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Definition of Motif
A motif is an element or idea that recurs throughout a work of literature. Motifs, which are often collections of related symbols, help develop the central themes of a book... read full definition
A motif is an element or idea that recurs throughout a work of literature. Motifs, which are often collections of related symbols, help develop the... read full definition
A motif is an element or idea that recurs throughout a work of literature. Motifs, which are often collections of... read full definition
Motifs
Explanation and Analysis—Assembly Line:
In the the story's second half, Kipling uses diction associated with manufacturing to describe the war and its sorrow. Through the metaphor underlying this motif, he compares the war to an industrial assembly line. On one conveyor belt, young men with their futures ahead of them are sent to their deaths. On another conveyor belt, their loved ones are sent into mourning. The mass scale of the war and immense number of its victims depersonalize loss and grief, making people like Helen feel as though their emotions are part of a cold, mechanized process without room for individual experiences.
The narrator touches on this several times, but elaborates most on it after the war is over and Helen finally receives an official letter stating that Michael's body has been found.
So Helen found herself moved on to another process of the manufacture – to a world full of exultant or broken relatives, now strong in the certainty that there was an altar upon earth where they might lay their love. These soon told her, and by means of time-tables made clear, how easy it was and how little it interfered with life’s affairs to go and see one’s grave.
Kipling uses this industrial metaphor to underline the senselessness of the war. Earlier in the story, when Helen receives the telegram announcing that Michael is missing, the narrator describes her "taking her place in the dreary procession that was impelled to go through an inevitable series of unprofitable emotions." As she moves through the process that countless family members have gone through before her, and countless others will go through in the future, she feels alienated from the experience. There are so many graves, and so many people going to visit graves, that paying respect to one's deceased loved one seems to merely revolve around following instructions and time-tables.
Kipling uses this manufacturing diction earlier in the story as well. For example, leading up to the shelling that buries Michael's body, the narrator writes that the Battle of the Somme "was being manufactured." In addition, Michael was initially "on the edge of joining the first holocaust of public-school boys who threw themselves into the Line." The word "line" carries many connotations that are relevant here. Primarily, the reader should interpret it to mean the battlefront. It also brings to mind a border or edge, such as England's border, the border between the Allies and the Central Powers, or the border between life and death. In a way, Michael throws himself into his ancestral line as well: he initially wanted to directly enlist because his supposed grandfather had been a non-commissioned officer. Being "in line" means being obedient and following orders. Furthermore, the word carries a vocational meaning, a reminder that all these soldiers were on the cusp of beginning their careers before the destruction of their futures. Finally, and most importantly for the motif in question, the word brings to mind the assembly line, which Michael and all of the young soldiers are metaphorically stepping onto as they join the fighting.
Before Michael died, he took Helen to visit a munition factory. At the time, it had struck her "that the wretched thing was never left alone for a single second." As she prepares various documents after Michael has gone missing in action, she recalls their visit to the factory and tells herself "I’m being manufactured into a bereaved next of kin." This shows that the manufacturing metaphor does not solely exist in the story's narrative layer: the characters themselves are aware of their experiences' resemblance to an assembly line.
Related Themes:
