Analysis Flashcards
(25 cards)
Line 1-2:
“Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags”
Similes comparing soldiers to unheroic things (old women and sick beggars)
Line 2:
“cursed through sludge”
Word choice: not marching in glory - And worse than just mud… what’s in it?
Line 4:
“our distant rest”
Double entendre/metaphor. Does he mean rest… or death? Creates a sense of being doomed.
Line 4:
“trudge”
Word choice: not heroic, just exhausted. Not marching like glorious soldier image.
Line 6:
“All…all”
Repetition of “all” emphasises the completeness of their suffering.
Line 6-7:
“lame; all blind; drunk…deaf”
Word choice “Lame,” “blind,” “Drunk” and “deaf” continue to stress their physical destruction.
Line 8:
“tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.”
Personification of the shells falling on them. “Hoots” suggests derisive laughter taunting them. “Tired, outstripped” suggests that even the machines are sick of war.
Line 9:
“Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!”
Use of dialogue and exclamations - change of pace and sense of immediacy.
Line 10:
“the clumsy helmets”
Transferred epithet. The soldiers are clumsy with the helmets, although the helmets are also difficult to use (suggesting ill-designed for emergencies). Again - unheroic.
Line 11-12:
“yelling…stumbling…flound’ring”
Trio of inglorious verbs. ‘Floundering’ suggests flapping about in an ungainly way, but also has connotations of desperation, failure, confusion and death.
Line 12:
“like a man in fire or lime…”
Simile comparing him to someone being burnt alive. Suggests an incredibly painful death. Ellipsis suggests continued replaying of this image in Owen’s mind.
Line 13:
“Dim…misty…thick green light.”
These nightmarish descriptions give the incident a surreal, dream-like horror (through glass of gas mask).
Line 14:
“As under a green sea,”
Simile: we now compare the man’s death to another horrible end (drowning).
Line 14:
“I saw him.”
First person point of view: vivid sense of truth and horror. Not glorious!
Line 14-16:
“drowning…drowning”
Repetition of “drowning: “ rather than a proper rhyme (the only slip in the rhyme scheme) emphasises Owen’s horror at this image.
Line 15:
“In all…dreams”
Word choice: “all” suggests the severity of the mental scars.
Line 16:
“Plunges at”
Again, nightmarish impact of this violent verb choice. Almost as if he’s attacking Owen - survivor’s guilt.
Line 16:
“guttering, choking, drowning”
Trio of horrible onomatopoeic verbs creates vivid image of the man’s death.
Line 17:
“Smothering”
Word choice: he feels suffocated by these memories, just as the gassed man suffocated.
Line 17:
“You too”
Use of the second person: in this stanza he directly challenges Jessie Pope and all those who perpetuate “the Old Lie.”
Line 19:
“Watch”
Coupled with “hear” in two lines’ time - use of senses makes the nightmare very vivid.
Line 20:
“like a devil’s sick of sin”
Simile comparing the man to a devil, tired of doing evil. Reminding us of the horrific things soldiers have to do, as well as see - a fact omitted by those who glamorise War. Suggesting Owen’s own feelings of guilt and trauma.
Line 21:
“My friend”
Ironic. He is not feeling friendly - he’s angry
Line 22:
“Children”
Emotive word choice. These are the “innocent” he referred to two lines earlier. And they’re also the boys being killed.
