Dea Handayani 23/9/2013

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ANTHEM FOR DOOMED YOUTH DULCE ET ECORUM EST

Form - Sonnet
14 lines 24 lines

Metaphors: Metaphors:

Simile: Simile:
“What passing bells for these who die as “Bent double like old beggars under
cattle?” sacks”
“Knock-need, coughing like hags, we
cursed through sludge”
Alliteration: Alliteration:
“Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle” “Knock-kneed” (line 2)
“Men, marched, many” (line 5)
Rhetorical:
“What candles may be held to speed
them all?”
Theme: death Theme: suffering
Onomatopoeia:
“Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle”

COMPARE AND CONTRAST ESSAY “DULCE ET DECORUM EST’ AND “ANTHEM FOR
DOOMED YOUTH”

World war is a military global conflict between some countries. It was started in 1914
and many people died because of World War at that time. “Dulce et Decorum Est” and
“Anthem for Doomed Youth” is the poem written by Wilfred Owen. “Dulce et Decorum
Est” was written in 1917 during World War I and published in 1920. “Anthem for
Doomed Youth” also was published in 1920. Wilfred Owen was a young British officer
in World War I. He wrote his poem according to his experience of becoming a soldier.
The poem he wrote give some horror image of war to make the reader know what is
the true situation of a war.

“Dulce et Decorum Est” talking about the real situation of a war. The poem was
according to Owen’s experience when he was in a battle. He described the situation
very specific and in the poem he uses some language features like simile, alliteration,
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simile, repetition, and some symbolic meaning to make the poem looks more
dramatic and to make the readers easy to imagine how the battle looks like.

“Dulce et Decorum Est” consist of 4 stanzas and 28 lines. Each stanza consists of
different number of lines. The first stanza consists of 8 lines, second stanza 6 lines,
third stanza 2 lines, and the last stanza 12 lines. From the first line until the last line,
the rhyme scheme is a,b,a,b. Owen put a,b,a,b rhyme scheme to make readers know
the beat when reading the poem. In the first stanza, Owen uses simile to start his
poem, which is “Bent double like old beggars under sacks”. From the sentence, we
know that the soldiers are being compared to beggars, which means they are begging
for freedom. It makes me think that the soldiers are suffering from the battle.

Besides that, we can see another simile in the second line of the poem, which is
“Knock-need, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge”. In my opinion, from the
words knock-kneed, I think the soldiers are bending his knee and hags mean some
kind of ugly woman or witch, which means the soldiers are bearing their pain during
the battle, so the soldiers are not as strong as we thought they would be.

In “Dulce et Decorum Est”, Owen uses alliteration in describing the situation of the
battle in the poem. The examples are “Knock-kneed” from the second line and “Men,
marched, many” from the fifth line. The word knock-kneed is included in alliteration
because the consonant sound in knock and kneed is the same, which is in the word
kn-. The same thing goes to the words men, marched, and many in the fifth line of the
poem, which is in the word m-.

Wilfred Owen not only writing “Dulce et Decorum Est” to describe his experience in
the battle. Owen also wrote a poem “Anthem for Doomed Youth”. “Anthem for Doomed
Youth” is a sonnet consists of 2 stanzas. The first stanza consists of 8 lines, and the
second stanza 6 lines. The rhyme scheme is a,b,a,b in every 4 lines. In starting the
poem, Wilfred Owen uses simile, which is “What passing bells for these who die as
cattle?”. From the sentence, it makes me imagine that the soldiers are being compared
to cattle. Cattle can be unruly crowded just like the soldiers during the war.
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The third line of the poem included in some of the language features, which is
alliteration, personification, and onomatopoeia, which is “Only the stuttering rifles’
rapid rattle”. In my opinion, I think the meaning of this sentence is that during the
battle, all we can hear is just the sound of rifles relentless. The alliteration is from the
words rifles’ rapid rattle. It has the same consonant in the beginning of the word,
which is r-. Besides that, Wilfred Owen also making rifles as living things, from the
word rattle. He wants to describe the sound of the rifles. So he uses the word rattle to
describe the sound, which makes it an onomatopoeia and personification.

In this poem, Wilfred Owen starts his second stanza with rhetorical question, which is
“What candles may be held to speed them all?”. Owen use rhetorical question because
he wants his reader to imagine what it is like to be in a battle, so he put a rhetorical
question to involve the reader so that they can imagine how it really looks like.

Wilfred Owen also put some symbolic meaning in both “Dulce et Decorum Est” and
“Anthem for Doomed Youth”. In “Dulce et Decorum Est” we can see from the thirteenth
line, which is Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light and the fourteenth
line, which is As under a green sea, I saw him drowning. Green light from the
thirteenth line means poisonous gas while green sea means a place that full of
poisonous gas that makes many people dying, just like what Owen said after the word
green sea.

Theme is the whole subject that describes writing, it could be poem, short story, and
many others. “Dulce et Decorum Est” and “Anthem for Doomed Youth” by Wilfred Owen
also has their own theme. The theme for “Dulce et Decorum Est” is about suffering.
The theme is about suffering because in the poem, Owen describes the situation of the
war is really scary and very detail. It tells the reader that the soldiers are suffering
from the battle. While the theme for “Anthem for Doomed Youth” is about death. I
think the poem tells us about the situation when the soldiers are dead, like from some
sentences, which is Only the monstrous anger of the gun, No mockeries now for them;
nor prayers nor bells; Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs, we know that all that
they can hear is just the sound of weapons and battle.
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From the poem written by Wilfred Owen, now I know that battle is not like what I
think before. It is cruel and scary. Wilfred Owen uses language features to describe
the situation of the war. I learned on how people can do anything for their country,
even though they need to be dead in the end. By analyzing these 2 poems by Wilfred
Owen, not I know that Owen is trying to describe the situation of the war in deeper
way by using language features.