Comparing Presentations of Love in "Havisham" and "Valentine" Anonymous 12th Grade

Carol Ann Duffy’s love poems are often riddled with oxymoronic statements, which affirm the changing nature of love and how it is perceived in different relationships and in different periods of time and life. "Valentine" and "Havisham" are two poems which share similar proposals of love, albeit through very different presentations. Overall, in these two poems love is shown to have negative effects, with Duffy using enjambment and structure, powerful imagery, and oxymorons to demonstrate this stance.

The most notable similarity is perhaps the titles of the two poems. Both ensure the reader begin the poems with preconceptions, "Valentine" alluding immediately to love, expressions of love and commercialism, while "Havisham" highlights the famous Charles Dickens’ character Miss Havisham from Great Expectations. Thus the reader begins "Valentine" with conventions in mind, the expectations of sweet love and couples aiding Duffy in the juxtaposing nature of the poem. The first line, “Not a red rose or a satin heart,” is a declarative, short and sharp to emphasise the absence implied in “Not” and to completely juxtapose itself against the title. "Valentine" by its topic implies presents, a “red rose, as well as love and here is where...