In the poem’s final movement, Rumens presents the speaker’s relationship with her city as active, tender, and openly defiant. The speaker gives the city her language and combs its hair: “I comb its hair and love its shining eyes, / my city takes me dancing through the city / of walls.” The personification of the city — hair, eyes, dancing — transforms a political space into an intimate companion. Rumens suggests that identity is not just where you came from; it is an active relationship you maintain.
The “city of walls” is the hostile present-day environment — the country the speaker now inhabits, or the bureaucratic barriers of displacement and exile. The city of sunlight moves through this hostile space like a companion, not a ghost. The final accusation — “They accuse me of loving it” — reveals that the speaker’s loyalty to her homeland is treated as a crime by those around her. Rumens presents this accusation as evidence of tyranny’s reach: the oppressors have not just claimed the city; they are trying to erase the speaker’s right to remember it. They fail. The city “shines” in defiance.
Quick Check: What argument does Rumens make by personifying the city as a dancing companion rather than a fixed memory?
Rumens presents the relationship between the speaker and her city as living and active, not a passive nostalgia. By having the city “take her dancing”, Rumens argues that the city’s power is not static — it moves through the present alongside the speaker. This is not grief for something lost; it is an ongoing identity. Rumens positions the city as a source of agency and joy that political oppression cannot reach, because it exists inside the speaker, not in a physical location.
This deep dive covers 🔍 Stage 3 — Defiance: The City Lives in the Speaker within The Emigrée (Rumens) for GCSE English Literature. Revise The Emigrée (Rumens) in Power and Conflict Poetry for GCSE English Literature with 10 exam-style questions and 15 flashcards. This topic appears regularly enough that it should still be part of a steady revision cycle. It is section 4 of 19 in this topic. Use this deep dive to connect the idea to the wider topic before moving on to questions and flashcards.
Practice questions for The Emigrée (Rumens)
In *The Emigree*, what does the phrase **'my city hides behind me'** most clearly suggest about the speaker's relationship with her homeland?
How does Rumens use **light imagery** in *The Emigree* to encode the speaker's relationship with memory? [2 marks]