“Out, Out –”
Brief Summary:
o Recreates a true-life tale where a boy loses his hand from cutting wood with a powerful
industrial saw, he is taken to the doctor but abruptly dies
o Sympathy is the dominant tone of the poem
Structure and Form:
o Narrative poem
o 1 long stanza
o iambic pentameter, sense of predictability which reflects the saw
o Caesura throughout poem
o End-stops at the beginning and end create simplicity and sense of finality
o The title is taken from Macbeth’s soliloquy in Macbeth where he conveys how life is ‘brief’
and fleeting which reflects the boy’s life in this poem
Beginning: description of the setting and of the threatening saw
o ‘The buzz saw snarled and rattled’ – zoomorphism-aggression, sibilance creates harsh tone-
foreshadows the disturbing ending, ‘rattled’ creates the sound of a saw
o ‘mountain ranges’ – tranquil rural description of setting, semantic field of nature, static
description of setting juxtaposes the aggressive, fast nature of the saw
o ‘snarled and rattled’ – the setting description is interrupted by the onomatopoeia, sound
creates an impending sense of doom, the saw is foregrounded again
Middle: His sister tells him its supper time and the saw cuts off his hand
o ‘Leaped’ – dynamic verb, personification of the saw makes it seem like an animal acting
through its own will, long sentence-fast pace and chaos
o ‘boy’ – repetition throughout poem emphasises innocence
o ‘rueful laugh’ – oxymoron creates disturbing imagery
o “Don’t let him cut my hand off” – gives character a voice, humanises them, creates
vulnerability, increases sympathy and now we can hear the desperation in his voice
o ‘So.’ – the physicality of the one-word monosyllabic sentence reflects the shortness of his life
as well as its simplicity
End: He dies abruptly and we learn how the others react
o ‘Little – less – nothing!’ – the dashes build suspense along with the short declarative
sentences, exclamative sentence creates a sense of panic
o ‘turned to their affairs.’ – the shift in pronouns take away the focus from the boy, makes him
seem less significant, reflected through the cold reaction to the boy’s death by the
community as the narrator suggests they do not spare the time to grieve the loss of this child
but instead they simply move on with their lives, the end-stop creates a sense of finality,
critical tone
Brief Summary:
o Recreates a true-life tale where a boy loses his hand from cutting wood with a powerful
industrial saw, he is taken to the doctor but abruptly dies
o Sympathy is the dominant tone of the poem
Structure and Form:
o Narrative poem
o 1 long stanza
o iambic pentameter, sense of predictability which reflects the saw
o Caesura throughout poem
o End-stops at the beginning and end create simplicity and sense of finality
o The title is taken from Macbeth’s soliloquy in Macbeth where he conveys how life is ‘brief’
and fleeting which reflects the boy’s life in this poem
Beginning: description of the setting and of the threatening saw
o ‘The buzz saw snarled and rattled’ – zoomorphism-aggression, sibilance creates harsh tone-
foreshadows the disturbing ending, ‘rattled’ creates the sound of a saw
o ‘mountain ranges’ – tranquil rural description of setting, semantic field of nature, static
description of setting juxtaposes the aggressive, fast nature of the saw
o ‘snarled and rattled’ – the setting description is interrupted by the onomatopoeia, sound
creates an impending sense of doom, the saw is foregrounded again
Middle: His sister tells him its supper time and the saw cuts off his hand
o ‘Leaped’ – dynamic verb, personification of the saw makes it seem like an animal acting
through its own will, long sentence-fast pace and chaos
o ‘boy’ – repetition throughout poem emphasises innocence
o ‘rueful laugh’ – oxymoron creates disturbing imagery
o “Don’t let him cut my hand off” – gives character a voice, humanises them, creates
vulnerability, increases sympathy and now we can hear the desperation in his voice
o ‘So.’ – the physicality of the one-word monosyllabic sentence reflects the shortness of his life
as well as its simplicity
End: He dies abruptly and we learn how the others react
o ‘Little – less – nothing!’ – the dashes build suspense along with the short declarative
sentences, exclamative sentence creates a sense of panic
o ‘turned to their affairs.’ – the shift in pronouns take away the focus from the boy, makes him
seem less significant, reflected through the cold reaction to the boy’s death by the
community as the narrator suggests they do not spare the time to grieve the loss of this child
but instead they simply move on with their lives, the end-stop creates a sense of finality,
critical tone
