A Critical Analysis of

Authors Avatar

A Critical Analysis of “The Charge of the Light Brigade” and explain its importance to Victorian Society.

This particular poem deals with the unfortunate mistake of Battle of Balaclava in 1854.  In an attempt to retrieve their stolen firearms, the British, lead by Lord Raglen, took their light cavalry to the innocent Turkish territory, rather than the guilty Russians.  In self-defence Turkey protect themselves by attacking the British troops causing hundreds of deaths but “not, not the six hundred”.

Tennyson uses various techniques to involve the reader more personally.  He uses this to emphasise the pain and suffering felt by the soldiers so the reader can really appreciate the physical defeat but the emotional victory from the “noble six hundred”.  The use of onomatopoeia in poems is generally used to make the situation more realistic.  Although the same applies in this instance, Tennyson adds aural imagery to seem as if the reader is actually at the battle listening to everything being “shatter’d” and “thunder’d”.  Also, the words used for onomatopoetic effect are all descriptions of adversity and hardship.  Words such as “shot” and “storm’d” conjure up images of the death in the mind of the reader.

The stanza layout is specifically used to reflect the journey of the cavalry.  In stanza one, they are striding towards the battlefield, moving “half a league onward”.  In the second canto, they are still travelling to the valley, and tension is mounting, even though their leader “had blunder’d”.  Although in modern times this would be very questionable when a leader makes a mistake when going into a potentially damaging battle.  However, they did not argue or “reason why”.  In the third verse, the struggle commences as they are fired at from all angles.  They bravely push on to the bloody fourth stanza where they lose the majority of the “six hundred” to the overpowering opposition.  The cavalry retreat back through the valley where they had previously been.  This is shown by the repetition of most of stanza three.  The final canto concludes the Battle of Balaclava and Tennyson’s thoughts of war are confirmed.  Although he finds the reason for their fighting, unwise, calling their charge “wild”.  However, he adds that the Light Brigade and their charge should be held in “honour” even though he agrees with the fruitlessness of war.  This reflects thoughts of people who find war ineffective but they will realise that the “noble six hundred” should be held in high esteem and respect.  Although the Light Brigade lost the battle they won the moral victory over their critics.

Join now!

Tennyson questions the authority of war in “The Charge of the Light Brigade”.  He wrote this poem based on the Battle of Balaclava because a huge mistake was made by the authoritative figure, Lord Raglen, which caused many deaths.  Although the troops knew “some one had blunder’d”, they did not question it.  He wants to show that even though a person is higher, richer or more powerful than other they can still be vulnerable in making errors.  This questions Victorian authority and whether they are making the right decision concerning the lives of British people.  Poets in the twentieth century ...

This is a preview of the whole essay