Power and Conflict Poetry Flashcards

Question

(O) "My name is...

Answer 1

"My name is Ozymandias, king of kings:/ Look upon my works, ye Mighty and despair!" - The direct address of 'ye Mighty' is more provocative and threatening. Furthermore, the fact that the addressee is referred to as 'Mighty', especially as a proper noun, suggests he is of even greater power, for those who are already 'Mighty' must 'despair', be hopeless, in confrontation with his immense power. These 'Mighty' he refers to may be other enemy kings, as he previously referred to himself as 'king of kings'. - His 'works' represent statues as art representing status and power. This can be linked to how the same is done in 'My Last Duchess'.

Answer 2

"Nothing beside remains. Round the decay/ Of that colossal wreck, boundless and bare,/ The lone and level sands stretch far away." - The sentence fragment of 'nothing beside remains' both could symbolise the fragmented statue, as well as create space around this sentence, which could be arguably a kind of volta (although its not on line 9) to create a more dramatic effect. - 'Colossal wreck' contrasts the powerful past self with the destroyed present statue. - The zooming out of the sands which 'stretch far away' highlights the insignificance of Ozymandias now.

Answer 3

"I pinned one onto your lapel, crimped petals,/ spasms of paper red, disrupting a blockade/ of yellow bias binding around your blazer" - The first person and direct address makes the poem feel intimate, symbolic of the maternal love as the mother pins a poppy onto her son's blazer. - The words 'crimped', 'spasms' and 'disrupting' all have negative connotations, which juxtaposes the positive connotations of a poppy. This leads us to reflect on the violence behind a poppy's meaning. - The vibrant colour imagery of 'red' and 'yellow' makes this memory feel also vibrant and real.

Answer 4

- 'crimped' - 'spasms' - 'bandaged' - 'graze' - 'blackthorns'

Answer 5

"All my words/ flattened, rolled, turned into felt,// slowly melting." - The metaphors used illustrate the surreality of the experience – the mother can't really come to terms with what is happening; it's almost like a dream.

Answer 6

- Dramatic monologue - Four stanzas, irregular length, but shorter, longer, longer, shorter - First person

Answer 7

(P) "I was brave, as I walked/ with you, to the front door, threw/ it open, the world overflowing/ like a treasure chest. A split second/ and you were away, intoxicated." - A 'treasure chest' connotes something valuable, rich, promising, which contrasts with the reality of war. Paired with the adjective 'intoxicated', we can read this as being the propaganda which has convinced the son it is worth going to war. - This is another example of metaphors conveying surreality. - The 'bravery' of the mother makes us think of the bravery of soldiers in war – Weir may be trying to show us just how equally brave those must be who lose people to war, even if they do not fight in it. - A door is a well-recognised symbol of opportunity.

Answer 8

"I listened, hoping to hear/ your playground voice catching on the wind." - This shows that the mother only hears her son as a child (his 'playground voice') – the image of her son in her head is a younger one. This shows the impact of memory.

Answer 9

"The dove pulled freely against the sky" - 'Pulled freely' is an oxymoron, showing the conflicting viewpoint of the mother. - The 'dove' symbolises peace, which is ironic as the mother has just lost her son to war. The peace could be the apparent peace seen by the mother who is geographically far from the conflict, but the internal conflict of the oxymoron shows that this does not quite satisfy the mother.

Answer 10

- Jane Weir is not a mother who has lost a child to war herself. - She often visited a churchyard with her son, where there too was a memorial, and you could hear the distant echo's of children's voices. This shows that although she is not writing from personal experience of someone who has lost people to war, she has extended her personal experience of being a mother to this environment. - Weir's own personal interest in textiles was used as metaphors to convey grief, she said. - 'Poppies is really a poem of remembrance' - Weir

Answer 11

"There once was a country... I left it as a child/ but my memory of it is sunlight-clear" - 'There once' with an ellipsis give a nostalgic, fairy-tale-like tone - The reoccurring 'sunlight' motif is introduced in the first sentence, building a positive tone

Answer 12

"It may be at war, it may be sick with tyrants,/ but I am branded by an impression of sunlight." - 'May' expresses doubt – she is still uncertain about the truth of her country, or refuses to believe it. - The fact that the country is sick personifies it, and makes us pity it like we would an ill friend; we realise here the connection the emigrée feels towards her country. - Furthermore, it is not the country's fault: it is that of the 'tyrants'. - 'Branded' can have connotations of pain or torture: it means to imprint by burning. The fact that this is by 'sunlight' suggests that the metaphorical sunlight is so powerful that it has burned positive impressions into her. This positive and negative imagery in conjunction reflects the emotional conflict over the emigrée's country.

Answer 13

"The white streets of that city, the graceful slopes/ glow even clearer as time rolls its tanks/ and the frontiers rise between us, close like waves" - 'White' is a symbol of purity – the opposite of that associated with war and corruption. - The war imagery as the 'frontiers rise between us' separates the war from the 'us'; the city. The speaker sees war not as a characteristic of the city, but a barrier keeping them apart.

Answer 14

"That child's vocabulary I carried here/ like a hollow doll, opens and spills a grammar. [...] It may now be a lie, banned by the state/ but I can't get it off my tongue. It tastes of sunlight." - The syntax of the sentence supports the meaning. - Everything so far in this poem is about her childhood and how influential it was on her memory of the place; this demonstrates the power of memory, for it has overruled all negative things she's heard since. - The fact something can become a 'lie' (it is now, implied it wasn't before) demeans the lie itself, as well as 'may' again expressing doubt. Are the people in control forcing an opinion upon the media? - The gustatory imagery of tasting of sunlight now adds to the visual ('sunlight-clear') and tactile ('branded by') imagery to create a full sensory experience of positive imagery. Surrounding all this imagery of war and control: it can still not overpower her positive memories.

Answer 15

"It lies down in front of me, docile as paper;/ I comb its hair and love its shining eyes." - This personification again strengthens this personal bond between person and place. - 'Shining' adds to this semantic field of light.

Answer 16

"My city takes me dancing through the city/ of walls. They accuse me of absence, they circle me./ They accuse me of being dark in their free city./ My city hides behind me. they mutter death,/ and my shadow falls as evidence of sunlight." - More personification in 'takes me dancing' and 'hides behind me' - 'City of walls' refers to the new city. 'Walls' have symbolise obstruction and being closed off; the new city refuses to take in and the emigrée and make her welcome. - 'They accuse me...' uses anaphora to emphasise the 'they', who are in opposition to the emigrée, separated from the 'me'. - 'They accuse me of being dark' could be interpreted as racism, which would be ironic, for 'they' are calling it a 'free city'. This may be trying to expose the hypocrisy of current society in regards to migration. - The poem ends with 'sunlight'; the positive memories are still strong in the face of 'death' and 'accus[ation]' and 'walls'.

Answer 17

- Soliloquy - First person - Three stanzas - No rhyme - 8, 8, 9 lines - Frequent enjambement - Every stanza ends with 'sunlight'

Answer 18

- Carol Rumens was born and grew up in South London, so does not have personal experience of migration. - She has translated various Russian poems, and has been said to have a 'fascination with elsewhere' – this is clear in the poem.

Answer 19

"In his darkroom he is finally alone/ with spools of suffering set out in ordered rows." - 'Finally' emphasises how much of a relief it is for the photographer to be alone, but we have no context as to why this is; the reader now subconsciously sees there is a problem. - Something as extreme as 'suffering' to be put in 'ordered rows' demeans it, making it seem insignificant, mundane. Maybe this is how the photographer views suffering at this point.

Answer 20

"Belfast. Beirut. Phnom Penh. All flesh is grass." - The place names isolated by full stops gives weight to each item in the list: each holds such meaning it is placed in an individual sentence. - This further gives the impression that the war photographer has seen things we haven't, with these one-word allusions. - The metaphor 'all flesh is grass' also makes death and suffering seem mundane and insignificant, yet also weak, indistinguishable, just as grass is.

Answer 21

"He has a job to do. Solutions slop in trays/ beneath his hands, which did not tremble then/ though seem to now." - This implies PTSD; long after the trauma, the photographer is now experiencing 'trembl[ing]' - The idea that this is his job detaches the photographer from the meaning behind what he does; it is as if he has to do what he does, and is not fully responsible.

Answer 22

"Rural England. Home again/ to ordinary pain which simple weather can dispel,/ to fields which don't explode beneath the feet/ of children running in a nightmare heat" - 'Ordinary pain' is an oxymoron: this surprising description explains that pain we experience in 'England' is 'ordinary' in comparison to that which the war photographer has witnessed. - The rather passive verb of 'dispel' juxtaposes the very dynamic verbs of 'explode' and 'running', creating a stark comparison between the places. - The fact that the 'fields' talk about are still the ones in England, and the speaker is saying how they 'don't explode' brings the focus of this sentence still to England; this suffering seems closer to us than ever before. - The 'children running in a nightmare heat' is an allusion to the well-known war photo 'Napalm Girl' from Vietnam. The fact that this is likely to be an existing image in the reader's mind brings the description into real life.

Answer 23

- Third person - Four stanzas - 6 lines each - ABBCDD rhyme

Answer 24

"A half-formed ghost. He remembers the cries/ of this man's wife, how he sought approval/ without words to do what someone must/ and how the blood stained into foreign dust." - A 'ghost' gives the impression of haunting, which could also be suggesting towards PTSD. - The fact we aren't even told what we did and can only imagine hints at the pain behind memories which we try and censor from ourselves. - The fact that he did what 'someone must' also takes away responsibility from his actions – he didn't have a choice. We can see that the photographer is desperate to feel less guilt for his actions. - The 'blood stained into foreign dust' is parallel to the 'blood shadow' in 'Remains'. It reinforces the idea that memory leaves a 'stain' – we can never fully get rid of it.

Answer 25

"A hundred agonies in black-and-white/ from which his editor will pick out five or six/ for Sunday's supplement. The reader's eyeballs prick with tears between the bath and pre-lunch beers." - The juxtaposition of 'a hundred agonies' with 'five or six' emphasises all of the suffering that goes unnoticed, the conjunction 'or' emphasising the insignificance of this small figure. - The fact that it's for a 'supplement' makes it seems almost like an afterthought – its importance is disregarded. - 'Prick' indicates a very small feeling of pain, which is all the readers will ever feel. This contrasts with the 'nightmare heat' previously experienced. - Such mundane things such as the 'bath and pre-lunch beers' dilute the impact the photos have on the people. - In 'Remains', the 'image of agony' was mentioned. This is quite the same description as 'agonies in black-and-white', and shows that while in 'Remains', the agony of only one is looked at, whereas in 'War Photographer', the agonies of many are displayed.

Answer 26

"From the aeroplane he stares impassively at where/ he earns his living and they do not care." - The adverb 'impassively' demonstrates the effect these 'agonies' have had – the war photographer is now emotionally indifferent from repeated exposure to suffering. - 'Earns his living' is the same idea as 'has a job to do' and 'to do what someone must'. The war photographer wants to dissociate these events from his responsibility as much as possible. - 'They do not care' could be in response to the war photographer earning 'his living', in response to the social attacks these photographers get from not doing anything in the face of suffering. We realise now that this could be what the war photographer is escaping from to become 'finally alone'. Alternatively, it could mean they do not care about the people who are suffering in the photos; it is merely a newspaper 'supplement' that gives them no more than a 'prick' of pain – nothing changes, despite that being the 'job' of a war photographer: to expose the horrors of war.

Answer 27

- The poem was inspired by Agard reading a school textbook claiming West Indian history started with Columbus. - The dialect used in the poem is called Creole – this undermines the education system as well as British colonisation. - John Agard is Guyanese. - Agard said the poem came out 'like a counterpoint of two voices' – one voice as the 'nursery rhymes' in the quatrains and the other the 'celebration of historical characters'. - Agard said he was playing with words 'they way you might play with musical notes', and that 'the voice of delivery doesn't show itself until after the poem is written. - In the celebration sections, he thought of it like 'casting a spell'. - Agard said the poem has a 'celebratory say', although he was writing a poem, not a 'history book'.

Answer 28

- 'Vision' - 'First' - 'Born' - 'Beacon' - 'Dream' - 'Hopeful' - 'Freedom' - 'Brave' - 'Healing' - 'Sunrise'

Answer 29

"Dem tell me/ Dem tell me/ What dem want to tell me" - The repetition including the epistrophe gives the impression he is being told over and over again - The Creole dialect subverts the education system and British colonisation - 'Dem' ('Them') Refers generally to a group of people – Agard could be referring to anyone, and could be criticising any range of people. - 'Me' is in the accusative case – it stays this way for the whole poem until the last two lines, indicating that initially, everything was about the others in power; Agard was simply at the receiving end of their control.

Answer 30

"Bandage up me eye with me own history/ Blind me to me own identity" - 'Bandages' have connotations of healing, whereas ‘blind’ denotes harm. This juxtaposition demonstrates the harmful effects of the education system. - Introduces the concept of identity early on, showing its importance. - 'Blind' is hyperbolic and metaphorical, but this indicates to what extent his history is being covered up.

Answer 31

- The quatrains are sung like nursery rhymes, mocking them. The italics are said with depth and wonder to contrast, giving them weight. - Quatrains use repetition to give a sense of predictability with the anaphora of 'dem tell me', whereas the italicised stanzas do not. This could indicate how repetitive current education is, and how his history is all new information. - Despite the Creole, the quatrains are grammatically correct in terms of syntax, whereas the italics are just a stream of words and information, e.g. 'Toussaint/ a slave/ with vision/ lick back/ Napoleon/ battalion/ and first Black...' - The italicised stanzas contain the semantic field of hope and power, whereas the quatrains are much more mundane, containing dates ('1066 and all dat', 'Columbus and 1492'), people known for apparently boring things ('who discover de balloon', 'Florence Nightingale and she lamp', 'Robin Hood used to camp'), as well as completely made up stories ('de cow who jump over de moon', 'de dish ran away with de spoon', 'Dick Whittington and he cat') - Whereas the quatrains have an organised structure (four lines, mostly aabb or aaaa rhyming), the italicised stanzas are all of different lengths, with unstructured rhymes.

Answer 32

"Dem tell me/ Dem tell me wha dem want to tell me/ But now I checking out me own history/ I carving out me identity" - The circular nature of the 'dem tell me what dem want to tell me' suggests there is a circular nature to how historical education is being forced; it continues. - The circular idea of 'identity also implies that identity is continually the key idea of history, demonstrating its importance. - 'Carving' denotes something skilled, as well as something that is a slow process, and is detailed. This represents how slow and difficult it is for the speaker to discover the truth of their own history, as well as how intricate and detailed their own history is. This can also be compared with Ozymandias, which about a statue, something that is 'carved'. You might talk about how both present history as something complex and detailed, a bit like a statue. - 'I' is used for the first time in the nominative case, demonstrating that by the end of the poem, the speaker has taken matters into their own hands, and is now going to be the one in control of their education.

Answer 33

- It was written in Victorian England, when women had very little rights, and this was only just beginning to be challenged. - Lack of rights included being legal property of their husbands upon marriage, not being able to vote, and not being considered capable of rational thought. - The poem is set in Ferrara, a town in Italy, where a lot of Browning's poems where set. Browning also moved to Italy and lived there, although born in London.

Answer 34

- 'My' is a possessive pronoun indicating ownership - 'last has the double meaning of both 'final' and 'previous' – which one does Browning mean?

Answer 35

- It is a dramatic monologue, indicating the self-centred nature of the Duke, and the power which he has to command the centre of attention for an entire interaction.

Answer 36

- It start's with the poem's title, with 'That's my last Duchess painted on the wall', which is significant for reasons I have already described. - The Duke name-drops 'Fra Pandolf' twice within four lines; this is to show off his status and influence. - It introduces the symbol of artwork to represent power, an idea which is circular in the poem and can be compared to that in 'Ozymandias'.

Answer 37

"A heart – how shall I say? – too soon made glad" - The fact that the Duke has to question himself helps highlight exactly how questionable this criticism is.

Answer 38

"She thanked men, – good! but thanked/ Somehow – I know not how – as if she ranked/ My gift of a nine-hundred-years-old name/ With anybody's gift." - The adverb 'somehow' indicates how unrealistic this behaviour is – we are lead to question whether the motivations behind this behaviour are truly as the Duke makes them out to be. - Every single criticism is built upon a positive trait, which even the Duke admits ('– good!'), but it is simply that these positive traits aren't reserved solely for the Duke himself; the only problem we can infer is caused by the Dukes arrogance, paranoia or need for control. - The Duke describes a name as not just any gift, but what is implied to be the highest gift; the fact he holds his ancestry so highly is a display of arrogance, as well as a symbol of patriarchy, something Browning may be trying to ironically criticise in this poem.

Answer 39

"Since none puts by/ The curtain I have drawn for you, but I" - The extent of the Duke's arrogance and need for power is displayed here, where we see he'd rather be able to control who sees his Duchess dead (as later implied) than have her share her pleasantness while alive. - Whereas before, the Duke was unable to make the Duchess purely his possession, he resolved to have her painted as an actual possession.

Answer 40

"In speech – (which I have not) – to make your will quite clear" "E'en then would be some stooping; and I choose/ Never to stoop." - The Duke claims he is not well-spoken, which is false humility, for he uses a high register of language throughout. - The Duke refuses to show any signs of powerlessness, such as even telling his Duchess what the problem is. This is another show of arrogance. - Everything is about how the Duke feels – the personal pronoun 'I' in 'I choose' is the Duke's refusal to let the Duchess have any say in the matter, or even knowledge.

Answer 41

"This grew; I gave commands;/ Then all smiles stopped together. There she stands/ As if alive." - The semicolons dramatically isolate these three simple clauses, creating space and tension. - It is still about what the Duke thinks and does: "I gave commands". - The fact that the Duke 'commanded' others to kill the Duchess shows off his influence that he has the power to give these kinds of requests. - The fact that the Duke sees the Duchess 'as if alive' demonstrates that being alive wasn't a remotely important factor to this Duchess – a painting on a wall is as good as.

Answer 42

(MLD) "Though his fair daughter's self [...] is my object." - The materialism of the Duke extends to people too, by using the metaphor of an object to describe the Count's daughter. - The fact that we are introduced to the Duke's 'next' Duchess reveals to us what he meant by his 'last'; his 'previous'. We see here that this is in fact a continual cycle. Compare this to 'Ozymandias' describing the temporal nature of power, whereas this implies the continual nature of power, although it describes the short term.

Answer 43

"Notice Neptune, though,/ Taming a sea-horse, thought a rarity,/ Which Claus of Innsbruck cast in bronze for me!" - This motif of artwork has been made circular, and the Duke name-drops as he did previously, also hinting towards the continual nature of power (since here art is a symbol for power). - The fact that the poem starts with 'That's my...' and ends with '...for me!' shows the Duke's circular, continual arrogance and self-obsession. This is comparable to 'Ozymandias', but where Ozymandias was tyrannical towards an entire nation, the Duke was tyrannical to just individual people, one by one. - The envoy the Duke is apparently speaking to this entire poem does not say a word seemingly. This highlights the Duke's power and dominance. - Neptune 'taming a sea-horse' could be a metaphor for how the Duke has the need to 'tame' others – when he is unable to absolutely control his Duchess, he must have her killed. - 'Notice' is an imperative, repeating the Duke's commanding nature.

Answer 44

- Heaney's poetry is often about the countryside, recalling his childhood in Northern Ireland. - 'The Troubles' was a euphemism for the assassination and bombing, started by the IRA, catholics who fought against the protestants who controlled Northern Ireland, although the poem was written two years before this began. The poem itself is about anticipating and fighting the violence itself – this prescience is common in both the poem and reality. - 'Stormont' was a mansion in Northern Ireland, where the Prime Minister of Northern Ireland lived at the time, and where a lot of parliament took place. This poem was likely a metaphor for the whole of Ireland and its government. - The poem was written in 1966, so WW2 would be fresh in the minds of the readers.

Answer 45

"We are prepared: we build our houses squat" - The repetition of 'we' in the first line of the poem gives the impression of community, which is later subverted; they are not together in this conflict; they do not have 'company'. - By beginning the poem on the idea of being 'prepared' introduces the idea of prescience. This is interesting as two years after the poem was written, the political tension broke out into major violence. This here could be Heaney trying to show anticipation of what is to come, maybe as a warning.

Answer 46

- 'blows full blast' - 'pummels' - 'the sea [...] exploding comfortably' - 'wind dives and strafes' (spraying bullets) - 'bombarded by the empty air' - 'space is salvo' (a burst of gunfire) - By linking the poem to warfare, it further clarifies the real-life criticism that Heaney is making of the conflict in Ireland. - Furthermore, by dehumanising the committers of this violence to mindless abiotic dangers such as the 'wind', the 'sea' and the 'air' could be communicating the lack of humanity in this conflict.

Answer 47

"You might think that the sea is company,/ Exploding comfortably down on the cliffs/ But no:" - 'Exploding' links to the use of explosives by the IRA during the conflict in Northern Ireland. It is used in an oxymoron, however: 'exploding comfortably', the adverb 'comfortably' indicating how those causing the conflict are doing so with relaxed indifference; they do not care for the damage they cause. - This idea of 'company' is repeated from earlier, with 'nor are there trees/ Which might prove company'. Here too, the idea of company is removed, as this quotation is followed by 'but no'. This undermined expectation of company is telling the reader that there is not company where you would expect it; in fact, there is a lack of it altogether. Heaney could again be criticising the unfazed violence of the IRA within the Irish community, demonstrating that there is no real community or company.

Answer 48

"Strange, it is a huge nothing that we fear." - Heaney calls this out as being 'strange' which seems out of place, since the danger of the storm seems very severe and real; why is fearing it 'strange'? - 'Huge nothing' is an oxymoron, demonstrating the incoherence of the scale of the violence with the meaning of the violence. There is a 'huge' conflict over 'nothing'.

Answer 49

"[The sea] spits like a tame cat turned savage" - This juxtaposition of security (tame) and violence (savage) and implies that even the tamest of people may turn savage by conflict. It also shows that this conflict is unnatural, uncalled for.

Answer 50

- 8 stanzas, all quatrains except the last which is two lines long - No rhyme scheme, though with the arguable use of occasional half-rhymes

Answer 51

- The poem from a collection of poems called 'The Not Dead', which looked to tell the untold stories of soldiers who fought in war. - It was published in 2008. - The poem was based on Guardsman Tromans, who fought in Iraq in 2003. - The speaker in the poem suffers from PTSD from his service at war. This is something that is thought to have affected 9.4% of veterans from the Iraq and Afghanistan wars.

Answer 52

"On another occasion we get sent out/ to tackle looters raiding a bank./ And one of them legs it up the road, probably armed, possibly not." - 'Legs it' is colloquial language – this makes the poem feel more conversational, and therefore more personal, as it feels as though you are speaking with this soldier informally. - The poem begins in medias res, which gives the impression of the speaker reliving the action abruptly. - The fact that it is 'another' occasion gives the impression that there are many others – we can't help but think of what other horrors this soldier has seen. - 'Probably armed, possibly not' gives this element of lingering doubt as to whether his actions were justified.

Answer 53

"Well myself and somebody else and somebody else/ are all of the same mind,/ so all three of us open fire./ Three of a kind all letting fly, and I swear// I see every round as it rips though his life –/ I see broad daylight on the other side." - The polysyndeton and repetition in 'and somebody else and somebody else' tries to make this list seem as long as it possibly can while only being three people – it is important to the soldier that he has to deal with as little of the blame as possible. This is reinforced when Armitage uses tautology, saying in each line: 'and somebody else and somebody else [...] all [...] all three [...] three of a kind'. This emphasises extremely that there are three people, showing just how desperate he is to get the reader to understand that it was not just him. - The enjambement onto the next stanza of 'I swear// I see every round' demonstrates the uncontrollable flow of memory, as the sentence flows uncontrollably into the next stanza. This is significant as it leads into describing the traumatic recollections, which strongly suggests the soldier is suffering from PTSD. - The anaphora of 'I see' indicates the repetition of these memories. - The hyperbole of seeing 'every round' gives the impression of slow motion, as that's the only way one could see individual bullets. This demonstrates the detail at which he recalls these memories, and the hyper-realistic, cinematic experience of him remembering them, as suggested by this slow-motion kinaesthetic imagery.

Answer 54

"Pain itself, the image of agony" - Compare with 'War Photographer', with 'a hundred agonies in black-and-white'

Answer 55

- 'legs it up the road' - 'one of my mates' - 'tosses his guts' - 'carted off'

Answer 56

"End of story, except not really./ His blood-shadow stays on the street, and out on patrol/ I walk right over it week after week." - The caesura separates these two contrasting comments of 'end of story' and 'not really'. The fact that the second idea subverts the first gives an impression of internal conflict that could represent that of the soldier. - A 'shadow' is something we cannot get rid of – it is forever present, just as the guilt and the trauma is to this soldier. - The repetition of 'week after week' again illustrates the repetitive nature of these memories.

Answer 57

"Then I'm home on leave. But I blink// and he bursts again through the doors of the bank.// Sleep, and he's probably armed, possibly not./ Dream, and he's torn apart by a dozen rounds./ And the drink and the drugs won't flush him out –" - The caesura after 'Then I'm home on leave' gives a false sense of safeness and security, which is suddenly undermined as the following enjambment uncontrollably flows into the next stanza showing powerful flashbacks. - The parallelism of 'blink, and he...', 'sleep, and he...' and 'dream, and he...' creates the impression of repetition, showing the repetitive nature of his PTSD. - Armitage has a strong use of plosives in this stanza, notable in 'blink', 'bursts', 'doors', 'probably', 'possibly', 'dream', 'torn', 'dozen', 'drink', 'drugs'. This gives the impression that the words are being said with force; it feels as though they are almost being spat out. This highlights the resentment the soldier feels at his own PTSD. - The circular structure of the poem is most obviously seen here, when exact phrasing from earlier in the poem is used. This demonstrates the continual nature of these haunting memories.

Answer 58

"Near to the knuckle, here and now,/ his bloody life in my bloody hands." - 'Bloody hands are a symbol of guilt, alluding to when in Macbeth they represented his guilt. As in Macbeth the guilt was so devastating that it drove Lady Macbeth to madness and consequently death, Armitage may be using this allusion to demonstrate the maddening consequences of the guilt the soldier feels and the PTSD he suffers from.

Answer 59

- It was written during WW1, from Owen's own experience, as he fought and later died in that war. - This poem was written to contrast against the heroic propaganda that was displayed to people. - Owen was very against the cruelty of war and the lies that were told about it, and conveyed this through his poems, notably in 'Dulce et decorum est'

Answer 60

"Our brains ache, in the merciless iced east winds that knive us..." - The long lines in the poem symbolise monotonously slow passing of time the soldiers are experiencing. - This is reinforced by the ellipsis that end several of the lines in the poem, creating a sense of never-ending. - The poem opens with focus on the weather, which introduces it as the primary threat to the soldiers, the personification of 'merciless' making the weather seem more dangerous.

Answer 61

Exposure uses half-rhymes in the form ABBAC, with the words not fully rhyming, but only slightly, such as '[...] knive us [...] silent [...] salient [...] nervous'. There is no obvious or strong sense of rhyme, but yet the words have slight familiarity to them due to their half-rhymes. This could be symbolic of there being no strong sense of purpose of the soldiers, yet there are subtle hints to what the soldiers are there for, such as the 'gunnery rumbles' and 'flights of bullets'.

Answer 62

"But nothing happens" - Refrain, showing the repetitive nature of their lives, and the constant anticlimax of their duty at war. - This is also the line on which the entire poem ends, showing the unchanging nature of this suffering.

Answer 63

"Dawn massing in the east her melancholy army/ Attacks once more in ranks upon shivering ranks of grey" - Personification makes the weather seem more threatening. - Weather merged with war subverts the importance of the actual war going on. - 'Dawn [...] melancholy' is somewhat oxymoronic, for dawn tends to have positive connotations. - Repetition of 'ranks' emphasises the repetitive, continual nature of the weather.

Answer 64

"The flickering gunnery rumbles,/ Far off, like a dull rumour of some other war./ What are we doing here?" - Rhetorical question explicitly shows the thoughts inside Owen's head at this time. Since rhetorical questions intend to impose reflecting rather than answers, we can see that this is Owen directly criticising their purpose in war, and war itself. - A 'rumour' denotes something not fully true. This could link to how Owen was critical about war propaganda not showing the full picture, almost being a 'rumour' of what war is actually like. In fact, the fact that Owen calls it 'some other war' directly shows that the war he was told of is not the war he is in, and his being there is truly pointless.

Answer 65

"Sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence./ Less deadly than the air that shudders black with snow" - The poem goes to subvert everything we know about the weather, with 'dawn' having 'misery', and now 'snow' making things 'black'. - The sibilance is onomatopoeic of what it is describing – the streaking of bullets. This adds to the threatening tone of the poem.

Answer 66

"Slowly our ghosts drag home [...] crickets jingle there;/ For hours the innocent mice rejoice: the house is theirs;/ Shutters and doors, all are closed: on us the doors are closed, -/ We turn back to our dying." - The stanza starts with 'ghosts' and ends with 'dying', implying that their ghosts are leaving them before they are fully dead. This presents the inevitability of death in the trenches, which is ironic, as Owen himself ended up dying before the war was over. - As the 'innocent mice rejoice', we see that even at home, the soldiers' last place of hope, nature has taken over. However, the mice are 'innocent'; it is not nature's fault – nature does not choose to be nature. If it is not nature itself that Owen blames for their suffering, despite it being the immediate cause, then the reader is forced to look on to who Owen may actually be placing the blame on. - Images like 'crickets jingle' conveys that the soldiers are losing their sanity, and gives the impression they are being driven mad.

Answer 67

"Half a league, half a league,/ Half a league onward,/ All in the valley of Death/ Rode the six hundred." - The rhythm of the first line sets a fast, exciting pace for the poem, with the anaphora giving a driving sense of forward movement. - The 'valley of Death' is a biblical allusion. We can infer here that it is believed that any death of a soldier will be a holy one. - The metaphor 'valley of Death' also foreshadows that death will be inevitable; this is recognised before the battle begins. - The 'six hundred' are throughout the poem referred to as one group entity; they are not individually significant. There were actually 670 soldiers in fact, but the rounded number adds to the sense of insignificance of the individual, merely the whole.

Answer 68

- Tennyson was poet laureate at the time; he was obliged to write for the government, so had to write in a way that satisfied them. - This is written in response to the Crimean war, which British troops fought in at the time. This particular scene is the Battle of Balaclava, when 670 soldiers were led into battle, 110 dying and 160 badly wounded.

Answer 69

"Theirs not to make reply,/ Theirs not to reason why,/ Theirs but to do and die:/ Into the valley of Death/ Rode the six hundred." - The consistent repetition maintains the fast pace of the poem. - The choice of the conjunction 'but' is significant, as it implies that their duty is in fact nothing but to fight and die. - The colon used is significant because it links the next clause as a result of the first; they cannot question what they do, their duty is to die, hence they charge 'into the valley of Death'. This emphasises these actions being devoid of choice.

Answer 70

"Cannon to right of them,/ Cannon to left of them,/ Cannon in front of them/ Volley'd and thunder'd" - This creates a sense of claustrophobia, and this kinaesthetic and auditory imagery of cannons going off all all around them, with the sound of 'thunder'. It gives a true sense of presence in the action from the listener and allows them to better perceive the danger and the action of the charge.

Answer 71

"Reel'd from the sabre-stroke/ Shatter'd and sunder'd./ Then they rode back, but not/ Not the six hundred." - The remains high and exciting throughout the poem, speeding up and up through constant use of repetition and alliteration, such as the sibilance here of 'sabre-stroke shatter'd and sunder'd'. This all leads up to somewhat of an anticlimax, in the very deliberately not descriptive 'then they rode back'. Here, the pace grinds to an absolute halt, with the anadiplosis of 'not/ not the six hundred', that occurs over the end of a line. Repetition of the word 'not' in conjunction with itself is clunky, and brings the pace right down. This promotes an air of reflection, and consideration of what has just happened.

Answer 72

"When can their glory fade?/ O the wild charge they made!/ All the world wonder'd./ Honour the charge they made!/ Honour the Light Brigade,/ Noble six hundred!" - The rhetorical question is a rhetorical device, demonstrating the propaganda of the time. - Both 'wild' and 'wonder'd' have double meanings: 'wild' can mean either daring and brave, or crazy and irrational; 'wonder'd' can mean 'were in awe' or 'were questioning'. - Even though the charge was a complete failure, the whole 'six hundred' were called 'Noble'. This shows that it is irrelevant that they failed and died, and although this is suggesting that it was not their fault they failed, it is also suggesting that their deaths were irrelevant.

Power and Conflict Poetry Flashcards

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