The End and the Beginning

Fiction | Poem | Adult | Published in 2001

A modern alternative to SparkNotes and CliffsNotes, SuperSummary offers high-quality Study Guides with detailed chapter summaries and analysis of major themes, characters, and more. For select classroom titles, we also provide Teaching Guides with discussion and quiz questions to prompt student engagement.

Download PDF

Summary

Background

Poem Analysis

Themes

Symbols & Motifs

Literary Devices

Form and Meter

Wisława Szymborska’s “The End and the Beginning” is a 47-line, free verse poem, denoting that there are no consistent patterns of rhyme, rhythm, or meter throughout the piece. The poem contains 10 stanzas, or groupings of lines, ranging anywhere from four lines in length (Stanzas 1, 2, 4, 5, 6, and 8) to seven lines in length (Stanza 7).

Free verse allows Szymborska to convey the same chaos that is present within the content of the poem in its physical structure. Szymborska’s purposeful lack of consistency and pattern leaves readers feeling unsettled and on edge for the entire 47 lines of the poem. Lines that only contain two beats, or syllables, such as Line 3 (“Things won’t”) are juxtaposed against much longer lines like Line 4 (“straighten themselves up, after all”). As a result of this, readers cannot anticipate what is coming next because both the form and content of “The End and the Beginning” is disorderly and confusing.

“The End and the Beginning” is marked more by the progression of time within the content of the piece than by its metrical or rhythmic features. However, it is important to note that, because the poem is a translation, some of the original structural elements and sonic features (literary elements used to stress certain sounds within prose and poetry) may read differently simply because of the linguistic accommodations across languages.

Anaphora

Anaphora, a figure of speech traditionally found in religious devotionals, occurs when a speaker or writer repeats a word or sequence of words at the beginning of a series of sentences or phrases. Szymborska uses this figure of speech across Stanzas 1-4 of “The End and the Beginning,” repeating the phrase “someone has to” five separate times (Line 2).

Szymborska introduces the phrase “someone has to” in the second line of Stanza 1, departing slightly from the conventional first line placement of the repeated phrase to account for the introduction of war in Line 1 (Line 2). Stanzas 2, 3, and 4 repeat the same phrase within their first lines, underscoring the importance of humanity within the context of the poem through the repetition of the pronoun “someone” (Line 5). Szymborska uses anaphora to make a rhetorical appeal, persuading readers to care about the anonymous individuals who are working tirelessly to “clean up” the aftermath of the war (Line 2).

Each time “someone has to” (Line 5) appears in the poem, a new task of reconstruction follows it, becoming increasingly specific across each stanza. In Stanza 1, someone generally has to “clean up” the wreckage (Line 2). However, by Stanza 4, “Someone has to drag in a girder,” a particular type of steel structure used for constructing the framework of large buildings, in order to “prop up a wall” (Lines 14-15). Stanza 4 also makes use of the phrase “someone has to” twice, creating an urgency in Lines 14 and 16, showing that the work is piling up (Line 14).

Szymborska’s use of anaphora mimics daily routines. The repeated use of the phrase “someone has to” across four separate stanzas is predictable, creating a small sense of safety and familiarity within the post-war chaos (Line 2). However, that same sense of safety is also destabilized by the harsh consonant -s sound, grating on readers’ ears, and therefore making them feel on edge.

Anaphora disappears after Stanza 4 of “The End and the Beginning,” fading into obscurity just like the sense of immediacy after the community begins to heal from the scars of war (see: Poem Analysis).

Metaphor

Szymborska does not use any figurative language until the final moments of “The End and the Beginning,” making Stanzas 8 and 10 stand out from the rest of the poem. Szymborska uses two distinct metaphors—exact comparisons between two unrelated things for dramatic or poetic effect—to shift the focus of the poem onto those who forget in the final stanzas. This figure of speech has two parts: a tenor (the object or concept being described in the metaphor) and a vehicle (what the object or concept is compared to). Szymborska’s own opinions and critiques serve as the vehicle of both metaphors, underscoring her frustrations with the residual traumas of war.

In Stanza 8, Szymborska details that after the war, “From out of the bushes / sometimes someone still unearths / rusted-out arguments” (Lines 33-35). The “rusted-out arguments” are the tenor of the metaphor, an abstract concept that is turned into a physical object through Szymborska’s use of figurative language (Line 35). Arguments become part of the tangible rubble, and are heaped onto “the garbage pile” during the final days of reconstruction (Line 36). Szymborska’s ironic tone exposes society’s indifference to the local. The apathy within the description of “the garbage pile” disregards the fact that every item piled together was once someone’s personal belonging, detaching local history from the larger aftermath of war (Line 36).

The final stanza of “The End and the Beginning,” Stanza 10, conjures the image of someone relaxing “in the grass that has overgrown / causes and effects” (Lines 43-44). Here, Szymborska compares the lasting traumas of war to something upon which newer, more pressing issues grow. Szymborska openly disapproves of the speed at which the horrors of war are forgotten, as the land those wars were fought on becomes just “grass” in this imagined future (Line 43).

Szymborska’s use of metaphor exposes how reconstruction is an act of willful forgetting for some, throwing out every physical manifestation of trauma to make the aftermath less emotionally draining. Szymborska’s use of figurative language accomplishes the work of imagining that is not necessary for the didactic observations of the present in previous stanzas. The vivid imagery of Stanzas 8 and 10 transcends the literal meanings of those that came before, exposing how, no matter how deep one buries trauma, it will always manifest itself into the present if it is not properly worked through.