This poem is about the conflict between the Catholics and Protestants, known as The Troubles, when in the 1960’s the Catholic community claimed they were being discriminated against by the Protestants. The fourth line, “I was trying to complete a sentence in my head, but it kept stuttering” means that the speaker finds it difficult to depict in words the terror that his eyes witnessed. He tried finding an escape, but he couldn’t. Ciaran Carson, the poet of ‘Belfast Confetti,’ was born in the year 1948. He is not only a poet but also an amazing novelist, who is cherished by almost all those who love literature. Born and brought up in Belfast, Northern Ireland, he writes both poetry and prose, which is often heavily influenced by his Irish roots. Carson’s speaker describes the war-like situation in the second line. The speaker can imagine a found of broken images floating in his mind and hear the sound of the explosion. In this line, the phrase, “Nuts, bolts, nails, car-keys” hints at the scrap metals used as weapons by the Protestants during the “Troubles” in Ireland.

Belfast Confetti - GCSE English Language and English Literature Belfast Confetti - GCSE English Language and English Literature

This poem is about the aftermath of the “Troubles” that were an ethnic-nationalist period of conflict in Northern Ireland. The situation lasted for 30 years from the late 1960s to the late 1990s. It is also known as the Northern Ireland conflict. The poet describes the aftermath of the sectarian riot in Belfast. His speaker describes how the confusion outside leads to a chain of internal confusions. He cannot think properly. The events that he observed keep flooding his mind, leaving him only with questions. The narrator’s inability to ‘complete a sentence in [his] head’ is a metaphor for the chaos and irrationality of the riot and the disorientating effect this is having on his composure. The word ‘stuttering’ reinforces this idea, whilst conveying the harsh sounds of the battlefield (links to ‘rapid fire’) as it is onomatopoeic for machine gun fire. Carson has adopted a narrative style in this poem ‘Belfast Confetti’ to depict an entire scene to the readers. They can feel the horrifying scene just like it is depicted by the poet. By reading this poem, one can easily understand the pain that the scene and the riot must have caused to the poet.

Carson uses enjambment to internally connect the last two lines. After referring to those things, he feels quite tense. The way he speaks reveals the growing tension in his mind. He cannot even remember his name or where he lives. The situation was so worse that none could say where they were heading towards. In the last line, the phrase “A fusillade of question-marks” depicts the questions raised by the innocent eyes of the Catholics that were slaughtered by the merciless nationalist groups.

Language and imagery - Belfast Confetti - CCEA - BBC Language and imagery - Belfast Confetti - CCEA - BBC

JuststartingtomakenotesoncomparisonbutIcan'tfigureoutwhichpoemstocompare,alsorllyhardtofindresourcesonlineforedexcel(mostofstuffisaqa).soifanyonehasanyresourcesthatwouldbehelpfullmk. Carson has used past tense to describe the violence held against the Catholic crowd in the place. He has used the same tense to portray the different effects of being in the middle of the conflict. To signify the war-like brutality of the riot, Carson includes a list of things synonymous with war – at first look we can see how the ‘shield’ and ‘walkie-talkies’ fit here. However, diving deeper ‘A Saracen’ is a word used by Christians in the medieval ages for Muslims. In these times conflict between both religious groups was harsh and frequent – hence, the violent connotations which Carson captures. I'mtakingmyEnglishLitreatureGCSEthisyear-1-9Edexel(2018)andI'mstrugglingtomemoriseeverysinglepoem,withquotations.IwaswonderingifIcouldgetawaywithstudyingafewpoemsindepth,thatmoreorlesscancomparetoanyotherpoem,suchasHalfcaste,TheClassGameorExposureandafewmore.Andjustknowtheothersbriefly?

To understand this language we must reflect on the asterisk and its uses. It is used to mark significance in a piece of text. Carson relates this idea of significance to an ‘explosion’. Carson creatively comments on the caesura of this line here as well – saying that the hyphen gives the spoken narrative a choppiness just like a ‘burst f rapid [machine gun] fire’. He has survived and there is absolutely no doubt about how tough his survival was, from the riot. However, he is still not able to forget the haunting scenes. He has seen everything with his own eyes and heard the fearful screams of those, who lost their lives to the hands of merciless troops. Carson wanted to be there with the ones, who were being discriminated against without any reason; he wanted to help them, but he simply couldn’t, because the scene and the terror had frightened him as much as it had frightened them.