Thank you sir. There's repetition of everything throughout the summary.. Chinua Achebe is a great Nigerian novelist poet and short story writer. It is a refugee camp somewhere in Africa. The poet gives us a realistic picture of a mother and her child. Hundreds of poor people are thrown out of their homes due to political disturbances or natural calamities. The refugees are in a miserable condition. There are innumerable mothers and children in the same miserable condition in the refugee camp. Their children are slowly dying of poverty and diseases.
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K J Thomas
We use cookies to give you the best experience possible. The title of the poem gives off the initial impression that the poem may focus on refugees: one who flees to seek refuge, The lives of refugee children, their parents, their feelings, their emotions and their pain. This foreshadows the idea that her son is dying, and she would have to forget him to adapt to her tragic loss. Don't use plagiarized sources. The picture perfect image — the ideal image of motherhood. The picture of a beautiful, serene mother with her holy new born child.
Introduction
At the beginning, in the first stanza, the author strikes us by telling us the child will soon die; "for a soon she soon will have to forget. The author uses simple and strong vocabulary, giving more emphasis to what is actually said than to the way it is said. This also helps in creating the tragic atmosphere by the use of words such a "diarrhoea" or "dried up ribs" or "washed out bottoms. The fact that "Most mothers there had long ceased to care but not this one" reinforces the idea that she still wants to share time with her son. A very shocking image used in the poem is the one where the mother combs her son, "as putting flowers in a tiny grave",preparing him for his funeral. The author expresses the sadness of death by showing the way a mother says goodbye to her son. This section contains words approx. Browse all BookRags Study Guides. All rights reserved. Toggle navigation.
Achebe uses imagery to not only portray the genuine love the mother had for her child but how bad their situation is as well. A refugee refers to one who will escape from danger to protect themselves and the people they care about risking their own life at any cost. With the imagery given throughout the poem the readers are able to see this. Due to the circumstance they were were in the poem illustrates the struggle to attain motherhood in various ways which this essay will elaborate on. Chinua Achebe wrote this poem to really show how much you should appreciate life and cherish it. Chinua Achebe used many components of African literature in his writing in his career.
