Hello friends today we are discuss this question, the question is -Bring out the irony of the poem ‘Asleep in the Valley’.
Rimbaud, in the poem ‘Asleep in the Valley’ exposes the horrors of warfare where the life of a young soldier is nipped in the bud. The poet in the first stanza leads the readers to believe that the soldier lies asleep amidst the picturesque landscape of the valley nourished by the warm rays of the sun. The soldier who lies ‘open-mouthed’ with a smile, devoid of guile, augments the beauty of the land. There he lies blissfully asleep, free from the cares of the world. But with an ironical twist, the concluding line discloses the real nature of his ‘sleep.’ The soldier has been put to death by the bullets which cast red marks in his body. His sleep’ is not the culmination of Nature’s effect but the tragedy of war. A very young soldier has been killed. The soldier does not lie asleep out of his will but is doomed to death by war. Therein lies the irony of the poem ‘Asleep in the Valley’.