Look We Have Coming to Dover!

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Even more intriguing is that this poem was published in 2007, almost a decade before the European Migration Crisis and numerous migrant controversies around the world and in the UK. Babbling” could be seen as an example of onomatopoeia, with Nagra playing with these words and phrases to continue the idea of multiple languages. As such, this would help to make the poem even more memorable and help a reader consider the implications and ideas of the poem in todays society.The poem begins with the speaker describing the terrifying arrival into Dover There is nothing beautiful about this scene. It is white, indistinguishable from other similar vehicles and likely the perfect on land camouflage. In the future, the speaker would like to see himself and his companions as part of British culture and “babbling [their] lingoes. Nagra, whose own parents came to England from the Punjab in the 1950s, conjures a jazzed hybrid language to tell stories of aspiration, assimilation, alienation and love, from a stowaway's first footprint on Dover beach to the disenchantment of subsequent generations. It wants to be fun but it just comes off as foolish, and I was left asking why I paid for someone else's indulgence.

Lines 21-25: “Imagine my love and I, / our sundry others, Blair’d in the cash / of our beeswax’d cars, our crash clothes, free, / we raise our charged glasses over unparasol’d tables / East, babbling our lingoes, flecked by the chalk of Britannia! It is scary, employed by the speaker to show how those in England would view the immigrants coming to their country. Its rhythmical, phonetic delicacies offer a colourful insight into British-Asian culture and are an inspiration to read.The link to immigration would become particularly clear with the reference to “Dover” as this is a key point of entry to the UK from mainland Europe as this is at the narrowest stretch of the English Channel.

I have had the honour of profiting from my good friend Daljit's teachings for a number of months now at my secondary school and would go so far as to say I am the finest student in the class, a muse if you will. Home to William Golding, Sylvia Plath, Kazuo Ishiguro, Sally Rooney, Tsitsi Dangarembga, Max Porter, Ingrid Persaud, Anna Burns and Rachel Cusk, among many others, Faber is proud to publish some of the greatest novelists from the early twentieth century to today. Taking in its sights Matthew Arnold's 'land of dreams', the collection explores the idealism and reality of a multicultural Britain with wit, intelligence and no small sense of mischief.

The inclusion of “invade” introduces the ongoing theme of words with negative connotations, but this one is particularly notable because of the direct link to hostile people entering another country. The waves are “ministered,” meaning they obey the needs of the tourists while the immigrants have to fight against them to make any progress. Learn more about the White Cliffs of Dover—and the ways that immigration (and invasion) have shaped British culture. You can change your choices at any time by visiting Cookie preferences, as described in the Cookie notice.

The poem is a dramatic monologue, the voice that of the poet, using the first person plural ‘we’ and in the last stanza ‘I’. One example is “ Bedford van” which became a well known piece of British culture throughout the 20th century, including many wartime vehicles branded as “Bedford”. There is also the personification of the wind and rain described as “yobbish” and the ugly connotations and dehumanisation of “swarms of us” which likens those entering the country to insects.

There is also frequent use of commas and hyphens throughout the poem, which may represent the idea of diversity and change within society due to the frequent use of these different types of punctuation. But the poem's sparky, inventive language suggests that immigration is a revitalizing force, offering immigrants' adoptive countries fresh energy and fresh perspectives.