Sunday, February 19, 2012

What are the language terms of the poem "The Man He Killed" by Thomas Hardy?Tell me if there is any metaphor, simile, allusion or anything about...

“The Man He Killed” by Thomas
Hardy


Had he and I but met
By some old ancient
inn,
We should have set us down to wet
Right many a nipperkin!

But ranged as infantry,
And staring face to
face,
I shot at him as he at me,
And killed him in his place.

I shot him dead because--
Because he was my
foe,
Just so: my foe of course he was;
That's clear enough; although

He thought he'd 'list, perhaps,
Off-hand like--just as
I--
Was out of work--had sold his traps--
No other reason why.

Yes; quaint and curious war is!
You shoot a fellow
down
You'd treat, if met where any bar is,
Or help to half a
crown.


We have lots of irony:
of place (the bar vs. the battlefield); of theme (friends vs. enemies in
war); verbal irony: "quaint and curious war is" and "that's
clear enought" are classic understatement.


We have an
unreliable (naive) narrator / speaker: he does not know who
he is and why things are.


We also have a
imbedded narrator: all of this is being overheard by a
narrator in the bar, so the narrator is like the reader, an indirect
source.


We have imagery,
mainly to do with the price of things ("half a crown", "sold his
traps")


We have
character foils (reflections of each other): "But ranged as
infantry,/ And staring face to face, / I shot at him as he at me, / And killed him in
his place."  Are they friends or foes?


We have a
logical fallacy (circular reasoning): "I shot him dead
because--/Because he was my foe, / Just so: my foe of course he was; / That's clear
enough; although."

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