The Firing Squad

Publication Instance Details #1389

Publication Overview

Translation	Is Multilingual	Explicit Irish Context?	Ekphrasis	Has Paratext?	Reference to News, Media or Technology
No	No	Yes	No	Yes	No

Details

Human Rights Issues	Death Penalty/Unlawful Detention/Incarceration War HR & Colonisation/Colonial Legacies
War / Genocide Referenced	War: First World War
Irish Context	Political Independence (Ireland) WW I (Ireland)
Languages	English
Genre	Short Lyric
Medium	Print Collection
Paratext Text	I am going to tell you something I never but once let out of the bag before and that was just after I reached London and before I had begun to value myself for what I was worth. It is a very damaging secret and you may not thank me for taking you into it when I tell you that I have often wished I could be sure that the other sharer of it had perished in the war. It is this: The poet in me died nearly ten years ago - Robert Frost to Louis Untermeyer, May 4, 1916 I am very happy I am dying for the glory of God and the honour of Ireland. - Joseph Mary Plunkett to Father Sebastian, May 4, 1916
Notes	There are two epigraphs to this poem: one in which Robert Frost references World War I and a second by Joseph Mary Plunkett, written before his execution in the Easter 1916 Rising. Explicit references to colonization in the context of Ireland, but also implicitly points towards a wider or more general context of poetry and violence.