Inheritance – Revision Notes

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Inheritance is by Eavan Boland and explores the idea of what parents pass down to their children whether it be materialistic or an intangible quality such as motherhood. We studied it as 1 of 4 poems out of the Poems of the Decade anthology relating to ‘Relationships’, this may be what the exam question asks about, or it could be something different – we just don’t know! That’s why you have to prepare for every eventuality, hopefully this post will help…

STRUCTURE

The poem has a very loose structure and is made up of 8 stanzas of various lengths (some of which are couplets) and there is no rhyme, this makes the poem seem rather disjointed at times.

• Boland choose to put the words “be theirs” on a separate line in the second stanza. This isolation of the line suggests worries for the future of the poetic voice’s children. She feels like her children will be left aloe with nothing from her.
• The loose structure reflects the personal nature as if she’s speaking to herself – it is open verse, a thought process. She is admitting that they have nothing of financial worth to leave behind.
• The poet starts with the idea of wondering, which sets the tone for the poem’s quiet, introverted quality. This is not a poem of dramatic gesture or noisy declamation.

LANGUAGE TECHNIQUES

• Concrete nouns, “silver and the fluid light left after silk – were never given here”, the concrete nouns create a sense that the speaker thinks that materialistic value is more important to her children and this is what she worries about leaving behind.
• Names of places (proper nouns) – “Three Rock Mountain” this gives the poem some context and allows us to understand how the things she considers worth passing down are landscapes of great beauty and she is sad that this is not hers to give (she only wants the best for her daughters)
• Personal pronouns – “I have wondering what I have to leave behind” this again reinforces the fact that this poem is very personal and the feelings are very much that of the poetic voice, this provokes sympathy from the audience because it is very relatable for them.

IMAGERY

• The worth of the things that she mentions are very expensive, contrasting with the “lace bobbin” and the “oat straw pillow” showing their financial situation. The juxtaposition of the concrete nouns in the poem demonstrates how she really feels like she has nothing of worth. A lace bobbin seems worth even less when compared to silver and silk, thus emphasising the fact she doesn’t think she owns anything of worth.

TONE

• She feels as though she has nothing of value and this hopelessness creates a very sad tone, “I leaned so little from them: the lace bobbin with it’s braided mesh, it’s oat-straw pillow and the wheat-coloured shawl”
• There is also a strong political message behind the poem, that women were not left things behind in wills when people died and she feels this was unfair, that her daughters will have nothing. It relates to the Married Women’s Property Act if 1870. There is no mention of men or sons, perhaps because throughout history they have always been given the priority in inheritance. “The ground I stood on was never really mine” – we can infer that this is because it was owed by a man and not hers to give.
• Positive tone after the realisation at the end.

CONCLUSION

• Last line realisation. In the last couple of stanzas, the poetic voice tells the reader if a time when one of her children was ill. She had motherly instinct and cared for the child until they were well again “I knew the secrets of health and air…I must have learned that somewhere” These are the only lines that rhyme showing how the uncertainty goes way at the end and she is able to see that it is only because of society pressures that people feel they have to leave valuables to their loved ones, but teaching them important skills, as she learned from her mother, is far more important.

This is a poem about the pressures put on us from society but also the oppression of women’s rights throughout history and the realisation that material possessions don’t matter once we’re gone.

By Ella

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