Devising: day 3

We began with being given a stimulus at first. This was a poem written by Wilfred Owen about World War One.

The Next War

Out there, we've walked quite friendly up to Death,-
Sat down and eaten with him, cool and bland,-
Pardoned his spilling mess-tins in our hand.
We've sniffed the green thick odour of his breath,-
Our eyes wept, but our courage didn't writhe.
He's spat at us with bullets and he's coughed
Shrapnel. We chorussed when he sang aloft,
We whistled while he shaved us with his scythe.

Oh, Death was never enemy of ours!
We laughed at him, we leagued with him, old chum.
No soldier's paid to kick against His powers.
We laughed, -knowing that better men would come,
And greater wars: when each proud fighter brags
He wars on Death, for lives; not men, for flags.

At first. I didn't really understand it. However after discussing it with our teacher we began to build up an idea of what the poem meant and began to build up our own interpretations and imagination.

We were placed into groups and tasked with coming up with a small piece of our choice based around the poem.  At first, I thought it would be quite artistic to have some sort of lift, showing how a soldier could be thrown around so easily by a bomb. Highlighting the fragility of life, before going into a flashback of the last conversation he had with his wife/girlfriend/family etc. However, this developed into a conversation with three soldiers about to go over the top. One being a war veteran, later back and matter of fact. The other two of us young men, with no training and no understanding of why they were fighting for.

As we are specifically looking at voice, it was important for us to really emphasise our tone to show our characters emotional state, I think we did so. I tried to make my speech very quick in short bursts. Empathising my nerves. I tried to show his desperation through the choked speech and nearing tears.  I think we did this well as a group, however it would have been beneficial to develop further, which was a suggestion from our teacher, after we had shown the piece.