The Death of a Soldier

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1923

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Form and Meter

Much like other Modernist works, Stevens’s “The Death of a Soldier” does not employ any traditional form or meter, but it retains some formal structure nonetheless. The poem has a loose iambic meter with a few instances of trochaic meter and is broken up into four stanzas of three lines. The first line of each stanza is the longest and each subsequent line decreases in length. This mirrors the contraction of life in the first line of the poem, “Life contracts and death is expected” (Line 1). The repetition of the stanza forms echoes the cyclical nature of the seasons and the routineness of death during the war. In addition, almost every ending line of each stanza is four syllables or three words long. This deliberate allegiance to a nontraditional form demonstrates Stevens’s mastery of language and immense knowledge of the canon of English literature. The consistent and unique form participates in the ultimate meaningfulness of the poem.

Rhyme

“The Death of a Soldier” has no formal rhyme scheme and only one possible end-rhyme throughout the whole poem, with “pomp” (Line 6) and “stops” (Line 9). The poem resists rhyme in all forms, and those rhymes that do occur appear to be accidental rather than a deliberate formal choice. The poem’s resistance to rhyme reinforces the uncomfortable nature of the topic. The poem neither attempts melodic harmony nor mnemonic device. The lack of rhyme effects a bluntness and solemnity, even if the poem makes a few ironic references. There is also the philosophical tone; it is not a narrative for fantasy or fun. There are a few slant rhymes that are uncomfortable, like “autumn” (Line 2) and “separation” (Line 5), or “heavens” (Line 10) and “direction” (Line 12), but for the most part, the poem plays with consonance and assonance as opposed to rhyme. Rhyme is also a very traditional poetic device, and Stevens’s avoidance of it could also indicate the Modernist departure from tradition. Even in a poem this small and concise, Stevens makes no effort to implement a rhyme scheme for a more accessible experience.

Consonance

Instead of utilizing rhyme to play with language and sound, “The Death of a Soldier” employs consonance to achieve dynamism, surprise, and complexity. Consonance is a figure of speech in which the same consonant sound repeats within a group of words. Consonance occurs when sounds (as opposed to letters) repeat, similar to rhyme. It is different from assonance; it focuses on the consonant sounds instead of vowels. This is apparent in the first line’s specific focus on the “ct” sounds: “Life contracts and death is expected” (Line 1). In the second line, there is a focus on the “s” and “umn” sounds: “As in a season of autumn” (Line 2). This pattern continues throughout the poem, repeating the “w” sound: “without memorial” (Line 7) and “When the wind stops, / When the wind stops and, over the heavens” (Line 9-10). The consonance in “The Death of a Soldier,” as opposed to the rhyme, gives the poem its musical and dynamic quality and works to emphasize these specific words that resonate with the main ideas like autumn, wind, season, and soldier. The consonance adds texture and complexity to this intellectualization of mundane wartime death.