The speaker of the poem apparently is a woman, since she talks about the Red Hat Society. But it is written from the point of view of middle-aged woman who yearns to throw off the cloak of respectability in her old age.
This poem tells about the things she wants to wear and how she wants to behave in their old age. For now, she must live the life of expected sobriety but, when she reaches old age she is determined to let respectability fly to the wind. She also thinks that she is older then she won’t care about fashion, what people think as rebellion to the “sobriety of my youth” that there is a clear message of defiance and mischief. The good thing about old age is that nobody cares so much about what you look like or what you do. You can get away with most things and all people will do is call you eccentric! She is addressing society to watch out because she will change when she is older and has the excuse to be eccentric.
The lady thinks about her old age days. How she will spend her old age. She thinks that when she becomes old she will wear the dress that does not suits her like a purple dress with a red hat.
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She also says that she will spend their whole income (as pension) spending frivolously on brandy, summer gloves and satin sandals instead of satisfying the essential needs. She also wishes that when she got tired then she wants to sit down on pavement and gobble up samples in shops. The good thing about old age is that nobody cares so much about what you look like or what you do. You can get away with most things and all people will do is call you eccentric! She also expresses her wishes to go outside while raining in their slippers and want to pick the flowers from the others people’s gardens and fulfill her heart’s desire without needing to be concerned about anybody or anything.
It is very normal for every middle-aged person to be worried about the prospect of growing old. People usually pretend to be young always and try to postpone old age. That’s why she wants to be fattier, so that she can wear a terrible shirt. Old lady also thinks that why she is now restless. She feels the burden of being adult and sensible and thinks in old age she would like to be outrageous. She foresees the freedom of being old, when people will stop expecting her to behave in a responsible manner. The poem conveys both her excitement at her plans for growing old and her frustration at the way she is expected to behave now.
She wants to rebel against the ways in which she is expected to be a role model to her children and respect the norms of society’s standards so as not to stand out from the norm, yet in old age, we are done with society. But she expresses her desire to “make up. She will have a try at changing so that she can do everything without overly shocking people who know her already.