The Farmer’s Bride
Making links with The
Manhunt and In Paris
with You
Simple, colloquial language
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‘When us was wed ‘ ‘she runned away’ this is nongrammatical language
Uneducated – limited emotional intelligence- he can’t
understand her – pity him?
The speaker in In Paris with You also uses language
which seems simple and unconstructed such as
when he uses the colloquialism ‘earful’ to show he is
fed up hearing about love. What is different between
the way the two speaker’s use such unpretentious
language?
Imagery
‘Shy as a leveret’ ‘too young maybe -’ ‘young larch tree’ –
convey her youth, innocence -implies the match as
inappropriate
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‘like a hare’ ‘like a mouse’
timidity, vulnerability (him a predator?)
 ‘Her smile went out ‘like the shut of a winter’s day’ brief /cold /
darkness descends (emotional shutdown and internalised terror
– married to a stranger)
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What is the best quote in The Manhunt to compare the
presentation of someone in emotional shutdown?
Language
‘We chased her’ ‘we caught her’ ‘turned the key
upon her fast’
Verbs from semantic field of hunting – she is prey –
reader feels great sympathy
Pronoun ‘we’ repeated – they unite in hunt – reader
incensed by their witch hunt, she is misunderstood
(‘frightened fey’ (fairy))
 Which verbs are used in The Manhunt to convey the
‘hunting actions’ of the speaker? How do they
compare?
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She is uncommunicative
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‘‘Not near not near!’ her eyes beseech’ facial
expression is her only form of communication –
speech marks show his trying to translate her silence
I’ve hardly heard her speak at all – breakdown in
communication. She is more comfortable in
company of animals (she is a gentle soul – troubled
in past by men? Androphobic?)
Compare theme of communication with Quickdraw?
Sadness – feelings of isolation
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‘sweet as the first wild violets, she, / To her
wild self. But what to me?’
In Paris with You ‘I’m maroonded’
Who is most alone?
Which speaker moves you most?
Can we feel sorry for the farmer?
Symbolism
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Colour imagery – ‘blue smoke’ ‘low grey sky’
‘black earth’ associations with coldness,
winter, death – parallel the death of their
relationship (lack of warmth)
Compare with the death symbolism in
Quickdraw ‘silver bullets of your kiss’ ‘take
this…and this…’
Do both couples experience the same
metaphorical death of their relationship?
Sexual desire
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‘Oh! My God! The down, /the soft down of her […]
her eyes, her hair, her hair!
Farmer’s tone shifts to exclamative as his sexual
frustration is expressed
Sensual description ‘down’ = soft, silky hairs on body
Repetition ‘down’ and ‘hair’ – overwhelming with
longing (unsettles reader)
How does the farmer’s desire compare with that
shown by the wife in the Manhunt ‘after passionate
nights and intimate days’ and In Paris with you ‘I’m in
Paris with your eyes, you mouth’?
Structure and form
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Five stanzas in chronological order narrate the discontent of the farmer which remains
unresolved
Strong rhyme – first stanza abbacdcdd – creates an upbeat mood not in keeping with the
tragic subject; the rhyme sensationalises her fears ‘ hare’ ‘scare’ last’ fast’ – rhyme is
undignified. How does this change the feelings of the reader for the farmer?
Run-on lines emphasis key words such as ‘Alone’ positioned at start of new line
emphasising her solitude in the attic
The rhythm is regular – mostly iambic tetrameter (four feet unstressed/stressed –
conversational) but this alters to reveal emotional intensity ‘Not near, not near! Spondees
(two stressed syllables)
The final stanza shows his breakdown – his frustration evident from the ! and the - and the
The Manhunt also begins using strong end-rhyme ‘phase’ ‘days’ but then lapses into halfrhyme ‘hold/bone’ and no rhyme ‘thumb/lung’ – is this use of rhyme more or less effective?
The Manhunt does not have a regular rhythm, unlike TFB, why?
Do we see more progress in The Manhunt in terms of emotional reconnection than in TFB?
(13 couplets)
How to compare (many people did not follow the model paragraph
you stuck into your books before the holiday – you need to take
responsibility for making progress. Manage your resources
effectively)
Both FB and MH present difficulty when one person withdraws
emotionally. In FB we are told that when they married, the wife’s smile
went out ‘Like the shut of a winter’s day’, the simile suggests
emotional coldness and the symbolism of winter conveys the death of
any affection. Similarly, in MH, we see the husband return from war
and his reluctance to be emotionally open. Repetition of the
anaphora ‘only then would he let me trace…only then would he let me
explore’ reveals the resistance of the man to intimate contact. But
whilst progress is apparent in MH as we see she ‘only then did I come
close’ to identifying his pain, no such progress occurs in FB and in the
final stanza we learn that she sleeps ‘Alone’ in the attic. For me, the
emotional shutdown is more moving in MH because the speaker
shows such patience and gentleness trying to mend her lover whereas
the farmer appears more frustrated that Christmas has been ruined by
their lack of children.
What we will look at this week:
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Unseen poetry – Mirror by Sylvia Plath (15
minutes to practise planning an answer – as
discussed last week)
The theme of time (revising Coy Mistress/
Sonnet 43 / Sonnet 116 / Hour)
The theme of desire (revising Coy Mistress /
Ghazal / In Paris with You)
Born Yesterday / Praise Song