“Wearied we keep awake because the night is silent...
Low, drooping flares confuse our memory of the salient...
Worried by silence, sentries whisper, curious, nervous,
But nothing happens.”
In the second stanza of ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’, Owen here showed the gas attack very vivid and realistic into words. The 'guttering, choking, drowning,' phrase showing the repetitive pain and their emotions dragging on of the soldier as he 'plunges' towards his death. In fact throughout 'Dulce et Decorum Est', a surreal feel to the poem is made by Owen's continual use of metaphors when describing the bloody scenes.
“But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound’ring like a man in fire or lime......
Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.”
In the second stanza in ‘Exposure’, again it talks about why the men are in the army. Why did they involve themselves in a massive carnage for no entire reason? Here it shows this:
“Far off, like a dull rumor of some other war.
What are we doing here?”
You can now see Owen is trying to put the message through, that war isn’t what its cracked up to be and if men roll up thinking their doing it for their country. They will get a reality shock when their number is called and there running across no mans land and getting mutilated.
The pace then quickens during the final stanza of ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’ (a rhythm achieved by the use of lines with fewer syllables and run-on endings). It contrasts with Owen's conclusion given in the last four lines, drawing our attention to this particular point, the whole meaning of the poem as far as the poet is concerned:
"If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Bitter as the cud."
Then the last message/point of his poem lies right at the end of the poem. It offers the reader the chance to have a long hard think, about how they would feel if they were placed in the same situation as Owen was, and all the other tired, annoyed soldiers.
"If in some smothering dreams, you too could pace
Behind the wagon, we flung him in....
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum Est
Pro patria mori."
'Dulce et Decorum Est’ is a poem full of visual situations that Owen describes very graphically, and it is these visualizations that helps the reader look at the poem in a far more intimate, empathetic way rather than the propaganda side of war. The 'thick green light', the 'white eyes', and the 'haunting flares', just some of the keywords that Owen uses to enable him to create the intense imagery that he achieves in this poem.
This is also achieved in ‘Exposure’; there are a few lines like 'Dulce et Decorum Est’. Here are just some of the sentences which make the reader think of how bad the war is:
“Pale flakes with fingering stealth come feeling for our faces –
We cringe in holes, back on forgotten dreams, and stare, snow-dazed”
“... – Is it that we are dying?”
“Slowly our ghosts drag home; glimpsing the sunk fires, glozed”
This poem repeats different lines at the end of each stanza, to make the reader reflect of what it is really like. Owen puts the point over that nothing happens in the war, and that war is useless and doesn’t solve anything, also he talks about the men are already dead before they go over the top to fight the Boche! In every other stanza it repeats:
“... But nothing happens”
And another “... What are we doing here?”
As you can see in these 2 poems Wilfred Owen writes in 2 different sorts of language, In ‘Exposure’ he uses older language for example words such as snow-dazed, dowse, sun-dozed, littered, loath, brambles etc. In 'Dulce et Decorum Est’ he uses more fluent language, more today language, such words like hags, beggars, fatigue, drowning, guttering, choking, bitter etc. Owen uses more bitter language while in ‘exposure’ he doesn’t use today language, but ‘posh’ language, not so harsh words (example: choking, drowning, blood-shod etc.)
In conclusion, these two poems of Wilfred Owen are not completely contrasting, but are very different in many ways, and even if those differences are extremely subtle, without them the poems would never be able to fulfil their purpose. Whether it be to argue a case, or simply to enlighten the reader, neither would be possible without Owen's extensive knowledge and use of various poetical techniques and the context that he puts them in.
Now onto totally different war poems, ‘Vitai Lampada’, by Henry Newbolt and ‘The Soldier’, by Rupert Brooke. These 2 poems are not like ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’ or ‘Exposure’ because they are pointing to the sheer Pride of going to war, to be a man, to be a war hero. As you can see, it is different to being mutilated in a gas attack.
In ‘Vitai Lampada’ the surface is set, with boys playing cricket in a public school. A captain shouting to boost the cricket players morale:
“A bumping pitch and a blinding light,
An hour to play and the last man in.
And it’s not for the sake of a ribboned coat,
Or the selfish hope of a season’s fame,
But his captains hand on his shoulder smote:
Play up! Play up! And play the game!”
Now this starting stanza may be odd at first glance but it tells us that the boys are not playing for reward or superiority over others but to follow their captain’s orders and to make the captain pleased by playing the game well. He talks about a cricket match, but Brooke is comparing these boys pleasing the captain, to soldiers in the war to please their captain not for reward or a medal but for the captain.
In the contrasting war sonnet ‘The Soldier’, it is not like the above where the soldier is pleasing the country or their captain. It is about fighting for the country, feeling fortunate to have been brought up in England and believes it was a real blessing:
“If I should die, think only this of me:
That there’s some corner of a foreign field
That is forever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed”
“Washed by the rivers, blessed by the suns of home”
This poem gives the impression of England being an idyllic country, timeless and everything in it is perfect, showing comradeship. England is personified as being a mother as Brooke says:
“Her sights and sounds”
Brooke’s message in this poem is that if he should die, the place of his death will be made richer by his body. The body will carry these English blessings, passing them onto the ground on which it lies:
“And think, this heart, all evil shed away,
A pulse in the eternal mind, no less
Gives somewhere back the thoughts by England given,
Her sights and sounds; dreams happy as her day;
And laughter, learnt of friends; and gentleness,
In hearts at peace, under an English heaven”
Brooke writes his own epigraph and shows a moving sense of the poet’s deep love of England and it’s people. The poet feels he can influence the thoughts of those left behind, with this he will try to cement the continuation of those qualities that he thinks of as being essentially English. Brooke has transformed the poem into
sonnet, not addressed to a loved one but to his country.
In this poem, the moods of the first few months of the war are summed up. Despite the subject matter, there is a sort of serenity in the poem, even the words ‘If I should die’ suggests that he expects to survive. The reality of the horror had still to be discovered.
Now this is a very different view to ‘Vitai Lampada’ as this poem is a very patriotic poem talking about if this man should die think that he died for his country etc.
‘Vitai Lampada’ from the 1st stanza where the boys are playing cricket in their local public school, to the 2nd stanza where it ‘transforms’ into soldiers in the war fighting for their country. NOT for reward, Not for honour but to make the captain pleased of their work, and not to disappoint him:
“The Gatling’s jammed and the colonel dead,
And the regiment blind with dust and smoke.
The river of death has brimmed its banks,
And England’s far, and honour a name,
But the voice of a schoolboy rallies the ranks:
‘Play up! Play up! And play the game!”
This stanza talks about when the colonel (the soldiers ‘morale booster’) has died, and they could only rely on him to get through the war, but he died. The soldiers in deaths paws, waiting until their number has been called. But they can still hear the colonel’s voice saying ‘Play up! Play up! And play the game!” so they are not loss with hope, so they struggle on through the pain and anguish through the war for their colonel.
In the last stanza shows us that all the men who died in the war, tried their best and kept on going for their colonel to make him proud of the regiment. Went through pain, anger and mostly tiredness for the colonel, not for reward, not being selfish but to never give up trying to help your country and your captain.
“...Beat through life like a torch in flame
And falling, fling to the host behind –
‘Play up! Play up! And play the game!”
In conclusion to these two poems ‘A Soldier’ and ‘Vitai Lampada’ they are the same but in different ways. The language is not the same between these 2 poems. In ‘The soldier’ the language is very patriotic and old, not today language. But in ‘Vitai Lampada’ the language is more ‘today language’ and is not so patriotic.
‘Vitai Lampada’ is quite a difficult poem to grasp at first, but when you read it a couple of times, you know what he is talking about. That is the same as ‘The Soldier’.
Luke Danton ~ 10 Manns ~ 17/12/01