A FREE CONTRIBUTION FOR THE STUDENTS OF CLASS -11

1. THE LABURNUM TOP
Ted Hughes
By
Prepared by - AJIT SINGH , PGT ENGLISH

2. ABOUT THE POET
Edward James Hughes (17 August
1930 – 28 October 1998) was an English
poet, translator, and children's writer.
Critics frequently rank him as one of the
best poets of his generation, and one of the
twentieth century's greatest writers. He
was appointed Poet Laureate in 1984 and
held the office until his death. In 2008 The
Times ranked Hughes fourth on their list
of "The 50 greatest British writers since
1945.

3. Poem
The Laburnum top is silent, quite still
In the afternoon yellow September sunlight,
A few leaves yellowing, all its seeds fallen.

4. Poem
Till the goldfinch comes, with a twitching chirrup
A suddenness, a startlement, at a branch end.
Then sleek as a lizard, and alert, and abrupt,

5. Poem
She enters the thickness, and a machine starts up
Of chitterings, and a tremor of wings, and
trillings —
The whole tree trembles and thrills.

6. Poem
It is the engine of her family.
She stokes it full, then flirts out to a branch-end
Showing her barred face identity mask

7. Poem
Then with eerie delicate whistle-chirrup
whisperings
She launches away, towards the infinite
And the laburnum subsides to empty.

8. what is Laburnum ?
Laburnum, sometimes called golden
chain or golden rain, is a genus of
two species of small trees in the
subfamily Faboideae of the pea
family Fabaceae. The species are
Laburnum anagyroides—common
laburnum and Laburnum alpinum—
alpine laburnum. They are native to
the mountains of southern Europe
from France to the Balkans.

9. what is Goldfinch ?
The American goldfinch (Spinus
tristis) is a small North
American bird in the finch family.
It is migratory, ranging from
mid-Alberta to North
Carolina during the breeding
season, and from just south of
the Canada–United States border
to Mexico during the winter.

10. Stanza -1
The Laburnum top is silent, quite still
In the afternoon yellow September sunlight,
A few leaves yellowing, all its seeds fallen.

11. Words-
• Laburnum – a short tree with hanging
branches, yellow flowers, and poisonous
seeds

12. Explanation -
• In the above lines, the poet says that he saw
a Laburnum tree whose leaves were yellow.
The tree’s top is still and silent in the day
time of September month. It is autumn
season and all the seeds of the tree had
fallen.

13. Explanation -
• The poet has used the word ‘yellow’ for
leaves and sunlight. Yellow symbolizes
silence, death, and beauty. He describes the
whole scene of the tree with this colour.

14. Stanza -2
Till the goldfinch comes, with a twitching chirrup
A suddenness, a startlement, at a branch end.
Then sleek as a lizard, and alert, and abrupt,

15. Words -
• Goldfinch – a small singing birds with
yellow feathers on its wings
Twitching – sudden jerk movement
Chirrup – a bird making repeated high
pitched sounds
Startlement – feeling or showing sudden
shock
Abrupt – rapid

16. Explanation -
• A Goldfinch bird comes to end the death-
like scene of the tree and makes a sudden
chirrup sound. The bird while being rapid,
alert and precautiouns like a lizard, sits on
the branches of the tree.

17. Stanza-3
She enters the thickness, and a machine starts up
Of chitterlings, and a tremor of wings, and
trillings —
The whole tree trembles and thrills.

18. Words -
• Chitterings – to make a chattering
sound
Tremor of wings – involuntary vibration
of the wings
Trillings – to produce a chirruping
sound
Trembles – to shake
Thrills – a sudden feeling of excitement

19. Explanation -
• As she moved towards the thickness of the
branch, her younger ones started chirruping
and doing vibrations with wings, making a
sound like a machine. Because of the
movement of the bird and her young ones,
the tree starts to shake and thrill.

20. Explanation -
• The poet has given two opposite scenarios
of the tree. The tree first being death-like
and still and then giving life and shelter to
bird and her young ones.

21. Stanza-4
It is the engine of her family.
She stokes it full, then flirts out to a branch-end
Showing her barred face identity mask

22. Words -
• Flirts out – lead on to
• Stokes – to add fuel to the engine
• Barred – stripy

23. Explanation -
• The Laburnum tree is the engine of her
family. She provides food to her young ones
and moves to the other branch end. Her
dark coloured striped face is visible as her
body is yellow coloured and hides behind
the yellow leaves of the tree.

24. Stanza- 5
Then with eerie delicate whistle-chirrup
whisperings
She launches away, towards the infinite
And the laburnum subsides to empty.

25. Words -
• Eerie – weird and strange
• Whistle-chirrup – gentle whisper like
the chirping of the bird
• Subsides – diminishes

26. Explanation -
• After reaching the end of the branch, the
bird makes a sweet chirping sound just like
whispering and flies away towards the
infinite sky. It again makes the Laburnum
tree silent and dead-like again.

27. POETIC DEVICES-
Alliteration –
repetition of a consonant sound at the beginning of two
or more consecutive words. The instances of alliteration
in the poem are as follows-
• September sunlight
• tree trembles

28. POETIC DEVICES-
Simile –
comparison between two things
using like or as.
• Sleek as a lizard

29. POETIC DEVICES-
• Metaphor –
an indirect comparison between two things.
Generally, a quality is compared.
• “She enters the thickness, and a machine starts up” - the
noise created by the movement of the birds is compared
to the machine’s noise
“It is the engine of her family.”
“Showing her barred face identity mask”

30. POETIC DEVICES-
Personification –
the attribution of personal nature characteristics
to something non-human
The whole tree trembles and thrills.

31. POETIC DEVICES-
Transferred Epithet –
the figure of speech where the adverb is
transferred to another noun
her barred face identity mask

32. THANK YOU….