N & Q on Wilfred Owen's Poem "Anthem for Doomed Youth"

1. Owen's poem is one of many sonnets to be found in R&J. Sonnets are generally one of two types: Italian --- sometimes called "Petrarchan" --- form (8 lines called the octave; 6 lines called the sestet); or the English -- sometimes called "Shakespearean" -- form (3 quatrains -- 4, 4, 4 -- and a couplet -- 2).

(a) Which kind is Owen's poem? (b) How does imagery help determine this form? (c) How does the setting change in lines 9-14?

2. Many students have difficulty in grasping the poem, but the following key concept should help: substitution. Instead of items for a regular or normal funeral, other items should be substituted because the "doomed youth" did not die regular or normal deaths. The repeated idea is "not the regular item, but instead this substituted item." A chart can be drawn up of the regular items and substituted items:
 

Not the regular funeral item	Rather the substituted item
passing-bells	monstrous anger of the guns
orisons	??
choirs	??
??	glimmering of boys' eyes
pall	??
flowers	??
drawing-down of blinds	??

See if you can find in the poem the substitutions demanded by the speaker because of the abnormal way the "doomed youth" met their deaths.

3. How is the imagery of lines 3-4 enhanced by the sound effect (see Ch. 19 of R&J) of alliteration or consonance?

4. (A) What custom of British mourning, differing from American practice, does one learn about in the poem's last line? (B) Since the boys, referred to in lines 9-11, are back home, they are not the "doomed youth" killed on the battlefield; who are they, then? (C) Since the girls, referred to in line 12, are back home, and the "doomed youth" on the battlefield are very young (eighteen to twenty-one, in many cases), who are these girls?
 

N & Q on Elizabeth Bishop's Poem "The Fish"

1. Elizabeth Bishop's poem has both straight imagery -- e.g., in lines 1-4 -- as well as imagery inside figurative language -- e.g., lines 10-16. In both cases, the imagery is significant --- that is, has implications. For example, how does the imagery in lines 10-16 validate the speaker's assertion that the fish is "homely" -- that is, how does the imagery inside of the figurative language actually exemplify in any way a "home"? What are the implications of this aspect of "home" about the relationship between the fish (nature) and the angler (humanity)?

2. What same kind of imagery, in addition to visual imagery, can be found in lines 24-26 ("-- the frightening gills . . . "), lines 51-55 ("hung five old pieces . . . "), and 63-64 ("a five-haired . . . ")? What kind of relationship between nature and humanity is implied by the imagistic connection of these two passages?

3. This poem has a definite little plot. How does this plot have a surprise ending? What ideas are implied by the ending -- what accounts for the surprising action or behavior of the angler-speaker?
 

N & Q on Ch. 21 of R&J

        Just as figurative language depends on imagery (imagery can exist without figurative language, but figurative language depends on imagery), so symbolism and allusion depend on imagery. The symbol is a particular image that accrues many meanings; allusions must be to specific persons, events, objects, and so on, which are, in themselves, examples of various kinds of imagery.
 

N & Q on Virginia Scott's Poem "Snow"

1. (a) Which of the six kinds of imagery occur in the poem? (b) How does any of the imagery become symbolic? (Don't overlook the excellent brief discussion of the poem by R&J, which follows the poem and study questions on it by R&J.)

2. How does each of the stanzas of the poem constitute some sort of thought unit?

3. Vocabulary: Ben Lomond (line 15); hemlock (line 16). Look these up in your collegiate dictionary.