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Havisham Essay
Carol Ann Duffy’s “Havisham” is a dramatic monologue which gives voice to one of Charles
Dickens most famous and eccentric characters, Miss Havisham
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The title of the poem “Havisham” draws the reader’s attention to her
unmarried title and her status as a spinster
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The theme of the
corrosive nature of hatred on the human psyche is emphasised as Miss Havisham has been
left in the past and her mental state has deteriorated
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“Beloved sweetheart bastard”
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The minor
sentence emphasises this and shows the short space of time from which her love turned into
hate
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The grudge she holds has made her go insane and this is shown in the structure of the
poem
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The disordered structure of the poem replicates her wild and illogical
thoughts
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The corrosive to her psyche as she is unable to progress with her life and is a
constant state of depression, hate and love
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She expresses this hate when she says
“Not a day since then
I haven’t wished him dead”
She is stuck in the moment of her pain when she was so brutally abandoned
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The fact that she wants her fiancé to die
indicates the violence entwined with her hatred
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Her devotion to this hate is shown in the next line
“Prayed for it so hard I’ve dark green pebbles for eyes”
Duffy makes use of assonance on “hard” and “dark” which intensifies her praying and makes
it seem more sinister
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This is emphasised as the colour green is generally associated
with jealousy
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All her joy and warmness has
been taken away from her and all that is left is cold dark shell of her previous self, clearly
showing the extremely corrosive nature of hate and rage
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In
stanza 2 line 1, Havisham describes herself as:
“Spinster
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Duffy starts the stanza with a single word opening sentence creating impact and
emphasising Havisham’s isolated status
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Havisham describes herself as
stinking creating a stark image of her remaining in her wedding dress
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The theme is shown as
her hates is not only decaying her mind, but also her body as she is stinking and dirty
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The immense distress she feels about her
broken marriage is shown by the onomatopoeia and the capitalisation of the letter N, all
which create a combined effect of intensifying her pain
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The dress also shows how long she has been in denial and the enjambment further
emphasises the vast length of time she has been holding a grudge
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Stanza 3 starts off with enjambment from the previous stanza in which
Havisham has a split personality
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The fact that she ruined her life is shown
by the word choice of puce which suggests decay and disease, and her mind and body have
decayed since her fiancé left her
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Her mixed character is further shown when their relationship is described
before Havisham was abandoned:
“my fluent tongue in its mouth in its ear/ then down till I suddenly bite awake
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She thinks of all the good times
they had however the violence and pain of her situation wakes her up to her harsh reality of
isolation and rage, and the present tense of bite suggests that this is an ongoing process
and has been happening ever since her fiancé left
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In the final stanza, Duffy subverts the typical wedding and Havisham is represented as
violent towards these traditions
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The stanza starts off with enjambment showing the close link between love and hate and
also represents the the short time in which love can turn to hate
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The poet uses clever
metaphor here as the white veil is Havisham's wedding dress and underneath that veil is all
the love and hate she possesses towards her husband
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The colour red also contrasts with the white veil as white is a
symbol for innocence and red is violence and this combines to create a violent metaphor
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Duffy then goes on to subvert a typical honeymoon to something far more ominous:
“give me a male corpse for a long slow honeymoon/Don't think its only the heart that b-b-bbreaks”
This is s subversion of a normal honeymoon, however Havisham's wedding never took
place, so she can only think about what a honeymoon is like, and the hate for her former
fiancé has caused her thoughts to corrupt a regular honeymoon
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The fact that she wants her fiancé, or any
man, to die suggests how deep her resentment is for all men, and the darkness of her
thoughts
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The final line of the poem sums of
Havisham's mentally degraded and hysterical state perfectly as the “b-b-b” shows Havisham
crying in despair as her conflicting thoughts want her fiancé to come back but she also has a
deep loathing towards him
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This is a perfect round up of the poem as
this line thoroughly shows the corrosiveness nature of hate on the human psyche
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She has a very fragile mind and this is shown clearly throughout the poem
through her moments of madness and hate
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