AUTORI PRIMA GUERRA MONDIALE, Appunti di Inglese

Scarica AUTORI PRIMA GUERRA MONDIALE e più Appunti in PDF di Inglese solo su Docsity! THE AGE OF ANXIETY The first World War left Britain in a disillusioned and cynical mood: some soldiers celebrated their return home with the quest of pleasure, other were haunted by sense of guilt. During the 1930s and 1940s some writers warned their readers against totalitarianism, like George Orwell. Scientists and philosophers destroyed the old and they try to look men and the universe with a different view. The first set of ideas and been introduced by Freud, who emphasized the power of the unconscious to affect behavior. He used a new method of investigation of the human mind, the concept of “free association”. Albert Einstein introduced the theory od relativity, discarded the concepts od time and space, which he saw as subjective dimensions. WORLD WAR I AUTHORS The war poets refers to a group of men who fought in trenches during the first World War. They have many aspects in common: - they took part in the war as soldiers → the fought for their country, they fought in orribile conditions - They all enrolled enthusiastically when the war broke out (but most of them after the battle of the Somme in 1916 were disillusioned and doubtful + compassion for those who died in the war) - They were all in their late twenties when they volunteered - They wrote poems in which the war describes terrible experiences, dealing to death, suffering and alienation - They are considered ad romantic heroes - They managed to represent modern welfare in a realistic and unconditional way - The awake the conscience of their readers to the horror of the war - They were modern in subject-matter and tried to find new modes od expression The key figures od this group are Brooke, Owen and Sassoon; most of them died in trenches RUPERT BROOKE (1887-1915) He was born in 1887 and he was a good student and athlete, become popular for his aspect. He joined up at the beginning of the conflict but saw little combat since he died in 1915, after a blood poisoning. After his death, he became very popular and a new symbol of the young romantic hero who inspired patriotism in the first months of the war. He is known for 5 sonnets in which he expresses the idea that war is clear and cleaning (purificante). The war is not described as a tragic experience, but as a noble act (positive idea of war). He didn’t experience the same horror of the others and he taught that death, during the war, is seen as a reward. Sonnets follow traditional form and show a sentimental attitude in particular a patriotism that was lost in the other War poets. • The Soldier It si a Petrarchan sonnet, divided into two stanzas, an octave and a sestet (ABAB CDECDE EFGEFG): the octave focused on his body and the sestet focused more on his heart and what he will be after his death (redemption). It gives an idealized view of war in which heroic young soldiers die willingly to defend the beauties and values of their England. The speaker, who is speaking to the reader, is really proud of himself of being a soldier and of fighting for his homeland. In fact we can see the presence of natural elements such as field, flowers, river and sun. But also, he expresses his feelings towards his homeland in the same way Petrarca expresses them towards his love for Laura. His homeland, England, is seen as a mother who gave himself and grow thing up, teaching his felling of joy and gentleness. England has shaped him. (→ idealization) In fact, he concludes that only life will be the appropriate thing to give to his great motherland in return for all the beautiful and the great things she has given to him, and made him what he is. The tone of the poem is sentimental and romantic, it deals with patriotic ideals and the idealization of those who sacrifices their life for their county. The main themes are immorality and glory, while the death is not regarded as a tragic experience but as a reward. WILLIAM OWEN (1893-1918) He was born in 1893 and was woking as a teacher of English in France. In 1915, after visiting a hospital, he decided to return in England and enlist. During the mouth of March of 1917, he was injured and sent to the hospital to recover from shell shock. There he met Sassoon, who has already the reputation as a poet. In August 1918 he returned to the front and seven days before the armistice he was killed during a German machine gun attack. His poems describes his own experiences of the horrors (wind, rats, bodies, blood and the effect of gas) of the war in trenches. The tries to communicate the pity of the war and the men who are clinically alive although their bodies have been destroyed. He used new technique such as pararhyme, where the consonant are the same but vowels different and then he used also assonance and alliteration. The subject-matter is the war with its horror and he used a bloody realism (realismo cruente) to convey the horror for who has not experience the conflict. • Dulce et Decorum est Is one of his masterpiece and Owen is very realistic in describing the ruthlessness (spietatezza)of war. The quotation at the end came from Orazio and means “it is sweet and honorable”, but, in this case, Owen is ironic, sarcastic, because he wants that the poem is a powerful indictment of war and of the hypocrisy of those who pretend that it is a noble cause. It is divided in three stanzas but with an irregular scheme. (1^person narrator) Owen wrote “Dulce et Decorum est” while he was fighting as a soldier during World War I. Summary: in the poem, Owen recounts thorough a first person poetic voice the exhausted return of a group of soldiers from the front and the horrific death of one of the soldiers in a gas arrack. The speaker affirms that the nightmarish vision of the man growing as he suffocates will haunt him forever. - In the first stanza, the poet introduces the situation describing the retreat of the soldiers (octave) - in the second stanza, there is the description of the gas attack (sestet) → the first two lines of the stanza, the speaker captures the terror and the confusion of facing a gas attack (use of repetition: “Gas!Gas”); there is a men that was unable to get his helmet and face mask and, at the end, he died - the third stanza plunges into the speaker’s own mind (si immerge nella mente dell’oratore) and doing so, the poem revels another aspect to the horror of war: the surviving speaker describes himself as seeing in “all my dreams” this man dying in agony → poet’s nightmare; there is, also, the description of the death and the poet’s message, an awareness against the war and the glory of it * Gas caused horrific injuries: inhaling a large amount of chlorine made soldiers choke, turn blue and soffocate SIEGFRIED SASSOON (1886-1967) He was born in 1886 and he studied both low and history before living without taking a degree. He joined the war in 1915 and he was sent to France, where he was noted for his bravery and known as Mad Jack. In war he was suffering form shell shock and, for this reason, he was sent to hospital, where he met Owen. In his poems he expressed his thoughts through irony. • Suicide in the Trenches This poem draws on Sassoon’s own experiences as a soldier in the British Army during World War I. This poem begins with a description of a typical soldier - young, innocent. Tragically, the horrific reality of war drives him to commit suicide in the trenches. The poem criticizes the public back at home, which it claims and encourages young men to give up their lives without fully acknowledging the terrors that would await them once arrived in the trenches. The poem focuses on one “simple soldier” who, in his ordinariness, stands in for millions of other young men. Torn (strappato) from what would have been a typical life of “youth and laughter,” Sassoon’s “boy” is quickly overwhelmed (sopraffatto) by the sad realities of warfare and, in despair, shoots himself through the head. • First stanza: Sassoon begins with a description of the soldier; he was a typical young man, he was “simple” and “grinned at life in empty joy”; the young man was just fine before war came along. Indeed,