How does Owen make clear his feelings about war in Dulce et Dorcum est? :: English Literature

How does Owen make clear his feelings about war in Dulce et Dorcum est? The title of this poem which is ‘Dulce et Dorcum est,’ is a Latin saying which means, ‘It is sweet and honorable to die for your country.’ It is written by Wilfred Owen who gives us his opinion about this motto. He uses one of his brutal memories to support his views and to compare a stereotypical soldier as we visualize one in our heads and one as he saw whilst fighting in the war. This memory is of a time when Owen, along with his fellow soldiers is walking back to their rest place, when all of a sudden there is a gas attack. All except one of these soldiers manages to put on his gas mask in time; therefore he dies a horrible death. The poem explores a different mood for each of the four stanzas. In stanza one the mood is slow and weary. In stanza two there is a mood, which is fast and panicky. Stanza three explores a tragic mood and the final stanza has a mood of bitterness and anger. Owen is successful in providing detail throughout the poem. He is also successful in writing the poem as a memory, as he did fight in the war. In this poem he effectively shows his thoughts and expressions, as he wants the reader to think of them. Owen accomplishes the mood in verse one through his use of language. The poem starts with the words â€Å"Bent Double†, which introduces the image of a soldier as Owen remembers one. These words show us the action and figure of the soldiers. In reality you cannot walk bent really close to the ground, therefore these words can be considered as metaphors or slight exaggerations of what the soldiers were doing. These words start off the comparison of a real soldier with a stereotypical one. â€Å"Like old beggars under sacks†¦Ã¢â‚¬  This implies the visual sight of the soldiers if an ordinary person were to see them. This sentence is a simile and therefore means that the soldiers look like beggars. The word ‘sacks’ helps us to visualize the soldiers walking really close to the ground, under the weight of a sack. The simile above can also express torn clothes worn by the soldiers, muddy faces, slight injuries taken on by the soldiers and the mental conditions that they were facing. The simile compares these soldiers to people who have nothing to lose and their uniform to ‘sacks’, which indicates their shabby conditions. Another word, which suggests the speed at which soldiers move, is â€Å"trudge.