Analysis of Wilfred Owen's Poetry

Percy Bysshe Shelley verbalized pure genius in saying that: “Poets are the hierophants of an unapprehended inspiration; the mirrors of the gigantic shadows which futurity casts upon the present; the words which express what they understand not; the trumpets which sing to battle, and feel not what they inspire; the influence which is moved not, but moves. Poets are the unacknowledged legislators of the world.” (Percy Bysshe Shelley) It seems that even though Wilfred Owen was not alive until many years after this quote that he embodied this quote about poets and their poetry. Poetry throughout the ages has been one literary device that has neither changed nor conformed to the whims of society. Poetry has been a device to recount history, express emotion and bring about change; thus poets being agents of change. Wilfred Owen, a brilliant poet was amongst those who initiated anti-war writing amidst a country being fed propaganda. Owen brought attention to the harsh realities of war, rather than perpetuating societies’ ignorant delusions that war was heroic and adventurous. Owen was resolved to edify England on the actualities of war. By writing poetry that denied England’s teachings of noble warfare, Owen set an unprecedented example of exposing repressed truth to the public. Two of his most distinguished works, “Dulce et Decorum est” and “Anthem for Doomed Youth” will be analysed alongside Owen’s life to prove the validity of this statement.
The way in which Wilfred Owen was brought up was integral to his phenomenal poetry. He was birthed in the year 1893 in England and was a devout Christian throughout his years of boyhood. On October 21st 1915, Owen enlisted into the army and nearly a year later was commissioned as a second lieutenant. Owen had been born into England at a time where war was what men did for adventure, it was honourable, a transition from boyhood to manhood some might have called it. What Owen witnessed was anything but what was advertised by his