“Queen Herod” Introduction

• Read the full text of “Queen Herod”

“Queen Herod” Summary

“Queen Herod” Themes

• 

  The Tender and Violent Maternal Instinct

  Where this theme appears in the poem:

  • Lines 18-48
  • Lines 62-98
• 

  Marriage and Patriarchal Oppression

  Where this theme appears in the poem:

  • Lines 7-15
  • Lines 18-24
  • Lines 34-39
  • Lines 46-68
• 

  Collective Feminine Power

  Where this theme appears in the poem:

  • Lines 1-30
  • Lines 40-47
  • Lines 58-65
  • Lines 90-98

Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Queen Herod”

• Lines 1-6

  Ice in the ...
  ... to the stables;

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 7-15

  courteous, confident; oh, ...
  ... till bitter dawn.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 16-21

  They were wise. ...
  ... my little child.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 22-24

  Silver and gold, ...
  ... of her face.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 25-30

  Grace ...
  ... with insolent lust.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 31-35

  Watch ...
  ... Husband. Hero. Hunk.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 36-39

  The Boy Next ...
  ... Ladykiller. Mr Right.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 40-48

  My baby stirred, ...
  ... peacock screamed outside.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 49-57

  Afterwards, it seemed ...
  ... was twelve, thirteen.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 58-65

  I watched each ...
  ... means he's here…

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 66-68

  Some swaggering lad ...
  ... nothing, nowt in gold.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 69-74

  I sent for ...
  ... knives, swords, cutlasses.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 75-77

  Ride East from ...
  ... Spare not one.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 78-83

  The midnight hour. ...
  ... at his heels.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 84-89

  High up in ...
  ... The Boyfriend's Star.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

• Lines 90-98

  We do our ...
  ... thunder and drum.

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

“Queen Herod” Symbols

• 

  The Boy

  Where this symbol appears in the poem:

  • Lines 31-39: “Watch / , they said, / for a star in the east— / a new star / pierced through the night like a nail. / It means he's here, alive, newborn. / Who? H / im. The Husband. Hero. Hunk. / The Boy Next Door. The Paramour. The / Je t'adore. / The Marrying Kind. Adulterer. Bigamist. / The Wolf. The Rip. The Rake. The Rat. / The Heartbreaker. The Ladykiller. Mr Right.”
  • Lines 46-47: “No man / , I swore, / will make her shed one tear.”
  • Lines 66-68: “Some swaggering lad to break her heart, / some wincing Prince to take her name away / and give a ring, a nothing, nowt in gold.”
• 

  Orion

  Where this symbol appears in the poem:

  • Lines 80-83: “Orion to the South / who knew the score, who'd seen, / not seen, then seen it all before; / the yapping Dog Star at his heels.”
• 

  The Peacock

  Where this symbol appears in the poem:

  • Line 48: “A peacock screamed outside.”

“Queen Herod” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

• Alliteration

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

  Where alliteration appears in the poem:

  • Line 4: “several sweating”
  • Line 5: “laden,” “long”
  • Line 7: “courteous, confident”
  • Line 8: “King,” “Queen,” “here,” “Herod”
  • Line 9: “baths,” “beds”
  • Line 16: “were wise”
  • Line 18: “Herod's head”
  • Line 26: “hennaed hands”
  • Line 33: “night,” “nail”
  • Line 34: “he's here”
  • Lines 35-35: “Who? H / im.”
  • Line 35: “Husband. Hero. Hunk.”
  • Line 38: “Rip,” “Rake,” “Rat”
  • Lines 40-41: “stirred, / suckled”
  • Line 54: “spat, snatched”
  • Line 55: “smoky,” “mead”
  • Line 56: “maid”
  • Line 59: “back,” “beast”
  • Line 61: “below,” “bulk”
  • Line 62: “fierce”
  • Line 63: “flash,” “felt”
  • Line 65: “he's here”
  • Line 66: “Some swaggering”
  • Line 68: “nothing, nowt”
  • Line 70: “mountain man”
  • Line 80: “South”
  • Line 81: “score,” “seen”
  • Line 82: “seen,” “seen”
  • Line 87: “blatant, brazen, buoyant”
  • Line 88: “blue”
  • Line 89: “Boyfriend's”
  • Line 93: “We wade”
  • Line 97: “hooves,” “horses”

• Assonance

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

  Where assonance appears in the poem:

  • Line 1: “trees”
  • Line 2: “Three Queens”
  • Line 4: “several sweating”
  • Line 12: “be”
  • Line 13: “asleep,” “me”
  • Line 14: “three”
  • Line 16: “wise,” “I”
  • Line 18: “Once drunken,” “Herod's head went”
  • Line 22: “gold”
  • Line 24: “glowed,” “bowl”
  • Line 35: “Husband,” “Hunk”
  • Line 36: “Door,” “Paramour,” “t'adore”
  • Line 43: “breast”
  • Line 44: “left,” “down”
  • Line 45: “mouth”
  • Line 48: “peacock screamed”
  • Line 49: “seemed,” “dream”
  • Line 53: “clapped”
  • Line 54: “spat, snatched”
  • Line 55: “mead”
  • Line 57: “thirteen”
  • Line 58: “each,” “Queen”
  • Line 59: “beast”
  • Line 66: “swaggering lad”
  • Line 67: “wincing Prince,” “take,” “away”
  • Line 68: “give,” “ring,” “nothing”
  • Line 76: “mother's son”
  • Line 77: “one”
  • Line 81: “score”
  • Line 82: “before”
  • Line 87: “blatant, brazen”
  • Line 95: “eyes”
  • Line 96: “lullabies”
  • Line 98: “thunder,” “drum”

• Asyndeton

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

  Where asyndeton appears in the poem:

  • Line 3: “dressed in furs, accented”
  • Line 4: “sweating, panting beasts”
  • Line 7: “courteous, confident”
  • Line 8: “Herod, me”
  • Lines 9-11: “sunken baths, curtained beds, / fruit, the best of meat and wine, / dancers, music, talk—”
  • Lines 13-14: “save me, / those vivid three—”
  • Line 16: “They were wise. Older than I.”
  • Line 34: “he's here, alive, newborn.”
  • Lines 35-39: “H / im. The Husband. Hero. Hunk. / The Boy Next Door. The Paramour. The / Je t'adore. / The Marrying Kind. Adulterer. Bigamist. / The Wolf. The Rip. The Rake. The Rat. / The Heartbreaker. The Ladykiller. Mr Right.”
  • Lines 50-57: “The pungent camels / kneeling in the snow, / the guide's rough shout / as he clapped his leather gloves, / hawked, spat, snatched / the smoky jug of mead / from the chittering maid— / she was twelve, thirteen.”
  • Lines 62-64: “I saw the fierce eyes of the black Queen / flash again, felt her urgent warnings scald / my ear.”
  • Line 68: “a ring, a nothing, nowt in gold.”
  • Line 74: “knives, swords, cutlasses.”
  • Line 87: “blatant, brazen, buoyant in the East—”
  • Lines 91-92: “we Queens, we mothers, / mothers of Queens.”

• Colloquialism

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

  Where colloquialism appears in the poem:

  • Lines 35-36: “Hunk. / The Boy Next Door.”
  • Line 37: “The Marrying Kind.”
  • Lines 38-39: “The Wolf. The Rip. The Rake. The Rat. / The Heartbreaker. The Ladykiller. Mr Right.”
  • Line 68: “nowt”
  • Line 89: “Boyfriend's”

• Simile

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

  Where simile appears in the poem:

  • Lines 32-33: “a new star / pierced through the night like a nail.”
  • Line 49: “Afterwards, it seemed like a dream.”
  • Lines 58-59: “I watched each turbaned Queen / rise like a god on the back of her beast.”
  • Lines 70-72: “a mountain man / with a red scar, like a tick / to the mean stare of his eye.”

• Metaphor

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

  Where metaphor appears in the poem:

  • Lines 22-24: “Silver and gold, / the loose change of herself, / glowed in the soft bowl of her face.”
  • Line 28: “made a tiny starfish of my daughter's fist,”
  • Lines 63-64: “felt her urgent warnings scald / my ear.”
  • Line 68: “a ring, a nothing, nowt in gold.”
  • Lines 78-79: “The chattering stars / shivered in a nervous sky.”
  • Lines 80-83: “Orion to the South / who knew the score, who'd seen, / not seen, then seen it all before; / the yapping Dog Star at his heels.”
  • Line 85: “studded, diamond W.”
  • Line 95: “We have daggers for eyes.”
  • Lines 96-98: “Behind our lullabies, / the hooves of terrible horses / thunder and drum.”

• Personification

  

  

  

  

  Unlock with LitCharts A⁺

  Where personification appears in the poem:

  • Lines 50-51: “The pungent camels / kneeling in the snow,”
  • Lines 78-82: “The chattering stars / shivered in a nervous sky. / Orion to the South / who knew the score, who'd seen, / not seen, then seen it all before;”

“Queen Herod” Vocabulary

Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

• Laden
• Herod
• Hennaed
• Insolent
• Hunk
• Boy Next Door
• Paramour
• Je t'adore
• Adulterer
• Bigamist
• Wolf
• Rip
• Rake
• Suckled
• Pungent
• Hawked
• Mead
• Chittering
• Splayed
• Fusty
• Scald
• Swaggering
• Nowt
• Tick
• Cutlasses
• Blatant
• Buoyant
• Brazen

• (Location in poem: Line 5: “laden for a long hard trek”)

Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Queen Herod”

• Form

• Meter

• Rhyme Scheme

“Queen Herod” Speaker

“Queen Herod” Setting

Literary and Historical Context of “Queen Herod”

More “Queen Herod” Resources

• External Resources

  • Who Was Herod the Great? — Learn more about Herod as a historical figure from this brief reference entry, courtesy of Britannica. 

  • Herod's Real-Life Wife, Mariamne — Learn more about Herod's wife Mariamne from this brief biography, courtesy of the Jewish Women's Archive.

  • Carol Ann Duffy's Biography — Learn more about the poet's life and work from this short biography, courtesy of the Poetry Foundation.

  • An Interview with the Poet — In this interview with The Guardian, Carol Ann Duffy responds to her appointment as the UK's Poet Laureate and discusses women poets' important contributions to literature.

  • Herod in the Bible — Read the story of King Herod as it appears in Chapter 2 of the Gospel of Matthew.

• LitCharts on Other Poems by Carol Ann Duffy

  • A Child's Sleep

  • Anne Hathaway

  • Before You Were Mine

  • Circe

  • Death of a Teacher

  • Demeter

  • Education For Leisure

  • Elvis's Twin Sister

  • Eurydice

  • Foreign

  • Havisham

  • Head of English

  • In Mrs Tilscher’s Class

  • In Your Mind

  • Little Red Cap

  • Mean Time

  • Medusa

  • Mrs Aesop

  • Mrs Darwin

  • Mrs Faust

  • Mrs Icarus

  • Mrs Lazarus

  • Mrs Midas

  • Mrs Sisyphus

  • Originally

  • Penelope

  • Pilate's Wife

  • Pope Joan

  • Prayer

  • Pygmalion's Bride

  • Quickdraw

  • Recognition

  • Salome

  • Standing Female Nude

  • Stealing

  • The Darling Letters

  • The Dolphins

  • The Good Teachers

  • Thetis

  • Valentine

  • Warming Her Pearls

  • War Photographer

  • We Remember Your Childhood Well

  • Work