'War Photographer' notes, example essay and Revision/essay-writing tasks

War Photographer Notes

Overview

In this poem, Duffy describes the experience of a war photographer, whose job it is to witness terrible crimes against humanity and bring them back to us many miles away.

The poem is about how he deals with this kind of traumatic experience.

It asks questions about how we react to disaster in other countries.

You can appreciate the poem without having strong opinions on these matters, but Duffy encourages us to think for ourselves. In the end, it is up to you as a reader to decide what you think.

Duffy uses a lot of poetic techniques and often taps into the symbolic associations of ordinary words. In the first stanza the photographer is in the 'darkroom' and the 'only light is red'. The process of developing a photograph is turned into something ominous. A darkroom is a room where photographs are developed but the context changes it to a portmanteau where we think of a dark room. Dark contains the idea of evil, moral darkness and gives a sinister atmosphere. The colour red is associated with blood which makes the light deadly although light is normally associated with hope or clarity. Similarly, 'ordered rows' would sound innocent enough in other contexts, but here it makes us think of graves, or bodies waiting to be buried.

Duffy contrasts the world in the photographs to the world back home. This makes us aware of the enormous gulf between our lives and those of the people in the photographs. Maybe the contrast should also make us feel a little more appreciative of and thankful for what we have got in this country, and also perhaps makes us feel a little guilty that we take it for granted.

Sometimes a gulf like this can make it difficult for us to relate to these people.

However, Duffy makes us relate and react by using vivid, disturbing images, and by guiding us through the feelings of the photographer himself...

Imagery

Duffy creates some powerful and disturbing images in this poem such as:

'fields which don't explode beneath the feet of running children in a nightmare heat.'

Analysis of such an image should follow the TCQEL structure:

Topic Sentence: It can be difficult for us to relate to suffering in faraway countries and so to make us feel angry and guilty about it Duffy has to use some disturbing and powerful images, images we would rather not think about, or really see.

Context: She says we live by...

Quote: 'Fields which don't explode beneath the feet/ Of running children in a nightmare heat.’

Explain/Effect: This image is effective because we would normally think of 'running children' in 'fields' as an image of fun. We also associate children with innocence, and the idea of them being hurt brings out our protective instincts. Duffy does not tell us what these children are running from, but describes it as some kind of 'nightmare heat', leaving it up to us to imagine our worst fears. In effect, this image is what happened before the images we have all seen on our TV's of children badly burnt, without legs or arms. We know while they are 'running' what will happen to them.

Link: This strong image helps us to imagine and understand the suffering of war victims and incites strong emotion within the reader.

Try your own analysis of the following images:

'how the blood stained into foreign dust.'

'a hundred agonies in black-and-white.'

'The reader's eyeballs prick with tears between the bath and pre-lunch beers.'

 

Form

Form is the structure and layout of the poem on the page..

It includes the type of stanzas the poet uses, and their rhyme scheme.

The regular form of this poem in some ways mirrors the sense of the photographer's attempt to order his strong emotions. The form is a way of containing, controlling and dealing with the anger and pain the poet feels.

The fact that the form is unchanging, that the stanzas are all of the same length and the rhyme scheme is constant suggests that despite the photographer's efforts nothing will change.

This idea is re-enforced by the fact that the poem starts with the photographer home from an assignment and ends with him off on one again.

The poem is circular, a closed loop where nothing can change. This emphasises the futility of the situation.

 

Summary

In all poetry questions you will be asked to write about the following:

• The subject(s) of the poem
• The attitude of the poet
• The poetic devices the poet uses

In other words you will be asked about what the poet is writing about, what the poet feels about the subject(s) and how the poem is written.

Subject

Duffy's poem is about how we deal with the suffering of others, who might be faraway. It takes the character of a war photographer to represent someone more involved and committed than we are. Attitude Duffy appears to admire the photographer, and be critical of the rest of us. The poem is powerfully anti-war. However, elsewhere Duffy does not spell out her feelings, she allows readers to make their own judgements. The form however suggests she is pessimistic about things changing for the better. Style Duffy uses the symbolic association of ordinary language. So that a simple word like 'dust' can carry lots of possible meaning. She also includes some powerful imagery to shock us out of our complacency. The use of a repetitive form suitably supports the ideas in the poem. Word-choice Word                                                    What this makes the reader think   Intone Idea of a priest saying a mass in a chanting/preaching tone for effect and praise. In the similar way a priest prepares for a funeral mass, remembering the dead, the photographer prepares his photographs as a remembrance of those who died in his pictures. Solutions "Solutions" refers literally to the developing fluid in the trays, but also suggests the idea of solving the political problems which cause war - "solutions" which he does not have, of course. Rural The word 'Rural' stands out as it creates the image of an idealised England that is covered in perfect countryside that is pure and has beautiful views. It suggests that England is peaceful place in comparison with the panic and chaos of war. Stained The word ‘Stained’ suggests the blood will leave a mark on the ground when it dries. It will also leave an eternal mark on the memory of the photographer, who will never forget the traumatic image of the dead man; it will be ingrained in his mind. Supplement A newspaper supplement gives additional news that is not used in the main headlines or newspaper itself. It suggests that the pictures are of secondary importance, not significant enough to make the main headline and not interesting enough to the reader who doesn’t really care enough to remember their important message.

Example Essay and Revision tasks

The surface subject of the poem is the war photographer of the title but at a deeper level the poem explores the difference between "Rural England" and places where wars are fought (Northern Ireland, the Lebanon and Cambodia), between the comfort or indifference of the newspaper editor and its readers and the suffering of the people in the photographs.

The photographer in the poem is anonymous: he could be any of those who record scenes of war. He is not so much a particular individual as an observer and recorder of others' lives. He is an outsider ("alone/With spools of suffering") who moves between two worlds but is comfortable in neither. The "ordered rows" of film spools may suggest how the photographer tries to bring order to what he records, to interpret or make sense of it. The image also conjures up visions of a graveyard scene where the spools of film are gravestones.

The simile which compares him to a priest shows how seriously he takes his job, and how (by photographing them) he stands up for those who cannot help themselves. His darkroom resembles a church in which his red light is like a coloured lantern. The image is also appropriate because, like a priest, he teaches how fragile we are and how short life is. ("All flesh is grass" is a quotation from the Old Testament book of Isaiah. Isaiah contrasts the shortness of human life with eternal religious truths - "the Word of the Lord" which "abides forever"). In the poem, the sentence follows a list of names. These are places where life is even briefer than normal, because of wars.

The second stanza contrasts the photographer's calmness when taking pictures with his attitude as he develops them. If his hands shake when he takes pictures, they won't be any good, but in the darkroom he can allow his hands to tremble. This suggests that the full impact of the photographs is brought home to him only now. "Solutions" refers literally to the developing fluid in the trays, but also suggests the idea of solving the political problems which cause war - "solutions" which he does not have, of course. Duffy contrasts the fields in England with those abroad - as if the photographer thinks English fields unusual for not being minefields. The image is shocking, because he thinks of land mines as exploding not under soldiers but under "the feet of running children".

What "is happening" in the third stanza is that an image is gradually appearing as a photo develops. "Ghost" is ambiguous (it has more than one meaning). It suggests the faint emerging image, but also that the man in the photo is dead (which is why the picture was taken). The photographer recalls both the reaction of the wife on seeing her husband die. He is not able to ask for permission to take the picture (either there is no time or he does not speak the language or both) but he seeks "approval without words". It is as if the wife needs to approve of his recording the event while the blood stains "into foreign dust".

"In black and white" is ambiguous: it suggests the monochrome photographs but also the ideas of telling the truth and of the simple contrast of good and evil. The photographer has recorded some hundred images which are only a small sample of what has happened, yet only a handful will ever appear in print. Although the reader may be moved, to tears even, this sympathy is short-lived, between bathing and a drink before lunch. Duffy imagines the photographer finally looking down, from an aeroplane, on England (either coming or going). This is the country which pays his wages ("where/he earns his living") but where people "do not care" about the events he records.

Hints

In writing about the poem try to focus on some of these details. Look also at the poem's form. This form is quite traditional - the rhyme scheme and metre are the same in each stanza (there are rhyming couplets on the second and third lines and on the last two lines; each line is a pentameter).

Duffy obviously feels something in common with her subject - she uses his experience to voice her own criticism of how comfortable Britons look at pictures of suffering, but do not know the reality. She sees the photographer (far removed from the paparazzi of the tabloids) as both priest and journalist. The reader's response to the Sunday newspaper is almost like going to church - for a while we are reminded of our neighbour's suffering, but by lunchtime we have forgotten what we learned.

Try filling in the blanks of this essay before you attempt some of the critical essay questions:

Write about a poem that deals with the subject of work but also has a deeper meaning. You should refer to use of techniques such as sound, word choice, structure, imagery or any other relevant way to convey the poet’s message.

In the poem………………………….. by Carol ………………….. the topic of work, and especially what a war photographer does as part of his job, is examined. The poem deals with more than just the subject of work; it also looks at the theme of how other people treat the work of the photographer and questions us about how we think about the suffering of others in foreign lands. The poet has a particular interest as she personally knows the British photographer Don McCullin.

The poem is about a ………………………….. who has returned from a ………………..with a series of photographs of …………………….. from that particular area. He is said to be “finally alone” which make the reader think ….. . In the line “……………………………..”we notice how the poet uses alliteration of the “s” sound to represent how harsh conditions depicted in the photos are. Duffy then employs the image of the photographer as a priest and the reader asks if the cameraman thinks of his work as …………………

The second stanza begins with the simple statement, “………………………………..”We feel that he is trying to do a worthwhile job and feels that he is serving the public by …………… . The scene in the darkroom shows his hands which “did not ………………………….. but………………..” The writer tells us exactly what conditions were like in the war zone by contrasting that place with home , where “fields……………………………….”

In the darkroom“Something is happening.” This refers to the actual development of the pictures and also the ideas he has of how the photographer thinks the British public react to them. He recalls “ the cries of……………………………..” We ask about this “approval”and what he means by this. Is it …………………………….. ?

Later we read that he does what someone “must” and this word choice makes us think ………………. The third stanza ends in a chilling image, as “the blood………………………… “

In the last stanza the scene moves away from the darkroom to the plane in which the photographer travels. The poet begins by using the phrase “ a hundred ……..” The choice of this word in deliberate, not“images” or “pictures”. In doing so he makes us think………………….. From these hundred the editor “picks out”five or six”. This makes the editor sound …………………………………….. . But the photographer is very aware of the power of his pictures which make “ the reader’s eyes …………………. “ We know, as he does, that their power is short – lived.

The last line of the poem is very powerful and it conveys the writer’s message perfectly Now go on to discuss what you see is CAD’s point –clearly she tries to make us think of how the war ph’s job is both cruel and kind at the same time. As Tim Page said,”all war photography is anti-war”. We see how the photographer reacts to the images he captures and then how the public react to them. How does he feel about this public reaction ?She invites the reader to ask the question “Does such photography have a useful role in society or are we somehow making suffering less painful for us to endure and more easy to ignore ? What do you think ?