How does the poet use language and imagery to portray Aunt Julia's character and the life she had and associate them with his childhood?

Answer 1

AUNT JULIA - Norman MacCaig Protagonist: Poetic voice only Themes include: Family / Cultural Traditions / Artistry of the ordinary / Harmony / Ambiguity Events include: The life of the poetic voice / Childhood visits / Growing up / Life and death "Aunt Julia spoke Gaelic very loud and very fast." - 1st person, sounds personal. Enjambment is used to emphasise her speed and dialect. "... in absolute darkness ... ... listening to crickets being friendly." - Antithesis (juxtaposition of contrasting ideas, to give a feeling of balance, comforting) "... crickets being friendly." - is personification. "She was buckets and water flouncing into them. She was winds pouring wetly round the house-ends" - Metaphors + Parallelism (sentences that have a similar form thus a definite pattern). "... brown eggs, black shirts and a keeper ..." - Tricolon stressing the fact of all the things Aunt Julia was. She is everything for the poetic voice. The metaphores further encapsulate the image of Aunt Julia: how organic and natural she was. "But I hear her still, welcoming me ..." - Present participle, showing that eveything is happening in the present (NOW), sense of action. The world is no longer so simple without her, showing that she was important. Poetic Structure: Irregularity of the poem makes it seem spoken / The stanzas divide the actions and ideas / The repetition of the 1st stanza in the last one, gives the audience a dramatic conclusion / The poem has a circular motion.