The repetition of question marks and dashes illustrate the confusion and frustration witnessing Owens fellow comrades, it is a demanding tone begging for explanation for the entrapment of victims. And as a result, it encourages the reader to consider the impact the war had on both, the soldiers who survived, and those who didn’t. Dulce et Decorum Est brings to reality that war is not what people say it is. Given by its very title, ‘It is sweet and fitting to die for one’s country’. Although, it only an illusion reinforced throughout the poem, along with its irony and sarcasm that is ‘The old Lie; Dulce et Decorum est Pro patria mori’, it is not sweet and fitting to die for ones country.
He emplys the use of imagery in the quote “Drooping tongues from jaws that slob their relish, Baring teeth that leer like skulls' tongues wicked?” (Lines 3, 4). Within those lines, Owen dehumanises the soldiers by personifying them as animalistic with the repulsive imagery used to shock the audience and refute the idea that war is grand. Similarly Owen also depicts this notion in Dulce Et Decorum Est in which the exhaustion of soldiers on the front and their movement between battlefields and trenches is conveyed. In this poem Owen displays to the audience that war is glorified and in doing so challenges this perception through the use of irony in the title “Dulce Et Decorum Est” which reads ‘it’s sweet and honourable’. Owen rejects this misrepresentation of war and confronts the audience through descriptive visual imagery in the line “at every jolt, the blood came gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs”(Line 22), emphasising the gruesome details of his real experiences drawing an insight into the treacherous warfare that society for many years have thought of as noble.
“Dulce et Decorum Est” By Wilfred Owen Critical essay – Callum Kaczynski “Dulce et Decorum Est” is a truly inspiring poem written by Wilfred Owen. As a former soldier, Owen’s poetic exploration conveys the shocking reality of war, and his anger towards the destruction and devastation it causes. The physical state of the soldiers after war creates a pitiful sense of despair. “Bent double, like old beggars under sacks.” This simile shows that they may be seeking desperate help, rest, peace and shelter. At one point they were young, fit men, and now they are worn and weak.
The poet is saying that people should not talk about war as enthusiastically as it gives the impression that war is glorious. Furthermore, he says that the idea that ’it is sweet and right’ to die for your country is entirely untrue. Through this, we are able to form the opinion that war is not okay because it is a serious thing that carries many negative consequences. In Wilfred Owen’s poem Dolce et Decorum est, the use of similes conveys the harsh reality of war on soldiers as it changes them dramatically and kills the majority of them. In the first two lines of the poem, Owen uses the similes “Bent double like old beggars under sacks, knocked kneed, coughing like hags” to paint a grim picture in readers minds of how the soldiers were.
The Manhunt + Nettles War is a destructive force that can be seen as a catalyst for a broken relationship, and this idea is shown in two poems: The Manhunt and Nettles. Whilst both have a literal meaning of remedying and preventing physical pain, both poems show that war is a symbol for destruction for relationships. The Manhunt, as the title suggests, is a definite poem about a desperate search for a man, a man who is being sought after by his wife, Laura in an attempt to save the conditional relationship they have through examining his physical and mental pain seen through a series of metaphors. The poet, Armitage is sending a message to the readers: are efforts to save a relationship futile? Correspondingly, through a conceit in its title, Nettles is a poem about a boy who has fallen into a nettle bed and seeks comfort from his father.
The swirl and muddle of rough and raw emotions of the battlefield, permeating the air like a smog. They think war is a game … when someone is shot they merely die… They do not know, cannot know the truth, cannot hear the screams of dying broken men, crying for their mothers. The tremor of men in their death throes, missing limbs, spewing their own entrails. The malodorous fetor of death loosened bowels. How could we have fathomed the unvarnished nature of war, it was supposed to be an adventure to find our true measure.
Owen compares soldiers fighting in war to sick old men because it shows that soldiers are like outcasts from society. At the top left of the poster, the image shown represents the difficulty and the terrible physical outcomes, soldiers found travelling on ground particularly in sludges as Wilfred Owen states in the first stanza: “Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge” The use of the word Knock-kneed is alliteration for emphasis, a hard, staccato sound to echo the harsh mood of these lines and soldier’s misery. It stresses echo the brutality of the soldiers’ destruction, their transformation from healthy young men into ‘beggars’ and ‘hags’. The use of the word coughing compares men to sick women, showing how they are unrecognisable; they have lost their masculinity, youth, health and therefore are now deemed to be outcast’s within the society. The word sludge is onomatopoeia to imply how heavy and difficult the ground is to cross for soldiers.
Through this detailed description, Gurganus adds to his argument, making the war sound even more horrific. He is trying to get people to see his perspective, and to make all the glory of war seem meaningless. We send these men over to live in terrible conditions and they don’t even know why they are there
Suicide in the Trenches – A hidden massage of a personal abhorrence How is war like? Siegfried Sassoon’s poem “Suicide in the Trenches” answers this question effectively through communication of his personal abhorrence of accruing bloodshed in war. He presents his hidden massage by contrasting images of a desperate young soldier and the conceited crowds to reveal his resentment of war. Sassoon uses the two main components to presents extreme abomination are language and content. Sassoon uses blameful language to describe the ruthless of government in order to reveal the ugly hidden massage as settling the situation.
Ones who died from these toxic gases were in a painful and miserable death. The ones that survived will never forget these images they saw and horrific experiences they had went through. Through Wilfred Owen’s imagery and Irony’s in his poem we can detect the tone, “Dulce et Decorum Est” is a horrific battle scene from World War I. The strong use of figurative language helps to interpret the real meaning of war. In the first line, "Bent double, like old beggars under sacks”, shows us that the troops are so tired that they look like old beggars, slouching from being so drowsy.