PMcPresents From My Aunts in Pakistan

8/7/2019 PMcPresents From My Aunts in Pakistan

1/10

Presents from my Aunts in

Pakistan

Learning Objectives:1. Note context

2. Consider key images andthemes

3. Annotate the poem

Slide 6 contains a link to BBC Bitesize video

NB: This presentation does not contain a copy of the text


2/10

Pakistan

Islamic CountryTemperatures can reach up to 45C


3/10


4/10

Context

Moniza Alvi was born in Lahore in Pakistan, the daughter of aPakistani father and an English mother. She moved to Hatfield inEngland when she was a few months old. She didn't revisit Pakistanuntil after the publication of her first book of poems - 'The Countryover my Shoulder' - from which this poem comes.

The poet says:"Presents fromM

y Aunts... was one of thefirst poems I wrote. When I wrote this poem, I hadn'tactually been back to Pakistan. The girl in the poem wouldbe me at about 13. The clothes seem to stick to her in anuncomfortable way, a bit like a kind of false skin, and shethinks things aren't straightforward for her.


5/10

Glossary

salwar

kameez

Loose trousers and tunic, traditionally worn by Pakistani

women.

sariThe traditional dress worn by women in India and some

parts of Pakistan.

mirror-workAsian clothing is often decorated in lots of tiny roundmirrors.

prickly heat Severe itching caused by the heat.

Lahore The poet's birthplace in Pakistan.

fretworkDecorative panelling, with cut-outs so you can partly see

through it.

Shalimar

GardensAn ornamental park in Lahore.


6/10

Listen to the poem

Add these notes to the poem:

The speaker in the poem, who is of mixed race, describes the giftsof clothes and jewellery sent to her in England by her Pakistanirelatives.

She is drawn to the loveliness of these things, but feels awkwardwearing them. She feels more comfortable in English clothes -denim and corduroy.

She contrasts the beautiful clothes and jewellery of India with boringEnglish 'cardigans/fromMarks and Spencer'.

She tries to remember what it was like for her family to travel to

England. Her knowledge of her birthplace, which she left as a baby, comes toher only through old photographs and newspaper reports.

She tries to imagine what that world might be like.


7/10

Structure and Language

The poem is written in free verse: the phrases are arranged loosely

across the page. It is divided into stanzas of varying length.

What might this suggest seeing as this was written by a thirteen

year old girl?

Look at the way the lines are arranged on the page. How does this

force the reader into reading it?

e.g.

Listen to the difference, for example, between:

'I longed for denim and corduroy'

and

'I longed

for denim and corduroy'


8/10

Imagery and Sound

The poem is a sequence of personal memories. I is

repeated a lot in the poem. When we are remembering

things, our minds often drift from one image to another, in

the way that the poem does, and sometimes surprise us

by fixing on odd details - like the 'tin boat', perhaps (line

54).

On the next slide are two lists; one for Pakistani imagery

and one for English imagery.


9/10

'A salwar kameez peacock-

blue'

'Glistening like an orange

split open''The presents were radiant

in my wardrobe'

Pakistani English

Picture courtesy of Jason R. Kessenich

'denim and corduroy'

'cardigans fromMarks and

Spencer'

Add to the lists and think about the words that the poet

has chosen


10/10

Documents

PMcPresents From My Aunts in Pakistan