How far do you agree that both novels are about the psychological effects of war? A 200 word essay on Slaughterhouse-five and Regeneration

Neither the structure of Slaughterhouse-five by Kurt Vonnegut nor Regeneration by Pat Barker are linear in structure. Slaughterhouse-Five is cyclical in structure while Regeneration is peppered with flashbacks. The significance of this is that both novel's structures mirror the complexities of the effects that war has on the characters. Neither the main character of Slaughterhouse-Five, Billy Pilgrim, or the main character of Regeneration, Siegfried Sassoon, suffer any serious physical injuries in their time at war, in fact, the only injury that Billy Pilgrim sustains in the war is from a pair of "low cut civilian shoes he had brought for his father's funeral" which gives him a "sore hip". The psychological effects of the war on both Billy and Siegfried are formidable. Billy is hidden in an underground meat storing facility while an entire city full of civilians is firebombed to the ground by his own people while Sigfried can still recall the "charred and blackened" corpses on the battlefield of the First World War and he wrote poetry about watching his friends dieing. In this respect, both novels are certainly about the psychological effects of war on the individuals that experience it as we will find out in the full essay...

A Short Marxist analysis of Slaughterhouse 5

In Kurt Vonnegut's famous anti-war novel, Slaughterhouse 5, three simple words are repeated throughout the book that almost perectly sum up the storyline: "So it goes". This is always said by the narrator after death is mentioned. A Marxist would say that this phrase adequately sums up the lack of power any character has over their own fate and c'est la vie. This links nicely to the Tralfamadorians, a race of aliens (whether they are real or imagined by Billy Pilgrim is never important) who can see the fourth dimention, time, and therefore know how the universe began and how it will end. They also know that they are powerless to change anything as all of time has already happened, will always happen and is always happening. When they see a dead fellow tralfamador, they don't feel sad, as they know that it is still alive in another time. So it goes.

The second title of Slaughterhouse-Five is "The Children's Crusade: A Duty-Dance With Death" and throughout the novel, the narrator is constantly correcting himself when soldiers and men are mentioned, instead calling them children. An example of this is used when describing a dying, mad colonel  “This was a man who had lost an entire regiment, about forty-five hundred men—a lot of them children, actually”(being a colonel who was incompitant enough to lead 4500 children to their deaths, it seems unlikely that he was promoted for being a good tactition and so it seems likely that he would have bought his way to the upper echelons of the army. A dig at the upper classes?) This is significant in that children do not have power in society and so Vonnegut attempts to show us that soldiers weren't all gallant young me who wanted to fight for peace and their country, they were lambs sent to slaughter. The Slaughterhouse-five in the title might not just be Billy's prison in Dresden, but also a description of the war. A slaughterhouse.

Finally, the name of the main character is Billy Pilgrim. Not William or Will or Bill, but Billy. How many adults do you know who call themselves "Billy"? It is a childish name for a child and as we know, children lack the power to change their fate. So it goes...

Musée des Beux Arts reading journal

Title analysis:
"Musée des Beux Arts", or Museum of beautiful/fine arts in English is the name of the fine art museum in Brussels, which W.H. Auden must have visited. He liked some of the art there so much that he wrote this 25 line poem about it.

"Storyline" synopsis:
There isn't any story in this poem, it must be said, it is simply Auden describing the people in the background of paintings going about their lives while important events are unfolding to people equally in the background. At first, he says about how the old masters were never wrong when it came to suffering and how it happens while other people are performing mundane acts like opening a window before proceeding to use Breughel's Icarus as an example. To cut a long story short, this poem is a good example of ekphrastic poetry, that is, poetry that describes art.

Themes:
There is only one theme in Musée des Beux Arts, and that is selfishness, as that is the theme to be found in Breughel's Icarus. We would rather carry on ploughing our field than to save a drowning boy.

Miscellaneous points:

• We know that this poem is set in 1940 in Brussels, before the German occupation in May. 
• The poem uses a subjective yet detached voice, the voice of Auden.
• Musée des Beux Arts is written in Free Verse, meaning that the stanzas are of random length with randomly sized lines and, in this case, randomly spaced rhymes. The first stanza lasts 13 lines, the second 1 and the third 8, lines range from 3 to 14 words long and it seems to have a simple A-B-C-A-D-E-D-B-F-G-F-G-E-H-H-I-J-K-K-I-J rhyming scheme.
• There is quite a good example of enjambement here, where a sentence runs down into it's own stanza, a one sentence stanza, no less. The first ends with "Where the dogs go on with their doggy life and the torturer's horse" before changing stanza and going on to say that it "Scratches its innocent behind on a tree". There are other uses of enjambement, for example, line 3 to line 4, but none as dramatic as that.

Miss Gee reading journal

Title analysis:
Miss Gee? This is clearly the name of a woman, an unmarried woman. Gee is rather an odd surname, and it may just be nothing, but the word "gee" (as in "gee whizz Batman!") is actually a minced oath of "Jesus", just as "darn" is for "damn". Nothing else can be learnt from the main title, but the bracketed notification of the tune, St James's Infirmary, tells us that the poem is to be sung to a blues tune and seeing as blues music is never the most chipper of genres, we can surmise that this poem won't be a joyous read either, unless Auden is ironic in his choice of tune (as it happens, he is not).

Storyline synopsis:
Miss Gee, a spinster (unmarried lady who is older than unmarried ladies usually are) has a Freudian dream about a bull with the face of a vicar with "lowered horn"(PWOAR) chasing her, she then goes to church before going to the doctor, who proceeds to say that she has cancer. After being taken to the hospital, there is a time-jump to when she is dead and her corpse is used for medical study by "Oxford Groupers" who dissect her knee.

Miscellaneous points:

• Ah, it's my old friend, ballad form. Also to be found in  "O what is that sound". It is based on songs and could be sung, which  Miss Gee is plainly intended to be, as it set to a blues tune. It should go without saying (however, i'm still going to say it) that the poem uses "quatrain"- four lines per stanza. This use of a simple, short stanzas helps the reader to understand the words of the poem and the regular ABCB rhyming scheme throughout the poem's 25 stanzas assists in keeping things interesting.
• The diction (words) used in the poem seem rather childish, for example, we readers are asked if we would like to hear a "little" story and Dr. Thomas says that cancer is a "funny" thing. It seems as if Auden is talking down at us. Why? Well, maybe the moral in the story will tell us, if you are in pain, always go to your doctor, just in case it's serious. What sort of text has a moral? Fables do, of course. These are told to children to help them grasp ideas about life and society. It could be argued (for instance, by me) that this poem is doing the same job and it tries to achieve it's aim of teaching the maximum amount of people the dangers of not visiting the doctor by using easily understood language, humour (a bull with the face of a vicar) and sung in a style popular in the era (blues). HOWEVER, the childlike language and tone could also conceivably be used in an almost ironic fashion, as the tone of the poem is quite dark, because, after all is said and done, this is a poem about a woman who has cancer, dies and is then cut up
• The poem is told by an objective and omniscient narrator as is evident from the first line in the poem, which is " Let me tell you a little story".
• Back in the day, I am told that cancer was never refered to directly, only in euthamism. If you had "The Big C", you were going to die and there was nothing you could do about it, so maybe the poem was to inform the population of the danger, because children were never told about cancer and, damnit, you need to know your evil to understand it.
•  Miss Gee has a Freudian dream in which she was the Queen of France and the vicar of Saint Aloysius (the church that she goes to) asks her to dance. There is then a storm and the palace blows down, so she cycles away from a bull with the face of the vicar, charging with lowered horn. So behind the prudish spinster exterior lies repressed sexual feelings for the poor old the vicar, eh? HOLD IT! Miss Gee's bicycle gets slower and slower because of her "back-pedel brake" and the bull was going to overtake. This could be a way of symbolising her cancer.
• Line 51 is a quotation from the lord's prayer; "lead me not into temptation". She could be worried about her love of the vicar.

O what is that sound reading journal

Title analysis:
O what is that sound. Surely there should be a question mark at the end of that title? I'm not one to go around thinking that i'm better than well respected and published poets, though, so there must be a reason that ol' Wystan Hugh Auden decided against a question mark. I suggest that it might be because, despite being asked in the first two lines of the poem ("O what is that sound which so thrills the ear / Down in the valley drumming, drumming?") it isn't really a question that needs asking. The person asking the question already knows the answer, they already know that the sound is "drumming", so why ask the question? I believe this is because the first person wants to keep the second person calm and to a certain extent, themselves calm. These reassuring questions continue until stanza seven.

Storyline synopsis:
Two people see some soldiers "down in the valley" with complete soldier "gear". As the soldiers walk towards them, the first person, who I believe to be the second person's wife (i'll explain why later), keeps asking the second person hopeful questions, such as whether or not it's "the parson they want". When, inevitably, it turns out that the soldiers were actually heading straight for our heroes, the second person tries to run away and the soldiers break the gate and splinter the door with burning eyes. Ruh roh! Raggy!!

Voice:
There are plainly two voices used in this poem, one asking questions and the other answering them. For the first three stanzi, these questions are answered in a reassuring manner starting with "only" as in, when asked "O what is that sound which so thrills the ear / Down in the valley drumming, drumming?" our friend Mr. 2 responds "Only the scarlet soldiers, dear / The soldiers coming." In a reassuring manner. We know that there are both two people and that they are a married couple from stanza eight, where Mrs. 1 (or Mrs. Wife as I shall call her from now on) addresses Mr. 2 (or Mr. Husband as he shall now be known [Mrs. Wife kept her maiden name, OK]), asking him to "stay with" her and whether "the vows" he swore were "deceiving". Another clue that Mr. Husband and Mrs. Wife must indeed be husband and wife is in the responses of Mr. Husband. After his first sentence in every stanza, he gives the term of affection "dear". This, along with Mrs. Wife's mention of their vows makes me assume that the two voices are those of a husband and a wife. The last thing there is to point-out about the voice of this poem is that, in the final stanza, there seems to be only one voice; that of Mrs. Wife. In all eight of the other stanzas, Mrs. Wife first asks a question before it is answered by Mr. Husband, but in this final, ninth stanza, a question is never asked as instead, Mrs. Wife simply describes the soldiers as they enter into the building, having all four lines to herself.

Miscellaneous points: 

• The poem is written in the present tense in the third person and is told solely through speech.
• The rhyme scheme is a simple ABAB affair.
• The poem is subjective, meaning that it is coloured with the emotions of the characters. From the curiosity and reassurance of the first three stanzas to the fright expressed in the last, the whole ballad is quite emotional.
• Yes, this poem is in ballad form with four lines per stanza, or a "quatrain".
• The language used throughout is relatively simple, with very few long words, as if to suggest that Mrs. Wife and Mr. Husband were simple, innocent folk. This illusion is shattered in the penultimate stanza, however, when Mr. Husband leaves and is stomped on by army boots when the body of soldiers enters the building by breaking the door with their eyes aflame. 
• This could be completely wrong, as it is just a guess, but maybe Mr. Husband is an army deserter who the soldiers have come to take to a court marshal? It couldn't be conscription as the the British army only officially started conscripting in modern times from 1916-1919 and from 1936-1960 and we know that the poem can't be set in either of these times because the soldiers are described as being "scarlet", meanting that they must be wearing the red coats of the British army pre-1914.
• The poem features call and response, with the first half of every stanza, excluding nine, being said by one person before the responce of another in the final half.
• The use of "O" at the beggining of every stanza implys romantic poetry, which this certainly isn't. "O" may also be interpreted as an expression of tension

Final thought:

In stanza nine, after "it" (the army? evil? forces beond her control?) breaks into the building, Mrs. Wife speaks of their "boots" and their "eyes". These wouldn't be the most notable things about the bright red coated soldiers, surely? Why are the coats not described whereas the eyes and boots are?

The History Boys: Act Two, initial thoughts

Act Two: AKA the other half of the play.

• At the start of the play, in the first scene of the first act, Irwin is in a wheelchair. Act two also begins with Irwin in a wheelchair. Coincidence? I think not. The second act's initial wheelchair scene, however, is set in the nearer future where Irwin is a TV presenter on a history program and has a conversation with a future Posner who is a journalist and has a dictaphone as opposed to the government spin doctor Irwin in act one.
• From future Irwin's talk with future Posner, we learn that, despite his getting into Cambridge, Posner wasn't happy there and he becomes a journalist instead.
• Hector gets angry and sad after he is told to move forward his retirement and holds his head in his hands and shouts "SHUT UP" at the boys (strange, I wanted to do that all through act one). Apparently, Bennet, the playwright, witnissed something similar at his school when a French teacher asked why he was teaching at the god-forsaken school! Coooooool.
• Mrs Lintott, being the only female character in the play, has a comedic rant about how women follow men around with a "bucket" in history during the boys mock interviews. This is completely unconected to her otherwise minor role as someone for the other teachers to talk to and as such, is out of character and done only for comedy, which this last act is lacking in, what with it's angst ridden boys and the prospect of Hector's early retirement.
• On page 81, it is confirmed that both Irwin and Posner fancy Dakin. Don't know why, but does that seem likely to you? Really?
• On page 105, Hector is killed in a motorbike accident while wearing all safety gear including a helmet, full leathers, gloves and a scarf, but Irwin escapes with his life despite not wearing any of the above, save the helmet and sitting on the back and therefore in a less secure possition. Uh-huh. I hate to suggest it, but could this have happened because Bennet wanted to punnish the pedo. It seems a mighty strange way to end a comedy and dare I say it, a "downer ending", with the death of one central character and the crippling of another.

The History Boys: Act One, initial thoughts

Characters:
Teachers: Hector, Irwin, The Headmaster and Mrs. Lintott
Boys: Akthar, Crowther, Dakin, Lockwood, Posner, Rudge, Scripps and Timms

Act One, AKA, half of the play.

• What's in a title? Well, these particular boys are testament to a time in society when one could cheat their way into university. Oh, for those halcyon days! But there is a double meaning in there with the boys being taught by a new history teacher, Irwin, who is brought in as a special coach by the Headmaster to help the men pass their exams. They are both history (set in the 1980's, it was first performed in twenty-oh-four) and being taught it.
• The boy's teacher, Hector, is a paedophile. In black and white (or cherry red and white in this case) this is an awful thing. He drives them home on his motorbike and molests them at "50 miles an hour". The really strange thing is that the boys themselves don't seem to mind this abuse of trust, they just seem to put up with it. Was the culture different then, with Saville on the TV, or is it just part of the plot that Bennett doesn't want getting too much in the way of the comedy? Either way, something bad is bound to happen to him, as he is both a paedo and gay and in the eighties, he would of been a figure of hate because of the fear that AIDS was spread by gay men and the obvious fear of kiddy-fiddlers.
• The comedy in this play is mostly created in the boys talking and being smart-arses. Sometimes with Hector, sometimes with Irwin, but always with the boys. Unless it's in the staffroom, in which case it's without the boys and with Mrs.Lintott, the token female of the play. There is also a little slapstick near the beginning on pages five to six, where Hector hits Timms and Lockwood on the head with a book. Of course, these days, the teacher would be given the sack and never be allowed to work as one again, but Hector gets away with a lot worse things than book-head hitting.
• In some areas, Irwin is less clever than the boys, for example, he can't pronounce "Nietszche", meaning that he has never said the name allowed before. Ha! What a cretin! We can contrast this Magdalen College, Oxford alumni with Hector, who went to Leeds and seems to know everything. Is this Bennet's way of trying to show up the snobbery of the best university attenders as being nought but a facade. Irwin calls "un chat un chat" while Hector prevaricates around the bush, quoting poetry and being eccentric in his mannerisms.
• King Lear is quoted. This is strange because King Lear is a tragedy and The History Boys is a comedy. Could it be quoted because it is about passing on a kingdom to the next generation, just like Hector is passing on knowledge? Will this play end in tragedy? It already has the time bomb of Hector, who, in the final slice of act one, is found out for what he is and forced to bring forward his retirement.