Refugee Blues And Wilfred Owen

The subject of war and the loss had deeply influenced poetry on the first half of the 20th century. Poets from all around the world had felt the direct influence of these earth-shattering wars and expressed their passionate responses towards the horrors of war. It was during the times of war in which the poems “Refugee blues” and “Disabled” were written by W.H. Auden and Wilfred Owen respectively. Considered to be some of the most remarkable pieces of literature, they were written in the times of worldwide conflict. This explains their bleak tone, brutal honesty and the poets’ desire to convey trauma and misery through their first-hand experiences of war. The poem “Disabled” speaks of the tragic loss of a soldier whose life turned into devastation …show more content…
In the poems “Refugee blues” and “Disabled”, both poets display the melancholic impacts of war through the use of similes and symbolism. In "Disabled", similes are used to create an irrational comparison between the protagonist and animalistic things. For instance, "touch him like some queer disease”, the protagonist is being compared to a disease, to display how low the protagonist had sunk on a social level. This quote conveys the poet's feelings towards how many war veterans were undeservingly alienated from their society due to their disabilities. Alternatively, Auden uses the same technique to compare the extent of liberty given to an animal and a German Jew in “Refugee Blues”. To show the misery the Jews had to face, this point is given directly from the protagonist. As shown in the lines, "Saw the fish swimming as if they were free", from here we can observe the fact that the poem's main characters, the Jewish refugees, had little to no rights at all as their agony made them wish to live as animals - fish in the harbour. It is ultimately clear that average, innocent citizens, as well as front-line soldiers, had their lives negatively affected by unnecessary wars which doomed their future, and although subtle, similes are a powerful way to depict their …show more content…
Auden, successfully used literary devices, tone and diction to portray the morose outcomes of war on an individual soldier and the Jewish community as a whole. It revealed the alienation from the society, loss of identity and a home, and the criticism that the soldiers and the Jewish community had to face as the result of war. Overall, both poems have lived up to their ideals and succeed in bringing the harsh reality of war to the