'A Comparison Of Differing Views/Attitudes To War With Reference To Regeneration, Strange Meeting, Selected Poetry and A Journeys End'

Authors Avatar

‘A Comparison Of Differing Views/Attitudes To War With Reference To Regeneration, Strange Meeting, Selected Poetry and A Journeys End’

David Lloyd George once commented, in a highly patriotic sense upon ‘the making of a new Europe-a new world’, to what degree was this true is debatable to a great extent, after all the armistice signed on November 11th 1918, didn’t confirm victory but only to learn a horrific number of 9,000,000 million fatalities were caused due to world war 1. Surely enough this was a new Europe? As a country, life would go on in England, but for wives, children and family the tragedy seemed to live on.

For many the thought of a war had urged men to fight for their country and ‘do their bit’. This was the pinpoint of where the tragic narrative begun. At first war was encouraged and seen as very exciting, but during and after the war these views changed dramatically.

Many of the opinions, feelings and views on war have been reflected in many different types of literature. Novels such as ‘Regeneration’ and ‘Strange Meeting’ illustrate the emotions, which were carried by most world war one soldiers. ‘A Journeys End’ and Gallipoli’ also take us through a narrative of happy, sad, tragic and anxious moments. The visual aid is advantageous to the audience as we are able to distinguish between the characters behaviour by seeing how each one responds to the reality of war. Many of the poems also provide in depth knowledge of attitudes towards the war, as they can be trusted due to time that they were created in. in many ways these poems written before and after the war reflect the truth behind the feeling of war. Poetry was a superb device for expressing the soldier’s honesty and thoughts, particularly the well known Wilfred Owen and Seigfried Sassoon.

The pre war poems most definitely would have been pro war, as at this time no one was aware of the deadly consequences after the war. Some poems were a device to raise the morale of young men to encourage them to go to war. In Jessie Pope’s, ‘Who’s For The Game’, the fact that she is a women emphasises the reason to go to war. Pope personifies the country as a ‘She’, which vaguely gives the image of a man impressing a woman.

‘And she’s looking and calling for you’

Pope has created an extremely lighthearted poem, which can’t be taken seriously at all, as she refers to the war as being a ‘game’. She tries to bring out the theme of male competition, with the idea of who can be the best?

‘Who’ll grip and tackle the job unafraid’

This poem proves to be ideological, as it’s not the truth, but its what would have been preferred to the real outcome.

Similarly Harold Begbie also created a highly patronizing poem to encourage soldiers to war in ‘Fall In’. Begbie refers to the boy as ‘Sonny’ and takes us through a narrative of how life would be if one did not participate in war. Like Jessie Pope, Begbie has also used women as a device but in a more obvious way.

‘But what will you lack when your mate goes by

With a girl who cuts you dead?’

The general attitude that can be detected in these poems is of a non-serious one. At the time, it wasn’t known that events would become so serious, after all most people believed that war would be over by Christmas. After the war, reading these types of poems would show people that war wasn’t about impressing people, neither was it a simple fight, but was a life risk, which would eternally change everything for a individual and his family. I think the poems are insensitive and lack understanding of what was being asked from these young men. However it is an obvious sign that the pre war poets were just as naïve as the soldiers who decided to join the war.

Join now!

However there were pre war poems, which weren’t as manipulative and sly, poems such as ‘Ad Astra’ by Mollie Corbally and ‘The Dead 111 and 1V’ by Rupert Brooke, show the war to be devastating and sad but what overweighs this sadness is the great respect of ‘honouring’. These poets have explored the emotions, which are caused by the deaths and tragedies and make the reader fully aware, that they too are aware of the effects. However these poets cleverly honour these dead soldiers as a contribution to their part in the war. It’s a positive factor that these ...

This is a preview of the whole essay