Mametz Wood

Question 1

Themes

Answer 1

• Passage of time
• Pain and suffering
• Death and Loss
• Effects of War
• Nature

Question 2

Subject

Answer 2

• the poem begins with farmers in france finding skeletons in their field of soldiers from WW1
• it briefly references the way the soldiers died in battle before returning to the discovery of their skeletons in the present
• This discovery is partly positive, - it allows the memory of these soldiers to be honoured

Question 3

Title

Answer 3

This is a place in France in which the 38th Welsh division fought against the heavily fortified germans

Question 4

Imagery of brokenness - vivid

Answer 4

-narrator uses detailed injured body parts in a list separated by caesurae. This shows how war can dehumanise people

Question 5

Imagery contrasting the violence of war with human fragility

Answer 5

• “blown// and broken bird’s egg of a skull” - alliteration links it
  -“nesting machine guns” - nesting meant to be soft and cosy
  -“broken mosiac” “china plate”
  -“socketed heads”
  highlights the soldier’s humanity and what they had to face

Question 6

Bird imagery

Answer 6

“broken bird’s egg”
“nesting machine guns”
“the notes they had sung”
birds symbol of life, they died too soon

Question 7

Language - the personification of Earth needing to heal and that it guards the soldiers

Answer 7

“tended the land back into itself”
“the earth stand sentinel”
“even now”
This emphasises how long it takes to recover from the war damage and stresses the importance of remembering those who fought in the war - even the earth guards them

Question 8

Language - “skeletons paused mid dance - macabre”

Answer 8

• personified death that summons representatives from all walks of life. No matter your position, everyone dies
• dark humour
• reinforces that they were human

Question 9

Language that they were lost too soon

Answer 9

-“wasted young”
-“foreign body”
“they were told to walk not run” - like teachers telling children, innocence

Question 10

Tone

Answer 10

-Sadness - mournful, lyrical tone suggests a calm sadness for the deaths of the young soldiers
-Reflective / Rememberance - nature seems to be making sure that the dead soldiers aren’t forgotten - a strong sense that memory is important and that the past shouldn’t be forgotten
“with this unearthing, slipped from their absent
tongues” - it gives them a voice they didn’t have and
gives them an identity

Question 11

How is the reflective tone shown

Answer 11

-Long sentence and enjambment establish a reflective tone
-the slow pace doesn’t change and images of the past are there all through the poem
emphasises the lasting effects of war and the time it takes for the earth to heal

Question 12

Structure

Answer 12

-the poem is written in 3rd person - sense of distance/detachment