"We'll have democracy sandwiches and be home for Christmas"
For all the death and destruction that came out of World War I, it seems the least we can say is that we at least received some moving war poetry out of it. Also:
Rupert Brooke
prrrr.
Okay. So here we have Rupert Brooke, celebrated war poet who was criticized by some for his idealized, romanticized view of the war. Compared to many other famous war poets (ie. Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen), who focused on the horror and terror of war, Brooke tended to focus on patriotism and the more positive aspects of the outcome of war. This is not to say that his poems contained particularly happy themes... but while he wrote about death and loss, he managed to express a more uplifting side to it. Here we have sonnet three of his five celebrated sonnets:
III. The Dead
Blow out, you bugles, over the rich Dead!
There's none of these so lonely and poor of old,
But, dying, has made us rarer gifts than gold.
These laid the world away; poured out the red
Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be
Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene,
That men call age; and those who would have been,
Their sons, they gave, their immortality.
Blow, bugles, blow! They brought us, for our dearth,
Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain.
Honour has come back, as a king, to earth,
And paid his subjects with a royal wage;
And Nobleness walks in our ways again;
And we have come into our heritage.
~ Rupert Brooke (1914)
Using the traditional form which he preferred, the octave addresses the tragedy of all the things the soldiers give up by going to war and dying: "These laid the world away; poured out the red / Sweet wine of youth; gave up the years to be / Of work and joy, and that unhoped serene, / That men call age; and those who would have been, / Their sons, they gave, their immortality." These lines are essentially a list of things that can never be; these soldiers, in their prime, their youth, gave up not only that, but their future, and even their future generations. This last line of the first section, about giving up their immortality (by not producing children), seems to represent the height of their loss.
But we enter the sestet which finishes the sonnet with a new sense of optimism, for after "Blow, bugles, blow!", during which England's people presumably honour the men who have died for their country, we are met with the rewards of the war. The poem exclaims, "They brought us, for our dearth, / Holiness, lacked so long, and Love, and Pain. Honour has come back, as a king, to earth [...] and Nobleness walks in our ways again." So in the end, we are left with a sense that these soldiers have not died in vain, for they have brought about these great things. People may mourn their deaths, but in the great scheme of things, their immortality may now be found in the pride and remembrance of England.
On the other hand, we have Wilfred Owen, who I will only discuss briefly because I don't want to ramble, but I do like his poem "Anthem For A Doomed Youth", and I think it makes a good contrast.
Anthem For A Doomed Youth
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, -
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.
What candles may be held to speed them all?
Not in the hands of boys but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.
~ Wilfred Owen (1917)
While this is an extremely bleak view of the realities of war, and the way that soldiers die unceremoniously amid trench warfare, something I enjoy about it is the onomatopoeia in the first section. The 't' and 'r' sounds, which when repeated bring to mind the sound of repetitive gunfire, are found in the words "cattle", "stuttering", "rifles' rapid rattle", and "patter", all of which illustrate the "monstrous anger of the guns." The imagery of this poem shows the great contrast between the early and the later examples of war poetry.
Peace and love,
Laura <3