Wilfred Owen's poem, 'Dulce Et Decorum Est', first published in 1921, reveals the idea that to die for your country is not 'glorious'. It is disturbing, frightening and gruesome.

Furthermore, when Owen describes how the ‘Men marched asleep’, the reader can almost sense the slow, irregular marching pace of the soldiers. This use of alliteration is further highlighted with the irregular rhythm of the following lines, ‘many had lost their boots, but limped on, blood shod’. In this stanza, there is a dream like quality, ‘men marched asleep’, but this soon becomes a nightmare for the soldiers. Also, Owen lets the reader think that the soldiers have an animal like quality as he describes them as, ‘lame, blood shod’. This gives a sense that the men have lost their humanity through horrendous nature of the war. Owen states that the soldiers are                                                                                                                                                  ‘deaf even to the hoots                                                                                                                           Of the gas shells’

This gives the effect that the gas shells have fallen silently without notice; the smooth effect of this line highlights the shock of the next lines, the panic and erratic punctuation.

        The tone and mood of the poem changes significantly at the beginning of stanza two. The use of exclamation marks and capital letters, emphasises the true sense of panic when a soldier shouts, ‘Gas! GAS! Quick, boys’! This shows a contrast of movement to when Owen states that the soldiers ‘limped on’. This shows relief, when Owen says they were ‘fitting the clumsy helmets just in time’. This highlights the horror and ‘ecstasy of fumbling’ that someone is still trapped and yelling out for help. In this stanza, there is also a dream like quality, which also becomes a nightmare visualised through distorting ‘misty panes of thick, green light’. This gives a sense of the agonising death that soldiers are faced with, ‘floundering, drowning, stumbling’. The reader sees the horror directly through Owen’s eyes and after seeing this the reader is hopefully persuaded that war is anything but glorious.

        Owen, in the third stanza recalls how the vision of a ‘drowning man’ returns to him in his dreams. In this stanza there is the use of iambic metre, but only on the first line. ‘In all my dreams, before my helpless sight’. This is a line of reflection and looking back he realises his dreams still affect him. The Iambic metre, and the regular rhythm, emphasises the irregular rhythm of the second line ‘guttering, choking, drowning’. This shows the pain of the soldier. These two lines are on their own for a reason; to make them stand out and also to show that war will affect anyone who survives it. Also the repetition of the word ‘drowning’, emphasises the appalling death for some of the soldiers and the fact that Owen is drowning in the anguish of the memories that he cannot step away from.

        In the final stanza of the poem, Owen makes a personal appeal to the reader. He states that ‘if you could pace behind the wagon we flung him in… if you could hear the blood come gargling’. This is the most disturbing and brutal part of the poem. The reader is not spared any of the details ‘froth-corrupted lungs… gargling’. Owen states that they ‘flung him in the wagon’. This shows that the soldier is already a corpse and other soldiers are hopeless and helpless to assist him. The use of alliteration ‘watch the white eyes writhing’ emphasises the pain and breathlessness of soldiers. Owen uses a simile ‘like a devil sick of sin’. This highlights the extremity of the pain suffered by the soldiers, also the injuries suffered by the soldiers are ‘vile incurable sores on innocent tongues’. Owen believes that war is unjust and undignified and very wrong.

        The final line ‘Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori’, presents a bitter irony to the reader. Owen talks directly to the reader when he says ‘my friend’. This gives the sense that this person has never experienced war. The reader can realise that the young soldiers will never be released from the suffering, which they experience during the war. The appalling picture painted throughout the poem finally undermines the glory of the Latin; Owen believes to die for your country is anything but patriotic and glorious.