Write about the similarities and differences in style and content in Rupert Brooke's 'The Soldier' andWilfred Owen's 'Anthem For Doomed Youth'

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 Describe How War Poetry Changed As    WWI Progressed In The 20th Century

Write about the similarities and differences in style and content in Rupert Brooke's 'The Soldier' and

Wilfred Owen's 'Anthem For Doomed Youth'

By Omar Omar

Y9C

If I should die, think only this of me:

That there's some corner of a foreign field

That is for ever England. There shall be

 The Soldier- Rupert Brooke

If I should die, think only this of me:
That there's some corner of a foreign field
That is for ever England. There shall be
In that rich earth a richer dust concealed;
A dust whom England bore, shaped, made aware,
Gave, once, her flowers to love, her ways to roam,
A body of England's, breathing English air,
Washed by the rivers, blest by suns of home.

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.

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By

Anthem For Doomed Youth- Wilfred Owen

What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?
       - Only the monstruous anger of the guns.
       Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;
       Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, -
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;
       And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

What candles may be held to speed them all?
       Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of good-byes.
       The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

War poetry changed as WWI progressed, Rupert Brooke's 'The Soldier' and Wilfred Owen's 'Anthem For Doomed Youth' are exact opposites in meaning and content, written by two poets a war apart, yet how was this achieved using similar techniques?

Strikingly similar in language and style, Brooke, who died at the outbreak of The Great War, wrote 'The Soldier' as if it were meant to appear on the back of a government recruitment pamphlet, made good use of imagery and personification. Owen, on the other hand, wrote a poem to echo the tragedy and reality of WWI, hence the title 'Anthem For Doomed Youth'.

Coincidently, both titles refer to the soldiers who fought on the front. However, Brooke refers to one soldier, to be buried in 'some foreign field', while Owen refers to the soldiers as an entire generation wiped out, citing the gigantic death toll of the war.

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Owen, unlike Brooke, uses death to depict war as a kind of final mission or stage of life which is dreary; he shows little sense of afterlife. Everything comes to a standstill as a result of death; Owen portrays death as having no alternative. His stance on the futility of war is further strengthened here. Brooke, meanwhile, shows a great sense of the afterlife and he brings out his secret hopes through these feelings. He dreams of soldiers achieving a wonderful England of peace.

'A peace in the eternal mind, no less.

 Here, the dead soul retains its ...

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The writer demonstrates genuine interest in the two poems and there is some insightful analysis. The poems are compared well throughout. However, there is not enough focus on the question (which itself is too vague) and as a result there is a lack of focus at times. A clear plan would lead to a more structured answer. More detailed analysis of technique would be an improvement, particularly structure (Both poets use the sonnet form for different effects).