Year 12 IB Extended Essays 2017

which is constant and makes the reader remember it and feel a change in the pace of the

poem. The narrator then "sank" as if wanting to disappear from the situation "to swim in the

sea", once again changing into various forms such as a; “mermaid”, “big fish”, “eel”,

“dolphin”, and “whale”. The “mermaid” being another allusion to Greek myth. In the sixth

stanza, the narrator “change[s] her] tune” and transforms into rodent-like creatures which

indicates the ‘race’/escape is becoming more dynamic and fast-paced, the narrator is

changing into smaller but more agile animals but then “smell[s] the stink of formaldehyde”

knowing that once again the male oppressor has caught up to the narrator. Duffy uses the pun

“stuff that” to conclude the stanza in a satirical tone however it also to show the hopelessness

of the narrator’s situation, humour is resorted to briefly in a sardonic manner.

In the penultimate stanza the narrator becomes “wind…gas…hot air… clouds for hair” as if

to become so wispy and almost insignificant that she would stop being stalked by her male

pursuer. The narrator even attempts to be stronger and overthrow him by “scrawl[ing] [her]

name with a hurricane” but is thwarted by “a fighter plane”, this showing the themes of man-

kind’s dominance over nature as well as male power over females. In the final stanza the

narrator describes that she “changed…learned…turned inside out” displaying how much she

was forced to alter for the “groom” who “wore asbestos”. The narrator states “that’s how it

felt when the child burst out” displaying what the narrator sees as the physical pain of being a

woman and having women’s responsibility it also shows the unjustified idea that women

must conform to society, for example in this poem, being forced to bear a child to an abusive

husband. While Thetis might not be hugely regarded as a feminist poem upon a superficial

reading, with a deep analysis it shows the huge injustice of the narrator’s situation and how if

men and women were considered completely equal genders, Thetis’ torture of being “turned

inside out” would not be present in a modern society.

12

Goldsmith