Bayonet Charge - Ted Hughes✔️ Flashcards
Effect of it being in third person singular?
gives a limited narrative perspective this allows the reader to focus on the individual impact of war by showing the ways war impacts a single individual
How does third person singular emphasise the sense of isolation felt by the soldiers?
The protagonist is the only human in the poem and he is isolated from any source of help or comfort with the isolation intensifying the suffering of the speaker and focuses the audience on the impact that war has on them
How is the reality of war presented throughout the poem?
The soldier is driven by terror rather than patriotism he is “stumbling” in the mud and is “in bewilderment” - this is not the amazing war they were being told about back home
How is the the nature presented throughout the poem?
the hare ‘thrown up’ into this conflict, dies in agonies as do the men - sense nature is corrupted by this war and also effected - reinforced with the ‘green hedge’, which ‘dazzles’ with gunfire and the airs ‘belly’ (most vunreable part) being smacked with bullets
How is language used to portray the natural world?
Personification of nature + onomatopeia in “bullets smacking the belly of the air” adds to the violence of war - the “yellow hare” that the earth “threw up” suffers agonies - use of “threw up” carries uncomfortable connotations with links to vomiting
Significance of the poem opening in media res?
no warning of the fighting to come and the reader has no chance to prepare leaving us confused which reflects the panic and confussion of the soldiers - helps us emphathise with the soldier
Significance of the repetition of “raw”?
stands out against the strength of his other vocabulary conveying the soldiers intense suffering - repetition is also reminiscent of stuttering - as if the soldier is experiencing a breakdown in rationality as a result of his anxiety and stress
Effect of the enjambment in the poem?
Stops the reader taking a break or pause - which quickens the pace of the poem - the whole of the first stanza is a single sentence - which matches the tense action of the poem and maintains the momentum of a bayonet charge - helps the reader empathise with the panic and fear felt by the soldiers
Effect of the caesura in the poem?
Fast pace created by the enjambment in the first stanza starkly contrasts with the second stanza which is much slower and is broken up with lots of caesuras - here the soldiers stop to consider the philosphical meaning of war - sense of awakening to reality of war
Significance of simile “lugged a rifle numb as a smashed arm”?
‘numb’ suggests the soldiers have become desensitised to the horrors of war - also suggests the soldiers are unprepared for war with a sense of disconection between their weapons as if they are uncomfortabe holding them - implies they are physicaly unsuitated for the role
How does the sense of patriostism change to terror throughout the poem?
Speaker had a “patriotic tear” which shows he came to war out of a sense of duty to protect his country - now the patriotism is ‘sweating from the centre of his chest’ - suggesting it is leaving him as he sees what war is really like
Significane of the personification of the hare?
Personfication of the hare through Hughes description of its eyes and screaming mouth helps the reader to associate the hares suffering with that of the human soldiers which helps remind us the danger the speakers in - reinforced through the harsh imagery of it ‘threshing’ around
How does the writer show nature as a victim of war with personification?
Hughes uses personification in “bullets smacking the belly out of the air” - here the active verb “smacking” serves to demostrate the violence inflicted on the air - emphasised further, through the air being personified with human characteristics, a ‘belly’ which allows us to relate and symphaise with nature
Significance of the metaphor and alliteration “cold clockwork of the stars and nations”
Suggests war turns individuals into tools/pawns to be used - he questions if he is “the hand pointing that second” which suggests a certain irelevance in the grand shceme - reflects the cruel and futile aspects of war, which takes the soldiers life out of his control and makes him feel powerless in the hands of fate
First and last line?
‘suddenly he awoke and was running’
‘His terrors touchy dynamite’
