Dulce Et Decorum Est - Critical Response Essay

Wilfred Owen's poem, "Dulce et Decorum Est", uses striking and vivid imagery to convey the horror of gas warfare during World War I. Owen opens the poem with a description of soldiers retreating from battlefield. These men are exhausted as they "marched asleep." (line 6) The agonizing physical state soldiers lived through is grusesome and detailedly depicted by Owen. He explains how they "bent double like old beggars inder sacks/Knock-kneed, coughing like hags" (lines 1-2). Soon, "Gas! GAS!" (line 9) is shouted and the men go into an "ecstasy of fumbling" (line 9) to secure their masks against the green poison trying to invade their lungs. This new chemical warfare introduced in World War I was a deadly enemy that many were not prepared for.

During his recount of a gas attack, Owen uses similes to help convey the desperation he and his comrades faced during World War I. In fact, in his

In “Dulce et Decorum est” Wilfred Owen presents war as a gruesome and demoralizing paradox . Throughout the poem, Owen mocks the idea of war making it evident that he finds war vain and futile. The poem is written in first person and Owen expresses his own experience of the brutality of war-which makes it easier for the reader to empathize with the soldiers.

“Dulce et Decorum Est” is a poem written by English soldier and a poet, Wilfred Owen. He has not only written this poem, but many more. Such as “Insensibility”, “Anthem for Doomed Youth”, “Futility”, “Exposure”, and “Strange Meeting” are all his war poems. (Poets.org) His poetry shows the horror of the war and uncovers the hidden truths of the past century. Among with his other poems “Dulce et Decorum Est” is one of the best known and popular WWI poem. This poem is very shocking as well as thought provoking showing the true experience of a soldiers in trenches during war. He proves the theme suffering by sharing soldiers’ physical pain and psychological trauma in the battlefield. To him that was more than just fighting for owns country. In this poem, Owen uses logos, ethos, and pathos to proves that war was nothing more than hell.

Wilfred Owen is a tired soldier on the front line during World War I. In the first stanza of Dulce Et Decorum Est he describes the men and the condition they are in and through his language shows that the soldiers deplore the conditions. Owen then moves on to tell us how even in their weak human state the soldiers march on, until the enemy fire gas shells at them. This sudden situation causes the soldiers to hurriedly put their gas masks on, but one soldier did not put it on in time. Owen tells us

Owen uses Imagery as another method to convey the brutality of war and also as a means of contrast to show his life before and after. In the third stanza he creates a picture of blood being poured away; “poured it down shell-holes till the veins ran dry” and he uses metaphorical language to emphasis the point that he nearly bled to death as you cannot literally pour the blood out of your veins.

Another tool in developing the effectiveness of the poem is the use of compelling figurative language in the poem helps to reveal the reality of war. In the first line, the metaphor, ?Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,?(1) shows us that the troops are so tired that they can be compared to old beggars. Also, the simile "coughing like hags"(2) helps to depict the soldiers? poor health and depressed state of mind. Owen makes us picture the soldiers as ill, disturbed and utterly exhausted Another great use of simile, ?His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin,?(20) suggests that his face is probably covered with blood which is the color symbolizing the devil. A very powerful metaphor is the comparison of painful experiences of the troops to ??vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues.?(24) This metaphor emphasizes that the troops will never forget these horrific experiences. As you can see, Owen has used figurative language so effectively that the reader gets drawn into the poem.

Wilfred Owen’s porter vividly depicts the horror and futility of war and the detrimental impact of war upon the soldiers. Owen’s poem, ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’, written in 1917 depicts the horror of war as the physical and mental damages on the solders. Most importantly, the context of the poem subverts its title. In his other poem, ‘Futility’ written in 1918, conveys war as fatal and that war is pure wastage of human lives.

Written by famous war poet Wilfred Owen, ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’ is a poem he wrote while he was serving as a World War 1 soldier and was thought to have been written between the eighth of October 1917, and March, 1918. Owen often wrote poems during the war explaining his feelings of hatred and uselessness of the war and often sent them back to Australia for his mother. Owen uses a range of poetic techniques to convey his central themes of the futility of the war and the suffering that the soldiers had to endure. The techniques he uses in the war poem to covey the themes of futility and suffering are by writing the poem in the form of a ballad which recounts one of his foulest memories from the war, the vivid imagery which paints a picture of his recount and the hidden meaning behind the title itself.

Young lives are wasted in war which only increases the cruelty and meaningless of it. Wilfred Owen’s poem, “Dulce et Decorum est” follows the death of a young soldier. In the line “If you could hear at every jolt the blood froth from his corroded lungs. The strong use of visual and sensory imagery depicts what the soldier’s final moments of how his life ended, the soldier died a painful death from suffocation due to a fierce gas attack.

‘Dulce et Decorum Est’ is another of Wilfred Owen’s poems that conveys inner human conflict, in terms of past doings in World War I. The poem was written in 1917 at Craiglockhart (Owen’s first battle after his rehabilitation due to ‘shellshock’). It portrays an inner change in his approach to war and it’s gruesome environment:

Throughout the poem ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’, Owen exposes the true horrors of the war, with the opening of the poem beginning with a disturbing and confronting description of soldiers that are under attack; challenging the idea of the nobility of men fighting honourably for their country from the first lines. As the men struggle through the “sludge”, Owens has compared their condition to that of ‘Knock-kneed old hags’ through the use of alliteration and a simile when he writes “Knock-kneed, coughing like hags”. This displays to readers that the men were physically exhausted and their bodies unable to cope with the conditions that they have to deal with, exposing to the public the real situation the soldiers were in as well as challenging the political propaganda that glamourized war. Continuing on from this Owens writes “And towards our distant rest began to trudge”. This use of a metaphor provides a double meaning, displaying both

The poem vividly depicts a snapshot in time and the reader can see, hear and almost smell the environment leaving them in a state of sadness and shock. Through the use of similes, metaphors and oxymorons Owen is able to evoke a realistic experience immersing the reader into the soldier’s terrors and distress during warfare and gassing in the trenches. ‘Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge’. These similes clearly depict soldiers struggling in the atrocious conditions and likens them to beggars and hags. ‘His hanging face, like a devil’s sick of sin’ Expresses the idea that the dying soldier can take no more and has given up. Owens use of metaphors such as ‘Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots, of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind’ impress upon the reader the shell shocked state of the soldiers and struggle of survival. ‘As under a green sea, I saw him drowning. In all my dreams, before my helpless sight, He plungers at me, guttering, choking, drowning.’ This soldier is helpless to save his mate and watches on as he dies. The use of oxymorons emphasise the soldiers plight- ‘Men marched asleep.’ Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!- An ecstasy of fumbling’ Dulce et Decorum Est is an emotionally wrenching tale confronting the reader. Through the use of expressive language, the poem is constructed into a work of art that successfully transports the reader to experience the emotional pain of the

Poems using strong poetic technique and devices are able to create a wide range of emotions from the readers. Wilfred Owen’s poetry effectively uses these poetic techniques and devices to not only create unsettling images about war but to provide his opinion about war itself with the use of themes within his poem. The use of these themes explored Owen’s ideas on the futility of war and can be seen in the poems: Anthem for Doomed Youth, Futility and The Next War. The poems provide unsettling images and belief of war through the treatment of death, barbaric nature of war and the futility of war.

Particularly during Owen’s time at war, World War I, many people thought that it was noble and glorious honour to go to war, but Owen’s poetry completely disregards that notion and how futile war really is. The title of Dulce Et Decorum Est is Latin for “It is sweet and glorious” and is ironic, due to the fact that that is not what the poem is about, especially as the last two lines state that “The old Lie” is that it is sweet and honourable to die for one’s country, although this is written in Latin in the poem. The