COURSE 202 401 English Poetry and Drama 1900 to Contemporary TimesCourses on Poetry:Voices from the Battlefield:This course will engage with English (British and American) poetry that relates to the experience of the two World Wars. The readings are likely to survey classic war poets (Rupert Brooke, Wilfred Owen) trench poets (Isaac Rosenberg, Siegfred Sasoon, John McCrae) and include select readings from Thomas Hardy, Rudyard Kipling, Ronald Ross, Robert Graves, D.H.Lawrence, Stephen Spender, W.H. Auden and Dylan Thomas. Through this range of modern poetry, students will be introduced to debates hinging on attitudes to war, warfare, pacifism, non-violence, to the socio-cultural impact of war on art and writing, to the emergence of new languages, techniques and forms of expression. War will be considered as a global/international event that intersected with discourses of imperialism, patriotism, victimization and violence as well as new political ideologies.1. The heritage of the Great War. Mainly photographs and visual archiveshttp://www.greatwar.nl/2. (America and the Great War)http://www.usgennet.org/usa/topic/preservation/books/over.htm#ameri3. Digital archives, with photographs of First World War poetryhttp://www.oucs.ox.ac.uk/ww1lit/collections4. Digital history/dates of First World War eventshttp://www.digitalhistory.uh.edu/historyonline/ww1_chron.cfmReading assignments: (d/nd= detailed/non-detailed)Rupert Brooke: The Soldier (nd)Wilfred Owen: Anthem for Doomed Youth (d), Spring Offensive (d)John McCrae : In Flanders Fields (d)Isaac Rosenberg: Break of Day in the Trenches(nd), Dead Mans Dump (d)Siegfred Sassoon : Attack (d), The Hero (nd)Thomas Hardy: In Time of The Breaking of Nations (nd)Robert Graves: Its a Queer Time (nd)Rudyard Kipling: If (nd)Rabindranath Tagore: The Storm- Crossing (Jharer Kheya/ Balaka) (d), The Trumpet (d)Kazi Nazrul Islam: Bidrohi (d)D.H. Lawrence: War and Peace (d)May Herschel-Clarke: The Mother (d)Vera Brittain: Perhaps (d)Winifred Letts: The Spires of Oxford (d)Jessie Pope: Whos for the Game (d)

Stephen Spender: The War God (nd)W.H. Auden: Here war is Simple (d)Dylan Thomas: A Refusal to Mourn the Death (d)Louis Mac Neice: Prayer Before Birth (d)The SoldierbyRupert Brooke

If I should die, think only this of me: That there's some corner of a foreign fieldThat is for ever England. There shall be In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware, Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,A body of England's, breathing English air, Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

And think, this heart, all evil shed away, A pulse in the eternal mind, no less Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given;Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day; And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness, In hearts at peace, under an English heaven.

ANTHEM FOR DOOMED YOUTH

What passing-bellsfor these who die as cattle?Only the monstrous anger of the guns.Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattleCan patter outtheir hasty orisons.No mockeriesnow for them; no prayers nor bells;Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;And buglescalling for them from sad shires.What candles may be held to speed them all?Not in the hands of boys but in their eyesShall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.The pallorof girls' brows shall be their pall;Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,And each slow duska drawing-down of blinds.

SPRING OFFENSIVE1 Halted against the shade of a last hill,2 They fed, and, lying easy, were at ease3 And, finding comfortable chests and knees4 Carelessly slept. But many there stood still5 To face the stark, blank sky beyond the ridge,6 Knowing their feet had come to the end of the world.

7 Marvelling they stood, and watched the long grass swirled8 By the May breeze, murmurous with wasp and midge,9 For though the summer oozed into their veins10 Like the injected drug for their bones' pains,11 Sharp on their souls hung the imminent line of grass,12 Fearfully flashed the sky's mysterious glass.

13 Hour after hour they ponder the warm field--14 And the far valley behind, where the buttercups15 Had blessed with gold their slow boots coming up,16 Where even the little brambles would not yield,17 But clutched and clung to them like sorrowing hands;18 They breathe like trees unstirred.

19 Till like a cold gust thrilled the little word20 At which each body and its soul begird21 And tighten them for battle. No alarms22 Of bugles, no high flags, no clamorous haste--23 Only a lift and flare of eyes that faced24 The sun, like a friend with whom their love is done.25 O larger shone that smile against the sun,--26 Mightier than his whose bounty these have spurned.

27 So, soon they topped the hill, and raced together28 Over an open stretch of herb and heather29 Exposed. And instantly the whole sky burned30 With fury against them; and soft sudden cups31 Opened in thousands for their blood; and the green slopes32 Chasmed and steepened sheer to infinite space.

33 Of them who running on that last high place34 Leapt to swift unseen bullets, or went up35 On the hot blast and fury of hell's upsurge,36 Or plunged and fell away past this world's verge,37 Some say God caught them even before they fell.

38 But what say such as from existence' brink39 Ventured but drave too swift to sink.40 The few who rushed in the body to enter hell,41 And there out-fiending all its fiends and flames42 With superhuman inhumanities,43 Long-famous glories, immemorial shames--44 And crawling slowly back, have by degrees45 Regained cool peaceful air in wonder--46 Why speak they not of comrades that went under?Wilfred Owen

In Flanders Fieldsby John McCrae, May 1915In Flanders fields the poppies blowBetween the crosses, row on row,That mark our place; and in the skyThe larks, still bravely singing, flyScarce heard amid the guns below.We are the Dead. Short days agoWe lived, felt dawn, saw sunset glow,Loved and were loved, and now we lieIn Flanders fields.Take up our quarrel with the foe:To you from failing hands we throwThe torch; be yours to hold it high.If ye break faith with us who dieWe shall not sleep, though poppies growIn Flanders fields.Break of Day in the TrenchesBy Isaac RosenbergThe darkness crumbles awayIt is the same old druid Time as ever,Only a live thing leaps my hand,A queer sardonic rat,As I pull the parapet's poppyTo stick behind my ear.Droll rat, they would shoot you if they knewYour cosmopolitan sympathies,Now you have touched this English handYou will do the same to a GermanSoon, no doubt, if it be your pleasureTo cross the sleeping green between.It seems you inwardly grin as you passStrong eyes, fine limbs, haughty athletes,Less chanced than you for life,Bonds to the whims of murder,Sprawled in the bowels of the earth,The torn fields of France.What do you see in our eyesAt the shrieking iron and flameHurled through still heavens?What quaver -what heart aghast?Poppies whose roots are in men's veinsDrop, and are ever dropping;But mine in my ear is safe,Just a little white with the dust.Dead Mans DumpIsaac RosenbergThe plunging limbers over the shattered track Racketed with their rusty freight, Stuck out like many crowns of thorns, And the rusty stakes like sceptres old To stay the flood of brutish men Upon our brothers dear.

The wheels lurched over sprawled dead But pained them not, though their bones crunched, Their shut mouths made no moan. They lie there huddled, friend and foeman, Man born of man, and born of woman, And shells go crying over them From night till night and now.

Earth has waited for them, All the time of their growth Fretting for their decay: Now she has them at last! In the strength of their strength Suspendedstopped and held.

What fierce imaginings their dark souls lit? Earth! have they gone into you! Somewhere they must have gone, And flung on your hard back Is their soul's sack Emptied of God-ancestralled essences. Who hurled them out? Who hurled?

None saw their spirits' shadow shake the grass, Or stood aside for the half used life to pass Out of those doomed nostrils and the doomed mouth, When the swift iron burning bee Drained the wild honey of their youth.

What of us who, flung on the shrieking pyre, Walk, our usual thoughts untouched, Our lucky limbs as on ichor fed, Immortal seeming ever? Perhaps when the flames beat loud on us, A fear may choke in our veins And the startled blood may stop.

The air is loud with death, The dark air spurts with fire, The explosions ceaseless are. Timelessly now, some minutes past, Those dead strode time with vigorous life, Till the shrapnel called `An end!' But not to all. In bleeding pangs Some borne on stretchers dreamed of home, Dear things, war-blotted from their hearts.

Maniac Earth! howling and flying, your bowel Seared by the jagged fire, the iron love, The impetuous storm of savage love. Dark Earth! dark Heavens! swinging in chemic smoke, What dead are born when you kiss each soundless soul With lightning and thunder from your mined heart, Which man's self dug, and his blind fingers loosed?

A man's brains splattered on A stretcher-bearer's face; His shook shoulders slipped their load, But when they bent to look again The drowning soul was sunk too deep For human tenderness.

They left this dead with the older dead, Stretched at the cross roads.

Burnt black by strange decay Their sinister faces lie, The lid over each eye, The grass and coloured clay More motion have than they, Joined to the great sunk silences.

Here is one not long dead; His dark hearing caught our far wheels, And the choked soul stretched weak hands To reach the living word the far wheels said, The blood-dazed intelligence beating for light, Crying through the suspense of the far torturing wheels Swift for the end to break Or the wheels to break, Cried as the tide of the world broke over his sight.

Will they come? Will they ever come? Even as the mixed hoofs of the mules, The quivering-bellied mules, And the rushing wheels all mixed With his tortured upturned sight. So we crashed round the bend, We heard his weak scream, We heard his very last sound, And our wheels grazed his dead face.Attackby Siegfried Sassoon

At dawn the ridge emerges massed and dunIn the wild purple of the glowering sun,Smouldering through spouts of drifting smoke that shroudThe menacing scarred slope; and, one by one,Tanks creep and topple forward to the wire.The barrage roars and lifts. Then, clumsily bowedWith bombs and guns and shovels and battle-gear,Men jostle and climb to meet the bristling fire.Lines of grey, muttering faces, masked with fear,They leave their trenches, going over the top,While time ticks blank and busy on their wrists,And hope, with furtive eyes and grappling fists,Flounders in mud. O Jesu, make it stop!The HeroSiegfried Sassoon

"Jack fell as he'd have wished," the Mother said,And folded up the letter that she'd read."The Colonel writes so nicely." Something brokeIn the tired voice that quavered to a choke.She half looked up. "We mothers are so proudOf our dead soldiers." Then her face was bowed.Quietly the Brother Officer went out.He'd told the poor old dear some gallant liesThat she would nourish all her days, no doubt.For while he coughed and mumbled, her weak eyesHad shone with gentle triumph, brimmed with joy,Because he'd been so brave, her glorious boy.He thought how "Jack," cold-footed, useless swine,Had panicked down the trench that night the mineWent up at Wicked Corner; how he'd triedTo get sent home; and how, at last, he died,Blown to small bits. And no one seemed to careExcept that lonely woman with white hair.In Time of 'The Breaking of Nations'Only a man harrowing clodsIn a slow silent walkWith an old horse that stumbles and nodsHalf asleep as they stalk.

Only thin smoke without flameFrom the heaps of couch-grass;Yet this will go onward the sameThough Dynasties pass.

Yonder a maid and her wightCome whispering by:War's annals will cloud into nightEre their story die.Thomas HardyIt's a Queer Time

Robert GravesIt's hard to know if you're alive or deadWhen steel and fire go roaring through your head.One moment you'll be crouching at your gunTraversing, mowing heaps down half in fun:The next, you choke and clutch at your right breast -No time to think - leave all - and off you go ...To Treasure Island where the Spice winds blow,To lovely groves of mango, quince and lime -Breathe no good-bye, but ho, for the Red West!It's a queer time.You're charging madly at them yelling "Fag!"When somehow something gives and your feet drag.You fall and strike your head; yet feel no painAnd find ... you're digging tunnels through the hayIn the Big Barn, 'cause it's a rainy day.Oh, springy hay, and lovely beams to climb!You're back in the old sailor suit again.It's a queer time.Or you'll be dozing safe in your dug-out -A great roar - the trench shakes and falls aboutYou're struggling, gasping, struggling, then ... hullo!Elsie comes tripping gaily down the trench,Hanky to nose - that lyddite makes a stench -Getting her pinafore all over grime.Funny! because she died ten years ago!It's a queer time.The trouble is, things happen much too quick;Up jump the Boches, rifles thump and click,You stagger, and the whole scene fades away:Even good Christians don't like passing straightFrom Tipperary or their Hymn of HateTo Alleluiah-chanting, and the chimeOf golden harps ... and ... I'm not well today ...It's a queer time.Rudyard Kipling (1865-1936) IFIf you can keep your head when all about youAre losing theirs and blaming it on you,If you can trust yourself when all men doubt you,But make allowance for their doubting too;If you can wait and not be tired by waiting,Or being lied about, don't deal in lies,Or being hated, don't give way to hating,And yet don't look too good, nor talk too wise:If you can dream - and not make dreams your master,If you can think - and not make thoughts your aim;If you can meet with Triumph and DisasterAnd treat those two impostors just the same;If you can bear to hear the truth you've spokenTwisted by knaves to make a trap for fools,Or watch the things you gave your life to, broken,And stoop and build 'em up with worn-out tools:If you can make one heap of all your winningsAnd risk it all on one turn of pitch-and-toss,And lose, and start again at your beginningsAnd never breath a word about your loss;If you can force your heart and nerve and sinewTo serve your turn long after they are gone,And so hold on when there is nothing in youExcept the Will which says to them: "Hold on!"If you can talk with crowds and keep your virtue,Or walk with kings - nor lose the common touch,If neither foes nor loving friends can hurt you,If all men count with you, but none too much;If you can fill the unforgiving minuteWith sixty seconds' worth of distance run,Yours is the Earth and everything that's in it,And - which is more - you'll be a Man, my son!David Herbert Lawrence (1885-1930) PEACE AND WARPeople always make war when they say they love peace.The loud love of peace makes one quiver more than any battle-cry.Why should one love peace? It is so obviously vile to make war.Loud peace propaganda makes war seem imminent.It is a form of war, even self-assertion and being wise for other people.Let people be wise for themselves. And anyhowNobody can be wise except on rare occasions, like getting married or dying.Its bad taste to be wise all the time, like being at a perpetual funeral.For everyday use, give me somebody whimsical, with not too much purpose in life,Then we shant have war, and we neednt talk about peace.

Rabindranath fromGitanjaliWhen I leave from hence let this be my parting word, that what I have seen is unsurpassable.I have tasted of the hidden honey of this lotus that expands on the ocean of light and thus am I blessed - let this be my parting word.In this playhouse of infinite forms I have had my play, and here have I caught sight of him that is formless.My whole body and my limbs have thrilled with his touch who is beyond touch; and if the end comes here, let it come - let this be my parting word.The OarsmenDo you hear the roar of death through the listening hush of distance.And that awful call midst fire-floods and poison clouds and the wrestling of earth and sky in mortal combat.- The Captain's call to steer the ship towards a shore yet unnamed?For that time is over - that stagnant time in the port -Where the same old store is bought and sold in an endless round.Where dead things gather in the exhaustion and emptiness of truth.They wake up in sudden fear and ask 'Comrades, what is the hour of the night? When shall open the golden gate of the new dawn? The murky clouds have blotted out all stars -Who are there to see the beckoning finger of the day.They rush out with oars in hand, the beds are emptied in the house,the mother prays, the silent wife watches by the door.The wail of separation sweeps the sky like rushing wings of night birds,And there rings the Captain's voice in the dark,'Come, sailors, for the time in the haven is over!'All the black evils in the world have overflowed their banks,Yet, oarsmen, take your places with the blessing of sorrow in your souls!Whom do you blame, brothers! Bow your heads down!The sin has been yours and ours.The heat growing in the heart of God for ages -The cowardice of the weak, the arrogance of the strong, the greed of fate prosperity, the rancor of the deprived, pride of race, and insult to man -Has burst God's peace, raging in storm.Like a ripe pod, let the tempest break its heart into pieces, scattering thunders,Stop your bluster of abuse and self-praise, my friends,And with the calm of silent prayer on your brows sail forward to the shore of the new world.We have known sins and evils every day and death we have met.They pass over our world like clouds mocking us with their transient light night laughter.Suddenly they have stopped, growing stupendous,And men must stand before them saying -'We do not fear you, O Monster! For we have lived every moment of our life by conquering you,'And we die with the faith that peace is true, and God is true, and true is the eternal One!'If the deathless dwell not in the heart of death,If glad wisdom bloom not bursting the sheath of sorrow,If aim do not die of its own revealment,If pride break not under its load of decoration,Then whence comes the hope that drives these men from their homes in [...]ars rushing to their death in the morning light?Shall the value of the martyrs' blood and mothers' tears be utterly lost in the dust of the earth, not buying Heaven with their price?And when Man bursts his moral bounds, is not the Boundless revealed that moment?The TrumpetThe trumpet lies in the dust.The wind is weary, the light is dead. Ah, the evil day!Come fighters, carrying your flags and singer with your songs!Come pilgrims, hurrying on your journey!The trumpet lies in the dust waiting for us.I was on my way to the temple with my evening offerings.Seeking for the heaven of rest after the day's dusty toil;Hoping my hurts would be healed and stains in my garments washed white,When I found thy trumpet lying in the dust.Has it not been the time for me to light my lamp?Has my evening not come to bring me sleep?O thou blood-red rose, where have my poppies faded?I was certain my wanderings were over and my debts all paidWhen suddenly I came upon thy trumpet lying in the dust.Strike my drowsy heart with the spell of youth!Let my joy in life blaze up in fire.Let the shafts of awakening fly piercing the heart of night and a thrill of dread shake the palsied blindness,I have come to raise thy trumpet from the dust.Sleep is no more for me - my walk shall be through showers of arrows.Some shall run out of their houses and come to my side - some shall weep,Some in their beds shall toss and groan in dire dreams:For to-night thy trumpet shall be sounded.From thee I had asked peace only to find shame.Now I stand before thee - help me to don my armour!Let hard blows of trouble strike fire into my life.Let my heart beat in pain - beating the drum of thy victory.My hands shall be utterly emptied to take up thy trumpet.

Vera Brittain (1893-1970) PerhapsPerhaps some day the sun will shine again,And I shall see that still the skies are blue,And feel once more I do not live in vain,Although bereft of You.

Perhaps the golden meadows at my feetWill make the sunny hours of spring seem gay,And I shall find the white May-blossoms sweet,Though You have passed away.

Perhaps the summer woods will shimmer bright,And crimson roses once again be fair,And autumn harvest fields a rich delight,Although You are not there.

Perhaps some day I shall not shrink in painTo see the passing of the dying year,And listen to Christmas songs again,Although You cannot hear.'

But though kind Time may many joys renew,There is one greatest joy I shall not knowAgain, because my heart for loss of YouWas broken, long ago.(To R A L)Roland Aubrey Leighton (1895-1915). Jessie Pope (1868-1941)Whos for the game, the biggest thats played, The red crashing game of a fight? Wholl grip and tackle the job unafraid? And who thinks hed rather sit tight? Wholl toe the line for the signal to Go!? Wholl give his country a hand? Who wants a turn to himself in the show? And who wants a seat in the stand? Who knows it wont be a picnic not much- Yet eagerly shoulders a gun? Who would much rather come back with a crutch Than lie low and be out of the fun? Come along, lads But youll come on all right For theres only one course to pursue, Your country is up to her neck in a fight, And shes looking and calling for you.

Winifred M. Letts (1882-1972) The Spires of Oxford

I SAW the spires of Oxford

As I was passing by,

The gray spires of Oxford

Against the pearl-gray sky.

My heart was with the Oxford men5

Who went abroad to die.

The years go fast in Oxford,

The golden years and gay,

The hoary Colleges look down

On careless boys at play.10

But when the bugles sounded war

They put their games away.

They left the peaceful river,

The cricket-field, the quad,

The shaven lawns of Oxford,15

To seek a bloody sod

They gave their merry youth away

For country and for God.

God rest you, happy gentlemen,

Who laid your good lives down,20

Who took the khaki and the gun

Instead of cap and gown.

God bring you to a fairer place

Than even Oxford town.

May Herschel-Clarke (1850-1950) The MotherWritten after reading Rupert Brooke's sonnet, "The Soldier": If you should die, think only this of me In that still quietness where is space for thought, Where parting, loss and bloodshed shall not be, And men may rest themselves and dream of nought: That in some place a mystic mile away One whom you loved has drained the bitter cup Till there is nought to drink; has faced the day Once more, and now, has raised the standard up. And think, my son, with eyes grown clear and dry She lives as though for ever in your sight, Loving the things you loved, with heart aglow For country, honour, truth, traditions high, --Proud that you paid their price. (And if some night Her heart should break--well, lad, you will not know.

The War GodStephen Spender

Why cannot the one goodBenevolent feasibleFinal dove, descend?

And the wheat be divide?And the soldiers sent home?And the barriers torn down?And the enemies forgiven?And there be no retribution?

Because the conquerorIs victim of his own powerThat hammers his heartFrom fear of former fear--When those he now vanquishesDestroyed his hero-fatherAnd surrounded his cradleWith fabled anguishes.

Today his day of victoryWeeps scalding lead anxietyLest children of these slainProve dragon teeth (sownNow their sun goes down)To rise up one morningStain the sky with bloodAnd avenge their fathers again.

The defeated, filled with lead,On the helpless field,May dream the pious reasonsOf mercy, but alasThey know what they didIn their own high seasons.

The world is the worldAnd not the slainNor the slayer, forgive.There's no heaven aboveTo make passionate historiesEnd with endless love.Yet under wild seasOf chafing despairsLove's need does not cease.

Here War Is Simpleby W H Auden

Here war is simple like a monument:A telephone is speaking to a man;Flags on a map assert that troops were sent;A boy brings milk in bowls. There is a plan

For living men in terror of their lives,Who thirst at nine who were to thirst at noon,And can be lost and are, and miss their wives,And, unlike an idea, can die too soon.

But ideas can be true although men die,And we can watch a thousand facesMade active by one lie:

And maps can really point to placesWhere life is evil now:Nanking. Dachau.A Refusal to Mourn the Death, by Fire, of a Child in London

byDylan Thomas

Never until the mankind makingBird beast and flowerFathering and all humbling darknessTells with silence the last light breaking And the still hourIs come of the sea tumbling in harness

And I must enter again the roundZion of the water beadAnd the synagogue of the ear of cornShall I let pray the shadow of a soundOr sow my salt seedIn the least valley of sackcloth to mourn

The majesty and burning of the child's death.I shall not murderThe mankind of her going with a grave truthNor blaspheme down the stations of the breathWith any further Elegy of innocence and youth.

Deep with the first dead lies London's daughter,Robed in the long friends,The grains beyond age, the dark veins of her mother,Secret by the unmourning waterOf the riding Thames.After the first death, there is no other.

Prayer Before BirthLouis Macneice

I am not yet born; O hear me.Let not the bloodsucking bat or the rat or the stoat or theclub-footed ghoul come near me.

I am not yet born, console me.I fear that the human race may with tall walls wall me,with strong drugs dope me, with wise lies lure me,on black racks rack me, in blood-baths roll me.

I am not yet born; provide meWith water to dandle me, grass to grow for me, trees to talkto me, sky to sing to me, birds and a white lightin the back of my mind to guide me.

I am not yet born; forgive meFor the sins that in me the world shall commit, my wordswhen they speak me, my thoughts when they think me,my treason engendered by traitors beyond me,my life when they murder by means of myhands, my death when they live me.

I am not yet born; rehearse meIn the parts I must play and the cues I must take whenold men lecture me, bureaucrats hector me, mountainsfrown at me, lovers laugh at me, the whitewaves call me to folly and the desert callsme to doom and the beggar refusesmy gift and my children curse me.

I am not yet born; O hear me,Let not the man who is beast or who thinks he is Godcome near me.

I am not yet born; O fill meWith strength against those who would freeze myhumanity, would dragoon me into a lethal automaton,would make me a cog in a machine, a thing withone face, a thing, and against all thosewho would dissipate my entirety, wouldblow me like thistledown hither andthither or hither and thitherlike water held in thehands would spill me.

Let them not make me a stone and let them not spill me.Otherwise kill me.