Steel Town Sunsets

1. Steel Town Sunsets By Joshua Carter and Michael Waters

2. Overview The poem is about an old man, reflecting on thepast to a younger man. He's talking about how the steel-town of Sheffield used to have beautiful sunsets, but now the town has become polluted due to the steel works and the sunsets aren’t as beautiful as they once were.* *A steel town is a town that produces metals such as steel and silver as their main industry.

3. Themes • Innocence • Memories • Generations • Pollution (possibly) • Reflection

4. Don’t have such sunsets because of pollution past Liked to be alone “We used to have such sunsets”, he said, “you don’t see them so bright anywhere but a steel town. I loved the late shift; orange, red, pink, spread out like a kid’s painting across the dark, and dust spinning in all the lights...” “That’d be pollution, right?” I said it twice: no answer. “Eh?” “Pollution.” “Aye, I suppose.” He stared out at black towers against a grey dusk. First person Represents innocence of the town when there was no pollution The delay of answer shows us that the old man doesn’t fully understand what pollution is. He doesn’t really know what causes the ruined sunsets A metaphor for huge factory chimneys Sunset has no colours anymore due to pollution