Critical Analysis of
Write a 1000 word critical analysis of ONE of the following poems, with reference to context, themes and use of language. Philip Johnstone's "High Wood" is a wry glimpse at battlefield tourism. Writing in 1918, just two years after the Battle of the Somme which the poem refers to, Johnstone predicts the commercialisation of war, and imagines how the war will be regarded by people in the aftermath. Some of the major themes dealt with in the poem are: apathy about the war; the distance between the reality of war and the people not involved in it; and the commercialisation of the war In the poem, Johnstone predicts that people will not care about the war once it is over. I will now begin by discussing the theme of general apathy about the war in the poem.The narrative voice is that of a tour guide. As he gives his tour, he repremands members of the group as they wander away, or try to take away artifacts from the site. The guide's growing impatience with the tourists is evident in the use of italics, "the path sir, please" (l.25). The wandering of the tourists suggest that the tourists are distracted and lack interest in the information he is giving. The soldiers who died are of no interest to them, they appear more
The juxtaposition of this with the figure of eight thousand deaths is inevitably sobering, even though the information is given in factually, with no hint of regret. 22) predicts that they will not even be remembered. This has the effect of dehumanising the memory of the war. The imagery of a well-kept, tidy dug-out, evoked by the request to use the waste-paper baskets is also ironic when contrasted with what we know of the filthy conditions in the trenches. The writer preludes the information with the assurance that "It has been said on good authority", implying that the reliability of the information is more important the the effect of it. The tour is meant to be factual, rather than as a memorial to those who died. The description of High Wood as "this patch of wood" (l. The reference to the "unknown British officer"(l. The guide also makes use of rhetoric when telling the tourists not to drop litter, "You are requsted not to leave about/ Paper, or ginger-beer bottles, or orange peel [my emphasis]" (l. When talking about the war he is impassive and shows no sign of caring about what happened. It is clear that there is a great distance between the reality of the war and the battlefield tourism in the aftermath.
Common topics in this essay:
Battle Somme,
,
Johnstone's Wood,
battlefield tourism,
reality war,
commercialisation war,
apathy war,
tourist attraction,
distance reality war,
reasonable rate,
war poem,
distance reality,
people involved,
refreshments provided,
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