Wilfred Owen Poems Analysis Essay Research Paper

Wilfred Owen Poems Analysis Essay, Research Paper

Wilfred Owen Poems Analysis

20th Century War Poems Analysis

I think that your production of a new book “Anthology for a Warred Youth”, the content it should include is of three sections. The three sections should consist of “Sending Men of to War,” “Horror within War” and “After effects of War”. The five poems you should include are “The Send-off,” “The Going of the Battery”, “Joining the Colours”, “Dulce Est Decorum Et” and “Disabled”.

The first poem “The Send-off” is written by Wilfred Owen. The poem is about men going off to war. It expresses an intense and ominous atmosphere. It is described as being done furtively “down the close darkening lanes”. The use of darkening by Owen suggests that it was done in the evening to obtain secrecy and privacy from any interference of a person. “And lined the train with faces grimly gay”, this third line and Owen has made use of the device oxymoron. The juxtaposition of the word ‘grimly’ against gay suggests that the men are happy to got to war. But one can assume that deep down inside the men are feeling miserable and are low in the level of confidence to proceed with going to the battle front. The usage of ‘gay’ has been applied to convey the device oxymoron, although the men are anxious about departure for war, they still try to show cheerfulness. Owen progresses further ahead into the poem and introduces people watching the men departure. “A casual tramp, stood staring hard.”, the indication we get from this line is that other individuals who have not entered to fight in war are the ‘ones’ better off than the soldiers. The tramp is described “staring hard”, he must have been thinking at the back of his mind, I am lucky that I am not rising my life to go and fight for my country. The use of “hard” indicates that the tramp really focused, gazed, glared not taking his eyes off and foreseeing the large number of men one by one lining up. “Sorry to miss them,” feeling guilt inside himself. “I should be down there to offer my services on behalf of the entire Great Britain. Owen says “then, unmoved, signal nodded and a lamp winked to the guard.” Here there is a usage of personification, meaning signals do not nod or wink, that is the action of a human being. As they went “so secretly, like wrongs hushed up,” Owen uses a simile here. The word “like” indicates this. There is a mention of mistakes “like wrongs ” when they departured. They were “stuck all white with wrath and spray” that could be assumed as preparation for death. The sisters and mothers as the “women meant who gave them flowers.” Assuming the young men would not return as they would result in being killed during war. The men will make their way “to the village wells,” many not to return alive and unable to identify their non-existent village due to war damage, travelling “up half known roads.” The rhyming scheme is ABAAB which is regular as it repeated in all of the verses.

The second poem “The Going of the battery” is written by Thomas Hardy. This is also a poem about war, it’s about the Boer War. “Gas glimmers drearily, blearily, eerily” is a section of this poem showing that this poem is highly rhythmic as it sounds like a song the whole of the poem. this speeds up the pace of the poem, when compared with Owen’s “The Send-off” it is more faster it is similar by having a regular rhyme scheme of ABCB while “the Send-off” ha a ABAAB rhyme scheme. This poem consists of seven quatrains while “Send-off” consists of a 3,2,5,3,2,5 line structure. It is also similar to the “Send-off” by showing these men as fully determined to go to war and fight on behalf of the entire United Kingdom. The women are unfortunate “first to risk choosing, them leave alone losing them,” they are unable to convince their men not to go to war. They have been described as going “beyond the South Sea ,” the use of an eclipse here conveys that the distance travelled will be large. The soldiers can not expect to return safely as many would have battled as the “rain came down drenchingly:” has a symbol of a colon, in poetic terms this is called caesura, it is only made productive for a change in mood or expressionism. It is similar by to Owen’s “Send-off” in aspects of women “choosing them”, their husbands and then as they proceed to prepare for war they are left to “leave alone losing them.” Owen describes this as “women meant who gave them flowers,” they had affectionate and deep passionate feelings for their men and were concerned by how young the men were. Hardy’s view differs from Owen’s by “each woman prayed for them,” each individual needed as much positive thought and needed the help of god to succeed. “nevermore will they come:,” who could die in agony, going unnoticed , piling upon existing rotting bodies, who “evermore are there now lost to us.” Not to return or maybe to develop physical and mental disabilities. In “The Send-off” Owen has used similar foundations upon the return of men but “may creep back, silent, to village wells,” they will feel mentally hanged and travel “up half known roads,” affected physically during war injury and also by the environmental surroundings not familiar with the men anymore. For weeks they have spent their lives in trenches, seeing so many lives lost. “The Going of the Battery” is more descriptive and goes more in-depth into the emotions of the soldiers hopes and how ‘each’ feel for