In the following essay I intend to compare and contrast Listen Mr Oxford Don by John Agard and No rights Red an Half Dead by Benjamin Zephaniah.

by mim3007 (student)

University Degree Linguistics, Classics and related subjects

Miss Amy Clegg – U0388700 – Page 1

Y180 – Making Sense of the Arts

EMA – Task 1

Option 1 (Poetry)

Read John Agard’s ‘Listen Mr Oxford Don’. Then read Benjamin Zephaniah’s ‘No rights Red an Half Dead’.

Write an essay that compares and contrasts the two poems ensuring that, in line with the Study Diamond, you comment on their effects, the techniques used in then, interpretations of their meanings and any relevant contextual information.

Use no more than 1000 Words.

In the following essay I intend to compare and contrast ‘Listen Mr Oxford Don’ by John Agard and ‘No rights Red an Half Dead’ by Benjamin Zephaniah. I will look at both poems in relation to the four points of the Study Diamond, effects, techniques, context and meaning. I will begin by talking about Agard’s poem ‘Listen Mr Oxford Don’ then compare the points I have raised with Zephaniah’s ‘No rights Red an Half Dead’.

I very much enjoyed reading John Agard’s “Listen Mr Oxford Don”, although the subject matter was clearly based around race I also found parts somewhat humorous, mainly due to the language Agard uses. Agard’s poem ‘Listen Mr Oxford Don’ uses irregular rhyme structured in fairly short verses. “Me not no Oxford Don, Me a simple immigrant, From Clapham Common, I didn’t graduate, I immigrate”. Just reading the first verse I could almost hear the poem also being sang as a song which contributes to the rhythm of the poem also. In the lines “I don’t need no axe, to split / up yu syntax, I don’t need no hammer, to mash up/ yu grammar”, Agard draws attention to the words “axe”, “syntax”, “ hammer” and “grammar”, he is comparing the words syntax and grammar to actual weapons and adds to the meaning of the poem, being that he believes just because he lives in England he doesn’t have to speak the Queen’s English, he is free and able to speak how he wishes. The rhythm used in the poem creates a fairly fast pace throughout, “I ent have no gun, I ent have no knife, but mugging de Queen’s English, is the story of my life”, in these lines we as the reader are drawn to the words gun and knife, again Agard is using weapons to demonstrate his anger at the way he feels, which is an effective technique.

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Agard uses language to reinforce to the reader the message he is trying to get across, he is proud of his Caribbean roots and this is conveyed in the poem using the word “de” instead if “the” and the word “dem” instead of “them”. Agard is a prominent voice of Caribbean culture in Britain after moving from Guyana in 1977.

On reading “No rights Red an Half Dead” it struck me as being a very sad and morose poem using far more detail to describe the event taking place. In ...

This is a preview of the whole essay

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On reading “No rights Red an Half Dead” it struck me as being a very sad and morose poem using far more detail to describe the event taking place. In contrast to Agards poem “Listen Mr Oxford Don”, Benjamin Zephaniah’s “No rights Red an Half Dead” has longer and more descriptive verses using imagery to describe an incident of police brutality against what we are led to believe is a black person, although this is not actually made clear in the poem itself. The first lines of the poem read “Dem drag him to de police van, An it was broad daylight, Dem kick him down de street to it, I knew it was not right”, this sets a sad tone to the poem immediately as we as the reader imagine the victim being kicked down the street and hauled into the van in daylight in front of onlookers. “His nose had moved, bloody head, it was an ugly sight” conjures up an image of someone’s nose being broken and having moved on his face and his head being bloody caused by injuries made by the police. Zephaniah uses imagery throughout the poem in contrast to Agard as “No rights Red an Half Dead” is describing a particular event whereas Agard’s poem is talking about a general feeling.

Agards poem uses irregular rhyme and rhythm to create the effect of anger and frustration, while Zephaniah uses a more structured rhyming pattern to create a more sad and morose mood. “Down de road dem speed away, All traffic pulls aside, Next to me a high class girl said, ‘Hope they whip his hide’”. This line also adds to the meaning of the poem being race and how white people perceive black people in the community. In likeness to Agard’s poem Zephaniah replaces the word “the” with “de” and “them” with “Dem” so we as the reader can clearly pick up on the accent and language used in both poems. The last line of both poems I felt were important to the meaning and message being conveyed. Agard says “I making de Queen’s English accessory/to my offence”, reinforcing the anger he feels, and Zephaniah says in the final line “An if yu tink yu seeing justice, You mus be bloody blind”, this also feels angry because of the use of the word “bloody”.

While both poems deal with the subject of immigrants in Britain and race, they do this in a very different way using different effects and techniques to achieve a different feeling in each poem.

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Both Agard and Zephaniah are of Caribbean roots and are proud to be as this is clear to see in their poetry. Agard was born in Guyana in 1949 and immigrated to Britain in 1977, whilst Zephaniah was actually born in Birmingham, England in 1958 to Jamaican parents. Both men are referred to as dub-poets and are well known figures in contemporary English Literature.

References

Agard, J. Listen Mr Oxford Don cited in Making Sense of the Arts – Resource Booklet 1, (2011) Milton Keynes, The Open University, p 21.

Zephaniah, B. (1992) City Psalms, Newcastle, Bloodaxe Books cited in Making Sense of the Arts – Resource Booklet 1, (2011) Milton Keynes, The Open University, p15.

Word Count for Task 1 = 864

Task 2

Write no more than 200 words in total for this task, which covers the past, present and future.

Past: give at least one example of a way in which your learning skills have improved during this module.

I have very much enjoyed this module and feel I have improved my abilities to use the study diamond in relation to different pieces of the Arts. I also feel my note taking skills have improved a lot throughout this module.

Present: give at least one example of a strength and at least one example of a weakness in your learning skills.

I feel a strength of mine is that I am able to pick out key points in a text, especially in the poetry section and relate these to the points of the study diamond. I struggled with the History chapter of the book and didn’t fully understand the analysis of the primary and secondary sources.

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Future: give at least one example of a way in which you could improve a specific skill in future.

I would like to try and improve my skill of being able to select relevant evidence from a resource and applying this to the argument I am trying to make. I feel I would be able to improve this by further analysing the resource and also by researching any contextual information about that resource.

Word Count for Task 2 = 150