‘History‘ by Carol Ann Duffy uses personification to compound all of the events in history into one woman. This woman, representing all women, has seen every major event in the past, Duffy reminds the reader that women have always been present, even if history does not remember them. Right from the moment Jesus was removed from the cross, up until the wartime evacuations within the world wars, women were there, watching and partaking in history. Duffy aims to remind the reader of the female experience, often lost within a history that focuses on the lives of men. The personified ‘everywoman’ is left alone in a rotting house, representing the mistreatment of women throughout history – something that is now only beginning to change.

Duffy writes ‘History‘ in 7 stanzas, each measuring 6 lines. There is no rhyme scheme within the poem. However, there are several cases of internal rhyme. In using this more subtle form of rhyme, Duffy is pointing to the subtextual or hidden history of women, often not remembered but absolutely important. The internal rhyme creates a connection between lines, the subtle ringing of syllables reflecting the connected nature of history. The rhyme creates a link between words, emblematic of the connection between women that spans across history, women present at every major historical event – a testament to their perspective.

The most important technique Duffy uses when writing History is personification. The central unnamed woman within the poem comes to represent all of those forgotten women of the past, events of history personified into the mystery character. In doing this, Duffy connects the female experience, emphasizing the importance of women’s perspectives while also demonstrating how they have been continually abused and undervalued throughout history. The final figure, ‘smelling of pee’ portrays a woman forgotten, women’s perspectives are often deemed not important enough to remember or take care of.

Another technique that Duffy employs within History is a caesura. Caesura disrupts the natural flow of a line, creating tiny pauses that derail the movement of the meter. In doing this, Duffy emphasizes keywords with these pauses coming before or after important phrases. An example of this would be how ‘the Cross, his mother’ both emphasize ‘Cross’ and ‘mother’ due to the caesura in the form of a comma coming between them and inserting a slight pause.

The first word of the poem chimes ‘She’, instantly establishing the central theme of the poem: the female perspective. Duffy places the personified ‘History’ as the first thing the reader encounters upon reading the poem, the disoriented woman waking up ‘alone’. This status of being ‘alone’ reflects how women’s perspective is often forgotten in history.
Duffy rallies against the patriarchal notion that women must be pristine and beautiful, creating a depiction of a woman who goes against these ideas. Her mouth is ‘tooth[less]’, looking ‘half-dead’ as she ‘limped downstairs’. The use of verbs within these two stanzas, ‘limped’, ‘slurped’, ‘wheezed and coughed’, ‘dozed, snored’ all further the indelicate and graceless presentation of the woman. Going against the patriarchal archetype of women, Duffy creates a woman who does not have to look perfect and beautiful, portraying someone who doesn’t care that they smell ‘of pee’.
This description, coming as the final and shortest line of stanza one, ‘smelling of pee’ is finished by an end stop. The blunt nature of this description intends to shock the reader, Duffy displaying the natural state of this woman through a manner that goes against the stereotypes of women. Ugliness and lacking grace are not something to be shied away from, Duffy puts these qualities at the centre of this woman. This simultaneously dismantles the stereotype, while also suggesting that the woman (representing women’s perspectives throughout history) is not cared for by society, Duffy demonstrates how women are left unattended as they grow old.
STANZA 2 CYCLICAL STRUCUTRE OF SLEEPING AND WAKING UP reflects the cyclical structure of history where conflict and wars never truly dissipate and perhaps women are sitll not included within this.

These stanzas begin with the phrase ‘She was History’, the short sentence contrasting the following lengthy descriptions of moments in history. Duffy’s use of a short sentence creates a blunt line, furthered by the use of an end stop. These poetic techniques culminate in a bold depiction of the woman, the grandeur of ‘History’ being attributed to the equally impressive ‘She’ – both being capitalized in this short sentence. This also brings about the idea of patriarchal control throughout history, and inn documents of history where women are forgotten as observers. "His story"- she was his story... suggests that women are only part of a man's story and a man's world.

Duffy uses these stanzas to move through different events in history, each one being witnessed by women. It is interesting to note that the verbs that Duffy uses, ‘been’, ‘seen’, ‘watched’, ‘witnessed’, ‘observed’, are all passive instead of active. This could suggest that women are silent observers in history, watching passively while events happen around them. This links to the historic conception of a woman’s place, Duffy focusing on the idea that women’s perspectives were deemed less important, therefore taking on a passive, rather than active, role in history.

Many poetic techniques are used to emphasize the events, including plosive ‘b’ across ‘blew out his brains’ to further the horror of this imagery, horrific imagery within ‘burnt at the stake’, and enjambment to reflect the movement of the children way on the trains while they ‘waved/their little hands’

Duffy begins each stanza with imagery of sight "been there" "witnessed" "seen up close", emphasising women witnessing events but not being part of them or not being labelled as part of them- men are always active participants in history whilst women are not part of it. Whilst Duffy dismantles the actual involvement of women throughout history, she also dismantles the lack of documentation of women, the lack of representation of women in literature.

Duffy presents the history of war and conflict predominantly as violent and negative which is interesting because this shows the damage men have done throughout history, and the violence of the patriarchy. Duffy subverts the common ideas were one force is seen as a hero- another is seen as evil. In this poem, no one is a hero or part of a glorious event. This also serves as a criticism of the idea of 'glory of war'.