War is kind Essay Example for Free

War is kind Essay ‘War is kind’ is a harsh and critical poem. The poetry is a sort of protest against war and ranks among the large collection of harrowing works of poetry about war. The title draws the reader’s attention to the ironic tone in the poem as it is very hard to picture war being kind. The author seems to be very pessimistic and adopts a satirical and cynical statement after the statement ‘war is kind’. For instance he says, ‘War is kind’, hoarse booming drums of the regiment, little souls who thirst for fight, these men were born to drill and die’ (Crane, 2009, pp 9). By referring to the ‘unexplained glory above them’, Crane seems to be questioning whether the destruction and death is worth it. This is an important question as most wars are really not about what they issues that the people at war claim. There are some exceptions to this, for example, World War II was about a fight for the end of holocaust, while the Civil War was about ending slavery. However for the most part, wars have been conflicts over cultural values and over natural resources. In his poem, Crane appears to be disagreeing with the notion that wars are about glory, nationalism and patriotism. These emotions that people associate with war are in reality made up to enable people feel better about the war and its effects. The level of sarcasm in the poem clearly shows Crane’s doubts as to whether war is worth anything to anyone. The author makes this point even more clearly by pointing out that war its glory and honor are worth very little to the child whose parent has died, the wife whose husband has died or the parent whose child has died. The poem is an emotional and bitter protest against the horrors of war. It gets a lot of its strength form the use of highly descriptive simple words that are contrasted with innocence. In the first line a maiden seems to be grieving about the loss of her husband, but the statement ‘war is kind’ follows. The poem then goes on to present a very dramatic picture of the husband’s death, where the dying soldier is throwing his wild hands in the direction of the sky and his frightened horse is left running alone. The constant repetition of this line is and the line ‘do not weep’, works well to place emphasis on the poem’s objective which is to undermine the fundamentals of war. The poem also has a political angle which is significant to its interpretation. In attacking the situation of those who learn only to die and drill, the poem is accusing the politics of war. In most wars, the poorer people in society are those most affected by the war and left to suffer the real ‘unexplained glory’. The poem is timeless in its setting as its message speaks for all situations and times of its kind. War is dreadful and ugly for all who have to pay the price but in looking at the surface of the political aspects of war one finds that the actualities of war are far much worse. It is more like the politicians of the day are using the lower segments of society or at least those not in politics to achieve their own ends. The poem also mocks the pomp of war with phrases and words such as ‘eagle with crest of red and gold’ and ‘swift blazing flag of the regiment’. The ‘booming drums of regiment’ have an orderly and strong official splendor which is contrasted deeply to the suffering that is displayed throughout the poem. The poem moves to a rapid conclusion where the mother’s humble labor has produced a shroud in which her son lies in together with other corpses. Crane pushes the point home by using the pronoun ‘your’ to relate more directly to the reader. The author also uses the term ‘bright splendid’ to describe the blood that the corpse will be soon covered in. The message in the poem is that there is never any winner in wars as there are losses on both sides that is in terms of the soldiers who die and the innocent people who lose their loved ones and are often also caught in between the wars. Crane emphasizes the psychological torment that people who are dying and their loved ones have to endure as opposed to focusing on the patriotic act of going to war. This depiction is a picture of the world as seen by Crane rather than how he would like it to be. The poem goes back and forth between views of the soldier and the civilian, that is the maiden and the soldier, the soldier and the child and the mother and the soldier. The poem demonstrates the excuses given to those who are left behind and the things the soldiers are told. Messages such as they died for the greater good, they died well- in excellence and virtue, they died for glory. Soldiers die in the belief that they are doing what is best to be a hero and that they are dying for glory. The poem however dismisses all these in the statement,’ but the only kingdom is that of the war god, his subjects a thousand corpses’ (Crane, 2009, pp9). All that is left behind are the tears of the people that loved the soldiers who have died at war. The poem does not simply comfort the loved ones of those who died in warm rather the poem seems to indicate that there is no comfort for these women as there sons, husbands and fathers died in the futility of war. The irony in the poem is not because Crane does not care for the pain of these women but because he feels that the men who died at war died needlessly. Crane has used his gift of writing to voice his opinion on modern events. He uses irony to convince the reader about the harsh realities of war. The reputation of war is not admirable especially when the tragic outcomes of war are realized. The survivors of war are left to endure the terrible pain and also the tactics of killing one another which are rather cruel. Crane achieves this using a style of irony and paradox and statements that have a devastating point. The illustration of how a man died at war in the first verse shows the viciousness of the people at war. The cynicism is at first shocking but it makes the reader think, why someone would speak with such cruelty to a maiden who has just lost her lover. The impact here is one of enlightening the reader to think past what the poet has written. The sarcasm in the description by the author is glaringly obvious from statements such as ‘these men were born to drill and die’ (Crane, 2009, pp9). It is very unlikely that a human being could be born simply for acts of war. The stanza also goes on to make a mockery of the glory to be found in battlefield. This mockery is evident in the lines, ‘Great is the battle-god, great and his kingdom, A field where a thousand corpses lie’ (Crane, 2009, pp9). The battle-god and his kingdom illustrate how battle can be malicious. The irony in the poem is brought out by the disguise of the battle-god as a great god and mentioning the kingdom of the battle-god as a field of a thousand corpses. The images created by the statements about war seem to create as sense of futility, resignation and exhaustion about the soldiers (unexplained glory) as they fight with flag flying above. The bitter irony of the poem is continued in the lines that follow which underscores just how senseless war can be. The bitter irony in the poem draws attention to the soldiers and in effect to all humanity demonstrating the futility that is often seen in life. According to the poem it seems that human beings have their destinies determined by social and biological determinants and do not have much of a choice in their lives. This is developed further by when the poet says, ‘point for them the virtue of slaughter, make plain to the excellence of killing (Crane, 2099, pp10). The tone here is not just ironic; it is also very despairing as Crane seems to be describing something that he thinks cannot go in any other way. Even though the poet seems to be condemning the military, he however is sympathetic to individuals affected by the war including those in the military and those who are civilians. There is a scene described by the poet in which a soldier dies in a trench. Again this is a graphic description of the death of the soldier. The tactile images used to describe him (tumbling, raging, gulping) indicate how physical war can be and the toll it can have on the human body. The description of men born to drill and die is also description of the brutal nature of war. The brutal nature of war is also depicted in the fourth stanza by the description of the flag as swift and blazing. This description points to the fierceness of war. The soldier dies in the yellow trenches. The color yellow could be used to denote a large number of things, for instance, yellow could denote the image of sunlight and thus underscore the tragedy and irony in the death of the soldier. Yellow is also a suggestion of disease and sickness making it easy to see how the soldier would fall among the bodies of his comrades which are probably jaundiced. The simile in the first line of the fifth stanza, ‘mother whose heart hung humble as a button’ describes a connection between the mourning of the mother and the smallest detail of the clothing on her son. This fills the comparison with pathos, a button’s humility comes form its small and unassuming nature. This comparison places emphasis on the unimportance of the victims of war to greater powers. The poem ends with the mother mourning for her son which brings home the highest degree of emotion as there is no consolation for the mother. Reference Crane S, 2009, War is Kind, Biblio Bazaar, pp9-10