Character sketch of Welhelmine in After
Answers
Answer:
Explanation:
n Robert Southey’s anti-war poem “After Blenheim”, Wilhelmine is presented as an innocent and curious little girl. She is the granddaughter of old Kaspar in the poem. We know of Wilhelmne only from her two speeches. We hear the girl speaking for the first time in the fifth stanza when she asks Kaspar —
“Now tell us all about the war,
And what they fought each other for.”
She is spotted with “wonder-waiting eyes” conveying the curiosity of the girl to know why the war took place.
In the penultimate stanza of the poem Wilhelmine speaks out again to deny Kaspar’s claim of a “famous victory” by saying —
“Why, ’twas a very wicked thing!”
Through the character of Wilhelmine the poet reflects upon the zeal and enthusiasm associated with young age and the ability to question things as a peculiar quality of kids which fade away with growing age. Her character goes along well with her brother Peterkin’s but is in sharp contrast to that of her grandfather Kaspar.
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