Dulce Et Decorum Est Analysis Essay

“Dulce et Decorum est”, by Wilfred Owen, tells the shocking truth about warfare. The author discusses the reality and corruption of war, and it is not something to be glorified. He tells the story from a soldier's perspective. In the first stanza, Owen describes the state of the soldiers. They were “Bent double, like old beggars under sacks”(1). This displays how weak the men were, both physically and mentally. In the following stanza, a terrible gas attack robs the life of one of the soldiers. The hapless boy wasn't agile enough to fit “the clumsy helmets just in time”(10). During the third and final stanza, the author explains the death of the soldier as “He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning”(16), and this vivid and traumatizing image haunts him in his dreams. Lastly, Owen criticizes those who support war and promote it as “some desperate …show more content…
The poem “Dulce et Decorum est” holds this message: not to gratify war. Owen successfully uses imagery to communicate.

Imagery dominates and contributes to the impact of the poem. Thus, the reader feels present at the scene. Wilfred Owen uses this literary device in "If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood/ Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs”(21-22). This is an example of auditory imagery, and it explains the sounds of the gruesome and chilling death of the soldiers. Also,“bitter as the cud”(23) is gustatory imagery. This describes the bubbling of phlegm or mucus spewing from the soldier's mouth. Owen compares the soldier to a cow. "As under a green sea, I saw him drowning"(14) is visual imagery. The author expresses the death of one of the soldiers during the gas attack. The “green sea”(14) is a metaphor for the gas. The reader visualizes the soldier suffering to death.“An ecstasy of fumbling/