The Full Text of “A century later”
The Full Text of “A century later”
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“A century later” Introduction
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Imtiaz Dharker's "A century later" celebrates (and mourns) young women who fight for their right to an education and who often meet with terrible violence from oppressive religious and political forces in response. The poem alludes to the story of Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani activist who stood up to the Taliban when they banned girls' schools in her hometown. The Taliban retaliated by attempting to kill her, but their plan backfired when she survived the attempted assassination and became a world-famous advocate for women's education. Young women like Yousafzai, the poem suggests, will not be stopped by violence, and their ideas can't be killed. Yet even as the poem honors Yousafzai's triumph, it also quietly laments the fact that she and others like her have to march to the "front lines" to win the right to an "ordinary" life as schoolgirls. This poem first appeared in Dharker's 2014 collection Over the Moon.
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“A century later” Summary
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Going to school is like marching into battle, with the sound of the school bell calling them to war. When they go to class, it's as if they're walking into the line of fire. One girl in particular gets singled out as a target: a girl with delicate skin at her temple, and with cheeks still childishly round because she's just 15 years old.
Helpless and trapped, the girl gets shot in the head.
But then she keeps walking. The bullet only makes its way down a road in her mind to a blooming orchard and a welcoming, sunlit field full of poppies and the sound of bees.
This girl has earned the right to live a normal life.
She has earned the right to wear jewelry to a wedding, paint her nails, and go to school. The girl says to the bullet: You're stupid. You have lost. You can't murder a book or the buzz of life it contains.
The speaker describes the sound of a murmuring crowd. Behind the girl, more and more schoolgirls like her are getting ready to head into battle.
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“A century later” Themes
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Girls' Courage in the Face of Violent Oppression
“A century later” honors the courage and persistence of the young women who have fought for their right to an education in places where school has been forbidden to them. The poem alludes in particular to the story of Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani activist who stood up to the Taliban after they forbid girls from attending school in her hometown. A Taliban gunman attempted to assassinate her for her resistance. Not only did she survive, she became a world-famous advocate for women’s education (and the youngest-ever Nobel Peace Prize laureate). Retelling Yousafzai’s story, the poem insists that she and brave young women like her won’t be stopped in their quest for an education, even if the price of their activism is terribly high.
Describing the Taliban's attempt on Yousafzai’s life, the poem’s speaker makes it clear that this young woman has tremendous courage and endurance. Though she's only 15, with a “rounded” face that shows she's still not much more than a child, she "takes [a] bullet in the head" and nevertheless “walks on," refusing to be stopped or cowed by violence.
In fact, she transforms her suffering into action and activism. The assassin's bullet, the speaker imagines, only "cuts / a pathway in her mind" to a vision of a better world, a scene where an “orchard / in full bloom” and a “field humming in the sun” speak symbolically of hopes coming to fruition and female strength rising (the latter evoked by a “humming” field that suggests the sounds of an energetic, collaborative “swarm” of bees: besides standing for cooperation, hard work, sweet reward, and stinging self-defense, bees symbolize female power, as their hives are led by queens).
This vision of the bullet “open[ing] a path” toward this better world rather than blotting it out makes the point that brave young women like Yousafzai simply refuse to be cowed or destroyed by violence. Rather than hiding away from further suffering, the poem's Yousafzai uses her injury to spread her beautiful, hopeful visions further. (And that's true to life: the story of Yousafzai's courage became world-famous, giving her an even better platform from which to continue fighting for women’s education. Dharker underscores this point by never directly naming Yousafzai in the poem. Her story has become so famous that the poem doesn’t need to say her name for readers to recognize her.)
Though it’s horrific that young women should face violence in their quest for something so “ordinary” as an education, the poem suggests, violence can’t and won’t stop them. Their ideas can’t be erased, and their courage is tremendous.
Where this theme appears in the poem:- Lines 1-19
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The Unstoppable Power of Learning and Ideas
As well as celebrating the sheer courage of the young women who stand up for their right to an education even in the face of violent oppression, this poem explores some of the reasons this fight is so essential. Shared ideas and learning, in this poem, are an unstoppable force; ideas are power, and access to a world of thought and ideas is a big part of what these young women are fighting for.
Describing the Taliban’s failed assassination of the young Pakistani women’s rights activist Malala Yousafzai, the poem imagines Yousafzai addressing the bullet that couldn’t kill her: “Bullet, she says, you are stupid. / You have failed. You cannot kill a book / or the buzzing in it.” Presenting Yousafzai’s indestructible ideas and ideals as a book “buzzing” with energy, this metaphor also makes the point that Yousafzai and young women like her fight for their right to claim the power of knowledge. Book-learning, this image hints, is powerful indeed: ideas are hard to kill! And through education, ideas have the power to spread and to bring about big change.
In demanding their right to an education, then, these young women are also claiming their right to power and influence, their right to have a say in the way their world runs. That is precisely why oppressive political and religious forces like the Taliban attempt to deny them access to schooling.
Where this theme appears in the poem:- Lines 7-10
- Lines 14-16
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Grief for the Suffering and Violence Faced by Youth
Alongside celebrating the courage of young women who stand up for their right to an education even in the face of violence, “A century later” mourns the suffering and danger they face—and the suffering and danger that young people have often faced at the hands of blinkered, cruel older people. In particular, the poem draws a parallel between the dead soldiers of World War I and the armies of young women who march to the “front lines” of a battle every time they walk into a classroom, suggesting that the horrors these two groups of young people have faced are similarly shameful—and depressingly unchanging across a hundred years of history.
The poem’s title reveals something about this broader theme. Imtiaz Dharker has explained that she was inspired to write “A century later” in 2014—a century after the beginning of World War I. In particular, Dharker wrote in response to the soldier poet Wilfred Owen’s “Anthem for Doomed Youth,” a lament for the millions of heartbreakingly young soldiers who died in the mud of the trenches. (He himself would become one of them.) World War I was a particularly bloody and fruitless war, a war in which the political machinations of the older generation massacred a frightening percentage of Europe’s young men.
For young women who have been forbidden an education by oppressive religious or political authorities like the Taliban, the poem suggests, the situation is similar. For them, the “school-bell is a call to battle,” and every day they go to class is a march to the “front line”—a disturbing state of affairs that simply wouldn’t be the case if violent, blinkered adults weren’t in power. The poem’s speaker draws attention to just how young these brave students are, describing “cheeks still rounded from being fifteen.” Like the soldiers of World War I, these girls are little more than children, and adult cruelty and stupidity is forcing them into battle. This poem invites readers to honor and mourn contemporary young women as much as long-ago young men.
Where this theme appears in the poem:- Lines 1-2
- Lines 9-10
- Lines 17-19
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Line-by-Line Explanation & Analysis of “A century later”
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Lines 1-4
The school-bell is ...
... from being fifteen.“A century later” begins with an uneasy metaphor. “The school-bell,” the speaker says, “is a call to battle,” and going to class is taking a “step into the firing-line.” This poem will describe the experience of young women trying to get an education in places where it has been forbidden to them—circumstances in which a classroom may truly turn into a battlefield, a place of violence. At the beginning of the poem, however, this theme isn’t yet explicit. The speaker simply leaves readers to grapple with the disturbing idea of school as a battlefield (and thus the idea of schoolchildren as soldiers).
The reason that these schools are battlefields becomes clearer as the speaker starts retelling the story of Malala Yousafzai:
- Yousafzai is young Pakistani activist who spoke up for girls’ right to an education after the Taliban took over her hometown and shut down girls’ schools. The Taliban at last tried to assassinate her for her activism. She was only 15 years old at the time.
- Yousafzai survived, and she and her family moved to England, where she became a global advocate for women’s education and the youngest-ever winner of a Nobel Peace Prize.
The speaker doesn’t introduce Yousafzai by name, but they don’t need to: her story is world-famous. (Her anonymity here might also allow the poem to be read as a more general celebration of all the girls and women who have similarly faced violence for trying to stand up for their rights: for instance, the two other young women, Kainat Riaz and Shazia Ramzan, whom the Taliban shot alongside Yousafzai, and who thankfully also survived.)
Instead, the speaker shockingly introduces Yousafzai as “the target”:
Here is the target, fine skin at the temple,
cheek still rounded from being fifteen.The speaker seems simultaneously to see this girl from the perspective of the Taliban gunman (who recognizes her as nothing but “the target”) and the perspective of a caring adult looking at a child. Their imagery here, capturing this girl’s “fine skin” and “rounded” cheeks, establishes just how young she is: these soft features come from still “being fifteen,” a child. (Delicate, light /t/ and /f/ alliteration and consonance and tender /ee/ assonance support that sense of youthful fragility: “the target, fine skin at the temple / cheek still rounded from being fifteen.”) This detail clues readers in that it’s Yousafzai whose story they're hearing: she was indeed 15 when the Taliban tried to kill her.
Ominously, the place where the speaker notices this girl’s “fine skin” is at her “temple,” the side of her forehead: just the place where the Taliban assassin aimed.
This story of young women’s battle for their rights will be told in free verse, without a regular rhyme scheme or meter. Imtiaz Dharker will instead shape the poem through changing stanza lengths and meaningful enjambments.
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Lines 5-7
Surrendered, surrounded, she ...
... and walks on. -
Lines 7-10
The missile cuts ...
... full of poppies. -
Lines 11-14
This girl has ...
... go to school. -
Lines 14-19
Bullet, she says, ...
... the front line.
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“A century later” Symbols
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The Orchard and the Field of Poppies
After the assassination attempt in the poem's second and third stanzas, the speaker describes the bullet that hits a young girl, implied to be Malala Yousafzai, "cut[ting] a pathway in her mind" toward an orchard in full bloom in a field of poppies. On one level, this orchard can be thought of as symbolizing her youthful, hope-filled mind. Flowers and spring traditionally represent the springtime of life, and the image suggests that the girl is filled with fresh energy, hope, and ideas. If the orchard is "in full bloom," that means that it's getting ready to fruit—an image that suggests Yousafzai's efforts (and the efforts of young activists like her) will come to beautiful fruition. (This reflects the real-life story the poem is based on: since Yousafzai not only survived this assassination attempt but also persisted in her activism, the news coverage of her survival and bravery only served to amplify her voice, and her suffering ultimately led to the creation of something powerful and inspiring.)
The field "full of poppies" raises other symbolic connotations as well. These flowers are a common symbol of remembrance for the young dead of World War I (of whom Dharker was thinking when she entitled this poem "A century later": she wrote this poem in 2014, the centennial of the Great War). Just as many young men suffered and died on those battlefields, the poppies suggest, many young women suffer and die seeking their rights today. This moment thus creates a mingled vision: the future looks bright and fruitful, while the past is poignantly commemorated.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Lines 8-10: “an orchard / in full bloom, a field humming under the sun, / its lap open and full of poppies.”
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The Buzzing Swarm
Without ever directly mentioning bees, this poem is full of the sounds of them: there's a "field humming under the sun," a book full of energetic "buzzing," and a crowd of schoolgirls who make "a murmur, a swarm." By subtly raising the image of bees, the poem calls up their symbolic meanings: collaboration, hard work, sweetness, and the power of women (as beehives are ruled by queens).
Casting schoolgirl activists as a "swarm" of bees about to rise up together, the poem suggests that women standing together have enormous power. Bees, after all, don't just peaceably make honey: they sting, and they defend each other and their hives. If the young women are a swarm, they're ready to stand together and fight for their rights.
And when the defiant young girl tells the bullet that tried to kill her "You cannot kill a book / or the buzzing in it," she suggests that a bee-like creative energy lives in the words of activists—and that the "buzz" of their writings might pass that energy along.
Bees even sing in the poem's prophetic vision of a "field humming under the sun," a place of eventual fertile, creative reward for the young women's efforts.
Where this symbol appears in the poem:- Line 9: “a field humming under the sun”
- Lines 15-16: “You cannot kill a book / or the buzzing in it.”
- Line 17: “A murmur, a swarm.”
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“A century later” Poetic Devices & Figurative Language
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Imagery
The poem's imagery captures the powerful energy (and poignant youth) of the young women who fight for their right to an education. Describing a girl implied to be the Pakistani activist Malala Yousafzai at the time the Taliban attempted to assassinate her, for instance, the speaker's imagery points out just how very young she looks:
Here is the target, fine skin at the temple,
cheek still rounded from being fifteen.This image of soft skin and round, childish cheeks feels maternal in its tenderness. By presenting Yousafzai this way, the speaker invites readers to share in their outrage and horror that this child should be a "target" for adult male violence.
The imagery of the blooming orchard in the girl's mind further emphasizes the horror of this violence: the bullet "cuts" through the girl's mind and into a lovely world filled with flowers "in full bloom" and sunshine. The girl's mind, this imagery conveys, is warm and vibrantly alive, brimming with hopes and dreams for the future. There's a stark juxtaposition between the violence of that bullet and the wondrous beauty of its target.
But the girl is undefeated by that violence, and so are the many young women fighting the same fight. The speaker supports this point with a subtle, repeated sound. In line 9, there's a "field humming under the sun"; in line 16, a book has a "buzzing in it"; in line 17, an assembling army of schoolgirls makes a "murmur" as they form a "swarm." All of these moments evoke the sounds of bees, suggesting that—like bees—the young women are a collaborative, hardworking force. More than that, they've got a sting: they're ready to work together to fight for their rights.
Where imagery appears in the poem:- Lines 3-4: “Here is the target, fine skin at the temple, / cheek still rounded from being fifteen.”
- Lines 7-10: “The missile cuts / a pathway in her mind, to an orchard / in full bloom, a field humming under the sun, / its lap open and full of poppies.”
- Line 17: “A murmur, a swarm”
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Metaphor
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Alliteration
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Allusion
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Enjambment
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"A century later" 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.
- Temple
- Surrendered
- Bangles
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(Location in poem: Line 3: “fine skin at the temple”)
A point near the hairline on the side of the forehead. The temple is a delicate area, and its mention here highlight's the girl's youth and vulnerability.
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Form, Meter, & Rhyme Scheme of “A century later”
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Form
"A century later" is written in free verse, without a regular form, rhyme scheme, or meter. Instead, Dharker uses a flexible shape to create emotional and musical effect.
The poem's 19 lines are divided into six irregular stanzas that range from two to four lines long. The movement between longer and shorter stanzas creates moments of tension and release throughout the poem. For instance, take a look at the way an enjambment dramatically bridges the second and third stanzas:
Surrendered, surrounded, she
takes the bullet in the headand walks on. The missile cuts
a pathway in her mind, to an orchard
in full bloom, a field humming under the sun,
its lap open and full of poppies.Here, the poem's shape matches the miraculous survival these lines describe. A "bullet in the head" sure seems likely to spell the end for the girl—and for just a moment, as the two-line stanza ends, it feels as if it might. But then, through that enjambment, the girl's life moves on. So does the poem, into a redemptive image of a blooming paradise that unfolds at leisure over four lines of rich imagery. The reader, still shocked by the bullet to the head, thus gets a lot of space and time to soak up the surprising, poignant idea that the girl's suffering ultimately leads toward something beautiful and fertile.
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Meter
"A century later" is written in free verse, so it doesn't use a traditional meter. The poem's rhythms instead come from changing line lengths and stanza shapes.
For example, consider the way the poem's shortest stanzas work (each just two lines long). First comes the second stanza (lines 5-6), which describes an assassination attempt on a 15-year-old girl who dares to go to school (an allusion to the story of Malala Yousafzai). Listen to the enjambment here:
Surrendered, surrounded, she
takes the bullet in the headThe abrupt, unnatural-sounding line break between "she / takes" gets at the sheer shock, violence, and wrongness of this murderous act.
The girl survives, and the speaker describes her "walk[ing] on" toward a vision of fertile beauty. Then comes the short, bracing fourth stanza (lines 11-12). The speaker here declares:
This girl has won
the right to be ordinary,At first, line 11 seems ready to stand on its own: in just four punchy words, "This girl has won" makes a bold statement of triumph. But then comes another enjambment. The sentence continues in line 12, describing the fruits of this girl's victory: the simple "right to be ordinary."
Both of these stanzas thus use interrupted rhythms to create layers of meaning—and to capture the drama and triumph of the girl's suffering and survival.
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Rhyme Scheme
There's no rhyme scheme in this free verse poem. Nonetheless, there's plenty of music. Dharker uses abundant alliteration, assonance, and consonance to make her verse sing. For example, listen to the echoes in lines 3-5:
Here is the target, fine skin at the temple,
cheek still rounded from being fifteen.Surrendered, surrounded, [...]
In lines 3-4, delicate /t/ and /f/ alliteration/consonance and sweet /e/ assonance helps to highlight the girl's heartbreaking youth: the sounds here are as "fine" as the "skin at the temple" a gunman will soon take aim at. Then, in line 5 (in which a gunman corners the girl), the densely alliterative/consonant sounds of "surrendered, surrounded" feel fittingly claustrophobic.
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“A century later” Speaker
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The poem's speaker is a passionate, lyrical observer. Rather than taking part in the poem's action, they describe events from a distance. In particular, they train their eye on the many young women around the world fighting for their right to an education in the face of sexist (and often violent) oppression.
The speaker retells the story of Malala Yousafzai, the young Pakistani activist and Nobel Peace Prize winner who survived a Taliban assassination attempt after advocating for girls' education in her hometown. Though the speaker never names Yousafzai, they don't need to: the story of a 15-year-old girl who "takes [a] bullet in the head" and lives is a famous one.
The speaker celebrates Yousafzai's survival and persistence as an inspiration: her story (and her continued bravery and activism) opens up a vision of a better world for young women like her, inspiring many more to "take their places on the front line" of activism. But also, the speaker poignantly observes, this young woman has earned "the right to be ordinary": to live her life and get an education, the sadly simple desires for which the Taliban nearly murdered her.
The poem's speaker is clearly moved by Yousafzai's courage—and by the courage of all the young women like her who demand their right to an education in spite of serious danger. They're also terribly sad at the thought of these young women's suffering. The poem's title, "A century later," alludes to one of Dharker's inspirations for this poem: Wilfred Owen's "Anthem for Doomed Youth," a World War I poem lamenting young men ruthlessly and pointlessly murdered in battle. A century after World War I broke out, Dharker reflects, it's brave young women who stand on the "firing-line."
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“A century later” Setting
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The poem never specifies its surroundings. Readers know only that it takes place "A century later"—but a century later than what? Dharker has explained that she wrote this poem in 2014, the centennial of the outbreak of World War I. On that occasion, she read Wilfred Owen's battlefield poem "Anthem for Doomed Youth" and reflected on the ways in which dreadful battles still chew up the lives of the young.
In this case, the battles she's thinking of aren't those fought on literal battlefields. Rather, the poem focuses on young women's fight to get an education in places where it's forbidden to them. In particular, the speaker's retelling of the story of Malala Yousafzai suggests that the poem takes place in Pakistan, where Yousafzai advocated for girls' schooling and survived a Taliban assassination attempt.
But really, the poem's concerns go beyond national borders. The speaker's description of "schoolgirls [...] standing up / to take their places on the front line" could suggest schoolgirls in any place where young women are denied an education; sadly, that could mean any number of places in the world.
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Literary and Historical Context of “A century later”
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Literary Context
Imtiaz Dharker is a British poet who was born in Lahore, the capital of Pakistan, in 1954. She grew up primarily in Glasgow, Scotland, where her family moved when she was one year old. Dharker studied at the University of Glasgow, graduating with an M.A. in English Literature and Philosophy. She has won many awards for her poetry, including a 2011 Cholmondeley Prize and a 2014 Queen's Gold Medal, and serves as a member of the Royal Society of Literature. Alongside her writing, Dharker works as an artist and a documentarian.
Dharker has published numerous books of verse, including the 2014 Over the Moon, in which this poem was first collected. Her poems often deal with questions of identity, home and exile, cultural displacement, and community.
This poem's title, "A century later," might seem a little cryptic at first. But its meaning becomes clearer when readers learn that Dharker wrote this poem in response to the poet Wilfred Owen's "Anthem for Doomed Youth," an elegy for the millions of young soldiers who died in the trenches of World War I. World War I was known as the "war to end all wars"; sadly, as Dharker's poem reflects, that wasn't true. Writing 100 years after World War I began, Dharker reflects here on ongoing battles in which the young still die: this time, young women battling for an education under regimes that would rather kill them than allow them to learn.
Historical Context
This poem alludes to the story of Malala Yousafzai, the famous women's education activist. Dharker doesn't need to say Yousafzai's name for readers to recognize her: her story has become legendary.
As a young woman, Yousafzai fought back when the Taliban took control of her hometown in Pakistan and declared that (among other repressive new rules) girls would no longer be allowed to go to school. Yousafzai not only defiantly returned to class, she agitated for young girls' rights to get an education, leading protests and giving speeches.
When Yousafzai was only 15, a masked Taliban gunman attempted to assassinate her on the bus home from school. Miraculously, she survived. Granted political asylum in England, she and her family began a new life; Yousafzai continued to advocate for women's rights, took a degree at Oxford University, and founded the Malala Fund, an organization dedicated to girls' education. She was awarded the Nobel Peace Prize for her efforts, becoming the youngest person ever to receive that honor.
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More “A century later” Resources
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External Resources
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The Poem Aloud — Listen to Imtiaz Dharker reading the poem aloud (and describing how the Wilfred Owen poem "Anthem for Doomed Youth" inspired her).
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A Short Biography — Learn more about Dharker via her publisher, Bloodaxe Books.
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The Poem's Inspiration — Learn more about the story of Malala Yousafzai, the young activist who was one of the inspirations for this poem.
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A Celebration of Dharker — Read an article about Dharker from the year that she won the Queen's Gold Medal for Poetry.
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Dharker's Website — Visit Dharker's personal website to learn more about her life and work.
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LitCharts on Other Poems by Imtiaz Dharker
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