Stealing by C.A. Duffy and S. Armitage's "About His Person" analysis

1. Carol Ann Duffy Simon Armitage
Stealing About his person

2. Carol Ann Duffy
Stealing

3. Poetic Technique
Conversational monologue: The poem replicates natural
speech, so that we can 'hear' the voice of the speaker
talking to us . We can even hear the pauses as s/he adds
details to the story. ""A snowman. / Midnight."
• Allitteration
• Internal Rhyme
• Clichè
• Use of enjambment
• Occasional pentameter
• Jarring vocabulary

4. STYLE
Duffy's work explores both everyday experience and the
rich fantasy life of herself and others. In dramatizing
scenes from childhood, adolescence, and adult life,
She discovers moments of consolation through love,
memory, and language.
Ear for ordinary eloquence

5. THEMES
She slides in and out of her characters' lives on a stream
of possessions, aspirations, idioms and turns of phrase.
She said. “In each poem, I'm trying to reveal a truth,
so it can't have a fictional beginning."

6. LANGUAGE
Although the poem is about I, it is not the poet herself who
is talking to us. it is deliberately ambiguous, a mystery
voice.
The poet appears to be responding to a question
someone has asked. ""'The most unusual thing I ever
stole?'"" ,the language of the poem sounds like
natural speech. S/he asks us to respond ('You
don't understand a word I'm saying, do you?')

7. IMAGERY
The central image is that of the snowman alone in
someone's empty yard in the middle of the night -
an image of dark and icy cold: there is an obvious
parallel between the ice-cold snowman, alone in
his yard, and the speaker,
The parallel is underlined by the speaker
The snowman, in other words, stands as a symbol
for the cold and loneliness of the speaker's own
situation. it is also symbolic of his or her self-
destructive behaviour.

8. ATTITUDE
'Attitude' can be thought of as a combination of the poet's tone
of voice, and the ideas he or she is trying to get across to the
reader. Is this poem: sneering and aggressive, almost
spitting at 'ordinary' people who cannot understand?
sad, lonely and asking for help?
Either tone would work. In fact the poem seems to be
between the two, sometimes cynical and cruel (""Part
of the thrill was knowing / that children would cry in
the morning."") sometimes almost appealing
for sympathy (""I was standing / alone among….. It's
as if the speaker's toughness masks something
else, something far more vulnerable.

9. Simon Armitage
About his person

10. Poem Analysis
• "About his person"•, suggests that this poem is about what
is found about the person of a dead corpse. It also follows
the theme of identity because we as the reader are
attempting to analyse the poem to find out the corpse's
characteristics and why he died. "About he person"•, can
also be linked to us because we are made to think about
what makes up our own personal image. The poem is spilt
into two line couplets. This could be linked to the content
because the lines are short which could represent his short
life, but they also give the impression of a list, which ties
into the fact that the poem is basically a catalogue of what
was found on the body.

11. Stanza one says that the corpse had exactly five
pounds fifty in change. This in itself is strange
because it isn't normal to carry around that exact
amount of money. The next line shows that a
library card was found on the corpse and that it
was on its date of expiry. This could symbolize
that his life has ended or that his life, like the
card, is no longer any good.
The next stanza is about a post card that was
found. The card has been stamped and franked
which means it is basically ready to send, but
nothing has been written on it. This could
definitely be a metaphor for his life, it has
finished but he hasn't done anything with it.

12. Stanza three is all about this person's diary. It has
been slashed from March 24th to the 1st April. This
could have been his last week alive and the
person could have died on April fools day, which
could suggest a poor practical joke.
Stanza four says that the corpse is found with a
brace of keys for a mortise lock. The word brace is
symbolic for his death because when you kill foul
you would normally end up with a brace of birds.
The mortise lock suggests that his life was very
complicated. The next line describes that the man
was carrying a stopped analogue watch, symbolic
of his death because time has stopped for the
watch and for this person. stops.

13. Stanza five contains the line, "•A final demand."•
This is normally a letter you get when you owe
bank money. He has written his final demand to
the world that may mean the letter was some kind
or suicide note.
Stanzas six and seven, link in with stanza five and
helps to prove the idea of suicide. The final
demand is an explanation of why he committed
suicide and has been put in his hand like a flower
that has been beheaded. This flower could also be
a metaphor for his death because the flower is
dead but it could also reflect the reason for his
death.

14. Stanza eight shows that a giveaway photo was
found inside this person's wallet and that it was a
very precious and treasured thing to the owner.
The fact that this is a giveaway photo may mean
that it meant nothing to the person in the picture
but the fact that this is now banked in the heart of
a locket shows it was very important to the dead
man.
The last two stanzas are very much liked together.
The first is saying that there is no gold or silver
wedding ring on his finger but instead crowing
one finger is a weathered spot where a ring used
to be.

15. While reading the poem more interpretations are
possible. Someone could have murdered this
person and then his ring was stolen. He wasn't
supposed to die, but still his life has come to an
end. The watch was probably damaged during a
fight of some sort and then gradually died. This
person could have been murdered because his
note of explanation has been planted in his hand.
This could mean that the note was planted
because this links with the spray carnation, which
is a flower, or it could have been planted on the
body, in his hand, by the murderer.

16. The final piece of evidence I see for the murder is
that there was giveaway photo in his wallet. This
could be a giveaway photo as I have already said
or it could be a photo that gives away the identity
of the killer or some information on the crime.
Overall I think that this poem shows a lonely guy
who due to desperation has killed himself
because of the death or divorce of his greatly
loved partner. That's why I would agree that the
ring of white unweathered skin, "That was
everything."•