Analysing War Poetry
Comparing and contrasting the poems we have read, show how they convey the thoughts of the poets and their reasons for writing the poems. Refer in detail to the poems, using quotations from the poems. There are five different poems to be looked at, all of varying style, and about different aspects of war, such as celebrations, mourning and reminisces. Also, they were written in different periods, i.e. 'The Soldier,' which was written in 1914, before people were aware of how long and horrific the war was going to be. The poet, Rupert Brooke, was a soldier in the war, as were the other poets, but is writing early on so his manner tells me he almost expects not to die, and that the war will be over quickly. The way he says, 'If I should die,' tells me that dying, in an all out war, only remains a possibility to him, but a possibility he has prepared for, quite evidently, by writing such a poem. Rupert Brooke believes, that if ever he dies on foreign soil, that soil will become English soil, and that it will be a victory because a man, born and bred in England, has, in one form or another, claimed land for his country. 'That there's some corner of a foreign field That is forever England. There shall be
Having mentioned the sentences at the end of each stanza, I think they were his main thoughts whilst at war. For long periods, nothing probably did happen. He probably did wonder what he was doing there. He also probably thought about dying a lot. To children ardent for some desperate glory, 'Gas! GAS! Quick, boys! - An ecstasy of fumbling, I think Wilfred Owen wrote this poem, like Dulce et Decorum est, to expose the fact that war isn't a place to make yourself a hero, but not in such an extreme fashion. He puts the point across by hidden messages in the poems, like, 'Their breasts were stuck all white.' The term stuck can be used when an animal is slaughtered by having it's throat slit, and so could mean the soldiers are 'lambs to the slaughter' if it is viewed in that sense. He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.'
Some common words found in the essay are:
Siegfried Sasoon, Wilfred Owen, GAS Quick, Rupert Brooke, , Lie Dulce, Brooke Brooke, Decorum Est', Owen Dulce, wilfred owen, et decorum, owen wrote, rupert brooke, Lying Gods, et decorum est', decorum est, dulce et, 'their breasts, poems looked, brooke wrote, 'dulce et decorum, dulce et decorum, et decorum est, 'dulce et, guttering choking drowning',
Approximate Word count = 2155
Approximate Pages = 9 (250 words per page double spaced)
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