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B.A English Literature
3rd Year 6th Semester
Elective Paper
GREEN STUDIES (AG46D)
5.4 “Horses” by Edwin Muir
About Poem
The
Horses’ is one of the best-known and most widely studied poems by the Scottish
poet Edwin Muir (1887-1959). The poem (not to be confused with Muir’s early poem
‘Horses’) was published in his 1956 final collection One Foot in Eden.
This
period is also, for the most part, more positive in outlook than his early
work, although, paradoxically, the most anthologised poem of this group, ’The
Horses’, deals with his fears for the Cold War and his growing realisation of
the nuclear age. Echoing and subverting the seven‐day creation in Genesis, the
poem depicts the aftermath of an unspecified world war which has rendered
useless the machinery and illusory benefits of the modern age. The “radios
dumb” and obsolete planes and tractors force the survivors to remember an older
way of life, long aban‐ doned; their return to the plough seen as the
revitalisation of a lost communion between man and the world, ’Far past our fa‐
thers’ land’.
In 53 lines, Muir creates a kind of
modern neo-Christian fable, describing in literal and symbolic terms the
devastated world and the arrival of the horses. The narrative follows the
collective mind of the survivors as they put the past behind them and look to
the future.
Poem:
Barely a twelvemonth after
The seven days war that put the
world to sleep,
Late in the evening the strange
horses came.
By then we had made our covenant
with silence,
But in the first few days it was
so still
We listened to our breathing and
were afraid.
On the second day
The radios failed; we turned the
knobs; no answer.
On the third day a warship passed
us, heading north,
Dead bodies piled on the deck. On
the sixth day
A plane plunged over us into the
sea. Thereafter
Nothing. The radios dumb;
And still they stand in corners
of our kitchens,
And stand, perhaps, turned on, in
a million rooms
All over the world. But now if
they should speak,
If on a sudden they should speak
again,
If on the stroke of noon a voice
should speak,
We would not listen, we would not
let it bring
That old bad world that swallowed
its children quick
At one great gulp. We would not
have it again.
Sometimes we think of the nations
lying asleep,
Curled blindly in impenetrable
sorrow,
And then the thought confounds us
with its strangeness.
The tractors lie about our
fields; at evening
They look like dank sea-monsters
couched and waiting.
We leave them where they are and
let them rust:
"They'll molder away and be
like other loam."
We make our oxen drag our rusty
plows,
Long laid aside. We have gone
back
Far past our fathers' land.
And then, that evening
Late in the summer the strange
horses came.
We heard a distant tapping on the
road,
A deepening drumming; it stopped,
went on again
And at the corner changed to
hollow thunder.
We saw the heads
Like a wild wave charging and
were afraid.
We had sold our horses in our
fathers' time
To buy new tractors. Now they
were strange to us
As fabulous steeds set on an
ancient shield.
Or illustrations in a book of
knights.
We did not dare go near them. Yet
they waited,
Stubborn and shy, as if they had
been sent
By an old command to find our
whereabouts
And that long-lost archaic
companionship.
In the first moment we had never
a thought
That they were creatures to be
owned and used.
Among them were some half a dozen
colts
Dropped in some wilderness of the
broken world,
Yet new as if they had come from
their own Eden.
Since then they have pulled our
plows and borne our loads,
But that free servitude still can
pierce our hearts.
Our life is changed; their coming
our beginning.
Summary:
The speaker is a spokeperson for a
group of survivors. They tell of the strange horses come to renew their hope,
symbols of the natural spirit, innocence and strength.
Lines 1–3
The war
is over, the whole world quietened and strange horses have arrived. This is the
opening image which would surely suit a movie or documentary, with the text as
commentary. The recent past is about to unfold.
It's
unusual to see an adverb start a poem and to discover an archaic word in the
same line, twelvemonth, a dialect word which means a year. There's a mix of the
matter-of-fact and the fairytale—twelvemonth/seven days . . . put the world to
sleep and then the strange horses appeared.
Enjambment,
where one line runs on into the next without punctuation, occurs immediately.
The seven days war has ended (not that long for a war), and it must have been
devastating because the world is no longer awake.
This is
no conventional war, this is atomic or nuclear war.
Lines 4–6
To make a
covenant is to make a deal or agreement. In this context the survivors must have
come to some sort of collective decision—the silence was all they had, and they
agreed to accept it, to bond with it. Perhaps they agreed that such a war
should never happen again.
This act
indirectly calls up the old testament story of Noah's Ark. Noah built the ark
to save the animals from drowning in the flood, sent by God to cleanse the
world of sin. When the flood waters receded Noah saw a rainbow—this was God's
sign, covenant, that never again would the earth be flooded.
So silent
was their world they could hear their own breathing and this frightened them.
Is this factual or figurative? Once the noise of war had died down, the silence
must have been disturbing, especially since everything had been killed?
Animals, wildlife and the majority of humankind?
Lines 7–8
The
radios failed on the second day we are told in a short line that is cut off
prematurely. Power of communication to the outside world is lost. Electrical
technology is of no use.
This fact
means so much. Imagine having been through the most terrible of wars, surviving
somehow, when all of a sudden your one hope, getting in touch with someone
somewhere, asking for help, using the last piece of tech that functions . . .
no longer works.
A sure
sign that your modern, sophisticated world that existed prior to the war is now
no more.
Lines
9–20
More
sightings follow, of a warship carryng dead bodies, and a plane crashing into
the sea on a final mission gone wrong. The death throes of the war are taking
place, on the third and sixth days.
Their
radio is definitely kaputt. But even it worked, like millions more all over the
world, they wouldn't answer, they wouldn't want to engage with voices from the
bad world, the previous system that developed and finally employed the worst of
weaponry.
A subtle
change in syntax reflects the altered tone and the repeated words If/And
underline the certainty of the speaker. Now way would they wish to go back to
what they had before.
Repetition
of small words and phrases . . . If/And/We would not . . . helps reinforce the
message of stubborn resistance. There will be no going back to the previous
age.
In line
19, there is mention of children being swallowed at one great gulp by the bad
old world. Muir's liking for Greek mythology is apparent here as this directly
relates to the story of Cronos (Kronos) leader of the Titans, offspring of Gaia
and Uranus, the earth and sky. When children were born to him he promptly ate
them for fear of being overpowered or killed.
Lines
21–23
The
bigger picture is laid before the reader. Like embryos forming in a womb in
foetal position, nations lie asleep, victims of the war. Use of the word asleep
suggests that there will be an opportunity, eventually, to wake. At least these
nations are not yet dead; they have life, they are only dormant.
Lines
24–30
Another
vivid image comes into focus, that of tractors, those powerful machines that
formerly worked so hard on the land. Once indispensable, they are now rusting,
left for the elements.
The
tractors are menacing and are given zoomorphic status in a simile . . . like
dank sea-monsters. Note also the one line spoken by someone in the collective,
the line with moulder and loam—the tractors will rot away (moulder) and become
like the soil (loam).
Perhaps
surprisingly oxen are still around. They go back further than the horse in the
history of farming and were an integral part of medieval working of the fields.
Lines 31–32
A repeat
of the third line—those strange horses appear late one summer evening.
Lines 33–35
The
collective voice of the speaker describes the sounds of the horses as they
approach. First comes their distant tapping which then changes into drumming
before turning into thunder at the corner of the road.
This
gradual build-up and use of different verbs helps to intensify the image—here
come the plough-horses running, then momentarily stopping before heading off
again louder and louder towards the waiting survivors.
Lines
36–37
A
shortened line brings a certain emphasis and enjambment takes the reader from
the horse's heads on into a maritime simile . . . like a wild wave charging
which is full of fearsome energy.
The group
were afraid of the strange horses.
Lines
38–41
Mention
of fathers' time gives a rudimentary historical context to the scene. Horses in
the past had been sold and the money used to buy machines, tractors, to work
the land. The cyclical nature of farming and growing becomes apparent.
For
centuries horses had been the mainstay of power on the land, pulling the
ploughs across the fields, teams of strong shire horses working day after day.
Then machines came along, humans developed engines that needed oil and fuel and
the ubiquitous tractor quickly took over from living horsepower.
Now the
tables had been turned. Tractors were rotting away, and oxen were used instead.
But the appearance of the horses took the survivors by surprise and all they
could think of was ancient symbolism—horses on knight's shields or in
illustrated medieval books.
This
militaristic viewpoint harks back to a time when the horse was an indispensable
animal, crucial to human endeavour and ironically, warfare.
Lines
42–45
The group
didn't approach the horses; they were scared. The horses waited for something
to happen. There's an air of uncertainty in these lines as both parties weigh
each other up, and the whole situation.
Generations
of humans hadn't worked with horses on the land. Horses had been mere leisure
animals, for racing, for pleasure. But now in the aftermath of a devastating
war here was a situation of rare quality—horse and human facing each other, the
ancient bonds attempting to reunite.
The
speaker's musings are understandable, if a little mythical. Mention of the old
command suggests a mysterious connection between the horses and the gods, or
God. They purposefully ended up in this place because, as ordered, a new
relationship was to be formed, based on the old traditions.
Lines
46–47
Initially
the survivors wanted nothing to do with ownership or useage—the horses were
seen as equal, living beings on a ravaged planet. This sets the tone for the
future.
Lines
48–50
Among the
horses are colts, male foals, born somewhere out back in the wilderness. They
represent the future, the new times to be. Note the biblical reference to Eden,
the garden of Eden, God's garden in the book of Genesis.
Lines
51–53
The horses of their own free will now work the land, ploughing and carrying loads for the group. For these frightened survivors the horses' arrival has turned things round, changed everything. They have a new beginning. Out of war and destruction comes peace and creativity.
******
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