Life, Nature, and Slumber

Wilfred Owen, the leading poet of World War I, wrote the poem “Futility” to describe his feeling of uselessness of the human being. After Owen’s time in rehabilitation, he was sent to a command depot in Ripon, England. There he wrote “Futility” describing his emotions to the war and life itself. The poem is summed up in his last like when he questions whether it is worth it “to break earth’s sleep at all.”

This passage signifies Owen’s use of sleep and nature with life and death.

            Nature is a constant image throughout the poem. We can identify this through Owen’s diction. He uses such words as seeds, stars, clay, sunbeams, fields, etc. These are used to describe how nature affects humans. The “king old sun” (Owen 7) is the center of energy that controls the things around it. The seeds and clay are the basic elements that make up nature. Although nature is a constant image, the speaker claims that nature is not the answer to life.

            The speaker asks the meaning of life. He calls to Nature or “the king old sun” but nature does not answer, but rather the speaker only repeats the question. This question supports Owen’s use of the concept of life and death. The speaker wonders whether he should live or not even “break earth’s sleep at all” (Owen 14) much like Hamlet’s query, when he wonders if it would be better to “dream.” We see how this concept of life and death relates to slumber throughout the poem. The speaker explains his time before war. At that time, he woke easily to the rise of the sun. Now, after being injured, he can’t find the desire to rise from sleep, but rather die. He is mad that the sun teased him into believing there was a meaning to life.

            Through Owen’s last line, the themes of “Futility” are expressed. It represents the use of nature, life, and slumber. They are used to set the mood of futility, the lack of usefulness. Basically, the speaker addresses that there is no meaning to life and we identify that nature is not connected to us as generally thought.

           

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The Separation of Humanity from Nature

Wilfred Owen’s poem “Futility” compares humanity and nature and their respective roles on the earth.  The poem discusses the meaning of life for both nature and man using “the king old sun” representing nature and “him” representing man, more specifically, a soldier.

Human kind’s role on the earth is unknown according to the poem when it states, “- O what made fatuous sunbeams toil/ To break earth’s sleep at all?”  This line, in translation, asks the question, “why does the sun rise to wake the earth?”  Essentially, the line is asking why God has mankind alive in the first place.

The king old sun’s role on the Earth is to provide for the rest of life.  The poem reveals nature’s role in the beginning of the second stanza, “Think how it wakes the seeds…”  The sun’s role is to wake the rest of the earth.  The sun brings life trough its light and heat to give to nature.

In the beginning of the poem, nature interacts with human kind: “Move him into the sun -/ Gently its touch awoke him once…”  Nature does its job to bring life to the earth, awakening him.  God created the sun for just this reason.

God put humankind on the earth to contribute to nature as well, but at one point, the human race broke off from nature.  There is now a distinct separation between nature and man.  To the narrator, human kind does not have a roll on the earth.  Because humans have broken away from nature, humans no longer have a roll to contribute to nature.  Selfishly, humans only contribute to themselves.  Examples of these contributions are war, science, even philosophy.

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Nature Doesn’t Exist

As he gazed around him the youth felt a flash of astonishment at the

blue, pure sky and the sun gleamings on the trees and fields. It was

surprising that Nature had gone tranquilly on with her golden process

in the midst of so much devilment. (Crane 29)

 

           

Nature doesn’t exist. This is not to say that trees, grass, plants, etc. don’t exist, but rather that the idea of nature as a one individual is false. Henry Fleming thinks otherwise. This character created by Stephen Crane in The Red Badge of Courage is used to illustrate the common thoughts and fears of a soldier during war. Henry believes “Nature” as a universal being that everyone can relate too. In the selected passage we can identify that Henry believes Nature should represent the “devilment” of war that encompasses it. However, nature is realistic and continues on throughout time as planned without representing human involvement.

            The idea of Nature occurs throughout the novel. Henry continually has an internal conflict between fear and courage. Very indecisive, he fights in battle and flees for safety. Much like Hamlet, Henry can’t stick to his “gut” instinct, the opposite characteristic of a hero. Henry can’t fight against the “monster” (Crane 25) as much as Hamlet can’t kill King Claudius. Thus Henry tries to find an idol, something or someone he can follow. He turns to “Nature.” In this selected passage we first identify the interaction between the two. Henry has just finished fighting in his first battle and realizes that Nature has continued on without him, without sympathy. He has more of a belief that Nature will characterize the evilness of death and destruction as it did in Julius Caesar. In the play by Shakespeare, “a lioness hath whelped in the streets; and graves have yawn’d, and yielded up their dead… [and] drizzled blood upon the Capitol” (Shakespeare 2.2. 18-22). However, none of such occurs in The Red Badge of Courage, but rather Nature ignores the war and continues on “tranquilly.” It contrasts the romantic idea of Henry Fleming and the realistic novel.

            Crane illustrates realism through his texts. In The Open Boat he also uses an unexpected situation like the continuity of nature to support his point. The Oiler, Billy, the only character whose name is given, dies. In an ideal story, he would have survived because he was the hardest worker, however that is not life. Life is unfair. Through the selected passage we can infer that the romantic Henry Fleming is confused between Nature, a mythical being, and nature, the realistic world around him. Nature doesn’t exist.

           

 

           

 

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