Rupert Giles

YEAR 12 ENGLISH “UNIVERSAL THEMES” - REPRESENTATIONS OF WAR: PLANNING Poem Chosen: Anthem for Doomed Youth Write a paragraph summarising the representation of war being presented in your poem and the main ways in which it is shown. The poem represents war as depressing and futile. The representation of how horrific war is, can be construed from the title itself. It conveys a strong feeling for the reader and foreshadows what the poem will consist of. Usually an anthem is a stirring song…

Inspired by the events of the 1991 Gulf War, Gillian Clarke’s Lament effectively describes the impacts of war on the surrounding environment and wildlife. Although written specifically about the Gulf War, the message of the poem can be applied to the present day - using only words, Clarke paints a vivid picture of the effect of humanity’s behaviour on nature and its inhabitants. Similarly, Boey Kim Cheng’s Report to Wordsworth illustrates the extent of the damage done to the environment. Written…

Both Wilfred Owen and Seamus Heaney present the power of nature in their poems “Exposure” and “Storm on the Island”, respectively, as overwhelming and uncontrollable. Between the two, they both emphasize nature as an unparalleled power, however, Owen’s poem is a visual representation of life in the trenches of WW1, contrasting from existing government propaganda glamorising the adventures of war and emphasizing the futility of the situation by depicting the fate of soldiers suffering from…

At first glance, The Things They Carried seems like a collection of one man's war stories. But this novel is full of so much more, it talks about love, loss, and recovery. The author, Tim O'Brien, being a veteran of the war himself, used his writing as a way to cope with the trauma he experienced. O'Brien connects these themes though the use of conceit. Conceit is the likening of two very opposite things through figurative language in stories. for example, love and war are completely different,…

How Love May Not Provide Successful Comfort Warzones can be incredibly violent, terrifying, and gruesome places. Especially during the Vietnam War, when soldiers had very long deployments in horrid conditions, one major way to deal with the difficult environment was to remember that there was a world beyond it. Even in civilian life, a very positive way to deal with stress is to remember that there is a life outside of the stressor. In the short stories in his book The Things They Carried, Tim…

An inquiry into the press in Britain had been done six times in less than 70 years before being requested again in 2011 by, then Prime Minister, David Cameron. This particular inquiry, called The Leveson Inquiry due to it being chaired by Lord Justice Leveson, was requested due to a multitude of press related events that caused both public and political upset. One of these particular events was the phone hacking of Milly Dowler. Milly Dowler was a 13-year-old girl who went missing and was then…

The poem that I have studied is ''Dulce Et Decorum Est'' by Wilfred Owen. The poet is trying to depict the reality. of war through this poem. The poem begins with a description of a group of soldiers retreating from the front lines of the battlefield. They are exhausted and are,''Bent double like old beggars under sacks ''. The poet used a simile to convey the ragged wretched state of the soldiers. They are''Coughing like hags''. The once clean, strong, handsome, young men are being compared to…

The poems “Dulce et decorum Est” and “The letter” are written by Wilfred Owen during WW1. Owen started writing these poems when he suffered an injury during the war and had to go back to England to recover. These poems have a similar message about war as Owen seems to give a firsthand experience about war in these poems which draws the reader closer to Owen. In the poem Dulce et Decorum Est, Owen presents war as violent, inconsiderate and simply pointless. He uses a variety of different…

Literary compositions have the influential capability to depict the punitive truths of warfare and shape the reader's perspective. The harsh realities of war are portrayed through World War 1 poetry composed by Wilfred Owen enhancing the readers understanding of the bleak realities of war and its traumatic effects on the soldiers. The poems “Mental Cases” and “Exposure” illustrates the psychological trauma, the brutality of nature and loss of faith of which the soldiers faced as grim veracity of…

Guy Masterson - A Master of Poignant Poetry Guy Masterson brings the trenches of the Great War to life in his one-man show Anthem for a Doomed Youth, one of four performances in his #LestWeForget series, at the Bakehouse Theatre this Fringe season. Whether performing solo or with an accompanying cast, he consistently brings excellent productions to Adelaide and this is no exception; the show features Masterson expertly and passionately presenting a moving compilation of poems and prose from…