Poetry Comparison Task

1. What you need to do…
•Work out a group of 4.
•Pick a pair of poems
•Come and see Mr Edgecombe and tell him which
pair you are doing.
•If another group has beaten you to it, you will need
a fresh pair.
•Each member of your group will pick some aspect
to compare. For instance, someone might write
about symbols used in the poem, someone else
might talk about

2. ‘House and Land’
Allen Curnow 1941
‘The Skeleton of the
Great Moa in the
Canterbury
Museum,
Christchurch’
Allen Curnow 1943
‘Sad Joke on a Marae’
Apirana Taylor
‘The Trick of
Standing Upright
Here’
Glenn Colquhoun
1999

3. Your task (working in groups of 4)
•What is the central idea of each poem?
•How does each poet make use of the
following to make their point
–Symbolism
–Structure (e.g six line stanzas, sonnet, mihi etc)
–Rhyme/ half rhyme/ free verse to
–Characters
–End-stopped lines/ enjambment
–Repetition/ contrast
–Subversion of form
–Tone
•What is the tone?
•Does it change? If so, where? Why?
•Which specific words contribute to this tone?
•Why does the poet create this tone?
Each member of your
group will write ONE
paragraph.
Pick ONE thing for
each member of your
group to look at (e.g.
Paul will look at
repetition, Simon will
look at tone, Duncan
sym bolism)
It will be a long
paragraph – at least
hand-written 25 lines.
Use MULTIPLE
examples to make
your point. Talk about
both poems.

4. Turangawaewae:
a place to stand

6. EXEMPLAR…
In his 1941 poem ‘House and Land’ Allen Curnow makes the point that New Zealanders
have no real sense of their own identity. They are displaced from Britain, (widely
regarded in 1941 as the Mother Country), yet they have not adapted to New Zealand
customs, or emotionally settled in New Zealand. Curnow ends the poem talking about
‘…what great gloom stands in a land of settlers with never a soul at home.’ Curnow
draws upon the key difference between a house and a home to make this point. The
reader is left in no doubt that a house is merely a physical building, whereas a home
requires emotional attachment. Therefore, the ending is significant, because it is a
direct criticism of those who have not adapted.
Apirana Taylor’s poem ‘Sad Joke on a Marae’ deals again with the idea of
displacement. Like Curnow’s earlier poem, Taylor deals with a people-group who are
stuck in limbo between two cultures. Curnow’s claim is that Pakeha in 1941 are clinging
to British customs, with relics such as pictures of ‘…the baronet Uncle…’ and other
such British relics. Taylor also presents people who are torn between two cultures. The
central character, ‘Tu the freezing worker’ is a Maori man, trapped between Maori
culture and Pakeha culture. He stands to give his Mihi on a marae, yet it is obvious that
he is disconnected from his Maori culture, when he says ‘I said nothing but/ Tihei
Maoriora/ For that’s all I knew.’ Taylor’s point is that Maori who have lost sight of their
own culture suffer. All elements of Pakeha culture referred to are negative: pubs, jail,
repetative manual work.