Analyzing The Poem 'Ingrid Jonker' By Sally Bryer

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1.1 Quote two similes from the poem, and explain their meaning. Then indicate how these similes contribute to the overall meaning of the poem.
In the poem ‘Ingrid Jonker’ by Sally Bryer, the speaker compares Jonker to two types of birds, ‘a hungry bird’ line 2 and ‘a heron’ line 3.The speaker uses an allusion comparing Jonker to a bird, Jonker compared herself to a hungry seagull in her poem ‘ontvlugting’, line 7, ‘Ek is die seevoël wat verhongerd dwaal’. In the poem ‘ Ingrid Jonker’ the speaker want us to see that just like a hungry bird, line 2, that is searching for something to soothe its empty stomach, its hunger pain, so is Jonker seen as searching for something to soothe her emptiness, her emotional pain. She looked for her solution in death. The speaker says in line 2/3, ‘your curly head/intent as a heron’. The significance of using this comparison not only brings to light that Jonker had curly hair similar to the curl in a herons’ neck but also talks about her persona, she is determined just like a …show more content…

This line ‘your child dies and lives on’ can also refer to Demeter and Persephone, Demeter’s daughter was condemned to the underworld, which resembles death (Persephone spends 1/3 of the year with Hades), but Persephone lives on (Persephone lives every 2/3 of the year with her mother). Ingrid Jonker has a daughter, Simone, born in 1957 and Jonker had an abortion. This line might also suggest that your one child is dead, but the other lives on. The abortion was one of the reasons that made Jonker depressed and caused her to become mentally

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