Winter Session 1942 by John Keats

The winter tone at Devon is dull. The younger teachers are gone to war. These younger teachers can be generally described as the cooler ones. They are rather personable. Older, stricter, and traditional teachers such as Mr. Ludsbury, who brutishly claims that Gene had “slipped” over the summer, create a boring atmosphere. Because of the war, the students find ways to contribute to the war effort. One way was to shovel the snow off nearby railroads, an onerous duty that required a day of hard labor. Gene narrates that the “grime of the railroad and the exhaustion of manual laborers were on us all.” The words “grime” and “exhaustion” show the tough task that was placed before the students in the winter. The first train to go on the cleared tracks was a troop train, which suddenly puts the war on the students' minds. As they are in their senior year, the classmates of Gene have enlistments or the day they are eligible for the draft on their mind. Brinker, after seeing the troop train and Leper coming back from inspecting a beaver damn, declares that he is going to enlist. Brinker exclaimed that:

I’ve got to preside at a meeting of the Golden Fleece Debating Society tonight,” he said in a tone of amazed contempt, “the Golden Fleece Debating Society! We’re mad here, all mad,” and he went off raving to himself in the dark.

Brinker is saying that, while there is a war going on, he is attending unimportant clubs such as the “Golden Fleece Debating Society.” This frustrates Brinker so much that he shouts again in bewilderment, “the Golden Fleece Debating Society!” Then, he goes off “raving to himself” in frustration. He is craving to escape the daily, boring life at Devon and go off to war. The war, at this point, obsesses him. This stresses the fact that while Devon is living in normalcy, there is a war going on. As a result the war makes a large impact on the winter session.