Compare the Methods the Poets Use to Explore a Character’s Sense of Identity in ‘Casehistory: Alison (Head Injury)’ and in One Other Poem from Character and Voice.

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Compare the methods the poets use to explore a character’s sense of identity in ‘Casehistory: Alison (head injury)’ and in one other poem from Character and voice. In "Casehistory: Alison (head injury)" and "The Hunchback in the Park" we find two poems that treat about the character's sense of identity by highlighting the idea of isolation, disability and first appearance. In "Casehistory: Alison (head injury)" the poem tells us that Alison has lost her memory perhaps she doesn't remember anything including her family and herself and this is shown by saying ' I would like to have known my husband's wife, my mother's only daughter '. In the previous sentence the idea of isolation is emphasized by the past tense which indicates the fact that she doesn't know who her family is and the tone of the phrase suggests the fact that she's talking as a stranger. In "The Hunchback in the Park" the writer directly tells us that the character is lonely and doesn't have anyone that loves him because of his appearance and this is shown by saying ' A woman figure without fault Straight as a young elm Straight and tall from his crooked bones That she might stand in the night After the locks and chains'. In the previous sentence the idea of loneliness is emphasized by the conditional tense which suggest the insecurity of the character towards the girl because he doesn't know whether she's going to accept him or not. The absence of punctuation and irregular, inconsistent rhyme in the whole poem could also reflect a lack of stability in the life of the "hunchback". Either of the poems show that the characters are isolated from the society but this isolation is due to different reason, for the first poem the segregation is due to an accident that has caused Alison's head injury whilst in the second poem the loneliness is due to a native reason that cannot be changed. Both poems

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