Dulce_Et_Decorum_Est_Analysis

Wilfred Owen was a soldier who fought during the First World War. During his time at war he was hospitalized with Post traumatic stress which was then known as “Shell shock”. As part of Owens recovery, he was encouraged to write poetry as therapy. In all of his work, Owens uses various visual and aural techniques to send a powerful message and portray the horror, pain and reality of the war. He expresses his message very clearly in three poems: Dulce et Decorum Est., Disabled and Mental Cases. In Dulce et, Owen ends the poem with the lines: “My friend you would not tell with such high zest… the old lie: Dulce et Decorum est Pro patria mori.” This is latin which means : “It is sweet and proper to die for your country/homeland”. By using these lines to end Dulce et, I think these lines sum up the ideas and message of all Owens poetry that is that the war is a lie and there is a completely different Physical and Mental reality to what is being said. Owen shows us the real reality of war through strong imagery and other techniques in these poems. In Dulce et, Owen uses language techniques to show the physical reality of war and how dying for ones country is not as sweet and honorable as thought. Owen uses a simile straight away with the line “bent double, like old beggars […] coughing like hags. This allows the reader to better picture a bunch of soldiers that are to malnourished and beaten to even stand straight. Another example Owen using simile’s is is "flound'ring like a man on fire or lime." The man described has been poisoned by gas, but he looks as though he is running around trying to put out a fire on himself. The simile illustrates the suffering of the man and his hopelessness. By using the quote “the white eyes writhing in his face […] like a devil’s sick of sin” he shows how the closing line is a lie. Because this quote is able to show how death on the battlefield is not sweet or glorious and how it is brutal and disgusting. Owen also utilizes words that have negative connotations in order to give the reader a feeling of unease. Words such as "sludge," "fatigue," "guttering," "froth-corrupted," "vile," and "incurable," all have negative connotations. By choosing these words, Owen gives the poem an overall feeling of sorrow, sadness and ugliness . This is likely done on purpose to make the reader see the war as Owen does, Miserable and hellish. Owen continues this confronting imagery in the poem Disabled with quotes like “legless, sown short at elbow”. In the poem “Disabled”, Wilfred Owen uses poignant regret and loneliness to show that war is not as glorified as it is portrayed.