We Didn T Start The Fire Analysis

Numbers vs. We Didn’t Start The Fire

Bill Gates, one of the most successful entrepreneurs in the world, states, “It’s fine to celebrate success but it is more important to heed the lessons of failure.” Instead of only looking at the advancements that his business, Microsoft, has made, Gates evaluates and learns from the mistakes or failures he’s also made, and finds ways to prevent them from happening again. Billy Joel’s song “We Didn’t Start the Fire” is about all the people or events that made a large impact on the world from 1950 to 1989 and how the United States was not the main cause of all the problems going on. A majority, if not all of the topics of this song are things that had negative impacts on the world. Mary Cornish’s poem “Numbers” is about the use and power of numbers. The main idea of the poem is how even though something may be subtracted from one thing, whatever is subtracted is usually added to another thing. The lyrics of the song “We Didn’t Start the Fire” by Billy Joel incorporates

poetic devices that make it more artistic than the poem “Numbers” by Mary Cornish because of the use of rhymes, allusions, and metaphors.
Rhyming is very common within poetry, but is sometimes even more common in songwriting.

Rhymes are two or more words that have the same ending sound. Songwriters and poets often times use rhymes to help their piece flow better, or keep the audience or readers engaged. Billy Joel’s song “We Didn’t Start the Fire” is filled with rhymes, with a rhyme in almost every single line: “Brando, the King and I, and the Catcher In The Rye / Eisenhower, Vaccine, England’s got a new Queen / Marciano, Liberace, Santayana goodbye” (line 6-8). Billy Joel uses the rhymes to move from one topic to the next, and the song is even in chronological order from 1950 to 1989. The rhyme schemes of the song are end rhymes as well as perfect rhymes. On the other hand, the poem is completely free verse, or without a single rhyme. This makes the poem less artistic and harder to remain engaged and interested. In addition to rhyming, allusions are another way of displaying artistic

ability.
Allusions are references to famous people, events, or places. Billy Joel’s entire song is filled with allusions of people and events who had a major impact on the world. For example, Joel sings, “Joseph Stalin, Malenkov, Nasser and Prokofiev / Rockefeller, Campanella, Communist Bloc” (line 15-16). The people and events listed are things that had a great impact on not only the United States, but the entire world in 1953. The allusions relate the entire theme of the song to real life examples, making the flow very interesting and engaging. The poem does not use a single allusion, making the song a more artistic choice.
Metaphors are similar to similes in that they compare two unlike objects or things, but they do not use like or as. Extended metaphors are metaphors that span across an entire section of writing or even the entire writing itself. The poem “Numbers” does use few metaphors to help compare a message or topic to real life examples. For example, Mary Cornish states, “Three boys beyond their mothers' call, / two Italians off to the sea, / one sock that isn't anywhere you look” (line 32-34). This is comparing the italian boys and their mother to the idea of an odd remainder when dividing numbers. Although the poem does use metaphors, the song uses very strong extended metaphors to express an idea. The major extended metaphor in Joel’s song is that “we didn’t start the fire.” This means that the United States is not the cause of all of the world’s problems. The problems of the world is related or compared to the fire, as they are both destructive and can spread easily. Joel sings, “We didn't start the fire / No we didn't light it / But we tried to fight it” (line 12-14). This means that the United States did not start all of the problems, but they are trying to extinguish the flame, or resolve the problems. The extended metaphor is a creative way of establishing Joel’s point of view. This makes the song a more artistic piece in comparison to the poem.
Billy Joel’s song, “We Didn’t Start the Fire,” incorporates poetic devices that are artistically stronger than the poetic devices used in “Numbers” by Mary Cornish because of the use of rhymes, allusions, and metaphors.