In her poem “Stealing,” Carol Ann Duffy takes on the persona of a criminal who appears to have no regrets. The poem opens with the narrator repeating a question, 'The most unusual thing I ever stole?' It seems that he or she is being questioned by someone who is curious about the thefts. The thief's answer to the question is 'A snowman,' which certainly is an unusual thing to steal. The description is poetic: 'He looked magnificent: a tall, white mute / beneath the winter moon.' Enjambment allows for an extended image; it is noticeable that there are three words beginning with the letter 'm' here. Two more appear in the following sentence: 'mate' and 'mind'. The thief explains his desire to have the snowman, using the simile that his mind was 'as cold as the slice of ice / within my own brain.' The coldness of the two minds conveys the idea that the thief is a person with no feelings, a harsh criminal. Duffy uses rhyme within the simile in 'slice of ice', creating a vivid image. The first stanza ends with a simple sentence in which the thief recounts that he stole the snowman's head first.

The second stanza opens with the thief stating bluntly that it would be better to die rather than give up on the idea of stealing something you want: 'Better off dead than giving in.' He remembers how heavy the snowman was when he carried the 'torso' close to his own chest and the intense coldness penetrated his own body: 'a fierce chill / piercing my gut.' The phrase that follows, 'part of the thrill', forms a rhyme with 'chill', although 'thrill' is not at the end of the line. What gave the thief a thrill was the thought of children waking up the next morning and crying when they saw that the snowman had gone. This is another obvious clue to the harshness of the thief. He ends the second stanza with the brief statement 'Life's tough.' The shortness of the sentence gives it punch, and again shows the thief's lack of remorse. We sense that life has been hard for him and he wants to pay back, even if the ones who suffer are children.

At the beginning of the third stanza, the thief goes on to say 'Sometimes I steal things I don't need'. This perhaps suggests a sense of boredom. He says 'I joy-ride cars', but it is just for the sake of it, not because he has to go somewhere. Then again he burgles houses purely out of curiosity. Line 13 contains another three words beginning with the letter 'm': 'I'm a mucky ghost, leave a mess, maybe pinch a camera.' This line, however, is much less poetic than the description of the snowman in the first stanza, using slang words such as 'mucky' and 'pinch'. The last two lines of the stanza describe the way that the thief, with a 'gloved hand', opens the door of a bedroom where a stranger is sleeping. 'Mirrors' is a single word sentence that continues the thread of words beginning with 'm'. He ends with a description of his sigh, 'Aah,' which is set in italics for emphasis, as he sees the reflection of someone asleep.

Stanza four returns to the occasion of stealing the snowman: 'It took some time.' The thief 'reassembled' the snowman in his own garden, but it looked different. He decided to kick it and break it, showing a streak of vandalism: 'I took a run / and booted him. Again. Again.' The repetition of 'Again' in one-word sentences stresses his determination and also gives the impression that he was starting to lose control of himself. The alliterative description 'My breath ripped out / in rags' emphasises desperation, and the idea of rags underlines the destructive act. Looking back, the thief realises that it was a senseless thing to do: 'It seems daft now', but this sentence makes us feel that at the time the thief was completely wrapped up in his desire to destroy the snowman. The stanza ends once again with a simple sentence, 'I was sick of the world.' The thief does not seem to have been capable of any positive thoughts, or any optimism.

The fifth and final stanza opens with another one-word sentence: 'Boredom.' That seems to be what pushes the narrator to steal, and he continues 'Mostly I'm so bored I could eat myself.' This is a person who cannot find anything constructive to do with his time. He then says that he once stole a guitar and considered learning to play it. He obviously didn't do so, but it is the only positive idea that he mentions during the poem. 'I nicked a bust of Shakespeare once, / flogged it' means that he stole the bust and sold it. The words 'nicked' and 'flogged' are reminiscent of the slang in line 13, and form a sharp contrast with the literary connotations of an object representing Shakespeare. In the penultimate line, the thief remarks again that the snowman was the strangest thing he ever stole. The poem ends with the question 'You don't understand a word I'm saying, do you?' It creates a feeling of alienation and implies that the person he is talking to will not be able to see his point of view or help him to overcome his compulsion to steal.

Duffy has composed 'Stealing' in five regular stanzas of five lines each, and the fact that the third stanza moves away from the theft of the snowman but the fourth stanza returns to it gives the poem a certain symmetry. The use of enjambment where one line runs through to the next to create a fuller description contrasts effectively with the abrupt, one-word sentences dotted here and there. Rhyme is used in an unusual way as in 'slice of ice', and slang phrases give a sense of genuine conversation.

The narrator here, the thief, is a cold-hearted character who gets a thrill out of depriving people of their belongings and even upsetting children. His life has obviously been hard and the fact that he refers to boredom probably means that he is unemployed. Duffy has portrayed a character that, as hard-hearted as he is, needs help from the society that he cannot conform to.

Salome, by Carol Ann Duffy

Two references in the New Testament of the Bible, in the Gospels according to Mark and Matthew, give us the background to the character of Salome. Briefly, she danced for King Herod who was so delighted that he said he would give Salome whatever she asked for. Salome, prompted by her mother Herodias, asked for the head of John the Baptist, who had said that Herodias' marriage to Herod was unlawful. Herod had no choice but to send an executioner to John the Baptist, who was in prison. His head was brought to Salome 'in a dish', and she presented it to her mother.

In her poem “Salome”, Carol Ann Duffy adopts the persona of the dancer, but she doesn't sound like a biblical character at all. The impression is of a contemporary girl or young woman. The narrator tells us at the start of the poem 'I'd done it before' and says she will probably do it again: do what again? Salome has woken up with a head on the pillow next to her, and she doesn't even know whose it is. She doesn't seem to think that's important, either. It may not sound too out of the ordinary; people might have too much to drink and not remember what happened when they wake up the next morning. Salome tells us that the man is 'Good-looking' with 'dark hair'; so far, so good. Then, however, she says that the hair is 'rather matted' and that the beard is a lighter shade of red than it had been. It begins to sound as though the head is blood stained. Salome goes on to say that the 'deep lines around the eyes' could be caused by laughter, but she thinks more likely by pain. His mouth is 'crimson', another sign of blood. When she kisses his lips, they are 'Colder than pewter', a simile that tells us that he is dead. She tries to remember his name: 'Peter?' ends the first stanza.

Duffy links the second stanza with the first by opening it with more possible names: “Simon? Andrew? John?” They are all names of Jesus' disciples, and this is the first direct biblical reference. Salome then turns to her need to treat her hangover, wanting tea with 'dry toast'. The fact that she 'rang for a maid' makes it clear that she is from a high-class family. (Salome was the step-daughter of King Herod.) When the maid comes up with breakfast, Salome appreciates the 'innocent clatter' of the crockery, the tidying up, and the maid's conversation, described as her 'regional' patter. The second stanza closes with Salome's admission that she has a hangover and is in a dreadful state after a night on the tiles: 'wrecked as I was from a night on the batter.'

The third stanza opens with the brief but clear announcement 'Never again!' The focus now switches to Salome's determination to 'clean up' her act. She is determined to get fit, as well as to give up alcohol ('booze'), cigarettes ('fags') and sex – a cluster of three. As her thoughts turn to sex, she realises that she has to 'turf out' the man she slept with the previous night. She refers to him initially as the 'blighter', giving the impression of a nuisance, then the 'beater or biter', alluding to either physical violence or sexual perversion, perhaps. The stanza ends with the description that he had come to bed 'like a lamb to the slaughter', a simile that has biblical connotations and is ironic as he has in fact been killed.

The fourth and final stanza, which is also the shortest, begins with Salome looking at her reflection in the mirror. Her eyes 'glitter' – is it from a thought in her mind, or could it even be tears? She makes a sudden action, flinging back the sheets that are 'sticky red' with blood. Her comment on what she sees is 'ain't life a bitch', but actually it seems that Salome herself is the bitch. In the poem's closing line, she reveals that under the sheets is the man's head 'on a platter', just the way that John the Baptist's head had been brought to Salome.

One of the most striking elements of the poem “Salome” is Duffy's skilful use of language. There are alliterative phrases, such as 'clatter / of cups', 'clearing of clutter' and 'the blighter / the beater or biter', the last of which are also half rhymes. Running throughout the poem is a series of words ending in '-er': 'lighter', 'laughter' and 'pewter', for example, in the first stanza; these are also half rhymes. Others are complete rhymes but are dotted around in the poem: 'matter', 'flatter', 'clatter', 'batter', 'latter', and the final word 'platter'. Duffy avoids a restricting, traditional rhyming pattern, but the use of rhyme here and there throughout creates a unity, like a thread running through. Some of these words, such as 'clutter' and 'clatter' are also onomatopoeic. They add to the poem's fast rhythm which is in keeping with Salome's coldness or lack of emotion. The four stanzas are all of different lengths, and the lines vary between short, medium and long quite randomly. It is as though thoughts are popping in and out of Salome's mind as she deals with her hangover and flits from one pattern of thought to another. Duffy uses ellipsis twice in the first stanza, 'how to flatter …' to create a pause; she also uses enjambment here and there to extend an idea or a description.

“Salome” is a poem that shocks by the narrator's flippant attitude, and Duffy achieves this effect perfectly. The language itself is informal, contemporary and includes a few slang phrases such as 'a night on the batter' or 'ain't life a bitch'. Above all, the combination of the poem's rhythm and Duffy's skilful use of rhyme and half rhyme throughout the poem give an almost humorous tone to the dark theme. “Salome” paints a picture of decadence, of a dancer who has revelled in nights filled with alcohol, smoking and sex. Just when she realises the error of her ways and decides things will have to change, she discovers the severed head under the sheets. Duffy brings the poem to a dramatic conclusion, saving this image for the final line. 

Revise the English and English Literature Anthology for AQA A

I must emphasise at the outset of this review that Revise the English and English Literature Anthology for AQA A is intended for pupils taking GCSE English examinations, but only those who are studying the AQA Specification A as is clear from the title. (AQA is an examination board.) Pupils will be supplied by their schools with the AQA Anthology itself (Oxford University Press, ISBN 0198318812); the Anthology is not available in online or offline bookshops, but if you did need to obtain a copy, you might find one on Ebay.

Tony Childs' book is therefore intended to assist with revision of the Anthology, by taking the poems and short stories one by one and asking questions that will guide pupils in the understanding and analysis of the works. The book opens with a six-page introduction that explains the aims of the book, how it can help with revision, and how to prepare for the examination. The summary stresses the importance of reading all the texts again before attempting to answer the questions in this book. There is also some guidance on sitting the examinations themselves, giving details of how long they last, how many questions there are, how to make a good choice of question, and how to plan an answer before starting to write.

The book is then divided into two main sections, Section 1 on English and Section 2 on English Literature: all pupils study at least half the poems in Section 1; all pupils study some of the poetry in Section 2; and some pupils study the prose in Section 2.

Section 1 English

All pupils have to study this section of the Anthology, although some schools concentrate on only Cluster 1 or Cluster 2, each of which contains eight poems. In the examination, there is a choice of two questions, one featuring poems from Cluster 1 and the other poems from Cluster 2. A pupil who has only studied one of the clusters will therefore not have a choice of questions. Cluster 1 contains poems by poets such as Lawrence Ferlinghetti, Chinua Achebe and Grace Nichols, whilst Cluster 2 has works by John Agard, Moniza Alvi and Tom Leonard amongst others. Some of these are written in non-standard English, and most are by poets of non-British origin.

Section 1 briefly explains how the English Anthology fits into the course, and then goes on to discuss what the examiners are looking for over the following two pages. It then looks at the poems one by one, giving a little information about the author followed in some cases by a glossary, and then the main 'Read and revise' set of questions. The questions are preceded by two or three sentences giving a reminder to read the poem and pointing out a basic feature of it, for example, 'Notice particularly the changing length of sentence' for Imtiaz Dharker's poem 'Blessing'. To give an example of the type of questions presented in this book, for Lawrence Ferlinghetti's 'Two Scavengers in a Truck, Two Beautiful People in a Mercedes', Childs asks, 'Which details in the description of the scavengers contrast with the people in the Mercedes? Look for words and phrases, and think about their effect.' Whilst the book does not provide answers to these questions, they will guide pupils in their reading of the poems and show them the points that they need to look for. The questions are followed by 'Final thoughts', a brief summing up, for example 'Read the poem again. Much of the poem is at least half-joking, and is like a song. How does this change at the end?' sums up John Agard's 'Half-Caste'. Finally, there is a table suggesting which poems in the collection could be compared to the one in question.

After all the poems have been dealt with, Childs discusses how to go about comparing poems from different cultures and traditions. He takes 'Night of the Scorpion' and 'Two Scavengers in a Truck, Two Beautiful People in a Mercedes' and draws up a plan giving notes on how they could be compared in terms of meanings and interpretations; linguistic, structural and presentational devices; language variations; and finally place and culture. The following two pages on Structuring a response to Poems from Different Cultures and Traditions considers the question 'Compare the ways in which the poets present people in Night of the Scorpion and one other poem of your choice from the selection.' It offers clear advice in the form of bullet points as well as a table of detailed notes. Pupils are always advised to end by stating which poem of the two they prefer and why.

Section 2 English Literature

All pupils have to study some poems from the Pre-1914 Poetry Bank; alongside these, some pupils study the poems of Seamus Heaney and Gillian Clarke, whilst others study those of Carol Ann Duffy and Simon Armitage. Most examination questions involve comparing two poems, either one by Heaney with one by Clarke or one by Duffy with one by Armitage, and referring in addition to two poems from the Pre-1914 Bank. The Pre-1914 Poetry Bank includes works by poets such as Walt Whitman, Robert Browning, Thomas Hardy, William Blake and William Wordsworth.

Section 2 opens, similarly to Section 1, by showing how the English Literature Anthology fits into the course and explaining what the examiners are looking for. The Assessment Objectives are explained, which include responding to texts critically, sensitively and in detail; exploring how language, structure and form contribute to meaning; and exploring relationships and comparisons within and between texts. Childs notes that examiners will be looking for an understanding of the texts and an ability to think about them and compare one with another.

The poems of Heaney, Clarke, Duffy, Armitage and those of the Pre-1914 Poetry Bank are then looked at in detail, one by one, in a way similar to that of Section 1. Questions include 'The person in the poem is violent. Find as many violent actions, thoughts or intentions as you can in the poem' (for Duffy's Education for Leisure), or 'In lines 4-6, find two examples of things being unusually sad and affecting – one stated, one implied' (for Heaney's Mid-Term Break). Some of the questions are broken down into several bullet points relating to the same aspect of the poem. Final thoughts sum up each poem, and again there is a table suggesting which other poems are suitable for comparison.

A sub-section on Comparing poems/ Structuring a poetry response explains a little about the choice of questions offered in the examination and what candidates might be asked to compare, for instance feelings, ideas, and the poets' styles of writing. A plan is given in the form of a table for the question 'Compare the ways that poets write about nature in four or more of the poems you have studied. You should write about The Field Mouse by Gillian Clarke and Storm on the Island by Seamus Heaney, and two poems from the Pre-1914 Poetry Bank'. Childs selects Tennyson's The Eagle and Clare's Sonnet from the Pre-1914 Bank. In the plan, one column is dedicated to each poem, and notes are then made on aggression connected with nature, feelings caused by nature, other issues, language, structure and form.

Prose follows the poetry: many pupils study a novel as a set text for English Literature, such as Steinbeck's 'Of Mice and Men', but the short stories in the AQA Anthology provide an alternative to the novel. Pupils do, however, have to compare two short stories from the selection in the examination. There are seven short stories altogether, the authors of which are Doris Lessing, Sylvia Plath, Ernest Hemingway, Joyce Cary, Graham Swift, Leslie Norris and Michele Roberts – all modern or contemporary writers.

Revision guidance for the Anthology Short Stories is presented in the same way as it is for the poems. Each story is looked at in turn through a series of questions (preceded again by a brief note on the author and a glossary where necessary). Final thoughts are followed by two examples of examination questions which require the story to be compared in some way to one of the others in the collection.

Following the detailed analysis of each story, Childs gives guidance on comparing short stories with regard to both content and style. Structuring a Prose Response on the following two pages shows how to 'Compare two stories where characters face difficult situations'. Taking Lessing's 'Flight' and Roberts' 'Your Shoes', Childs defines the four main points to consider and shows how to make a plan in table form giving notes on these four points.

Sample answers and commentaries give three responses to the question 'Doris Lessing uses pigeons to represent something else. Write about how she does this, and how the author of one other story in the Anthology uses the same technique.' One of the sample answers was awarded a Grade A, one a Grade C, and the third a Grade E. Each sample answer is followed by a commentary.

The Glossary on the final page gives definitions of terms such as alliteration, paradox, refrain and syntax.

This is probably the best book available to assist in studying and revising the AQA Anthology. Whilst it does not provide answers to the questions asked, the nature of these questions gives a clear idea of what needs to be considered for each poem or short story and assists in giving a sound understanding. Even an able pupil who understands a poem or story well, however, may not be confident in comparing it with another work in the Anthology, and Childs' book gives plenty of advice in this area. There is a bonus for those studying the poems of Cluster 1 for English, as well as those studying the poems of Heaney and Clarke for English Literature, as some of these are focused on when showing how to structure a response to the poems.

I have used this book on a one-to-one basis both when introducing a pupil to a poem or short story for the first time and for the purposes of revision. I have also lent it to one or two more able pupils who were aiming at a Grade A for English and English Literature, and they were able to gain a stronger insight into the Anthology by using this book on their own. I do think it would be difficult for a less able pupil to use the book without a tutor or parent guiding them, but for a parent who does wish to help, this is an ideal book. No-one is likely to be using every single sub-section of the book, but even so, if it results in achieving even one grade higher, £6.50 seems a small price to pay. I would definitely recommend this book as a study guide or a revision guide for the examinations in question.

Revise the English and English Literature Anthology for AQA A

by Tony Childs

Heinemann, 2002

Paperback, 252 pages

ISBN 0435102885

Price £6.25 (Amazon Marketplace from £2.25)

Before you were mine - Carol Ann Duffy

This is a delightful poem written by a daughter about how she imagines her mother's life to have been in her teenage years, ten years before her daughter was born.

The first line initially seems a little confusing as we read 'I'm ten years away from the corner you laugh on', but it becomes clear that the narrator (the daughter) is looking at a photograph of her mother with three of her friends. They 'shriek at the pavement' and seem to be sharing a great joke, young and carefree. As the daughter looks at her mother's dress blowing round her legs in the photo, she is reminded of Marilyn Monroe: the one-word sentence 'Marilyn' that closes the first stanza tells us how glamorous the future mother looked as a teenager.

As the second stanza begins, the narrator reminds us that all thoughts of her are still distant as the girl in the photo goes dancing 'in the ballroom with the thousand eyes': it sounds as though all these eyes were on her mother-to-be. She imagines how her mother must have danced, and can understand that if the right person walked her home, she would have been in a dream-world the following day: 'those fizzy, movie tomorrows' conjures up the magical feeling perfectly. The daughter also knows that her grandmother would have been waiting 'with a hiding' (a spanking) if her mother was late home, but that this would have been a small price to pay for such a night out.

In the third stanza, the daughter refers to the moment of her birth with the phrase 'my loud, possessive yell', conveying the idea that this was a pivotal, life-changing moment. She realizes that the ten years preceding her birth, as her mother approached adulthood, must have been the best ones. She can remember playing with an old pair of her mother's 'high-heeled red shoes, relics,' and pictures her mother walking in them, strangely referring to her 'ghost' as she approaches. Her imagination takes on the senses of both sight and smell as the picture becomes more vivid: 'till I see you, clear as scent'; she refers to her mother as 'sweetheart', and imagines that she would have had love bites on her neck.

The fourth and final stanza begins with an expressive Cha cha cha! in italics, and the daughter remembers how her mother taught her to dance on the way home from church. There is the sense of the forbidden here, echoing the idea of her mother going home late to a punishment perhaps. These dancing lessons seem to have taken place when the daughter was still a child, as she says 'Even then / I wanted the bold girl winking in Portobello'. The last two lines of the poem describe the mother's love as glamorous, and in the final one, the daughter captures the essence of her mother's teenage years where she used to 'sparkle and waltz and laugh', creating a picture of a vivacious, carefree young woman.

The poem is a four stanza one, each stanza being made up of five lines, with some variation in length of line. The first two stanzas focus purely on the life of the mother before the daughter was born, whilst the third stanza opens with a reference to the daughter's birth and then moves to the daughter's vision of her mother in her earlier life, thus providing a link with the previous stanzas. The fourth stanza begins with a recollection from the daughter's younger life with her mother, and then takes us back once again to the mother's days of dancing.

It's refreshing to read a poem in which a daughter enthuses over her mother, imagining how full of life and fun she must have been before she was born. Her admiration of her mother is conveyed in a delightfully direct way, and words such as 'shriek', 'sparkle' and 'fizzy' conjure up the lightheartedness of youth. I never tire of going back to read it again and to enjoy the way in which a daughter can see her mother as a young person, just like herself.

Education for Leisure - Carol Ann Duffy

Carol Ann Duffy's poem 'Education for Leisure' immediately shocks us with its opening line 'Today I'm going to kill something. Anything.' As we continue through the first stanza, we realize that the narrator is an attention-seeker, someone who wants to 'play God', someone who wants to relieve boredom in no uncertain terms.

The first thing to be killed is a fly, squashed against the window. Almost anyone could do this, so we are not taken aback by the action. The cat, however, hides away, more sensitive to an approaching threat. Then the goldfish goes down the toilet, or 'bog' to use Duffy's word here, and we begin to wonder how far this is going to go. The budgie starts to panic. In the final stanza it seems that perhaps the cat and the bird met the same fate as the fish, as 'there is nothing left to kill'. The narrator takes the bread-knife and goes out into the street; the ominous final phrase 'I touch your arm' strikes us all the more forcefully because it is the first time that the reader has been addressed directly, and therefore threatened personally, during the entire poem.

The title 'Education for Leisure' highlights the plight of those who, having gone through their schooling and been pressured to pass exams, are then unable to find a job; it is as though they have been educated just to have free time, and the result here is an extreme case of the effect of boredom, of being ignored. The narrator here is suffering from delusion, 'breathing out talent' on the window, believing himself to be a genius who could 'change the world'. Not having been given the opportunity to do so, he takes matters into his own hands by deciding to kill. This is the most powerful option open to him. We understand that he is on the dole from the sentence 'Once a fortnight I walk the two miles into town for signing on.' Referring to his signature as his 'autograph' reminds us that this is a person who craved fame but found only emptiness in his life. The sentence 'I see that it is good' following the flushing away of the goldfish is a biblical reference, echoing the narrator's idea to 'play God' in the first stanza. As we come to the final stanza, he phones a radio announcer in desperation and tries to convince him that he is a 'superstar'.

It is a little surprising that the poem is so tidily organized into five stanzas of four lines each, but this perhaps serves to emphasize the fact that the narrator's mind has in fact planned a certain course of action. The straightforward, matter-of-fact language is underlined by a number of very short and concise sentences such as 'I pull the chain.'

This is an interesting poem to compare with Simon Armitage's 'Hitcher'. The latter deals with a person who can no longer face the daily grind and resorts to violence when confronted with a hitchhiker who seems to have all the freedom he could wish for. Both poems portray extreme behavior by people who do not somehow fit into what society demands that they be: on the one hand, boredom is intolerable and inspires senseless killing; on the other, not being able to escape the rat race leads to a desperate outburst of anger and violence.

Anne Hathaway - Carol Ann Duffy

n her poem entitled 'Anne Hathaway', Carol Ann Duffy adopts the persona of Shakespeare's widow. The introductory quote from Shakespeare's will 'Item I gyve unto my wife my second best bed' reminds us that Shakespeare's best bed was reserved for guests, and that Anne inherited the one that she and her husband slept in. This bed becomes the focus of the fourteen-line poem.

In the opening two lines, Duffy uses a metaphor to express the magic of the bed in which Shakespeare made love to Anne: it was 'a spinning world / of forests, castles, torchlight, clifftops, seas'. More metaphors follow in lines three and four as Anne Hathaway recalls their lovemaking; she expresses the notion that Shakespeare would 'dive for pearls', and she describes the sweet words he said to her as 'shooting stars' that landed on her lips when he kissed her.

From line five to line ten Duffy uses imagery in a fascinating way that relates directly to the fact that Shakespeare was a writer. Anne sees her body as 'a softer rhyme to his ... now assonance', assonance being a figure of speech in which the same vowel sound is repeated. Then follows the charming personification of his touch, portrayed as 'a verb dancing in the centre of a noun', giving a feeling of grace and delicacy. Anne says that she sometimes dreamed that Shakespeare had 'written' her, wishing that she herself were part of his artistic creation. She metaphorically imagines the bed as 'a page beneath his writer's hands'. She sees their lovemaking as drama enacted through 'touch', 'scent' and 'taste'.

In lines eleven and twelve a contrast is created to the early magic of the poem in the description of how the guests, in the best bed, 'dozed on, / dribbling their prose'; no poetic lovemaking for them! But line twelve then switches to Anne's alliterative description of Shakespeare as 'My living laughing love'. She tells us in line thirteen how she treasures her memories of him with the metaphor 'I hold him in .the casket of my widow's head'. The final line compares this act to the way in which Shakespeare held Anne so lovingly in that second-best bed. The last two lines are a rhyming couplet, just as the last two lines of a Shakesperian sonnet would be, ending the poem with a sense of unity.

Duffy's 'Anne Hathaway' is a poem full of rich imagery, the tale of a woman who remembers her husband in a wonderful, loving way with no hint of sorrow. It is beautiful to read and to dwell on the magical pictures that are painted within it.