Study Guide: The Telephone Call by Fleur Adcock

Study Guide: The Telephone Call by Fleur Adcock is a detailed analysis of Fleur Adcock’s poem, “The Telephone Call.” The poem is one of the six non-African poems recommended for the harmonised Literature-in-English syllabus for senior secondary schools (2026–2030) in West Africa. The text is prescribed for WASSCE, NECO SSCE, and other equivalent O-Level examinations within this period. This study guide is also suitable for students preparing for Cambridge IGCSE Literature-in-English examinations.

“The Telephone Call” by Fleur Adcock presents a dramatic yet ironic account of a telephone conversation in which the speaker is informed that she has won an enormous lottery prize. The poem exposes how modern systems manufacture hope, commodify emotion, and discard individuals once the “experience” is complete. The forty-eight-line poem was originally published in Adcock’s early poetry collection, The Incident Book.

This Literature PADI study guide offers a comprehensive analysis of the poem, covering its background, setting, summary, structure, stanza-by-stanza analysis, figures of speech, tone and mood, and central themes.

Ridwan Adédèjì

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Literature PADI