Aunt Julia
Norman MacCaig
Isle of Harris –
Famous for its
Harris Tweed!
Norman MacCaig was
influenced by visits to his
mother’s family in the
Highlands of Scotland, even
though he was brought up in
Edinburgh.
Aunt Julia
Stanza 1
Aunt Julia spoke Gaelic
very loud and very fast.
I could not answer her —
I could not understand her.
Stanza 2
She wore men's boots
when she wore any.
— I can see her strong foot,
stained with peat,
paddling with the treadle of the
spinning wheel
while her right hand drew yarn
marvellously out of the air.
adverb
Stanza 3
Hers was the only house
where I've lain at night
in absolute darkness
in a box bed, listening to
crickets being friendly.
Stanza 4
Personification
to suggest
something
about her
character
She was buckets
and water flouncing into
them.
She was winds pouring
wetly
round house-ends.
She was brown eggs, Metaphors to
black skirts
define her hard
life
and a keeper of
threepennybits
in a teapot.
Stanza 5
Aunt Julia spoke Gaelic
very loud and very fast.
By the time I had learned
a little, she lay
silenced in the absolute
black
of a sandy grave
at Luskentyre.
Alliteration
Stanza 5 continued
But I hear her still,
welcoming me
with a seagull's voice
across a hundred yards
of peatscrapes and lazybeds
and getting angry, getting
angry
with so many questions
unanswered.
Key points
• The poet pays tribute to his aunt who lived a
hard life on the island of Harris in the Western
Isles of Scotland
• She had a spinning wheel for producing the
famous Harris Tweed
• The poet uses power of observation to
describe her and the settings
• She spoke Gaelic which he could not
understand
Content – 1st stanza
• A child’s memory of his aunt– Aunt Julia
• Main recollection is her language – Gaelic –
which he could not understand
Content – 2nd stanza
• Describes his aunt and how she seemed
strange to him – barefoot, or wearing ‘men’s
boots
• His description gives an insight into her way of
life
Content 3rd stanza
• He recalls the strange experience of sleeping
in a box bed but he feels safe there
Content 4th stanza
• Vivid images and metaphor capture aspects of
her life: carrying buckets of water as there is
no running water
Content 5th stanza
• By the time he learned some Gaelic, it was too
late to communicate with his Aunt: she had
died
• He feels frustrated and ‘angry’ that he was too
late to get the chance to chat with her and
really get to know her
• She could be angry because she didn’t ever
experience a life other than her own and
didn’t get to know him either.
Tone and language
• Some language is plain and factual
– The two opening lines
– Metaphors define her hard life
– ‘She was buckets’
• Personification is used to suggest something
about Aunt Julia’s character
– ‘flouncing’
Tone and language
• Her ‘seagull’s voice’ is a metaphor to describe
her loud, incomprehensible voice!
• Scottish dialect is used in the poem
– ‘lazybeds’
Tone and language
• The repetition of ‘getting angry’ emphasises
his frustration at never having talked to her
• Dark images are used throughout the poem to
illustrate how basic and bleak things were on
the remote island – ‘stained with peat’
‘absolute darkness’ ‘black skirts’ ‘absolute
black
• Her loud, fast Gaelic voice is the most
memorable thing about her; when she is dead
she is ‘silenced’
Other culture
• Most obviously the Gaelic language – it seems
alien as it could not be understood
• Description of features of the landscape
• The spinning wheel used for generations to
make Harris tweed
• The traditional box bed
• The use of an actual place name: Luskentyre
WRITTEN TASKS
• Try your best to work through the eight
questions about, ‘Aunt Julia’. Make your
answers and detailed and as mature as
possible. Use your notes and use the words
metaphors and personification!
• Imagine that you are the young narrator
laying in your box bed listening to the friendly
crickets, writing a diary entry about your visit
to see Aunt Julia.
Extension Task
• If you have time, why don’t you try to draw
Aunt Julia, and illustrate some of the
metaphors around her to show your
understanding.