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War poets - Coggle Diagram
War poets
Rupert Brooke (1887-1915)
The soldier
comprehension
Where will his grave be?
Somewhere, in a foreign country.
How will his dead body enrich the soil?
By becoming dust.
Is the speaker afraid of death?
No, he isn’t.
How should the addressee react if the speaker died in the war?
He/she shouldn’t mourn him because he has sacrificed himself for the country.
Who do you think the poet is speaking to?
To the English people.
Is there any emphasis on war?
No, the emphasis is only on the poet’s feelings.
Who is the speaker?
The lyric I is a soldier who is in war.
What did England do for the speaker?
England gave him life and form, made him aware, gave him her flowers and her landscape (ll. 6-8).
analysis and interpretation
Highlight the view of England conveyed. What traditional qualities does the poet underline?
The poet views England as a mother who gave him life and brought him up teaching him feeling of joy and gentleness. He stresses the beauty of the landscape, and the politeness and friendship of the English
people.
What is the function of the repetitions of the words “England” and “English”?
To emphasise the centrality of country and nationhood, which makes the tone of the poem patriotic,
sentimental, nostalgic.
Images referring to death can be found in lines 1, 4, 6-7, 9-10; they convey a sense of immortality, glory,
peace.
What does the form of the poem reveal?
The poem’s form reveals an abstract, idealized view of the war.
Wilfred Owen (1893-1918)
Dulce et Decorum Est
comprehension
Sum up the content of each stanza.
STANZA 2:
There is a description of a gas attack. The men try to put on their masks in the green light but the poet’s friend is wounded or unable to protect himself in time. Through his own mask, Owen watches helplessly as the man is unable to breathe in a sea of gas.
STANZA 3
: The sight of the dying friend returns in the poet’s dreams.
STANZA 1:
While retreating to the trenches, the soldiers are tired and scared. They cough and are made blind as a result of the gas in the shells.They are suffering from post-battle fatigue and so physically exhausted that they do not hear the sound of the gas shells quietly exploding behind them.
STANZA 4
: The poet describes his friend’s horrible death from chemical warfare and conveys the message of the poem.
analysis and interpretation
Who are the children that the speaker is talking about?
The young, sometimes too young, men who enthusiastically enrolled.
What is the role of the second occurrence of the world “gas”, which is written in capital letters?
Its role is to emphasize the imminent danger: soldiers must hurry up!
In the poem there are some personal pronouns: who do they refer to?
We-> the soldiers, included the Lyric I/poet;
I-> the poet;
him ->a soldier, a friend of the poet’s;
Explain why the final words of the poem are called “The old Lie”.
The poet wants to underline that there is nothing noble or decorous in war; it just means degradation and death. He uses bitter irony: the capital letter underlines the negative meaning of the word.
Sum up the theme and the message of the whole poem.
The poem is a manifesto against war and is addressed to those who claim that war is right and glorious. Through anti-heroic images Owen gives an insight into what he calls “the pity of war”, its human aspects. He depicts the evil and the obscenity of war at a level unequalled in any other poem.