How does the poet convey his central ideas, themes and message in The Island Man-By Grace Nichols?
The poem Island Man by Grace Nichols is about the struggles and the agonising transition for a man who lived all his life free and peaceful on a Caribbean island suddenly being forced to live in London, a big city that is noisy and busy all day long. He doesn’t even have good English (is there evidence in the poem to justify this?. He dreams of his homeland and the wonders that are there, finding this new prison unbearable, as he has different values to the everyday city dweller, and finds no joy in living here. The poem is narrated in the third person. However, it seems to be describing what is happening inside the island man’s head; what he is thinking, and what he is doing in his tiny flat.
The tone is very slow paced, with various stops, time passing is emphasised by the huge quantity of lines, gaps, and simple vocabulary. The voice is also very simple minded, symbolising the mindset of ‘the island man’, using more simplistic vocabulary, primary school words …show more content…
As stated before, the mood or being tired is prominently enhanced by the huge irregular gaps and pauses in the text, as the voice is simple-minded, and tired, fitting the mood. On the other hand, if you look at the poem sideways, it looks a lot like the breaking waves of a Caribbean coastline, washing in and out. The poem would ruin it’s atmosphere if everything was blocky and chunky, and Grace Nichols knew that, and so structured the poem to be soft, foamy, and liquid.
This poem is extremely well done, as the poet has thought of everything she could do to build up the atmosphere of the poem. From text structure to vocabulary usage, to even using the mindset of the character. I think that this poem really gets the message through and makes people think about the problems that can be found
The poem Island Man by Grace Nichols is about the struggles and the agonising transition for a man who lived all his life free and peaceful on a Caribbean island suddenly being forced to live in London, a big city that is noisy and busy all day long. He doesn’t even have good English (is there evidence in the poem to justify this?. He dreams of his homeland and the wonders that are there, finding this new prison unbearable, as he has different values to the everyday city dweller, and finds no joy in living here. The poem is narrated in the third person. However, it seems to be describing what is happening inside the island man’s head; what he is thinking, and what he is doing in his tiny flat.
The tone is very slow paced, with various stops, time passing is emphasised by the huge quantity of lines, gaps, and simple vocabulary. The voice is also very simple minded, symbolising the mindset of ‘the island man’, using more simplistic vocabulary, primary school words …show more content…
As stated before, the mood or being tired is prominently enhanced by the huge irregular gaps and pauses in the text, as the voice is simple-minded, and tired, fitting the mood. On the other hand, if you look at the poem sideways, it looks a lot like the breaking waves of a Caribbean coastline, washing in and out. The poem would ruin it’s atmosphere if everything was blocky and chunky, and Grace Nichols knew that, and so structured the poem to be soft, foamy, and liquid.
This poem is extremely well done, as the poet has thought of everything she could do to build up the atmosphere of the poem. From text structure to vocabulary usage, to even using the mindset of the character. I think that this poem really gets the message through and makes people think about the problems that can be found