‘The Class Game’ by Mary Casey
The poem considers the differences in social class and attitudes arising from this
difference. This is portrayed by the vocabulary and poetic devices uses in the
poem. In particular, the reader experiences the reaction of narrator on being
judged by how they speak.
Structure
1st person perspective – dramatic monologue exploring the working class
persona’s thoughts and feelings about being judged on the way they speak and
their social background. The persona is from a working class background ‘we
live in a corpy’ whereas the listener is from a middle class background ‘pretty
little semi’ (see the link here to ‘Parades End’).
The poet decided to write the poem as one long stanza to indicate the feelings of
frustration and anger experienced by the persona (see ‘Half Caste’). The title
suggests that the division in social class is not to be taken seriously and the
persona systematically attacks middle class prejudice towards the working class.
The rhythm and rhyme of the poem could suggest the light-heartedness linking
with the notion of a game. However, the fact that the poet introduces internal
half-rhyme at the beginning of the poem ‘nose/clothes’, ‘Tara/Ma’ and rhyming
couplets as the poem progresses ‘card/yard’, ‘mother/brother’ emphasises the
narrator’s mounting anger towards the unfair treatment of the working class.
The short line lengths speed up the ending of the poem to indicate the narrator’s
contempt at the prejudice experienced. The exclamation mark in ‘Well, Mate!’
enhances the defiant tone which concludes with the final line ‘And I am proud of
the class that I come from.’
Language
The poet uses contrasting language to highlight the differences in social class
‘bread pudding/wet nelly’, ‘stomach/belly’ between working class narrator and
middle class reader. Dialect and colloquialism are used throughout the poem in
order to make the reader ‘wince’ with such phrases as ‘Say toilet instead of bog
when I want to pee’. At the end of the poem the narrator deliberately increases
their use in order to challenge and defy the reader’s prejudice.
Rhetorical questions are used to involve and unsettle he reader. The questions
are confrontational and the repetition ensures that the reader has to think about
the issues raised. The change from ‘How’ to ‘Why do you care…’ increases the
attack by becoming more direct.
The poet uses imagery to convey the contrast between the two classes: ‘my
hands are stained with toil’ suggesting hard work contrasting with the ‘soft lilywhite’ hands of the middle class. The simile ‘stick in your gullet like a sour plum’
shows that the narrator is fully aware of the adverse reaction of the middle class
readers when they hear her dialect and colloquialisms.
Essay title
Explain how effectively Casey has used vocabulary and poetic devices to
portray differences in social class and her attitude towards them.
Use examples from the poem to explain our answer.s