Okay, so your teacher is asking you to write an extended piece of writing. She asks you to stretch those sentences and use semi colons and colons wherever you can, to make your writing more structured and get you into the A-C grades.

You sit there in your classroom and most likely think one thing; what the hell is a semi colon?

Well, if you look at the second paragraph of this blog piece [the bit underlined on purpose for you], you will see an answer to that question. I typed 12 words ending with the word “thing.” At that point I could have added a full stop or a comma and carried on. The full stop of course, would have ended the sentence. Then I typed 7 more words, beginning with “what” and ending with “colon.” I added the question mark because that is what the last half of that sentence is all about. In other words, a semi colon is used for the extension of meaning in a sentence. The first part of the sentence is about you sitting there in a class room. The second is about you thinking what a semi colon is.

Does that make sense? The two halves of that sentence need to be related to each other! That is the simple rule to remember.

Then we get the colon. Now the Science geeks amongst you will say “ah, I know where the colon is. It is in your gut” and you would be right, for there is a colon in the stomach and intestinal area of the human body. However, there is a colon used when writing as well. But, what is it and why is it used?

Generally speaking, a colon is used where there is a list involved. For example, if you was to write about my favourite football team and say who played in a match, you would do so like this.

In the match against Sunderland, these were the City players who took part in the game: Hart, Zabaleta, Boyata, Demichelis, Clichy, Jesús Navas, Touré, Fernandinho, Jovetic, Milner, Nasri, Pozo, Agüero and Lampard.

In that example, you have the explanation of what the list will be [the players who took part]. Then you get the colon and then you get the list. Easy!

Now, as a way to remember which is which, I refer to 1974 or thereabouts and to the one and only Mr Smith, my Science teacher; Chemistry to be exact. He would every now and again dictate notes to us so we got everything written down and copied accurately. Sadly, he passed away whilst I was there and the way I remember him is that he looked like the bossy teacher in Dead Poet’s Society as well, but was a pussy cat at heart. Lovely man!

He used to be dictating and then he would come to a colon in the text and he would say, out loud, to us all, “then add a colon, for the ignorant, two dots, one above the other” and before too long, we of the more cheeky variety of student would say it out loud in a chant. God bless him, wherever he is, for 40 years on I still remember that chant.

So now you know the difference between the two. Use them wisely.

RJ

Come On, Come Back 

Stevie Smith 

(incident in a future war)

Left by the ebbing tide of battle
On the field of Austerlitz
The girl soldier Vaudevue sits
Her fingers tap the ground, she is alone
At midnight in the moonlight she is sitting alone on a round flat stone.

Graded by the Memel Conference first
Of all human exterminators
M L 5
Has left her just alive
Only her memory is dead for evermore.
She fears and cries, Ah me, why am I here?
Sitting alone on a round flat stone on a hummock there.

Rising, staggering, over the ground she goes
Over the seeming miles of rutted meadow
To the margin of a lake
The sand beneath her feet
Is cold and damp and firm to the waves’ beat.

Quickly – as a child, an idiot, as one without memory –
She strips her uniform off, strips, stands and lunges
Into the icy waters of the adorable lake.
On the surface of the water lies
A ribbon of white moonlight
The waters on either side of the moony track
Are black as her mind,
Her mind is as secret from her
As the water on which she swims,
As secret as profound as ominous.

Weeping bitterly for her ominous mind, her plight,
Up the river of white moonlight she swims
Until a treacherous undercurrent
Seizing her in an icy amorous embrace
Dives with her, swiftly severing
The waters which close above her head.

An enemy sentinel
Finding the abandoned clothes
Waits for the swimmer’s return
(‘Come on, come back’)
Waiting, whiling away the hour
Whittling a shepherd’s pipe from the hollow reeds.

In the chill light of dawn
Ring out the pipe’s wild notes
‘Come on, come back.’

Vaudevue
In the swift and subtle current’s close embrace
Sleeps on, stirs not, hears not the familiar tune
Favourite of all the troops of all the armies
Favourite of Vaudevue
For she had sung it too
Marching to Austerlitz,
‘Come on, come back’.

ANALYSIS

At first glance, there are two things that are rummaging through my brain; firstly that any teacher who dares to go near this is nuts and lastly, why on earth has AQA added something as complex, even if it is good, as this to the syllabus when there are F tier students out there who will struggle with most prose, let alone this? The next thought is one that this teacher must be mad to have a go at this one, but here I am, having a go, so if it ends up as gibberish, consider I am typing these words at midnight.

This is a poem written in third person from the point of view of the poet, or in this case, the story teller, who tells her story about a young girl. In parenthesis [use of brackets] the reader is told this could be in a future war, not in a past one, so we are immediately expecting something different, or at least this published poet is.

If we take this verse by verse we see in the first verse, or stanza, that the young girl in question is called Vaudevue, an intriguingly odd sounding name and one that reminds me of the word Vaudeville but clearly not meant to be the same meaning. This girl then, is sitting after the field of battle has ended or paused, and “her fingers tap the ground.” Immediately the reader should ask the question, why would someone do such a thing? Is this meant to be taken literally or metaphorically? If literally then very odd indeed. The place in question is the “field of Austerlitz” so this is of a foreign climate to the British reader’s thoughts, as well as those of you who are from the far corners of the globe. So we are left to assume it is meant to be metaphorical, or symbolic of something else.

We find that “she is alone at midnight in the moonlight,” itself a very alliterative section of the poem and one meant to reflect the almost moonlight, romance of the scene. She is “sitting alone on a round flat stone.” Again the reader has to ask the question here – why the round, flat stone? What symbolism does this carry, if any? What else was round in the past or in folklore? Is there a link to the idea of something old passing through the portals of one dimension to another?

The answers are not forthcoming for now until we get to the next verse which begins with the idea that she is a remnant of something that fought there. Strange words that sound futuristic emerge as we see she has been “graded by the Memel Conference” or classified as being of minor importance any more by the “human exterminators” called “M L 5,” who have “left her just alive” or barely alive. The strange wording of “only her memory is dead for evermore” sounds almost too futuristic in a sense because the memory of someone is something that will last forever. We remember the person of Napoleon Bonaparte, or King James I or Queen Elizabeth and Historians gather information on them, so their memory is never dead, but in this battle that has happened so there is the sense that all can die. The girl feels the raw emotion of warfare and battle as she “fears and cries, Ah me, why am I here?” If there is ever such a comment as this that would sublimely describe the raw emotion of the eternal question of why we go to war, it is this one, as she is “sitting alone on a round flat stone on a hummock.”

But she is not beaten. No, she is defiant to the last as she rises, “staggering, over the ground” and she begins to trudge the meadows of the battle to emerge at the outer most parts of a lake, travelling from carnage to tranquillity as she goes. Now there is sand in her shoes or toes and she feels the rise and swell of the beach, blessed relief from what she has just endured. Suddenly she is in the opposite of the brutality she has endured so far and is now somewhere where there is peace and beauty. She is now able to act “as a child, an idiot, as one without memory” as she wanders off into the lake and the waters that engulf. It is an extraordinary image being painted here of someone who can see the horrors of war and then wander off from the battlefield and find somewhere where peace resides and if metaphorically understood, reflects the idea that this is about passing from earth to heaven, or indeed, wherever the afterlife takes us.

She “strips her uniform off,” itself symbolic or dropping the last vantage of warfare. A soldier wears a uniform in battle, so this removal is symbolic of her desire to seek peace over war and here we begin to see the poet’s attitude to warfare and conflict in some detail as she lets her heroine do the sorts of things she would want to do in the same situation, diving into the “icy waters of the adorable lake.” The description that follows is simply mesmerizing in its beauty as she describes how “on the surface of the water lies a ribbon of white moonlight.” Here, there is romance. Here there is love. Here there is the chance to live again as we are intended to and just as much as baptism is a rite of passage in the worldwide church so too could this watery entrance be her rite of passage as she dies and enters the waters of the afterlife.

The waters are described as being “on either side of the moony track” and as “black as her mind,” which leads the reader into thinking that perhaps this is a poem about the entry into the after life after all [pardon the pun there]. She is in a situation where her mind and her body could be said to have separated from each other, which is symbolic of death. Everything therefore, is described in “ominous” terms.

Then there is a change in tone again and one towards the negative, where we see something change in her. We see words like “weeping bitterly” and “treacherous undercurrent” as she swims the lake in the direction of freedom and as she does so, the lake and the waters are “seizing her in an icy amorous embrace” showing just how far on this journey she is. She has laboured in death, travelled to beauty and now is guided by some magical force to somewhere where there is peace but in order to do so, she has to let “the waters … close above her head.” Such words are again metaphorical in content and meant to make the reader think in terms of our journey from life through death and into whatever comes next. For this poet, this is her beautiful journey that she hopes will be hers when her day comes.

And just as she is on her journey of discovery, something happens to change the direction for the reader again. A guard finds her clothes and waits for her to return either thinking or saying those words “come on, come back!” When you think about it, why would you say those words? In what context might you say them? You might say them if someone is leaving and you do not want them to, or when someone is dying and you desperately want them to stay with you. The latter works better here, as with the earlier sentiments because of the words that follow describing the “chill light of dawn.” Everything is cold. Everything is dead or dying. So is Vaudevue as she passes from one plane to another, as the “close embrace” slowly ebbs away from her and she fails to hear the tune she knows so well, the tune that was sung in the battlefields before this day, the song that was called ‘Come on, come back.’

The Falling Leaves

Today, as I rode by,
I saw the brown leaves dropping from their tree
In a still afternoon,
When no wind whirled them whistling to the sky,
But thickly, silently,
They fell, like snowflakes wiping out the noon;
And wandered slowly thence
For thinking of a gallant multitude
Which now all withering lay,
Slain by no wind of age or pestilence,
But in their beauty strewed
Like snowflakes falling on the Flemish clay.

Margaret Postgate Cole

Analysis

Margaret Cole (nee Postgate) was a pacifist in the First World War and an active supporter of the Second World War. She was a lifelong socialist and active in education reform in England. It is in knowing this information that the reader can formulate what this poem is trying to do and why the poet write the thing in the first place. Being a pacifist in WW1 and mentioning the “Flemish clay,” we are led to believe that this was meant perhaps, as a form of protest at the total futility of war, like many of Wilfred Owen’s poems were; from the front but saying why did we go to a Flemish field and waste so much blood? It is also possible to suggest that her later poetry may have been totally different from this because of her stance change.

So, we get to the poem itself. Count the lines and we see twelve lines of poetry, so unlike the beautiful poems that are usually two lines longer [sonnets] and usually have a regular rhythm and symmetry to them, this one alters and changes the length of lines to suit her need to say something short and specific, for dramatic emphasis. For example, she begins with “Today, as I rode by,” signifying that this is from the point of view of an officer, or at least someone who had the privilege and luxury of being on horseback. Normal soldiers were foot soldiers, who marched for miles, trudging through the Flanders mud. So this person who is speaking is from the privileged classes. It is a nice, to the point, short line, followed by a longer one for emphasis.

The next line then follows with “I saw the brown leaves dropping from their tree” which immediately makes a reader who knows something of symbolism and metaphor think about the leaves themselves and how they can be seen to represent or symbolize the soldiers themselves, falling in the mud at the onslaught of the German guns. Indeed, one could argue it from the other side and the Germans seeing the British falling before their onslaught. Either way, the loss of human life that we ‘remember’ each November is evident from the beginning in this poem. Then she follows with the fact that it is a “still afternoon” when this is taking place. Stillness reflects calm normally, but in the terror of warfare, stillness can be equally terrifying, so we are led to believe that terror and conflict exists here in the stillness of the day, “when no wind” exists in a situation that brings forth the men “whistling to the sky,” in their adventure.

Now notice the word “But” on the next line. Words like this usually signify a change. Something is good, but it will change. Someone is poor, but they win the lottery. Here, the reader expects a change and gets one with “But thickly, silently.” These are words that are so strong and so powerful in their usage and meaning. The event that follows happens heavily and quietly, like a dream before the soldier’s eyes as his comrades fall “like snowflakes wiping out the noon.” Now, we see sadness and despair coming into the poem whereas the previous sense of bravery and honour is passing.

Then the reader is led along a path of misery with words that suggest a slow movement from this soldier as he sees so much death and decay all around him. He wanders “slowly” through the ranks, “thinking of a gallant multitude” who have gone before him into battle and who are now lying dead in his tracks. It is a simmering sight of sacrifice he sees, where “all withering lay,” rotting and smelling of death. He makes note that they are “slain by no wind of age or pestilence,” meaning that it was not sickness of the body that killed them or old age and decay, but rather the inhumanity of one nation to another just because of a desire to have more land. Now the reader sees the true poet/pacifist of the First World War coming out in her writing, shouting from the roof tops her belief about how wrong this all is and how we are wrong to send our men [and now women] off to war. To her, it is all a needless waste.

Then we get a repetition of the word “But” again and this time, the change has to go the other way. Instead of being a horrible sight, the soldier [or more likely, the poet] sees the men not as horrid and unsightly, but “in their beauty strewed like snowflakes falling on the Flemish clay.” Snowflakes are beautiful to behold. Snowflakes falling is something beautiful to see. To match the two images together like this is stunning to say the least, but it also shows how someone can use the English language to describe something so that her horror of war as well as her belief that it is indeed right and good to die for your country to great effect. This is a poem therefore, that reflects a depth of emotion and the use of symbolic metaphor to show a belief system that still exists to this day.