Analysis Of Out Of The Blue By Armitage

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Commenting closely on the writing of your chosen section, show how it contributes to the sense of terror in “Out of the Blue” Armitage presents and develops terror in many different ways and whether that is through stylistic technique, language, form or structure, it deeply effects the reader. I will explore how he does this and if he does it effectively. Fear is presented straight away in the first stanza by imagery of the twin towers being calm and still and fear effects everyone afterwards. The first line “The silent prongs of a tuning fork, testing the calm.” is short and includes caesura and end stopping which causes an eerie emphasis on the image created of the twin towers like a tuning fork. The two prongs are symbolic of the twin…show more content…
Lack of emphasis on humans makes it less personal which may confuse the reader as the people that passed are usually the main focus and something you relate to 9/11. He chose to do this, because it makes the reader feel more terror, because of how unnatural the images created are and how inconceivable it is that these things are almost like humans. The rhyming between the lines “And a cabinet spews its lunch. And a water-cooler staggers and slumps.” links the lines together in both of them Armitage is trying to describe the physical things; this objective view is refreshing and resembles humans in the towers when the plane hits. It highlights that they were just left in the towers and no one would take the machines (like the humans) out of imminent danger increasing the duration of terror felt by the workers. The water cooler instead of resembling the humans could be metaphorical for the towers giving up and collapsing as it “staggers then slumps”. The sibilance slows the line down, puts emphasis on those words and creates an unsettling effect and suspense; as it shows how the towers slowly and calmly fall as if it is in slow motion on a camera. Just like a horror film when they want to emphasise the shock and…show more content…
He personifies the element this creates terror as they’re uncontrollable and causes deaths for example in hurricanes or floods. He lists how he thinks the towers are strong “I know for a fact these towers can stand the shoulder-charge of a gale force wind or the body-check of a hurricane”. The theme infallibility is shown in this quote and exaggerates how incomprehensible it is for the public to understand that the towers did actually collapse as even “hurricanes” couldn’t damage them. This shows fear and terror because nothing seems safe now to the civilians as they have been deceived about how safe the towers are they are paranoid about safety of other things being misleading. Like in section eight when the personification is used for fire “tongues of flame licking under the door” it presents terror. Because, Simon Armitage has used personification on the things such as fire which has caused peoples deaths, it implies other humans have done it, and this has an emotional effect on the reader because it makes them realise it wasn’t just a plane that caused this, a human inflicted all those deaths. Infallibility is likes to present terror because the facts have been stated that the towers are shown to be relied upon because things like wind can’t hurt them. But the fact is they can’t be as they were damaged by the plane so easily. This demonstrates illogic and things being

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