Exploring the Theme of Love in Duffy’s Havisham Essay

Duffy, writing from the twentieth century perspective, revisits the considerably known character from Great Expectations in a dramatic monologue, where she assumes the persona of Havisham to explore the innermost thoughts and feelings of a bitter woman destroyed by unrequited love and humiliation. Havisham appears to be written in the modal value of a Shakespearean sonnet, but does not end in a rhyming couplet, only continues in this style. This symbolises that there is no happy ending for Havisham and thoughts of her lovers betrayal will haunt her passim the rest of her life, her pain in ongoing and never ending.Duffy takes away Miss Havishams title by doing this she strips her of her identity in society. Duffys use of an oxymoron and pejorative, Beloved sweetheart bastard, has an undercurrent of violence, and marks Havishams contrary emotions about her ex lover. The use of dark, monosyllabic language like dead, coupled with the harsh d sound shows how detached Havisham has beco me from her emotions. The metaphor dark green pebbles for eyes, reflects how her soul has been hardened to solely feelings and emotions.The isolated noun spinster reflects Havishams own isolation from society, through her embarrassment at being leave at the altar. Havisham stinks and remembers, the olfactic image shows that Havisham is consumed by her past and that every part of her is tainted by it. Duffy employs an aural animalistic image, cawing that strips Havisham of her femininity and in her wardrobe Havishams dress is yellowing, reflecting her own decay.Havisham is afraid to look in the slewed reverberate because she fears herself and then she questions who did this to her, whether she is responsible for what she has become. Duffy uses darkly erotic and sensual images as Havisham imagines emasculating her lover, and a violent plosive, bite, to emphasise her desire to emasculate him, just as her femininity was taken from her. The oxymoron loves hate reflects Havishams confl icted emotions, that her past has disturbed her present and future.Duffy employs a violent plosive, red balloon bursting in my face, with a denotation that emphasises her desire for revenge. There is a violent, isolated, onomatopoeic, aural image that represents her pain, her past and her suffering. Havisham longs for a male corpse which implies her desire to torture and gain revenge on her ex lover. Duffy shows us that it is not only Havishams heart that has broken, but her mind is broken too, she has been destroyed by her ex lover and this has distorted her impression on her life and herself.