Poetry

Question 1

“Slowly our ghosts drag home,”

Answer 1

Exposure

Question 2

“We cringe in holes”

Answer 2

Exposure

Question 3

Antithesis meaning

Answer 3

Opposite

Question 4

What are the key idea explored in exposure

Answer 4

Pointlessness of war, misery in war, loss of humanity, weather and boredom and lasting effects of war

Question 5

“Our brain aches in the merciless iced east winds that knife us” what technique is this and what does it highlight

Answer 5

Sibilance, personification highlights the intensity and the brutality of the weather. Personified to sound menacing and deadly
Nature is personified in a sinister way to create fear in the listener

Question 6

The quote “Less deadly than the air that shudders black with snow” suggests…

Answer 6

suggests nature as more damaging and deadly than the bullets

Question 7

“Pale flakes with fingering stealth come feeling for our faces” what technique is this and what is reflected through it

Answer 7

the consonance (repetition of consonant sounds) reflects the ferocity of the weather through the harsh sounds of the letters

Question 8

“Dawn amassing in the east? The melancholy army attacks once more and in ranks on shivering ranks of grey” suggests…

Answer 8

That dawn that is usually associated with ideas of light and hope is now contradicted and is hostile here and brings even more suffering

Question 9

What does the colour imagery “grey” in “Dawn amassing in the east her melancholy army/ attacks once more in ranks on shivering ranks of grey” suggest

Answer 9

Despair and boredom

Question 10

What does the word “ranks” suggest in the “dawn amassing in the east her melancholy army attacks once more in ranks on shivering ranks of grey” a reminder for

Answer 10

It is a military term and is repeated reminding the reader that the weather is the soldiers enemy

Question 11

What do the quotes “The poignant misery of dawn begins to grow” and “War lasts, rain soaks and clouds sag stormy” highlight

Answer 11

The bleak imagery of misery of the soldiers in war

Question 12

“We hear the mad gusts tugging on the wire”

Answer 12

Exposure

Question 13

What technique does Owen use throughout the poem to emphasise the boredom he is experiencing and to give a the readers a sense of this boredom cause by waiting

Answer 13

Repetition in “but nothing happens”

Question 14

What rhetorical questions does Owen use to hint and the pointlessness of war and highlight the boredom he is experiencing?

Answer 14

“What are we doing here?” Is it that we are dying”

Question 15

What does the metaphor “Slowly our ghosts drag home” suggest

Answer 15

That War has sucked all the life out of the soldiered and it also reminds the readers they are on the brink of death

Question 16

What does the metaphor “all their eyes are ice” suggest

Answer 16

The soldiers have lost their humanity and are close to breaking point and it also describes the extreme effects of the weather

Question 17

How does the five line stanzas (rhythm) reflect the boredom of the soldiers

Answer 17

The form mirrors the repetitive and never ending nature of war. It also mirrors the ongoing boredom and misery of the soldiers

Question 18

How does the ABBAC rhyme scheme reflect the boredom of the soldiers ?

Answer 18

Reflects the monotony (sameness) of war. The last line of each stanza creates an unsettling feeling to mirror how destabilised and on edge the soldiers feel waiting for the enemy to attack

Question 19

How does exposure being a first person narrative reflect the boredom of the soldiers?

Answer 19

It has many collective possessive pronouns like “we” “us” or “our”. This hints at the collective suffering of the soldiers in WW1 and also encourages the reader to share their pain

Question 20

What poems would you want to compare the theme of the effects of or reality of conflict in exposure to ?

Answer 20

War photographer, poppies or kamikaze or bayonet charge or remains

Question 21

What poems may you want to compare the theme of the power of nature versus power of man in exposure to?

Answer 21

Storm on the island or the prelude or tissue

Question 22

What does “Wearied we” in the quote “Wearied we awake because the night is still silent” do and how does it do this?

Answer 22

The use of alliteration makes the phrase difficult to say alluding to the difficulty of the soldiers lives

Question 23

What does the quote “worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous” create and how ?

Answer 23

A rushed, panicked pace and contrasts with the content of the poem through asyndetic listing

Question 24

“Like twitching agonies” is a … and what image does this create”

Answer 24

Simile and it creates an uncomfortable image to hear

Question 25

What does the use of sibilance and fricatives in “Sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence” do

Answer 25

They create a horrific image

Question 26

What does the absence of war in the poem suggest?

Answer 26

That weather is the main enemy

Question 27

What does “We turn back to our dying” show and how

Answer 27

It is a blunt and passive statement to show the soldiers disillusionment with their cause

Question 28

What does “For love of God seems dying” imply and how?

Answer 28

It is a religious reference and is implying there is a lack of religiously imposed morality remaining in the situation which highlights the cruelty of it

Question 29

Why does Owen open the poem with “Our brains ache”

Answer 29

To focus the poem on the psychological impact of war

Question 30

What do the para rhymes do?

Answer 30

They create an underlying atmosphere of unease

Question 31

Where does Owen use a cyclical structure and what does this emphasise?

Answer 31

The last line of the first and last standard is, “but nothing happens” which connects the end of beginning of the to emphasise the fact that nothing has happened in that time

Question 32

What does the caesura in “slowly our ghosts drag home: glimpsing the sunk fires” do

Answer 32

It depicts the soldiers to imagining the warmth of their homes yet there is a Barrier between the two places as they cannot return and must instead stay and fight in the cold

Question 33

What does “dull rumour of some other war” suggest

Answer 33

That the weather is the real war and the actual fighting isn’t the main issye

Question 34

Why do the first three lines end with ellipses?

Answer 34

To emphasise the waiting and boredom of the soldiers

Question 35

How is exposure and the prelude similar?

Answer 35

Nature presented to be an inescapable force in both poems

Question 36

How is exposure and prelude different?

Answer 36

Wadsworth gives nature power due to its great expanse however in exposure nature power comes from its sheer aggression

Question 37

How is charge of the light brigade and exposure similar?

Answer 37

Both poets repeat phrases to criticise how violence and military mistakes continue to repeat themselves

Question 38

How are the poems exposure and charge of the light brigade different?

Answer 38

In charge of the light blade Tennyson is not outwardly critical of the government and Owen is on Tennyson is critical of the rash action in his poem whereas Owen the detests are waiting in the trenches

Question 39

How is bayonet charge and exposure similar?

Answer 39

Both poets to pick soldiers who have reached the battlefield and realise that it is largely what they have been told and the psychological element of fighting is also addressed in both poems

Question 40

How is bayonet charge and exposure different?

Answer 40

An exposure of the soldier seems relatively prepared to fight however the soldier in being that charge shows his extreme reluctance