Pg4
Here Kien is on his body collecting mission, putting to rest the bodies and souls of the soldiers who died fighting in the war. There is a strong presence of the spiritual realm in this passage. “Disease and successive famines had erased all life” and they “set the village alight to cleanse it.” However even after the fire “soldiers were still terrified” of the place because of the “civilian souls loose in the wood.”
From this passage the writer explores the erasable damage war causes. They can try destroying the physical evidence by burning it however the souls of all those killed in war will always haunt the area and the sorrow of war will forever be marked in the Jungle of Lost Souls.
In the line: “emitting a stink that penetrated the imagination” has symbolic significance in supporting the writer’s key themes. The “stink” symbolizes the sorrow of war. This line represents how the impact the sorrow of war can get to even the bravest of men, even those who do not believe in an afterlife. This supports the key theme of the strong spiritual force the sorrow of war has on all people.
No comments:
Post a Comment