26. Elvis’s Twin Sister

About this Lecture

Lecture

In this module, we think about the twenty-sixth poem in the collection, 'Elvis's Twin Sister', focusing in particular on: (i) the figure of Elvis Presley and his real-life twin brother who didn't survive childbirth; (ii) the idea that Elvis did have a twin who lived not in Graceland, but "a land of grace"; and (iii) the scattering of Elvis songs throughout the poem ("blue suede shoes", "Heartbreak Hotel").

Course

In this course, Professor John McRae (University of Nottingham) explores Carol Ann Duffy’s 1999 collection, 'The World's Wife'. After a brief introduction to the collection as a whole, the course continue with a read-through and analysis of each of the thirty poems in the collection, one by one.

Lecturer

John McRae is Special Professor of Language in Literature Studies and Teaching Associate in the School of English at Nottingham University, and holds Visiting Professorships in China, Malaysia, Spain and the USA. He is co-author of The Routledge History of Literature in English with Ron Carter, and also wrote The Language of Poetry, Literature with a Small 'l' and the first critical edition of Teleny by Oscar Wilde and others.