How World War One presented in poetry by Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon Essay

A semblance of the modal values in which introduction strugglef be mavin is amazeed by Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon in their song with close case to Dulce et decorousness est and Anthem for goddamn novel person by Owen and The normal and footstall expatiate by Sassoon.* * *The First conception struggle marked a signifi croupt bend point in poetical customs duty and history by the revolutionary styles and ideas verbalized by the poets. Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon be credibly ii of the most well sleep withn war poets and their numbers was instrumental in this change. preliminary to 1914, much numbers was written roughly wars much(prenominal)(prenominal) as the Crimean warfare in 1854-56 (The hit of The Light Brigade by Tennyson who pleads, Honour the Light Brigade, Noble hexad hundred.) scarcely the great majority of the poets had non experience war basic-hand. Thus, they reinforced the poetic tradition of glorifying war and death. Both Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, who both fought through most of the First World state of war, phthisis their poetry in the want that they sack up give a much realistic impression of war than the pre-twentieth cytosine poetry.Both Owen and Sassoon present World warfare One as unheroic, in unionise contrast to pre-twentieth war poetry such(prenominal) as The Destruction of Sennacherib by Byron. At the truly beginning of Dulce et decorousness est Owen describes the spends as Bent double, like old beggars downstairs sacks. That kitchen range is the complete opposite of what we would realize to be a heroic and ro hu existencestic figure, an attribute that was al itinerarys given to soldiers in pre-twentieth carbon poetry. Owen goes on to describe the soldiers as knock-kneed and coughing like hags. incomplete of these images can be confrered with the glorified, smartly robed soldier that would be fixed in or so wholly of the minds of women and children fend for h ome. The comparison of the soldiers to hags is not a pleasant unscathedness as hags are often sordid and disgusting. The mention of the coughing portrays the many illnesses that soldiers suffered from in the trenches.Although both of them present war as unheroic, they do so in very(prenominal) several(predicate) ways. The style of Owens poetry which is much kick the bucketing and contains much interpretation than that of Sassoons, every last(predicate)ows him to expand on the simple rende send for of the horrors of war that he experienced. In Dulce et Decorum est, he describes in graphic and horrendous detail the death of a man who was not able to fit his helmet in time during a gas attack. He uses discourses such as floundring guttering, choking, drowning. The devise floundring gives the impression of the weakness of the man.The onomatopoeic effect of these wrangling gives an image that adds relaism to the horror of war. This makes it much than than realistic a nd moreover, more deject to read. Owen goes on, in the final stanza of this poetry to describe the jobless man in greater detail. His varied use of linguistic process allows him to create terrible imagery which federal agency that the reader can visualise the man. Owen uses articulates such aswatch the white look wriggle in his faceandthe railway telephone circuit/Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungsThe first of these phrases is particularly chilling as it makes the reader think of snakes writhing in his face. This gives the impression of a madden person, driven insane by what he has seen and what he had suffered before dying. The alliteration of the w is as well as effective as it vehemencees the phrase. Owen wants to present the reality of the First World War and in slowing the reader down, he makes them think closely what he is really describing and change the way in which it was brushed over before World War One.The south phrase is overly blow out of the water and the use of the onomatopoeic word gargling makes it all the more visual and makes the reader scent more chilling. This image of a man choking on his own argument because of gas is very unheroic and it is this that Owen wants to portray the unheroic spirit of war however brave the soldiers whitethorn be. This is in comparison to many pre-twentieth century war rimes w present they emphasise the heroic temperament of war such as in a speech in hydrogen V where Henry says that the man who survives the affair will remember with advantages what feats he did that mean solar day, emphasising the heroic temper of war.Owens second poetry, Anthem for ill-omened offspring in addition presents World War One as unheroic and unromantic. The very first line of his poem epitomises Owens feeling about the young men sent impinge on to war.What head bells for those who die as cattle?The use of the word cattle immediately robs all glory from the idea of war as a hale. T he simile compares how cattle are slaughtered for meat to soldiers dying for their country. This is a very unheroic comparison and is effective in what it is onerous to portray.On the other hand, in the cardinal poems by Sassoon that I dedicate elect to discuss, Sassoon does not present World War One as unheroic. His poems, which are forgetful and concise, deal more with the unfairness of war and protest against the oecumenics and commanding officers. However, in The General, Sassoon presently presents the soldiers in an unheroic way, telling us that rag and Jack slogged up to Arras, instead of the quick, efficacious marching of the soldiers that had been frequently portrayed precedent to the First World War such as is described in The Charge Of The Light Brigade where Tennyson conveys the riders riding quckly by the phrase, Half a league, half a league, half a league onward. The calendar method of birth control of these lines show the quick pace of the soldiers.Sassoons poetry presents the unfairness and inequality among the front-line privates and the generals who sat in consolation behind lines. Sassoon attacks the establishment of the country and the trace of his two poems is very sardonic, making sportsman of the generals in quite a light-hearted way but with a pointed marrow to his poetry. In The General Sassoon presents The General as ham-handed and responsible for the deaths many men.Now the soldiers he smiled at are most of em dead,And were cursing his staff for clumsy swine.The very last line of the poems refers to bother and Jack who are named in the poem. This makes the generals attitude and incompetence more poignant and personal to the reader.But he did for them both by his plan of attack.This ill-judged last line is to the point and cuts sound to the quick. Sassoon does not play with words like Owen but presents World War One is his poetry in the most compendious way. The majority of his poems are no longer than three short stanzas whereas Owens can be eight verses long. However, Sassoons message is just as worthy as Owens is.Base Details is probably Sassoons best poem for assail the generals as using harsh gratify it describes them sitting in luxury hotels eyepatch men are starving on the front-line with rationed food. He presents the generals of the First World War as scarlet and fat. Although the poem is short, he describes the generals so effectively that we oblige an image of the generals in our head which does not conform to what we might expect, or sure as shooting not what was generally thought of generals before the war. The title of the poem can be read on different levels the first being the simple meaning of the word as in headquarters, or on another level, the meanings of in short or unworthy. This emphasises their unworthiness of the elevated positions that they hold. Sassoons first line seems to sum up all that he is trying to sayIf I were fierce, and bald, and short of breath,Thi s one line immediately gives us a tragicomic image of a general which is almost like those we see in cartoons forthwith of blustering, half drunk generals sitting in offices wheezing with a pipe in hand. In Base Details Sassoon continues his stalk of their unworthiness by describing the generals table adroitness which according to him, are disgusting. He presents them as guzzling and gulping. These onomatopoeic words give the effect of pigs eating at a trough, especially guzzling. It as well conveys them stuffing their faces when the soldiers on the front-line are risking their lives day aft(prenominal) day with little to eat. We associate these words with animal behaviour and this is then what Sassoon is trying to present.He similarly presents the generals as nave and frivolous, spending the war in the best hotels and when their presence was required after a battle they brushed off the importance of war calling it a scrap. Sassoons bitterness is also displayed when the gene ral says I used to know his father well. This emphasises his bitterness effectively towards the upper dividees and old boy network, fantastic that whether you survive the war depends on class and connections. This bitterness is integral to many of his poems and is also spare, in a less straight way, in The General.Both Owen and Sassoon present the red of jejuneness in their poems. In Dulce et Decorum est, Owen is bitter towards those who tell children a word which emphasises their younker the old Lie Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori or in English, It is enjoyable and honourable to die for ones country. The use of the Latin here emphasises the tralatitious temper of war and the patriotism that the Latin evokes in men.The idea of the detriment of youth is more evident in Owens second poem, Anthem For Doomed Youth, where the very title shows all that Owen thinks about sending boys off to war. He himself was unaccompanied twenty-two when he joined the regular army and thus would pay known about how terrible it was. The words of the title, Anthem For Doomed Youth has the theme of a funeral and says how not only youth itself is doomed but youth as an idea. Owen also mentions, in the second stanza, the words boys and girls which stresses once again the youth of the soldiers and perhaps of their nurses or their girlfriends. entirely Base Details mentions the impairment of youth in Sassoons poems saying climb up the end that youth is stone dead. Taken out of the context of the poem, this phrase is disturbing the firing of a whole generation of men and also the loss of innocence of those who survived. In context, the phrase becomes level off more disturbing, that more of the fat, drunk generals of sixty, have survived the war, while boys of seventeen have died. The whole line readsAnd when the war is done and youth stone deadThe casual nature of this line is shocking and represents how Sassoon pictures the generals view of the loss of millions of boys. A whole generation has been missed or affected so poorly by the war and the majors would seesaw safely home to bed where they could die. The word toddle is very visual and humourously conveys the generals waddling back to England as they are so fat. It also shows their child-like nature and their frivolity. The bitterness that Sassoon feels is clearly evident in this poem. In contrast, The General mentions zip of the idea of youth but concentrates more on the inept nature of The General. These poems are very different to the nature of those by Rupert Brooke, a young soldier who was killed at the beginning of the war and had experienced little fighting. The first stanza of his poem pink of my John he describes how wonderful it is that he is active at this time and he can fight for his countryNow idol be thanked Who has matched us with his hourHe also describes going to war as swimmers into cleanness leaping, very different to the dirty and dreadful conditions that Owen d escribes.Owen and Sassoon differ very greatly in the structure of their poems Owen tends to write longer, more detailed poetry whereas Sassoon writes short and sententious poems. Anthem for Doomed Youth is a sonnet which is traditional style of poetry but the themes that Owen deals with are very modern, tell with the style that he has chosen to use. However, the poetry scheme of a sonnet does not always remain true to its traditional form such as in the last stanza of Anthem for Doomed Youth where it is e.f.f.e.g.g. The rhyme scheme of Sassoons poetry is very simple and direct, which reflects the nature of his poems. He generally uses alternate rhyme, except the last lines where he uses a rhyming bridge such as in Base Details dead and bed. In The General the last three lines have the same rhyme Jack, cram and attack. The rhyming couplet gives emphasis to the end of the poem.Sassoons poetry is short, neat and succinct, conveying one or several(prenominal) points in maybe two or three short stanzas such as The General, which is only seven lines long compared to Owens poetry which is usually longer. The style of Sassoon is more colloquial, using soldiers slang such as Hes a festal old card, grunted Harry to Jack. and tends to be more vitriolic such as And locomote glum heroes up the line to death. Conversely, Owen uses descriptive and elaborate words that convey the standard pressure and images that the poems evoke, such as his unforgettable and shocking description of the dead man in the third stanza of Dulce et Decorum est.Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon present different aspects of World War One Owen, the conditions and horrific deaths of the ordinary soldiers in contrast to Sassoons pointed and bitter attack against the majors. They do this in very different ways and despite Sassoons influence on Owen, their styles are extremely contrasting but no less effective. Their poetry helped mark a radical change in the way war poetry was written and it is their origination of their themes that effected this shift.