하디와 토마스의 전쟁시

Abstract

Thomas Hardy was a non-combatant, but Edward Thomas was a soldier poet, both of whom wrote poetry on the First World War. Critics say that the two poets’ “war poetry” is lacking in reality and insufficient to convey the horrors of the battlefield. However, it would not be enough to repeatedly portray the terrible truth because poetry is not a newspaper article or reportage, or even war chronicles either. Rather, it is the essential responsibility of the poet to embody in literature the limitations and compassion of the universal humanity impaired by such a devastation and inevitability of the warfare. Both Hardy and Thomas have successfully avoided the publicly recognized patriotic language and instead focused on mentioning the beauty of the countryside, the love and affection of the people, the history of England, and the literary tradition of the past. Their lyricism and meditation is an important factor protecting their poetry from the weaknesses of other Georgian war poems, which were most of them ideological or idealistically patriotic attempt, or cynical accusation or anti-war instigation at best.