Wilfred Owen was born on the 18th March 1893 in Oswestry in Shropshire. He was very religious and wanted to become a priest. He was born into a poor family and could not afford to go to university instead he taught English in a French school, called the Berlitz school of English. He signed up in September 1915; he received his commission to the Manchester regiment in June 1916. In January 1917 he was posted to France, this was where he wrote some of his most famous poems. In May he was diagnosed as having shell-shock. He was evacuated to England and on June 26th he went to craiglockhark war hospital in Edinburgh.
This was where he wrote and perfected his poems. The poems ” The send-off”, ” Dulce et decorum est” and ” Disabled” about the different aspects of war. Before the men went to war, during the war and after they returned and the consequences. These poems use strong imagery. He returned back to the front-line in August. He was awarded the military cross for bravery at Amiens. He sadly died on the 4th November, 7 days before the war had ended. These three poems by Wilfred Owen look at different aspects of war. The Send-off describes the soldiers before they go to war.
This poem suggests that the men are going to die and everyone knows their fate except for them. The poem ” Dulce et decorum est” describes the soldiers during the war. It tells the reader that war is not good, and it is certainly not ” sweet and fitting to die for one’s country”. The poem ” Disabled” is describing a solider after the war and the misery that fills him. He has come back from the war with no arms or legs and has cut short his life; he now has to rely on other people. All of these three poems use strong imagery, and also have rhyme that affects the poem and the mood.
This use of rhyme and imagery help Owen to deal with each aspect of war, before the soldiers go, whilst the soldiers are at war and when the soldiers come home and the consequences they have to put up with. These three poems also show Owens message about war to the reader. All three poems use a rhyme scheme. The rhyme scheme in ” The send-off” doesn’t dominate the poem; it doesn’t do this because the rhyme goes between the verses even though it is regular rhyme. The hidden rhyme suggests that the rhyme compares to the soldiers. Hidden ” down the close darkening lanes” they were sent-off ” so secretly, like wrongs hushed-up.
The rhyme adds to the fact of hidden soldiers ” To the siding-shed, And lined the trains with faces grimly gay. Their breasts were stuck all white with wreath and spray As men’s are dead. ” These rhyming words are in different verses this hides the rhyme scheme and the soldiers in the poem. The rhyme scheme in ” Dulce et decorum est” sets the pace and rhythm of the poem. At the beginning of the poem the rhyme is very slow like the soldiers so the pace of the poem is slow” like old beggars under sacks. ” During the second verse the rhyme scheme speeds up and so does the rhythm Gas! Gas! Quick boys! ” The rhyme scheme is a main part of the poem.
The rhyme scheme in ” Disabled” links with flashes back and forth in the poem, from what life is like now for him and what life was like for him before the war ” When glow-lamps budded in the light blue trees and girls glanced lovelier as the air grew dim, in the old times, before he threw away his knees. ” This shows us that Owen is trying to link both past and present. By linking the rhyme with different parts of the poem this makes the rhyme scheme not stand out a lot in the poem. In all three poems by Wilfred Owen the rhyme schemes are a big part in all of the poems even if they are not dominating in two of the poems.
All three poems use very strong imagery. In the poem ” The send-off” when the men are described as ” grimly gay” this creates an image of the men feeling nothing because grim and gay are opposites so therefore cancel each other out this is called an oxymoran. The phrase ” their breasts were stuck all white with wreath and spray. ” Creates the image that the men are already dead. Also ” signals nodded, and a lamp winked. ” This creates the imagery of secrecy between the train and the guard this means that everyone knows something that the soldiers do not, it also creates personification.
In the poem ” Dulce et decorum est” the imagery creates horror Owen does this to show war is not a game like the people who create propaganda poems lead people to believe. This poem is the image people at home do not expect ” bent double, like old beggars. ” There is an image when there is a gas attack one of the men ” was yelling out and stumbling. ” The imagery in the last verse is the worst of all it is obscene having the image of ” froth corrupted lungs, obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud of vile incurable sores on innocent tongues.
This makes war sound nasty and horrible and create a really shocking image of war and puts strong images in our minds. The poem ” Disabled” uses colourless grey imagery which is in contrast to the vibrant colour of the town with the ” glow-lamps. ” The colourless is non-human also the image of a man with no arms or legs. Owen relates the blood in the mans body to the life of the town. ” He’s lost his colour very far from here, poured it down shell-holes till the veins ran dry and half his lifetime lapsed in the hot race and leap of purple spurted from his thigh.
The town was full of colour like him, now he is colourless and cannot appreciate the colour of the town. This gives us the image of the life that is lost ” before he threw away his knees. All of the three poems are written with words which create lots of vivid imagery in our minds. Owen deals with each aspect of war in a very similar way. He deals with before the soldiers go to war, in ” The send-off” he thinks it is wrong to send the soldiers off to war without them knowing what is happening, unlike all of the other people who know their outcomes of death.
In ” Dulce et decorum est” he thinks it is wrong that people make propaganda poems to make men join the war when they do not know the overall out come for them. In the poem ” Disabled” he looks at what happens to a solider after the war and puts responsibility on the man because he ” threw away his knees. ” He uses rhyme and strong imagery to portray his views of war to the reader. Wilfred Owen’s overall message is that war is not jolly and joyful it is cruel and nasty.
