There is an intense somber and emotional tone to this poem as this is highlighting a death of somebody who Elton obviously respected and thought a great deal about. He does not want to express Marilyn’s death as a happy occasion as we are not remembering the good aspects of her life; we are reminiscing the bad and hard times she had to persist. Elton creates a doleful atmosphere whilst he works his heavyhearted emotion into this poem, it is very moody and deeply inspiring, “Your candle burned out long before your legend ever did.”
I feel that there are only three characters in this poem, the first, Marilyn Monroe. Marilyn is represented as the innocent figure that was bullied and changed to fit the endorsed design, she was the outsider with nobody to turn to, “Loneliness was tough”. Elton John is another, as he wrote the poem and has included his personal emotions within the text. He is represented as a long lost friend of Marilyn that she could have needed when she was alive, he also represents us, the audience, we feel for Marilyn, Elton has portrayed our feelings for us, “From the young man in the 22nd row”. Finally I agree the last characters are represented as the group of evil that taunted and administered Marilyn’s life, these were her bosses, the media and her fans that provoked her and drove her to breakdown, “Hollywood created a superstar and the pain was the price you paid”.
The style of this poem is very much set out in a narrative style as the facts are in a chronological order. The poem is expressed in the past tense as Marilyn has died and Elton is reminiscing events that had happened in the past, “You had the grace to hold yourself”. The poem is brought to the future with lines such as “Goodbye Norma Jean”, here Elton is saying goodbye now, as he was too young to do this when she died.
Within the context of this poem there is a message from the authors, this message is personal and dedicating to Marilyn, but it is also aimed at the reading audience. In my opinion Elton John is trying to emphasize and highlight the fact that Marilyn was not just a materialistic, aesthetically sold sex icon that was exploited by the media and was driven to suicide after a long string of marriages and affaires. Instead, he symbolized Marilyn as a real person with thoughts and feelings, people never knew the true Marilyn because the papers exploited her as something she wasn’t. Elton admired and respected her and can
also relate to what she was going through, it is made apparent that Elton can see past the outside beauty of this sex icon and can recognize her hidden talents, her admiration to carry on and the beauty of Marilyn’s character. In my opinion he wants everybody who reads this poem to feel the same way as he does and respect Marilyn for what she was, not how she was sold.
The poem is quite formal as it uses accurate and polite language and there are no colloquial words. The words are very effective when expressing hard and endured times as many have hidden meanings. When put together the words make up the images, therefore, they do not need to be described fully, an example of this is “They crawled out of the woodwork and whispered into your brain”. This gives the image of sneaking insects that her bosses were, they appeared out of nowhere and she could not escape from them, she had no freedom. These people were evil and they are not respected in the poem, Elton always refers to Marilyn’s bosses and the media attention as “They”, they do not deserve the recognition, this is a very powerful vocabulary use. Repetition is used to emphasize and reinforce the main issues and themes of the poem. The chorus is repeated three times in the song; this is a perfect place to put the main issues, as issues will be acknowledged here. These issues tie strongly to the message that the song is trying to transfix in the listener’s mind, this way the listener will always remember the essence and message of the song. Alliteration is used, “Pain was the price you paid”, this causes the words stand out, it gives them depth and meaning, this technique helps emphasize the torture Marilyn encountered.
The main aspects of imagery in this poem is the candle in the wind, Marilyn was pictured to be an innocent, vulnerable candle in a storm of pressure, drugs, media, and fans that taunted the candle until it was extinguished. This picture is thoroughly emphasized and expressed in the chorus so this image never leaves the audiences’ minds, “And it seems to me you lived your life like a candle in the wind”. Other images are, Marilyn managed to keep herself together whilst her life broke down around her, she stood tall, this showed Marilyn’s strength of character and her admiration to carry on. “You had the grace to hold yourself whilst those around you crawled”. The poem creates an image of pure evil when describing the press and her bosses, they were insects, the actions they carried out to make her a star also showed this evil, “They made you change your name”. They just wanted to make money from her, “Even when you died the press still hounded you”. The word hounded sounds like animals, they were not human or they would have seen that they had caused a woman of endless talent to total destruction.
I shall now analyze the poem Remembrance Day written by Andrew Peters. This poem shares some of the same themes that are embraced in the poem “Candle in the wind”. The themes and issues highlighted in this poem are bullying at school and its link with the war and death, the second line is an example of this, “Does bullying’s shellshock ever cease?” Bullying is an issue that is often raised at school, whereas shellshock is connected with a physiological pain and torture after a war. Suicide is another issue that is strongly emphasized in this poem as it is about children taking their own lives after excessive bullying. “James, too posh for the common attack went over the top with a hit
of smack.” again the deaths are linked with war. Drugs are related with teenagers or youths, as these are the vulnerable few that can’t say no. Therefore Andrew Peters has also included this issue in this poem, “Retreated in the warmth of dope”, drugs are seen as an escape route for some. The reason all these children were being bullied is because they were considered as outsiders and they did not fit in with the crowd, they were then stereotyped by the bullies and became isolated. They were victims, “Lost ones with lonely fears”. Acceptance is an important issue that is suggested in this poem, all the victims want it and all the bullies have it, they are using the fact that they are accepted to their advantage to abuse the ones who are not.
The title Remembrance Day is symbolic, as this is the name we have to mark 11th November, on this day we remember the people who died serving their country in the war. The title is anecdotal as the author is remembering the people who died through bullying. The title represents death, war, evil, fighting and the loss of innocent lives, this successfully concludes the poem.
The structure of this poem is not set out in stanzas, neither is any part of this repeated in a chorus, as this is not converted into a song, instead this poem is continuous, it is set out like a story, it is in a very chronological order. The poem start in the past and then comes to the future, a conclusion is added onto the end of the poem to help emphasize the issues of bullying and war, “Trudging the trenches of tear-sodden years”. This is a very powerful end to the poem and penetrates and expresses the authors feelings of sorrow; it is also very thought provoking. Pace also helps to express these emotions, it is a very heart-wrenching poem so the pace needs to be slow and respectful a fast pace would not be suitable and the message would be lost. An aspect that makes this poem flow is the rhythm, at the end of every line it rhymes with the one before such as “few” and “crew”, this gives the poem its edge, it keeps it quick and snappy, this is a good language feature.
Throughout the duration of this poem the tone changes as the author expresses his view of the past in a chronological order. It is the author, whom has prescribed the tone, as it is his feelings and emotions that he has woven into this penetrating poem. The poem contains lots of anger and bitterness; the author is very sad and remorseful towards the bullies. It shows negativity as Andrew Peters is resentful and has a lot of anger he wants to relieve from his body and express within this poem, he empathizes on sorrow and fury. “I’m so sick of sickos taking the piss, deserting their conscience in cowardice”, this shows his anger and the fact he has no tolerance for bullies.
There are more characters in this poem than in the last, but they all fit into the same groups as before. We have the victims, “the sensitive few” who are in minority in this story, they are the outsiders that were never accepted in life and had to escape through death. The bullies are another group, again we don’t know how may there was but they proved more powerful that the victims. They are mindless monsters that taunted others and “they could not see that their fun, was the equivalent of a loaded gun”. Lastly, Andrew Peters is the final character; he was on neither side but now as he has grown he is
speaking out for the victims “And me? Retreated in the warmth of dope”. This shows he knew he stood back and watched what happened rather than standing up for what he believed in, guilt has now risen and he feels he should do something.
The style of this poem is organized in a narrative style as the facts are in a chronological order. The poem is expressed in the past tense as the victims have died and Andrew Peters is reminiscing events that had happened in the past, “Gave up eating for the hell of it”, gave up is futile, they could not see the future. The poem then comes to the future when he adds, “Now, I am a veteran visiting schools”.
The author’s message in this poem comes across very clearly. It is very personal and has a lot of feelings and emotions that penetrate to the audience, “I’m so sick of sickos taking the piss”. He wants bullying to stop as he has seen the consequences and he is trying to get that message to the targeted audience with hope they will recognize what he is saying and will think twice about bullying. Also he is reflecting the actions of a bully with the actions of war and trying to make people understand that bullying can be as hurtful as war in the long run, “trudging the trenches of tear-sodden years”.
The vocabulary used in this poem is very informal, this is because Andrew peters is aiming this poem to a much younger audience than Candle in the Wind. Therefore, he has used a language that his audience can understand and relate to, it is very laid back and casual, colloquial words are used. Such as, smack and dope, these are the common words used by youths for different types of drugs. Also the line “I’m so sick of sickos taking the piss”, this is slang or mild swearing but it is a good use of language and helps to portray this message he is presenting, it is perfect for his audience. The language is also very explicit; he does not hint something he tells it how it was very frankly, “Went over the top with a hit of smack”, this is very explicit detail. There is some sarcasm in this poem which you would not expect to find, “Thanks to the bullies”. This shows anger and hatred towards the bullies yet it is thanking them for making his and others life a misery, it is a strange thing to say but is very thought provoking and effective in its use. Vocabulary is used to highlight the image of war and bullying, it is effectively used to link the two so that we don’t forget these themes and their importance within the poem, “Limping, survived the mindless war”, the victims were always fighting the war against the bullies.
The main imagery that we come across within this poem is war and bullying and how the effects of these issues build close links with each other. Nearly in every line we have a word that can be used to describe bullying and also war, “Here’s a rollcall, the sensitive few”. A rollcall was used in the war to call people up to fight, the sensitive few were the outsiders that were bullied at school. We also get the strong image of death, this is inevitable with a poem that has the theme of war, all the victims died in this poem which creates a somber mood. We can feel how these children felt and their will to die, it is a very powerful image that we have in our minds that the author has successfully created. The main image we get is loneliness and acceptance, “Leaving the lost ones with lonely fears” this shows they were not accepted because of a number of reasons that they were helpless to change, these were the victims and the outsiders.
In conclusion to “Candle in the Wind” and “Remembrance Day” I have compared how different authors present and explore the situation of being an outsider. I have found that in “Candle in the wind” the audience is a large group of people and the language is formal, the poem is more dedicating to one particular person and there is a message but it is not made as apparent as in “Remembrance Day”. In the poem by Andrew Peters, the audience is much smaller as it is aimed at teenagers and bullies, to target and capture their interest the language is informal and very laid back with explicit detail. The message made is put across very bluntly and is not as dedicating to one particular person, instead it is to the “sensitive few”. Both are very effective in their own ways when they present the situation of being an outsider, but I agree that “Remembrance Day” is more shocking as this includes issues of death, war and bullying in more explicit terms. It is because of this I like this poem and the way it presents the situation of being an outsider more than “Candle in the wind”, I don’t feel “Candle in the wind gets its message across as effectively as “Remembrance Day”. My emotive response to “Candle in the wind” was sudden sadness and shock and I could not believe what she had to endure, I realized she was not just an idol but the public almost owned her and she was granted no freedom even when she died. Whereas for the poem “Remembrance Day” my response was anger and hatred towards the bullies and also disbelief that his could happen and nobody acted to stop it. It is fair to say that both poems present the situation of being an outsider realistically and interpret its own message effectively.