Horrors of Warfare
The evocative and even graphic imagery of the poem, interwoven with the introspection of the photographer, illustrates the enduring and horrifying impact of warfare. Duffy describes the “nightmare heat” of fields that “explode” beneath the running children. The use of “nightmare” as an adjective suggests the disturbing and surreal qualities of the horrific war scene. The red glow of the darkroom foreshadows the horrific “blood” that “stains” the ground of the war scene; this link between the subtle red glow and the red blood highlights the violence of war itself. Other diction choices, such as “suffering,” “pain,” and “agonies,” build together in each stanza to create a complex depiction.
The listing of three war sites in very different locations—Belfast (Ireland), Beirut (Lebanon), and Phnom Penh (Cambodia)—reflecting how widespread the pain inflicted by war is globally. By mentioning these sites in a single line—“Belfast. Beirut. Phnom Penh”—the poem strings them together in a brutal succession, suggesting that although the locations and contexts of the different conflicts are very different, they are simply items in a list for the photographer, who has witnessed similar violence across different times and places. This repetition is further established in the final stanza, which invokes the “Sunday supplement” that is published once a week, numbing the readers who routinely “prick with tears“ at the images before carrying on with their Sunday routines of “baths and pre-lunch beers.” The full horror of war is obscured within this repetition, which in the context of the poem, only highlights the pain of war. Duffy further develops this theme through comparison: while those in countries not at war, like England at this time period, still confront “suffering,” that pain is “ordinary” in comparison to the immense trauma of war. “[S]imple weather” can “dispel” such suffering, while the pain of war is much more indelible and horrific.
Ethics of War Photography
By demonstrating both the horrors of war and the trauma that is then transferred onto the photographer as an observer, Duffy invites the reader to reflect on the concept of war photography. On one hand, the photographer is partially traumatized by his role as a witness rather than an active participant in the conflict: he must watch “running children in a nightmare heat” and hear the screams of war victims’ families, but is powerless to intervene in the conflict. Some scholars have critiqued the practice of war photography as “voyeuristic”: the photographers must view immense conflict through an aesthetic lens, determining how to get the most powerful image for their audience. Some believe this places aesthetics over ethics by recreating a violent, horrific scene into an image that is preserved and presented to an audience, without intervening in the moment. In turn, the viewers themselves observe and are affected by these images, but rarely take action to help victims. Duffy develops this concept of passivity in the face of atrocity by repeatedly describing moments of stillness—the photographer’s hands were steady and did “not tremble” during the heat of war; he feels like a priest “preparing” to give a Mass, capturing the moment of silence and inaction before speech; and he silently “sought approval” to take the photographs during the war.
Another potential ethical concern is consent, as revealed in the line in which the photographer “sought approval without words” from a war victim’s wife to document her husband’s suffering during the war. The photographer must work quickly in the moment and is removed from his “subjects,” who to him are not just humans in conflict but subjects of a photograph. Duffy highlights this theme when she describes the "stranger's features," his facial characteristics, which are then transformed into images within a newspaper "feature," an article on the war. Duffy also develops this theme structurally by making the poem’s reader a silent observer who witnesses the photographers’ actions even though he is ostensibly “finally alone.” Similarly, although the photographer feels himself to be alone, he is haunted by images of other people, specifically the “running children” in the warzone, the stranger that died in war, and the man’s wife who observed this. This blending of subject and artist reflects the blurred ethical lines between observing and aestheticizing war.
Duffy also presents another perspective: that the photographer is performing a difficult yet necessary service in documenting the atrocity of war, in order to raise awareness, inspire action, and prevent similar horrors from happening in the future. Duffy signals this theme by expressing how the photographer silently seeks consent to “do what someone must”; the need to document war to spread awareness and to preserve memory of the atrocities that were committed needs to be completed by “someone.” While war photography can be met with apathy, as it is in the text, the photographer’s intense emotion implies his hope that photography could serve higher aims by motivating the audience. This is also hinted at in the line where the viewers' eyes “prick with tears” at the horrors depicted by war photography, suggesting that they are not totally desensitized to suffering. Susan Sontag’s famous and influential 2003 book Regarding the Pain of Others explores the ethics of war photography and reflects many of the same themes as those in “War Photographer.” While Sontag suggests that our overexposure to violent imagery of foreign conflicts in the media may desensitize and numb us to suffering, war photography also has the power to encourage activism and invoke empathy.
Religion
According to scholar Jane Dowson, Duffy’s work “disrupt[s] binary polarizations of atheism and faith.” "War Photographer" fits within this depiction by using religious images as metaphors to describe the war photographer’s work. While Duffy is an atheist, she was raised as a Roman Catholic and has expressed her view that “[p]oetry and prayer are very similar.” Here, the photographer also compares his art form to religion, describing himself as a priest giving Mass while he prepares to develop his photographs. This metaphor shows the similarities between religion and art: the artist is the creator and ‘God’ of their work, whether it be an image or a literary work. However, the fourth stanza demonstrates how just as religion was losing importance in late-twentieth-century society, art may also fail to achieve its intended impact. The photographer refers to “Sunday’s supplement.” Sunday is also the day of weekly Catholic Mass, further highlighting the religious overtones of the photographer’s work. Just as the priest’s Mass may not fully reach or affect his parish, the photographer’s images, while momentarily evocative, are quickly forgotten in the Sunday routine of “bath and pre-lunch beers.”
Just as religion has been an essential part of human history, so has war. Major religions also attempt to offer a way to cope with horrors such as war but often fail to explain why such atrocities can possibly occur. The line from the Bible that Duffy selects, “All flesh is grass,” offers one explanation by emphasizing the frailty of human life and God’s ability to take life away, as well as restore eternal life. However, the photographer himself seems unable to accept the brevity of human life and the traumatic way in which it can be taken away. Although he thinks of this Bible verse as applicable to his situation, this thought doesn’t stop his hands from “trembl[ing]” as he works.
