Month: February 2015

Futility is engaged in the poems through language, structure and form.

Imagery is used in both poems to show themes of futility. Imagery is used throughout ‘Futility’ to enhance futility. ‘Fields half-sown’ links to before war broke out, creating the memories of happier, easier times. Through imagery the poet can clearly get a memory or view across and it creates a picture in the readers head of the events he is describing. although it is all pointless in the end. Not sure about this paragraph.

The use of a metaphor expresses futility in both poems also. In ‘Futility’ the metaphor is the sun, it is the key image and when it has gone, the who poem begins to give up and draws to a close. The same effect can be noted in ‘At the boarder’, the main metaphor is the boarder. Futility is shown in it as there is no certainty on where it stays

Both poems use structure and a change of stanza to forward futile emotions. ‘Futility’ is written in 14 lines like a sonnet, but is not set out like one. The two-stanza structure shows the poem’s change in tone, from hope to worry. The poem begins positive with the sun. However, the second stanza is in completely different tone referring to the sun as a dead star, through oxymoron. The sun then becomes the object of the poet’s anger as it was the last piece of hope he was counting on. This is also done in ‘At the boarder’. The change in stanza shows a differing viewpoint to the boarder, seeing it from a child’s perspective; a guards; a mothers etc. It is used along with bathos for example ‘Dozens of families waited in the rain’. This effect empathises the changes allowing the reader to follow more easily and fully understand the poems.

Both poems use form to express unpredictability and futility. ‘Futility’ features both half and full rhyme. Full rhyme towards the end of stanzas and half rhyme throughout for example ‘sun’ and ‘sown’. This jumping between rhythmic techniques creates a sense of unpredictability and pointlessness,  like it was for the men on the frontline during the war and like what they . ‘At the boarder’ however, uses a lack of form to express this. The lack of a set form brings to the light the unfixed and unpredictability of a boarder. This man-made ‘thing’ doesn’t need to exist and can in-fact move, the enjambement and unequal length used in the poem also hint this.

POET:

Wilfred Owen

STRUCTURE:

The poem opens by directly connecting and talking with the reader. ‘Move him’ is a command telling the reader what they or someone has to do, its an imperative.  This statement implies that ‘him’ is unable to move himself, that they are emotionally/physically impaired and that they can’t move themselves. This is followed by contradictory lines which tell of safety at home. Imagery, including natural imagery, is used greatly in the poem too.

POETIC FORM:

This poem features both half and full rhyme. Full rhyme towards the end of stanzas and half rhyme throughout for example ‘sun’ and ‘sown’. This jumping between rhythmic techniques creates a sense of unpredictability, like it was for the men on the frontline during the war.

LANGUAGE: 

Imagery is used throughout the poem to set mood. ‘Fields half-sown’ links to before war broke out, creating the memories of happier, easier times. Through imagery the poet can clearly get a memory or view across and it creates a picture in the readers head of the events he is describing. The use of natural imagery too sets the scene for the reader but its the imagery which often creates contrast in the poem. From snow to sun and from the happy fields to the frontline.

Owen also uses personification to emphasise importance. ‘Kind old sun’ Gives the Sun a humane characteristic of friendliness, someone in which we can always rely. Who we contrast as it has been around so long that its age has blossomed wisdom. It is later described to be futile as it has also given up.

Rhetorical questions are often used throughout the poem to reinstate the readers importance. No man could hide from war, and having the reader so directly linked expresses that it cold be any man.

KEY QUOTATION:

‘If anything might rouse him now’

EXPLAINATION:

Tone is expressed through language linked back to the war. ‘If anything might rouse him now’ mimics the recruitment campaigns during the man to get men out to the trenches. Tis creates a change in tone as it acts as a reminder of life before war, and how quickly it was able to be forgotten. It infers that all hope is lost, which many linked to fighting in the war and to the memories before it.