Love in Valentine and Havisham Anonymous 11th Grade

Duffy explores ideas, thoughts and feelings about love in Valentine and Havisham by commenting on societal expectations of the outcomes and portraying love as unstable, dangerous and likely to cause hurt.

Firstly, Duffy explores the expectation of marriage following a relationship in both poems, ‘the platinum loops shrink to a wedding-ring, // if you like.’ The onion ‘shrinking’ implies that is it diminishing, losing part of itself, triggered by the proposal - this may be Duffy showing her beliefs that people change themselves for love, they try to make themselves more appealing to their partner, eventually whittling themselves down into smaller pieces of themselves. On the contrary, the ‘platinum’ ring suggests that marriage is valuable and something to be treasured - alternatively, this could be implying that people spend lots of money unnecessarily on materialistic items. The addition of ‘if you like’ in a casual tone suggests fear of rejection - if turned down, they will have to endure society’s constant questioning of what went wrong, however if the speaker doesn’t get married, they will have to tolerate being asked why they aren’t married.

The idea of weddings being an expectation is also featured in Havisham - the poem...