“Feeling sorry for her”. Kate Daniels uses the iconic photo of the child, hurt in a napalm attack on a Vietnam village who is screaming in pain and fear, to show the extent of the suffering that innocent civilians have to go through in war time. She wants people to be aware of the pain and to show what the reality is like for them in the war, focusing on the horrors in particular. The poem uses this to instil emotions such as sympathy and compassion but also to make people feel appalled by the war. She asserts that all over the world, people are “being appalled at the war”. The poem foregrounds the human suffering and by showing this, she tries to make the Americans feel guilty for causing all this pain to millions of innocent people in Vietnam. Daniels reiterates this by criticizing the human response to war further on in the poem. “How can she know what we really are?” As the child is young, she is naïve to the world around her and therefore does not know how cruel people can be. The narrator is speaking on behalf of all the Americans in the country who believe the war is their responsibility. She uses the words “terribly human” in juxtaposition as a way of illustrating the two sides of humanity. Children tend to look to adults for help as the word “human” implies generosity, kindness and compassion. However, the word “terribly” has a negative feeling and either can mean ‘very’ or can show how awful something can be. Using these words together shows that what humans look like on the outside is not the same as what is in the inside; it contains both meanings simultaneously.
The photo of the young child running shows the desperation of her need. “Her arms stretched out” gives the reader the idea that the girl is running t...
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...n “War Photographer”, the line “Belfast. Beirut. Phnom Penh,” indicates that Duffy has a wider perspective of the war in which she is talking about war in general and the fact that it is happening everywhere in the world. This can be more effective because if people are reading about wars that are happening all over the world, they may become more aware of the shocking calamity that is war. The pace and the language used in each of these poems create another contrast between them. Daniels uses colloquial language with a quick pace, making the poem more conversational and focuses on the child’s naïve view. Duffy, however, uses a more formal approach with a slower pace to represent the photographer reflecting and her complex ideas and imagery shows his intellectual view on war.
Works Cited
War Photograph - Kate Daniels
War Photographer - Carol Ann Duffy
Poetry has been used for centuries as a means to explore emotions and complex ideas through language, though individuals express similar ideas in wholly different forms. One such idea that has been explored through poetry in numerous ways is that of war and the associated loss, grief, and suffering. Two noted Australian poets shown to have accomplished this are Kenneth Slessor with his work ‘Beach Burial’ and John Schumann’s ‘I Was Only Nineteen’. Both of these works examine the complexities of conflict, but with somewhat different attitudes.
"A picture is worth a thousand words," we say. From the eyes and mind of the archivist studying the pictures of Robert Ross' experience with war, they are worth a lot more. The photographs in the epilogue of Timothy Findley's "The Wars" play an important role in Findley establishing both a trust with the reader, and a sense of realism to his war story. This satisfies the need for realism in his tale. The result of this image that is brought forth through the medium of the photograph, is that we are forced to see the "before" and "after" of Roberts "experience" and figure out our way through what is deposited in between: the cause and effect.
...display how the average citizen would see war for the first time. Colonel Kelly sees her as “vacant and almost idiotic. She had taken refuge in deaf, blind, unfeeling shock” (Vonnegut 100). To a citizen who even understands the war process, war is still heinous and dubiously justified when viewed first hand. The man who seems to have coldly just given away her son’s life without the same instinct as her has participated in this heinous wartime atrocity for so long, but it only affect her now because she cannot conceive of the reality of it until it is personally in front of her. That indicates a less complete political education of war even among those who war may have affected their entire lives. The closeness and the casualties of this “game” will affect her the most because she has to watch every move that previously could have been kept impartial and unviewed.
The poem begins by exploring how the speaker’s grandfather was a photographer in World War One and how he turned his hobby into his job: “Opened a shop. Turned it into a family affair”. Kay then goes on to introduce the father’s speaker and how he approached photography differently: “His father knew the equipment but not the art. He knew the darks but not the brights, my father learned the magic.” By first introducing the grandfather as a character the reader can better understand the speaker’s father. Since the grandfather took pictures for the war the moments he captured through his lens were much more gruesome, whereas the speaker’s father chooses to stray from this and focus on positivity or as it’s referred to in the poem “light”. Kay then introduces the speaker’s mother, exploring her passion for photography and giving her the title of “artist”. While the grandfather turned photography into his job, the speaker’s father uses photography as a way of capturing noteworthy events, for example: “he travelled across the country to follow a forest fire, hunted it with his camera for a week.” Finally, the speaker’s mother focuses more on the artistry of photography which is seen through her focus on the use of her darkroom. By exploring each of these characters, Kay
Throughout the history of war poetry, no aspect of war can be said to feature more prominently than the representation of death and dying. While such representations are constant in their inclusion in war texts, the nature of the representation varies greatly, be it as a noble act for ones country, or as the defining negative of war. Poems such as Brooke’s ‘The Soldier’ and Seaman’s ‘Pro Patria’ are strong examples of the former; while others such as ‘Dolce et decorum est’ by Owen and ‘The Rear Guard’ by Sassoon best exemplify the latter. The question remains however as to why these representations of death and dying differ so, and whether there is a relevant relationship between the type of depiction and the time period or conflict, as well as the author’s proximity to death’s harsh reality.
Bruce Weigl’s work gives readers an accurate glimpse of what took place in Vietnam. His poetry reveals a harsher reality of the war that goes beyond the raw number of people who perished. The idea that real human beings are casualties in war is a burden Weigl and fellow Vietnam War poets share. To this day American’s simply see the fallen as just names and bodies, nothing further. Weigl serves as a forefront example of just how painful and disturbing the war was and his poetry is greatly influenced by it in nearly every facet. Moreover, it’s a reminder that the images he witnessed are unforgettable and are completely ingrained in his mind to the point where horror is the focus and projecting it as beautiful if his main goal.
War and its ramifications for those who are unfortunately entangled in it, is an issue that has fueled both political discussion and literary exploration throughout the previous century. Underived, authentic accounts of the experience and effects of war, from those who have served in it, can be especially enlightening for the majority of society who have had the fortune of not being intimately familiar with war. Through the examination of poems and stories written by soldiers, who were inspired by their involvement in conflict, one can obtain a greater understanding of this gruesome aspect of life, without having to directly experience it. Similarly, soldier turned poet, Bruce Weigl, has contributed his perspective on war through his literary
The purpose of visual imagery in poetry is to help get the poet’s message across in a language that is strong, vivid and very visual. Visual imagery evokes the emotions of the reader by appealing to their senses and through this helps enhance the mood of the poem. The mood implied in “Daddy”, by Sylvia Plath, is that of aggressive, anger, irritable from one that has a childlike devotion to one of severing due to abandonment. In “The Colonel”, by Carolyn Forche, is one of controlled terror, intimidation, torture, and literal dismemberment. In “The Death of the Ball Turret Gunner”, by Randall Jarrell, the story sets the mood of melancholy at the hands of the state. Each poem a dictatorial figure whether it be the father,
The poems also have many contrasts. Owen speaks of a first-hand experience whilst Duffy speaks of the events which her photographer friends witnessed. Owen also addresses the reader to highlight how little glory there is in war but Duffy, in ‘War Photographer’, does not refer to the reader, keeping her style of writing in third person. Duffy also refers to several countries whereas Owen, who died at the end of the First World War, only refers to the one he has witnessed. Duffy also criticises her fellow countrymen, saying they are unaffected. ‘War Photographer’ is much calmer in tone than ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’, which is very shocking for the reader.
Ultimately, we have two poems which can be compared on the grounds of their subject, but are poles apart regarding their message. The structure of these poems is not what would be typically expected from a war poem, but are structured on the basis of these typical structures in order to create some sense of familiarity. Brooke’s poem expands on this familiarity while Owen attempts to deliberately sabotage it. In regards to content, Brooke shows throughout his perception of the nobility of dying for one’s country, whilst Owen uses all of his poetic techniques to show the opposite.
Owen’s poem uses symbolism to bring home the harsh reality of war the speaker has experienced and forces the reader to think about the reality presented in romanticized poetry that treats war gently. He utilizes language that imparts the speakers experiences, as well as what he, his companions, and the dying man feels. People really die and suffer and live through nightmares during a war; Owen forcefully demonstrates this in “Dulce et Decorum Est”. He examines the horrific quality of World War I and transports the reader into the intense imagery of the emotion and experience of the speaker.
This type of writing interests me because it was used as a tool to open people’s eyes to the brutality of war. In a way it protested and spoke up against this injustice and most importantly gave a voice to the people who became the biggest victims of war – the soldiers themselves.
In “War Photographer”, Duffy illustrates the wrongful killings and heart wrenching deaths that the war photographer had to witness. The photographer took pictures of constant death from his surroundings and Duffy shows how he managed to deal with that and she highlights his sadness and grief from his experience. A line from the poem that says, “how the blood stained into foreign dust” is clear evidence that there was death taking place on the battleground. Duffy uses the words “foreign dust” to describe that there was a conflict in another country, which meant th...
The poem comprises three stanzas which are patterned in two halves; the rule of three is ingeniously used throughout the poem to create tension and show the progression of the soldiers’ lives. There is a variety of rhyming schemes used – possibly Duffy considered using caesural rhyme, internal rhyme and irregular rhyme to better address the elegiac reality. The rhythm is very powerful and shows Duffy’s technical adroitness. It is slightly disconcerting, and adds to the other worldly ambience of the poem. Duffy uses a powerful comparative in each stanza to exemplify the monstrosity and extent of war, which is much worse than we imagine; it develops throughout each stanza, starting with a syntactical ‘No; worse.’ to ‘worse by far’ and ending on ‘much worse’. Similarly, the verbs used to describe the soldier’s shadow as he falls shows the reader the journey of the shadow, as if it’s the trajectory of soldiers’ lives. At first, the shadow is as an act...
War consumes the youth of young men and completely alters a person. From numerous poems, it is made clear that war exhausts the youth of young men, and has left their lives with no meaning. These poems are “Dulce Et Decorum Est” and “Mental Cases” written by Wilfred Owen. Similarly, they both employ the same techniques, such as similes and metaphors. However, a somewhat different perspective is projected through the poem “In Flanders Field” by John McCrae, which dissimilitudes yet intensifies the main message. Whether from a more emotional perspective or from a physical view, war has devastated the prime time of many young men in multitudinous ways.