Carol Ann Duffy's Havisham

"Havisham"

Beloved sweetheart bastard. Not a day since then

I haven't wished him dead, Prayed for it

so hard I've dark green pebbles for eyes,

ropes on the back of my hands I could strangle with.

Spinster. I stink and remember. Whole days

in bed cawing Nooooo at the wall; the dress

yellowing, trembling if I open the wardrobe;

the slewed mirror, full-length, her, myself, who did this

to me? Puce curses that are sounds not words.

Some nights better, the lost body over me,

my fluent tongue in its mouth in its ear

then down till I suddenly bite awake. Love's

hate behind a white veil; a red balloon bursting

in my face. Bang. I stabbed at a wedding-cake.

Give me a male corpse for a long slow honeymoon.

Don't think it's only the heart that b-b-b-breaks.

I decided to look at Carol Ann Duffy's "Havisham" in order to get another perspective on how Miss Havisham was viewed. This research will help me to create a Miss Havisham in how I think she would have looked. The poem touches on her physical appearance and also her mental appearance, hence the last line, 'Don't think it's only the heart that b-b-b-breaks'.

'I've dark green pebbles for eyes' - Imagery showing how being jilted would have affected Miss Havisham's appearance. 'Dark Green', being the colour under and around the eye, portraying tired eyes. 'Pebbles', being the size of the bags under her eyes from such misery. 

'Love's hate behind a white veil' - Oxymoron showing the turmoil Miss Havisham went through. This turmoil would have been noticeable on the face, the love represented by the veil and the happiness this brings; tinged with the hate of been left at the alter. 

'A red balloon bursting in my face' - Signifies Miss Havisham's heart bursting with the pain she feels. Could also signify when the fire bursts into Miss Havisham's face in the wedding room, which would have created burns. 

'The dress yellowing' - Miss Havisham hasn't seen the light of day since her wedding day, therefore all of the fabrics in the room would be yellowing. Dirty with the decay of the room and of her. Her skin texture would also be decaying from no sun light. It would be oily from the heat of the fire and the oil from the lamps. 

In the Victorian age there wasn't the products to clean the skin that we have today. The lower class wouldn't have had the resources to wash. Families would disinfect their clothes with urine, which of course would have made them smell even more. Smell was an indicator of wealth and social standing. If you were more pungent and dirty you would come from the lower class; cleaner from the higher class. For the upper class there would be soaps and long grooming regimes to show their cleanliness. Makeup was not worn by the women as this would have portrayed them as whores. Therefore, when creating my interpretation of Miss Havisham, I need to show that although a higher class citizen, she would not wash due to her broken heart. So I need to focus on the skin texture and the materials surrounding the face, like a veil, and how dirty these would have been.