Pay attention to language, structure and the writer’s purpose in presenting war as they have.Dulce et decorum est and Anthem for doomed youth were written by a soldier called Wilfred Owen during the First World War. Dulce et decorum est is about war and the circumstances soldiers who fought in it had to face, the writer wrote the poem based on his own experience of the war.
It was first published in 1921. Anthem for doomed youth was written in (year) with assistance from Wilfred Owen’s fellow soldier Siegrfried Sasson while Owen was being treated in hospital as a result of an injury he obtained in war. By comparison Lord Tennyson, the poet laureate, wrote The charge of the Light Brigade in 1964. It was written subsequent to the reading of WH Russell’s report on the charge of the Light Brigade during the Crimean War.
Wilfred Owen’s Dulce et decorum est consists of twenty-eight lines. These lines are divided into three main stanzas, each with eight to twelve lines.The second stanza of Dulce et decorum est is broken further into two parts, one with six lines and the other with two making eight lines altogether. The writer did this in order to create effect by making the reader pause before going to the second part of the stanza.
Anthem for doomed youth can be easily distinguished from most of works of Owen, as it is sonnet. Since sonnets are normally for love poems, there is some irony in the use of a sonnet in Anthem for doomed youth, which is a poem about war. Through the style of the poem Owen shows the readers the further irony in what was experienced by the soldiers who died ‘as cattle’ as a result of their patriotism. The fourteen lines of Anthem for doomed youth are divided into two stanzas – the first an octet and the second a sestet.
The charge of the Light Brigade has a total of thirty-three lines, which are split into six stanzas of six to eleven lines each. Lord Tennyson did this in order to build a narrative structure, which tells of stages of the charge.There is no definite rhyming pattern in The charge of the Light Brigade although it has a strong use of rhymes, most of it rhymes are half rhymes. Lord Tennyson did this by replacing the word Brigade with words like ‘Them’ and ‘The six hundred’ to prevent creating definite rhyming pattern.
This creates a half rhyming scheme, which gives a galloping pace to suit the subject.Anthem for doomed youth has an alternate rhyming pattern, which forms two quatrains of abab and cdcd in the first stanza. This pattern is similar to that of Dulce et decorum est. In the second stanza the first four lines form a rhyming couplet of effe, the ninth and twelfth stanza rhyme while the tenth and eleventh line rhyme.
Dulce et decorum est has a strong rhyming pattern of abab, cdcd for every stanza. The impact of the rhyming pattern is reduced while the poem is being read due to the run on lines which makes the poem seem more like prose.The rhythm of Dulce et decorum est shows the pace at which the writer intended the poem to be read by its readers. This could be seen in the variation of the words and phrases in the poem.
Stanzas one and three contain a lot of long words and phrases with more than one syllable, and frequent punctuations which makes the reader read the stanzas slowly for example ‘knock-kneed, coughing like hags…sludge’ from stanza one and ‘Of vile, incurable tongues’ from stanza three. While stanza two has short words, which are mainly monosyllables, short phrases with less punctuation than the other stanzas, increasing the pace at which the stanza is read at for example ‘As under the green sea’.
Anthem for doomed youth has a similar rhyming pattern to Dulce et decorum est. Its rhythm shows how Wilfred Owen wanted the poem to be read. Initially the poem has a fast pace but as the reader goes on the pace decelerates and finally draw to a very ‘slow’, and sober close.Wilfred Owens Dulce et decorum est and Anthem for doomed youth are in iambic pentameter.
For example the rhetorical question in stanza one of Anthem for doomed youth ‘What passing bells for those who die as cattle’, which was answered in the rest of the stanza. Although line four of Dulce et decorum est has an extra unstressed syllable ‘and’ this shows that they both have a regular metre.The metre of The charge of the Light Brigade is regular. It uses short words and lines and very little punctuation.
This feature allows the lines to be read quicker because the reader doesn’t have to pause as many times as he or she would have had to if for instance the poem had more punctuation. The writer mimics the sound of galloping horses by putting one long syllable after two short ones for example ‘Half a league’ this dactylic feet also speeds up the pace at which the poem is read through excitement.Wilfred Owen used complex words in both of his poems. The choice of words give an idea of the type of audience the poems were aimed at.
Dulce et decorum est was aimed at, which is an educated audience- mainly the propagandists. Evidence for this can be seen in stanza three ‘My friend you would not tell… Pro patria mori’. While Lord Tennyson used simple words to portray his message to his audience, which was the general public. This feature allows the poem to be easily understood by anybody in the general public. Anthem for doomed youth was aimed at the family of the soldiers who died during the war and were being buried in the absence of ‘prayers nor bells’, ‘nor any voice of morning’ as well as the ‘pallor of girls’ who go pale from the news of their the death of their brother, father or partner.
I will discuss the audience more fully later in this essay.The Language of Dulce et decorum est is very powerful. This is because Wilfred Owen used a lot of imagery. He did this by juxtaposing situations in war to our day-to-day activities by using metaphor and simile through out poem.
These comparisons do not only create vivid images in the reader’s mind’s eye but also add daily connotations, which allows the reader to attach new meanings to the images. For example in stanza one Wilfred Owen observed that the ‘Men marched asleep’ juxtaposing the men marching to people sleeping to show how tired the soldiers were and how they still followed orders automatically by marching while sleeping, unable to cheat nature, regardless of danger. This hyperbole is effective because the writer exaggerates the tiredness of the soldier by saying that they ‘marched asleep’. The soldiers could have been excessively tired but being human, they couldn’t march asleep.
In line seven he uses metaphor to compare the ‘fatigue’ of the tired soldiers to being ‘drunk’. By applying the word ‘drunk’ he allows the reader to imagine the ‘fatigue’ of the soldiers and also to generate a vivid picture of the soldiers marching down slowly and staggering through connotation. Connoting the ‘drunk’ with our day to day activities also makes it an irony since drinking on normal circumstances has to do with celebration and fun would have been rather remote while they ‘trudge’ ‘towards their’ far away camp or ‘distant rest’.’Haunting Flares’ is another one of the metaphors used in Dulce et decorum est.
This metaphor does not only describe the flares that kept on revisiting them but is also contradictory when imagined in an every day scene. This is because ‘flares are white and they cast light over things that we attach to darkness for instance ghosts. There fore flares are not supposed to haunt but are to get rid of things that haunt.The term ‘Haunting flares’ is also a paradox because it appears to contradict but it doesn’t when looked at in the conditions of war as described in the poem.
The writer must have used ‘Haunting flares’ because the ‘flares’ cast lights over everything exposing the soldiers to the enemy.One more example of a phrase that is both a metaphor and a paradox is ‘An ecstasy of fumbling’ because it suggests that the soldiers were delighted to mishandle their life saving ‘helmets’.Wilfred Owen started Dulce et decorum est using simile. The first line of the poem says ‘Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,’ this introduces the young energetic heroic soldiers to us as old, weak characters who did not have enough strength to stand erect or manage themselves.
One of Owen’s strongest uses of simile to create imagery is in stanza two- ‘…flound’ring like a man in fire or lime’. At this point he is comparing ‘someone’ who did not fit his ‘clumsy helmet’ ‘just in time’ to a man in ‘fire or lime’ in order to depict to the reader how uncomfortable the man would have been, twisting, tossing and turning hoping to find a comforting position to help ease his pain and escape his torment.The writer goes further to describe what he could see through the ‘Dim’ ‘misty panes’ of his ‘helmet’. His helmet would have been misty because of heat, breath and sweat making him uncomfortable as a result. The dimness would have been due to the ‘thick green light’, brought about by the ‘green sea’ of ‘gas’.
Showing us that the gas was poisonous chlorine ‘gas’ because poisonous chlorine ‘gas’ is green.Owen also uses a lot of Juxtaposition in Anthem for doomed youth. He constantly compares and contrasts the loud noises and nature of funerals that soldiers got in war fronts to the traditional Victorian funeral. For example he uses simile to juxtapose ‘the monstrous’ gun shots and ‘rapid rattle’ of stuttering rifles which the soldiers who died ‘as cattle’ received during their burial to the ‘passing bells’, ‘prayers’, and ‘voice of mourning’ which they deserved for fighting and dieing for their country but where denied due to the conditions in the war which they died in.
Most of the imagery in Anthem for doomed youth create noise and sound metaphors as opposed to Dulce et decorum est where the imagery created was mainly vision and touch based. An example of this could be found in the first stanza where he described the sounds of the ‘riffles’ as ‘stuttering’ and the ‘shells’ ‘wailing’.In The charge of the Light Brigade, Tennyson also creates imagery not by using mostly visual imagery, through connotations as Owen did but by using some clich imagery, which allows connotations and also by using a lot of denotation, which lets most of the words, have their actual dictionary meaning.
Some examples of clich imagery in the charge of the light brigade are ‘jaws of Death’, ‘Mouth of Hell’ and ‘Valley of death’ these phrases allows the reader imagine the fatality that soldiers charged into by connoting the words in the phrase to their cultural meaning which the readers may not be able to picture clearly because they haven’t seen it before but have an idea of what it would look like.
‘Forward the Light Brigade’ ‘Charge for the guns’ these commands carry their actual dictionary meanings. They conjure images of heroes on horsebacks going forward and charging for their guns. Thus promoting imagery through denotation.Tennyson uses many verbs like- ‘Flash’d as their sabres bare’ ‘Flas’d as they turn’d in air’ ‘Sabring the gunners there’ to portray action and to create a brilliant image of powerful and energetic soldiers fighting bravely even in the air.
The language of The charge of the Light Brigade also contains a lot of euphemism. He uses phrases such as ‘the valley of Death’, ‘the jaws of Death’ and ‘the mouth of hell’, to narrate to the reader about the unfortunate charge of the Light Brigade. By using such phrases he under plays the reality of the slaughter amongst the ‘six hundred’ soldiers in order to focus on their courage.Repetition is used in Dulce et decorum est and The charge of the light brigade to stress the significance of the directions given to the soldiers.
In Dulce et decorum est Wilfred Owen repeats the word ‘Gas’ twice in direct speech to show that the command “Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!” that was given was necessary to save the lives of the soldiers. Owen also repeated ‘Drowning’ to remind the reader of the poisonous effect of chlorine gas.”Forward the light Brigade” the command that led to the charge of the ‘Light Brigade’ was repeated in stanza two to show the seriousness of the command and its effect which led to the massacre of the ‘noble six hundred soldiers’ in the ‘valley of death’.Lord Tennyson advanced to use repetition to show the seriousness of the actions of the ‘six hundred’ soldiers, their bravery, and to put emphasis on the enormous loss of life.
For example ‘Rode the six hundred’ was repeated to show the sever actions of the ‘six hundred’ soldiers, ‘Cannon…shot and shell’ was repeated to show the bravery of the six hundred whilst they rode and ‘six hundred was repeated in every stanza to remind the readers of the huge number of lives lost in the charge of the Light Brigade.
Wilfred Owen personifies the ‘helmets’ of the soldiers by calling them ‘clumsy’ in so doing he gave the ‘helmet’ a characteristic of something that has life. He probably did this because the helmets saved the soldiers ‘lungs’ from being ‘froth-corrupted’ therefore saving their lives or in order to depict the helmet as something awkward furthermore struggling not to be put on.Owen personified the shells that were shot by the soldiers as ‘demented choirs of wailing shells’. In so doing he makes the ‘shells’ seem to have life and to be able to cry or go mad.
In addition he suggests that not only war was evil but also the atmosphere.Throughout The charge of the Light brigade, Lord Tennyson uses a capital D for death. Hence classifying ‘Death’ as a living thing. Through personifying death Tennyson gives the readers an impression that the soldiers ‘Rode’ into Deaths own region the ‘valley’ or its mouth ‘the jaw’ to fight ‘Death’ as if it was a soldier.
All through Dulce et decorum est, Alliteration and assonance are used to stress certain words and more strongly to project certain images. ‘Bent… Beggars’, ‘knocked-kneed’, ‘men marched’, ‘watch…white’ and ‘Drunk. ..deaf’ are some examples of alliteration and assonance in Dulce et decorum est.Alliteration and assonance is also used in The charge of the Light Brigade for example ‘Storm’d with shot and shell’, ‘While horse and hero fell’ Volley’d and thunder’d’ and ‘Flash’d as they turn’d’ to reduce the consequence of the death of ‘the six hundred’ soldiers.
Alliteration and onomatopoeia are used together in Anthem for doomed youth for example stuttering riffles rapid rattle’, ‘The shrill… of wailing shells’. ..from sad shires’ and ‘shall shine’. They emphasize on the ‘demented’ sounds that were present during the burial of the soldiers instead of the peace that would have been present if there where buried in their respective ‘shires’ in England.
Lord Tennyson uses onomatopoeia to convey the bravery of the soldiers and to recreate the sounds that could be heard in the battlefield. By using words like ‘Thunder’d’ and ‘Storm’d’ he describes the loud noises, as they would have sounded.Onomatopoeia is used in Dulce et decorum est to stress the horrific sounds of a man dying from ‘Gas’ poison. Owen used words such as ‘gargling’ and ‘choking’ as the sounds of the words could be likened to what they are describing.
Lord Tennyson’s poem has a commending tone and it puts the reader in an exciting mood. Thus honouring and glorifying the Light Brigade for the ‘wild charge they made’. The poem does not make the reader forget about the sad, enormous loss of life involved in the charge but makes the reader give the Light Brigade respect, which they deserve for their unquestioned obedience and bravery.Owen’s two poems have sad tones.
Their tone makes the reader imagine how miserable the soldiers would have been and how they where denied their last respects in their burials. In addition Dulce et decorum est has an imploring tone begging the propagandists to stop telling lies about the reality of warfare to ‘children’.Both writers used similar poetic method but for different purposes. Lord Tennyson used poetic methods to evoke the bravery of the ‘Light Brigade’ in order to honour their courage obedience and also to condemn the blunder ‘Forward the Light Brigade’ which led to the death of most of the ‘six hundred’.
On the other hand Wilfred Owen uses poetic methods to state and to describe the terrible conditions the soldiers had to face in the war before and after their death. He uses words like ‘haunting’, ‘blood-shod’, ‘cancer’, ‘incurable’, and ‘sores’ in Dulce et decorum est to explain to the audience how ‘bitter’ and irreversible the effect of war is on ‘innocent’ ignorant youthful soldiers and the society as a whole.
In Anthem for doomed youth he uses phrases like ‘monstrous anger of the guns’, ‘no mockeries’ and ‘no prayers nor bells’ to in form the readers and people who may have lost their families in the war of how the soldiers died ‘as cattle’ and were buried insignificantly without something as simple as ‘flowers’ or candles held in the hands of ‘boys’ to ‘shine’ soldiers ‘the holly glimmers of good bye’.Their purpose and audience also largely affect the mode by which each of the writers have presented war.
Wilfred Owen’s main purpose of writing his poem was to discourage the propagandists from deceiving young ignorant people to go to war by telling the youths that war was romantic, to inform people about the reality of war and how meaningless war was. Owen presented his poem in such away that it described and informed people the conditions the soldiers had to face in war during their life and after they ‘die’. Furthermore in Dulce et decorum est he implored the propagandists to stop telling ‘children’ lies about war. Thus accomplishing his purpose by his style.
Lord Tennyson’s main aim for writing The charge of the Light Brigade was to set up a memorial in ‘honour’ of the ‘Light Brigade’ by narrating the story of the ‘charge’ in such a way that it highlighted the bravery of the soldier. He achieved his aim by setting the poem as a narrative structure telling the successive stages of the charge in addition to reminding the readers of the ‘honour’ which the ‘Light brigade’ deserved for their bravery.The audience of Lord Tennyson knew about the full details of the charge of the Light Brigade because they, like him, had read a report of the ‘charge’ in the newspapers. This explains why Tennyson did not focus on the blunder but on the courage of the ‘Light brigade’.
Hence he reminds the audience that though the ‘Brigade’ was defeated they had ‘fought so well’ that the entire ‘world’ should wonder weather thier glory would ever ‘fade’. He ends the poem by telling the audience to ‘Honour the Light Brigade, Noble six hundred!’ for ‘the wild charge they made!’ in spite of the fact that they were defeated.
Anthem of the doomed youth was written to inform its readers about the way soldiers died, the type of funeral they received and to give answers to some questions like ‘What passing bells’ were rung ‘for’ the soldiers? ‘What candles’ were held to say good-byes?’ which people in the public who lost their family in war and never had a chance to say good bye properly as they where not present in the funerals may have been yearning to be answered.Wilfred Owen wrote Dulce et decorum est for an audience who were either propagandists or victims of propaganda.
Most of his audience were ignorant of the reality of warfare due to the fact that the information given to them about war was repressed in order to encourage more people to join the army. As a result of that Wilfred Owen gave a detailed description of what the soldiers went through in war and also discouraged the propagandist who told ‘with such high zest.
Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori’ which when translated from Latin to English means It is sweet and honourable to die for your country. The Latin statement ‘Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori’ is an irony when compared to the way ‘someone’ in the poem suffered and died ‘bitterly’ from the ‘green sea of gas’.Thus we can see that both writers presented war with in different ways in order to fulfil their purpose and suit their audience.
