FUTILITY by Wilfred Owen

Summary

This poem, written just before the end of WW I, reflects a soldier’s desperate hope that his comrade is not dead. He gives instructions for his fallen comrade to be moved into the sun, reasoning that the sun is associated with awakening and growth – life. Finally, in three questions, the speaker accepts the soldier’s death with despair and bitterness. As the title ‘Futility’ indicates, the action of putting the dead man in the sun is useless. Faced with the consequence of war, the speaker questions whether life itself is in fact ‘futile’. Why was life ever created, if it must end in such a death?

Themes

The value of life
The futility of war

Form

A line-count reveals 14 lines – but there is no resemblance to a sonnet in any other way. It is almost as if Owen has set out to shake and bend the expected sonnet form, as a reflection of his own views and ideas being shaken.
The scheme of half-rhyme that Owen often uses is present here; but it appears in every second line, rather than in couplets. For example :

sun/ once ; once / France ; unsown / snow / know.

With ‘snow now’ Owen uses eye-rhyme: the words look the same but don’t sound the same. All these effects create a rather uneasy unity – there is rhyme, but it is not obvious, and sometimes it isn’t there at all. This once more reflects the turmoil of emotions and ideas in which Owen finds himself.
The rhyme scheme is also broken at line 8, halfway through the poem. However, the sense of the poem doesn’t change here – again, the poem is just as shaken as Owen feels. This feeling is emphasised by the punctuation in lines 9 – 11, where the lines are broken and jerky.

Poetic techniques

Metaphor: ‘Was it for this the clay grew tall?’ (l.12) – clay is a metaphor for the stuff of which we are made – not literally, but figuratively so, connected to nature and the earth. Both ‘seeds’ (l.8) and the ‘cold star’ (l.9) are ‘woken’ and the ‘earth’s sleep’ is broken – inanimate things compared to something living.
Personification:The sun is personified throughout the poem in an extended metaphor. Its nature changes with the speaker’s mood, from ‘gentle’, ‘whispering’, ‘kind’ to ‘fatuous sunbeams’ (l.13) that is working with no purpose. Note that the sun is referred to as ‘he’ but simply given human qualities.
Assonance: ‘home ... unsown’(l.3) – the long vowel sound emphasises the loss, as the fields will remain unsown; ‘rouse him now’ (l.6) – the repetition of the long vowel sound reinforces the futility of their attempt (to save the comrade) ‘now’ – he can never be roused again.
Consonance: ‘Woke, once, the clays of a cold star’ (l.9) – the ‘o’ in ‘once’ soundslike ‘w’; ‘c’ in ‘once’ is an ‘s’ sound. The past tense is emphasised in the repeated sounds ‘Woke once’, while the words of the line are all joined together in the repetition of the k- and s- sounds.
Antithesis: The word ‘hard’ in l.11 means difficult. However, it could also mean ‘stiff’ or ‘cold’. The juxtaposition of ‘still warm’ with ‘too hard to stir’ (l. 11) is a poignant expression of the speaker’s realisation that nothing can help his dead comrade.
Symbolism: ‘fields unsown’ (l.3) are literally farm fields waiting for crops to be sown; figuratively, they symbolise the future – a future that this dead soldier cannot now experience.
Rhetorical questions: The speaker asks a series of questions. To the first, he must answer ‘yes’, acknowledging that his comrade is dead. This leads him to question the meaning of this man’s life: did he grow up only to die? If he must answer ‘yes’ to this, as he certainly must, he is led to the final, most despairing question of all: why was earth ever ‘woken’ to life ‘at all’?
Choice of words: Look carefully at all the endings (of each line) to find examples of Owen’s half-rhyme. For example: ‘seeds’ (l.8) are woken but ‘sides’ cannot be; the ‘cold star’ (l.9) came to life, but limbs are too hard to ‘stir’(l.11).
Tone: Initially, the tone is one of care and hope; as the speaker adds examples to try and convince himself that the sun might waken his comrade, the tone turns to desperation, Finally, with the realisation that he (comrade) is indeed dead, comes the bitter questioning of why his life, or any life, ever began in the first place.

Contextual questions

Easy

1. List the two places the soldier has been woken by the sun, in the past. (2)

2. Match the word in Column A with the meaning in Column B.

There is only one answer per letter.

A. clays (l.9) 1. Work hard

B. rouse (l.6) 2. Earth, soil

C. clay (l. 12) 3. Pottery

D. toil (l. 13) 4. Awaken

5. Flesh (4)

3. Refer to line 12: “Was it for this the clay grew tall?” Explain the meanings

- in their proper context- of the words in italics. (3)

4.1. What does it mean to “break” someone’s “sleep”? (1)

4.2. What figure of speech is Owen using here? (1)

4.3.Earth’s sleep was broken, but the ‘sleep’ of the soldier cannot be broken.

Apart from ‘sleep’ what other connection is there between earth and the

soldier? (2)

Challenging questions

5. Refer to lines 1 – 5 and quote :

5.1. two words which convey “hope”. (2)

5.2. a single word which introduces “doubt”. (1)

6. Do you think the speaker knows his comrade is dead at the start of the

poem? State your choice and support your answer by referring to the title and

lines 1-5. (6)

7. Outline (what is) the speaker’s argument in lines 8 – 11? (4)

8. The mention of France, which was the site of many WW I battles, is the only

reference to war in this poem. Discuss how the poet achieves his anti-war

message without mentioning war itself. (4)

Essay Question

9. Carefully explain the full meaning of the title “Futility”. In an essay of 250 –

300 words refer to :

The action that opens the poem
The poet’s subsequent view of the soldier’s life
How this makes him question creation in general. (10)

Londonby William Blake

Summary

Blake’s poem on England’s capital city, London, written in 1792, at the time of the Industrial Revolution, paints an horrific picture of a society in which all Londoners were trapped by poverty, exploited by the government of William Pitt and infected by terrible diseases like smallpox. The wealth was in the hands of the rich minority and this left the poor of London dispossessed. The streets are ‘chartered’, meaning owned, even the river Thames is ‘chartered’, indicates that it too is owned by the rich. Here, political attitudes imprison and enslave the poor, keeping them in ‘mind-forged manacles’ (l.8). This is the London of enforced child labour, when chimney sweeps, mainly small children, were sent out to clean the chimneys of the richer people, which is s serious accusation against the churches who were meant to protect them. This is also the London of the child prostitute, whose cry makes a mockery of traditional church-sanctioned marriage. Soldiers die by the orders of monarchs and governments who do not care for them.

Themes

Human suffering is everywhere and is nowhere more pronounced than where the rich prey upon the poor.
The injustices of inequality is something that can stir the emotions of any thinking human being.
The young have always been victims in cruel systems that support unequal laws.

Form

The poem is written in four quatrains with alternate lines rhyming.
It is a lyric poem.
It is written in the first-person, from the perspective of a concerned observer.
It is a protest poem.
Repetition reinforces the rhythmic quality of the lines.
The hopeless trudge of the London poor beats out a rhythmic tattoo, measured in phrases like, ‘In every voice, in every ban ...’ (l.7)

Poetic techniques

Metaphor:‘mind-forged manacles’ (l.8) a terrifying comparison between handcuffs (manacles) and the sufferings/burdens that bind humans.
Alliteration: ‘hapless soldier’s sigh’ (l.11) Impossible to read fast, here Blake forces the line to be read slowly, carefully, thoughtfully ...
Oxymoron: ‘marriage-hearse’ (l.16) an ironic placing together of two words that are out of place. A marriage should be a time of celebration, but it is also a time of mourning because marriage is mocked / shamed by the existence of child prostitutes.
Hyperbole: ‘Blasts’ (l.15) a deliberate exaggeration highlighting the terrible injustice done to young women who are forced into prostitution.
Metonymy: ‘church’ (l.10) and ‘palace’ (l.12) refers to the responsibility of religion and the monarchy for the suffering of the London poor and sending soldiers off to war. ‘Marriage-hearse’ (l.16) the hearse carries the dead and so is associated with sadness and tragedy.
Choice of words: ‘chartered’ (l.2) means belonging to someone, an Englishman ie all Englishmen. Ironically is also means to limit or curtail, suggesting that the use of the streets and the Thames was limited or reserved for a select few. The word ‘ban’ (l.7) reinforces the idea of prohibition. The word choice suggest pain, suffering and death.
Repetition: ‘marks of weakness, marks of woe’ (l.4) repetition of ‘marks’ is emphatic (for emphasis); London’s poor are marked with the visible signs of disease and misery. The use of the word ‘marks’ has a biblical sense, reminding the reader of the Beast from Revelations or the mark of Cain.
Tone and Mood: The tone is angry. Blake attacks the political situation of the day with great passion. The mood however is deeply depressing with morbid images of suffering and death.

Contextual questions

Easy

1. Describe the London of William Blake. List FIVE points. (5)

2. Refer to line 4: ‘marks of weakness, marks of woe’

2.1. Name the poetic device or technique used in this line. (1)

2.2. Comment on the effectiveness of the device. (2)

3. From the poem, pick out FIVE words associated with suffering. (5)

4. Explain why the soldier would be ‘hapless’.

Hapless : unfortunate, unlucky, ill-fated, miserable etc (1)

5. Match the word in Column A with the meaning in Column B.

There is only one answer per letter.

A. chartered (l.2) 1. dirties

B. forged (l.8) 2. restriction

C. blights (l. 16) 3. Restricted

D. ban (l. 7) 4. Created

5. Tearful (4)

6. Refer to stanza 2 and say whether this statement is TRUE of FALSE.

Give a reason for your answer.

‘The poet is a disinterested observer as he walks through the streets of

London.’ (2)

Challenging questions

7. Give a full account (explanation) of the suffering of the poor of London. (5)

8. Refer to line 8: ‘mind-forged manacles I hear’

8.1. Name the comparative figure of speech (poetic technique) used here. (1)

8.2. Comment on the effectiveness of this figure of speech. (2)

9. Explain the irony implicit (implied) why the chimney-sweeper’s cry would

appal the blackening church. (1)

10. Comment on what is implied (indirectly stated) by ‘midnight streets’ (l.13). (2)

Essay Question

11. Write an essay of 250 – 300 words commenting on Blake’s tone and

diction. (10)

In Detentionby Chris van Wyk

Summary

This poem, which exposes (and mocks) the behaviour of the South African Police in apartheid South Africa, is an example satire. It fits into the protest poetry category and ridicules the official reasons given for the deaths in detention, usually the opponents of the ruling party of the time. Commonly these deaths were blamed on suicide or natural causes. The title sets the scene, but does not clarify that the poem is specifically about deaths in detention. The poem looks like a list of statements – causes of death in detention. The first three reasons are initially plausible, but in case the reader has missed the implications, they are repeated. Thereafter, their content is jumbled and the resultant combinations become increasingly absurd, so that the thinking reader must question the validity of what is stated. If one examines detailed records of deaths in detention, one finds that these first three reasons are actually stated officially as causes of death of certain political prisoners. However, one also discovers that the injuries were not always compatible with the given cause of death. By jumbling the causes of death and creating ridiculous statements, the speaker exposes the atrocities of police brutality in apartheid South Africa, and leads one eventually to wonder at the validity of any statements made by the authorities at the time.

Themes

Police brutality
Attempts to blind people to reality
Absurd human behaviour
Human cruelty to fellow man.

Form

Poem is written in free verse: unrhymed lines; irregular line lengths
It has a simple structure – a list of the causes of deaths, such as might appear in official records
The lack of punctuation reinforces the idea of a list
Every line, although differing in length, has the same structure: ‘He fell ...’, ‘He hanged ...’, ‘ He slipped ...’.

Poetic Technique

Satire:The whole poem is a vicious satire, attacking the regime of the day, using the absurd statements they made regarding events under their control, which they tried to pass off as the truth.
Climax: A climax of absurdity in the last line, as the juxtaposition of the different lines increases in absurdity. By the last line, one cannot be in any doubt as to the poet’s intent.
Choice of words: Very simple words are used so that the meaning is absolutely clear to everyone.
Repetition: Whole lines are repeated in the first six lines, but the order varies: line 1 becomes l.6, l.2 becomes l.4, l.3 becomes l.5. This is followed by further repetition, with variation of content. The content of the first three lines is jumbled to create absurdity.
Tone: Underlying an apparently simple list of facts is a tone of horror, disapproval, condemnation, and even disgust.

Contextual questions

Easy

1. Refer to the title of the poem.

1.1. Supply the missing words derived from the word ‘detention’.

People who were in detention were called ...1.1.(a)... and they were

...1.1.(b)... by the security police of the apartheid government. (2)

1.2. Learners at school may be given detention as a form of punishment.

Where, do you think, does the meaning of the word ‘detention’ come

from? (3)

2. The poem does not state why people were detained during apartheid.

2.1. What sort of people do you think were detained like this? (2)

2.2. What was the purpose of detaining them? (2)

2.3. Traditionally, what cultural group or race did the security police

belong to? (3)

3.1. Which causes of death in the poem do you find credible (believable)? (3)

3.2. Which causes of death do you find the hardest to accept?

Give a reason for your answer. (3)

4. Supply another word for ‘piece’ of soap. (1)

5. In lines 2, 4 and 7 the word ‘hanged’ is used and in lines 9, 12 and 14,

‘hung’ is used.

5.1. Which is grammatically the correct one? (1)

5.2.Use the other form in a sentence to show you know how to use it. (2)

5.3. What do you think the poet might have been trying to achieve by

using the one form incorrectly ? (2)

Challenging questions

6.1. Which stated cause of death is self-inflicted? (1)

6.2. Supply one word which would describe this type of death. (1)

6.3. Why would the authorities have been happy to label a death like this? (2)

6.4. How might the security police have tried to excuse the other deaths? (2)

7. Explain why it can be said that this poem could be satirical. (5)

8. Would you say these prisoners were really criminals? Give a reason

for your answer. (2)

9. Why do you think the poet chose not to make the title of the poem more

explicit (clear)? (2)

Essay question

10. In diary form, create two entries written by a prisoner in detention in an

apartheid-era prison. Your answer should 250 – 300 words. (10)

Rugby League gameby James Kirkup

Summary

In this 20-th century poem, the speaker expresses his views about the game of rugby. He is a spectator at a rugby match played by ageing players. It depresses him to see these overweight, balding, out-of –place men, with their traditional striped socks and blue shorts. He feels he should be watching younger men playing an heroic game, their bodies toned, their youthful spirits not yet tamed by marriage, raising children, doing the washing. He sees that what these older men do on weekends is to try to escape their humdrum lives and to recapture their youth.

Themes

Men try to find their lost youth by pursuing the same activities they excelled at in their youth.
It is somehow ridiculous, absurd and sad that older people go on doing the same things; much like mutton dressed a lamb.
All people yearn for a lost youth.
Domestic obligations take over the lives of all people eventually.

Form

The poem is written in free verse, with four stanzas of six lines each.
The poem is orderly in structure and has the feel of a monologue, the poet seeming to be having an intimate conversation with the reader, or thinking aloud.

Poetic techniques

Allusion:‘Spartan freedom’ (l.8) is an allusion to the Spartans of Ancient Greece who lived their lives simply and by strict discipline. The allusion works well as schoolboys from all boys boarding schools of the past would be able to identify with the description.
Alliteration: ‘a gay/ and golden age ago’ (l. 21/22) gives the feeling of sentimental and nostalgic worship of the past. The words have an eloquent ring.
Paradox & Irony: There is a paradox implicit in the golden age when boys were men; then these men were really boys trying to be men; now they are men trying to be boys once more. This situation is also ironic.
Sarcasm: The poet’s attitude towards Rugby League is much the same as he feels about all sport: he thinks sport absurd.
Symbolism: The ‘pram’ and the ‘spin drier’ (l.17) represent, or are symbols of married life and domesticity.
Rhetorical question: ‘Is all this courage really necessary?’(l.8) – the question is asked tongue in cheek, almost sarcastically, of no one in particular.
Synecdoche: ‘the cap’ (l.12) is a part representing the whole: the cap represents the team; it is part of the insignia.
Choice of words: The choice of words like ‘noble’ to describe youth; ‘Edwardian’ to describe stockings (socks); ‘Spartan’ to describe freedom, is quite spare, summing up in broad strokes entire concepts or periods, but the allusions do challenge the reader. Kirkup’s poetry is for the thinking reader who is prepared to make an effort. The choice of words mocks the ‘old school tie’ mentality. Phrases like ‘good, clean fun’ (l.9), ‘back, back to the days’(l.19) suggest the bonhomie of boys having fun together,
Repetition: ‘back, back’ (l.19) is repeated, reinforcing the idea of the journey these old boys make to recapture their youth. The ‘back’ appears four times through the poem, making it quite clear what the old boys are trying to recapture.
Tone / mood: Ironic, sarcastic, disenchanted, disillusioned – from time to time, the speaker expresses disdain/disgust when talking about the ‘fat knees that ought to be heroes’ (l.6), suggesting that it would be far more appropriate to be watching strong, young men on the sports fields, than these old men.

Contextual questions