Compare the ways in which the poets present isolated characters in ‘The Hunchback in the Park’ and ‘Horse Whisperer’
Compare the ways in which the poets present isolated characters in ‘The Hunchback in the Park’ and ‘Horse Whisperer’
Both poets, Dylan Thomas and Andrew Forster, present isolated characters in The Hunchback in the Park and Horse Whisperer respectively. However, whilst there are many similarities in the way that these characters have been expressed, there are key differences which set the poems apart. For example, the horse whisperer himself was driven ‘from villages and farms’ whereas Dylan Thomas presents the ‘hunchback’ as a character that has an element of freedom when it comes to where he lives. An example of this freedom is that the hunchback ‘slept at night in a dog kennel/ but nobody chained him up.’ This shows that whilst the ‘old dog sleeper’ didn’t really have a huge choice of where he lives, he is still accepted as inhabiting the park.
One way in which the hunchback is described as a character that has been excluded from society is as a ‘solitary mister’. The word ‘solitary’ presents how isolated he is from general society. Also, the reference to the character as both ‘mister’ and ‘the hunchback’ avoids giving him a true identity. This anonymity is an important expression that the character is missing key aspects of standard society such as a name, and it also points out that this lonely character does not require a name because he is never talked to. The Horse Whisperer is similar in this regard, in that we never find out the characters name, and there is no dialogue to represent any form of social aspect to his life.
Despite this, the Horse Whisperer is written in first person, which gives some form of identity to the speaker and allows us to associate certain characteristics with the horse whisperer. For example we discover that he or she misses the horses, naming them in the poem as ‘Shire, Clydesdale, Suffolk’, and ‘the pride’. This shows that the horse whisperer had an emotional relationship with the horses themselves, and this was possibly
Both poets, Dylan Thomas and Andrew Forster, present isolated characters in The Hunchback in the Park and Horse Whisperer respectively. However, whilst there are many similarities in the way that these characters have been expressed, there are key differences which set the poems apart. For example, the horse whisperer himself was driven ‘from villages and farms’ whereas Dylan Thomas presents the ‘hunchback’ as a character that has an element of freedom when it comes to where he lives. An example of this freedom is that the hunchback ‘slept at night in a dog kennel/ but nobody chained him up.’ This shows that whilst the ‘old dog sleeper’ didn’t really have a huge choice of where he lives, he is still accepted as inhabiting the park.
One way in which the hunchback is described as a character that has been excluded from society is as a ‘solitary mister’. The word ‘solitary’ presents how isolated he is from general society. Also, the reference to the character as both ‘mister’ and ‘the hunchback’ avoids giving him a true identity. This anonymity is an important expression that the character is missing key aspects of standard society such as a name, and it also points out that this lonely character does not require a name because he is never talked to. The Horse Whisperer is similar in this regard, in that we never find out the characters name, and there is no dialogue to represent any form of social aspect to his life.
Despite this, the Horse Whisperer is written in first person, which gives some form of identity to the speaker and allows us to associate certain characteristics with the horse whisperer. For example we discover that he or she misses the horses, naming them in the poem as ‘Shire, Clydesdale, Suffolk’, and ‘the pride’. This shows that the horse whisperer had an emotional relationship with the horses themselves, and this was possibly