Bruce Dawe Journeys
Every journey will have its challenges and rewards, but by the time it is over, we will be changed
Without the challenges and rewards in life’s journey we would not be able to grow and become stronger individuals. Our lives are full of journeys and what we experience during these journeys often change us. Journeys can change a person’s perspective of life by providing them with new information and ideas. We often feel like the destination is the most important thing and never take into consideration what we learn on the way. Bruce Dawe expresses this idea of change in his poems ‘migrants’ and ‘enter without so much as knocking’. Dawe showcases both a positive and negative aspect of change by using poetic techniques such as personification, alliteration, metaphor and ellipsis. Journeys can be physical, emotional and inner.
Bruce Dawe’s poem, migrants, portrays a long quest from the perspective of a migrant group. This group is acknowledged as ‘they’ were met with indifferences from the local people. ‘They’ react to this treatment with confusion and surprise which is evident in the line ‘indifference surprised them’. This creates a sense of ambiguity and lack of identity. The text portrays a physical journey between continents. This is evident ‘in the fourth week the sea dropped away and they were there…’ which contains features of imagery, pronouns and ellipsis. The imagery used appeals to an audiences visual senses and creates an atmosphere while the ellipsis gives the sense of ambiguity and evokes attentiveness in the audience. Pronouns evoked in the poem allows the theme to be easily accessed by the audience by suggesting the migrants have a lack of identity as a result of leading their homeland and travelling for a long period.
In migrants, the physical journey is a catalyst for an emotional and inner journey as well. The journey is about barriers and when we push past these barriers new ones are presented. At first the journey is travelling a long distance
Without the challenges and rewards in life’s journey we would not be able to grow and become stronger individuals. Our lives are full of journeys and what we experience during these journeys often change us. Journeys can change a person’s perspective of life by providing them with new information and ideas. We often feel like the destination is the most important thing and never take into consideration what we learn on the way. Bruce Dawe expresses this idea of change in his poems ‘migrants’ and ‘enter without so much as knocking’. Dawe showcases both a positive and negative aspect of change by using poetic techniques such as personification, alliteration, metaphor and ellipsis. Journeys can be physical, emotional and inner.
Bruce Dawe’s poem, migrants, portrays a long quest from the perspective of a migrant group. This group is acknowledged as ‘they’ were met with indifferences from the local people. ‘They’ react to this treatment with confusion and surprise which is evident in the line ‘indifference surprised them’. This creates a sense of ambiguity and lack of identity. The text portrays a physical journey between continents. This is evident ‘in the fourth week the sea dropped away and they were there…’ which contains features of imagery, pronouns and ellipsis. The imagery used appeals to an audiences visual senses and creates an atmosphere while the ellipsis gives the sense of ambiguity and evokes attentiveness in the audience. Pronouns evoked in the poem allows the theme to be easily accessed by the audience by suggesting the migrants have a lack of identity as a result of leading their homeland and travelling for a long period.
In migrants, the physical journey is a catalyst for an emotional and inner journey as well. The journey is about barriers and when we push past these barriers new ones are presented. At first the journey is travelling a long distance