War Poetry – Page 6 – Interesting Literature

A Short Analysis of John McCrae’s ‘In Flanders Fields’

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

Although the association between fields of poppies and commemorating the war dead predates the First World War, the war-poppies connection was certainly popularised by WWI and in particular by this John McCrae poem, ‘In Flanders Fields’.

John McCrae (1872-1918), a Canadian lieutenant colonel, was inspired to write it after he conducted the burial service for an artillery officer, Alexis Helmer, who had been killed in the conflict. In the chaplain’s absence, McCrae, as the company doctor, presided over the burial of the young man.

A Short Analysis of Ivor Gurney’s ‘To God’

On a great poem by one of WWI’s overlooked war poets – analysed by Dr Oliver Tearle

Ivor Gurney is a relatively little-known poet of the First World War. Born in Gloucester in 1890, he served in the War from 1915 until 1917; he would spend most of his final years in the City of London Mental Hospital, dying in 1937. ‘To God’ was written after Gurney’s experiences in the First World War, and during his confinement, as the ‘four walls’ suggest in the poem’s second line. Here is ‘To God’, followed by a short analysis of its language and meaning.

To God

Why have you made life so intolerable
And set me between four walls, where I am able
Not to escape meals without prayer, for that is possible
Only by annoying an attendant. And tonight a sensual
Hell has been put on me, so that all has deserted me
And I am merely crying and trembling in heart
For death, and cannot get it. And gone out is part
Of sanity. And there is dreadful hell within me.

A Short Analysis of Isaac Rosenberg’s ‘The Troop Ship’

A brief introduction to a powerful short WWI poem by Isaac Rosenberg

According to Robert Graves, Isaac Rosenberg was one of the three poets of significance who died during the First World War. Although his reputation has been overshadowed by Wilfred Owen (who died in 1918, the same year as Rosenberg), he was an important voice during WWI, as his short poem ‘The Troop Ship’ demonstrates. Here is the poem, followed by a brief analysis of its features.

The Troop Ship

Grotesque and queerly huddled
Contortionists to twist
The sleepy soul to a sleep,
We lie all sorts of ways
And cannot sleep.

The Best War Poems Everyone Should Read

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

There are many great war poems out there and there have been a great number of popular war poets. Putting together a universal list of the best war poetry raises all sorts of questions. But since such a list will always be a matter of personal taste balanced with more objective matters such as ‘influence’ and ‘popularity with anthologists’, we hope you’ll forgive the presumptuous title ‘best war poems’.

A Short Analysis of Laurence Binyon’s ‘For the Fallen’

By Dr Oliver Tearle (Loughborough University)

Laurence Binyon’s ‘For the Fallen’ (1914) is one of the most widely quoted poems of the First World War. Unlike Wilfred Owen’s ‘Futility’, it wasn’t written from the trenches but by a poet back home, reflecting on the sacrifice thousands of men on the Western Front were making every week. But how well do we really know ‘For the Fallen’?