Hi I'm Mark!
Ms B's S2s have been doing some great poetry work and my essay is on the
link below. We have been reading the poem
Dulce Et Decorum Est and we did an essay about it. We discussed the techniques
Wilfred Owen uses and how well he uses them. We wrote about the language he uses and some of
the similes and imagery he uses.
I hope you enjoy my essay.
Dulce Et Decorum Est
The poem “Dulce Et Decorum Est” By Wilfred Owen is a very good war poem because of its theme: the horrors and unfairness of war. The techniques used by Owen make it more vivid and meaningful. He uses great language like “sludge” and “trudge”. He makes some of it rhyme and uses great similes, metaphors and personification. I will discuss the techniques Owen uses and how well he uses them.
In section one of the poem the soldiers are marching to their base, very slowly and then a gas-shell falls on them. The theme of the poem is the horrors and unfairness of war and this is shown very well because the soldiers are walking away from the fighting and yet, they are caught in a random gas attack. Owen uses great imagery, which gives us a better understanding of the poem and also gives us a better picture in our minds. He uses great similes and a very good example is:
“Like old beggars under sacks.”
He uses a lot more good examples and some of them are:
“Coughing like hags”, “Men marched asleep”, they had lost their boots “But limped on blood shod”, “all went lame all blind”, “Drunk with fatigue”.
All the quotes above help us imagine what the author was writing or seeing if he was writing about a first hand experience. The imagery makes us think that the soldiers are old men but are actually young men. The men are all tired, some may have serious injuries and the poet describes them as if they are old, tired and walking around like homeless people.
The punctuation in the middle of the lines, which slows it down and also, gives us the impression of the pace the soldiers are moving at.
“Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots.”
The pace and rhythm of the section makes us think that the soldiers are dragging themselves away from the fighting.
The imagery used also used sound effects like sludge and trudge and they give us the idea of walking through mud and instead of saying walk and mud, sludge and trudge are much more effective. The ‘s’ sounds in the last two lines are; hoots, gas-shells and softly. This gives us the impression of gas shells falling softly on the ground and hoots for the gas escapes and is a very good example of onomatopoeia.
Sound effects lead to word association because they give us a picture that makes us think of something else. “Blood shod” means shoed with blood because they have lost their boots and their feet are covered in blood and scabs because of walking over the rough ground. We associate the word “blood shod” with blood shot and blood shed. The first section suggests that the men have been through a very hard time and then they are attacked by a gas shell and their day just gets even worse.
In the second section the soldiers are putting on their gas masks because a gas canister has falling behind them but one man breaths in the gas and then chocks and is dieing and it is as if he is drowning in a sea of green grass. The lack of punctuation in the second section gives us the impression of a fast rhythm and pace, makes us think that the soldiers are moving fast trying to put their gas masks on time and it all happens very quickly. The pace and rhythm of the second section makes us think that something fast is happening and they’re trying to get their gas masks on quickly. Owen uses capital letters at the start of the second section when writing “GAS!” and this shows that the men are reacting very quickly and panicking to try to get their gas masks on in time. Owen uses an image to describe the man dieing in the gas and the poet describes it as a man drowning in gas but if someone seen that happening it would be like a man drowning in a sea of green gas.
In section three Owen isn’t telling a story anymore, he is talking about his dreams. How he sees a man dying after the war. Owen says the man plunges at him and that relates to the dream because the man plunges at him dying choking. It relates to the image because all of a sudden a man plunges and the poet sees him in all his dreams dying, choking, guttering and drowning. Guttering is very effective because it is to do with the throat because the throat is burning and completely destroying his throat and the noises he makes are quite horrific. Guttering is sometimes descried as a flame and is relevant to the soldier’s life because the human life is sometimes described as a flame and the solider is guttering his last breaths of life as his flame of life is burning out.
In section four the soldiers are taking the dying man, and flung him in the wagon and watched his eyes writhing and listing to the blood gargling from his mouth. The poet describes what is happening to us and he uses the word flung and he lets everyone know the horrors of war but he also tells us how they treated dying soldiers. “We flung”, gives us the impression of how they would just throw the bodies in to a wagon and watch them dieing like some animal. The poet is trying to achieve the image of a man dying and the effect the gas is having on him. He uses words like;
“Writhing”, “gargling”, “froth corrupted” and “incurable”.
The solider is writhing in pain and blood is gargling from his mouth and it is all because of the gas. The motto at the end of the poem is,
“Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori”.
This means it is sweet and fitting to die for your country. By saying about the solider dying and the language he uses, we know he was calling this a lie. It is not good to die for your country and certainly not sweet or fitting.
The motto is ironic because the poet proves it is not good to die for your country because the soldiers are walking away from the fighting and the gas shells are fired from far away from the soliders but one solider dies a horrible and agonizing death. It is not good to die for your country.
The effect the poem had on me was negative because it shows me the horrors and unfairness of war. It was a shame for how many men had to die for their country, which is very sad indeed. The poem made me think how unfair war is and now I, no matter what, will never join the army.
The poem helped me understand the horrors and unfairness of war and also what some of the soldiers went through. My response to the poem is shock because of how much pain the soldiers went through and how awful war is. The poet uses some great language and one example is,
“Like a devil’s sick of sin”.
This is one of the most horrific examples of a tragic moment. This is a great poem and it shows everyone the unfairness of war, and how it will never be sweet and fitting to die for your country.
The End - By Mark
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