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‘The Poetry Girl’

A Book Review

By Amy Rosemary Goodier

‘The Poetry Girl’ is a deeply moving, emotional, and sometimes funny, journey of adolescence. The story was written by New Zealand children’s author Beverly Dunlop who has been writing children’s stories since 1972 and has had over 80 published. Set in the South Island of New Zealand in 1947, it is told through the eyes of twelve-year-old Natalia who loves animals and living on the farm, though worries about being too tall, repeating Form One, and the nasty rows between her parents. She uses the world of poetry and to escape her problems but soon finds that you can’t just wash them away with words.

One language technique that is used to help understand the main idea of the story is first person narrative. First person narrative helps to understand as well as give insight to the thoughts and feelings of Natalia, the main character. It helps highlight the key fact that Natalia does not like change, which is seen throughout the book through her rebellious or somewhat negative attitude to growing up. This emphasises and shows the main idea of the story: adolescence, which links to the existing world of our own: how growing up is just not one smooth ride for every teen.

Symbolism is used throughout the book, and helps convey ideas in the story. An example of symbolism used in ‘The Poetry Girl’ that I relate to because of what it means, is: Natalia’s teddy bear that she forgets to take with her, when she leaves the farm. Natalia’s teddy represents a part of her that she is leaving behind or letting go, which is: her home, and shows that change will happen even if you don’t want it to. This links to how we sometimes have to let go of things and people even though we may not want to, it may feel like there’s ‘a hole in our heart’ but that just means that we loved them, just like Natalia loved her farm when she had to leave it behind………

'I cried and cried under the blankets with my hand over my mouth so that no one could hear me. Poor Teddy stuck under the wood-heap in the cold, forever.'-Natalia Kontotovitch (‘The Poetry Girl’)

Relationships between characters help highlight key ideas in the story. Joan is the best friend or rather former of the main character Natalia, and can be described as a studious, knowledgeable but rather pompous person with plain features and of course glasses. The relationship between Joan and Natalia helps highlight the idea of friendship: the struggles, the ups and downs, and the changes that lead to growing apart. How new bonds form while others break. While reading 'The Poetry Girl' you could slowly feel the characters drifting apart: the differing opinions, and of course Natalia having to repeat a year which put a deep fissure in their distancing friendship. I can also see how the idea of friendship connects to the idea of adolescence which is the key idea the book.'

Overall, this shows clear strengths of 'The Poetry Girl' attributed to her author: Beverly Dunlop. I personally would give this book a 4/5 and would highly recommend it to all readers and bookworms alike aged 9-13 who love an emotional story or a good biography, as it was definitely worth the read.