In Mrs Tilscher's Class by Carol Ann Duffy

501 Words3 Pages
Throughout this poem, Duffy vividly describes one of her primary school years. She explores the way in which one teacher can make the classroom into a place of safety and adventure. She also focuses on the transition of children from innocence to experience and both the excitement and confusion that this can bring. In the first stanza, Duffy uses enjambment to create a sense of movement, by suggesting that you could “travel up the blue nile” she captures a sense of adventure, enabling children to use their imaginations to completely experience what is being taught. The second stanza explores how Mrs Tilscher is able to protect the children, from the horrors of “Bready and Hindley”, making sure that their fears are “faded” away, and the way in which she “loved you” suggests safety for the children, contrasted with the idea of horror expressed earlier on. Duffy is also writing in the second person therefore making the poem more personal to the reader. The third stanza begins the transition as children enter their last days of primary school. They aren’t fully grown up yet, shown by the “inky tadpoles”; tadpoles have not yet matured into frogs, which act as a metaphor for the children showing how they are not quite ready to become adults yet. This change emphasises the impermanence of life and links the children to adolescence: the stage in between being a child and an adult. In the fourth stanza when questioned about the facts of life, Mrs Tilscher simply “smiled” then “turned away”. Her smile hints at the truth, but she seems to be dismissing the question; it is not hers to tell, she wouldn’t want to shatter their innocent world and would rather protect them from the harsh reality of life- could this be the only question that Mrs Tilscher cannot answer? By the end of the poem, the poet embraces the inevitable part of life: growing up. The children are more experienced
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