Mametz Wood - Owen Sheers Flashcards
(31 cards)
when was this poem written?
2005
themes?
- power - the soldiers are presented as being powerless
- war
- time - time hasn’t yet healed with the wounds from war
- place
- man
- death
poet context
- born in Fiji, but raised in South Wales
- his work ‘has focused on the way people identify with land and country’ and is also interested in ‘loss, separation and the many different borders that people create between themselves’
- a poet, author, playwright and university professor
- wrote this poem in 2005, when war detritus was still being uncovered in Mametz Wood
- Sheers visited Mametz Wood to make a short film on the 85th anniversary of the battle
Mametz Wood context
- a wood in part of the Somme in France
- Battle of the Somme took place here in 1916
- the British army gained 760,000 additional volunteers within two months of WW1 starting
- Men were grouped together based on where they came from - the 38th Welsh Division had to reclaim Mametz Wood from the German forces
- 4,000 men died
- despite their success at Mametz Wood, the Welsh Division were viewed as ill-trained and poorly led
what is the meaning of this poem?
- the poem is about farmers finding the remains of the 38th Welsh Division in the woods, years after the war had passed
- the remains of the soldiers are comparable to fragments, showing how violent their deaths were
- after finding several fragments, the farmers discover ‘twenty men buried in one long grave’, who are frozen in a scene of death
what is the mood of this poem?
- being an elegy, this poem has a sad, reflective tone, as shown by ‘and even now the earth stands sentinel’
- however, there are times where a slightly critical tone is used too, such as ‘wasted young’ and ‘told to walk, not run’, suggesting that the soldiers’ deaths were unnecessary
what was the motivation for the poet to write this poem?
- as a Welsh poet, Sheers have written this poem to acknowledge the soldiers that history forgot
- their sacrifice is honoured by the many references to their deaths, such as ‘paused mid dance-macabre’
- furthermore, Sheers presents the soldiers’ deaths as unnecessary as seen in ‘wasted young’, suggesting that he is criticising those responsible for their deaths: their leaders, who were known to have been inadequate
title: ‘Mametz Wood’
LANGUAGE:
- this title could foreground themes of place, war and death
‘For years afterwards’
LANGUAGE:
- time phrase suggests that the impact of war is long lasting
‘found them-‘
LANGUAGE:
- the verb ‘found’ suggests the soldiers are passive - they are inactive and powerless
- the pronoun ‘them’ makes the soldiers anonymous as they no longer have specific identities
- shows how destructive war has been
‘the wasted young’
LANGUAGE:
- Sheers uses a critical tone when describing the soldiers’ death implying he criticises war
‘turning up’
LANGUAGE:
- the colloquial language suggests that the farmers have been desensitised
‘A chit’
‘the china plate’
‘the relic’
IMAGERY:
- these metaphors all compare the soldiers to fragile things
‘bone’
‘shoulder blade’
‘finger’
‘skull’
LANGUAGE:
- the body parts in this stanza are not connected and there is a random assortment of bones
- war is shown to be destructive as all that is left of the soldiers are remains
‘broken bird’s egg’
IMAGERY:
- bird’s eggs are symbols of new life - the juxtaposition between ‘bird’s egg’ and ‘skull’ highlights the destructive force of war
- war eradicates any hope and potential
‘they were told to walk, not run’
LANGUAGE:
- critical tone - Sheers mocks the leaders in charge of the 38th Welsh Division
- an example of how their poor leadership resulted in more casualties
‘nesting machine guns’
IMAGERY:
- comparing guns to birds makes them sound predatory - possible links to the ‘broken bird’s egg’
- the guns birth death
- the soldiers represent prey
’.’
STRUCTURE:
- the end-stopped line creates a sense of finality - links to death
‘earth stands sentinel’
IMAGERY:
- this suggests that the earth is guarding and watching over the soldiers, implying that it is working with them
- example of Sheers writing about how man and place interact
‘reminders of what happened’
LANGUAGE:
- the vague, euphemistic language suggests that the atrocities of war are too terrible to think about
‘like a wound working a foreign body to the surface of the skin’
IMAGERY:
- this simile is a hopeful image, as wounds heal over time
‘This morning, twenty men buried in one long grave’
LANGUAGE:
- the adverbial phrase indicates that the effects of war is still being felt today
- statistic language is used here to create a more formal tone
‘a broken mosaic of bone’
IMAGERY:
- metaphor hints at the soldiers complete destruction
- also suggests there is something beautiful about their sacrifice and they should be honoured
‘dance-macabre’
LANGUAGE:
- also known as the ‘dance of the dead’ which is an artistic allegory
- acts as reminder that no matter who you are in life, death will unite people together
- a reminder of the fragility of life
