Genesis 2:7 – “And the Lord God formed man of the dust of the ground, and breathed into his nostrils the breath of life; and man became a living soul.”
Personification – How has personification been used in this poem to enhance meaning? Why?
Owen uses personification to present to the naivety of the speaker. ‘ Gently its touch awoke him once’. The speaker is referring to pre-war, when the dead soldier would wake up in the morning due to the Suns beams. The Sun is being personified as its touch is what awoke the soldier. Of course this is not the reason we get up, but without the Sun nothing will be. The speaker believes that the Sun is what ‘awoke him once’ so it can do it again.
They are asking God to bring back life into the fallen soldier. God and the Sun allows seeds to grow into plants, and even let there be life on Earth ‘cold star’ . With this power to give life, the soldiers believe it is possible for the Sun to give life again. This is there naivety. At the end of the end of the poem the speaker’s anger is directed at the futile Sun. ‘O what made fatuous sunbeams toil, To break earth’s sleep at all?’ The speaker is questioning the point of the Sun giving life if all that humans do is destroy each other.
In stanza one the Sun is described as “kind” and “old”, its warmth ancient and affirming, as if it were a God. The idea of reviving the fallen soldier could be a metaphor for finding comfort in religion. In stanza two however the tone changes, they start to question the Sun’s power which disproves the idea of looking for comfort within religion. ‘Was it for this the clay grew tall?’ The biblical idea that God sculpted us out of clay is implied in this line. The idea of the sun making the world can be linked to the way God created the world in seven days, in the bible.
React!