LitCharts (2024)

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British poet Carol Ann Duffy published "Mrs. Lazarus" in The World's Wife, her 1999 collection of poems focused on the female counterparts to male figures from history and myth. This poem's speaker is the wife of Lazarus, whom Jesus famously raised from the dead in the Bible. Lazarus's resurrection is typically praised as one of Jesus's greatest miracles, but the Mrs. Lazarus of Duffy's poem has a different perspective. Having deeply mourned the loss of her husband, Mrs. Lazarus has finally begun to heal—and to allow herself a chance at new love—when Lazarus unexpectedly returns to a world where he no longer belongs. The poem explores the difficult nature of grief while questioning the concepts of faithfulness and betrayal. It also prompts readers to reconsider how traditional expectations around women's bereavement make it difficult for them to move on with their lives.

• Read the full text of “Mrs Lazarus”

• “Mrs Lazarus” Summary

• “Mrs Lazarus” Themes

  • 

    Grief, Letting Go, and Moving On

    Where this theme appears in the poem:

    • Lines 1-29
    • Lines 36-40

  • 

    Patriarchy, Faithfulness, and Betrayal

    Where this theme appears in the poem:

    • Lines 1-40

• Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “Mrs Lazarus”

  • Lines 1-5

    I had grieved. ...
    ... again, dead, dead.

  • Lines 6-10

    Gone home. Gutted ...
    ... my bare neck,

  • Lines 11-15

    gaunt nun in ...
    ... a snapshot, going,

  • Lines 16-20

    going. Till his ...
    ... of my ring.

  • Lines 21-25

    Then he was ...
    ... he was memory.

  • Lines 26-30

    So I could ...
    ... towards me, shouting,

  • Lines 31-35

    behind them the ...
    ... parting before me.

  • Lines 36-39

    He lived. I ...
    ... grave's slack chew,

  • Line 40

    croaking his cuckold ... of his time.

• “Mrs Lazarus” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language

  • Allusion

    Where allusion appears in the poem:

    • Lines 36-40: “He lived. I saw the horror on his face. / I heard his mother's crazy song. I breathed / his stench; my bridegroom in his rotting shroud, / moist and dishevelled from the grave's slack chew, / croaking his cuckold name, disinherited, out of his time.”

  • Asyndeton

    Where asyndeton appears in the poem:

    • Lines 1-5: “I had wept for a night and a day / over my loss, ripped the cloth I was married in / from my breasts, howled, shrieked, clawed / at the burial stones till my hands bled, retched / his name over and over again, dead, dead.”
    • Lines 6-8: “Slept in a single cot, / widow, one empty glove, white femur / in the dust, half.”
    • Lines 8-11: “Stuffed dark suits / into black bags, shuffled in a dead man's shoes, / noosed the double knot of a tie round my bare neck, / gaunt nun in the mirror, touching herself.”
    • Lines 13-16: “but all those months / he was going away from me, dwindling / to the shrunk size of a snapshot, going, / going.”
    • Line 21: “Then he was legend, language;”
    • Line 31: “behind them the women and children, barking dogs,”
    • Lines 32-35: “I knew by the sly light / on the blacksmith's face, the shrill eyes / of the barmaid, the sudden hands bearing me / into the hot tang of the crowd parting before me.”
    • Lines 38-40: “my bridegroom in his rotting shroud, / moist and dishevelled from the grave's slack chew, / croaking his cuckold name, disinherited, out of his time.”

  • Repetition

    Where repetition appears in the poem:

    • Line 1: “I had,” “I had”
    • Line 5: “over,” “over,” “dead, dead”
    • Line 14: “going”
    • Lines 15-16: “going, / going”
    • Line 21: “Then he was,” “Then he was”
    • Line 22: “arm,” “arm”
    • Line 32: “I knew. I knew”
    • Line 36: “I”
    • Line 37: “I,” “I”

    See Also

    LitCharts

  • Imagery

    Where imagery appears in the poem:

    • Lines 2-5
    • Lines 8-11
    • Lines 17-18
    • Lines 19-20
    • Lines 22-24
    • Lines 26-29
    • Lines 32-35
    • Lines 37-40

  • Metaphor

    Where metaphor appears in the poem:

    • Lines 7-8: “one empty glove, white femur / in the dust, half.”
    • Line 9: “shuffled in a dead man's shoes,”
    • Line 11: “gaunt nun in the mirror”
    • Line 12: “the icon of my face”
    • Lines 16-17: “Till his name was no longer a certain spell / for his face.”
    • Line 27: “in a shawl of fine air”
    • Line 39: “the grave's slack chew”

  • Alliteration

    Where alliteration appears in the poem:

    • Line 4: “burial,” “bled”
    • Line 6: “Gone,” “Gutted,” “Slept,” “single”
    • Line 7: “widow,” “one,” “glove,” “white”
    • Line 8: “dust,” “Stuffed,” “dark,” “suits”
    • Line 9: “black,” “bags,” “shuffled,” “dead,” “shoes”
    • Line 10: “noosed,” “double,” “knot,” “neck”
    • Line 11: “nun”
    • Line 12: “face”
    • Line 13: “frame”
    • Line 15: “size,” “snapshot”
    • Line 16: “name,” “no,” “certain,” “spell”
    • Line 17: “for,” “face,” “hair,” “head”
    • Line 21: “legend,” “language”
    • Line 22: “schoolteacher”
    • Line 23: “strength,” “sleeve”
    • Line 29: “hare,” “hedge”
    • Line 33: “blacksmith's”
    • Line 34: “barmaid,” “bearing”
    • Line 36: “He,” “horror”
    • Line 37: “heard,” “breathed”
    • Line 38: “bridegroom”
    • Line 40: “croaking,” “cuckold”

• “Mrs Lazarus” Vocabulary

  Select any word below to get its definition in the context of the poem. The words are listed in the order in which they appear in the poem.

  • Retched
  • Gutted
  • Femur
  • Gaunt
  • Stations of Bereavement
  • Icon
  • Dwindling
  • Hedgerows
  • Shawl
  • Occur to
  • Shrill
  • Shroud
  • The grave's slack chew
  • Disheveled
  • Cuckold
  • Disinherited

  • (Location in poem: Lines 4-5: “retched / his name”)

• Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “Mrs Lazarus”

  • Form

  • Meter

  • Rhyme Scheme

• “Mrs Lazarus” Speaker

• “Mrs Lazarus” Setting

• Literary and Historical Context of “Mrs Lazarus”

• More “Mrs Lazarus” Resources

  • External Resources

    • Duffy Discusses the Genesis of The World's Wife— An interview with Duffy for the Lincoln Review in which she talks about how she started writing poems for this collection.

    • An Introduction to Lazarus of Bethany— Learn more about the story that inspired Duffy's poem.

    • An Overview of the Dramatic Monologue— A video explaining the history of the dramatic monologue, a form Duffy uses in many of her poems (including this one!).

    • A Review of The World's Wife— A Guardian review written of Duffy's fifth collection of poetry, in which "Mrs. Lazarus" was published, by the writer Jeaneatte Winterson.

    • The Poet's Life and Work— Learn more about Duffy in this biography from the Poetry Foundation.

  • LitCharts on Other Poems by Carol Ann Duffy

    • A Child's Sleep

    • Anne Hathaway

    • Before You Were Mine

    • Circe

    • Death of a Teacher

    • Demeter

    • Education For Leisure

    • Elvis's Twin Sister

    • Eurydice

    • Foreign

    • Havisham

    • Head of English

    • In Mrs Tilscher’s Class

    • In Your Mind

    • Little Red Cap

    • Mean Time

    • Medusa

    • Mrs Aesop

    • Mrs Darwin

    • Mrs Faust

    • Mrs Icarus

    • Mrs Midas

    • Mrs Sisyphus

    • Originally

    • Penelope

    • Pilate's Wife

    • Pope Joan

    • Prayer

    • Pygmalion's Bride

    • Queen Herod

    • Quickdraw

    • Recognition

    • Salome

    • Standing Female Nude

    • Stealing

    • The Darling Letters

    • The Dolphins

    • The Good Teachers

    • Thetis

    • Valentine

    • Warming Her Pearls

    • War Photographer

    • We Remember Your Childhood Well

    • Work