Bihar Board Class 12th English Important Questions Critical Appreciation of The Poem Everyone Sang are the best resource for students which helps in revision.
Critical Appreciation of The Poem Everyone Sang
Question 1.
Write a critical appreciation of Everyone sang.
Answer:
In this poem Siegfried Sassoon, who himself joined First world war and wrote various volumes of lyrics and satires against war and war activities, records the general feeling of joy when on 11 November, 1918, the war came to I an end and armistice was declared.
The poem expresses the joy that everyone, particularly the soldiers in the battle field, felt when the news of armistice came. The poet himself experienced a happiness that could be compared to the bliss of the caged birds who suddenly . had been liberated and set flying wildly on their wings across the white orchards and dark green fields. The cage of the war had imprisoned this birds-the soldiers-and now they had been freed. Their happiness, indeed, is great and spreading over a large canvas.
‘Prisoned birds’ in this stanza is a very powerful simile. Birds have everywhere been treated as symbols of freedom. But circumstances are sometimes very pressing for them as well. On being trapped by hunters and later on being put into cages birds lose their freedom.
This loss is felt in every gesture of theirs, in their circumscribed movement and their voice. The soldiers were in the same predicament, that is, they were prisoners of circumstance, forgetting their natural gentleness and engaged in making war. The declaration of armistice restored their natural selves and mentally they were in a state of flight, free, unencumbered flight.
In the second stanza the poet moves from delight to beauty and notes that there is a certain upliftment in this music and an artistic beauty set on it, like the setting sun which pours its golden splendour all around. Now the poet tells us that his joy is deeper than the joy felt by birds. It is a silent joy, and it is a joy more permanent than those of birds.
The poem is a unique recollection of powerful emotions. It is mainly about restoration of peace that has made everyone sing out in rejoicing. Though short, it has an ordered Structure and the very sound of words brings out the poet’s feelings.