Stephen Crane’s poem, “Do Not Weep, Maiden, for War Is Kind” quite clearly speaks to the horror and grief of war, but does so in a roundabout way that comes across as sarcasm; in fact, it is exactly this heavy use of verbal irony that drives his message home to the reader. Verbal irony, put simply, is the use of words to deliberately convey the opposite of their direct or literal meanings. For example, the first stanza of Crane’s poem reads, “Do not weep, maiden, for war is kind. / Because your lover threw wild hands toward the sky / And the affrighted steed ran on alone, / Do not weep. / War is kind” (Crane 1-5). Here, the speaker is addressing a woman who has lost her lover in battle. Crane’s claim that war is kind and that the woman should …show more content…
/ War is kind,” to showcase the fact that war is ugly and painful not only for those who perish in it (the men whose deaths are described), but also for those who grieve because of it (the women whose lives are forever changed by war). Additionally, verbal irony can be found in stanzas two and four, in which Crane chooses words that, taken literally, speak of the glory of war in order to highlight the shame of it. For instance, Crane writes, “These men were born to drill and die / The unexplained glory flies above them / Great is the battle-god, great, and his kingdom – / A field where a thousand corpses lie” (Crane 8-11). Here Crane is stating that no man is born to simply drill and then die, regardless of what the rhetoric around the glorious battle may claim, and that such rhetoric (“Great is the battle-god, great, and his kingdom”) hides the true hideousness of war (“A field where a thousand corpses lie”). Overall, “Do Not Weep, Maiden, for War Is Kind” is an expression of Crane’s sadness over the glorification of war and death. He uses verbal irony in this poem by juxtaposing praise of war with reality, and succeeds in shedding light on the true nature of war that is fear, death, and
At first he feels he can’t do it, but then he finds the courage to fight. He feels he has to protect his fellow soldier. Crane’s account of the assault also shows the bond the young soldier feels with his regiment and the pride he feels being a part of
In stanza five, the narrator sounds matter-of-fact while describing the soldier’s dead and decaying body, but also seemingly lacks pity as the narrator mocks the dead soldier. The narrator notes that the soldier’s girlfriend “…would weep to see to-day/ how on his skin the swart flies move;” and though another casualty in war is saddening, it is simply another casualty and nothing more. Douglas’ simple and unsentimental language emphasizes that war cannot be sugar-coated, it is bloody and
The concealment of a deeper meaning through the use of irony is a powerful tool that can be utilized to bring about a greater impact to the actual meaning of what was intended. The use of irony is more common than it is thought to be, thus resulting in an incorrect use of the language device. In the article “Word police: irony & ironic” it is stated, “People routinely use without knowing what they mean. No one seems to use the dictionary anymore--and thus they end up sounding ignorant. ”(1).
The speaker lets us know of the reality of what this type of weapon is intended for in the third verse “Before it stained a single human breast” and completely leaves the outcome out of the poem, but instead focuses on the stricken flower, while still having the target of a human life to be stuck in the back of the readers mind. (3) “ And still the bird revisited her young,” this is of great importance to the poem, this intense truly puts into perspective that even the violence that engulfs the surrounding nature, there is still life outside of this death. (5) In other words, even though there is a life at stake, there is still a life that is just beginning, and life does not simply stop because of war, life is still being lived and work still has to be done.
Men in battle were not only dying from bullets, but from a lack of nutrients. Crane makes the reader give the reader the impression that being in war is tough. Crane gives the reader the sense of experiencing the war, just like the characters in the
Edgar Allan Poe creates horror and suspense in his use of irony -including verbal irony, situational irony, and dramatic irony-in his short story “ The Tell-Tale Heart”. Verbal irony is when something that is said means the opposite of what is meant. Poe uses verbal irony when he states, “ I loved the old man.” Situational irony is similar. It is defined as when what happens is different from or even the opposite of what we expected.
“War Is Kind and Other Lies” by Stephen Crane he uses irony to protest war. It claims in the text and title that “War is Kkind”, which certainly cannot be true. War is gruesome and brutal, seemingly the opposite of what the document states. Authors use irony to display the different perspectives of the
In both works, Remarque and Crane both describe terrifying situations that are seen through the eyes of soldiers. In Crane’s poem, he describes the battle-god’s kingdom as the “field where a thousand corpses lies” (Crane 11). This shows that death is inevitable and that by “a thousand corpses”, it could be very literal as wars eventually lead to many deaths. This is a situation where many soldiers must deal
Unit 5: Lesson 3: Flowers for Algernon, Part 1 Apply: In the story, "Flowers for Algernon, Part 1", One example of irony in this story was when Charlie had reacted to his inkblots tests. The reason I choose this was ironic is because of his responses. He saw that there was nothing in the inkblots, but when everyone else could see stuff in them he saw nothing wrong with that. This was situational irony.
Crane writes Henry saying, “‘Well, we both did good. I 'd like to see the fool what 'd say we both didn 't do as good as we could’” (205). In this small gesture, the reader is shown that Henry is becoming more and more selfless, as Henry would have taken the glory for the victory and refused to share it even two chapters earlier. Crane is sure to leave Henry with flaws, however: “A scowl of mortification and rage was upon his face.
The last two lines in the poem translate to, “The old lie: It is sweet and fitting to die for one’s country.” The connection between these lines and O’Brien’s quote is the idea that soldiers dying for their country is a concept that is undermined and dismissed everyday as a “sweet and honorable way to go,” when in reality it means so much more. The authors of the two works are expressing frustration toward their readers, trying to provide meaning to each and every war-related death. Each writer indicates that they are not convinced dying for your country is justifiable, and are struggling to draw reasoning from the way their comrades have
David Sedaris’s use of verbal irony achieves the greatest comic effect due to the way he uses it to be humorous and foolish. The irony is the greatest due to the contrast he creates with his words. On page 13, Sedaris states, “Her english was flawless. ‘I really, really hate you.’” (Sedaris 13).
The poem aims to glorify soldiers and certain aspects of war, it goes on to prove that in reality there really isn 't good vs bad on the battlefield, it 's just a man who "sees his children smile at him, he hears the bugle call, And only death can stop him now—he 's fighting for them all.", and this is our hidden meaning.
This is different to the other poems already mentioned in this essay as it refers to the innocent citizens killed as opposed to the soldiers or upper class ranking officials at the time. A theme throughout the poem is that the first line of each verse contains the person who survives and the second line contains the person of is dead or about to die. “One man shall wake from terror to his bed. Five men shall be dead”
During war, authors like Stephen Crane,Wilfred Owen, Tim O’Brien, and Kevin Powers use literature to protest war. There were also authors who experienced the war first hand.. These authors use irony, imagery, and diction to help their anti-war protest. In many anti-war writing pieces, authors use irony to advance their purpose.