Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon were both British soldiers fighting on the Allied side of World War I. They both wrote anti-war poems that were influential in subverting stereotypes about war. In ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’ and ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’, Wilfred Owen employs the use of gruesome, brutal imagery to show the violent and savage reality of trench warfare. Siegfried Sassoon makes use of irony in ‘The General’ to portray the callousness with which commanders treated men’s lives. His other poem, ‘Glory of Women’ is similar to Owen’s poetry in its graphic imagery depicting the death and murder wrought in the trenches of the war. Their gritty and raw poetry was in part a response to national stereotypes of war and nationhood. Much of the British media at the time was jingoistic and portrayed a skewed image of the war. It employed the use of propaganda to glorify the war effort, presenting the warfare as valiant, brave and chivalric. In contrast, Owen and Sassoon, who experienced the war first-hand, presented trench warfare as brutal and lacking any heroism and chivalry. Hence, I will argue in my essay that Owen and Sassoon’s poetry use irony and imagery to subvert the stereotypes about war as chivalric and glorious, as a part of a larger critique of the incompetent command which caused many young men to die in the trenches.
Wilfred Owen and Siegfried Sassoon’s use of irony in their poetry can be better understood in the context of the jingoistic war poetry and propaganda that was prevalent during the time of the war. Owen’s poem ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’ was written as a response to a poet named Jessie Pope who often portrayed war as chivalric and noble with much glory to be obtained. In 1916, Pope wrote ‘Who’s for the Game’, a poem calling for soldiers to enlist and gain glory in the Great War. The first stanza reads:
“Who’s for the game, the biggest that’s played
The red crashing game of a fight?”
Who’ll grip and tackle the job unafraid?
And who thinks he’d rather sit tight?” (Pope, lines 1-4)
The poem is written in iambic pentameter, giving the poem an upbeat, bounding rhythm. The stanza also follows a simple ABAB rhyme scheme. Pope intentionally includes a strong beat in her poem to make it easy to read and the rhyme makes the poem easily memorable. Pope appeals to young men’s values of courage and valour by directly asking them a rhetorical question if they will “tackle the job unafraid”. Her use of the word “unafraid” implies that those who do not go to war are cowardly and weak. Pope’s uses the rhetorical question to encourage young men to show their valour by enlisting for the war effort.
Pope also extensively made use of euphemism to appeal to young men’s machismo. First off she utilises metaphor to refer to the war as a “game, the biggest that’s played”. She appeals to the machismo of men by downplaying the seriousness of the war and presenting it as a sports game or a fun challenge in which there was glory to be gained in victory. The lighthearted nature of her verse was in stark contrast to the reality of the war which Owen and Sassoon experienced. Pope also uses euphemism by suggesting that the worst-case scenario for a soldier was to “come back with a crutch”, in other words, an injury (Pope, 11). She deliberately omits details of death at the front lines of the war to encourage unknowing men to join the army. Finally, Pope makes use of direct address in the final lines of her poem: “Your country is up to her neck in a fight, / And she’s looking and calling for you.” (Pope, lines 16-17). Pope speaks directly to the young men in the poem with the words “Your country” and “calling for you”, telling them to enlist in the war effort and fight for their country. Hence, we see that Pope downplayed the seriousness of the war using euphemisms, as well as presenting it in a romantic light. Pope’s poem was representative of much of the war poetry at the time, jingoistic and lighthearted, far from the reality which Owen and Sassoon experienced.
Owen subverts the national stereotypes about war using the same techniques as Pope in ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’. The title itself is ironic, stemming from a Latin phrase: “it is sweet and good to die for your country”, but the poem’s content is about the brutal and graphic nature in which men are killed in the trenches. The men are “Bent double, like old beggars under sacks” (Owen, ‘Dulce’ 1). Through the images of the soldiers with their bodies warped and distorted in pain, Owen likens the soldiers to “beggars”, “coughing like hags” (Owen, ‘Dulce’ 2). These are images from of malnourished, poverty-stricken people, who are unhealthy and sick, and focused on survival, not hunting for glory. The soldiers are weakened and exhausted from the war. Furthermore, they are emasculated by Owen’s comparison of them to “hags”, slang for old ugly women. The soldiers have lost their masculinity and virility because of all their suffering in the war. Owen’s poem defies the norm of stereotypical war poems such as Pope’s by presenting the soldiers as weak, malnourished and tired. Instead of presenting the war as jovial and fun, Owen draws from his own experience at the front line to portray a realistic depiction of trench warfare where soldiers suffered all of the time.
In his other poem, ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’, Owen portrays the brutality and massive scale of death in trench warfare through the use of imagery. The first stanza of the poem draws attention to the countless number of casualties from the trenches, asking a rhetorical question: “What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?” (Owen, ‘Anthem’ 1). Owen employs the use of metaphor in this line, referring to the dead soldiers as cattle. By equating war casualties with cattle, Owen implies that the value of human life is the same as that of “cattle”. In the war, young men were sent to die by their generals, similar to how farmers brought up farm animals, only to be butchered for their meat and fur. Trench warfare, then, is lacking any bravery or honour, as men are simply sent to their deaths. Through his metaphor of soldiers as farm animals brought up for slaughter, Owen portrays the lack of respect for the sanctity of human life.
Owen also employs the use of irony in his reference to “passing-bells”, which were church bells which were tolled at funeral services to remember the dead. In ‘Anthem’, there are no real burial services for those who died on the battlefield. There is no traditional tolling of a church bell. The church bell is replaced on the battlefield by “the stuttering rifles’ rapid rattle” (Owen, ‘Anthem’ 3) to commemorate their deaths. Owen’s referring to gunfire as a funeral service is ironic, as the tolling of the church bells was a sacred ritual and a tribute to the dead, while the rifles only intended to kill more of the dead soldiers’ comrades, bringing them into the ranks of the dead. Owen’s use of alliteration in the phrase “rifles’ rapid rattle” creates rhythm in its iambic pentameter, further underlining that the rifles would continue to fire and kill more and more of the soldiers. Pope’s chivalry and honour are nowhere to be seen, as even the men who died bravely were not given properly funeral rights. Hence, we observe that Owen uses irony in ‘Anthem’ to depict the massive scale of death caused by trench warfare. The war, as depicted in ‘Anthem’, was brutal and unforgiving.
Similarly, Siegfried Sassoon uses irony in ‘The General’ to highlight the injustice of how the commanders used soldiers’ lives in the trenches. The poem is written in anapaestic meter, which creates a cheery and upbeat rhythm. Sassoon writes: “we met him last week on our way to the line” (Sassoon, ‘The General’ 2). The line has a pleasant, bounding rhythm which works in tandem with the General’s jovial manner. Sassoon ironically portrays the war as light-hearted, fun and pleasant, which contrasts and highlights the tragic death of the two soldiers at the end of the poem because of the General’s tactics. The General’s greeting to the soldiers also conveys an illusion of normalcy and everyday life: “Good-morning, good-morning!” (Sassoon, ‘The General’ 1). The greeting conveys a lack of seriousness of the General to the gravitas of the situation, where “the soldiers he smiled at are most of ‘em dead” (Sassoon, ‘The General 3). Sassoon’s satirical portrayal of the General implies that the commanders and upper ranks of the soldiers were detached from the brutality of trench warfare. Although he is responsible for sending men to their deaths in the trenches, the General is able to address the men jovially, showing that he has no regard for the men whose lives he is throwing away in the trenches. Sassoon shows as long as the commanding staff treat the men’s lives as expendable resources, there is little glory to be gained. He hence subverts stereotypes that the battlefield is a place for honour and bravery.
Sassoon also critiques the General Staff’s incompetence in their tactics. As Sassoon writes, “we’re cursing his staff for incompetent swine” (Sassoon, ‘The General’ 4). Sassoon makes a switch to low diction, employing the use of the colloquial term “swine” to show his disgust towards the General’s behaviour, being upbeat and cheery when men die because of his failure. In doing so, Sassoon marks a clear distinction between the “staff” who are incompetent in regards to their tactics and the soldiers who are sent to die for them, straight “up to Arras with rifle and pack” (Sassoon, ‘The General 6). The Battle of Arras was a diversionary battle, where British soldiers would fight to divert enemy strength away from another battle, throwing away their lives. The soldiers’ “cursing his staff for incompetent swine” is can hence be seen as Owen’s condemnation of the General Staff’s tactics, mainly that of throwing away of lives to gain ground in trench warfare. The result of their tactics is similar to Owen’s metaphor of men as cattle in ‘Anthem’, where men were sent to the front lines to be slaughtered like farm animals. There was no room for any of the stereotypes of glory and chivalry at the front lines. Hence we observe that Sassoon uses his portrayal of the General to critique the huge loss of human life lost by the incompetent tactics of the General Staff.
In conclusion, we see that the national poetry at the time, as represented by Jessie Pope and other writers, was jingoistic and unrealistic in its depiction of war. It deliberately portrayed a lighthearted view of the war in which the prime motive was to gain honour and glory. Wilfred Owen employs the use of irony and imagery in his poems ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’ and ‘Dulce et Decorum Est’ to highlight the reality of trench warfare. Similarly, Sassoon uses irony in ‘The General’ to critique the injustice of how the General Staff threw away many men’s lives to aid the war effort in their incompetent tactics. Through their honest depictions of war in their poetry, Owen and Sassoon helped to subvert the stereotypes about World War I being noble and chivalrous.
Works Cited
Wilson, Owen. “Anthem for Doomed Youth”. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/47393/anthem-for-doomed-youth. Accessed 23 April 2020.
Wilson, Owen. “Dulce et Decorum Est”. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/46560/dulce-et-decorum-est. Accessed 23 April 2020.
Siegfried, Sassoon. “The General”. https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57217/the-general-56d23a7de4d1c. Accessed 23 April 2020.
Pope, Jessie. “Who’s for the Game?” https://allpoetry.com/Who%27s-for-the-Game-. Accessed 23 April 2020