Allegory : Rivers' Dreams
Rivers is suffering from dreams that are miniature allegories of Alice In Wonderland; his patients all resemble the smiling Cheshire Cat, and he is constantly chased down by the March Hare, brandishing his pocket watch and warning Rivers not to be late for his appointment. He also finds them claustrophobic and his office resembles the rabbit hole that Alice went into in the classic Carroll novel. This is also allegorical of Rivers' feeling that he is going down the rabbit hole to find madness at the end of it.
Motif : Class Resentment
The motif of class resentment runs throughout the novel. Prior finds that he is increasingly angered by the obvious displays of snobbery he witnesses and particularly by Birtwhistle's characterization of the working classes as "water closets" insinuating that they are "bog standard", a British phrase that means that something or someone has the general standard of a toilet. Prior also notices more and more the differences between the way he is treated as an officer and the way in which his men are treated. He is given a servant as an officer and the motif also illustrates the conflict within Prior himself between the working class man he was, and the upper class man he has been promoted to. He still essentially dislikes the class of man he has become and so even resents this part of himself.
Symbol : Water Closet
Birtwhistle nicknames working class soldiers "water closets" using the initials of "working class" to symbolize something entirely different. In Britain the phrase "bog standard" derived from the fact that things or people that were nothing special were considered the standard of the average outdoor toilet in a working class town. The usage of this term symbolizes Birtwhistle's disdain for the soldiers that came from working class backgrounds, and the disdain he also had for their use as soldiers.
Symbol : Immortality of the Writer
Prior observes that among his men there are more poets and diarists than he has seen before. The act of narrating a poem or diary symbolizes the wish for immortality as there was a belief that the first person narrator cannot die. Keeping a diary symbolized the need of the writer to believe he would finish the war alive and live to tell his story in person.
Motif : Homosexuality
Throughout the book, the motif of sexuality is close to the fore. Prior is having a relationship with Captain Manning but outside of this relationship he also judges every man he meets in physical terms rather than by character. He describes each new soldier in terms of his physicality, not just basics like height, weight and coloring, but by the look of their naked chest, their hips, their musculature. Every description Prior gives, or observation that he makes, is rooted in the sexual way in which he is looking at them. The motif is also a more fundamental one in that it is sometimes difficult to judge whether the government of the day considered the Germans, or homosexuals, a more dangerous enemy, as their intent was to destroy both as soon as possible.
