Basking Shark

Basking Shark

Norman McCaig describes in his poem "Basking Shark", his meeting between him and the shark, and how this had a profound effect on him, as it made him realise that the shark and himself comefrom the same family from way back in the past, and conveys to us that they are the same, that they are one.

The presentation of the shark, as a "rock", shows how strong,hard and tough, including the fact that the poet describes it as an object, shows that the poet has no feelings for the shark. In addition lets take into concern the quotation "That roomised monster",which allows us to visualise the immense size of the shark, and being described as a "monster" expresses the fearfull feelings of the poet towards the shark, because when something is unknown to us we get scared and therefore refer to it as a monster. Furthermore, "matchbox brain", tells us the low degree of intellegence that the shark has, but also the shark scientifically is known of having a small brain, but the attitude showed here by the poet, is showing how unimportant the shark is to him.

The poet's encounter wth the shark leads him to think that they come from the same "slime of everything", indicating that the are connected and that they come from the same family. This is reinforced by the poets use of the word "townee", as a fellow friend, as someone that come from the same place and puts the shark in the same level as him, as if the contain no other difference. In addition the "family tree" indicates a connection, that they are related; however, the shark is from "the wrong branch" showing that the have similarities but also some differences, since they are from the same family but in different branch they have some different mutations, and going back to the start of the poem, we see that is called it a "matchbox brain", and