Disapproval of War
In my
opinion, war is ugly and should not be praised because of the sorrow that
always comes along with it, which is why I did not enjoy reading the lyric, “In
Praise of War” by Bertran de Born. In this poem, Bertran discusses his beliefs
on war and the values a man is supposed to have in battle and each barbaric
ideal that was presented, I did not agree with. Of course, Bertran’s poem is
well written, but his content on the wonders of glorious war is anything but.
When
reading this lyric I tried to keep in mind the time period which this was
written and the beliefs presented in “In Praise of War” were probably common among
most men in the medieval period. However, it is ideas such as, a man is not “worth
a thing” unless he has “given and gotten blow on blow,” that I could not help
but disagree with because it is ideals like theses that has conditioned society
today to think that aggression seen in men is normal and okay for men to
violently express this aggression (Bertran 341).
As well
as Bertran’s beliefs on the “values of masculinity,” his views on war is also
something I strongly disagree with (Bertran 340). Bertran basically believes
that war is a “great joy” that any man worth anything should enjoy, despite the
many casualties of innocents that get in the way of their “skirmishers”
(Bertran 340). What bothered me the most was Bertran’s repeated phrase “it
pleases me,” which he often referred to when talking about the activities of
war such as, “it pleases [him]” to hear innocent people caught up in the war
scream “Help! Help!” (Bertran 341). Overall, Bertran’s diction and content was
horrible and I did not find any profound message to Bertran’s poem other than, “war
is glorious”, which can hardly be called profound. Maybe if Bertran gave other reasons
for believing in war besides it “pleasing” him, I would have found this poem a
bit more reasonable and enjoyable to read.
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