Wilfred Owen Speech

Wilfred Owen
Wilfred Owen criticizes war using imagery and poetic techniques to convey his feeling towards war and to try to show how young men are sacrificed, slaughtered, dehumanised and ignored for their bravery. His poems are about the suffering and horrors young men face on the battlefield, they are left scarred and demented by the sounds, horrors and fear of death. They are forced to watch their friends die in front of them and they lose their minds, not knowing when or how they could suddenly die.
‘Anthem For Doomed Youth’
Rhetorical Question:
(Line 1-9) * What passing-bells for these who die as cattle? * What candles ma be held to speed them all?
Owen uses rhetorical questions to quiz the readers into understanding the ferociousness and barbaric ways of war. He uses these lines to describe the horrors that befell the young men in the wars.
The first line, suggests the horror of young men being slaughtered like cattle by machine gun fire. WWI the English sent their soldiers in lines to try and overwhelm the enemy, but were stopped by machine gun fire. Dehumanising humans as cattle for the slaughter.
Line 9 suggests that people mourn for their loved ones from the young men's hometowns, family, friends and community. Personification:
(Lines 2 and 7) * 'Monstrous anger of the guns' * 'demented choirs of wailing shells'
Personifying the guns as monstrous and raging as they tear through young soldiers like butter, and the shells as demented choirs of wraiths and death. Owen uses sound visual language to influence the readers with thoughts and sounds of the horrific warzone that young men faced without guidance or readiness. Repetition:
(Lines 2, 3, 5, 6, 10) * Only * No, Nor, Not
Using negative connotations to stress the fact that it is hopeless in the face of war, there is very little chance of survival when one is sent out into the battlefield. 'Only' is used to state that on the battlefield the soldiers being slaughtered will not get any sympathy or prayers of safe haven into heaven, this is a mockery to the Christian belief of funeral rites and mourning.
Whilst 'No', 'nor' and 'not' are used to cut off any positive points from war, because unless you survive there aren't any girls, honour or parade to show you home. Final summary:
'Anthem for Doomed Youth' is a very horrific poem about young soldiers sent to war in WWI, where they were slaughtered by machine guns and artillery as they were charging to overwhelm the enemy in the trenches.
The negative connotations deeply emphasis that there can be no good out of war as it is a pointless and wasteful thing, the young soldiers have no idea what they get themselves into and are slaughtered mercilessly. Rhetorical questions ask the readers to consider the fact that war is a gruesome and horrifying scene to experience, and to ask why young soldiers had to die before they became adults, was it worth sacrificing thousands of young men aged between 16-19.
Personification expresses the anger of guns and cannons, showing their bone-shaking force and ability to murder hundreds of innocent boys. The shells are wailing like wraiths coming to take their souls and destroy their existence from the world.

Dulce et Decorum Est: (It is sweet and honourable to die for one's country) Similes:
(Lines 1, 2, 12, 14, 20, 22 and 23) * (1) Like old beggars under sacks * (2) Coughing like hags * (12)Floundering like a man in fire or lime * (14) As under a green sea * (20) Like a devil's sick of sin * (22) Obscene as cancer * (23) Bitter as the curd
Owen uses similes to describe the soldiers as they head from the battle front to head quarters, they are tired, sleepless, injured and coughing from the smells of guns and corpses. They are attacked by gas and they fumble for their masks, but one unlucky soldier doesn't make it and inhales the green, toxic fumes of the gas. His fellow soldiers are helpless as they watch in horror they comrade dying in front of them as he chokes and splutters hopelessly trying to escape his dastardly fate, the young soldier continues to writhe in pain as his comrades toss his corpse into the wagon. They know they cannot help him and that he will suffer and they are helpless to come to his aid, it is futile to resist. Alliteration:
(Lines 2, 19) * Knock-kneed * Watch the white eyes writhing
The use of alliteration expresses the feeling of the soldiers as they trudge through sludge and carrying heavy bags they buckle under the weight yet they keep marching, whilst the other tells of the horror these soldiers witnessed as they watch a comrade die in front of their eyes. Hyperbole:
(Line 6) * All went lame, all blind
Exaggerates their suffering, tiredness and the fact that they are exhausted. The hyperbole stresses their tiredness of marching, hearing shells go off around them and the fact that they have not slept, 'all blind'. Final Summary:
'Dulce et Decorum Est' is about men who are tired from marching through the thick sludge and mud, they are tired from hearing shells going off and are tired of seeing their comrades die in pointless battles. The men are too weary to notice a gas bomb going off behind them, when one soldier notices the gas, they spring to life and fumble for their gas masks. Unfortunately one soldier doesn't make it and he is caught in the billowing green smoke that robs him of his life. Slowly and painfully, as his comrades and friends watch in horror and helplessness as they cannot save him and are force to see their friend squirm and writhe in pain.
Owen mocks the Latin phrase: "Dulce et Decorum Est Pro Patria mori"
Translated as "It is sweet and honourable to die for one's country", as an old lie used to lure young men to enlist in hopes that they gain fame upon their return, but the reality is when they are dead no one cares for them anymore.

‘Disabled’

Alliteration:
(Lines 7, 8, 9) * Gay * Glow-lamps * Girls glanced lovelier
Owen uses this to show how the young soldier's hometown used to be bright, eventful and cheerful but now he cannot see the gayness anymore because he has been mentally and physically deformed.
'The town used to swing so gay' depicts that there was laughter and happiness in the youth's eyes when he was whole. Simile:
(Lines 4, 13) * Saddening like a hymn * Touch him like some queer disease
These are used to show the emotions of the disfigured and dismembered soldier who has been cut off at certain parts of his body, women won't look at him like they used to when he was whole and had legs. The similes are important to convey how he feels and what others think of him, because he is not like he used to be when he was strong and athletic. Sexual imagery:
(Lines 9, 12, 26, 43, 45, 46) * Girls glanced lovelier * How slim girls waists are * To please his Meg * How the women's eyes passed to strong men who were whole * Why don't they come and put him to bed?
Owen uses sexual imagery to criticize how the once whole man is now viewed as some queer disease that they won't touch or go near, rather they pity him because of his disability. The line 'how the women's eyes pass to the strong men who were whole', depicts that the disable man longs for a woman's touch but will not receive it because he is not 'whole' like other men. Final Summary:
'Disabled' is about a soldier who once had an athletic figure and was very charming, signed his life away and lost his legs and an arm. He once was a 'whole' man, but the old lie that stole young men's souls pulled him in because he wanted fame, glory and to be heroic for his country. Instead he is rewarded with a 'wheeled chair' and the grotesque features from war, he has lost his soul and he is wondering why he signed his legs and arm away. Owen uses a very horrific imagery to convey the outcomes from war, the disabled soldier will never be able to be loved or love a woman again because he is not seen as 'whole' and they think the other 'whole' men will satisfy them. The ending question "Why don't they come and put him into bed? Why don't they come?", shows the loneliness the disabled man feels when he is being ostracized by people when he went and fought for them, also it stresses that he cannot be with a woman ever again.

Wilfred Owen uses these poems to show the horror and stark reality of war, and the fact that there aren’t any happy endings to war because there will always be deaths. The deaths will just be another letter home to the family and a name which will be forgotten as time goes by, and even though their family may recognise what they did, many will not know. ‘Lest We Forget’, was a memorable phrase used to remember what the ANZAC soldiers did to stop enemies from invading, but the same will not apply for most of the soldiers that died without families, and it will just be another name carved onto marble.
The use of techniques in the poems such as rhetorical questions, make the readers to digest and think deeply about how dehumanised young men can be in war, how they can be slaughter like cattle, how they don’t receive funeral rites nor burial, no one to mourn their death, no one to say some parting words.