Consider the Role and Treatment of Love in Carol Ann...

Consider the treatment of love in Carol Ann Duffy’s ‘Valentine’. Carol Ann Duffy’s ‘Valentine’ ultimately depicts a highly cynical attitude towards love and conventional gestures of affection. The poem uses traditional images of valentine as a starting point, before showing how an onion is much more true to the nature of love. An extended metaphor of the onion is then used to depict Duffy’s underlying implication that love can be destructive on many different levels. One of the main ways in which Duffy conveys this message is through structural devices. The structural progression of the poem is very ordered and logical; firstly defying traditional images of love, and then developing the stanzas by offering statements to justify this†¦show more content†¦It can therefore be seen that romanticised images of love using eloquent imagery and metaphors are used to depict how love is exactly the opposite; harsh and blinding. Furthermore, Duffy also uses personification of the onion in order to accentuate its overwhelming power; much like love itself. The line â€Å"Its fierce kiss will stay on your lips/possessive and faithful† depicts literally the strong taste of the onion, as well as exposing how difficult love is to forget or obliterate its effects. Here the pungency of taste is being compared to the sheer intensity of love; another point where the comparison of love to an onion is being made explicit. In addition to this personification, other literary techniques are used in order to inject life into the text. In the second stanza, the onomatopoeic word â€Å"wobbling† helps add dramatic effect to the image of the wobbling vision, and creates a clearer visual image for readers. Similarly, Duffy also uses paradoxical images to accentuate the effectiveness of the images illustrated. The taste of the onion is described as â€Å"possessive and faithful;† both are terms which are asserted in the experience of love, despite one being faithful and one, paradoxically,