Rain By Edwards Thomas (poetry) Flashcards
Context
Born in London 1878
Nature poet who served and died in WW1 1917
Written in 1916
Tone and Themes
Melancholic/ mournful
Somber
Contemplative
Death
Solitude
Power of nature
Human existence
Structure and form
Steady meter (mirrors driving intensity of the rain)
Enjambment (adds liquidity that mirrors being engulfed by the rain and overwhelming sense)
Tonal shift in line 7 (begins reflecting on others that have died at war,not just himself)
‘Rain, midnight rain, nothing but the wild rain’ (1)
REPETITION OF RAIN: (pathetic fallacy) emphasises insistence of rain and sadness, overwhelming and engulfing sense of pouring
MIDNIGHT WORD CHOICE: Darkness, anxiety, sense of fear
WILD WORD CHOICE: savage, unpredictable, dangerous
‘On this bleak hut, and solitude, and me’
BLEAK ADJECTIVE CHOICE: Colourless depressive - connotes sadness and depression
REPETITION OF SOLITUDE THROUGH POEM: Emphasises the presence it has in all aspects of life (birth, life and death)
‘Remembering again that I shall die’ (3)
REMEMBERING GERUND: places the reader in the situation and creates empathy
AGAIN WORD CHOICE: Emphasises how the thought ot dying is haunting him over and over
SHALL MODAL VERB: creates a sense of certainty and soon.
‘And neither hear the rain nor give it thanks
For washing me cleaner than I have been
Since I was born into this solitude’ (4-6)
Washing: Idea that rain can wash you from your mistakes, sins, impurity and pain - he feels cleansed by it
SOLITUDE REPETION AGAIN: emphasises the presence of it in life - you are born and die alone
‘Blessed are the dead that the rain rains upon.
But here I pray that none whom once I loved
Is dying to-night or lying still awake’ (7-9)
GERUND HERE: again places the reader in the situation and creates empathy for him
Hopes that no one feels the way he does, believes the dead are blessed - death is an escape from pain
‘Solitary, listening to the rain,
Either in pain or thus in sympathy’ (10-11)
REPETITION OF SOLITARY
SIBILANCE: Reflects the liquidity of the rain and sound of water, emphasises the sound of the rain in the background
Line 11: people are feeling the same as him - creates a sense of a shared human experience of loneliness and pain
‘Helpless among the living and the dead,
Like a cold water among broken reeds,
Myriads of broken reeds all still and stiff,’ (12-14)
Metaphor with water: brings the imagery back to the rain
METAPHOR: represents the millions of dead people because of the war - lack of warmth and kindness in war - he feels a connection to the other soldiers (shared experience of the rain)
COLD WATER: represents the lack of warmth
BROKEN REEDS: Dead bodies
STILL AND STIFF: sibilance that reflects the rain
Overall, the metaphor creates a sense of connection through death and pain
‘Like me who have no love which this wild rain
Has not dissolved except the love of death,
If love it be for what is perfect and
Cannot, the tempest tells me, disappoint.’ (15-18)
WILD ADJECTIVE CHOICE: dangerous
DISSOLVED VERB CHOICE: Everything is slowly disappearing - the rain is eating away at his love for everything.
Perfect = death
Death cannot disappoint, it is complete and all-consuming, it comes and takes everything before leaving - he loves death for this.
The rain has washed away his last link to the world (love) - he now feels ready and cleansed to go to war and die.
Death theme
Death is an escape - it relieves you
Death is perfect - it takes and then it leaves
Narrator’s ambivalent feelings towards death- he is afraid of it and yet is desperate for the relief it offers
Power of nature theme
Nature has the power to cleanse and relieve you (rain)
Human existence and solitude theme
Humans are born, live and die alone
