Catrin by Gillian Clarke is an emotive poem about a mother’s relationship with her daughter. It explores the complex feelings of motherhood, love, conflict, identity and separation. Read on for analysis of the poem’s context as well as the structure, language, themes, and literary devices used by Clarke.
This post will be particularly useful for students and teachers of CCEA’s GCSE English Literature Identity Anthology and Pearson Edexcel’s GCSE English Literature Conflict Anthology. Read on to the end to see which poems pair well with Catrin.
Contextual information for 'Catrin'
Gillian Clarke biographical information
Gillian Clarke is a Welsh poet. She has made a big impact on contemporary poetry in Wales and the UK. She was born in Cardiff in 1937. Clarke lived in Pembrokeshire during WW2. After that, she lived in Barry with her parents, who spoke Welsh. She studied English at Cardiff University. Later, she worked as an English teacher. Clarke has published poetry and prose since 1971, her work spanning six decades. She was the National Poet of Wales from 2008-2016.
Catrin
I can remember you, child,
As I stood in a hot, white
Room at the window watching
The people and cars taking
Turn at the traffic lights.
I can remember you, our first
Fierce confrontation, the tight
Red rope of love which we both
Fought over. It was a square
Environmental blank, disinfected
Of paintings or toys. I wrote
All over the walls with my
Words, coloured the clean squares
With the wild, tender circles
Of our struggle to become
Separate. We want, we shouted,
To be two, to be ourselves.
Neither won nor lost the struggle
In the glass tank clouded with feelings
Which changed us both. Still I am fighting
You off, as you stand there
With your straight, strong, long
Brown hair and your rosy,
Defiant glare, bringing up
From the heart’s pool that old rope,
Tightening about my life,
Trailing love and conflict,
As you ask may you skate
In the dark, for one more hour.
Inspiration for 'Catrin'
Clarke’s own experience as a mother shapes the context of “Catrin.” She wrote the poem shortly after her own daughter, Catrin, was born. The poem reflects the intense emotions of motherhood. Clarke has said that the poem is about the struggle to let go of one’s child. It’s about recognising that they are their own person and have their own path to follow. The poem also speaks to the deep bond between a mother and child. It shows the love that endures as the child grows up and becomes independent.
Beyond its personal context, “Catrin” also has broader social and cultural significance. The poem is part of a larger body of literature that explores the experience of motherhood. It speaks compellingly to the often-contradictory feelings that mothers can have about their children. The poem also reflects on the unique challenges and opportunities of being a mother in today’s society. It shows how motherhood can shape a person’s identity and sense of self.
Gillian Clarke’s website has an excellent interview. In it, she explores the meaning and imagery of the poem Catrin. It is definitely worth a read.
What is 'Catrin' by Gillian Clarke all about? Summary:
Stanza one summary
In stanza one, the speaker remembers the birth of her daughter Catrin. The memory is powerfully and vividly described as a struggle, a confrontation. In her memory, the speaker sees the labour room in the hospital as clinical and sterile, and remembers the detail of looking out at the traffic. Even so many years on, the minor details of this momentous day are strong.
Despite the sterile hospital room, the intense emotions of love and pain are anything but sterile. As the pregnant mother gives birth, and the mother and child exist separately for the first time, their cries are loud and wild.
Stanza two summary
In stanza two, time has moved forward and the daughter is older. Still the mother and daughter struggle and fight with each other, and the intensity of emotion is no less strong than on the day Catrin was born. The poem ends in a reflective mood with the daughter asking for more freedom and the mother struggling to let go.
Catrin: analysis of form, structure and language
Form in Catrin
Catrin is written in free verse. It does not follow a set form, like as a sonnet (such as ‘‘Efface’ by Paul Maddern or ‘Sonnet 29’ by William Shakespeare) or a villanelle (such as ‘Genetics’ by Sinead Morrissey). Instead, the modern, honest and thought-provoking poem is made up of two stanzas of irregular length, irregular rhyme scheme and irregular rhythm. Why? Perhaps Clarke’s choice of free verse reflects the nature of the relationship she has with her daughter, and the sense of the unknown nature of motherhood.
Structure in Catrin
Stanza one (17 lines) is a longer than stanza two (12 lines), perhaps reflecting the movement of time. The memories of the past are longer and more developed. As stanza two moves into the present tense, the stanza length shortens, speeding up time to the present moment. Time is not a major theme in this poem, but it is subtly suggested that time seems to have sped up, which is a feeling shared by many parents. You may have heard the phrase ‘the days are long but the years are short’. This is perhaps some of what the speaker is feeling as her daughter asks for freedom and independence, yet the memory of the day of her birth is still strong and vivid.
Language analysis in Catrin
Enjambment
Enjambment is when one line of poetry runs straight into the next without punctuation and pause. Clarke makes use of enjambment to create a sense of a continuous memory and reflection. 13 of the 17 lines of stanza one, and 7 of the 12 lines of stanza two flow straight into the next line. As each memory, reflection and description overflows its line, the reader gets the sense of the depth of feeling experienced by the speaker.
Alliteration
Catrin is punctuated by alliteration, for example in lines two and three, ‘the hot, white/ Room at the window watching…’. Here the long, alliterative ‘w’ sound elongates the description, slowing down for a moment while the speaker remembers.
In lines four and five, the alliterative ‘t’ in ‘cars taking/ Turn at the traffic lights’ adds a staccato effect, drawing attention to each detail of this memory.
The story matures in the middle of stanza one, where the reader find out that the birth was ‘our first/ Fierce confrontation’. The alliterative ‘f’ highlights the intensity of this meeting.
In stanza two, alliteration and assonance work together to lengthen the effect of the extended description of Catrin’s appearance. Look closely at the list style description: ‘your straight, strong, long/ Brown hair and your rosy,/ Defiant glare‘. The adjectives are drawn out with the alliteration of ‘straight, strong’. Assonance then takes over, elongating the ‘o’ of ‘strong, long,/ Brown’. These aural techniques create the effect of the frustrated, slow speech of a mother trying to deal with a difficult issue.
Anaphora
Anaphora is the repetition of a word or phrase at the start of a clause or sentence. The speaker uses anaphora to establish the importance of this memory. In lines one and six, the speaker repeats, ‘I can remember you‘. She is highlighting the significance of the memory of birth in the relationship she has with her daughter.
Anaphora is used again at the end of stanza one: ‘we want, we shouted‘ and also in ‘To be two, to be ourselves.‘ These repeated phrases add emphasis, add structure and rhythm, and create a sense of closure to the stanza. The use of two part anaphora (i.e. two phrases repeated rather than three or more) reminds the reader of the sense of pairing, of mother and daughter, of two people in a struggle.
Opposites
Stanza two picks up the use of opposites where stanza one left off with anaphora. The opposite pairs of ‘won nor lost‘ in line 18 and ‘love and conflict‘ in line 27 emphasise the opposite nature of the two characters in the poem, and their struggle and conflict with each other. Love and conflict often go hand in hand as a result of the strong emotions expressed in family relationships.
Setting
The poem is a memory which looks back from the present moment where the speaker and her daughter struggle over a request from the daughter to go out alone. The poem opens, however, in the past in the hospital where the speaker gave birth to her daughter. The environment is sterile and clinical. Clarke describes it as ‘a hot, white/Room’ and ‘a square/ Environmental blank’ which is ‘disinfected’ and in stanza two, a ‘glass tank’. These clinical descriptions create a backdrop which contrasts to the intense emotions of love and pain as the child is born.
Imagery of conflict
Childbirth and motherhood in ‘Catrin’ is depicted as a struggle and a fight. This is an unusual way of visualising birth and parenthood, which is more often presented in literature as something beautiful and magical. Clarke’s more graphic and honest depiction of the difficulty of birth and of raising a strong willed daughter does not mean it is any less beautiful and magical, but in this moment, when her daughter fights for more freedom, the speaker likens the argument now with the experience of childbirth. The imagery of one becoming two, or of two joined entities separating for the first time and continuing to separate as they grow is a powerful picture of parenting.
The imagery of conflict is emphasised through the vocabulary choices throughout the poem, for example: fierce confrontation, fought over, struggle (used twice), separate, shouted, fighting, defiant glare, conflict.
Imagery of joining vs separating
Two metaphors stand out in the poem: one in stanza one which uses the picture of ‘the tight/ Red rope of love‘ to conjure the image of the umbilical cord. The second is ‘that old rope,/ Tightening about my life/ Trailing love and conflict …’ which continues the tangible image of a rope or cord which ties the two together. The umbilical cord is widely used in literature as a symbol of the connection between mother and child, and the cutting of that cord, both physically and metaphorically, representing the growth and independence of the two people.
In stanza two, the speaker continues this picture, but rather than the umbilical cord, the picture is one which Clarke herself explains to be like a rope tying a boat to its dock. Clarke says that the rope itself is often under the water, hidden from view, but its pull is felt in giving stability and tether to the boat. The boat bobs up and down, with some movement and flexibility but safe and secure in its tie. This is a beautiful image of parenting. The struggle though, is made clear in the daughter’s request to be freed from the old rope. As the daughter requests more freedom from the rope, the mother feels the rope tighten in reluctance to let it go.
Imagery of darkness
The final lines of the poem help the reader to understand the crux of the conflict between mother and daughter: the daughter seeks freedom which she sees as fun and exciting. This freedom and independence is symbolised by the verb ‘skate’. Clarke explains the choice of skating in the dark as something a young person sees as exciting and adventurous. In contrast, this same freedom is seen by the mother as ‘dark’, in other words potentially dangerous, risky, needlessly unknown. Her natural tendency to protect her daughter makes her see this request as a negative. ‘Dark’ is the perfect way of imagining the mother’s perspective.
'Catrin' themes
Identity
This poem is part of the CCEA Identity poetry anthology, and in its nature, explores the theme of identity. One factor in understanding ourselves is seeing the power our relationships have to shape who we are. In ‘Catrin’, Clarke looks back to help her to see where she is now, and how she relates to her daughter. The conflict of birth and life and growth changes both the speaker and the child.
Relationships
The mother-daughter relationship is the central focus of this poem. Clarke’s description of the struggle of childbirth, the tug-of-war between the pregnant mother and the unborn child, is vivid and confronting. It challenges the reader to think beyond the typical depiction of the beauty of birth. Instead, we think about the challenge of how to still be ourselves and yet a mother, and how to protect and nurture yet allow room for growth and separation. This complex relationship is at the heart of the poem.
Catrin by Gillian Clarke goes well with ...
Both ‘Kid’ and ‘Catrin’ explore the changing relationship between two people as they grow and separate, with a sense of . Both poems use free verse forms to explore the theme of identity. There are contrasts too, for example Catrin’s central emotion is love, while Kid’s central emotion is bitterness.
‘Genetics’ explores the central importance of parental relationships for a child, from the perspective of the adult child of the relationship. In contrast, ‘Catrin’ is the reverse; ‘Catrin’ explores the relationship between mother and child from the point of view of the mother. Despite the opposite perspectives, these poems provide much for students to compare in their speakers, their use of memory and their tone. These poems also contrast sharply in their forms; ‘Catrin is written in free verse while ‘Genetics’ is in the form of a traditional villanelle.
Like ‘Catrin’, ‘Piano’ is a memory poem and it also explores the relationship between mother and child. ‘Piano’ is written from the perspective of the child thinking back on an idealised childhood, while ‘Catrin’ is written from the perspective of the mother. Both poems explore the intensity of emotions connected to childhood and memory. There are contrasts in the form and structure of these two poems, giving students plenty to explore in their essays.
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