"Education for Leisure" is a poem by the British writer Carol Ann Duffy, in which a delusional and violent speaker describes his plans to commit a murder. The work was originally published in Duffy's 1985 collection Standing Female Nude. Over the course of five free-verse quatrains, the speaker announces his plans to kill a stranger and then builds up to his act of violence by killing animals. Duffy examines the psychology of his violence, displaying his outsize ego and feelings of alienation from society. The poem is written with accessible, straightforward diction and in a dramatic but informal tone, intensifying the disturbing effects of its subject matter.
The poem is particularly well-known following a 2008 controversy in which, following educators' protests, it was removed from a GCSE English anthology—a textbook used by secondary school students in the United Kingdom. Advocates for the poem's removal cited its references to knife crime as potentially upsetting or dangerous. Duffy, whose work is a popular choice for students and teachers of literature, expressed dismay over the decision. She argued that her references to violence constituted not an endorsement, but an artistic critique and an opportunity for meaningful discussion.
