The opening stanza in The Best of School contains many references to soothing natural imagery. The atmosphere is completely opposite to the atmosphere in the classroom in Last Lesson of the Afternoon. The opening lines give us a sense of the children being protected inside the classroom. ‘The blinds are drawn because of he sun,’ this gives us a sense of the classroom providing a protective atmosphere whereas in Last Lesson we get a sense of violent imagery in the classroom. The second and third lines are a contrast to each other. The second line says that ‘The boys and the room in a colourless gloom.’ The classroom is a dark and gloomy place but ‘Bright ripples run.’ The second line gives us a negative description of the gloomy classroom but the third line gives us a positive contrast of the boys studying, even thought it is dark they are bright.
D H Lawrence uses a lot of natural imagery, but in particular he uses water imagery. He uses water imagery to explain his relationship with the boys. Lawrence refers to the teacher as ‘Sitting on the shores of the class,’ and the boys are like the sea water coming into the shore. We can see another contrast between the two poems. In Last Lesson the boys are ‘Tugging on the leash,’ and want to go in a different direction to the teacher but in The Best of School the boys are willing to follow the teacher. The first stanza of the Best of School indicates that the boys are focused on the task that the teacher has set them. ‘As they write, their heads busily bowed.’ The words ‘Busily bowed’ show us that the boys are actively thinking and I think that the word ‘Bowed’ refers to their acknowledgement of the teachers input and a sense of respect that the boys share for the teacher.
As Last Lesson of the Afternoon progresses towards the third and fourth stanzas the teacher takes a more frustrated and angry tone. The boys in the class were from working class backgrounds. This meant that they were destined for jobs in the factories and other working class industries. The imagery contains words associated with factories and industrial production, words such as ‘fuel’, ‘kindle’, ‘flame’, and ‘dross’. The teacher seems to lose hope in the boys, ‘I will not waste my soul and my strength for this.’ Words such as ‘Abyss’, refer to a pit this suggests that they are all heading along the same route and will end up as ‘Factory fodder’, young children working in dead end jobs.
The Best of School gives us a sense of the children growing. Words such as ‘Sweet’, and ‘Ripening’, give us a sense of the boys’ knowledge growing as time goes on, just like a fruit they are ripening and becoming sweeter. In contrast to Lawrence’s industrial imagery of gloomy factories and mines in Last Lesson, we get more positive imagery in Best of School, natural imagery such as ‘sunlight waves’ and ‘brightening souls,’ are used to describe the boys learning experience. Imagery of the boys growing in the Best of School is portrayed by words such as ‘grain’, ‘climb’ and ‘ripening’. In the fourth stanza of Best of School Lawrence uses a simile to describe the boys taking knowledge from the teacher. ‘Discovery, like birds that steal and flee.’ The boys are like birds who steal and flee with the teachers knowledge, but the teacher is happy and willing to let the boys steal his knowledge. The teacher is generous and willing to help the boys in Best of School, but in Last Lesson the teacher is stubborn and gives up easily. He is not willing to ‘ waste his soul and strength’ for the boys in his class. Throughout the best of school the teacher is portrayed as a vast source of knowledge, the boys in the class just need to look at him for inspiration.
In the final stanza of Last Lesson of the Afternoon the teacher thinks forget it and he will not waste his time on the class. ‘I do not, and will not; they won’t and they don’t; and that’s all!’ The teacher also says, ‘Why should we beat our heads against the wall.’ Again we are reminded of the violent imagery, and the pain of teaching the boys. The final stanza again refers to the children having no decent future. The teacher says ‘ I shall keep my strength for myself; they can keep theirs as well.’ We get the sense that the teacher is letting the boys keep their strength for the hard labour in the factories.
The final stanza of The Best of School is much more positive than Last lesson. The teacher uses words such as ‘cling’ and ‘cleave’, these ‘C’ words suggest the closeness between the teacher and the boys. ‘As vines going eagerly up; they twine.’ The imagery of the vines interlocking shows that they have gained knowledge and grown. When the vines twine they become stronger but separately they are easily broken. I think that the last two lines sum up the poems well because it expresses the symbiotic relationship whereby the boys and teacher gained knowledge and developed a relationship with each other. ‘My life with other leaves, my time is hidden in theirs, their thrills are mine.’ I think we can use Lawrence’s reference to the vines to explain how the boys developed a relationship with the teacher. In Last Lesson of the Afternoon the teacher gives up and the boys are not inspired by him, they are like separate vines. Where as in The Best of School the boys are inspired by the teacher and the teacher is ‘generous’ in sharing his knowledge, their vines have grown stronger and are stronger because they twine with each other. The boys who are referred to as vines need a support to grow on, the teacher is their support and helps them to grow. In the Best of School it is not only the boys who enjoy the learning experience but the teacher also finds joy in teaching the boys and watching them learn, ‘their thrills are mine.’
