Dulce Et Decorum Est Irony
Imagery, symbols and word plays
Line 1: "Bent double, like old beggars under sacks" is a simile, which compares the men marching to beggars. Instigating the poem with an image of men "doubled" generates a possibility that the soldiers have become two people: the men they were before the war and the unsympathetic men that they have become. Line 2: In this simile, Owen is referring to the men participating in the war as hags "Knock-kneed, coughing like hags”. Line 5: "Men marched asleep." Line five starts with a strong image. Usually people don’t sleep walk and by making this abnormality the norm, the reader is told that the war has had a drastic psychological effect on it’s soldiers. On the contrary, this …show more content…
By stating ‘the devil’s sick of sin’ the poet is alluding to the fact that the atrocities carried out through the war would even sicken Satan.
Lines 27-28: In this line, Owen is attacking those who utilize popular rhetoric’s regarding “war’s glory”, such as Jessie Pope, a common WW1 propagandist.
- Onomatopoeia
Dulce et Decorum is entirely focused on life at war with it’s language accurately articulating the images and the pace of the war front.
With the repetition of consonant sounds such as "k" in "sacks," "knock," "coughed" and "cursed", Owen is making our tongues perform strong movements in our mouths, thus adding to the poems intensity.
- Punctuation
With the utilization of shouted exclamations such as line 9’s "Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!", a sense urgency and danger is presented from the gas attack.
- Metaphor
In line 14’s ‘under a green sea, I saw him drowning’ Owen incorporates an extended metaphor for allow us to reimagine the frothed drowned solider, a victim of one of many gas attacks. The following two lines are separate from their stanza as Owen wished to directly link wars reality to those who presented it otherwise, particularly …show more content…
Through the alliteration of ‘White eyes Writhing’, Owen intends to ‘sicken’ the reader, and tap in to their sympathetic side, allowing them to acknowledge the fact that this isn’t fictional and Owen witnessed these horrors first hand.
- Structure
"Dulce et Decorum Est," has no specified rhyme scheme. However, each stanza changes more of its structure as the war beings to escalate throughout the poem. The first stanza is structured in an eight-line pattern of an ABABCDCD rhyme scheme. Stanza two partially mimics the first stanza with only an ABABCD rhyme scheme. The third stanza concludes with a larger rhyme pattern of an ABABCDCDEFEF scheme. The constant change of rhyme pattern between stanza’s is intentionally produced to emulate the revulsion of war
- Repetition
Owen also draws the reader’s attention to key actions and themes in the poem by his use of repeated short, single words:
‘All’ is repeated twice in line 6 to ensure we are aware that no one
Line 1: "Bent double, like old beggars under sacks" is a simile, which compares the men marching to beggars. Instigating the poem with an image of men "doubled" generates a possibility that the soldiers have become two people: the men they were before the war and the unsympathetic men that they have become. Line 2: In this simile, Owen is referring to the men participating in the war as hags "Knock-kneed, coughing like hags”. Line 5: "Men marched asleep." Line five starts with a strong image. Usually people don’t sleep walk and by making this abnormality the norm, the reader is told that the war has had a drastic psychological effect on it’s soldiers. On the contrary, this …show more content…
By stating ‘the devil’s sick of sin’ the poet is alluding to the fact that the atrocities carried out through the war would even sicken Satan.
Lines 27-28: In this line, Owen is attacking those who utilize popular rhetoric’s regarding “war’s glory”, such as Jessie Pope, a common WW1 propagandist.
- Onomatopoeia
Dulce et Decorum is entirely focused on life at war with it’s language accurately articulating the images and the pace of the war front.
With the repetition of consonant sounds such as "k" in "sacks," "knock," "coughed" and "cursed", Owen is making our tongues perform strong movements in our mouths, thus adding to the poems intensity.
- Punctuation
With the utilization of shouted exclamations such as line 9’s "Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!", a sense urgency and danger is presented from the gas attack.
- Metaphor
In line 14’s ‘under a green sea, I saw him drowning’ Owen incorporates an extended metaphor for allow us to reimagine the frothed drowned solider, a victim of one of many gas attacks. The following two lines are separate from their stanza as Owen wished to directly link wars reality to those who presented it otherwise, particularly …show more content…
Through the alliteration of ‘White eyes Writhing’, Owen intends to ‘sicken’ the reader, and tap in to their sympathetic side, allowing them to acknowledge the fact that this isn’t fictional and Owen witnessed these horrors first hand.
- Structure
"Dulce et Decorum Est," has no specified rhyme scheme. However, each stanza changes more of its structure as the war beings to escalate throughout the poem. The first stanza is structured in an eight-line pattern of an ABABCDCD rhyme scheme. Stanza two partially mimics the first stanza with only an ABABCD rhyme scheme. The third stanza concludes with a larger rhyme pattern of an ABABCDCDEFEF scheme. The constant change of rhyme pattern between stanza’s is intentionally produced to emulate the revulsion of war
- Repetition
Owen also draws the reader’s attention to key actions and themes in the poem by his use of repeated short, single words:
‘All’ is repeated twice in line 6 to ensure we are aware that no one