Hunchback The Park Poem

Firstly, I will be starting with the poem “An elementary school classroom in a slum” which was published by Stephen Spender in 1964. “Far far from gusty waves these children's faces.” (Line 1). The image used in ‘gusty waves’ indicates brightness, verve and animation. But these are missing from the faces of these children. The next image of ‘rootless weeds’, (line 2), produces double effect. ‘Weeds’ indicate being unwanted and ‘rootless’ indicates not belonging. The slum children are like ‘rootless weeds’ unwanted by society and not belonging to society. The poet is saying that the children in the slum are underprivileged and malnourished.

Furthermore, a few of the slum children are described. There is a tall girl whose head is weighed-down with sadness, disinterestedness or shame or a mixture of all the three. “The tall girl with her weighed-down head.” (Line 3) “The paper-seeming boy, with rat's eyes” (Line 3-4) is a metaphor meaning that the boy is as thin as paper and his eyes pop out from his thin body, looking sly like rat’s eyes. He seems to have

To me, the man being talked about in the poem is someone who is different from others, both physically and mentally. The poet uses the phrase “solitary mister” (line two) referring to the basic reality of this person’s existence that is; he is living an identity less life. The “Solitary Mister” is very far away from the sense of beauty and sense of duty in this world of reality. He is deprived of the physical beauty because of the hunch on his back and there is no sense of duty because he lives a careless life. But this very person is engaged in creativity because he is able to transcend the bitter experience of the world of reality that includes his physical deformity. In reality this person is tormented, neglected and teased and he is quite cut off from social realities. ‘’Laughing when he shook his paper’’ (line