Strange Meeting By Wilfred Owen Essay

Explain how particular features of at least two of Wilfred Owen's poems set for study interact to affect your response to them.

The first device used by Owen in the poem is without a doubt the title, in which he uses to establish the opposing side of the argument in the poem. The poem is titled, “Dulce et Decorum Est”, which comes from Horace’s Odes, book three, line 13, and translated into English to mean: “It is sweet

Wilfred Owen’s poetry is shaped by an intense focus on extraordinary human experiences. In at least 2 poems set for study, explore Owen’s portrayal of suffering and pity.

the boy is quite excited and happy that he had hurt the cat that had

The purpose of war is again in question through the ironic titles evidenced in most of Owen’s poems. In ‘Dulce Et Decorum Est’, the sweet and fitting death is contrasted against the bitter and

Owen’s inner beliefs and perspectives tell himself to believe that the sun will rejuvenate the young soldier, despite the futility of the miracle occurring. This is a great example of Owen’s perspectives on human conflict. Owen continues the second stanza with thoughts questioning the sun’s creation of life in the first place: ‘Think how it wakes the seeds, - Woke once the clays of a cold star’. The repetition of ‘W’ symbolises the confusion of Owen and leaves him questioning why the sun has the potential to create life, but is unable to resurrect the fallen. Throughout the poem of ‘Futility’, Owen contrasts his opinions on the sun. He moves from acknowledging his affection to the ‘kind old sun’ in the first stanza, to finding the sun’s beams ‘fatuous’ and meaningless in the second. These techniques Owen uses convey his perspectives on human conflict extremely well.

As for the meter, it reminds Iambic Pentameter. Though, the conventional rhythm is broken by the author’s punctuation (exclamation points and commas as well as periods and dashes). Due to this device the poem comes closer to prose and sounds conversational. It was probably used to avoid song music mood and to give as much contrast as possible to the heroic poems of other authors like Richard Lovelace. If in Lovelace’s case the poem is to inspire the reader, in Owen’s work the rhythm is like a war, like death itself – hard, stumbling, hopeless, fumbling, and full of suffer. The reader suffers while overcoming all those hyphens and points inside lines. In this way, the two poems are on the opposite sides by their inner and outer sense.

How does Wilfred Owen use language and poetic devices to create impact on the reader?

Owen also uses language of terror and powerlessness for the speaker as the poem progresses. Describing the soldier the speaker has seen fail to attach his gas mask, he says, “I saw him drowning” (14). He dreams of this encounter repeatedly, “[in] all my dreams, before my helpless sight/ He plunges at me” (15-16). In his dreams, he is not only powerless to aid this man, but

In the first stanza the pace is very slow and a painstaking rhythm. Owen decides to use long words to illustrates how painstaking and slow the war was. Owen describes how painful and miserable the trenches are by using; similes, alliteration, hyperbole and onomatopoeia this is a wide range of language use and fits in well with what is described in the first stanza.

How does Owen’s portrayal of the relationship between youth and war move us to a deeper understanding of suffering?

army when he was 22 years old. He was injured in a shell explosion in

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.

<br>There are several image groups used in this poem, two of which I will be reviewing. The first image group is "Sleep or Dreams". Owen often refers to many subconscious states like the afore mentioned one, the reason why he uses these references so frequently is that war is made apparent to the

War makes all its soldiers its victims. It strips them of their innocence; all had dreams for their future. Their future will become a lost life or a life full of memories that will continue to haunt them. The memories of killing, friends being killed, almosts, etc. War contains many horrors like these.