Don Paterson (Scottish Highers English): Revision Notes

11:00: Baldovan

Overview

"11:00: Baldovan" by Don Paterson tells the story of two young boys taking their first unsupervised bus journey to Hilltown. What begins as an exciting childhood adventure gradually transforms into something darker and more unsettling. The poem explores the experience of growing up and the way change can make the familiar world suddenly feel alien and threatening.

Paterson uses the bus journey as a metaphor for the transition from childhood to adulthood. The boys begin full of confidence and excitement, counting their coins and planning to buy sweets and comics. However, their confidence gradually gives way to anxiety and confusion. By the poem's end, they return to a transformed world where their mothers and sisters are "fifty years dead", symbolising the profound sense of loss that can accompany growing up.

The poem shifts from realistic description to surreal nightmare. Streets forget their names, rain tastes like sherbet, the bus becomes a "charred wreck", and the familiar landscape turns hostile. This dreamlike quality captures the disorienting nature of change and the loss of childhood innocence. The boys find themselves isolated in an adult world they do not recognise or understand.

Form and structure

Paterson structures the poem in two-line stanzas (couplets) that create a steady, building tension. This short stanza form works effectively because it forces the reader to pause frequently, mirroring the stop-start nature of a bus journey. The brevity of each stanza also emphasises how quickly things can change, with each couplet potentially introducing a new twist or revelation.

The poem's structure reflects the boys' loss of control as their journey progresses. The first five stanzas form a single sentence that captures the boys' breathless excitement about their adventure. This extended syntax suggests confidence and forward momentum. The fifth stanza contains the simple, assured statement "I plan to buy comics / sweeties, and magic tricks", demonstrating the speaker's sense of being in command of his day.

This confidence is deliberately juxtaposed with what follows. Stanza six begins with "However", a pivot word that marks the poem's crucial turning point. Despite his earlier confidence, the speaker admits he is "obscurely worried". From this moment, the tone shifts dramatically from excitement to anxiety, and then to something approaching terror.

The structural momentum accelerates in the final section. Paterson uses anaphora, repeating "and" at the start of each stanza from stanza eleven onwards. This technique creates several effects. It mimics a child's breathless way of describing events, piling detail upon detail without pause. It also suggests loss of control, as if the frightening vision has "run away with itself" and the speaker cannot stop the cascade of disturbing images. The last seven stanzas form one continuous sentence, driving relentlessly towards the poem's bleak conclusion.

The final line provides closure with devastating finality: "and our sisters and mothers are fifty years dead". This statement ends the poem's single long sentence and emphasises the boys' vulnerability and isolation. They have returned to an adult world where childhood comforts and nurturing figures have vanished.

Stanzas 1-5: Childhood excitement and adventure

The poem opens with two minor sentences: "Base Camp. Horizontal Sleet." These grammatically incomplete sentences create immediate drama, as though the boys are explorers reporting from a significant expedition. The language elevates their simple bus journey into something momentous and adventurous. "Base Camp" borrows terminology from mountaineering, suggesting the boys see themselves as embarking on a heroic quest.

The third stanza introduces "Two small boys" who have "raised the steel flag of the 20 terminus". The adjective "small" immediately establishes their vulnerability and youth, which will become increasingly important as the poem progresses. The metaphor of raising a flag "as if they have reached the top of a mountain" transforms the ordinary act of signalling the bus into a gesture of conquest and achievement. This reveals how children can perceive everyday activities as grand adventures.

The boys are "going up the Hilltown / for the first time ever on our own." Paterson emphasises the significance of this moment by clustering three key words: "first", "ever", and "own". The repetition drives home how monumentally important this journey feels to the boys, even though to adults it represents a short, ordinary bus trip. This is a rite of passage, a step towards independence.

The speaker displays boyish swagger when he considers his "spending power". He lists his coins with evident pride: "shillings", "tanners", "florins" and others. These pre-decimal British coins place the poem in the past, possibly the 1960s. What matters is not the actual value of the money (which is small change) but the attention the boy gives these coins. They represent possibility and adult purchasing power.

The simile "like thick cogs" suggests these coins are integral to the success of the day, just as cogs are essential to a machine's operation. The onomatopoeic verb "chank together" conveys the weight and substance of the coins clinking in his pocket. References to "blazonry" and "bald kings" (images on the coins) suggest the money gives the boy a sense of status and importance as he ventures into the adult world.

The fifth stanza is brief and decisive: "I plan to buy comics / sweeties, and magic tricks." The tone here conveys confidence and authority. The boy has clear intentions and believes he can execute them. For adult readers, there is something poignant in this certainty. These are the concerns of someone who "hasn't seen responsibility or much challenge" yet. The innocence and simplicity of these plans will be sharply contrasted with what follows.

Stanzas 6-8: The turning point

These three stanzas form one sentence and mark the poem's crucial shift in tone and mood. The word "However" at the start of stanza six signals that something is wrong despite the previous confidence. This transitional word is pivotal, introducing doubt into what had seemed like a straightforward adventure.

The speaker confesses: "…I am obscurely worried…" The adverb "obscurely" is particularly effective. It suggests the boy does not fully understand why he feels anxious, that his worry is vague and undefined rather than focused on any specific threat. The word "obscurely" also sounds more adult than the childish language of the previous stanzas, hinting that the speaker is beginning to mature or reflect with an adult's vocabulary on his childhood experience.

The phrase "as usual" reveals that this anxiety is familiar. The boy has felt this uncertainty before. What worries him are "…matters of procedure, the protocol of travel…" These adult phrases contrast sharply with the childish excitement about sweets and magic tricks. The formal language ("procedure", "protocol") emphasises how the adult world's expectations and rules unsettle the small boy. He is anxious about practical matters like when to ring the bell on the bus and whether he has the correct money.

The confident tone has now been "reduced to secretive insecurity". The boys whisper to each other: "…whispering, Are ye sure? Are ye sure?" The repetition of the question emphasises their uncertainty and doubt. The use of "ye" returns us to the language of children speaking Scots dialect. This juxtaposes with the formal adult language around it, highlighting how these are small boys attempting to navigate adult situations but lacking the knowledge and experience to feel secure. They are "out of their depth in adult surroundings".

Stanzas 9-15: Nightmare and transformation

From stanza nine onwards, the poem transitions fully into surreal nightmare territory. The boy's worrying achieves nothing: "…the bus will let us down in another country…" This line suggests the speaker has no control over what happens. The bus, which should take them safely to their destination, instead abandons them somewhere unfamiliar. The metaphor "another country" implies a foreign, alien place where the boys do not belong. This marks the poem's shift from literal to metaphorical journey.

Stanza ten continues the strangeness. The speaker looks out onto "the wrong streets". His description sounds childish and confused. The phrase "streets that suddenly forget their names" employs a transferred epithet. Streets cannot actually forget; this is a human quality. The effect is to intensify the surreal atmosphere and suggest that the external world is somehow in control rather than the boys. Reality itself seems to be shifting and becoming unreliable.

From stanza eleven, Paterson begins using anaphora, starting each remaining stanza with "and". This repetition creates mounting pace and an increasing sense of drama and panic. The lack of punctuation compounds the feeling that the boy has lost control, that his speech and the events are running away from him. The reader enters an "almost dreamlike state where reality has morphed into nightmare".

Paterson lists elements that should feature in the boys' planned day, but each one has turned hostile:

The sweet shop man does not recognise the sweets they ask for and responds aggressively. He calls for his wife, seemingly to mock the boys rather than help them. The bus they travelled on has become a "charred wreck". This image of destruction is powerful. Has the bus been damaged by its journey through time? Does this suggest that what feels secure and familiar is inevitably destroyed by change? The charred wreck symbolises how quickly the safe and known can become ruined and threatening.

The boys return "at the point" they "left off", echoing stories like Narnia or Back to the Future where time travel returns characters to their starting point. However, now both the boys and their world have been altered. "All the houses are gone", creating a "strange futuristic landscape" that is no longer recognisable.

The surrealism intensifies. The rain tastes "like kelly" (the Dundonian Scots word for sherbet). Ordinary rain has been transformed into something "sweet, fizzy and unnatural". The phrase "black waves fold in" uses an unusual metaphor. Waves do not fold; fabric folds. This suggests the sea is "a solid fabric or covering - something with the potential to smother, just like a nightmare". The ocean becomes menacing rather than natural.

The boys themselves have changed: "…our voices sound funny…" This implies they have grown up during the journey. Have their voices broken? The childish phrase "sound funny" indicates they do not understand what is happening to them. They can hear the change but cannot comprehend it.

The final stanza juxtaposes two disturbing images. The black sea encroaches "very slowly" on the familiar "Macalpine Road". This slow movement could represent change itself, which is "ever-present, working slowly, so that you wake up one day to realise you are suddenly on your own". The final line delivers the most devastating blow: "…our sisters and mothers are fifty years dead."

This statement conveys utter isolation and loss. The nurturing figures who represented home and security have vanished. The "fifty years" creates a temporal paradox (how can they be dead for fifty years when the boys only just left?) which emphasises how quickly time passes. This "jars with the 'slow' process of change", suggesting that whilst change happens gradually, its cumulative effect can feel sudden and absolute.

The poem's message seems to be that "life is elusive and bewildering: one minute everything is familiar and secure; the next you are facing a 'charred wreck' of what was". Growing up means accepting that "you are not in control: you are picked up and set down in new territories frequently – that is what it is to be an adult".

Themes

Growing up

Growing up is the poem's central theme. The narrative begins with "two small boys" taking the bus "on their own for the first time", which represents a significant milestone in childhood development. This moment of independence should be empowering, but Paterson explores how the experience of maturation can be deeply unsettling and confusing.

The literal bus journey becomes a metaphorical journey into adulthood. The boys start with confidence and excitement. The speaker counts his money and imagines the treats he will buy, exercising what he perceives as his newfound autonomy and "spending power". He feels in command of his limited world. However, this confidence rapidly crumbles when faced with practical adult tasks. Pushing the bell on the bus, paying the correct fare, following "the protocol of travel" – these small responsibilities overwhelm him.

The speaker admits "I am obscurely worried as usual", revealing this is a nervous child for whom "small things have the potential to throw him off course". The transition from confident plans to whispered doubts ("Are ye sure? Are ye sure?") captures how quickly a child's self-assurance can evaporate when confronting the unfamiliar adult world.

The nightmare that follows represents "the new feelings and experiences of adulthood - where people are no longer friendly, don't understand you and where you are suddenly placed in situations to fend for yourself". The sweet shop man who does not recognise the sweets symbolises how adults may not understand or accommodate children's perspectives. The hostile, surreal landscape reflects how growing up can make the world feel alien and threatening.

The final image of the boys alone, their mothers and sisters gone, conveys the isolation that can accompany maturity. Growing up means accepting that childhood securities will not last and that you must eventually "face the approaching 'black' sea by himself". The poem presents maturation not as triumphant or liberating but as a process of loss, confusion and reluctant acceptance of a harsher reality.

Change

Whilst Paterson explores the specific transition from childhood to adulthood, the poem also examines change itself as a fundamental aspect of existence. The bus journey represents not just growing up but any transformative experience that alters how we perceive the world.

The poem presents life as a series of changes where "there are sudden twists and turns that essentially mean that you never 'make it home again'". The boys return to their starting point physically, but home is no longer what it was. "All the houses are gone", the rain tastes unnatural, and their family members have vanished. This suggests that change is irreversible. Once you have experienced a transformation, you cannot recover what you have lost. You "must assemble new constructs and securities in the light of changing experiences".

The "charred wreck" of the bus is particularly symbolic. What was secure and functional has been destroyed. This "could imply that what is secure and familiar is destroyed by change". The image suggests that time and experience damage even the most solid structures we rely upon.

The temporal aspect of change is emphasised through the paradox of the "fifty years". The poem implies that "time can go very fast and you can suddenly realise you are alone in the world that once provided you with nurture and support". The sea encroaching "very slowly" creates a contrast. Change works gradually and imperceptibly, "so that you wake up one day to realise you are suddenly on your own". The slow process and the sudden realisation coexist, capturing how change operates both incrementally and shockingly.

The poem suggests we have limited control over change. The boys cannot prevent the bus from letting them down "in another country". Streets forget their names without the boys' permission. The boys' voices change without their understanding why. This lack of agency emphasises that change is something we endure rather than direct. We are passengers on a journey we did not fully choose and cannot fully control.

Comparing to other Don Paterson poems

Although "11:00: Baldovan" does not explicitly describe a parent-child relationship like some of Paterson's other poems, it shares several thematic connections with his other work.

Change and first experiences appear throughout Paterson's poetry. In "11:00: Baldovan", the boys experience going "up the Hilltown / for the first time ever on our own". Similarly, "Waking with Russell" focuses on Paterson becoming a father for the first time. Both poems explore how first experiences transform our understanding of ourselves and the world.

Childhood and loss of innocence connect multiple poems. "11:00: Baldovan" begins with a colourful scene where boys plan to buy "comics, / sweeties, and magic tricks" but ends with "death and destruction" and the bus as a "charred wreck". "The Circle" shows Paterson's son Jamie painting "outer space […] comets, planets, moon and sun", capturing childhood wonder, but then the poem reveals the darker side when Jamie "screws [the picture] up" and "rage[s] and moan[s]", showing that childhood involves frustration and failure. "Why Do You Stay Up So Late?" describes a son's "vivid imagination" with stones as jewels, whilst noting that this creative vision requires more effort for adults. "The Swing" subverts childhood's happy associations by transforming a swing into an "empty seat" symbolising grief after losing an unborn child.

Doubt and uncertainty pervade these poems. In "11:00: Baldovan", the speaker is "obscurely worried" and whispers "Are ye sure? Are ye sure?", showing confusion and insecurity. In "Waking with Russell", the speaker admits "the true path was as lost to me as ever", emphasising his lack of clarity about life and fatherhood. "Why Do You Stay Up So Late?" expresses uncertainty with "I don't know, and I've no pool to help me tell". "The Swing" presents a speaker who struggles to find meaning in loss, caught between rational belief that there is "nothing here" and emotional conviction of his daughter's presence. "The Circle" explores how painting and existence itself can go wrong, suggesting that life is uncertain and fragile, though this imperfection creates meaning.

These thematic connections demonstrate that whilst "11:00: Baldovan" takes a different narrative approach, it shares Paterson's broader concerns with transformation, the complexity of childhood, the loss of innocence, and the uncertainty that characterises human experience.

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