The Charge of the Light Brigade

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 1854

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Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Symbols & Motifs

The Valley of Death

The light brigade follows a miscommunicated order and gallops into a valley where cannons surround them on the cliffs on three sides. The landscape becomes the “valley of Death” (Lines 3, 7, 16). The words serve as a description as a resting place for the dead men on the battlefield. However, this phrase also alludes to Psalm 23 of the Bible, which in the King James version, reads: “Yea, though I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil: for thou art with me” (King James Version. The Book of Psalms 23:4). This would have reassured Victorian audiences, who were generally of Christian faith. They would have connected the phrase with the idea that the soldiers would have been comforted by their religious beliefs during the horrors of war, knowing that they were ultimately to “dwell in the house of the Lord forever” (The Book of Psalms 23:6). The speaker in the poem uses the phrase to convey this moment of reaching for faith and the human casualty of war.

The Mouth of Hell

In many cultures, hell is personified as a beast, and the journey through the mouth into the belly of the beast is often symbolically initiatory, a rite of passage from one state to another. Many philosophers and artists have used this to laud those who make it through the journey. The speaker exploits this familiar image to symbolic end, using it to criticize the cost of war. The image of the hellmouth helps to describe war as monstrous in an otherwise succinct poem. The British brigade goes “boldly […] / [i]nto the mouth of hell” (Lines 23, 25). They know that they will “do and die” (Line 15), as befits their chosen profession, but this doesn’t lessen the impact of what they go through or that the cost of their lives is due to human error. This is expanded when the remaining men come “back from the mouth of hell” (Line 47) after fighting the Russians. They are regurgitated from the belly of the beast, but at what cost? While they have acted nobly, they are “not / Not the six hundred” (Lines 37-38) that began the mission, either literally or figuratively. In fact, a part of them has been eaten away. They return as “[a]ll that was left of them / Left of six hundred” (Lines 48-49). While the speaker doesn’t exactly condemn the battle, they use this image to clearly delineate its horrors.

The Six Hundred

The British Light Brigade at Balaclava numbered between 660-670 soldiers by most accounts. Tennyson admitted that he rounded down because he preferred the single beat of “six” to the two-syllable “seven” (See: Further Reading & Resources). However, the use of the number 600 also serves to illuminate the loss suffered by the men of the brigade. At the beginning of the poem, the men perform as a single unit, a unified front riding into the battle as a trained, unbroken group, represented by a round number. However, once the brigade engages, losses are rapidly accrued. The chaos of “shot and shell” (Line 22) causes the brigade’s diminishment. They ride back, but “not [as] the six hundred” (Line 38). This is again emphasized in the notation of the survivors who come “back from the mouth of hell / All that was left of them / Left of six hundred” (Lines 47-49). A more specific number, like 670, would have lessened the idea of loss made hauntingly obvious by the diminishment of the whole number, which represents the entire brigade and its unity.