When I first read the poem I was pretty confused. There were a few words that I had to figure out the meaning of, like "nipperkin" (meaning a small cup). It seems to me that Hardy's trying to convey the message that war often is stupid and vacuous in meaning, when he says "quaint and curious war is", then talks about the barbaric shooting games at bars. He claims if "you shoot a fellow down" then "you'd treat" to a round, which makes it sound like some casual game. Clearly, the ending of another person's life is not casual, let alone morally acceptable enough to be part of a drinking game. In the first stanza Hardy even states that if him and the man he killed had met earlier, they might have "sat us down to wet right many a nipperkin", or to drink many cups together. If it weren't for the arduous requirements of war, if they had any other choice, they could have even been friends. To me, this poem is sad! It shows the actions that those involved in war have to take, even if they know the actions to be unnecessary and wrong in any other setting. Kind of heartbreaking... I could be wrong in my interpretation, but I think it's depressing! :( Wahhh Question: Why does Thomas Hardy put each stanza in separate quotation marks?
My initial reaction to this poem was confusion. The first time I read it all I understood was that two men had shot at each other, one had died and that somehow these actions had a reflection on war. However I did a small analysis of it and came to the conclusion that the poem has much more depth. Stanza 1: If he and I met before, we might have sat down to have a drink—like friends. Nipperkin—a small cup
Stanza 2: But since he and I met as enemy soldiers. I shot at him and he at me, but I killed him. Infantry—soldiers or military units that fight on foot.
Stanza 3: I shot him because he was an enemy. Just because he was an enemy—there I sort of felt as if the speaker did not really trust that the man he shot was truly an enemy. That killing the man was an order because in the beginning of the poem it is made clear that he thinks of the man he shot as a possible friend, if he considered the idea that they might have met in a bar to have a drink. Stanza 4: The “foe” thought his enlistment was without a price to pay, just like the speaker. They were out of work and sold their carriages. The fact that they were poor and lack other ways to make something of themselves was the reason they enlisted. Off-hand--Without previous thought or consideration. Traps--a carriage, especially a light, two-wheeledone.
Stanza 5: How charming and curious war is. The man you shoot down at the battlefield, could have been the friend that you share a drink with. Quaint-- having an old-fashioned attractiveness or charm. Half-a-crown-- a denomination of British money worth half of a crown, equivalent to two and a half shillings.
Questions: Is the Thomas Hardy or speaker mocking war by calling it “quaint” and implying that the man you kill could have been a friend but because this his war he becomes an enemy? Could he be saying that war is nonsensical? Could stanza one through four be the speaker’s comments because they begin in quotation marks but do not end in quotations? Could the last stanza be the Hardy’s comment because it starts and ends in quotations marks?
I noticed that from the beginning of the poem to the end, there were several shifts in tone, from happy and quaint, quickly to bad, and even quicker to a dark dreary experience. So even though this poem is relatively short, it packs a punch from line to line. Toward the end, the speaker also seems to attempt to justify his actions and blame it on the war atmosphere.
For a normal person, it is viewed as very hard to take another human life, but it seems so simple and regret less in the poem, so in a wartime can this feeling be suppressed, or is it simply self defense? And later in the poem the speaker seems to question the actions he had just taken, so it seems to me that he regrets it and wishes he did not do it, so why did he? Also, in wartime do the old adage of survival of the fittest apply, and I wonder based on the text of the poem, how far would a person go for their own country and act solely on what they think in a split moment rather than their overall morals and beliefs?
All in all it was a very intriguing work, that while reading you could not predict what was coming next and after all was said and done, a lot happened by the end.
This poem is for me, truly illustrates how absurd war is to the individual. Wars are created by the state not the individual. In the end however, it is the individual who pays the price of war either through death or the heinous act of killing someone who under any other circumstance, would be his friend. I tried reading the poem first without making any small mental annotations regarding Harding’s style but I stumbled upon certain phrases and was curious as to why he decided to do certain things. In the first stanza, I wanted to know what in the world a nipperkin was. Harding begins the poem by foreshadowing a gloomy ending with “had he and I but met” meaning that something terrible must have occurred for these two men not to become friends. The second stanza really breaks the simplicity of war; kill or be killed. Despite the immorality of certain actions and events, if one is not assertive in the battle field, your life is in jeopardy. It was this stanza that made me wonder why Harding picked the scenario of two soldiers facing each other. War is so much grander than two people. Why did he simplify it to that small point? The third stanza drives home the meaning that in war, the end justifies the means of actions, especially during war. It also illustrate the point that a soldier truly does not understand or even know why the enemy is the enemy. It shows how during war, someone fights without purpose adding to the truly barbaric element that war always brings. The fourth stanza furthers the idea of an idealess war. When one romanticizes war, soldiers are always fighting for a moral righteousness or battling an evil foe, justifying their actions. Soldiers do not enlist out of idealistic fervor but rather out of necessity. What does that say about the morality of our motives or even the state of our society? Finally the last stanza shows the utter ridiculousness of war itself. “Yes! Quaint and curious war is!” that we will kill and fight for something we don’t believe in just because we can’t pay our bills.
Title : Who is the man? Who killed him? Why did he kill the man and not the man kill him? Suggests an eerie tone, hinting about how the man was killed. The tone is also very detached. The first stanza reads as what should have happen in place of the murder. The speaker states it like the option was very easy to choose. What is a nipperkin? The punctuation confuses me at first but the more I read the poem it is clear that the speaker is also confused as to why the most rationale approach wasn’t chosen. Is this between just two men, some type of gentlemen’s dual? The more I read it, it shows Hardy’s deeper message of humanity’s lack of concern for another’s life. The first stanza suggest that the past had a better way of addressing an issue, is this what he means by “old ancient inn.” The second stanza is a shift in tone, more towards a disgust of how the actions took place. What does the last line mean? The fourth stanza is where the most emotion is shown, why is that important for the affect at the end of the poem? Hardy’s message focuses on the lack of concern for life countries have for other humans. It emphasizes the idea that many believe a “just because” reason is a enough to commit murder. The length of the poem parallels the idea that caring is just as short.
After reading the poem a few times I took it to be a poem about a man who shot and killed a man in war and how if they were not soldiers they would probably be friends rather than enemies. To me it kind of expresses the senselessness of war. The first stanza describes a situation where the two men meet in a bar, "we should have sat us down to wet/Right many a nipperkin!" It is not until the following stanzas that I became aware that instead of meeting at a bar they are on opposing sides in a battle, and it is the narrator's shot that kills the other man. The final stanza reiterates the insanity of going to war and killing a man that he would have other wise been friends with, bought a drink, or lent money. My questions about the poem are: Because of the lack of names within the poem, does that generalize the poem to be about any man who has been involved in a war and killed someone? What war is this poem referring to?
The first thing I thought about is the title of the poem. It's something that caught my attention when I first saw it because not many people commit such a crime surprisingly. The title made my wonder what happened?, was it an accident? and such. I had to read the poem several times. Any poems where the entire thing is in passive voice and is cut in phrases can be a hard read. Others questions I had were why the stanzas had quotations? Are there more speakers to emphasize that this kind of story is a common thing? Another thihng was the repitition. This made such emphasis on what the poem is about that it's hard not to figure it out. Overall, I like this poem, it has a message that I believe in, that violence is ridiculus and it's easy for everyone to just be friends.
When I first read this poem, I had no idea what it was talking about except that one person shot another. What does nipperkin mean? After reading it a couple times, I have come to the conclusion that this poem is about how pointless war can be. You can shoot someone you have never known for the soul reason that he or she has different beliefs than yourself. Both men shoot at each other, but only one survives. This depicts a common scene in war, where one side shoots at the other and vice versa. Neither side knows the other, but shoot anyways to support some cause. Hardy is trying to say that this pointless shooting is just as pointless as war. I liked the poem after reading it a few times and understanding it.
Some things that I thought about while reading the poem were:
-What significant events were happening globally at the time this poem was written?
-Is the poem pointing out the anonymity of war, or the lack of true understanding of a group one may be against?
-Might this be intended as simple reflection, or as a call to action to inspire change?
-Are the speaker’s ideals in question with himself?
-Is the repetition of the word “because” in lines 9 through 10 showing doubt, or conviction as to the reason for having “shot him dead”?
It seems to me that the speaker is concerned with the anonymity related with killings in a war to resolve a conflict when the conflict may otherwise be unrelated to the two unique individuals. Both “quaint and curious” (17) describe war in the last stanza, which leads me to be unsure of whether the author is pointing out a lack of proper deduction and looking for change or just accepting it as a norm.
The casual tone throughout the poem is also important to note, possibly to develop other recognizable writing techniques along with other themes.
After reading the poem a few times through, I definitely got the message that the speaker was reacting to the absurdities of war and the situations they force men into. However, even more than that I felt that "The Man He Killed" underscores what killing another human being truely does to a person. In the first and fourth stanzas he shows how the two men are very much alike, probably with similar socio-economic backgrounds, stuck in the same cruddy situation, in a war killing people because they have to, not because they want to. I think the extensive use of hyphens adds to this idea of an inner dialouge, as the man confronts, ideally, a mirror image of himself differenciated only by party lines. He understands that this man is a foe because of what he has been told but sees the same eyes looking back at him in a sense. I think this poem is so extremely powerful. Sure war is bad when we consider its purpose, but when we consider what it forces us to do- killing our equals because "big brother tells us" is life-altering idea to consider, well at least to me.
Honestly I've read this poem before, and yet I love it more each time I read it. The title is interesting as the poem is written in first person, but the title is in second person. I'm still a bit confused about why Hardy does this. Why not "The Man I Killed"? What effect is created by going with "he"? Also in the first stanza I saw something different this time. The word "should" implies that in contrast to what occurred they should have had drinks together instead of my first interpretation that normally they would have been cordial under different circumstances. I'm not so sure that it really makes a significance difference in the poem but for me when I reread it with the word would instead of should I get a different tone. The change in wording makes it sad for me as before it seemed more like a simple friendly recollection of what could have been. The third stanza is important simply because of the concept. Men of war kill each other because they are fed the lie that the opposing them are the enemy, when in fact, the other soldiers are just like them, at war because they too were "out of work". I think it's a great poem and I'm curious about why it's written the way it is. Why "--" instead of a simple comma or breaking the sentence into two lines?
I actually had to read this poem multiple times. It was really confusing and everytime that I thought that I understood it, I would read it again and get something totally different. Finallt I realized that it was dealing with the the senselessness of war through a story of a man killing another man simply because they were on opposite sides. The final stanza helped me with that with its theme saying that was is a strane phenimenon because a soldier finds himself forced to kill a man that he otherwise have bought a drink for or lent money to, that is if they had met in a time of peace. It displays the tragic truth that someone hed to die and if he had not shot the man, then they would have shot him. He regrets having to kill this man which makes the poem that more emotional. After I actually understand the poem, I like it; a little. My questions are: Does the word "man" in the title refer to mankind and humanity in its entirety? Does Hardy capitalize the first word of the poem to show the emotion and emphasize on how much the speaker did not want things to turn out the way they did?
Wow! That poem was so beautiful! Initially, I read the title to try and get a feel for what the poem was about, but it was pretty straightforward, so I just delved into it. What I found intriguing was that Hardy wrote the poem in first person, but wrote the title as third person. I noticed that it said it was from "The Dynasts", which leads to my first question. Is "The Dynasts" a story that the poem is just a part of?
Reading it for the first time through was like a punch in the stomach. It packed a lot of power in just five stanzas! I found that the poem stressed the gross injustice of war, and what people do when forced. It was incredibly sad to read when the speaker said, "You shoot a fellow down/ You'd treat, if met where any bar is,/ Or help to half-a-crown." This was meaning to say that a man would shoot someone in the name of war that could have become a friend. This to me, raises a moral question as well as a poetic one: Why?
Why did Hardy choose to write about that? Did he experience a similar thing? Why do people shoot down another in the name of war when it is morally unjust?
Another thing that I found quite interesting was the "sexy" syntax. ;) Why did Hardy use the syntax in that way? He uses abrupt pauses and quotations only at the beginning of each stanza.
I thought this was a beautiful poem and although sad, I would love to discuss it further in class.
It is interesting that the title of the poem is "The Man He Killed," while the "he" in the poem is killed by the speaker. Who is the "he" referred to in the title? Is "he" symbolic of all soldiers? The poem is about the pointlessness of war, where soldiers often fight each other for seemingly no reason. Similar people who would normally become friends are forced to kill simply because they are told. The first stanza has relatively few pauses compared to the rest of the poem. There is a shift from hopefulness to regret and confusion. The poem has a casual tone, which is not expected when discussing serious matters such as death and war.
It’s an interesting poem. The first time I read the poem I was like, “what is going on?” One thing for sure, the poem deals with war. After reading it several times, it caught my attention how Hardy points out that his actions are a result of the war. It reminds me how some of our actions tend to be influenced solely by our surroundings. Some questions: What’s a “nipperkin?” Did this actually happen in Hardy’s life?
After reading the poem a couple times, I liked it, although the message is kind of upsetting. Thomas Hardy is making the point that when people kill each other during a war they really have no reason in doing so, just like speaker had to reason in killing the other man but that he was his “foe”. The speakers says that if he and this man had “met by some old ancient inn”, they would have sat down and shared many drinks together, but because they were assigned to be soldiers who fought on foot, he had no choice but to raise his gun and shoot him dead. The speaker strengthens the idea that there was no real reason to shoot the other man (except that it was his job) by explaining that he had only enlisted just because he was out of work; the speaker had no grudge and no hatred towards the other men, there was “no other reason why”. Hardy emphasizes the ridiculous yet completely true nature of war where soldiers have to do what they have to do to stay alive, even if it means killing a lot of people with no real reason or motive. Q: What is up with the random quotation marks at the beginning of each stanza? And then no placing the end quotation mark at the end of the stanza? What do the last two lines of the poem mean? Is the poet actually the speaker in this case? Does the “he” in the title represent all soldiers?
Amy Marshall Block 2 p.s. - I didn’t just skip school today just for fun! I was really sick in the morning. :( Hopefully I’ll feel well enough to come tomorrow.
I must admit I was a tad flabbergasted during the first read through but found the poem to be rather straightforward after a short while. I like this poem because it’s relatable to today’s conflicted world and emphasizes the absurdity of war. It shows the dichotomy between natural relations and forced obligations, the natural aspect being friendly to a fellow man and the obligatory part being bound by constricting wartime duty. This anti-war poem reminded me of an incident I learned about a long, long time ago (back when Adam named the animals) about two opposing sides playing sports games with each other during a momentarily established peacetime during a war. How silly it seems, that someone would befriend a man one moment but be obligated to kill them the next! Whether obligations come from loyalty to one’s country or out of survival (He thought he'd 'list, perhaps,/Off-hand like-just as I-/Was out of work-had sold his traps-/No other reason why.), the whole situation seems rather ludicrous!
Well when I first read through the poem, I understood the gist of it and I actually enjoyed it and the way Hardy wrote it. I got the fact that the speaker was a soldier and that this soldier was killing just to kill but didn't really know why, which showed how nonsensical war really was in that its own soldiers didn't even know what they were fighting and killing for. A couple questions I had were: What exactly does it mean to "wet right many a nipperkin" ? Were all these thought coming into the soldier's mind now because he felt bad for the soldier he'd just killed or was he just curious of whether that soldier might've been just like him ? (And just a thought) The next time this soldier were in a bar, would he question whether he'd be at war with one of the men in the bar anytime soon? I know I would.
When I first read the poem I was extremely confused. I went online to dictionary.com and defined words that I was unfamiliar with. Such as “nipperkin” which means a small cup and “infantry” which is a solider trained, armed, and equipped to fight on foot. Also “quaint” which means marked by skillful design. Then something hit me; I began to understand the poem. In the first stanza the speaker is talking about if he and his foe had the opportunity to sit down and have a drink using a nipperkin. Then in the second stanza the speaker goes on to say that as armed solders they both held each others gaze them the speaker shot him and killed him. In the third stanza the speaker says that he shot him dead because he was my foe. Then I thought, do we always kill our enemies? Then the fourth stanza I honestly don’t get it. I know he is saying that his enemies had enlisted because like him they had no other means of making money. And the fifth stanza is about how horrible and hurtful war is and how you shot and kill people that you might have met or seen in a bar and lend them a hand. This speaker worries about the fact that he actually killed a man and how war is so corrupt. Then the thought came to me; everyone acts a specific way due to what’s going on around them. Question: What is "The Dynasts"? Did this happen to Thomas Hardy? Sue-Ann Shaw Block # 4
I really enjoyed this poem because it is an interesting way to view war. Obviously war is never good because people die, but Hardy takes an approach to it that I found rather enticing. Would the man he killed have actually met him in a bar? That's such a profound concept. It universalizes the process of killing the process of living and I very much liked it. The logic in "I shot him dead because he he was my foe" is not only very indicative of soldiers in general, but it also shows a further insight in man on man crime. Why did you kill him? Well I killed him because someone told me he was my enemy. It's fascinating!It's also sad because it recognizes in the poem that the only reason either of them went to war was most likely because they were poor and needed money to help their families. When it comes down to killing people for money (essentially what it is) you know you are in a funk. It was a powerful piece... I also really liked the rhyming.
The first time I read the poem, I just did a quick run through, and I was like WHAT?! :) But then I went back and read it slowly out loud a second time, putting emphasis on words that seemed important. Hardy wrote this poem in first person so that the reader could get a personal view of what one of the men were thinking. When the speaker says "I shot him dead because—/Because he was my foe", It shows that he had no good reason to kill the man other than the fact that he was on the opposing side in the war. I figured out that Hardy was referring to war when the speaker says "quaint and curious war is".
This poem is putting emphasis on the futility of war and how it can drive perfect strangers to kill one another. In the first stanza the speaker says if the circumstances had been different, he would've been sharing a drink with the smae man he shot at. This poem was very interesting to me because Hardy makes the speaker battle within himself to justify his action. The repition of the words "because" and then follwed by "although" show that he was searching for a justifiable reson to his killing.
I can appreicate Hardy's poem because he wrote it in a conversational way, as if the soldier himself was telling us the story, and trying to get us to see what war can drive man to do.
My favorite part of the poem is the last stanza when Hardy writes, "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." I think Hardy has the concept of war summed up in this one stanza. Soldiers are trained to flat out kill one another "because he was my foe" on the battle field. But, if this face were to be in any social setting, without uniforms or weaponry, the hatred that is supposed to be felt towards one another would be practically non-existant since it is unknown that they are supposed to be enemies.
I have read this poem before so it will be hard to give a really good, first time I ever read it response. That being said I still love the poem it is very dark yet with a hint of a curious nature and this is what, in my opinion, gives it a charming personality... Of course I am one of the few who would write that about a poem dealing with death and loss but honestly it is almost like a child trying to understand a strange mystery. This is what ties the entire thing together making it quite a good poem.
I read the poem twice and both times I didn't really understand what the point was. I understood, however, the plot and the speaker explaining why he shot someone. The tone seemed to be regretful, but then again, I really didn't understand so it could be anything. So, my question is what is the significance and/or purpose of the poem?
So i read it over, was a little confussed. Upon further review, however, i realized that the speaker was talking about war and how arbitrary the violence associated with it was. Its ultimatly a very tragic poem, because circumstances led the speaker to kill a man whom he would otherwise have probably liked, and even drank with.
At first I really didn't understand what this poem was about. I was actually very confused. I thought that maybe the poem was an experience of Hardy's, but as I read it more and more I started to think that maybe it had to do with war. I think that the poem is about how trivial (Vocab word!!)war is, and how pointless the causes are. I didn't really love the poem, because I didn't feel connected to it at all. I am wondering what a nipperkin is. I also want to have a better understanding of the poem, because I don't feel like I have a good enough understanding of the poem on a deeper level.
I think this poem is really beautiful and quite moving. Initially I was a bit confused about some of the words the author uses (i.e. nipperkin, which is, according to my trusty dictionary, some kind of small cup.) Some of the language is pretty antiquated, but the meaning of the poem was still easy to distinguish. Another question I don't think is clearly discernible from the poem is who the speaker actually is. The speaker kills a man, but that seems to contradict the title, which refers to an entirely separate person. Another question would be why the redundancy of an 'old ancient' inn in the first stanza.
The poems' point, that war leads to oftentimes unnecessary slayings of people who have done absolutely nothing wrong, is made more poignant, in my opinion, by the way the poem is written. Particularly in the third stanza, which serves as a noticeable contrast to the apparent objectivity of the second stanza. When the soldier is trying to justify his actions but simultaneously questioning himself, Hardy shows how false the jingoistic language of governments can be in wartime.
Honestly, I was confused when i read this poem. In the beginning, I couldn't understand what Hardy was trying to say...I just couldn't get my head around it. When I read on and the SPEAKER killed the man, I was confused..yet again. In the title, it made it seem as though another person killed a man, but in reality, it was the speaker. I thought that the poem was well-written, small words for me to understand (except nipperkin) :D. It seems abrupt though, the speaker just sits and shoots the man. But then, this man is his foe, and perhaps that's why the task was done quickly. It expresses that killing one another for the sake of killing is quick and simple, no hidden meanings behind the task. It reveals (yes MY FAVORITE WORD) Hardy's stance on killing in general.
Overall my reaction to the poem is confusion. I understand that the poem is talking about war but i am not 100 percent sure what he is trying to say. I believe that he is trying to say that war is obviously a horrible thing and that people kill other people that they don't know for the wrong reasons when in reality we would never kill people we get a long with and share "drinks" with. I think people don't realize how much war affects everyone and everything around us. This poem made me upset because I sort of got the impression that he was trying to prove that some people take war as a joke and nothing serious when in reality it is a very serious thing. I don't believe violence ever solves anything, however I think that as human beings, we think it is more important to protect ourselves and make it okay to kill our so called "prey". I don't understand the part where he says "just as I—/Was out of work—had sold his traps—". I also didn't know what "nipperkin" meant so I looked it up. And last but not least, I was also confused by the meaning of "half-a-crown".
I found the poem to be quite depressing. Knowing that Thomas Hardy intended for this to be satirical, I found it to be disturbing and awakening. I did enjoy the poem, due to its readability but I did find the choppyness of the line through his use of (-), really interupts the flow of the poem. The poem delivers a great message once one is able to see past the satire, which is the fact that war and fighting is completly arbitrary and pointless. One word that did leave me in a carfuffle was nipperkin which I looked up to be small pieces of dinnerware (cups and plates.)
I thought this poem was sad, but not sad in like "aww the poor men, they're shooting at each other!", but sad as in its almost pitiful that these men are so mindless, they have been trained to kill so they will kill. No thought process, no thinking involved whatsoever. People have just become roboticly brainwashed and they don't even no it. People see people as what the government and what people tell them they should see them as. This has occurred in history over and over again. "Oh look red coats! Must Kill!" "Oh look Jews! Must Kill!" "Oh look Arab! Must Kill!" Nothing has changed in war, and it doesn't even have to be on that large of a scale, even in our own neighborhoods. Hardy realized that people don't think at all and just kill because they are "enemies", when in fact people don't see people for people and just generalize them as a whole. War is defending a country from harm, not for a quick economy fix, not to generalize and practice genocide, how does killing an innocent person you don't even know defend your country? The man in this poem even SAYS that if they would have met somewhere else they would have been friends, so why kill him? Just because someone says to? Which leads me to believe that it is satirical and Hardy is mocking the modern idea of war and the lunacy that we should kill our brother because he is the "foe". Everyone else has said it but, I didn't understand what "nipperkin" was? And also who the speaker was? That was a little confusing but reading it over again I got it. :-)
After reading the poem a couple times I came to the conclusion that it wasn't simply about a man being killed but about war as a whole . The poem seems to be saying that war causes us to act inhumanly . In war we kill people without knowing anything about them . That same person that you kill may be someone that , had you taken the time , is just like you . Someone that you may have a lot in common with and enjoy their company . War hardens us and takes away our emotions .
Some questions/thoughts that came to mind :
The title : The "he" in the title and the "he" in the poem aren't the same person . One seems to be a victim and the other , the killer . Why ?
The poem seemed to have a satirical tone , why did Hardy create a satirical tone rather than a serious one ? Especially since the topic choice seems so serious .
Why the pauses ? What do they achieve ?
Moreso , does the speaker , the "I" , realize Hardy's message about war ?
I found the poem very interesting. I thought the events, which eventually lead to the soldier killing his "enemy," that if he had met in an "old ancient inn" they could have been friends. I think the poem is appealing, because of the possibilities that one persons actions can make. The soldiers questions if the enemy joined the army because he was unemployed and needed money.
The fact that they could have become friends, if they were not in the war, and both lived a similar life, kinda shows the universal hardships that we all go through.
My initial reaction was confusion. The speaker makes it seem as if it was okay for him to kill a man because he was his foe, "my foe of course he was;/That's clear enough" without any other reasoning. There were also words that I did not understand, i.e. nipperkin. I realised after further reading, the poem describes how war has become an institution - a benefit for the mass, but no benefit for the individual because he's saying that if you met a man in war, you'd kill him but if you met him in peaceful circumstances you'd probably sit down and have a drink. I liked this poem because it highlights the misuse of war and the way it effects an individual outlook.
When I first read the poem I was pretty confused. There were a few words that I had to figure out the meaning of, like "nipperkin" (meaning a small cup). It seems to me that Hardy's trying to convey the message that war often is stupid and vacuous in meaning, when he says "quaint and curious war is", then talks about the barbaric shooting games at bars. He claims if "you shoot a fellow down" then "you'd treat" to a round, which makes it sound like some casual game. Clearly, the ending of another person's life is not casual, let alone morally acceptable enough to be part of a drinking game. In the first stanza Hardy even states that if him and the man he killed had met earlier, they might have "sat us down to wet right many a nipperkin", or to drink many cups together. If it weren't for the arduous requirements of war, if they had any other choice, they could have even been friends. To me, this poem is sad! It shows the actions that those involved in war have to take, even if they know the actions to be unnecessary and wrong in any other setting. Kind of heartbreaking... I could be wrong in my interpretation, but I think it's depressing! :( Wahhh
ReplyDeleteQuestion:
Why does Thomas Hardy put each stanza in separate quotation marks?
Piper Miller
Block 4
My initial reaction to this poem was confusion. The first time I read it all I understood was that two men had shot at each other, one had died and that somehow these actions had a reflection on war. However I did a small analysis of it and came to the conclusion that the poem has much more depth.
ReplyDeleteStanza 1: If he and I met before, we might have sat down to have a drink—like friends.
Nipperkin—a small cup
Stanza 2: But since he and I met as enemy soldiers. I shot at him and he at me, but I killed him.
Infantry—soldiers or military units that fight on foot.
Stanza 3: I shot him because he was an enemy. Just because he was an enemy—there I sort of felt as if the speaker did not really trust that the man he shot was truly an enemy. That killing the man was an order because in the beginning of the poem it is made clear that he thinks of the man he shot as a possible friend, if he considered the idea that they might have met in a bar to have a drink.
Stanza 4: The “foe” thought his enlistment was without a price to pay, just like the speaker. They were out of work and sold their carriages. The fact that they were poor and lack other ways to make something of themselves was the reason they enlisted.
Off-hand--Without previous thought or consideration.
Traps--a carriage, especially a light, two-wheeledone.
Stanza 5: How charming and curious war is. The man you shoot down at the battlefield, could have been the friend that you share a drink with.
Quaint-- having an old-fashioned attractiveness or charm.
Half-a-crown-- a denomination of British money worth half of a crown, equivalent to two and a half shillings.
Questions: Is the Thomas Hardy or speaker mocking war by calling it “quaint” and implying that the man you kill could have been a friend but because this his war he becomes an enemy? Could he be saying that war is nonsensical?
Could stanza one through four be the speaker’s comments because they begin in quotation marks but do not end in quotations?
Could the last stanza be the Hardy’s comment because it starts and ends in quotations marks?
Georgette Taluy
Block 4
I noticed that from the beginning of the poem to the end, there were several shifts in tone, from happy and quaint, quickly to bad, and even quicker to a dark dreary experience. So even though this poem is relatively short, it packs a punch from line to line. Toward the end, the speaker also seems to attempt to justify his actions and blame it on the war atmosphere.
ReplyDeleteFor a normal person, it is viewed as very hard
to take another human life, but it seems so simple and regret less in the poem, so in a wartime can this feeling be suppressed, or is it simply self defense? And later in the poem the speaker seems to question the actions he had just taken, so it seems to me that he regrets it and wishes he did not do it, so why did he? Also, in wartime do the old adage of survival of the fittest apply, and I wonder based on the text of the poem, how far would a person go for their own country and act solely on what they think in a split moment rather than their overall morals and beliefs?
All in all it was a very intriguing work, that while reading you could not predict what was coming next and after all was said and done, a lot happened by the end.
Brandon Richards
Block 2
This poem is for me, truly illustrates how absurd war is to the individual. Wars are created by the state not the individual. In the end however, it is the individual who pays the price of war either through death or the heinous act of killing someone who under any other circumstance, would be his friend. I tried reading the poem first without making any small mental annotations regarding Harding’s style but I stumbled upon certain phrases and was curious as to why he decided to do certain things.
ReplyDeleteIn the first stanza, I wanted to know what in the world a nipperkin was. Harding begins the poem by foreshadowing a gloomy ending with “had he and I but met” meaning that something terrible must have occurred for these two men not to become friends.
The second stanza really breaks the simplicity of war; kill or be killed. Despite the immorality of certain actions and events, if one is not assertive in the battle field, your life is in jeopardy. It was this stanza that made me wonder why Harding picked the scenario of two soldiers facing each other. War is so much grander than two people. Why did he simplify it to that small point?
The third stanza drives home the meaning that in war, the end justifies the means of actions, especially during war. It also illustrate the point that a soldier truly does not understand or even know why the enemy is the enemy. It shows how during war, someone fights without purpose adding to the truly barbaric element that war always brings.
The fourth stanza furthers the idea of an idealess war. When one romanticizes war, soldiers are always fighting for a moral righteousness or battling an evil foe, justifying their actions. Soldiers do not enlist out of idealistic fervor but rather out of necessity. What does that say about the morality of our motives or even the state of our society?
Finally the last stanza shows the utter ridiculousness of war itself. “Yes! Quaint and curious war is!” that we will kill and fight for something we don’t believe in just because we can’t pay our bills.
Title : Who is the man? Who killed him? Why did he kill the man and not the man kill him? Suggests an eerie tone, hinting about how the man was killed. The tone is also very detached.
ReplyDeleteThe first stanza reads as what should have happen in place of the murder. The speaker states it like the option was very easy to choose. What is a nipperkin?
The punctuation confuses me at first but the more I read the poem it is clear that the speaker is also confused as to why the most rationale approach wasn’t chosen.
Is this between just two men, some type of gentlemen’s dual?
The more I read it, it shows Hardy’s deeper message of humanity’s lack of concern for another’s life.
The first stanza suggest that the past had a better way of addressing an issue, is this what he means by “old ancient inn.”
The second stanza is a shift in tone, more towards a disgust of how the actions took place.
What does the last line mean?
The fourth stanza is where the most emotion is shown, why is that important for the affect at the end of the poem?
Hardy’s message focuses on the lack of concern for life countries have for other humans. It emphasizes the idea that many believe a “just because” reason is a enough to commit murder.
The length of the poem parallels the idea that caring is just as short.
This comment has been removed by the author.
ReplyDeleteAfter reading the poem a few times I took it to be a poem about a man who shot and killed a man in war and how if they were not soldiers they would probably be friends rather than enemies. To me it kind of expresses the senselessness of war. The first stanza describes a situation where the two men meet in a bar, "we should have sat us down to wet/Right many a nipperkin!" It is not until the following stanzas that I became aware that instead of meeting at a bar they are on opposing sides in a battle, and it is the narrator's shot that kills the other man. The final stanza reiterates the insanity of going to war and killing a man that he would have other wise been friends with, bought a drink, or lent money.
ReplyDeleteMy questions about the poem are: Because of the lack of names within the poem, does that generalize the poem to be about any man who has been involved in a war and killed someone? What war is this poem referring to?
Danielle Malcolm
Block 4
The first thing I thought about is the title of the poem. It's something that caught my attention when I first saw it because not many people commit such a crime surprisingly. The title made my wonder what happened?, was it an accident? and such.
ReplyDeleteI had to read the poem several times. Any poems where the entire thing is in passive voice and is cut in phrases can be a hard read.
Others questions I had were why the stanzas had quotations? Are there more speakers to emphasize that this kind of story is a common thing?
Another thihng was the repitition. This made such emphasis on what the poem is about that it's hard not to figure it out.
Overall, I like this poem, it has a message that I believe in, that violence is ridiculus and it's easy for everyone to just be friends.
Francheska Periche
Block 4
When I first read this poem, I had no idea what it was talking about except that one person shot another. What does nipperkin mean? After reading it a couple times, I have come to the conclusion that this poem is about how pointless war can be. You can shoot someone you have never known for the soul reason that he or she has different beliefs than yourself. Both men shoot at each other, but only one survives. This depicts a common scene in war, where one side shoots at the other and vice versa. Neither side knows the other, but shoot anyways to support some cause. Hardy is trying to say that this pointless shooting is just as pointless as war. I liked the poem after reading it a few times and understanding it.
ReplyDeleteSome things that I thought about while reading the poem were:
ReplyDelete-What significant events were happening globally at the time this poem was written?
-Is the poem pointing out the anonymity of war, or the lack of true understanding of a group one may be against?
-Might this be intended as simple reflection, or as a call to action to inspire change?
-Are the speaker’s ideals in question with himself?
-Is the repetition of the word “because” in lines 9 through 10 showing doubt, or conviction as to the reason for having “shot him dead”?
It seems to me that the speaker is concerned with the anonymity related with killings in a war to resolve a conflict when the conflict may otherwise be unrelated to the two unique individuals. Both “quaint and curious” (17) describe war in the last stanza, which leads me to be unsure of whether the author is pointing out a lack of proper deduction and looking for change or just accepting it as a norm.
The casual tone throughout the poem is also important to note, possibly to develop other recognizable writing techniques along with other themes.
Matt Brown
Block 2
After reading the poem a few times through, I definitely got the message that the speaker was reacting to the absurdities of war and the situations they force men into. However, even more than that I felt that "The Man He Killed" underscores what killing another human being truely does to a person. In the first and fourth stanzas he shows how the two men are very much alike, probably with similar socio-economic backgrounds, stuck in the same cruddy situation, in a war killing people because they have to, not because they want to.
ReplyDeleteI think the extensive use of hyphens adds to this idea of an inner dialouge, as the man confronts, ideally, a mirror image of himself differenciated only by party lines. He understands that this man is a foe because of what he has been told but sees the same eyes looking back at him in a sense.
I think this poem is so extremely powerful. Sure war is bad when we consider its purpose, but when we consider what it forces us to do- killing our equals because "big brother tells us" is life-altering idea to consider, well at least to me.
Maria Savarese Block 4
Honestly I've read this poem before, and yet I love it more each time I read it. The title is interesting as the poem is written in first person, but the title is in second person. I'm still a bit confused about why Hardy does this. Why not "The Man I Killed"? What effect is created by going with "he"? Also in the first stanza I saw something different this time. The word "should" implies that in contrast to what occurred they should have had drinks together instead of my first interpretation that normally they would have been cordial under different circumstances. I'm not so sure that it really makes a significance difference in the poem but for me when I reread it with the word would instead of should I get a different tone. The change in wording makes it sad for me as before it seemed more like a simple friendly recollection of what could have been. The third stanza is important simply because of the concept. Men of war kill each other because they are fed the lie that the opposing them are the enemy, when in fact, the other soldiers are just like them, at war because they too were "out of work". I think it's a great poem and I'm curious about why it's written the way it is. Why "--" instead of a simple comma or breaking the sentence into two lines?
ReplyDeleteAyanna Spencer
Block 4
I actually had to read this poem multiple times. It was really confusing and everytime that I thought that I understood it, I would read it again and get something totally different. Finallt I realized that it was dealing with the the senselessness of war through a story of a man killing another man simply because they were on opposite sides. The final stanza helped me with that with its theme saying that was is a strane phenimenon because a soldier finds himself forced to kill a man that he otherwise have bought a drink for or lent money to, that is if they had met in a time of peace. It displays the tragic truth that someone hed to die and if he had not shot the man, then they would have shot him. He regrets having to kill this man which makes the poem that more emotional. After I actually understand the poem, I like it; a little.
ReplyDeleteMy questions are: Does the word "man" in the title refer to mankind and humanity in its entirety? Does Hardy capitalize the first word of the poem to show the emotion and emphasize on how much the speaker did not want things to turn out the way they did?
Vashti Powell
Block 4
Wow! That poem was so beautiful! Initially, I read the title to try and get a feel for what the poem was about, but it was pretty straightforward, so I just delved into it. What I found intriguing was that Hardy wrote the poem in first person, but wrote the title as third person. I noticed that it said it was from "The Dynasts", which leads to my first question. Is "The Dynasts" a story that the poem is just a part of?
ReplyDeleteReading it for the first time through was like a punch in the stomach. It packed a lot of power in just five stanzas! I found that the poem stressed the gross injustice of war, and what people do when forced. It was incredibly sad to read when the speaker said, "You shoot a fellow down/ You'd treat, if met where any bar is,/ Or help to half-a-crown." This was meaning to say that a man would shoot someone in the name of war that could have become a friend. This to me, raises a moral question as well as a poetic one: Why?
Why did Hardy choose to write about that? Did he experience a similar thing?
Why do people shoot down another in the name of war when it is morally unjust?
Another thing that I found quite interesting was the "sexy" syntax. ;) Why did Hardy use the syntax in that way? He uses abrupt pauses and quotations only at the beginning of each stanza.
I thought this was a beautiful poem and although sad, I would love to discuss it further in class.
Holly Denton
Block 4
It is interesting that the title of the poem is "The Man He Killed," while the "he" in the poem is killed by the speaker. Who is the "he" referred to in the title? Is "he" symbolic of all soldiers? The poem is about the pointlessness of war, where soldiers often fight each other for seemingly no reason. Similar people who would normally become friends are forced to kill simply because they are told. The first stanza has relatively few pauses compared to the rest of the poem. There is a shift from hopefulness to regret and confusion. The poem has a casual tone, which is not expected when discussing serious matters such as death and war.
ReplyDeleteEric Marshall
Block 2
It’s an interesting poem. The first time I read the poem I was like, “what is going on?” One thing for sure, the poem deals with war. After reading it several times, it caught my attention how Hardy points out that his actions are a result of the war. It reminds me how some of our actions tend to be influenced solely by our surroundings.
ReplyDeleteSome questions:
What’s a “nipperkin?”
Did this actually happen in Hardy’s life?
Cinthya Castro
Block 4
After reading the poem a couple times, I liked it, although the message is kind of upsetting. Thomas Hardy is making the point that when people kill each other during a war they really have no reason in doing so, just like speaker had to reason in killing the other man but that he was his “foe”. The speakers says that if he and this man had “met by some old ancient inn”, they would have sat down and shared many drinks together, but because they were assigned to be soldiers who fought on foot, he had no choice but to raise his gun and shoot him dead. The speaker strengthens the idea that there was no real reason to shoot the other man (except that it was his job) by explaining that he had only enlisted just because he was out of work; the speaker had no grudge and no hatred towards the other men, there was “no other reason why”. Hardy emphasizes the ridiculous yet completely true nature of war where soldiers have to do what they have to do to stay alive, even if it means killing a lot of people with no real reason or motive.
ReplyDeleteQ: What is up with the random quotation marks at the beginning of each stanza? And then no placing the end quotation mark at the end of the stanza?
What do the last two lines of the poem mean?
Is the poet actually the speaker in this case?
Does the “he” in the title represent all soldiers?
Amy Marshall
Block 2
p.s. - I didn’t just skip school today just for fun! I was really sick in the morning. :( Hopefully I’ll feel well enough to come tomorrow.
I must admit I was a tad flabbergasted during the first read through but found the poem to be rather straightforward after a short while. I like this poem because it’s relatable to today’s conflicted world and emphasizes the absurdity of war. It shows the dichotomy between natural relations and forced obligations, the natural aspect being friendly to a fellow man and the obligatory part being bound by constricting wartime duty. This anti-war poem reminded me of an incident I learned about a long, long time ago (back when Adam named the animals) about two opposing sides playing sports games with each other during a momentarily established peacetime during a war. How silly it seems, that someone would befriend a man one moment but be obligated to kill them the next! Whether obligations come from loyalty to one’s country or out of survival (He thought he'd 'list, perhaps,/Off-hand like-just as I-/Was out of work-had sold his traps-/No other reason why.), the whole situation seems rather ludicrous!
ReplyDeleteWell when I first read through the poem, I understood the gist of it and I actually enjoyed it and the way Hardy wrote it. I got the fact that the speaker was a soldier and that this soldier was killing just to kill but didn't really know why, which showed how nonsensical war really was in that its own soldiers didn't even know what they were fighting and killing for.
ReplyDeleteA couple questions I had were: What exactly does it mean to "wet right many a nipperkin" ? Were all these thought coming into the soldier's mind now because he felt bad for the soldier he'd just killed or was he just curious of whether that soldier might've been just like him ? (And just a thought) The next time this soldier were in a bar, would he question whether he'd be at war with one of the men in the bar anytime soon? I know I would.
When I first read the poem I was extremely confused. I went online to dictionary.com and defined words that I was unfamiliar with. Such as “nipperkin” which means a small cup and “infantry” which is a solider trained, armed, and equipped to fight on foot. Also “quaint” which means marked by skillful design. Then something hit me; I began to understand the poem. In the first stanza the speaker is talking about if he and his foe had the opportunity to sit down and have a drink using a nipperkin. Then in the second stanza the speaker goes on to say that as armed solders they both held each others gaze them the speaker shot him and killed him. In the third stanza the speaker says that he shot him dead because he was my foe. Then I thought, do we always kill our enemies? Then the fourth stanza I honestly don’t get it. I know he is saying that his enemies had enlisted because like him they had no other means of making money. And the fifth stanza is about how horrible and hurtful war is and how you shot and kill people that you might have met or seen in a bar and lend them a hand. This speaker worries about the fact that he actually killed a man and how war is so corrupt. Then the thought came to me; everyone acts a specific way due to what’s going on around them.
ReplyDeleteQuestion:
What is "The Dynasts"?
Did this happen to Thomas Hardy?
Sue-Ann Shaw
Block # 4
I really enjoyed this poem because it is an interesting way to view war. Obviously war is never good because people die, but Hardy takes an approach to it that I found rather enticing. Would the man he killed have actually met him in a bar? That's such a profound concept. It universalizes the process of killing the process of living and I very much liked it. The logic in "I shot him dead because he he was my foe" is not only very indicative of soldiers in general, but it also shows a further insight in man on man crime. Why did you kill him? Well I killed him because someone told me he was my enemy. It's fascinating!It's also sad because it recognizes in the poem that the only reason either of them went to war was most likely because they were poor and needed money to help their families. When it comes down to killing people for money (essentially what it is) you know you are in a funk. It was a powerful piece... I also really liked the rhyming.
ReplyDelete-Tatiana Becker
Block 4 :D
The first time I read the poem, I just did a quick run through, and I was like WHAT?! :) But then I went back and read it slowly out loud a second time, putting emphasis on words that seemed important. Hardy wrote this poem in first person so that the reader could get a personal view of what one of the men were thinking. When the speaker says "I shot him dead because—/Because he was my foe", It shows that he had no good reason to kill the man other than the fact that he was on the opposing side in the war. I figured out that Hardy was referring to war when the speaker says "quaint and curious war is".
ReplyDeleteThis poem is putting emphasis on the futility of war and how it can drive perfect strangers to kill one another. In the first stanza the speaker says if the circumstances had been different, he would've been sharing a drink with the smae man he shot at. This poem was very interesting to me because Hardy makes the speaker battle within himself to justify his action. The repition of the words "because" and then follwed by "although" show that he was searching for a justifiable reson to his killing.
I can appreicate Hardy's poem because he wrote it in a conversational way, as if the soldier himself was telling us the story, and trying to get us to see what war can drive man to do.
p.s. - this was the best poem so far ;)
My favorite part of the poem is the last stanza when Hardy writes, "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." I think Hardy has the concept of war summed up in this one stanza. Soldiers are trained to flat out kill one another "because he was my foe" on the battle field. But, if this face were to be in any social setting, without uniforms or weaponry, the hatred that is supposed to be felt towards one another would be practically non-existant since it is unknown that they are supposed to be enemies.
ReplyDeleteCassie Rall
I have read this poem before so it will be hard to give a really good, first time I ever read it response. That being said I still love the poem it is very dark yet with a hint of a curious nature and this is what, in my opinion, gives it a charming personality... Of course I am one of the few who would write that about a poem dealing with death and loss but honestly it is almost like a child trying to understand a strange mystery. This is what ties the entire thing together making it quite a good poem.
ReplyDeleteI read the poem twice and both times I didn't really understand what the point was. I understood, however, the plot and the speaker explaining why he shot someone. The tone seemed to be regretful, but then again, I really didn't understand so it could be anything. So, my question is what is the significance and/or purpose of the poem?
ReplyDeleteSo i read it over, was a little confussed. Upon further review, however, i realized that the speaker was talking about war and how arbitrary the violence associated with it was. Its ultimatly a very tragic poem, because circumstances led the speaker to kill a man whom he would otherwise have probably liked, and even drank with.
ReplyDeleteThat's all i got.
Rev. Mack Kennedy
Block 4
At first I really didn't understand what this poem was about. I was actually very confused. I thought that maybe the poem was an experience of Hardy's, but as I read it more and more I started to think that maybe it had to do with war. I think that the poem is about how trivial (Vocab word!!)war is, and how pointless the causes are. I didn't really love the poem, because I didn't feel connected to it at all. I am wondering what a nipperkin is. I also want to have a better understanding of the poem, because I don't feel like I have a good enough understanding of the poem on a deeper level.
ReplyDeleteDakota Edelstein
I think this poem is really beautiful and quite moving. Initially I was a bit confused about some of the words the author uses (i.e. nipperkin, which is, according to my trusty dictionary, some kind of small cup.) Some of the language is pretty antiquated, but the meaning of the poem was still easy to distinguish. Another question I don't think is clearly discernible from the poem is who the speaker actually is. The speaker kills a man, but that seems to contradict the title, which refers to an entirely separate person. Another question would be why the redundancy of an 'old ancient' inn in the first stanza.
ReplyDeleteThe poems' point, that war leads to oftentimes unnecessary slayings of people who have done absolutely nothing wrong, is made more poignant, in my opinion, by the way the poem is written. Particularly in the third stanza, which serves as a noticeable contrast to the apparent objectivity of the second stanza. When the soldier is trying to justify his actions but simultaneously questioning himself, Hardy shows how false the jingoistic language of governments can be in wartime.
Nari Kretschmer
ReplyDeleteBlock 4
Honestly, I was confused when i read this poem. In the beginning, I couldn't understand what Hardy was trying to say...I just couldn't get my head around it. When I read on and the SPEAKER killed the man, I was confused..yet again. In the title, it made it seem as though another person killed a man, but in reality, it was the speaker. I thought that the poem was well-written, small words for me to understand (except nipperkin) :D. It seems abrupt though, the speaker just sits and shoots the man. But then, this man is his foe, and perhaps that's why the task was done quickly. It expresses that killing one another for the sake of killing is quick and simple, no hidden meanings behind the task. It reveals (yes MY FAVORITE WORD) Hardy's stance on killing in general.
ReplyDeleteEvan Jackson
Block Two!
Overall my reaction to the poem is confusion. I understand that the poem is talking about war but i am not 100 percent sure what he is trying to say. I believe that he is trying to say that war is obviously a horrible thing and that people kill other people that they don't know for the wrong reasons when in reality we would never kill people we get a long with and share "drinks" with. I think people don't realize how much war affects everyone and everything around us. This poem made me upset because I sort of got the impression that he was trying to prove that some people take war as a joke and nothing serious when in reality it is a very serious thing. I don't believe violence ever solves anything, however I think that as human beings, we think it is more important to protect ourselves and make it okay to kill our so called "prey".
ReplyDeleteI don't understand the part where he says "just as I—/Was out of work—had sold his traps—". I also didn't know what "nipperkin" meant so I looked it up. And last but not least, I was also confused by the meaning of "half-a-crown".
Izzy Szura
Block 2
I found the poem to be quite depressing. Knowing that Thomas Hardy intended for this to be satirical, I found it to be disturbing and awakening. I did enjoy the poem, due to its readability but I did find the choppyness of the line through his use of (-), really interupts the flow of the poem. The poem delivers a great message once one is able to see past the satire, which is the fact that war and fighting is completly arbitrary and pointless. One word that did leave me in a carfuffle was nipperkin which I looked up to be small pieces of dinnerware (cups and plates.)
ReplyDeleteI thought this poem was sad, but not sad in like "aww the poor men, they're shooting at each other!", but sad as in its almost pitiful that these men are so mindless, they have been trained to kill so they will kill. No thought process, no thinking involved whatsoever. People have just become roboticly brainwashed and they don't even no it. People see people as what the government and what people tell them they should see them as. This has occurred in history over and over again. "Oh look red coats! Must Kill!" "Oh look Jews! Must Kill!" "Oh look Arab! Must Kill!" Nothing has changed in war, and it doesn't even have to be on that large of a scale, even in our own neighborhoods. Hardy realized that people don't think at all and just kill because they are "enemies", when in fact people don't see people for people and just generalize them as a whole. War is defending a country from harm, not for a quick economy fix, not to generalize and practice genocide, how does killing an innocent person you don't even know defend your country?
ReplyDeleteThe man in this poem even SAYS that if they would have met somewhere else they would have been friends, so why kill him? Just because someone says to? Which leads me to believe that it is satirical and Hardy is mocking the modern idea of war and the lunacy that we should kill our brother because he is the "foe".
Everyone else has said it but, I didn't understand what "nipperkin" was? And also who the speaker was? That was a little confusing but reading it over again I got it. :-)
Sarah Hall
Block 4
After reading the poem a couple times I came to the conclusion that it wasn't simply about a man being killed but about war as a whole . The poem seems to be saying that war causes us to act inhumanly . In war we kill people without knowing anything about them . That same person that you kill may be someone that , had you taken the time , is just like you . Someone that you may have a lot in common with and enjoy their company . War hardens us and takes away our emotions .
ReplyDeleteSome questions/thoughts that came to mind :
The title : The "he" in the title and the "he" in the poem aren't the same person . One seems to be a victim and the other , the killer . Why ?
The poem seemed to have a satirical tone , why did Hardy create a satirical tone rather than a serious one ? Especially since the topic choice seems so serious .
Why the pauses ? What do they achieve ?
Moreso , does the speaker , the "I" , realize Hardy's message about war ?
I found the poem very interesting. I thought the events, which eventually lead to the soldier killing his "enemy," that if he had met in an "old ancient inn" they could have been friends. I think the poem is appealing, because of the possibilities that one persons actions can make. The soldiers questions if the enemy joined the army because he was unemployed and needed money.
ReplyDeleteThe fact that they could have become friends, if they were not in the war, and both lived a similar life, kinda shows the universal hardships that we all go through.
My initial reaction was confusion. The speaker makes it seem as if it was okay for him to kill a man because he was his foe, "my foe of course he was;/That's clear enough" without any other reasoning. There were also words that I did not understand, i.e. nipperkin. I realised after further reading, the poem describes how war has become an institution - a benefit for the mass, but no benefit for the individual because he's saying that if you met a man in war, you'd kill him but if you met him in peaceful circumstances you'd probably sit down and have a drink. I liked this poem because it highlights the misuse of war and the way it effects an individual outlook.
ReplyDelete