Mametz Wood by Owen Sheers (WJEC Eduqas GCSE English Literature)

Language, structure and form revision

What happens in the poem?

Language: 

• Metaphors (of fragile “bird’s egg” and “china” 

• Personification 

• Emotive language

• Imagery

• Assonance and consonance 

Form: 

• Free verse

• Seven tercets (three-line stanzas)

• No regular rhyme scheme

Structure: 

• Enjambment

• End-stopped lines 

• Caesura 

• Varied line length 

Stanza One:

• The poem opens with farmers discovering human remains while ploughing their fields; the pathos of the description of “wasted young” draws the reader in

Stanza Two:

• More remains are uncovered, with the descriptions of broken, fragile, bonelike materials reinforcing the horror of the debris

Stanza Three:

• The poem shifts to describe the soldiers’ final moments as they walk towards the wood where machine guns awaited them

Stanza Four:

• The earth is personified as a sentinel, a guard who keeps watch, holding onto memories of the battle
  

Stanza Five:

• Twenty men are found buried together with their skeletons linked “arm in arm”

Stanza Six:

• The poem describes the eerie posture of the skeletons, with their heads tilted back and jaws open
  

Stanza Seven:

• The final stanza suggests that the unearthing of these remains has finally allowed the soldier’s unsung songs to be heard, giving voice to their silenced stories 

Poems for comparison: 

• ‘Death of a Naturalist’ by Seamus Heaney: passage of time, nature, memory, loss

• ‘The Soldier’ by Rupert Brooke: war, death, memory

• ‘A Wife in London’ by Thomas Hardy: passage of time, disillusionment

• Dulce et Decorum Est’ by Wilfred Owen: war, death, sacrifice

Context: 

Rural

Conflict

Past and present

Themes: 

Death

War

Memory

Themes 

Key quotations 

Language, form and structure 

Death

“For years afterwards the farmers found them –
/ the wasted young, turning up under their plough blades”

“A chit of bone, the china plate of a shoulder blade”

The juxtaposition of the commonplace “farmers” with the metonym “wasted young” to describe the soldiers underscores the tragic loss of life

The metaphor compares a shoulder blade to the “china plate” which illustrates its fragility and delicacy. The consonance of the ‘ch’ sound and  assonance of the ‘i’ creates a harsh physical quality to the descriptions of bone 

War

“a broken mosaic of bone linked arm in arm”

“slipped from their absent tongues”

“This morning, twenty men buried in one long grave” 

The metaphor of a “broken mosaic” reinforces the idea of destruction while the intimate phrase “linked arm in arm” humanises the soldiers’ deaths, suggesting their camaraderie even in death

The phrase “absent tongues” is paradoxical as it suggests both presence and absence: the soldiers’ remains are there though they are not. The word “slipped” suggests an almost unnoticed movement which contrasts sharply with the violent nature of their deaths

The number “twenty” and the imagery of “one long grave” symbolises the mass casualties of war. It also implies a lack of individual recognition and dignity in death, reinforced by the  sombre statement 

Memory

“like a wound working a foreign body to the surface of the skin.”

“And even now the earth stands sentinel,/ reaching back into itself for reminders of what happened”

The simile compares the ground to a wound expelling a foreign object, suggesting the land is also trying to heal from the trauma of war by resurfacing both the bodies and the memories 

The earth is personified as a “sentinel” suggesting it acts as a guardian over the memories of the past and symbolises the enduring nature of memory and the importance of remembrance 

‘Mametz Wood’ is a poem about death.

Choose one other poem from the anthology in which the poet also writes about death. Compare the way the poet presents death in your chosen poem with the way Owen Sheers presents it in ‘Mametz Wood’.

In your answer you should:

• compare the content and structure of the poems – what they are about and how they are organised

• compare how the writers create effects, using appropriate terminology where relevant

• compare the contexts of the poems, and how these may have influenced the ideas in them

Thesis / Essay introduction: Both ‘Mametz Wood’ and ‘The Soldier’ explore the theme of death through the context of war. Sheers’ poem presents death through the lens of its aftermath, a haunting and enduring presence. In contrast, ‘The Soldier’ explores death through an idealised perspective as a noble sacrifice. While Sheers confronts the grim realities and lasting consequences of war deaths, Brooke romanticises the notion of dying for one’s country, offering the reader two distinct perspectives of death in war.

Similarities 

Differences

Both ‘Mametz Wood’ and ‘The Soldier’ examine the connection between death and the land, and how the bodies of the fallen soldiers become intertwined with the earth

In ‘Mametz Wood’ the poem presents a bleak and realistic portrayal of death and its aftermath. In contrast, in ‘The Soldier’ the poem presents death through a patriotic and romanticised perspective

Both ‘Mametz Wood’ and ‘The Soldier’ explore the enduring impact of a soldier’s death after they have died. In ‘Mametz Wood’, this is through the discovery of remains “years afterwards”. Similarly, in ‘The Soldier’ the speaker suggests that their death will change the land into “forever England”

In ‘Mametz Wood’ the poem depicts the soldiers’ death as a process of remembering and forgetting. In contrast, in ‘The Soldier’ the poem presents the memory of the soldier’s death as permanent and eternal

Both ‘Mametz Wood’ and ‘The Soldier’ use fragmented, textural language to convey the theme of death. In ‘Mametz Wood’, Sheers uses imagery such as “a broken mosaic of bone” to describe the soldiers’ remains. In ‘The Soldier’, Brooke also explores uses textural descriptions of the “dust whom England bore” to describe the soldiers’ deaths 

In ‘Mametz Wood’, the poet creates a sombre and reflective tone, describing the horror of the temporary graves. In contrast, in ‘The Soldier’ the poet creates an idealistic and patriotic tone

Thesis / Essay introduction: Both ‘Hawk Roosting’ and ‘Mametz Wood’ explore the theme of death but they approach the subject from different perspectives. Hughes’ poem presents death through the eyes of a predator, portraying it as a natural aspect of existence. In contrast, Sheers’ poem examines death through the lens of the tragedy of World War One and it mourns the senseless loss of life

Similarities  

Differences 

Both poems depict death as part of existence. In ‘Mametz Wood’, death is depicted as an inescapable consequence of war. In ‘Hawk Roosting’, death is portrayed as a natural and routine aspect of the hawk’s life.

In ‘Hawk Roosting’, the first-person perspective is that of a predator, characterised by its confident and arrogant tone. In contrast,  ‘Mametz Wood’ is narrated from the viewpoint of an observer reflecting on past deaths, resulting in a tone that is sombre and mournful

Both poems use vivid imagery to convey the physical reality of death. In ‘Hawk Roosting’,  graphic and violent imagery illustrates the hawk’s act of killing. Similarly, in ‘Mametz Wood’ stark imagery is used to depict the bodies of the dead

In ‘Hawk Roosting’ death is presented as immediate, an unending cycle, conveyed by the use of the present tense. In contrast, in ‘Mametz Wood’ death is depicted as a past event, exploring the deaths that occurred decades before the poem’s present

Both poems explore the relationship between death and its surroundings. In ‘Hawk Roosting’, the hawk’s environment is linked to its role as a predator. In ‘Mametz Wood’, the land is profoundly altered by the presence of death

In ‘Hawk Roosting’, death is depicted from the perspective of an individual hawk, whereas, in ‘Mametz Wood’ death is portrayed as a collective experience and the poet focuses on the mass casualties of war, innocent men