Examine How Poets Show Attitudes to Love

            The three poems that I feel explore different attitudes to love and sex effectively are The Beggar Women' by William King, To His Coy Mistress' by Andrew Marvell and Rapunzstiltskin' by Liz Lochhead.
             The first one is pre-1900 and is written with the woman as the stronger character. It explores love and sex by making it appear that the male character is in control when actually the female character is more in control than first appears, which is evident at the end of the poem. In contrast To His Coy Mistress' examines love and sex from the mans point of view which is highly controversial and is a Carpe Diem poem. The third poem, Rapunzstiltskin' is written in a well-known fairytale format and is a narration about a love story which has gone dramatically wrong. It has references to many differing fairytales from the obvious Rapunzel' and Rumpelstiltskin' to Red Riding Hood' and Sleeping Beauty'.
             The Beggar Woman' is a narrative poem which is slightly comical in places to provide light relief. It includes many metaphors about the male character e.g. line 4 and line 40 and a metaphor regarding the womans child - line 36 - however the woman does not feature in any metaphors, is this another way of showing that the woman is actually the strongest character even though she doesn't appear to be?! To His Coy Mistress' begins in a persuasive tone and then becomes slowly more desperate towards the end. It uses hidden metaphors to illustrate his feelings e.g. line 11 and line 24. It also personifies time in line 22 which helps Andrew Marvell put across how the subject of the poem is feeling. The third poem Rapunzstiltskin' has many connotations which show various viewpoints towards the underlying meaning within the poem. It begins with an ampersand which is unconventional, this ampersand is also in the middle of a sentence which is also highly unusual. The tower is a metaphor for the way the female character is metaphorically trapped in a tower because she doesn't have a male partner.