A Comparison Of 'Dulce Et Decorum Est' And 'Suicide In The Trenches'

A Comparison Of 'Dulce Et Decorum Est' And 'Suicide In The Trenches' The lies and illusions promising glory in war were cast aside by two poets during World War One, Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen. These poets have written many famous poems but when comparing the two most famous poems of the poets, Siegfried Sassoon's "Suicide in the trenches" and Wilfred Owen's "Dulce Et Decorum Est", an immediate conclusion can be drawn about the contents of the poems. "Suicide in the trenches" which gives an impression of despite being in the trenches, men were not only being killed by the brutal pounding of enemy fire but were killing themselves. Wilfred Owen's poem "Dulce Et Decorum Est" however seems to give the opposite impression at first as the Latin saying translates into: "It is fitting and honorable to die for your country," but, ironically, the meaning of the poem is the opposite. The poet has chosen this title deliberately so he can display it in a sarcastic manner. The poem "Dulce Et Decorum Est" is, therefore, not about dying gloriously or patriotically for your country but instead the horrors of the way the soldiers died. "Suicide in the trenches" focuses on the meaningless life in the trenches and that a quick death ends it all where as "Dulce Et Decorum Est" focuses on the suffering and torture of a slow death. Sassoon's style of poetry and language is simplistic

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  • Level: AS and A Level
  • Subject: English
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Presentation of Suffering in Dulce et Decorum est and The Sentry

How does Owen convey the suffering of the soldiers in the Sentry and Dulce et Decorum est? In both the poems "The Sentry", and "Dulce et Decorum est", Wilfred Owen create a strong impression of the suffering of the soldiers involved, both at the time of the incidents portrayed, and the time lapsed since those incidents. Dulce et Decorum est tells the story of the death of one of Owen's men in a gas attack. In the first stanza, the use of hyperbole is a strong technique illustrating the torment of the soldiers. For example, lines such as: "Men marched asleep." And "All went lame, all blind" are blatant exaggerations, but subsequently convey the overwhelming nature of the soldiers' exhaustion and pain. Consequently, I feel that the use of such ideas as "Men marched asleep" gives the impression of the soldiers' psychological detachment from their own bodies - they have been subjected to so much stress and trauma that their minds no longer work in the same way as their bodies. This is a clear symptom of shell shock, and is evident in The Sentry also: "And splashing in the flood, deluging muck - / the sentry's body; then his rifle". The selection of the words "The sentry's body" rather than simply "The sentry" gives the idea that the man's body fell down the steps first, and that his mind may have followed later, as if he were in a trance, or were particularly panicked. Owen

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  • Word count: 1310
  • Level: AS and A Level
  • Subject: English
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