Article #214-2 | Gutenberg Articles

Excerpt

Excerpt from In the Days When the World Was Wide, and Other Verses, by Henry Lawson

There are boys to-day in the city slum and the home of wealth and pride
Who'll have one home when the storm is come, and fight for it side by side,
Who'll hold the cliffs 'gainst the armoured hells
that batter a coastal town,
Or grimly die in a hail of shells when the walls come crashing down.
And many a pink-white baby girl, the queen of her home to-day,
Shall see the wings of the tempest whirl the mist of our dawn away --
Shall live to shudder and stop her ears to the thud of the distant gun,
And know the sorrow that has no tears when a battle is lost and won, --
As a mother or wife in the years to come, will kneel, wild-eyed and white,
And pray to God in her darkened home for the 'men in the fort to-night'.

  .    .    .    .    .

But, oh! if the cavalry charge again as they did when the world was wide,
'Twill be grand in the ranks of a thousand men
in that glorious race to ride
And strike for all that is true and strong,
for all that is grand and brave,
And all that ever shall be, so long as man has a soul to save.
He must lift the saddle, and close his 'wings', and shut his angels out,
And steel his heart for the end of things,
who'd ride with a stockman scout,
When the race they ride on the battle track, and the waning distance hums,
And the shelled sky shrieks or the rifles crack
like stockwhip amongst the gums --
And the 'straight' is reached and the field is 'gapped'
and the hoof-torn sward grows red
With the blood of those who are handicapped with iron and steel and lead;
And the gaps are filled, though unseen by eyes,
with the spirit and with the shades
Of the world-wide rebel dead who'll rise and rush with the Bush Brigades.

Explanation

Henry Lawson’s poem "In the Days When the World Was Wide" (from his 1903 collection In the Days When the World Was Wide, and Other Verses) is a powerful meditation on war, sacrifice, and the romanticized yet brutal ideal of heroic conflict. Written during a period of heightened imperial tensions (the Boer War had recently ended, and World War I loomed), the poem blends nationalist fervor with a grim awareness of war’s human cost. Below is a detailed breakdown of the excerpt, focusing on its language, themes, and literary techniques.

Context & Overview

Lawson, a key figure in Australian bush poetry, often explored themes of mateship, hardship, and the mythos of the outback. This poem, however, shifts to a broader, almost prophetic vision of future wars—likely influenced by the Boer War (1899–1902), where Australian soldiers (including bushmen) fought for the British Empire. The title’s phrase "when the world was wide" evokes a nostalgic, expansive past (perhaps the 19th century’s colonial conflicts) contrasted with the claustrophobic, industrialized warfare to come.

The excerpt alternates between two perspectives:

The Home Front: Civilians (boys, women) facing war’s emotional toll.
The Battlefield: The glorified yet deadly charge of cavalry (or "Bush Brigades"), blending heroic romance with visceral horror.

Line-by-Line Analysis

Stanza 1: The Home Front – Unity and Sacrifice

There are boys to-day in the city slum and the home of wealth and pride / Who'll have one home when the storm is come, and fight for it side by side,

Context: Lawson erases class divisions—slum boys and wealthy youths will unite in war. This reflects the democratic ideal of mateship but also the brutal equality of conscription.
Literary Devices:
- Juxtaposition: "city slum" vs. "wealth and pride" highlights societal contrasts.
- Metaphor: "storm" = war, a natural force that unites disparate groups.
- Repetition: "side by side" emphasizes solidarity.

Who'll hold the cliffs 'gainst the armoured hells / that batter a coastal town, / Or grimly die in a hail of shells when the walls come crashing down.

Imagery: "Armoured hells" personifies mechanized warfare (tanks, artillery) as demonic. The "coastal town" suggests invasion fears (Australia’s vulnerability as an island nation).
Tone: Heroic but fatalistic—death is inevitable ("grimly die"), yet framed as noble.
Sound: Alliteration ("hail of hells") and onomatopoeia ("crashing") mimic violence.

And many a pink-white baby girl... shall live to shudder and stop her ears / to the thud of the distant gun,

Shift to Women: The poem expands to include women’s suffering—innocent girls ("pink-white") will become traumatized mothers/wives.
Sensory Imagery: "Thud of the distant gun" makes war’s sound visceral. "Stop her ears" suggests futile resistance.
Irony: "Queen of her home" contrasts with later powerlessness ("wild-eyed and white").

And know the sorrow that has no tears when a battle is lost and won, -- / As a mother or wife... pray to God... for the 'men in the fort to-night'.

Paradox: "Sorrow that has no tears" captures numb grief—war’s emotional desolation.
"Lost and won": Ambiguity—victory is hollow if loved ones die.
Religious Imagery: Prayer to God underscores helplessness. "Men in the fort" evokes besieged soldiers (e.g., Boer War sieges like Mafeking).

Themes:

Collective Sacrifice: War unites classes/genders in shared trauma.
Domestic Cost: Women’s suffering is collateral damage.
Futility: Victory is bittersweet; survival is uncertain.

Stanza 2: The Battlefield – Glory and Horror

But, oh! if the cavalry charge again as they did when the world was wide, / 'Twill be grand in the ranks of a thousand men in that glorious race to ride

Nostalgia: "When the world was wide" idealizes past wars (e.g., Napoleonic or colonial cavalry charges) as more "glorious" than modern trench warfare.
Romanticism: "Grand," "glorious race" glorifies combat, but the exclamation ("oh!") hints at ironic enthusiasm.
Contrast: The stanza’s opening "But" pivots from home-front sorrow to battlefield "glory."

And strike for all that is true and strong, for all that is grand and brave, / And all that ever shall be, so long as man has a soul to save.

Abstract Ideals: War is framed as a moral crusade ("true and strong"), but the vagueness ("all that ever shall be") suggests empty rhetoric.
Religious Undertone: "Soul to save" implies war as redemptive, a common trope in nationalist propaganda.

He must lift the saddle, and close his 'wings', and shut his angels out, / And steel his heart for the end of things, who'd ride with a stockman scout,

Metaphor: "Close his 'wings'" and "shut his angels out" = suppressing morality/compassion to become a killer.
"Stockman scout": Refers to Australian bushmen (skilled horsemen) who fought in the Boer War. Lawson ties national identity to martial prowess.
"End of things": Foreshadows death—war as apocalyptic.

When the race they ride on the battle track, and the waning distance hums, / And the shelled sky shrieks or the rifles crack like stockwhip amongst the gums --

Sensory Overload:
- "Waning distance hums" = bullets whizzing.
- "Shelled sky shrieks" = artillery explosions.
- Simile: "Rifles crack like stockwhip" ties warfare to the bush (gums = eucalyptus trees), domesticating violence.
Sound Devices: Alliteration ("rifles crack"), onomatopoeia ("shrieks," "crack") immerse the reader in chaos.

And the 'straight' is reached and the field is 'gapped' and the hoof-torn sward grows red / With the blood of those who are handicapped with iron and steel and lead;

Horse-Racing Metaphor: War as a "race" with a "straight" (final stretch) and "gapped" (broken through) field. This trivializes death as sport.
Gory Imagery: "Hoof-torn sward grows red" = blood-soaked earth. "Handicapped" ironically frames soldiers as burdened by their own weapons.
Triple Threat: "Iron and steel and lead" = bayonets, bullets, shrapnel.

And the gaps are filled, though unseen by eyes, with the spirit and with the shades / Of the world-wide rebel dead who'll rise and rush with the Bush Brigades.

Supernatural Imagery: Ghosts of dead rebels ("shades") join the charge—mythologizing fallen soldiers as eternal comrades.
"World-wide rebel dead": Could refer to:
- Australian bushrangers (e.g., Ned Kelly).
- Colonial rebels (e.g., Irish or Boer fighters).
- A universal brotherhood of the slain.
Nationalism: "Bush Brigades" ties the spectral army to Australian identity, suggesting a continuity of defiance.

Themes:

Glorification vs. Reality: The stanza oscillates between heroic romance ("glorious race") and grotesque detail ("blood," "shrieks").
Mythmaking: War dead become legendary spirits, obscuring individual suffering.
Colonial Identity: The "stockman scout" and "Bush Brigades" assert a uniquely Australian martial tradition.

Literary Devices Summary

Device	Example	Effect
Juxtaposition	City slum vs. wealth; glory vs. gore	Highlights contradictions in war’s narrative.
Metaphor	"Storm" for war; "wings" for morality	Abstracts complex ideas into vivid images.
Personification	"Armoured hells"; "shelled sky shrieks"	Makes war feel like a sentient, malevolent force.
Alliteration	"Hail of hells"; "rifles crack"	Creates rhythmic intensity, mimicking chaos.
Simile	"Like stockwhip amongst the gums"	Links warfare to the bush, normalizing violence.
Irony	"Glorious race" vs. "blood of those... handicapped"	Undercuts romanticism with brutal reality.
Supernatural	"Spirit and shades" of the dead	Elevates soldiers to mythic status, obscuring their humanity.

Significance & Critical Perspective

Prophetic Tone: Written in 1903, the poem anticipates WWI’s industrial slaughter (e.g., "armoured hells" foreshadows tanks). Lawson’s blend of nostalgia and dread reflects pre-war anxieties.
Nationalism & Imperialism: The poem both celebrates Australian martial identity ("Bush Brigades") and critiques the cost of empire (women praying for "men in the fort").
Gender Roles: Women are passive sufferers ("wild-eyed and white"), while men are active heroes—reinforcing traditional norms but also exposing their fragility.
Ambivalence: Lawson doesn’t outright condemn war but reveals its paradoxes: unity through destruction, glory through bloodshed.

Comparison to Other Works:

Similar to Wilfred Owen’s WWI poetry (e.g., "Dulce et Decorum Est") in its visceral imagery, but Lawson’s tone is more ambiguous—less outright anti-war, more resigned.
Echoes Rudyard Kipling’s imperialist verse (e.g., "The Last of the Light Brigade") but with a bush poet’s gritty realism.

Conclusion: The Poem’s Duality

The excerpt embodies Lawson’s signature blend of romantic idealism and harsh realism. The home-front stanza emphasizes war’s emotional toll, while the battlefield stanza oscillates between exhilarating charge and grotesque death. The "world-wide rebel dead" suggest a cyclical, almost mythic view of conflict—where the past’s ghosts fuel future wars.

Ultimately, the poem serves as both a call to arms (celebrating mateship and bravery) and a warning (revealing war’s dehumanizing horror). Its power lies in this tension: the "glorious race" is also a race to the grave, and the "one home" defended is built on shared sorrow. Lawson doesn’t glorify war so much as acknowledge its inescapable grip on human history—especially for a young nation like Australia, forging its identity through conflict.

Questions

Question 1

The poem’s depiction of women (“many a pink-white baby girl”) primarily serves to:

A. underscore the generational perpetuation of war’s trauma by framing female suffering as an inevitable inheritance.
B. critique the passivity of civilian populations in the face of militaristic nationalism.
C. idealize maternal sacrifice as the moral counterbalance to masculine aggression.
D. contrast the purity of domestic life with the corruption of the battlefield.
E. foreshadow the eventual collapse of traditional gender roles under the pressures of modern warfare.

Question 2

The phrase “the world-wide rebel dead” (line 24) is most effectively interpreted as:

A. a literal reference to fallen soldiers from global conflicts, emphasizing the universality of wartime loss.
B. an allusion to mythological figures (e.g., Valkyries) who escort the slain to the afterlife.
C. a critique of colonialism, invoking the ghosts of indigenous resistance against imperial forces.
D. a metaphor for the collective unconscious of nations, where war memories are eternally preserved.
E. a nationalist mythmaking device that transmutes individual deaths into a spectral, heroic legion.

Question 3

The shift from “the thud of the distant gun” (line 7) to “the shelled sky shrieks” (line 18) primarily reflects a change in:

A. temporal perspective, moving from anticipatory dread to immediate combat.
B. narrative voice, transitioning from civilian lament to soldierly exhortation.
C. sensory modality, replacing auditory trauma with visual horror.
D. ideological stance, rejecting romanticism in favor of unvarnished realism.
E. linguistic register, escalating from muted euphemism to visceral onomatopoeia.

Question 4

The “stockman scout” (line 17) functions in the poem as:

A. a symbol of Australia’s pastoral innocence, corrupted by the mechanization of war.
B. an archetype of the “noble savage,” whose primitive skills are obsolete in modern combat.
C. a critique of rural masculinity, exposing its vulnerability in industrialized conflict.
D. a nationalist emblem that merges bush mythology with martial virtue.
E. an ironic figure, highlighting the futility of traditional cavalry in trench warfare.

Question 5

The poem’s structural juxtaposition of the home front (stanza 1) and the battlefield (stanza 2) is most analogous to:

A. a dialectical argument, where thesis (unity) and antithesis (violence) synthesize into national identity.
B. a cinematic cross-cutting technique, interweaving parallel narratives to heighten emotional tension.
C. a religious diptych, contrasting earthly suffering with divine redemption.
D. a historical palimpsest, layering past conflicts onto future wars to critique cyclical violence.
E. a psychological split, externalizing the cognitive dissonance of glorifying war while mourning its costs.

Solutions and Explanations

1) Correct answer: A

Why A is most correct: The poem traces the arc of female experience from innocence (“pink-white baby girl”) to traumatized maturity (“wild-eyed and white”), positioning war’s emotional legacy as an inescapable inheritance. The focus on future suffering (“shall live to shudder”) and the intergenerational transmission of grief (“as a mother or wife”) aligns with A’s emphasis on perpetuation. The passage does not moralize (C), critique passivity (B), or contrast purity/corruption (D) as its primary function; E is unsupported by the text’s reinforcement of traditional roles.