Getting schoolchildren into poetry is a tricky business.
What's the best method? Having them learn it by rote? Well, it's effective. There are people well past retirement age who can reel off poems which were drummed into them before they'd seen their first Anderson shelter. But drilling poetry into children parrot-fashion can also put them off the stuff for life. Alternatively, one could analyse a poem, take it apart and tease out the varying levels of meaning along with the techniques used, but that runs the risk of making a poem seem like a cryptic crossword, a puzzle or exercise rather than an intimate means of communication.
The Weight Of Water suggests another approach. Basically, it's a novel in which every chapter is a poem written by a 12-year-old Polish girl named Kasienka, who has arrived in Britain with her mother in an attempt to track down the girl's errant father. They live in poor accommodation and Kasienka is bullied at school. Her only bright spot is the school swimming team.
The pleasure and ease of The Weight Of Water comes from the fact that we have a consistent narrator living through a linear plotline so the job of interpretation is kept to a minimum. At the arrival of each new poem, Kasienka is already known to us, and everything we learn about her life – the way that her mother tramps from door to door clutching a photograph of her husband, for instance – already has a context to slot into.
In the normal scheme of things, adopting a persona for the sake of an individual poem is just another rhetorical device a poet might employ. But, by limiting herself to telling Kasienka's story, Crossan brings a solidity and reliability to her verse that might be reassuring to those who are less familiar with the form, and introduces a narrative drive and ongoing emotional connection with the subject. It may not be a new idea, but in the context of the times it's a refreshing one, and it will be interesting to follow the fortunes of this book over the coming years.
THE WEIGHT OF WATER
Sarah Crossan
Bloomsbury, £6.99
Why are you making commenting on The Herald only available to subscribers?
It should have been a safe space for informed debate, somewhere for readers to discuss issues around the biggest stories of the day, but all too often the below the line comments on most websites have become bogged down by off-topic discussions and abuse.
heraldscotland.com is tackling this problem by allowing only subscribers to comment.
We are doing this to improve the experience for our loyal readers and we believe it will reduce the ability of trolls and troublemakers, who occasionally find their way onto our site, to abuse our journalists and readers. We also hope it will help the comments section fulfil its promise as a part of Scotland's conversation with itself.
We are lucky at The Herald. We are read by an informed, educated readership who can add their knowledge and insights to our stories.
That is invaluable.
We are making the subscriber-only change to support our valued readers, who tell us they don't want the site cluttered up with irrelevant comments, untruths and abuse.
In the past, the journalist’s job was to collect and distribute information to the audience. Technology means that readers can shape a discussion. We look forward to hearing from you on heraldscotland.com
Comments & Moderation
Readers’ comments: You are personally liable for the content of any comments you upload to this website, so please act responsibly. We do not pre-moderate or monitor readers’ comments appearing on our websites, but we do post-moderate in response to complaints we receive or otherwise when a potential problem comes to our attention. You can make a complaint by using the ‘report this post’ link . We may then apply our discretion under the user terms to amend or delete comments.
Post moderation is undertaken full-time 9am-6pm on weekdays, and on a part-time basis outwith those hours.
Read the rules hereComments are closed on this article