exposure Flashcards
“merciless iced east winds that knive us…”
wind personifies as enemy, cold is the worst enemy, the nature.fear in reader
sibilance is so strong almost hissing
The ellipsis wants us to ponder on the idea, cruel winter. (never ending)
confuse,worried,curious, nervous
semantic field of anxiety/chaos, distress magnified
… x3
use of ellipsis suggests slow decline and the sense of waiting
punctuation end stopping, in the first stanza evokes slow hypothermia death.
emphasise boredom+waiting of soldiers. conveying frustration
our brains ache
possessive noun means they are a team, exhaustation
“brain” not only estabilished physical impact but the psychological one too.
mental and physical impact
“like twitching agonies”
own uses the sound of wind to evoke screams of dying men
What are we doing here?
RQ, questionign theri prupose, God,Commanders, motivation to fight.
objcting unnecessary wars and poor leadership
“on us the doors are closed”
trapped in war
metaphor of door implies they have nobody to return to
“We turn back to our dying.”
paradox , suggesting that the only safety for these soldiers is in death, passive statement
“this frost will fasten on this mad and us”
foreshadowing the future, acceptance of death at end of the poem
“all their eyes are ice”
metaphor for the battle against cold which has been lost as eyes are symbol for hope and dreams
but nothing happens”
repeated many times throughout the poem. we still go to war, lack of progress evoked by this refrain
poet
owen
form
ballad
8 stanzas with 5 lines
regular stanzas demonstate monotony of war
main themes
nature stronger always wins
the pity of war
truth about war
horror of war
structure
cyclical, “but nothing happens” at end
