The document provides an overview and analysis of the poem "The War-Song of Dinas Vawr" by Thomas Love Peacock. It discusses the context of the poem, describing it as a song from Peacock's 1829 comic historical novel set in Arthurian Wales. It then analyzes various literary and linguistic features of the poem, including its rhyme scheme, meter, syntax, vocabulary, imagery, phonology, and orthography. The document aims to help students gain an understanding of the poem and plan a comparative exam response using a second text.

1. POETRY EXAM
PREPARATION
The War-Song of Dinas
Vawr (1829)
Thomas Love Peacock
L.O: To gain a clear understanding of the
literary and linguistic features of this poem.
To plan a comparative exam response to
this poem.

2. OVERVIEW/CONTEXT
 The text is describing an incident of sheep
rustling. The poem describes the overthrow of
the fictional Ednyfed by a group of fierce
warriors. The Poem is taken from 'The
Misfortunes of Elphin' (1829), a comic historical
novel set in Arthurian Wales, reflecting the
poet's interests in Welsh legends and history.
'The War-Song of Dinas Vawr' is a song, taken
from the novel, sung by those who have
conquered the castle of Dinas Vawr on the night
of their victory.

3. FORM
Statement Evidence Analysis
rhyme scheme creates humour through rhyme
ababcdcd
regular iambic
feet with
unstressed
syllable at end
of each line
Five stanzas Gives poem a ballad structure which
(octets) links to the folk song nature of the
poems content.

4. SYNTAX
Statement Evidence Analysis
Declarative conveys his personal convictions
mood
syndetic pairs 'house and
cellars', 'wine and
beasts'
parenthesis (line 25)
Parallelism (lines 27 - 28) Same syntactical pattern is repeated to
parallel syntax reinforce message

5. LEXIS
Statement Evidence Analysis
Dynamic 'forced',
verbs: 'conquer'd',
'march'd', 'cut'
comparatives: 'sweeter', 'fatter'
Archaisms 'sally', 'ere', 'kine'
lexical set of
war terms
welsh proper 'Dyfed', 'Ednyfed' Places the reader in the context of the
nouns: Welsh scene.

6. IMAGERY
Statement Evidence Analysis
Narrates the line 40 - the
story of the overthrow of
battle / conquer: Ednyfed has
supplied their
'chorus'
violent imagery 'Some sack'd his
undermined by house and cellars,
light-hearted / While others cut
tone and rhyme: his head off.'
Connotations

7. PHONOLOGY AND ORTHOGRAPHY
Statement Evidence Analysis
Assonance 'sheep', 'sweeter',
'meeter'
Aspirant 'head of him‘
alliteration
sibilance 'struggled', 'slew’

8. PRACTICE TEXT
Text A: The War-Song of Dinas Vawr (1829)
Thomas Love Peacock
 Text B: The text you brought from home to
compare…