Exposure

Question 1

Context summary

Answer 1

Owen was disillusioned by his role as a soldier - he was known to suffer from shellshock

Question 2

form summary

Answer 2

• 8, 5-line stanzas - repetitive - builds rich imagery but ends on an anti-climactic last line, mirrors how the soldiers are constantly alert but nothing happens
• long lines between 11 & 14 syllables - show the tedious waiting of soldiers
• ABBAC rhyme scheme (pararhyme) - leaves us unsatisfied to mirror the soldiers anticipating a battle, gives the effect the poem is only being kept together like the soldiers - also shows their entrapment, PRESENT TENSE shows Inescapibility
• consistency of rhyme shows monotony of war
• Inconsistent meter (hexameter)
• creates a feeling of monotony, unease and chaos

Question 3

Language summary

Answer 3

• ‘exposure’ shows vunrability
• sibilance & fricatives: ‘sag stormy’, ‘sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence’, ‘flowing flakes that flock’, ‘flakes with fingering’ highlight coldness,
• personification of nature as a bigger threat than the enemy ‘dawn massing in the east her melancholy army’ juxtaposes nurturing role of a female with the aggressive connotations of an army
• ‘less deadly than the air that shudders black with snow’ - oxymoron personifies deathlike connotations, minimises significance of actual fighting
  -‘Brains ache’ - psychological trauma and physical pain from the coldness.
• rhetorical questions show the reader questioning their motivation to fight
• asyndetic listing: ‘silence, centuries whisper, furious, nervous’ creates rushed pace - contrasts with poems tone
• ‘Twitching agonies’, ‘pale’ and ‘stare snow-dazed’ depict dead bodies, specific, uncomfortable, disturbing imagery
• anthropomorphism ‘we cringe in holes’
• ‘we only know’ shows the decide of war and exploitation of soldiers - they have limited knowledge
• ‘wearied we’ alliteration (tongue twister) is hard to say, alluding to the difficulty of the soldiers lived.
• ‘we turn back to our dying’ shows soldiers’ disillusionment with their cause
• ‘Grassier’, ‘blossoms’, ‘fires’, ‘dark-red jewels’, contrast the monochromatic imagery of black, white & ‘grey’ to depict the explosion of colours and hallucinations of being dazed by an explosion
• ‘will’, & ‘tonight’ show there is no escape
• ‘jewels’, ‘jingle’, ‘rejoice’ joyful verbs contrast with the tone of the poem to alienate the soldiers

Question 4

Repetition of ‘but nothing happens’

Answer 4

‘but nothing happens’ (anaphora) emphasises the torture of waiting and futility of the soldiers sacrifice - nothing has happened in the poem.

Question 5

Structure summary

Answer 5

• Cyclical structure emphasises how nothing has happened in that time
• anaphora emphasises the futility of war - leads to them questioning their motivation and unnecessary conflict + poor leadership
• caesura slowly our ghosts drag home: glimpsing the sunk fires depicts how the soldiers are imagining the warmth of home yet there is a barrier between the places, they must stay and fight in the cold.
• Ellipses emphasise boredom, slows the pace so the readers experience the same frustration as the soldiers as their suffering is stretched out with time

Question 6

Sibilance & fricative effect

Answer 6

• sibilance & fricatives: mimic sounds of the freezing wind that attacks the soldiers - nature is more lethal than the enemy, harsh consonant sound makes hostile atmosphere, ‘s’ sound mimics sound of gunfire - snowflakes are as deadly as bullets. ‘S’ sound gives serpent like connotations - all of this highlights how nature is the enemy and has malicious intent.

Question 7

Religious references

Answer 7

• religious references show the lack of religious imposed morality because war is so cruel, difficult to reconcile with the idea of an all loving God - they’re losing their faith. Tied to idea of Jesus suffering and dying to save humanity - similar acceptance of death in ‘we turn back to our dying’.

Question 8

Evidence of nature being the enenmy

Answer 8

(Semantic field of weather: ‘Ice’, ‘winds’, ‘snow’, ‘flakes’, ‘gusts’, ‘frost’)
- ‘Merciless iced east winds that knive us’
- ‘Pale flakes with fingering stealth come feeling our faces’
- ‘this frost will fasten on this mud and us’

Question 9

What is the effect of the passing of time

Answer 9

‘Snow dazed’, ‘sun-dozed’, ‘blossoms’, ‘blackbird fusses’ show the passing of the seasons and the boredom of the soldiers

Question 10

How is the idea of soldiers being forgotten showj

Answer 10

• metaphor ‘doors are closed’ show the lack of hope for the soldiers & and how those at home in safety carry on with life as normal.
  ‘Mud and us’ shows soldiers are indistinguishable from mud, shows how to leaders soldiers were dispensable.