Literary Analysis Of Valentine By Carol Ann Duffy

The poem Valentine by Carol Ann Duffy is essentially a critique of the clichéd symbols that has caused modern Valentine to become a diction of elegance and fragility. Duffy uses a symbolism of an onion to represent true love which to her is a form of love without the lack of honesty and imagination. This is the opposite of ‘cute card’ or ‘kissogram’. Nevertheless, the poet urges us to evaluate and explore uncanny viewpoints of the general conception of love. The structure of the poem had been remarkably manipulated to suit to poet style of writing by isolating key ideas in the form of one line verse stanzas. She also uses forms of monologue where the narrator is speaking to her lover but there was never reciprocation. It is a distinctly one-sided dialogue which conveys the perspective of the narrator and perhaps invites the reader to enter the distraught skirmish.

It is a moon wrapped in brown paper (metaphor referring to the onion) creates an imagery of the moon as an object of serenity, hope and light consequently creating a juxtaposition between the ‘moon’ and being ‘wrapped in brown paper’ due to the fact that brown paper is merely another object. Brown paper is personified by the verb ‘wrapped’ connoting the fact that the brown paper is indeed a deterrent causing the moon, a symbol of light to diminished. The simile that follows "like the careful undressing of love’ in which the word "undressing" has deliberate sexual innuendo that depicts the layers of an onion’s