Great War Prayer

804 Words2 Pages
bulb-icon

Recommended: Analysis of the war prayer by mark twain

There is a multitude of great literature to read and enjoy from the Civil War until present day. In the following paper there will be a critical analysis of just one of the many great pieces of literature from this time period. With so much great literature to choose from this time period the hardest part was to choose just one to write about. This paper will be a critical analysis of the Great War Prayer by Mark Twain. To really truly understand someone’s work you need to understand who they are as a person as well as their beliefs and core values. Having a firm understanding of the author’s personal life as well as the time period the piece of literature was written will help to engage the reader into a better understanding of what …show more content…

Mark Twain sets the stage for the story in the beginning when describing the exalting excitement and patriotism that is going through the town. Everyone is booming with excitement and nervousness as it is the day before the battle to begin. There is little opposition to the war that is dealt with rather quickly and is to be put out of sight. Mark Twain is using a very satirical criticism of the absolute glorification of war as well as criticizing the patriotism of those supporting the soldiers preparing to go to war to kill the …show more content…

In a very slight manner Mark Twain is pointing out how naïve not only the soldiers are but so are those patriotic people of the village who pack in the church to support the deploying of the soldiers. Then in the story when a stranger steps in to the church to give their personal prayer it is one of a vastly different tone and implications. The audience can only justify these comments by the stranger by saying that he was crazy and did not know what he was talking about. “It was believed afterward that the man was a lunatic, because there was no sense in what he

Show More
Related

  • Analysis: This Republic Of Suffering, Death And The American Civil War

    773 Words  | 2 Pages

    The American Civil War is one of the biggest turning points in American history. It marks a point of major separation in beliefs from the North and the South and yet somehow ends in a major unification that is now called the United States of America. It still to date remains the bloodiest war in American history. The book “This Republic of Suffering, Death and the American Civil War” by Drew Gilpin Faust better explains the change in thought from the American people that developed from the unexpected mass loss of soldiers that devastated the American people. Throughout this review, the reader will better understand the methods and theory of this book, the sources used, the main argument of the book, the major supporting arguments, and what the author did well and what the author didn’t do well.

    Read More

  • Summary Of The Fate Of Their Country By W. Holt

    561 Words  | 2 Pages

    I felt like the author could clearly show the true contributing factors of the civil war. As an admirer of history, I could use utilize his book for references later on in my academic studies. The book is 127 pages chronicling the events that led to the civil war. Holt gives novices history readers a wonder firsthand look into the world of young America pre-civil war. His book brought out new ways to approach the study of pre-civil war events. The question whether the Civil War was inevitable or could have been derailed was answered in The Fate of Their Country. Holt places the spotlight on the behaviors Politicians and the many congressional compromises that unintendedly involved the actions of the residents of American. These factors at hand placed the Civil war as inevitable. Most of the politician’s views in The Fate of Their Country were egotistical and shortsighted which left gaps in American’s social future. To consider the subject of why, first we need to understand the contributing causes, America’s great expansion project, the Manifest Destiny the driving factor behind the loss of virtue and political discord.

    Read More

  • How Does Mark Twain Use Irony In The War Prayer

    812 Words  | 2 Pages

    In the last paragraph the church goers make their final prayer for their departing soldiers and state “ O Lord our God, help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds with our shells;”. This is exactly what Twain was trying to convey during the whole satire. The church goers could not have made it any more blunt by literally saying “help us to tear their soldiers to bloody shreds”. At this point they are no longer alluding to the fact that they want their soldiers to kill their opponents they are just straight up saying they want them dead. Twain wanted to make sure no matter what the reader knew exactly what he was trying to get

    Read More

  • Analysis of For Cause and Comrades

    546 Words  | 2 Pages

    The book ‘For Cause and Comrades’ is a journey to comprehend why the soldiers in the Civil War fought, why they fought so passionately, and why they fought for the long period of time. Men were pulling guns against other men who they had known their whole lives. McPherson’s main source of evidence was the many letters from the soldiers writing to home. One of the many significant influences was how the men fought to prove their masculinity and courage. To fight would prove they were a man to their community and country. Fighting also had to do with a duty to their family. Ideology was also a major motivating factor; each side thought they were fighting for their liberty. The soldier’s reputations were created and demolished on the battlefield, where men who showed the most courage were the most honored. Religion also played an important role because the second Great Awakening had just occurred. Their religion caused the men who thought of themselves as saved to be fearless of death, “Religion was the only thing that kept this soldier going; even in the trenches…” (McPherson, p. 76) R...

    Read More

  • A Stillness at Appomattox

    1344 Words  | 3 Pages

    “All up and down the lines the men blinked at one another, unable to realize that the hour they had waited for so long was actually at hand. There was a truce…” Bruce Catton’s Pulitzer prize winning book A Stillness at Appomattox chronicles the final year of the American Civil War. This book taught me a lot more about the Civil War than I ever learned through the public school system. Bruce Catton brought to life the real day to day life of the soldiers and the generals who led them into battle.

    Read More

  • Disillusualism In Chickamauga

    783 Words  | 2 Pages

    After he goes to ride the soldier, he his flung from his back and actually sees the soldier, “a face that lack a lower jaw – from upper teeth to the throat was a great red gap fringed with hanging shreds of flesh and splinters of bone.” (Bierce 44). This is the first glimpse the boy comprehends of the true devastation of war. And at this point the child has his first rational reaction,“terrified at last, ran to a tree near by, got upon the farther side of it and took a more serious view of the situation.” (Bierce 44). The author is using the childes revelation of the violence in war to introduce to his readers the devastation of

    Read More

  • Fly Away Peter by David Malouf

    581 Words  | 2 Pages

    When the war breaks out, this tranquil little town seems like the last place on earth that could produce a team of vicious, violent soldiers. Soon we see Jim thrown into a completely contrasting `world', full of violence and fighting, and the strong dissimilarity between his hometown and this new war-stricken country is emphasised. The fact that the original setting is so diversely opposite to that if the war setting, the harsh reality of the horror of war is demonstrated.

    Read More

  • The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum

    2840 Words  | 6 Pages

    Knowing about the writer of a literary text can shape significantly the way that it is read. Consider the effect of the writer’s context on your understanding of The Lost Honour of Katharina Blum.

    Read More

  • American Civil War and Religion

    1149 Words  | 3 Pages

    One of the important subjects during the civil war was Religion even though it received minor attention until recent years. Historians have considered civil war an important story of war; however, religion rose as an important factor with many publications. For example “Religion and the American Civil War” is a collection of essays and poems by various writers (Harry S. Stout, George Reagan Wilson, etc.1)

    Read More

  • Mark Twain’s The Notorious Jumping Frog of Calaveras County

    1008 Words  | 3 Pages

    Twain describes local customs and the ways that the characters behave to create a more realistic setting for the story. In the story the characters engage in behavior or activities that would be unusual for a regular person to do. For example, the narrator says:

    Read More

  • Writers During The Age of Discovery and The Romantic Period

    1169 Words  | 3 Pages

    “Civil Disobiedence.” The American Tradition in Literature, 12th ed. New York: McGraw Hill 2009. Print

    Read More

  • Religion, Slavery, and Democracy in Huckleberry Finn

    765 Words  | 2 Pages

    This essay will analyze the themes of religion, slavery, and democracy in the book Huckleberry Finn by Mark Twain. By exploring these themes that lie behind the book’s veneer, we can understand Twain’s objective for writing this book.

    Read More

  • Being Nice to Strangers

    1475 Words  | 3 Pages

    Throughout this literature class we have been reading stories of love & war, history & heroes, and Gods & Goddesses. This literature that has been introduced to us is about much more than that. It is about life. Everyday life. Our lives. If you understand the literature as it is meant to be understood, then you would be able to put yourself in the characters’ shoes. You would be able to relate with the choices they have to make, the feelings they feel, and the burden of society they have gone through.

    Read More

  • The Moon Is Down John Steinbeck Analysis

    637 Words  | 2 Pages

    All of the soldiers long for the war to end so that they can all return home to their families. The townspeople prolong this by sabotaging the invaders and blowing up the railroads. The soldiers are afraid of the townspeople and are growing homesick. They all wait for their letters to be delivered to their families and worry if someone has died in their town or family.

    Read More

  • Essay On Historical Criticism

    1564 Words  | 4 Pages

    Literary criticism is used as a guideline to help analyze, deconstruct, interpret, or even evaluate literary works. Each type of criticism offers its own methods that help the reader to delve deeper into the text, revealing all of its innermost features. New Criticism portrays how a work is unified, Reader-Response Criticism establishes how the reader reacts to a work, Deconstructive Criticism demonstrates how a work falls apart, Historical Criticism illustrates how the history of the author and the author’s time period influence a text, and last of all, Psychological Criticism expresses how unconscious motivations drive the author in the creation of their work as well as how the reader’s motivations influence their own interpretation of the text (Lynn 139, 191). This creates a deep level of understanding of literature that simply cannot be gained through surface level reading. If not one criticism is beneficial to the reader, then taking all criticisms or a mixture of specific criticisms into consideration might be the best way to approach literary

    Read More

More about Great War Prayer

Open Document