Comparison of Cousin Kate by Christina Rossetti and The Seduction by Eileen McAuley

Compare and contrast Cousin Kate by Christina Rossetti with The

Seduction by Eileen McAuley

Comparison of Cousin Kate by Christina Rossetti and The Seduction by Eileen McAuley

For this essay I have been asked to compare two poems. One from the

era of pre twentieth century and one from the twentieth century. The

poem from pre twentieth century I am writing about is ‘Cousin Kate’ by

Christina Rossetti. The poem from the twentieth century will be ‘The

Seduction’ by Eileen McAuley. These two poems have many similarities,

but they also have many differences. It is pretty obvious that both

these poets have different writing techniques, obviously because they

were written in different eras. These two poems which I will be

discussing have many similarities even though they were written in

different eras one of the similarities is exploitation. In the poem

’Cousin Kate’ the narrator feels she has been exploited by the Great

Lord, because she feels he used her to have sexual intercourse. And in

‘The Seduction’ the young girl is exploited by magazines, and the

young naïve teenager actually believed in what the editors wrote about

perfect stories of romance and she believed after reading this

magazines that it was almost abnormal not to have sexual intercourse.

The author of this poem, Christina Rossetti, begins this poem with "I

was a cottage maiden." This shows us that the narrator is writing in

the past tense the narrator is reminiscing on the past. The narrator

is also writing in first person narrative which creates a bond between

the author and the reader as if the narrator is talking directly to

us.

The next line of this poem starts with “Hardened by sun and air” this

tells us that the narrator is a to...

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...Cousin Kate’ it

was disgraceful as being chaste was highly important at that time.

“Shameless shameful” This live is incongruous an oxymoron the

alliteration of the letter ‘S’ also emphasizes the oxymoron.

The next line implies his predatory nature and his desire from the

beginning of meeting the narrator “His plaything” The word ‘plaything’

this word is very emotive word it conveys to us the lord’s true

intentions of using the narrator just for sexual intercourse. This is

also similar to ‘The Seduction’ as in The Seduction the young male

teenager buy’s the girl drinks and encourages her to come to the river

with him “’I’ll take you to the river where I spend the afternoons.”

This line implies that there is only one thing on his mind and that is

not to talk about but to take her chastity as the lord intended to do

with the narrator in ‘Cousin Kate’.