GCSE-readyLove's Dog by Jen Hadfield: context, form and key methods
A list poem that sets the things the speaker loves about love against the things she hates. This poem is in copyright, so it is described mainly in our own words.
Context and Hadfield's purpose
The poem refuses to give a simple answer about love. It suggests that every good thing about love comes with something bad.
Form and structure
Every line starts the same way: "What I love about love" or its opposite about hate. The couplets alternate, balancing a positive with a negative each time.
The poem does not build to a conclusion; it ends on a negative line, leaving love unresolved.
Language and key methods
Unexpected word choices: the lines end with surprising words, some medical (such as diagnosis and prognosis), some domestic or odd, which make love seem strange and unpredictable.
Antithesis: setting love against hate in every couplet shows that the two feelings are tangled together.
Compare how mixed feelings about love are presented in Love's Dog and Valentine.
- Both poems show love as a mixture of good and bad.
- Hadfield's antithesis and anaphora; Duffy's extended metaphor.
- AO3: both are modern poems that reject sentimental ideas of love.
Answer: Both Hadfield and Duffy present love as a mixture of pleasure and pain. Hadfield's anaphora, with lines starting "What I love about love" and then its opposite about hate, creates a pattern of antithesis in which every positive is cancelled by a negative. Duffy also shows love's two sides, but through one extended metaphor: the onion is beautiful like the moon, yet it brings tears, and the final line "Lethal" warns of danger. Hadfield's list ends unresolved, suggesting love can never be summed up, while Duffy's speaker is confident and controlling. Both poets reject the sentimental clichés of romance.
Hadfield, Shetland; Nigh-No-Place, 2008 (T. S. Eliot Prize). Sixteen lines in eight couplets, no punctuation; anaphora ("What I love about love"); antithesis of love and hate; surprising word choices; unresolved ending.
- Context
- The circumstances in which a text was written and set, such as historical events, social attitudes and the writer's life (AO3 in the GCSE, AO4 in the International GCSE).
- Form
- The type and shape of a text: for example sonnet, ballad, free verse, tragedy, comedy, novel or play.
- Speaker
- The voice of a poem. The speaker is not always the poet.
- Anaphora
- Repeating the same word or phrase at the start of several lines or sentences to build emphasis.
- Stanza
- A group of lines forming a section of a poem (a verse).
- Couplet
- Two lines of poetry that go together, usually rhyming. A Shakespearean sonnet ends with a rhyming couplet.
All GCSE and International GCSE English Literature key terms and definitions →
Try two quick questions
See if it has sunk in. Answers are marked straight away.
Check you have got it
Answer 6 quick questions with instant marking. If you get one wrong, GCSE-ready shows you why and gives you another go. It is free, and you do not need an account.
Last updated 2 October 2026. Spotted a mistake? Tell us and we will fix it.