Mametz Wood - Owen Sheers Flashcards
Structure
No regular structure or rhyme scheme
Themes
War
Nature vs Technology
Context
The poem is written about a Welsh regiment in WW2
The poet himself is Welsh
For years afterwards the farmers found them -
the wasted young, turning up under their plough blades
as they tended the land back into itself.
The poem begins In Media Res (in the middle) to hook the readers in. The phrase ‘the wasted young’ is quite poignant and is rendered even sadder by the ironic juxtaposition of the phrase ‘turning up’ as if they were just carelessly lost. Also the phrase ‘the land back into itself’ is quite significant as it implies there was once disruption on these lands but the effects are hidden
A chit of bone, the china plate of a shoulder blade
the relic of a finger, the blown
and broken bird’s egg of a skull
The constant references to quite fragile items show how fragile bones are in the face of machine guns but also how important they are and he alliteration helps to emphasise it. The onomatopoeic ‘ch’ sound helps to replicate the sound of machine gun fire which contrasts the men’s fragility with the violence of war. These lines introduce us to the lexical field of bones
all mimicked now in flint, breaking blue in white
The verb ‘mimicked’ is deeply ironic as the word usually means to copy for humour but here it is the opposite. The 2nd phrase s important as the men’s bones were copied in a blue and white flint after discovery and it shows their identities have been forever transformed by death
across this field where whey were told to walk, not run
The phrase ‘walk, not run’ is again quite ironic as there were told to do exactly that at the Battle of Somme but it just made them easier targets for the German artillery. The phrase also sounds like something a parent would say to a child which reminds us of how young the men were compared to their generals
towards the wood and it’s nesting machine guns
The men had no idea of their fate and held an almost child like obedience to their superiors again highlighting their innocence and naivety. The woods were the scene of their death. The phrase ‘nesting machine guns’ provides a strong contrast between such fragile creature and the destructive guns. Heavy artillery has overtaken nature
And even now the earth stands sentinel
The poet is saying the Earth stands guards over the dead soldiers using personification
reaching back into itself for reminders or what happened
This poem has a sort of circularity to it as the past of 100 years ago is revealing itself again and it adds a sense of longing to show what these young men have experienced so they aren’t forgotten
like a wound working a foreign body to the surface of the skin
He is saying that whatever is buried and hidden will eventually reappear no matter what. The phrase ‘foreign body’ suggests that war is like an illness and the bullets a symptom of the disease however it could also refer to fact that these men were Welsh soldiers fighting in a different country. The long vowels and slow rhythm makes the line sound almost hypnotic
This morning, twenty men buried in one long grave
That fact that the exact number is mentioned speaks to the dramatic reality and intensity of the discovery. Also the fact that they weren’t given separate graves suggests that it was a rushed job. Unfortunately, the men at Mametz wood were never identified
a broken mosaic of bone linked arm in arm
It’s brings to mind a vivid image of shattered human bones of the men who died violently during the war. The fact that they are ‘linked arm and arm’ represents a great camaraderie and it should soften the image but instead it just makes it seem macabre
their skeletons paused mid dance-macabre
The image is almost horror-like and suggests that it was a lively not a peaceful death
in boots that outlasted them
The boots in the trenches often rotted due to the sodden conditions but in this case only the boots were left intact showing how short their time was before they died
