The final image of this section focuses on ‘little bird inside a cage’, representing the trap that beauty is. Helen’s whole life was marred by the prosecution of men, trapped due to her physical features. The final image of a ‘cage’ symbolizes this oppression, Helen’s life is destroyed due to her beauty. The name Larkin often comes up when Duffy is discussed. She is, of course, in many ways Larkin's antithesis, but they do occupy the same niche in their respective eras. Duffy is the poet of the multicultural noughties as Larkin was the bicycle-clipped representative of the dowdy, repressed fifties. The critic Justin Quinn has noted how many of Duffy's poems echo themes of Larkin's - you can pair them off: "Larkin's 'Posterity', Duffy's 'Biographer'; 'Ambulances', 'November'; 'Mr Bleaney', 'Room', etc". The Larkin/Duffy story has taken a surprising turn recently. Duffy's new book has a long poem set in her girls' school of the 1960s, "The Laughter of Stafford Girls' High", an allegory of the rise of feminism, sweeping away dowdy post-war austerity and buttoned-up emotional sterility. And here is a fat new Larkin book, recently published, Trouble at Willow Gables, girls' fiction written for private entertainment. Duffy's last word on Larkin: "As anyone who has the slightest knowledge of my work knows, I have little in common with Larkin, who was tall, taciturn and thin-on-top, and unlike him I laugh, nay, sneer, in the face of death. I will concede one point: we are both lesbian poets." Carol Ann Duffy - Poetry - Scottish Poetry Library". www.scottishpoetrylibrary.org.uk . Retrieved 16 February 2018.

One device that Duffy uses consistently throughout The Laughter of Stafford Girls’ High is the asyndeton. Duffy creates asyndetic lists to display the rigidity of the school curriculum. Each list is boring, split grammatically by the commas, and monotonously slow. Duffy indicates her distaste for rote memorization through the construction of these asyndetic lists. Anderson, Hephziba (4 December 2005). "Christmas Carol" . Retrieved 30 January 2019– via www.theguardian.com. It is ironic that the first two women cited — one mythological and the other drawn from ancient history — were powerful and high status. The other women lived in the twentieth century but, despite the burgeoning feminist movement, were powerless victims. Duffy introduces a character who helps Helen, her female ‘maid’. This woman ‘loved her most’, loving her for herself instead of her beauty. Indeed, she would not ‘describe/one aspect of her face’, protecting Helen of Troy. Instead of furthering the iconic legend of Helen, she remains faithful, the only friendly character of this section is a female. This could be a mechanism through which Duffy suggests that women always support women, especially in retaliation to the male gaze. The poem moves chronologically through their lives, exploring their rise to fame and subsequent downfall. Each one is brutal, ending in a death caused by the exploitation of a patriarchal world. Although some of these women gained power within their lives, they could never truly flourish in a society that placed masculine identities as more influential. Duffy uses this poem to expose the horrors of society, women exploited until they come to a tragic end. Cleopatra, Marilyn Monroe, and Princess Diana all died horrifically. Cleopatra died to a self-inflicted snake bite, Munroe to an overdose, and Diana to a car crash after being pursued by the ravenous press of England. The exploitation of women is rife throughout history, not stopping even as we move into the 21st century.The first stanza ends with ‘loved’, emphasized by a caesura and end stop. This emphasis is a clear foreshadowing of what is to come, each of the four women suffering from male love and attention. Asyndeton is once again used across the end of the fourth stanza, Duffy linking together names for Helen. The large number of names people call Helen could further link to her name, her notorious beauty calling the attention of every man.

It is hard not to find that assumption of freedom heady. Even if, in this particular poem, the character is hardly given Duffy's approval, that readiness to move on is intoxicating. It teaches an odd, contemporary post-feminist courage; and perhaps that is the source of Duffy's huge popularity. Duffy's rise rather wrong-footed the Oxbridge poetry establishment. The first issue of the Oxford little magazine Thumbscrew (Winter 1994/5) carried a critical essay by Simon Brittain. He concludes: "By employing simplistic language and overstated imagery, Duffy is perfect for those no longer accustomed nor inclined to close reading". But according to her supporters, he comes to this conclusion by ignoring her best poems. These final three stanzas explore the mystery of Helen, the perusers unsure of where she escaped. The use of ‘dusk’, ‘moon’, and ‘smuggled’ play into the semantics of secrecy, Helen slipping away from her followers’ grasps. Yet, even in this act, the male gaze focuses on how ‘her dress/clung to her form’. Duffy suggests that at all times the male gaze sexualizes women.Last poem in the collection, suggests she has done all she can do, and the struggle for feminism is down to other people. Theme of death could also represent the passing of patriarchal dominance. This is Duffy at her most serious - the poems are rich, beautiful and heart-rending in their exploration of the deepest recesses of human emotion, both joy and pain. These works are also her most formal - following in the tradition of Shakespeare and John Donne, Duffy’s contemporary love poems in this collection draw on the traditional sonnet and ballad forms. The Laughter of Stafford Girls’ High by Carol Ann Duffy traces the developing wave of laughter. Duffy represents how female voices can lift each other up and lead to liberation. The Poetry Society". The Poetry Society. 1 July 2016. Archived from the original on 22 December 2015 . Retrieved 17 July 2016. The longest poem in the book is "The Laughter of Stafford Girls' High" and Duffy clearly enjoyed writing it. At one level the poem is a tour de force of sparkle and fizz. A mysterious giggle grows ineluctably into an all-consuming merriment that destroys the whole structure of grammar school propriety. Those who went to such a grammar school, as I did, will recognise the discipline and the drudgery, and recall the passionate longing to escape shared by teachers and students alike. At the same time it is hard to keep out of mind Searle's St Trinian's, or even the hearty attachments of Angela Brazil's captains and head girls. I found the poetry lay mainly in the asides: a teacher on a cold night, watching her own breath, a moment of loving abandon, an evocation of "The world like Quink outside". For all its accomplishment, this was not my favourite poem in the collection.

Laughter is described as ‘A silly joy sparked and fizzled’. The use of onomatopoeia furthers the aural quality of these words, with laughter echoing out of the poem. The childlike ‘silly’ refers to the childhood joy of this moment, Duffy immortalizing the laughter in her epic poem. After all, this poem is about the frenetic energy of growing up, and the unity that school can provide when used correctly. The oxymoronic ‘Tough beauty’ displays Cleopatra’s character perfectly. She is at once beautiful and impactful. She uses her beauty to gain leverage, being able to outsmart the men in her way. Anything that Caesar does, Cleopatra does the same or better, ‘matched him glass for glass’. Duffy dismantles the notion that women cannot perform equally to men, Cleopatra doing so despite being subjugated for her feminine beauty.Poet, playwright and freelance writer Carol Ann Duffy was born on 23 December 1955 in Glasgow and read philosophy at Liverpool University. The cave= yonic symbol of daughter's place of origin, linking her to the mother. Could also imply that women have been kept in the dark and that having children enables them to escape into the light One of these is mythological, Helen of Troy. One stems from ancient history, Cleopatra. Finally, both Marilyn Monroe and Princess Diana come from more recent history. Despite the status they held and the time period they lived through, these women were all equally prosecuted and exploited. A modernised adaptation of Everyman by Duffy, with Chiwetel Ejiofor in the title role, was performed at the National Theatre from April to July 2015.

The second character discussed is Cleopatra, the last active ruler of the Ptolemaic Kingdom of Egypt. She ruled from 51-30BC. Cleo, similarly to Helen of Troy, is a figure much favored by art and literature. In 30 BC, her naval fleet (including her husband, Mark Anthony) was defeated. This led to Antony’s suicide. Once Cleopatra learned of this, she killed herself by poisoning. While history is not certain if this death comes from self-poison or being bitten by an asp, many believe she self-inflicted the snake bite. The ‘starlike sorrows of immortal eyes’ is oddly wounded. Duffy could use this to suggest a melancholic pang to the character. Perhaps Helen, in her godly position, understood the great burden that beauty had placed upon her. Duffy is also a playwright, and has had plays performed at the Liverpool Playhouse and the Almeida Theatre in London. Her plays include Take My Husband (1982), Cavern of Dreams (1984), Little Women, Big Boys (1986) Loss (1986), Casanova (2007). Her radio credits include an adaptation of Rapture. [42] Her children's collections include Meeting Midnight (1999) and The Oldest Girl in the World (2000). She also collaborated with the Manchester composer, Sasha Johnson Manning, on The Manchester Carols, a series of Christmas songs that premiered in Manchester Cathedral in 2007. Miss Batt and Miss Fife ‘had moved’ together ‘to a city’, finally experiencing true freedom. They ‘drank in a dark bar where women danced, cheek to cheek’, being able to express their love publicly. In her new happy life, Miss Fife dreams of the oppressive school. She pictures it as a ‘huge ship/floating away’. Miss Batt’s lips, ‘a warm mouth’ wakes her, causing the ‘school sank in her mind’. The semantics of water return, symbolises how the school was lost to the battle of laughter.She was appointed as Poet Laureate on 1 May 2009, [12] when Motion's 10-year term was over. Duffy was featured on the South Bank Show with Melvyn Bragg in December 2009 [13] and on 7 December she presented the Turner Prize to artist Richard Wright. [14]