 Hello and welcome to a summary of all you need to know about Maniza Alvi's poem An Unknown Girl. Now, I'll explain the meaning related to this poem as it appears in the Pearson International GCSE anthology and I'll highlight literary and language devices that you need to be aware of as well as some contextual factors that you need to know when studying this text. So let's get started. Now do remember that Maniza Alvi, who resides currently in Britain, was actually born in Lahore Pakistan and she came to England when she was just a few months old. So what I'll do is I'll read through stanzas within this poem and pause every so often to highlight literary techniques that you need to be considering when analysing this poem. In The Evening Bazaar, studied with Nian, an unknown girl is hennaing my hand. She squeezes a wet brown line from a nozzle. She's icing my hand which she steadies with hers on a satin peach knee. In The Evening Bazaar, for a few rupees, an unknown girl is hennaing my hand. As little air catches, my shadow-stitched chemise, a peacock spreads its lines across my palm. Colours leave the streets float up in balloons, dummies in shop fronts. Now I'll pause there. So the title is really intriguing first off because we wonder who this poem is about. So she's anonymous, she's an unknown girl and it's interesting because this is repeated throughout the poem. Now in the first line of the stanza, the reference to Bazaar is actually a traditional Arabic market. So these are traditional markets which have stalls, usually quite busy, lots of different things that are sold and of course you find them in lots of Arabic countries but also you find them in places like India, Pakistan and so on. Now in the second line there's the reference to Nian. So Nian is something which we consider very modern, very western even. So this colour is actually a contrast to this traditional Bazaar, this traditional environment. So there's a dissonance here. Now the title was repeated, an unknown girl. So there's Anaphora here and it's interesting that although this woman is anonymous, she plays such a central role to the poem. Indeed the poem is named after her. Furthermore, the Anjambamon here after unknown girl emphasises that this is a stream of consciousness. This poem is dramatic monologue. The speaker, who we don't know if it's the poem or somebody else, is recalling and recounting this experience. Now this girl is henna-ing her hand and the alliteration here shows just how unique this experience is for the speaker. Furthermore in line five, the sibilance, she squeezes, emphasises a soft and fluid movement of this henna and of course she also highlights the colour, the wet brown line from a nozzle. Furthermore, the present continuous verb icing describes the action of this girl as if she's icing a cake, she's decorating her hand. Also the speaker tells us she steadies with her, so she steadies the speaker's hands with her own hands and this could be a symbol of how this unknown girl is giving the speaker a stable sense of her identity. Now that question of identity is really interesting because if we consider Manisa Alvy's own background, she herself of course we can assume has struggled with her identity being somebody who lives in the UK but it's from a different culture so sometimes that sense of identity can be quite shaky. Now in this case perhaps even the speaker themselves have a very shaky sense of her own identity. Moreover in line nine, we get the pre-modifiers satin peach and this is a very beautiful aesthetic that's described. Furthermore in line 11, we learn that she's getting this done for a few rupees and the alliteration for and few emphasises and creates the sense that her culture is actually not that valuable. She's only just paying a few rupees to get something that maybe represents her own culture and again there's this anaphora and unknown girl, the title is repeated like a refrain. Now in line 14, as the little air catches, now air is personified here and it shows that the outside world perhaps is encroaching on this encounter. Now in line 15, she refers to her shadow stitched chemise. Now the sibilance shadow stitched highlights that she's in the shadow of knowledge, self-awareness and understanding of her culture so in other words this could be a metaphor for how her knowledge of her culture is quite weak and she then mentions how a peacock spreads its lines and this is a metaphor which refers to how colourful her culture is. Moreover she talks about how colours leave the streets and this personification just highlights how dark it is getting, the external world is getting but also we can see that the world is getting less and less vibrant. Moreover in line 20 she talks about how the dummies are in the shop fronts and this is a reference to the mannequins as you can see in very up market shops and up market establishments so there's kind of a negativity to these mannequins which are fairly western, they are dummies, they're mute and even if they're quite western actually they don't have as much depth as her own culture. So let's carry on. Tilt and stare with the western perms banners for Miss India 1993 for curtain cloth and sofa cloth canopy me. I have new brown veins and the evening bizarre very deftly an unknown girl is hennearing my hand. I'm clinging to these firm peacock lines like people who cling to the sides of a train. Now the furious streets are hushed. Now in this part of the verse she talks about how these dummies tilt and stare and these verbs hint that outsiders or westerners like these dummies perhaps stare at her as she's when she's dressed in her cultural attire they don't understand it. Also her reference to western perms shows the westernization so western culture really encroaching on this really traditional experience that she has and of course what she wants to learn more about her culture and there's this kind of conflict perhaps that's being hinted between western idols that look down on her culture versus her culture which she really respects and sees as vibrant. Also she refers to the banners for Miss India 1993 for curtain cloth and sofa cloth all of this is in this bizarre and this listing adds the busyness and chaos of this scene and this canopies her so what actually this is showing is that she really finds this chaos and this busyness actually very beautiful and really comforting so all this activity just very much comforts her. Moreover this declarative sentence I have new vein new brown veins which of course is a reference to the henna the declarative sentence shows the unknown girl has really taught her more about her culture and identity than she thought was possible. Furthermore in line 30 she refers to how the girl deftly henna's her hand and this adverb shows just how skillful and practised her movements are of course this could also be a metaphor for how in tune with her culture this unknown girl is. Also the repetition of an unknown girl is entering my hand this is constantly repeated throughout the poem and this repetition in many ways makes it a refrain something that we keep on hearing over and over again showing how powerful this encounter has been for the speaker. Moreover the present continuous verbs I am clinging so the verb clinging shows that this speaker really really wants to cling onto her identity she wants to cling onto the shreds of knowledge that she's developing and she's clinging to these firm peacock lines and the adjective firm shows she's gaining a firmer sense of her own cultural identity and the simile like people who cling to the sides of a train actually references to a stereotype of indias notoriously crowded and packed trains the trains which people especially in the west sea in images of lots of people not only are they crowded inside the train but also on the outside of the train and this is sometimes a very derogatory stereotype however it's interesting that she's really referring to this and owning it. Furthermore she talks about the streets as furious and this personification shows just how busy Indian streets and roads are. Now you might be wondering when you're thinking about Manisa Alvi as I'd mentioned she's actually Pakistani heritage but actually this poem refers to a speaker who's talking about India so there's continuous references to India however what she's showing is that she's not only focusing on her own identity and the questions perhaps related to her identity as a poet but also showing the questions that other people might similarly face when they come from different parts of the globe including India. Now the poem continues. I'll scrape off the dry brown lines before I sleep reveal soft as a snail trolled the amber bird beneath. It will fade in a week when India appears and reappears. I'll lean across a country with my outstretched with my hands outstretched longing for the unknown girl and the neon bazaar. Now this ending verse is quite poignant so she talks about how she'll scrape off the henna of course do you remember the process of henna ring it's this liquid which hardens and you have to remove the hardened part to show the pattern that's on the skin so of course she's talking about how she removes this but actually this could be a metaphor which we could think about as her shredding and chipping away at her identity so the identity she's learned from this unknown girl is going to gradually fade away the more she sinks back into her normal routine and her normal life. Furthermore she talks about it being a snuffed as a snail trill and this similarly shows how fragile her understanding of her identity really is. She also talks about how the henna the color itself and her skin may fade in a week so this emphasizes that she fears she may lose a grasp of her culture and her understanding of her culture is also still very weak and tenuous. Moreover in line 45 she talks about how she'll lean across the country and this hyperbole shows that she is trying to really understand her own cultural identity within the confines of her life and also within the confines of things that are seen as westernized and more ideal. However she's trying her best her utmost to try and understand her own culture. Furthermore the present continuous verb longing shows she wants to continue discovering herself she earns to understand her culture more and she makes an aphoric references back to this unknown girl highlighting how she really really admires her and she's teaching her something about her culture. 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