How do I analyse Bayonet Charge for GCSE?

What is Bayonet Charge about?

Bayonet Charge describes a few seconds in the life of an ordinary soldier as he charges across a ploughed field towards a hedge where enemy rifles are firing. A bayonet is a blade fixed to the end of a rifle. The poem opens with him already running, with no memory of deciding to. His uniform is hot and rough against his skin, and the patriotic feeling that once brought a tear to his eye has turned into sweat and fear.

In the second stanza he almost stops. For a moment he wonders why he is there at all, and whether he is just a tiny part of a machine run by forces far bigger than him. Then a hare, flushed out of the field by the gunfire, twists in pain in front of him, and he plunges on towards the hedge. By the last lines every noble reason for fighting has fallen away. Only terror is left to drive him forward.

What is the context of Bayonet Charge?

Ted Hughes (1930 to 1998) grew up in Yorkshire and was Poet Laureate from 1984 until his death. Bayonet Charge appeared in his first collection, The Hawk in the Rain, published in 1957. Hughes never fought in a war himself, but his father had served in the First World War, and that war comes up again and again in Hughes's poetry.

The poem never names its war. The details fit the First World War, though: soldiers in khaki uniforms ordered out of their trenches to charge across open ground towards enemy guns. In that war, recruiting posters and speeches urged men to fight for King and country. Hughes's soldier finds that such words mean nothing once the bullets start.

For AO3, the key point is the gap between the ideals used to send men to war and the experience of the men who went. Hughes was writing nearly forty years after the First World War ended, and he strips the charge of any glory.

How does Hughes show patriotism giving way to terror in Bayonet Charge?

The opening words, "Suddenly he awoke and was running", throw us into the action with no warning. This is called starting in medias res, a Latin phrase meaning "in the middle of things". The word "awoke" suggests the soldier has been sleepwalking, perhaps through the patriotic dream that led him here, and has only now woken up to what war really is.

Hughes then shows that dream turning into physical pain. "The patriotic tear" that once filled his eye is now sweating from the centre of his chest "like molten iron". A tear of pride has become something heavy and burning, and his body is taking over from his beliefs.

In the second stanza time almost stops, and he wonders where he fits in the "cold clockwork of the stars and the nations". The metaphor pictures the war as a vast, unfeeling machine, with the soldier as the hand of a clock, moved by powers he cannot see. "Cold" suggests that whoever runs the machine does not care about him.

The hare is the turning point. It is "a yellow hare that rolled like a flame", twisting on the ground with its mouth open but making no sound. Nature is a victim of the fighting too, and in the animal's helpless suffering the soldier may glimpse his own. Straight after it, he charges on.

The ending completes the change. "King, honour, human dignity, etcetera" are dropped "like luxuries", things he can no longer afford. The careless "etcetera" shrinks those grand ideals to a list nobody bothers to finish. All that powers him now is "His terror's touchy dynamite", an image of fear so unstable it could explode at any moment.

What do the form and structure of Bayonet Charge add?

Bayonet Charge is written in free verse, which means it has no regular rhyme scheme and no metre (a steady pattern of beats). That suits a soldier with no control over what is happening to him. The soldier is never named, only "he", so he could be any young man sent to fight. The three stanzas follow the charge in order: frantic action, a strange frozen pause, then action again.

Enjambment, where a sentence runs on from one line to the next without a pause, keeps the first stanza lurching forward like the running soldier. Dashes break it up, so the rhythm stumbles as he does. In the second stanza the pace slows right down. Caesura, a pause in the middle of a line, comes straight after his question, and the blunt "He was running" pulls him back into the charge. For a moment his foot seems to hang in mid-stride like a statue.

The boldest piece of structure comes between stanzas two and three. The sentence about the ploughed field runs straight over the stanza break, and the hare bursts out of it on the other side. The violence refuses to stay inside its stanza, just as the war refuses to give the soldier any space to think.

Which poems does Bayonet Charge compare well with?

Bayonet Charge pairs well with other poems about the reality of fighting, and with poems that question patriotic ideals. Three strong choices are below. Pick one you can quote confidently from memory.

What could an exam question on Bayonet Charge ask?

In AQA Paper 2, Section B prints one named poem from the Power and Conflict cluster, and you compare it with one other poem from the cluster, chosen from memory. The question is worth 30 marks, assessed on AO1, AO2 and AO3. There are no marks for spelling, punctuation and grammar in this section.

Bayonet Charge could be the printed poem, or the second poem you bring in yourself. Two focuses to practise:

Focus 1: Compare how poets present patriotism in Bayonet Charge and in one other poem from Power and Conflict.

Focus 2: Compare how poets present fear in Bayonet Charge and in one other poem from Power and Conflict.

Here is an original model opening for the first focus, comparing Bayonet Charge with The Charge of the Light Brigade:

Both poems describe soldiers charging at enemy guns, but they treat patriotism very differently. Tennyson, writing as Poet Laureate in 1854, praises the Light Brigade for obeying without question: "Theirs not to reason why". Hughes's soldier cannot help reasoning why. He almost stops mid-charge, wondering if he is a tiny part in the "cold clockwork of the stars and the nations". By the end, "King, honour, human dignity, etcetera" have dropped away, and only terror drives him on.

Key quotations from Bayonet Charge to learn

Six short quotations, each with a line of analysis to learn alongside it.

• "Suddenly he awoke and was running": the poem starts mid-action, as if the soldier has woken up inside a nightmare, or woken up to what war really is.
• "The patriotic tear": the pride that sent him to war now pours out of him as sweat "like molten iron", heavy and painful.
• "cold clockwork of the stars and the nations": a metaphor for a huge, uncaring machine in which the soldier is one small moving part.
• "a yellow hare that rolled like a flame": an innocent animal caught up in the fighting, whose suffering mirrors the soldier's. Yellow can also suggest fear.
• "King, honour, human dignity, etcetera": the ideals used to recruit soldiers, dismissed with a careless "etcetera".
• "His terror's touchy dynamite": the final line shows him driven by fear, which is unstable and ready to explode.