A Critical Analysis Of Futility And 21 Guns

Wilfred Owen's war poems central features include the wastage involved with war, horrors of war and the physical effects of war. These features are seen in the poems "Dulce Et Decorum Est" and "Anthem for Doomed Youth" here Owen engages with the reader appealing to the readers empathy that is felt towards the soldier. These poems interact to explore the experiences of the soldiers on the battlefields including the realities of using gas as a weapon in war and help to highlight the incorrect glorification of war. This continuous interaction invites the reader to connect with the poems to develop a more thorough

what the nature of war and creating a sense of 'them' and 'us' this is

Literature and poetry are a reflection of society. The words are reflected in numerous feelings that we can almost touch and can be deeply felt in its reach. Most poets expressed their perception and emotion through their writings. Unfortunately the art and poetry describes one of the worst things that human can do to one another. The legalized murder called "war." Hence, this type of self-reflection called "poetry" has help create new fundamental ideas and values towards our society. In this essay, I will discuss the issue of the "War Poetry" during the "Great War" along with comparing and contrasting two talented renowned poets; Wilfred Owen (1893-1918) and Siegfried Sassoon (1886-1967).

War is a scandalous topic where peoples’ views differ as to what war is. Some people see it as pure evil and wicked while others think that it is brave and noble of what soldiers do. Looking at poems which had been written by people affected by war help show the messages which are portrayed. The two sets of poems which show different views of war as well as some similarities are “the Charge of the Light Brigade” by Alfred Lord Tennyson, “To Lucasta, on Going to the Wars” by Richard Lovelace and “Dulce Et Decorum Est” by Wilfred Owen, “The Song of the Mud” by Mary Borden. Both these poets use linguistic devices to convince the reader of their view of what the war is. Tennyson and Lovelace show how war is worthy

Protest poems and songs are, and have been throughout history, an effective medium of expressing their composer’s concerns or protests to a wide audience. The main themes behind each of these creative media are influenced heavily by the context in which they were created and focus on the composer’s opinions about controversial issues of that time. Poet Bruce Dawe, through his poem ‘homecoming’ and singer-songwriter Barry Maguire, through his song ‘Eve of destruction’ were able to explore and express their similar concerns about the harsh and dehumanising aspects of war and the effects on society, with Maguire focussing on the ignorance of society toward the detrimental effects of war and Dawe reflecting on emotional trauma experienced by those who lost love ones to the brutality of war.

One is to think of war as one of the most honorable and noble services that a man can attend to for his country, it is seen as one of the most heroic ways to die for the best cause. The idea of this is stripped down and made a complete mockery of throughout both of Wilfred Owen’s poems “Dulce Et Decorum Est” and “Anthem for Doomed Youth”. Through his use of quickly shifting tones, horrific descriptive and emotive language and paradoxical metaphors, Owen contradicts the use of war and amount of glamour given towards the idea of it.

In the second stanza the distinctive experience of power is present. The use of the technique of imagery and emotive words “to pluck them from the shallows and bury them in burrows’ tells us that the soldiers were strong, loyal and had enough power within a degree to assist fellow soldiers. The use of personification to create sound “sob and clubbing of the gunfire” This leads the audience to understand what the soldiers were up against without even directly saying it. The imagery visually shows the scene in their

Para-rhymes, in Owen’s poetry, generate a sense of incompleteness while creating a pessimistic, gloomy effect to give an impression of sombreness. Strong rhyming schemes are often interrupted unexpectedly with a para-rhyme to incorporate doubt to every aspect of this Great War. Who are the real villains and why are hundreds of thousands of lives being wasted in a war with no meaning? In ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’, the consistent sonnet rhyming scheme is disturbed by a half rhyme, “guns … orisons”, to show how the soldiers all died alone with only the weapons that killed them by their side, and a visual rhyme, “all … pall” to indicate that the reality of war is entirely the opposite to what it seems - no glory, no joy and no heroism, but only death and destruction. Owen occasionally works with this technique in a reverse approach to create similar thought. For instance, the assonance, consonance and half rhyme based poem, ‘The Last Laugh’, contains an unforeseen full rhyme, “moaned … groaned”, to emphasise that nothing is ever fixed in war except the ghastly fact that the weapons are the true winners. Different forms of Para rhymes often work together with common schemes to ably bring out the main ideas of Owen’s poetry.

Wilfred Owen experiences many inner conflicts during his time in the war. The harsh notions of war constantly challenge his personal morals and beliefs. ‘Futility’ explores Owen’s emotions involving the pointlessness of human sacrifice. In the poem, Owen and his comrades lay a dying

“In his poetry, Wilfred Owen depicts the horror and futility of war and the impact war has on individuals.”

Two poets who skilfully use language features to discuss the violence of mankind and the damaging effects of war are Owen Sheers in Mametz Wood and Simon Armitage in Out of the Blue. A few of these language features are metaphors, plosive alliteration, verbs and oxymoron. These poems are useful for the reader, as it allows them to have an advanced understanding of the impact that war has on an individual during and after the war. The poems are based on real-life events that affected a large part of the population; They are elegiac and respectful to the victims of those historical

War is not heroic. War is sickness, struggle, and death. This is the message that poet and World War I soldier Wilfred Owen wanted to instill in his people back home. Those back home talked of glory and national pride and rooted for their soldiers, however, they were unaware of the horrors these soldiers witnessed and experienced. The soldiers and their people back home were not only separated by distance but by mental barriers, which Owen showcases in his poetry. Owen’s use of personification in “Anthem for Doomed Youth” degrades the soldiers to objects to show how the war dehumanized them to intentionally create a disconnect between the audience and the soldiers.

Owen’s poem has the clear intention of showing the true nature of war to the reader, which is mainly achieved by contrasting reality against the ways in which war is so

The idea of the futility of war can be seen in the poem Strange Meeting, where the persona creates a scenario of two opposing soldiers having a conversation in Hell. The line, “The pity of war, the pity war distilled” uses repetition with the word “pity” to imply the pity that is felt for the soldiers that have died at war. The use of the word “distilled” is indicating how war is attracting the concentration of many people and that the soldiers are dying for pointless reasons, intensifying the pity felt on the soldiers. Futility of war is again demonstrated in Owen’s poem, Futility, in the final stanza with the rhetorical question, “Was it for this the clay grew tall?” Owen use of imagery of “clay grew tall” is making a biblical reference to humans being made by ‘clay’ and questioning was the creation of humankind futile due to the recurring inevitability of war and suffering. In the previous lines, Owen compares the sun with God and is desperate to bring his comrades back to life, “Woke, once, the clays of a cold star” The use of the oxymoron is Owen indicating that the sun is now weaker than it was previously. Owen is explaining how futile the sun was to provide life on Earth if it is unable to bring back the dead. The reference to a cold star is highlighting the life that was brought to Earth has now turned cold due to it being destroyed and killed from war. This presents Owen’s idea of the futility of war as it will result in the destruction of

Throughout Wilfred Owen’s collection of poems, he unmasks the harsh tragedy of war through the events he experienced. His poems indulge and grasp readers to feel the pain of his words and develop some idea on the tragedy during the war. Tragedy was a common feature during the war, as innocent boys and men had their lives taken away from them in a gunshot. The sad truth of the war that most of the people who experienced and lived during the tragic time, still bare the horrifying images that still live with them now. Owen’s poems give the reader insight to this pain, and help unmask the tragedy of war.