THE TONE OF A SETTING
When having a conversation with someone it is easy to know how they are feeling by the tone in their voice. If a person is being funny, they tend to have a smile on their face, but when a person is angry about a particular subject, the tone of their voice becomes extremely loud and overbearing. While reading novels or short stories the characters tone is distinguishable because of the author's use of exclamation points or italicized words. These make the reader understand the characters emotions and feelings throughout the entire book. As for poems, the tone is not as recognizable. A reader is not capable of understanding the tone from just simply glancing at a few words. The tone is derived from several words and
The detail of him knocking on his mother's door, gives the idea that he is not himself. His mother and father had a barbeque in his honor, but, "when the fuel/ Exploded on the coals, (he) heard screams" (Line 4-5). For him to hear such a horrifying sound allows the reader to understand in what types of conditions he had to endure as a soldier in war. Even though the soldier should now feel a sense of security, he continues to suffer from the emotional and psychological impact of the war, "(he) watched the sky for the enemy" (Line 14). The poem has pieces of a more cheery tone, such as, "Women and children laughed" (Line 12), but the reader can only believe that the speaker is describing them as for a way to distinguish the way he feels in comparison to civilians who don't realize what he and other soldiers have been through. Because the speaker was trapped in a war-state-of-mind, the poem had no way of changing the tone for a more pleasing one.
As shown, the tone of the poem can decipher where and how the speaker of the poem experiences an individual place. The tone in Mora's poem facilitated the idea of the speaker's attitude towards two distinct locations. On the other hand, Grooms used tone to illustrate the speaker's state of mind remaining the same because of the effects of war, no matter his location. Tone is a way to aid the reader in understanding the positions and behavior of the speaker, a character, or a