Rupert Brooke - The Soldier

The collection “1914” by Rupert Brooke includes the poem “The soldier”. The collection has been published in 1915 and so before the end of the First World War.

Considering the title, the reader can notice that it starts with the definitive article ‘the’; therefore the poem is not about an undefined soldier: the speaking voice has a specific soldier in mind.

Considering lay out the reader can find out that the poem is a sonnet and it follows the Petrarchan from (indeed it consists of an octave and a sestet). Even if it follows the Petrarchan form, it doesn’t follow the objective for which the Petrarchan model was invented: generally, the octave had to present a difficult situation while the sestet had to provide a solution; in this sonnet the solution is not provided. Even if the poem follows the Petrarchan structure, the rhyme scheme is the one of a Shakespearean sonnet ABABCDCD EFGEFG.

When the poem was publish and the readers read the title, they immediately thought about a soldier who used to fight in the First World War.

There is also another piece of information: this sonnet is considered the finale of the collection and so it is probably the most important.

The volta of the sonnet is after the forth line because the poet moves from the description of the death of the soldier to the soldier’s life accomplishment. The poem encompasses the memories of a dead soldier who declares his patriotism towards his homeland.

The speaking voice is the one of a soldier who hasn’t taken part in war. Therefore the idea of war conveyed by the poet is a mere perception: he considers an hypothetical situation where he might die in somewhere abroad (‘If I should die’).

In the middle of the third line there is the key-word ‘England’. In parallel, at the centre of the fourth line there is the word ‘earth’. The soil becomes richer because it hides the bodies of somebody who has fought for England. At the same time, England is personified as a mother that ‘bore, shaped and made’ the soldiers aware, and so, with his death, the speaking voice can return to his mother.

As the reader can see, England is pervading the speaking voice’s mind: the poet has a very close relationship with his own land. Indeed, even the ‘foreign field’ becomes a part of England (’that is for ever England’).

The octave presents the situation of a soldier who will probably die and lay on a ‘foreign field’ that, in a way or another, will become an expansion of the English territories (the place where the body of an English soldier lies will be ‘for ever England’). In addition, there is a comparison between the richness of the earth and England, that gives its soldiers rich opportunities. So the function of the octave is to express the speaking voice’s patriotism.

On the other hand, in the sestet the speaking voice doesn’t provide a resolution: it conveys an atmosphere that is the blissful state of the English soldier. His sacrifices will be the eternal ownership of England since he offers his life to England.

Since the speaking voice had not fought the war yet, the sonnet might express the common idea of the people living in that period.

The speaking voice is the soldier’s voice, and the soldier is an ideal one. The mass media of the time could use the sonnet for inviting young people to join the Army and sacrifice themselves for the greatness of England; indeed the poem celebrates the war that helps to make England great: sacrifice is worth to celebrate the greatness of England. In a way or another, the speaking voice celebrates also immortality and it conveys a romantic atmosphere.

The soldier is reassured by the reward in heaven and by the awareness that his sacrifice will make the Country live for ever (England continues to exist also in a foreign land and in heaven, where  the speaking voice will return after his death and will live again all his positive experiences he had lived in life).

The atmosphere is created by alliterations and the rhetorical figures of sound (‘Foreign’ ‘field’ ‘for ever’ - alliteration of the sound f ; ‘body’ ‘breathing’ ‘by’ ‘blest’ – alliteration of the sound b ; ‘laughter’ ‘learnt’).

The first line creates a nostalgic idea, as if the speaking voice is already dead.    

The reward is that in heaven he will leave again all the positive experiences he had lived in life (this is conveyed by the repetition, the technical level anticipates the reward). Death is not an end but but the beginning of a new blissful but familiar life in heaven.

The whole sonnet is an image, because the poet is not dead: so the war takes place only in the speaking voice’s mind.  

The key word is England, that is not only the English territory, but it includes also the ‘foreign field’ and heaven (in that way England is magnified). Living in heaven is a way to receive back the good things he had done in life: the speaking voice knows he might die but he believes that his sacrifice will benefit his country and so that he will be rewarded (Brookes’ idea of the ideal soldier who sacrifices hi life is the same of a common European person).

So the sonnet develops a pre-war idealism: the poet celebrates an ideal conflict without explaining the real atrocities.