The BoasTs of hywel aB owain Gwynedd

whaT is This poem aBouT?

• The persona in the poem, has a different girl for every day of the week. He boasts about all of the women he has been with and could be seen as objectifying these women. So he is basically a womanizer.

• He speaks about these women in a vulgar way.

feaTures ThaT we have analysed

• The persona in the poem speaks in a comically unpleasant way about these women. For example; ‘I sing in bed to my busty Nest’

• Shows love for each of these women, based on physical appearance rather than emotion. ‘her pale cheeks flush like rosy apple skin’

• Themes; unfaithfulness, fruit, days of the week, flowers.

ways of inTerpreTinG The poem

• The persona in the poem compares these women he’s been with to fruit. It could be viewed as sexual representation of the character but in a more subtle way ‘lick up juices of the fruit’.

• The persona in the poem could be viewed as being sexist and vulgar as he uses poetry to trick them into his bed ‘Dry old hymns I steal to please her’.

• The names the persona gives them mean something else. For example, Generys means ‘white lady’ which could be viewed as the persona trying to get across to the reader what they’re like.

links To larkin

• Larkin does not seem to like women or appreciate them, de-values them in a lot of his poems like in his poem ‘Faith Healing’ where he talks about women being naïve enough to believe in the practice.

• Larkin also appears untruthful in ‘Wild Oats’ as he doesn’t love the woman he is with and says he loves his partner’s friend. This could be related to Abse’s persona in this poem as he appears unfaithful and care free.

• The persona in the poem and Larkin in general seem to both boast about the women they’ve been with so are similar in that respect.

how To rememBer This poem

REMEMBER RYAN GOSLING;) FROM THE FILM CRAZY STUPID LOVE. HE’S A WOMANIZER AS IS THE PERSONA IN THE POEM.