Rhetoric
rhetorical language Language devices employed to convince and persuade an audience - eg questions, groups of three, alliteration. is used in the printed directiveAn instruction or order from a higher authority. issued to the men before they sail to France.
They are told to keep and “read it in moments of temptation”.
The directive states: “You are ordered abroad as a soldier of the King to help our French comrades against the invasion of a common enemy.”
This language reminds them of their duty. The complete directive repeats the pronounWords that replace nouns, ie he, she, it, they. ‘you’ and is very focussed on making the men feel their responsibility.
The list included in “You have to perform a task which will need your courage, your energy, your patience” is persuasive and typical of the kind of rhetoric that was used to influence young men.
Repetition
Johnston uses repetitionWhere a word, phrase or idea is repeated for emphasis. for effect in various occasions in the novel.
In the opening scene - as he ponders how his execution will affect his parents – Alec’s only comment about his mother is “My heart doesn’t bleed for her.”
He repeats this phrase later in the novel on reading a section in the army directive warning soldiers to “avoid any intimacy” with women in France – “Poor Jerry I thought, my heart bleeds for you.”
Alec probably means some humour in this remark, as Jerry has talked so much about wanting to be with a woman.
But the repetition of the phrase in this way shows how much Alec cares about Jerry, while being indifferent to his mother’s feelings.
Dialogue
Johnston uses characters’ dialogue to tell us more about them.
Their accents and colloquialismAn informal word used in everyday speech. are different depending on their social classSocial groupings, sometimes used to measure people's place in society. .
Alec’s narrative uses the standard English of an educated and affluent member of the Anglo-Irish upper classes. We also see this in the dialogue of his mother and father.
This is contrasted with the dialogue of Jerry and Mr Cave the piano teacher, who are of a different class.
Mr Cave uses colloquialisms such as “fellamelad” and “sonny” and Jerry teases Alec as a “queer eejit”.
Jerry’s use of the Irish “omadhánFrom the Irish (Gaeilge) amadán meaning fool or idiot.” also reminds us of his Irish as opposed to Anglo-IrishA term often used to describe people from a social class which was often made up of descendants of Protestant landowners and professionals, from the Protestant Ascendancy of Ireland. identity, another distinction between the friends.
