‘Valentine’ is a romantic conceit poem that attempts to reveal the true essence of love and was written by Carol Ann Duffy. ‘Love it or loathe it... it’s Valentine’s Day’, is an opinion article written by Taraya Galloway, who uses a text structure similar to the PEA chain method in her article.
The global issue which I have found present in both texts is the dogmatic perception of love through art. Both the poem and the article show the issue as they both utilize poetry and diction to challenge this dogmatic perception of love which we carry. In ‘Valentine’, Duffy writes “[n]ot a red rose or a satin heart’, which acts as a hook for the readers and almost instantly challenges the insistent perception of love, highlighting items that represent superficiality in love such as cute cards or kissograms. Following that, Duffy writes, “I give you an onion”. An onion is not typically associated with love but is used as an extended metaphor throughout the poem to describe love in its genuine form, one which is deep and has many layers.
In ‘Love it or loathe it… it’s Valentine’s Day’, Taraya states “[c]hocolate boxes and red, red roses. That’s what Valentine’s Day is right?”, which immediately hooks the audience to the text and sets a sarcastic and informal tone which is again used to challenge the dogmatic perception of love we currently have. A couple other sarcastic and ironic examples which also challenge and even butcher the stubborn perception of love show themselves in the text. These include that Valentine’s day is a day when individuals convey “...typically unsaid feelings of appreciation and adoration...” to their loved ones, showing the irony that these strong feelings of love are only conveyed on this annual tradition. The other being that Valentine’s day “...originated somewhere, and it wasn’t hallmark”, which uses sarcastic diction to reveal and challenge our dogmatic perception of love.
Setting aside the global issue, one can notice love being a common theme in both of the texts. In ‘Valentine’, Duffy uses an onion as an extended metaphor symbolizing love, to provide a raw, truthful, sophisticated, and significantly deep definition of it. Furthermore, she compares the onion to objects like the moon and an onions loops to a wedding ring, both of these items which are commonly associated with romantic love.
In the article, Taraya implicitly uses sarcastic remarks to highlight the lack of understanding of Valentine’s day. A couple of these include, “[c]hocolate boxes and red, red roses. That’s what Valentine’s day is, right?” and “...the fact remains that the day itself originated somewhere, and it wasn’t Hallmark.” Additionally, Taraya explicitly uses evidence, by means of introducing newspaper articles to further underscore her main argument. These are comprised of, “[t]he meaning of Saint Valentine’s day”, “[c]ards and Novelties Stress Meaning of Valentine’s Day”, and “[a] Loving Disagreement”. By using these pieces of evidence, Taraya attempts to reveal the truth about Valentine’s day; especially the fact that this universally misunderstood holiday goes beyond the superficial acts of love such as gifting generic Valentine’s cards.
It is through Duffy’s artful poetic techniques, the witty use of sarcasm in Tarayas article, as well as the evidence she uses to underscore her argument through which the dogmatic perception of love is challenged. In addition, both the poem and the article seek highlight (directly or indirectly) the significant misunderstanding people have about Valentine’s day.
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