Carol Ann Duffy approaches the poem “War Photographer” based on the life of a photographer. The poem details the internal conflict within the war photographer as he returns home to rural England after his work. Throughout the poem, the photographer struggles to contain his feelings of the horrors he has witnessed re-emerge in his everyday life. Carol Ann Duffy has written the poem to demonstrate the suffering and devastation, both physically and emotionally, caused by war.
It begins with the words “In his dark room he is finally alone…” This quotation conveys the photographer’s awkwardness. The word choice of “finally alone” shows he prefers this and feels more comfortable in his own company. The poet tells us immediately that he is developing his reel of film or as the poet puts it as a metaphor “Spools of suffering. ” The repetition of the ‘s’ sound or using sibilants (help create atmosphere and draw tension the poem.) Carol Ann Duffy uses a double meaning when she talks about the camera winding on, the second meaning could be suggested mirroring the photographer’s memories as winding on. The spools are laid “out in ordered rows”; this goes back to the topic of death; in the same way that coffins would be ordered in a graveyard. She is attempting to portray this as the endless rows of dead bodies or crosses.
“The only light is red and softly glows”. The red light is used by Duffy to symbolise many things. Firstly, the red may symbolise the blood that is lost in war. As the photographer develops the film, he compares himself to a Priest. This continues the idea of death, which is present throughout the poem. She talks to us deliberately of three places where wars have torn countries apart “Belfast, Beirut, Phnom Penh”. By invoking religious imagery “A priest preparing to intone a Mass.” Carol Ann Duffy makes us see the grieving process that one has to go to in order to lay a loved one to rest. Carol Ann Duffy is said to be a very religious person she...