1. Task 2
Soldier, rest!
Literary devices:
● Themes: War, sleep, freedom, meaning of life closure and death.
● Tone: reflective, dreaming, calming
● Alliterations:
○ “sleep the sleep”, makes reference to death
○ “Days of danger”, by repeating the letter d we can see that there is an
emphasis on the fact that war can be really Dangerous but those days
are over.
○ “ Hands unseen thy couch are strewing”, alliterative S to emphasise
that there won't be so many deaths as war is over, so the unseen
hands (which are not seen because are buried) are gradually
disappearing.
● Symbols:
○ “Enchanted halls” make reference to the trenches
● Oxymoron: “nights of walking”, it portrays the fact that as war ended, soldiers
can be able to walk during the day and even at night, when it used to be so
dangerous!
● images:
○ Auditory image related to the fact that as the warfare is over, they won’t
hear anymore the sound of the bombs or the sound of attacks, “no rude
sound shall reach thine ear”
○ As war is over, soldiers won’t be needing to have “squadron tramping”.
This visual and tactile image (as it makes reference to physical
aspects, exhaustion) suggest that soldiers won’t need to do long
distance walks in rough country any more.
○ “Bugles here shall sound reveillé”: auditory image referring to the fact
that there won't be more instrumental alerts of combat as war has
ended.
● Hyperbaton:
○ There is an inversion of the normal order of words throughout the poem
to put the emphasis on another part of the sentence. “dream of
battlefields no more”, here the poet emphasizes the word dreams to
make people understand the fact that, as battlefields ended, dreams
can be achieved.
● Onomatopoeia: “Armour’s clang”. this literary devices helps the Reader
understand how tormenting the war was and encourages the soldiers to fight
and die with no fear and honour.
● Language: Colloquial language
2. Personal opinion:
Through this very descriptive poem, Sir Walter Scott wanted to portray and protest
about the war. He thought that soldiers were mistreated and didn’t have to fight. War
was caused because of the mistakes and bad decisions of the leaders/kings, so he
believed it should stop. He is constantly doing an emphasis on the fact that the
“warfare o'er” so he ecourges the soldiers to rest and not to be afraid of what could
happen.
The Death Bed
Stanza 1:
● The poet presents a dead person “unshaken as the steadfast walls”. He is so
immobilized that he is compared with steady walls in the previous simile.
● Through the alliterative “s”, the poet is able to emphasize the fact that he is in
silence, because he is dead: “Silence and safety”. In the previous alliteration
we can see the emotion emphasized.
● Moreover, we can relate the fact that he is dead in the following metaphor
“soaring nd quivering in the Wings of sleep”. Here ‘sleep’ is personified and it
is covering the man, meaning that death is coming.
● “moonless waves of death”, the man is at the border of the “shore”. He is
between life and death.
Stanza 2:
● “Someone” symbolizes death. Death was holding water to his mouth because
he was drowning. So death is personified.
● The poet illustrates how dead the man is by comparing what he saw with what
he sees now. “Through crimson gloom to darkness”, this metaphor is related
with the fact he used to see colours, such as red, but now, because he is
dying, he only sees black colours, darkness.
● By presenting the following auditory and tactile image, the poet is able to
express the pain the man was suffering, “The opiate throb and ache that was
his wound”. He was in such pain that he heard his own agony.
● The repetition of the word “water” emphasizes the fact that he was drowned.
● the “Bird-voiced” alliteration together with the “sky” and the “weir” are used to
emphasize the fact that he was outside, in the nature, and not in a swimming
pool. It suggests that the man was drowned from a boat.
● Through this alliterative phrase we know he is dead, sleeping, since he emit a
long, deep audible breath expressing sadness: “oars, and sighed, and slept”.
3. Stanza 3:
● The next alliteration is used to emphasize how painful he was that now is at
the hospital, “With a gust of wind, was in the ward”. We can sort of feel his
grief through that tactile image as it causes in the reader shivers.
● The repetition of “night” contributes to the repetition of its symbol, death
● The poet suggests that something ghostly was taking the man to death,
“glinting among the wraiths of wandering cloud”.
● “purple, scarlet, green” this visual image presents dark colours that symbolize
death, if they are obscure.
● “drowning eyes” in this visual image we are directly informed that the man
was drowned.
Stanza 4:
● “Rain- he could hear it rustling through the dark” In this auditory image, rain
symbolises sadness.
● The auditory image, “passionless music”, makes reference to something sad
and dead (as dead as the man who was drawn). The music has lost its life, so
as the man.
● “gently and slowly washing life away” this metaphor makes reference to
death.
Stanza 5:
● “Pain” is personified
● The following simile shows the agony that the man is suffering and it is
compared with a monster, with a beast: “pain leaped like a prowling beast”
● As the man is dying, he won't be able to achieve his “groping dreams”
● Death is personified as it came towards him, it “paused and stared”
Stanza 6:
● “Light many lamps”, light is a symbol of life and hope
● The poet announces that the man could be saved and he transmit that in the
next images.
○ “lend him your eyes, warm blood and will to live”, the visual and tactile
image tells us that there might be an opportunity for him to be alive
○ “Speak to him; rouse him; you may save him yet” There are
possibilities for him to be saved
● The voice is begging death not to kill the young man who hates war
Stanza 7:
● In spite of the fact that someone or something begged not to kill the man, it
did it. So “Death replied: “I choose him” So he went”. Here we can also see
the personification of death.
4. ● “Silence in the summer night” So the auditory image reflect his death as there
is silence at night. “silence and safety”
● Auditory image: “thudding of the guns”
Theme: war poetry, death, dreams
Tone: Agony, confussion
Structure: We believe the lines of the finishing veres are shorter to emphasise how
the man is slowly dying, as the poem itself.
Anaphora:
“Water - clm, sliding green above the weir
Water - a sky - lit alley for his boat”
