The Casualties by JP Clark

 THE CASUALTIES BY JOHN PEPPER CLARK

Introduction:

John Pepper Clark’s poem The Casualties is about the causes and effects of war. It is said that

he wrote this poem as an elegy to Chinua Achebe, inorder to mourn and show respect for the

people who lost their lives unfairly during the civil war that took place in Nigeria. The war

started when Biafra wanted to leave the Nigerian Federation and become a country of its own.

However the situation may be, what Clark says is applicable to every war that had ever took

place in history.

The effects of war:

It is foolish to measure the effects of war in terms of ‘ the number of lives lost. The worst

casualty is that people are seized with death wish. This idea is conveyed in ‘ the first stanza

itself. The people who get slain in a war are to be envied, not pitied. For, death puts an end to

their sufferings. The people-who get wounded in a war are not in any way fortunate. Because

they move towards death by painfully in prolonged stages.

Crisis of uncertainty:

Some People naively believe that things would soon ‘take a turn for the better’. Clark, however

ends the argument saying that such thing that does not exist. Another evil effects of war is that

innocent and guiltless people are whisked away in the night and put in cells. But Clark says that

even the grave would be a far safer shelter, a safe haven.

Causes of war:

According to Clark, the manipulations by the politicians trigger off war. Clark describes

politicians metaphorically wandering minstrels. The present-day, opportunistic politicians jump

from country to country in search of cozy and sophisticated lives. With their powers of

eloquence, they’ sway the people’s mind, and their indecisiveness affects the people’s heart

like drummers beating drums. Misled by them, people are forced to pay too much taxes. After

the chaos, politician goes abroad and spend their time blissfully in smoke-rooms, without

heeding the starvation and death of large numbers of people due to Kwashiorkor and

malnutrition.

Conclusion:

Clark says that Kwashiorkor is the unseen camp follower of every war. This is a huge metaphor

as an effect of all the deteriorating and devastating effects of the claustrophobic war. What the

poet means to say that the war is like a disease afflicting a child, or a new generation at its very

core. Therefore the best way to win a war is to prevent it.