Analyse af Tich Miller

The poem Tich Miller is about the socially excluded school student Tich Miller. Tich Miller is eleven years old and is described by a first person narrator, whom we, as readers, do not know much about. One thing we do know for certain, is that the narrators nickname is Tubby and that she as well is rather unpopular. But the poem is just as much about their relationship, as it is about their unpopularity. Because after finishing the poem you are left with the question: “What killed Tich Miller? Was it the unpopularity and the bullying, or was Tubby's turndown, that drove Tich to suicide?”. ”We avoided one another’s eyes” is a line from the poem, clearly saying that even the other unpopular kid, Tubby, does not want Tich as a friend. Fact is though, that Tubby and Tich are both quite alone. Tich is described as clumsy and quite, a girl not much of socialising, some of the typical traits, to be seen with unpopular children. Very interesting is the specific details, Tubby chooses to describe Tich through. For instance the first three lines says: “Tich Miller wore glasses, with elastoplast-pink frames and had one foot three sizes larger than the other”. Already from the first line, Tubby describes Tich, in a way very few people would like to be described. Instantly exposing negative features, is a sign of hate, disgust, or at least a need to take distance from the discussed individual. It also shows that Tubby is a rather cold person, who is willing to fight to push herself higher in the “popularity hierarchy”, even though the dream of popularity, assumably is unattainable. Tubby is described as being overweight (the slang for overweight is 'chubby') and overlooked, but not os as much as Tich ('Usually they chose me, the lesser dud'), who indeed is alone. That also may be the reason that it is Tich and not Tubby, who in the end, decides to take her own life. And talking the last stanza, “Tich Miller died when she was twelve” it has got to be between the most powerful, single standing lines, the present writer has ever read. 'For Whom The Bells Tolls' or 'Of Mice and Men' are indiscussably a lot more emotional as an entirety, but no line in neither of these works, or any other work I have read (novel as well as poems), has had a single such impacting line, as this one. And the best part is: It is difficult to even say why. Never the less, my guess is that it has a sort of mystique, also to be seen in horror movies. The whole artwork gets too simple. The first three, earlier mentioned lines, are simply too straight forward, only describing physical features. As if a whole lot deeper and untold story lies beneath, unknown, but ready to suddenly jump into our faces, shockingly. This can give a very scary or a very sad effect, depending on what the specific surprise is. We know there is something wrong, but we don not know what it is. Actually, we never get confirmed that Tich Miller even commits suicide; assumably that is what she did, but technically, she could have died from cancer.