War Poetry
LO: to commence our unit of War
Poetry.
Discuss:
• An unjust peace is better than a just war.
• All wars are civil wars, because all men are
brothers.
• All war is deception.
Why write poetry?
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What emotions would one feel at war?
Why might someone write poetry on war?
Effects of war?
What is war?
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=e4CIHL1chyA
• http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=s48SPvy_0Q
Q
Futility by Wilfred Owen
Move him into the sun Gently its touch awoke him once,
At home, whispering of fields unsown.
Always it woke him, even in France,
Until this morning and this snow.
If anything might rouse him now
The kind old sun will know.
Think how it wakes the seeds Woke, once, the clays of a cold star.
Are limbs so dear-achieved, are sides
Full-nerved, - still warm, - too hard to stir?
Was it for this the clay grew tall?
- O what made fatuous sunbeams toil
To break earth's sleep at all?
Wilfred Owen
Images in Poetry
LO: to understand some of the
images in poetry and to try to create
what they image is telling you.
Challenging:
• Language of a poem
• How to create a poem
• Structure of a poem
• Listening to music and staying awake?!!
Imagery in Poetry
• One of the objectives of a successful poem is to create pictures into
the mind of the reader of important images and issues they want to
convey. The imagery in war poetry is very important as they want
the reader to understand the suffering they have witnessed and
experienced.
• Look at the poems and choose one you connect with.
• Using some plain paper, draw some of the images you find have an
impact on you, or that you think the poet is trying to make you see.
• You can either do one large picture, or several small images, dotting
words or lines around your picture/s from the poem to show what
you are illustrating.
In Flanders Fields
Anthem for Doomed Youth
In Flanders fields the poppies
blow
Between the crosses, row on row
That mark our place; and in the
sky
The larks, still bravely singing, fly
Scarce hear amid the guns below.
What passing-bells for these who die as
cattle?
- Only the monstrous anger of the guns.
Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers
nor bells;
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,
We are the Dead. Short days ago The shrill, demented choirs of wailing
We lived, felt dawn, saw sunset shells;
glow,
And bugles calling for them from sad
Loved and were loved, and now shires.
we lie
In Flanders fields.
What candles may be held to speed them
all?
Take up our quarrel with the foe: Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes
To you from failing hands we
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
throw
The pallor of girls’ brows shall be their
The torch; be yours to hold it
pall?
high.
Their flowers the tenderness of patient
If ye break faith with us who die minds,
We shall not sleep, though
And each show dusk a drawing-down of
poppies grow
blinds.
In Flanders Fields.
Wilfred Owen
John McCrae
The Falling Leaves
November 1915
Today, as I rode by,
I saw the brown leaves
dropping from their tree
In a still afternoon,
When no wind whirled them
whistling to the sky,
But thickly, silently,
They fell, like snowflakes
wiping out the noon;
And wandered slowly thence
For thinking of a gallant
multitude
Which now all withering lay,
Slain by no wind of age or
pestilence,
But in their beauty strewed
Like snowflakes falling on the
Flemish clay.
Margaret Postgate Cole
Images in poetry
LO: to understand some poetry
techniques;
: to find examples of them in a poem
Suicide in the Trenches
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I knew a simple soldier boy
Who grinned at life in empty joy,
Slept soundly through the lonesome dark,
And whistled early with the lark.
In winter trenches, cowed and glum,
With crumps and lice and lack of rum,
He put a bullet through his brain.
No one spoke of him again.
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You smug-faced crowds with kindling eye
Who cheer when soldier lads march by,
Sneak home and prey you’ll never know
The hell where youth and laughter go.
Seigfried Sasson
Alliteration
The strong rhythm to
this poem makes it
sound like a Nursery
rhyme.
Images in poetry
LO: to find examples of poetic
techniques in Dolce et Decorum est;
To explain the effect of the techniques
in the poems.
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DULCE ET DECORUM EST
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Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through •
sludge,
Till on the haunting flares(2) we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest(3) began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots(4)
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Of tired, outstripped(5) Five-Nines(6) that dropped
behind.
Gas!(7) Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling, •
Fitting the clumsy helmets(8) just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
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And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime(9) . . .
Dim, through the misty panes(10) and thick green •
light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
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In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering,(11) choking, drowning. •
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
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And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
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His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
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Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
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Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud(12)
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest(13)
To children ardent(14) for some desperate glory,
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The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.(15)
Wilfred Owen
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8 October 1917 - March, 1918
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Notes on Dulce et Decorum Est
1. DULCE ET DECORUM EST - the first words of a Latin saying
(taken from an ode by Horace). The words were widely
understood and often quoted at the start of the First World War.
They mean "It is sweet and right." The full saying ends the poem:
Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori - it is sweet and right to die
for your country. In other words, it is a wonderful and great
honour to fight and die for your country.
2. Flares - rockets which were sent up to burn with a brilliant
glare to light up men and other targets in the area between the
front lines (See illustration, page 118 of Out in the Dark.)
3. Distant rest - a camp away from the front line where exhausted
soldiers might rest for a few days, or longer
4. Hoots - the noise made by the shells rushing through the air
5. Outstripped - outpaced, the soldiers have struggled beyond the
reach of these shells which are now falling behind them as they
struggle away from the scene of battle
6. Five-Nines - 5.9 calibre explosive shells
7. Gas! - poison gas. From the symptoms it would appear to be
chlorine or phosgene gas. The filling of the lungs with fluid had
the same effects as when a person drowned
8. Helmets - the early name for gas masks
9. Lime - a white chalky substance which can burn live tissue
10. Panes - the glass in the eyepieces of the gas masks
11. Guttering - Owen probably meant flickering out like a candle
or gurgling like water draining down a gutter, referring to the
sounds in the throat of the choking man, or it might be a sound
partly like stuttering and partly like gurgling
12. Cud - normally the regurgitated grass that cows chew usually
green and bubbling. Here a similar looking material was issuing
from the soldier's mouth
13. High zest - idealistic enthusiasm, keenly believing in the
rightness of the idea
14. ardent - keen
15. Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori - see note 1 above.
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Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through
sludge,
Till on the haunting flares(2) we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest(3) began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots(4)
Of tired, outstripped(5) Five-Nines(6) that dropped
behind.
Gas!(7) Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets(8) just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime(9) . . .
Dim, through the misty panes(10) and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering,(11) choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud(12)
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest(13)
To children ardent(14) for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.(15)
Wilfred Owen
8 October 1917 - March, 1918
Dulce et Decorum
est
Effect of Poetic Techniques
LO: to understand why poetic
techniques are used and the effects
that they produce.
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Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through
sludge,
Till on the haunting flares(2) we turned our backs
And towards our distant rest(3) began to trudge.
Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots
But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind;
Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots(4)
Of tired, outstripped(5) Five-Nines(6) that dropped
behind.
Gas!(7) Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets(8) just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling,
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime(9) . . .
Dim, through the misty panes(10) and thick green light,
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering,(11) choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud(12)
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues,
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest(13)
To children ardent(14) for some desperate glory,
The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est
Pro patria mori.(15)
Wilfred Owen
8 October 1917 - March, 1918
Dulce et Decorum
est
Effects of word choices
Word Choice
• Good
• Nice
• Very fast
• Hard
Effect?
How might we create a stronger effect
with word choices?
Analysing Language
LO: LO: to analyse language, through PEE
paragraphs, in both poems for effect.
To find images in our poems, relating to war.
PEE!!
Now, create your own PEE paragraph,
using the analysis that you have
written in your sheets.
• The poet creates a very hostile atmosphere using the
technique of onomatopoeia.
• ‘Plunges’, ‘guttering’, ‘choking’ and ‘drowning’
• Choking:
• D) Can’t breathe
• C) scared, anxious, gagging and struggling
• B) desperate for an end, helpless, feeling death biting at
our heels, sharp movements, awkward, hurtful movements.
• Plunges:
• D) to put under water
• C) a sharp movement, felling pain
• B) feeling desperate that there is no end to the abuse;
willing the pain to end, a violent, forceful movement,
gasping for air.
PEE Paragraph
Home Learning: Please complete two
explanations for ‘plunges’ and
‘choking’, and put them into PEE
paragraphs.
• The poet creates a very hostile atmosphere using the
technique of onomatopoeia.
• ‘Plunges’, ‘guttering’, ‘choking’ and ‘drowning’
• suggest that the poet is in pain. The sound of the
words are harsh, especially ‘choking’ and ‘plunges’ as
they make us experience the turmoil that the poet is
experiencing.
• The words make us feel anxious, scared and begging
for an end to the pain that is being felt. We can feel the
movement of the word ‘plunge’ as it is a violent word
that forces a feeling of abuse and panic on us, lending
itself to the hostile atmosphere.