Notes

Memory is presented like a spectre in both Never go back and Nostalgia as it haunts the subjects present existence. By using the second person narrative in never go back the reader is positioned into the head space of the speaker and we explicity experience her fear of returning to the places that were significant to her.Then in nostalgia by using the third person narrative the mercanries story seems almost allegorical as if its trying to teach the reader a lesson about the effects of memeory. Both poems are clearly constructed by duffy to warn against the danger of memeories and so see memeory negaitvely.

P- memeories negative protrayal cheieved by bringing things to lfie to show exemplify the horrofyign the of effects memeory are.
E- 'The hosue were you were one of the brides has cancer.'
The nouns house and bride are hyponyms of family and are associated with steotypically happy ememories. This expected convention is destrcuted by Duffy by personifiying the hosue to give it 'cancer' effectively creating contrast. 'Cancer' has nagative connotations and evokes ideas of sadness, decay and sickness. Duffy does this to show how memories are mere snapshots and the reality is that with time things change. She draws the readers focus to the passage of time and reality by using the past tense phrase 'you were'.

In nostalgia a simialr effect is acheived by refering to the condtion using the prnoun 'it' by doing this nostalgia is transformed into a creature to be feared. The horrors are added to by demonstrating the effects it has 'they prined, wept, grown men.'. The verbs pined and wept contrast greatly to the use of the factual adjective 'grown' because they are actions of frightened obsessive children. They are also actiosn more tradtionally feminine and so juxtapose the image of these grown men. It shows how devastating the effects of ememory are if thsi is what they can reduce such strong willed peopel too.