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Dulce Et Decorum Est

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Good morning/afternoon audience. Today I will be giving a spoken analysis of the poem ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’ by Wilfred Owen. I have selected this poem because it does not glorify or romanticize the harsh realities of war or treat the effects it has on people as a taboo as many poets who write about war often chose to do. I would now like to show a video animation of “Dulce Et Decorum Est.”
Wilfred Owen was an English born poet, who served in the First World War. During his service, Owen experienced war in its actuality, namely the horrific front line action. This front line action caused Owen to be committed to the Craighlockhart Psychiatric Hospital situated in Edinburgh, Scotland. Here he wrote ‘Dulce’ while recovering from shell shock, …show more content…

The theme is captured in the lines “In all my dreams, before my helpless sight, He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.” Those exposed to chlorine gas did in fact often die of asphyxiation. The frankness of this poem was intended to refute the propaganda that at the time was the only information received about the war. The propaganda portrayed war as an act of patriotism, defending one’s country for the greater good. This lack of information often lead to not only the glorification of war and its violence, but has immortalized these events as acts of heroics and bravery. This resulted in ignorance of the mental effects and disorders that returning soldiers often develop during war, such as PTSD. Owen presents an overall antiwar and anti-jingoistic message through its blunt and graphic use of imagery, this is highlighted in the lines “If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues”. This imagery positions the audience to feel horror for what the soldiers are enduring.
‘Dulce Est Decorum Est’s first stanza opens onto a war torn battlefield with fatigued and jaded soldiers marching. The focal point of this poem, the second stanza, centers on graphic imagery of a gas attack, which describes a soldier struggling to get a gas mask on during the attack. In the next short, two-line stanza, the poem’s climax is seen as the soldier stumbles and chokes to death. The last, long stanza is the narrator’s response to the soldier’s death, depicting the theme of the poem as a whole: war is a not glorious or noble, and societies’ portrayal of this is a

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