Report from England. My niece:

This is completely pointless since you can't do anything about it but I'm going to bitch anyway.

This happened yesterday and pissed me off royally. What the hell is wrong with AQA? I studied that poem for a year, and I haven't turned into a knife wielding psychopath. The rest of the anthology isn't any different. The other things in that section include two poems by Robert Browning, both about murder, a short story by Sylvia Plath which has a disturbing passage about prison camps in the second world war and a poem called Hitcher where a guy picks up a hitchhiker and beats him to death with a krook lock! I find it really patronising that they don't think 15 and 16 year olds can cope with serious issues. It's like they don't believe we can take it in it's context. The poem was written in the height of Thatcherism, the reasons behind knife crime and social issues today are entirely different. It just seems sad to me that AQA can't even interpret a poem in their own anthology. Also, giving in because of three complaints? That is pathetic, three reactionary, uninformed, ignorant people and they cave.
Anyway, rant over. I'm fine, sixth form starts tomorrow, which is very exciting.

Hope you're doing well,
Helen.