“Was there a man dismayed.”
He is saying that someone blundered but it was their job to follow orders no matter how dangerous it sounded. Therefore the soldiers are portrayed as heroic and glorious. He does this by using strong verbs of action:
“Flashed all their sabres bare, flashed as turned in air”, “Volleyed and thundered”, “reeled” and shattered and sundered”.
Tennyson uses euphenesiam to describe what happened to the men without portraying the ghastly reality of war, thus he uses words like,
“The valley of death”, “the jaws of death”, and “the mouth of Hell.”
And he continues by saying how good it is to die for your country.
Also in those days when the soldiers rode on horseback with sabres, fighting was thought to be their duty not an honour, as we see by the words
“Theirs not to make reply, theirs not to reason why, theirs but to do and die”
“Cannon to the right of them, Cannon to the left of them, Cannon behind them, Volleyed and thundered;”
This verse gives the impression of cannons booming out, and emphasises it by repeating the word “Cannon”.
It mentions that the soldiers are dying and it makes it sound patriotic-
“While horse and hero fell.” It makes war sound glorious even though hundreds had been killed.
Tennyson clearly shows death:
“All in the valley of death”, and “is but to do and die”. However it fails to describe the horrors and destruction of war. This poem did not explain once the type of horrors the soldiers went through.
In this poem each line, the middle word is stressed the most, giving the word emphasis for example:
“Half a league onwards”
It has quite a few repetitions –
“Half a league, half a league…” and “Honour the charge they made, honour the light Brigade…” This creates a fast flowing rhythm. This poem is also full of metaphors, an example of this “All in the valley of death” and “into the mouth of hell”.
“Dulce et Decorum est.” is set during the First World War which was far more advanced then the Crimean War, this poem focuses on the trenches that the soldiers had to hide in, to avoid being killed by the gas. This war was fought with artillery, which were firing for 2 days. Owen shocks us with the grim reality of war. Owen’s soldiers are not “noble” and glorious but
“Bent double, like old beggars under sack.” And “knock need coughing like hags”
This is not a rousing poem but slow apart from the second verse.
Owen gives a deep description of what he went through for example:
“Limped on blood shed…and froth corrupted lungs”. This gives us a brief description of what his comrades looked like after being gassed. He described his friend who couldn’t get his gas mask on in time as:
“His hanging face, like a devil sick of sin” and not acting as especially heroes, but just doing their duty
“Incurable sores on innocent lungs.”
Owen gives a lot of emphasis on their appearance,
“He plunged at me, choking, drowning…” He also uses some repetition like:
“Gas! Gas! Quick boys” In desperate shock and frighten for shelter. The last line of this poem is really apposing Tennyson’s idea,
“The old lie: Dulce et Decorum est, pro patria mori”
The rhythm of this poem is slower, like trudging men and is more emotional.
This poem helps us put ourselves into their shoes. It helps us feel sorry for those soldiers and know that war in not glory, or good but bad and evil. There is much more reality of war in this poem than the other poem. Wilfred Owen wrote this, he saw the horrors of war. He saw people dying such horrible deaths, how could he praise war?! This poem is more powerful. It gives us a little glimpse of what really went on, and not to believe the propaganda like Tennyson’s poem. This poem is more realistic and therefore more influential.
