Tag Archives: Alan Seeger

Wanted: Teachers, Not Martyrs

Some say teachers should, like soldiers, should put their lives on the line. This A.E. Housman poem brings up the question of whether even soldiers should do so when there sacrifice will be meaningless.

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Memorial Day: Anthem for Doomed Youth

With Memorial Day, there is the danger that we will romanticize the deaths of the fallen rather than face up to the full tragedy. This tension can be seen in a number of World War I poems, some of which romanticize the fallen while others dwell on the absurdity of their deaths.

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