Sapper B Neyland memorial

• 5 key devices and main effect

  1 - jargon that is telling of the specialist roles of the job + recognizes the skill

  2 - dialogue forming a realism and showcasing a powerdynamic

  3 - listing

  4 - concrete language vs sensory imagery

  5 - strong impactful declaratives
• Purpose?

  To inform a reflection of his experience

  To reflect and record for himself
• Audience?


  Public audience = historians, broad audience

  Private audience = himself
• Context?

  Neyland served 1916 - 1919 in the royal engineers, wireless (radio) section at age 18

  Snapper = combat engineer

  Impact of propaganda on youth influence
• Voice?

  Passive voice

  Reflective

  Naive / Optimistic

  Bleak / Critical

  Emotive / Descriptive / Literary
• Mode

  An edited version of diary's conducted into a memoir
• 'at age 18'

  numerative

  first impression is immediatly of his youth + immaturity of boths that age

  immediate negative outlook on war
• 'i first experienced the bursting of a shell... and i laughed at the manner in which...'

  justaposing 'shell' and 'laugh' highlights his inexperience and immatury / naivety in the face of war.

  sets up the contrast as he learns the war horrors.
• 'trench filled waist deep with muddy water. '

  pre-modification, vivid imagery through the expected hyperbole that is their reality.

  shows how unprepared and shocked he is

  insight into the harsh living conditions evoking sympathy
• '- and i hesitated - i was wearing brand new....'

  parenthesis

  visually looks like he is waiting - reader also pauses

  the triadic list of clothing is an image of the propaganda put on British youth that is juxtaposed with the conditions
• 'the set, accumulators, dry cells, coils of wire, earth mats, ropes and other details.'

  semantic field of jargon / specialist equipment

  juxtaposes 'hewitt and i and an officer' the few of them vs asyndetic list of equipment = overwhelming
• 'to hear the german machine gun tat-tatting all around.'

  onamatopea, syntheisisia

  may mimich the fact he cannot remove the sound from his head

  violent scary atmosphere emphasised by youthful sounds
• Context of 'Roclincourt' 


  Notorious for being one of the worst examples of the trenches.
• Three key ideas


  He is driven by the need to take part, built from the propaganda

  The juxtapositions of expectations vs reality of war

  The tonal shift from passive voice to active, strangely symbolic religious imagery.