 'Elvis is alive and she's female' is the first line of 'Elvis's Twin Sister'. ...read more.

Middle

Bigamist ... The Rat' all terms that the three Queens use to refer to men, especially the new child that has just been born, once again showing Duffy's view on the male species. The black Queen takes out Queen Herod's breast and, in an act which can be seen as both sexual and nurturing, puts it into the baby's mouth; this appears to be an allusion to the attractions of lesbianism and the power of motherhood. 'The Kray Sisters' explores the criminal underworld that the Kray Sisters rule in; the sisters are clearly supporters of the women's movement. The poem begins with the sisters recalling what their lives used to be like and the impressions that they made on the local 'geezers'. The image of them 'walking down the frog and toad' with men shouting at them immediately strikes a tension between the masculine and the feminine. Typical male clothing, 'a whistle and flute' becomes translated into a bolder feminine stance to 'flatter' their 'thr'penny bits'; this image conjures thoughts of cross-dressing. The use of a single voice throughout the poem avoids the use of dialogue and accentuates their sisterhood and commitment to feminism. ...read more.

Conclusion

Elvis was not only a sex symbol, but had a reputation as being a womaniser, Duffy conveys her thoughts on this man and how he treated women with a careless disregard and did not give them respect. To conclude many poems in Duffy's collection explore her feminist views. In 'Queen Herod', we are shown how a radical feminist wants to protect her daughters from male domination so much that she is willing to kill every boy child in the land, just so that her daughter's identity is not over-powered by the ego of a man. 'The Kray Sisters' explores Duffy's view by showing that women can do the same things as men, and how women, such as the Suffragettes, fought for women's rights, without these people women would have no rights, the poem, in some way, pays tribute to 'Vi' who fought for women today. In 'Elvis' Twin Sister' we are shown how women are the reason why some men are so famous, this is also the case in 'Mrs Darwin', who claims to have started the idea of the Theory of Evolution in Darwin's mind. Duffy's poems are all very feminist and she shares her views through humorous, yet sometimes aggressive, tone. ...read more.

The above preview is unformatted text

This student written piece of work is one of many that can be found in our AS and A Level Carol Ann Duffy section.

Found what you're looking for?

  • Start learning 29% faster today
  • 150,000+ documents available
  • Just £6.99 a month

or


Not the one? Search for your essay title...
  • Join over 1.2 million students every month
  • Accelerate your learning by 29%
  • Unlimited access from just £6.99 per month

See related essaysSee related essays

Related AS and A Level Carol Ann Duffy essays

  1. Marked by a teacher

    Duffy's message in the 'Worlds Wife,' seems to be that ultimately the 'World's Wife,' ...

    4 star(s)

    At the end of the poem we see 'Mrs Aesop,' showing 'Mr Aesop,' that she is more than he gives her credit for, 'That shut him up. I laughed last, longest,' The whole tone of 'Mrs Aesop's' speech, and the way Duffy phrases it emphasises the fact that the relationship is not working and she wants to end it.

  2. Peer reviewed

    Duffy is entirely hostile towards men in 'The World's wife'. How far do you ...

    3 star(s)

    'Sweet, sweet', 'stranger's clasp'. That repeated sound, could be interpreted as men's output in the poem being harsh, this would also support the suggested view. A poem from The World's Wife, which does not support the view that Duffy is entirely hostile towards men, is 'Anne Hathaway'.

  1. To What Extent is Anne Hathaway Typical of the Collection The World's Wife?

    The name Shakespeare is associated with Shakespeare's works. The different surname separates Anne Hathaway's love from Shakespeare's works, which were fictional: Shakespeare's love for Anne was not fictional.

  2. Examine Duffys use of the dramatic monologue in The Worlds Wife anthology.

    In the first poem "Mrs Midas", Duffy uses the dramatic monologue to present Mrs Midas' own account and complaint, of the events leading from the moment she realized her husband's new found ability, and how his own self-absorption and greed with materialistic things cost him their marriage (in the original

  1. A critic has written that Duffys poetry is primarily concerned with human failings. To ...

    The poem is written based on the background history of the Moors Murders, with the protagonist Myra Hindley and how she became besotted with sociopath Ian Brady. In the first part of the poem we as the readers see how Duffy, displays Hindley as being the ordinary office worker with a crush "I scowled and poured and sneered.

  2. Duffy- Exploitation of Women

    In the third line of the first stanza, the poem reads 'he drains the colour from me'. This could be either in a literal sense due to the fact someone is doing a painting of her or in a metaphorical sense in that the painter is actually taking part of her, possibly suggesting that her dignity is being taken away.

  1. Duffy Published 'Mrs Midas' Several Years Before Its Inclusion in The Worlds Wife - ...

    the collection which makes me think that this poem is the key poem within the collection. There are a lot of links between the poems through the same kinds of theme that are in different poems but there are also differences in themes between 'Mrs Midas' and other poems within the collection such as 'The Devil's Wife'.

  2. Carol Ann Duffy's The World's Wife

    Whereas Little Red Cap portrays men as weak and pathetic, Thetis shows how men can be overpowering and possessive. Throughout the poem, the woman is trying to escape from the man. She changes herself into many different animals in order to flee from him, but it is all in vain.

  • Over 160,000 pieces
    of student written work
  • Annotated by
    experienced teachers
  • Ideas and feedback to
    improve your own work