Introduction

In Unit 1 of the senior secondary curriculum Literature course, students analyse (through detailed textual study) the significance of ideas and the distinctive qualities of texts, in order to develop their knowledge and understanding of different ways of reading and creating literary texts. Judith Beveridge’s poetry in Sun Music, with its distinctive and consistent stylistic qualities and preoccupations, is a rich and approachable body of work for students to explore in this manner.

This unit could also be used for the NSW Stage 6 Common Module: Reading to Write, focusing on responding creatively to Beveridge’s work through the creation of poetry and reflection on the process of drafting, redrafting and polishing work. It could also be used for the NSW Stage 6 Standard Module B: Close Study of Literature, or Advanced Module B: Critical Study of Literature, which both allow for study of a poetry text ‘which may constitute a selection of poems from the work of one poet’.

Many of Judith Beveridge’s poems – with their focus on animals/nature and short, sharply drawn portraits of people – could also be studied by younger students. Using appropriate selections from the poems and the activities in this unit, teachers could devise short units of work based on animal poetry, ‘portraits and landscapes’, nature poetry or poetry of social justice for students in Year 9 or Year 10.

Sun Music collects work from anthologies published over a thirty-year period, together with previously unpublished poems. Those studied in this unit enable students to both observe the distinctive and consistent stylistic elements and thematic concerns of Beveridge’s writing, and also to look for developments or shifts in her preoccupations. For example, a slight shift from the observational to the reflective is apparent in some of the later (previously unpublished) poems dealing with subjects like family, memory, grief and elegy. In her author’s note to Sun Music, Beveridge reflects on how the anthology represents both consistency and development; teachers and students will benefit from reading this note and considering the reasons behind selections.

This unit involves a close study of four poems, with several others suggested for wider reading (listed in the wider reading table [PDF, 94KB]). Together, they represent poetry that:

  • spans Beveridge’s body of work (drawing from all previous anthologies represented in Sun Music and from the previously unpublished poems);
  • expresses a variety of themes but also a remarkable consistency of preoccupation over a long period of time, enabling students to observe similarities and cohesion in the body of work;
  • is rich in language and displays many of Beveridge’s distinctive stylistic traits (see the introductory PowerPoint [PDF, 803KB]);
  • focuses on a mixture of both natural and human subjects, allowing for a critical approach from a number of perspectives (environmental/ecocritical and Marxist/social justice).

Beveridge has long been acclaimed for her deft, playful and evocative use of language, her richness of sensory detail, and her engagement with the natural world and the way humans interact with it. Students will notice the sharply observational nature of her poetry. They will learn much about her careful selection of structural features, subject matter and vivid (often surprising and unusual) imagery to lovingly portray beautiful and detailed landscapes and portraits of humans and animals, whose conditions are depicted with compassion, honour and dignity.

The four poems to be studied are:

  • ‘The Domesticity of Giraffes’ (originally published in The Domesticity of Giraffes, 1987)
  • ‘Bahadour’ (originally published in Wolf Notes, 2003)
  • ‘Herons at Dusk’ (originally published in Storm and Honey, 2009)
  • ‘Sun Music’ (published for the first time in Sun Music, 2018)

Note: These will not be approached in strict chronological order. ‘Bahadour’ is a very rich text for beginning the unit (with a teacher-led annotation to model analysis), while other poems lend themselves to increasingly independent/student-centred activities.

See the wider reading table for other suggested poems grouped under broad category headings. These have been selected for their similarity in theme and some technical aspects, and grouped with a view to facilitating critical approaches through different lenses later in the unit – in particular, environmental/ecocritical and Marxist/social justice. Other poems in the table are drawn from the anthology Accidental Grace (1996), ensuring that all stages of Beveridge’s career are represented in this unit. Also see the introductory PowerPoint for initial descriptions of the selected poems, and an overview of their themes and stylistic characteristics.

Students will recognise the unique stylistic characteristics of Beveridge’s work and appreciate the careful craftsmanship for which she is renowned. They will be encouraged to emulate this in crafting their own poetry and analysing how hers is rich in both literary technique and values.

Introductory activities

Activity 1: connecting poetry with personal experience

Ask students to think of their favourite place of natural beauty OR a wild animal that they love or are interested in.

  1. Direct them to write 5–10 adjectives or phrases that describe this place/animal.
  2. Then ask them to expand this work by adding movement. Discuss the power of verbs to ‘show not tell’. Choose a subject and model/brainstorm strong verbs that can bring this subject to life, before directing students to add to their own work.
  3. Ask students to look at the nouns they have included. Encourage them to add to or replace these with more interesting/varied nouns to create a more concrete and easily imagined scene.
  4. Since part of this unit’s focus is creating and reflecting on students’ own poetry, establish from the outset the need to reflect and refine. Ask students to replace the three least interesting words/phrases from their list with better, sharper, more expressive ones.
  5. Next ask them to add at least one simile or metaphor to enhance their descriptions. Encourage them to consider such aspects as size, colour, movement, beauty, atmosphere and other qualities that can be expressed by way of a comparison.
  6. Ask them to arrange their words and phrases into a small poem, add an illustration and publish their work digitally via a Learning Management System (or in hard copy for a wall display).

ACELR017   ACELR018

Activity 2: getting started with the text (‘five-minute flick’)

Allow students to flick or skim through Sun Music for about five minutes to get an overall impression of the type of poetry within. Using a collaborative mind mapping tool, students contribute answers to these questions:

  1. What sorts of subjects does Judith Beveridge write about?
  2. What other texts do you know that deal with similar subjects?

Activity 3: further familiarisation and preparatory reading

Students complete the scavenger hunt activity (PDF, 95KB) to increase their familiarity with the contents of the anthology. This can be done at home as preparatory reading for the unit.

ACELR002   ACELR004

Personal response on reading the text

Activity 4: Poetry TASTER

Ask the students to select any ONE poem from Sun Music (the four chosen for close analysis in the next section can be excluded if desired – see the wider reading table for these poems in bold type).

They should then complete the poetry TASTER table (PDF, 94KB) using the scaffold to record their initial responses to their chosen poem, including direct quotes from the poem (where necessary) to support their ideas. They can then share their work with one or two other students who have chosen different poems.

Note: This TASTER scaffold can be reused throughout the unit whenever a student encounters a new poem independently, or to support teacher-led analysis of the four selected poems.

ACELR002   ACELR005   ACELR009   ACELR010

Key elements of the text

Provide students with an overview of Judith Beveridge’s work, the anthology’s key elements and what is to come in the unit using the introductory PowerPoint.

Students will need to refer back to this resource, so either make it available via your Learning Management System or ask them to take detailed notes as they view the presentation.

Ask students to read the ‘Author’s Note’ in the text and make notes under the following headings:

  • What Beveridge values about her own work
  • How Beveridge sees her work as having developed over time
  • Beveridge’s main areas of interest (key themes)
  • What Beveridge says about how poetry is crafted

Encourage discussion about what makes a ‘good’ poem worthy of inclusion, and ask students to speculate on why the four poems in this unit were chosen to represent the poet’s body of work.

Synthesising activity

Comparing initial responses with the others’ observations

  1. Ask students to journal or blog about their initial response to Beveridge’s poetry so far.
  2. Ask students to read, in their own time, at least five of the following reviews. They should list words and phrases that the reviewers use to describe Beveridge’s poetry, and highlight those that resonate with their own initial impressions:

ACELR003   ACELR004   ACELR012