Essay Questions

The Cleaner in the poem of the same name has a very dim view of men. What does she think of them and why might she have this opinion?

The Cleaner's refrain, "I know what they're after", is often repeated in the poem and refers to the fact that, in her opinion, men are only interested in one thing when it comes to women and that is sex. From her description of the scenarios that she has seen, it seems likely that she is a cleaner at a college, or college dorm, and from seeing the interaction between the senior male students and the female freshmen she has deduced that the men are not interested in a relationship at all, just a night of sex with a pretty young girl who believes he is actually interested in a getting to know her.

She sees them when they first arrive at school, and knows that they are "after" sex, because it is their first time away from home and they want to sleep with as many girls as they can. In the following two or three years, she sees the male students age, but the age of the female they are looking to be with doesn't change; they continue to seek out the freshmen and the youngest because it is easier to convince them that the night that they are spending together is going to mean something. The senior female students are older, more experienced, in relationships or just plain cynical and it is far too much work to try to bed them. Her many years of seeing this dance take place between the boys and the girls has convinced the cleaner that, even though she has been married for thirty years and so much at least like men enough to consider spending her life with one, they are really only ever looking for sex, even if they imply there is much more to the flirting, the talking and the purchasing of drinks at the bar than this.

What the Donkey Saw is a poem about the Nativity, but it is also a poem about British manners and the class system. Do you agree?

On reading the poem for the first time, it is clear that the scene being described by the donkey is the birth of Christ, and the Nativity. From the donkey's perspective, it's a logistical nightmare because there is only really room for the animals in the stable at the best of times; now there are additional people as well, it really is almost impossible for everyone to fit. There's the Magi - that's three - Mary and Joseph, plus shepherds and their additional animals. The baby has been placed in the manger, which is usually where the donkey and his stable-mates eat their hay. It's all a very big squeeze and the donkey is frank in his assessment of it; if anybody else joins the group he doesn't know where he could possibly put them.

This is a reflection on the class system in England in that the donkey is representing the social expectation of the middle classes. He is the consummate host; he has received uninvited guests and really doesn't have room for them. He had not prepared because they arrived without warning. He could have accommodated Mary and Joseph and the baby but now that their friends have begun to arrive too, it's all getting very cramped and difficult. However, he is aware of his social expectations. He knows that he can't turn them away, and he cannot just sit in the stable and pretend the he isn't home either. He will have to make them welcome and also give the impression that he actually wanted them to come. He doesn't know where he will fit anyone else who turns up, but he is going to make a success out of the impromptu visit. This is completely representative of the English middle classes; the worst social faux pas one can commit is to seem unprepared to receive company or in some way seem inhospitable. One fits everyone in and does a good job of appearing as though the visit was expected. In this way, the poem is not just about the donkey opening his stable up to visitors, but also a wider comment on society and class expectations in the poet's native country.

The Wicked Fairy is a poem that is filled with irony. What are some of the most fundamental ironies within it?

The main irony in the poem actually occurs at the end, when the Wicked Fairy tells the child that he is going to come to a "public, prolonged and painful end", the child replies that this was "roughly what we had in mind". The poet has cast the Wicked Fairy in the role of Jesus' persecutors, and the baby in the role of the Messiah, showing that the horrible end that his persecutors believed they had planned for him was actually all in God's plan all along.

There are other examples of irony earlier in the poem; the Wicked Fairy believes that Jesus is going to get in with the wrong crowd; women, prostitutes, people with diseases (such as lepers) and generally drift from city to city without ever holding down a proper job. All of these examples are ironic because befriending the disenfranchised and unfortunate was the very essence of Jesus' role on earth. The fact that the Wicked Fairy is comparing the expectations of Jesus with the expectations of a "normal" man is ironic because it shows that this is the point; Jesus was far more than a "normal" man and in this way all of the things that the Wicked Fairy believes point to his lack of direction in life are actually examples of the direction God planned him to take.