 So now that we've reviewed key contextual information relating to, on an afternoon train from Perley to Victoria by James Berry, let's do a line-by-line poetry analysis of this entire poem. So let's now examine, on an afternoon train from Perley to Victoria in 1955, a big mouthful to be honest, for a title of a poem, and this is by James Berry. So remember that this poem is written in five stanzas. However, what I'll do is begin by reading firstly the title as well as the first three stanzas. I'll do a line-by-line analysis of each of these stanzas before I complete this lesson by going over the remaining two stanzas. So let's read through the first three stanzas on an afternoon train from Perley to Victoria in 1955. Hello, she said and startled me. Nice day. Nice day, I agreed. I'm a quaker, she said, and Sunday I was moved to silence to speak a poem loudly for racial brotherhood. I was thoughtful, then said, what poem came on like that? One the moment inspired, she said, I was again thoughtful. So let's now look at these first three stanzas and let's begin by the title itself in an afternoon train from Perley to Victoria in 1955. Now, this title is interesting because it sets the scene. It basically describes a conversation between two strangers on a train journey and the journey's literal and metaphorical consequences. So it's obviously talking about this journey, which is both literal because somebody is literally on a train from Perley to Victoria. And of course, it's a metaphorical journey because it basically envisions a future of racial harmony between predominantly black people and white people in England. Now, remember that this poem is written in free verse in terms of a structure to copy the informal nature of a real conversation. Remember that this poem is describing this conversation between a woman who's a quaker and a man who is listening to her, but presumably this man is from a racial minority group, presumably the Caribbean. Now, the reference to 1955 is of course also a direct contextual reference to how this poem was written in 1955, and it conveys the feeling of displacement that many West Indians at the time felt when adjusting to a new culture in the UK. Remember that these are the West Indians who migrated to the UK in the 50s after the Second World War and they were known as the Windrush generation. Let's look at the first stanza. So of course, it starts off with the term hello and the caesura and direct speech using here, which is obviously sudden and surprising, right? So you can imagine, maybe you'll, you know, you're seeing this from the perspective of the person that's being talked to. They're sitting on the train quite quietly and then suddenly they hear this hello out of nowhere. And of course, this surprise is also emphasised in the first stanza when the speaker states, the states startled me. So of course, here we can see the speaker is caught off guard and then this person, this quaker continues to say nice day. And this minor sentence reflects her clipped short comment. Remember clipped comment is just a brief comment. It doesn't have all the functions and components of a main clause, which is a subject, verb and object. Then the listener writes, this is the speaker within the poem, repeats what that person has said. Okay, so they say nice day. And of course, this repetition reveals that the speaker is somewhat tentative and guarded at first when they're speaking to this person who's obviously a stranger. Then in the second stanza that this woman says, I'm a quaker, she says, and of course, we know it's a woman because the pronoun she is used. So she says I'm a quaker. And the poet James Berry uses none standard grammar as well as on John Mont to reflect how much this woman is speaking. It's like an outpouring of a discussion and obviously this discourse kind of just pours out, right? And it's really, really free flowing. But of course, initially for the person that's being talked to, it's quite starting and surprising for them. Then remember that, of course, this woman identifies herself as a quaker. Remember that quakers are Christians who are part of the Protestant denomination and they're known for campaigning for equality and peace. Now this woman says, I was moved in silence. And here, remember that what she's illustrating is how Quakers usually meet and sit in silence until someone is moved to speak. And the speaker says they were moved in silence to speak a poem. And she says that even if she was sitting in silence, she couldn't do so for too long because she was really moved internally to speak out loud in this meeting. And she speaks about racial brotherhood. So when she talked, she spoke a poem about racial brotherhood. And this is a poem that came to her in the moment when she was inspired to speak out loud. Now the third stanza, the listener then reflects on this, okay? So we're told I was thoughtful then and of course here in thoughtful and then this is use of alliteration. And here we can see that the speaker is reflecting what the quaker has just told them. Also, they use caesura hair. And this is an interesting contrast to the general lack of punctuation, especially in the previous stanzas, first three lines. Then of course, the, or Berry, the poet uses a drum on at the end of this line. Again, signaling the conversation is flowing again because now this person that was initially the listener becomes chatty. And they ask what poem came on like that and this interrogatory sentence shows the curiosity and intrigue. Then the quaker responds by saying one the moment inspired. And here we can see that she's a certain the poem just came to her in a flash of inspiration, this poem about racial brotherhood and racial togetherness. Then the repetition of the word thoughtful reveals that the speaker is pausing once more and they're reflecting on what they've just been told. So let's now look at the final two stanzas. And again, I'm going to go over a land by land analysis after I've read the two stanzas. Inexplicably, I saw empty city streets lit dimly on a day's first hours. Alongside in darkness was my father's big banana field. Where are you from? She said, Jamaica, I said. What part of Africa is Jamaica? She said. Where Ireland is near Lapland? I said. Hard to see why you leave such a sunny country, she said. Snow falls elsewhere, I said. So sincere she was beautiful as people sat down around us. So now let's look at the second to last stanza where they're saying inexplicably, I saw empty city streets. And then they also refer to my father's big banana field. Now here the quaker is retelling this story, right? And this story that they tell the listener makes that listener who obviously speaking directly to us reflect and remember two crucial places for them. Firstly, London streets as well as their own father's banana field in the West Indies. And both are kind of these dim dark memories in his mind. And then of course, this darkness is reinforced through these two words, dimly and darkness. And the poet James Berry uses language belonging to the semantic field of darkness to put us in the listener's mind, okay? So they think of how dark London seems in the morning. But also we sense that the memory of his father's field, the banana field, is quite foggy and dark. Perhaps they've already migrated to the UK for a number of years and now they're starting to forget elements of the country that they came from. Also, the alliterative plosives B in Big Banana shows or rather brings our attention to the exotic place that this speaker is from. So you remember that the speaker who's talking directly to us, right? Which is different to the Quaker who's speaking to them. It's obviously very confusing. However, the person, the main subject of this poem, right? Presumably West Indian and maybe also reflecting James Berry himself obviously is trying to show us elements that they are from the West Indies, okay? So of course, our tension, especially with these alliterative plosives is brought to the exotic place that they're from. This exotic place that they left behind for the empty city of London. Now, in the final stanza, the Quaker asks this speaker, where are you from? And here, this interrogatory sentence makes us once more directly hear from this Quaker who vocally acknowledges and really openly acknowledges that this person is clearly foreign looking, okay? They're a visible minority. Remember, visible minority is somebody who's very different in terms of this skin colour and complexion. An invisible minority is somebody from a different culture but they have maybe the same skin tone, okay? So of course here, the Quaker clearly can see that this person is different and they are acknowledging this through the interrogatory sentence. Then in the following line, the speaker simply responds by saying Jamaica, okay? And this is the first time we realise that this speaker is of Caribbean descent and the repetition of the word Jamaica, this noun, has an interesting clever double meaning, okay? Because even if Jamaica is in the Caribbean, the speaker also wants to alert us to the fact that though many Africans were forcibly moved to Jamaica as slaves by European colonists, okay? So of course, even if they're originally from Jamaica, actually if you stretch back, the history is originally from Africa, okay? So James Berry is kind of layering in these complex ideas within this poem. Then the Quaker asks the speaker, what part of Africa is Jamaica? And of course here she is showing her ignorance when she asks him where Jamaica, you know, where Jamaica is in Africa, okay? Again, this is James Berry trying to allude back to that double meaning but also kind of showing the ignorance that a lot of English people had of places like Africa and the Caribbean, especially in the 1950s, okay? So also a lot of people who moved as part of the Windrush generation did also face lots of people who were fairly ignorant about where they'd come from, okay? That conflate and kind of mix up the Caribbean with Africa just because, you know, both regions have black people. Then the repetitive reference to the word said. This repetition shows that the conversation has actually become very chatty. It's gone from the initial kind of tentative distance in the first stanza to now this flowing conversation. There's a sense there's a slightly more familiarity established between the Quaker speaker and of course the man who's from Jamaica. Then of course when the Quaker asks, what part of Africa is Jamaica? The speaker is quite witty in responding by saying where Ireland is near Lapland. Of course, remember that Lapland is in the Scandinavian, nowhere close to Ireland. And here the speaker is being very sarcastic to show in a comical way that Jamaica is absolutely nowhere near Africa. Then the Quaker says, how to see where you live? And of course here, even if she's well-meaning, she's completely ignorant of maybe the economic hardships he may have faced to have left Jamaica behind, right? Of course, you know, if Jamaica was so perfect, he wouldn't have stayed or rather he wouldn't have left to stay in London. But of course, the Quaker woman isn't able to make that connection. Then she continues by saying such a sunny country. And here we can see Berry is using sibilance to show how this speaker, this Quaker lady has a very superficial and shallow understanding of Jamaica, the speaker's home country, as she only sees it as really sunny like a tourist would, right? So even if she's really well-meaning and of course, you know, we get the sense that she is well-meaning when she talks about the poem that she made about brotherhood and racial brotherhood, she's still quite ignorant and she has a very superficial understanding of people from other cultures beyond her race. Then the listener, so this is a person from Jamaica, says, Snow falls elsewhere, I said. And here the speaker is being really cryptic. Perhaps snow means opportunities which fall elsewhere, i.e. London. And here we can see that, you know, in his response, he's actually not really resentful of her, you know, basic understanding of where he is from. Then the poet uses the sibilance here so sincere because we can see that the listener who's talking to the Quaker lady actually acknowledges that she has good intentions. Her questions come from a good place. And the reference to beautiful illustrates that he sees her attempts as a Quaker to understand and connect with him as beautiful. So despite her ignorance, the speaker is actually quite inspired by her honesty. So that's really it. I hope you found this video useful in understanding and being able to analyse this poem. And of course, if you enjoyed this video, do give it a thumbs up. Thank you so much for listening.