LA Task 2 T2W10

1. Point of View
--> “…children in the darknessWho someone will teach to fight”

- The poet is trying to say that the children will be “led into the darkness”, learning something sinister which is fighting.

--> “Chalk and blackboards will not be, To this door there is no key”; “Could we give them half a chance,Could we teach them how to read,Could we teach them how to dance”

- Children are supposed to be educated academically. However, in this case, the poet is trying to say that they do not even have the freedom to choose what they want to do. Nobody is able to give them the chance to learn how to read. Their only way is to fight in a war

--> “Will their life and blood be pouredDown some endless thirsty hole”

-The poet is trying to say that, in a war the children will lose their lives easily, when they could have spent their lives picking up new skills instead.


2. Situation and setting

--> “endless thirsty hole”

- The use of the word “thirsty” shows that people fighting in a war are all desperate for survival, and in order to survive, they have to “quench their thirst” by killing others, if not they may get killed. The use of the word “endless” shows that it’s everyone who has this thought. Everyone wants to live on, and will thus fight with all theirs might, and therefore the competition on a battlefield is very tough. If children were to join in, it would be quite apparent that they will die.-

--> “Or will a war consume them,Their body and their soul”

- The poet portrays war as a cruel and merciless environment that will “consume them (the children), their body and soul”, showing that the enemy will not only simply kill them, but totally destroy them physically.


3. Language/ Diction


--> “Could we simply light a candle, Could we give them half a chance, Could we teach them how to read, Could we teach them how to dance”

- “simply light a candle” is trying to say that could adults show them what is the right path in life that they should head. The poet also used “half a chance” instead of just saying “a chance”. He is trying to say that nobody could even give the children the most minute opportunity to learn to read or write, and their fate has been decided, that is, to go to war.
- The rhetorical question also emphasizes the helplessness of adults. They want to prevent the children from fighting in a war, risking their lives, but they can’t stop it.

--> “Back into the darkness,From which there is no flight,Back into the darkness,Into which there shines no light”

- In both the first and last stanza the poet used “darkness” and “light”, which are two contrasting terms. The repetition used is trying to emphasise that going into war will turn children evil, and they will not have any chance to be able to “see the light” to do what a normal child should learn, and also risking their lives. The poet used “Back into the darkness”. The use of the word “back” shows that after thinking through, the poet realises that the only way for children is to head “back into the darkness” and fight in a war.

4. Personal response

- I feel that children should not be involved in war in any ways, or exposed to the cruelty of it. Imagine yourself as a young kid in a battlefield, who has killed another innocent man for survival, and has inevitably turned into a murderer, a monster. This will be marred in the children’s mind forever. Even if a child doesn’t kill, he or she will inevitably witness death, or how cruel one can be when he or she is desperate.