Analyse the title of ‘Climbing My Grandfather’. What impact might the title have on the reader?

The title acts as a metaphor. The speaker imagines his grandfather as a mountain to be climbed, allowing him to explore who he is as a person. Readers may identify with this, as of course, with any grandparent, we realise that age leaves a history of waking moments and experiences in life that need to be explored.

The title 'Climbing My Grandfather' can evoke a range of perspectives on the reader. Initially, it regards the relationship between the poet and their grandfather. One prominent theme which arises from this is nostalgia and childhood memories. The act of 'climbing' his grandfather is akin to that of mountaineering, and has been presented through an extended metaphor of rock climbing. Overall, the tone is loving and light humoured, which can influence the reader to possibly reflect on their own nostalgic memories.

My immediate reaction to this title was a feeling of appreciation. Not only for my own Grandfather, but for the simplistic effect of the title. Grandparents, in this specific case, Grandfathers, are held in esteem and with a great deal of affection by many. They possess a unique understanding of the world, life and, perhaps most interestingly; our parents. They know our parents better than we, as children do. They raised them, they cared for them and they helped mould them into the adults that brought us into the world. There is also a common ground to be found between grandchildren and their grandparents, where they occupy two environments where life is, as far as Grandfather is concerned, generally coming to a point where new experiences are a rare occurrence. For young children, new experiences are not in short supply, and both individuals live in a rather carefree state, whilst the aforementioned parents inhabit the middle ground where the rush of work, bills, building a family and finding a happy and healthy work/life balance is often their biggest challenge. The more a child gets to know their Grandparent, the more they may get to know themselves and where they truly originate from. The world climbing compels me to think of a tree, a family tree. By climbing their family tree, from the lower branches up to the highest echelons occupied by their grandparents, the child has the chance to collect a wealth of knowledge along the way.

Hi!

Climbing My Grandfather is a semi-biographical account of the speaker's journey climbing his grandfather, grasping for the memories connected to the body. The title of the poem is important for a variety of reasons. Firstly, Waterhouse was an environmentalist and this connection between the landscape and his own personal connections highlights the importance that nature has to him.

More importantly, the journey that the speaker takes in this poem is reflected in the physical things connected to his grandfather - Waterhouse uses this extended metaphor (sometimes referred to as a conceit) to establish this connection. The impact that the title has on the reader specifically is that it enforces the connection of the physical and metaphorical aspects of the poem thereby bringing a sense of realism to Waterhouse's writing.

Involvement is an all important factor that Waterhouse tries to include in his poem as we are immediately introduced to this 'deci[sion]' that the speaker has to make. We, the reader, feel included in this decision and feel that we are now a part of the metaphorical journey in climbing his grandfather with him.