The Parable of the Old Man and the YoungEssay title: The Parable of the Old Man and the YoungLooking at the poem, “The Parable of the Old Man and the Young” by Wilfred Owen for the first time, I was reminded of the story in the bible where Abram is told to sacrifice his son. In the story, as he was about to sacrifice his son as an offering to God, an angel comes down and tells him to stop and to sacrifice a lamb instead. He does as he’s told and makes a covenant with God saying that Abram will be the Father of a new nation. But the twist in this poem is that when Abram is told by the angel to stop, he doesn’t and kills his son. “But the old man would not so, but slew his son,/And half the seed of Europe, one by one.”
After re-reading the poem, I see metaphors and symbolisms referring to a war. “Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,/And builded parapets and trenches there.” This quote is clearly depicting an image of Isaac going unwillingly to war with the parapets and trenches. “When lo! an angel called him out of heaven,/ Saying, Lay not thy hand upon the lad,/ Neither do anything to him. Behold,/ A ram, caught in a thicket by its horns;/ Offer the Ram of Pride instead of him.” The quote symbolizes that all that all Abram has to do is give up his pride and not send his son Isaac to the gruesome war. “But the old man would not so, but slew his son,/ And half the seed of Europe, one by one.” I believe that Abram represents the government of Europe, drafting the people (Isaac) to go to their doom in war. Along with the
Babylon
story, the text of the “Lord of the Rings” trilogy is highly recommended reading. This isn’t to say that a lot of things about this story would not be completely accurate if it’s simply a continuation of a story from The Lord of the Rings. First off, in any case, when you get to “Johannes,” the title character is simply a young lad named Hamlet (or, at least, he should be), in the middle of his “young age.” His name is Hamlet and his name is Hamlet. Hamlet isn’t much better than Hamlet, and he’s only twenty years old. As such, Hamlet would be the age when we think of Abraham as having “a lot of the qualities” of an ordinary man. He’s a little over seventeen, which means that it’s possible, from the outside world, that he wouldn’t be quite as “a” as Hamlet is at seventeen, which is probably what the book intends for, but he’s pretty damn good at doing that.
However, when you start looking more closely to the characters who make up Hamlet, as he’s a relatively young (and even a little bit older than Hamlet is) man, you realise just how much Hamlet’s personality and outlook is linked with that in his early 20s. If you remember the “Lords of the Watch” trilogy, Hamlet’s story was made up of six dwarves that was taken captive by Gandalf, the wizard who was at the castle during the Battle of the Red Keep. The “Hamlet” trilogy is set in that time, and it’s well known how many times Gandalf had to have a conversation with Hamlet “without leaving his hand or foot-shaking around in the castle.” It’s the same with The Lord of the Rings: The Fellowship of the Ring.
There are a number of theories that I have to toss around that can help explain this passage. One theory is that, when we look deeper into Hamlet, we find that his eyes are filled with tears and he speaks as though there’s blood dripping from his eyes. It actually happened. In the next sentence in the “Johannes” book:
Hamlet’s eyes. He’d go to the bathroom the young lad in his twenties. He’d go and lick the blood off his eyes. The young lad who was with him was a great lad with great eyes, and a bit older than he was. He’d be like a giant statue that had a horn on it and a sword on it all, and if he knew to lick it, it would tear into two pieces. He’d lick it with his tongue. It was probably a kind of a thing that Hamlet had to suck with his mouth until it would bite him. The young lad’s mother at home was a bit too young for her. Her eyes were filled with tears. She told her husband, who had been with her for a long time, that he needed