Prayer before birth

Question 1

Overview of Prayer before birth

Answer 1

Written during WWII + highlights devastating impacts. Dramatic monologue from the perspective on an unborn child. who prays for a future that is safe from the horrors of the world and the poem outlines the child’s fears, both rational and irrational. The speaker suggests that if their prayer cannot be answered, they do not wish to be born at all.

Question 2

Main themes:

Answer 2

Despair, corruption, hopes/fears of future,

Question 3

Comparing poems:

Answer 3

If-, hide and seek, war photographer, tyger

Question 4

Form:

Answer 4

Dramatic monologue but had a pattern/rhythm of a prayer. Written in free verse and different lengths of lines reflects the relentless suffering. Indentations shows poet’s unease and concern of future/ wondering if they’ll be lost.

Question 5

‘I am not yet born;’

Answer 5

Anaphora shows the child’s vulnerability, therefore allowing the writer to express his fears for the future generation, rather than expressing through the voice of an adult.

Question 6

‘I fear that the human race may with tall walls wall me, with strong drugs dope me, with wise lies lure me…’

Answer 6

Evokes that the child was able to identify the problem ‘human race’, even before it was born. Use of asyndetic listing and use of polyptoton (tall walls wall me) emphasises the loss of one’s freedom and the relentless struggle we face in today’s society. ‘I fear’ is juxtaposed from previous paragraph, as now talking about real world threats and fears, compared to childish fears - references to conditions in Nazi concentration camps?

Question 7

‘bloodsucking bat…or…club-footed ghoul’

Answer 7

Repeated metaphors of violent and disturbing images, evokes the accumulation of irrational childhood fears, through the polysyndeton. Semantic field of the supernatural animals depicts the innocence of the child in the womb + suggests his scrambling efforts to address these fears despite not being born - loss of ignorance + ironic as should be carefree as a child.

Question 8

‘Forgive me for the sins that in me the world shall commit’

Answer 8

Plea to god, asking for mercy. Biblical allusion of ‘sins’, as unborn child is able to recognise the inevitability of committing sins and the religious implications, therefore asks to ‘forgive me’ - he knows the evils of the world will be forced onto him, and is willing to take responsibility before committing them.

Question 9

‘rehearse me in the parts i must play and the cues I must take when old men lecture me…’

Answer 9

Extended metaphor of theatre evokes that the child has no choice in his life. Enjambment in stanza= chaos/ lack of order, contrasting with extended metaphor of theatre - World is flawed

Question 10

‘Let not the man who is beast or who thinks he is God come near me’

Answer 10

States his fear of influential men. Biblical allusion ‘beast’ refers to the devil therefore highlighting how the loss of innocence of the child, as moved from childhood fears to developing theoretical moral beliefs and the fear of sinning. ‘Who thinks he is God’ may refer to the dictators who cost the lives of millions during the time period: Hitler + Stalin. Highlights the loss of humanity during war + in society.

Question 11

‘would dragoon me into a lethal automaton, would make me a cog in a machine’ ‘

Answer 11

‘dragoon’ suggests no choice/ dragged into it. ‘Lethal automaton’ evokes he’s fear of war and joining the army, doesn’t want to become a killing machine. ‘Cog in machine’ evokes the marginalisation of the function and the robotic connotations suggests lack of individuality and innocence.

Question 12

‘Otherwise kill me’

Answer 12

Simple declarative sentence that expresses how death is the only solution to overcome the loss of humanity and individuality due to the hostility and harshness of the world.