Compare the techniques that the poets you studied use to explore the idea that truly significant battles are fought within oneself.
Poets such as Robert Frost, Sylvia Plath, Seigfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen use a variety of techniques including metaphor (imagery), satire and personification to express their emotions from the battles they fight within themselves. These techniques are used to raise emotional relations and the association of the difficulties people face within their life to the events in the poem to help influence the reader to explore the idea of the significant battles that are fought within oneself. Frost uses his poetry to describe his view on life’s decisions, demons he faces after making these decisions and that the past
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Frost uses this technique in his poem The Road Not Taken, saying “Two roads diverged in a yellow wood”. This is a metaphor for a tough decision in life, the two roads represent a tough decision that must be made. The narrator realises that this decisions will have a significant affect on his future. This technique is also used in another poem of Frosts Fire And Ice although it is an implied metaphor Frost compares fire and ice without implying it , the fire becomes a metaphor for human desire “From what I've tasted of desire”. The ice becomes a metaphor for hatred “I think I know enough of hate”.The poem investigates the destructive power of human passion (metaphors of desire and hate) through the symbolism of destruction by fire or ice. Plath uses this technique similarly in her poem Daddy. The metaphor used in this poem contain dark literal meanings, these dark meanings are used to describe how she feels in a scenario. An example of this is when Plath states “An engine, and engine/Chuffing me off like a Jew./A Jew to Dachau, Auschwitz, Belsen./I began to talk like a Jew./I think I may well be a Jew.” The Jew is used as a metaphor to show her father is a German, she compares her treatment of her to the attack of the Germans on the Jewish …show more content…
In Dulce et Decorum Est, Owen uses satire to sarcastically describe how horrific and dehumanising war is. The title of the poem is Latin and once translated to English it means ‘sweet and proper’ which is completed in the last stanza stating ‘sweet and proper to die for ones country’. The poem concludes saying that the statement is an “old lie” as there is nothing sweet dying for ones country. The full statement was not provided at the start of the poem as Owen wanted the reader to decide for themselves the reality of war. In a similar way in Owens poem Futility, satire is used in an ironic way to show that war is irreversible and harsh. The poem states that the dead mans previous occupation before war was a farm worker of some sort as the reference “fields half sown” is related to a young mans life cut short because of war. Plath uses sarcastic comments in her poem The Applicant to sarcastically criticise societies views on what a wife and husband should be.”It is waterproof, shatterproof, proof./Against fire and bombs through the roof” as Plath states the perfect partner to marry it is clear that no human is ‘shatter proof’ and shows that all marriages will not be perfect and societies idea of them is not correct. Frost uses sarcasm and irony in
Similarly, Wilfred Owen’s poem “Dulce et Decorum Est” describes a soldier who witnesses the death of his comrade from poisonous gas. Using imagery and irony, Owen presents a blunt contrast between the propaganda practiced for recruitment and the truth behind the suffering endured by the soldiers. While presented in different formats, both literary works criticize the romanticism of war, arguing that there is no glory in the suffering and killing caused by conflict.
“Dulce Et Decorum Est” is a World War One poem written by Wilfred Owen, to express the dreadfulness of war and that no glory awaits men.
“Dulce et Decorum Est” showing an anti-war side, the poem was originally entitled to Jessie Pope. It shows a tone through out the poem of depression, sadness Owen gets his message across very rapidly and makes the reader feel like they had just experienced the war in the few minutes of reading ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’ this is done from the metaphors and magnificent imagery used to show a terrible side of war.
Throughout the poem, Plath contradicts herself, saying, ‘I was seven, I knew nothing’ yet she constantly talks of the past, remembering. Her tone is very dark and imposing, she uses many images of blindness, deafness and a severe lack of communication, ‘So the deaf and dumb/signal the blind, and are ignored’. Her use of enjambment shows her feelings and pain in some places, in other places it covers up her emotional state. She talks of her father being a German, a Nazi. Whilst her father may have originated from Germany, he was in no way a Nazi, or a fascist. He was a simple man who made sausages. ‘Lopping the sausages!’ However she used this against her father, who died when she was but eight, saying that she still had night mares, ‘They color1 my sleep,’ she also brings her father’s supposed Nazism up again, ‘Red, mottled, like cut necks./There was a silence!’. Plath also talks of her father being somewhat of a general in the militia, ‘A yew hedge of orders,’ also with this image she brings back her supposed vulnerability as a child, talking as if her father was going to send her away, ‘I am guilty of nothing.’ For all her claims of being vul...
THE POEMS MEANING TO ME The poem epitomises the futility and pointlessness of war. Not only is war a shocking waste of life, but it is ultimately barbarous and pointless act as World War I so horrendously demonstrated to the world powers. The graphic horror of war is presented through a series of images which are designed to demolish the notion of war being a patriotic and meaningful adventure. The one particularly vivid image that got to me was that of the lone soldier who doesn't fasten his mask fast enough and suffers from the full effects of deadly gas: 'In all my dreams, before my helpless sight, He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.'
Frost uses a religious allusion to further enforce the objective of the poem. Whether Frost's argument is proven in a religious or scientific forum, it is nonetheless true. In directly citing these natural occurrences from inanimate, organic things such as plants, he also indirectly addresses the phenomena of aging in humans, in both physical and spiritual respects. Literally, this is a poem describing the seasons. Frosts interpretation of the seasons is original in the fact that it is not only autumn that causes him grief, but summer.
Dulce et Decorum Est In Wilfred Owen’s poem “Dulce et Decorum Est” the speaker’s argument against whether there is true honor in dying for ones country in World War I contradicts the old Latin saying, Dulce et Decorum Est, which translated means, “it is sweet and honorable to die for the fatherland”; which is exemplified through Owen’s use of title, diction, metaphor and simile, imagery, and structure throughout the entirety of the poem. The first device used by Owen in the poem is without a doubt the title, which he uses to establish the opposing side of the argument in the poem. The poem is titled, “Dulce et Decorum Est”, which comes from Horace’s Odes, book three, line 13, and translated into English to mean: “It is sweet and honorable to die for the fatherland”. With this title it would seem as if the Owen himself condones the patriotic propaganda that resulted in the deaths of young men in World War I, tallying upwards of hundreds of thousands.
I am going to compare the two poems “Dulce et decorum est” by Wilfred Owen and “Channel Firing” by Thomas Hardy. The poem by Hardy talks about the great German guns “Big Berthas” which fired across the channel at the nearest coastal villages, and how the noise of these guns is so terrific that it wakes the dead in their graves. “Dulce et decorum est” is a poem about a group of tired, worn out soldiers who are making their way back from the front line. They come under a gas attack and Owen describes to us the scene which is presented to him of a fellow soldier and companion “drowning” in his own mucus. Both poems portray a sense of helplessness to this exposure to the war!
Robert Frost’s poem “Out, out” is set in Vermont during the late afternoon and is about a young boy who is cutting wood for the family stove and gets his hand cut off ultimately resulting in death. Frost uses this poem as a way to show that life has little sympathy for the dead. He does this by using many literary techniques such as imagery, personification, allusion, and blank verse. All of these techniques are important when understanding this poem because it helps to convey certain feeling and emotions from Frost’s perspective. The theme, symbols, and literary techniques Frost uses are essential in coming to terms with how to portray this poem.
‘Dulce et Decorum est’ is a line from the ode by Horace that translates to ‘It is sweet and fitting,’ a common trench lyric with the purpose to inspire men to believe their deaths will make them heroes. Wilfred Owen titles his poem with these words as a juxtaposition to the text, since he depicts the vulgar realities of the war in opposition to the patriotic propaganda soldiers were corrupted with.
In the poem, “Daddy,” Sylvia Plath shows her character to have a love for her father as well as an obvious sense of resentment and anger towards him. She sets the tone through the structure of the poem along with her use of certain diction, imagery, and metaphors/similes. The author, Sylvia Plath, chooses words that demonstrate the characters hatred and bitterness towards the oppression she is living with under the control of her father and later, her husband. Plath’s word choice includes many words that a child might use. There is also an integration of German words which help set the tone as well. She creates imagery through her use of metaphors and similes which allow the reader to connect certain ideas and convey the dark, depressing tone of the poem.
William H. Pritchard, an author of Modern American Poetry, points out, “But his attempt at poultry farming was none too successful and by 1906 he had begun teaching English at Pinkerton Academy, a secondary school in New Hampshire” (1). Although Frost failed at other occupations, those failures pushed him into teaching which also helped blossom his poetry. “Then took the other, just as fair and having perhaps the better claim” (1026) Frost claims. Eventhough he has a bitter childhood, a rocky start to his young adulthood, and was unsure of which career path to take, his love of poetry led him to best
Two roads diverged in a yellow wood, Frost is traveling when he comes across two roads split at a fork. The “yellow wood” shows that it is autumn. The poem seems like it’s just about two roads, but they become metaphors for decisions in his life. And sorry I could not travel both He realizes that he could not go down both paths.
In analyzing the poem 'The Road Not Taken'; by Robert Frost, it represents 'the classic choice of a moment and a lifetime.';(pg 129) He relies much on the reflections of nature to convey his theme. However, this poem seems to be in essence very simple but
The Poem The Road not Taken by Robert Frost explores the fundamental question of free will often pondered in philosophy. Frost is speaking and indirectly addressing the unique path each person will end up traveling in their lifetime. Every day humans are faced with decisions; nevertheless, humans are also granted with the ability to choose their future. While humans may attempt to weigh each choice and predict the consequence of the given decision, it is not possible to predict the future outcomes. Also, it is likely that those making a decision often attempt to look down one path as far as one can "to where it bends in the undergrowth" or as far as one can predict.