The theme of Owen's sonnet presents the bitter irony of the terrible costs and brutal realities of warfare in contrast to the incapability of England's rituals to honor the fallen soldiers and alleviate the terrible suffering in warfare.
In his poem "Anthem for Doomed Youth," Wilfred Owen creates a formal poem which eulogizes the fallen soldiers who have no funeral ceremony given them. It is his sonnet that acts as an anthem, or sacred hymn...
The theme of Owen's sonnet presents the bitter irony of the terrible costs and brutal realities of warfare in contrast to the incapability of England's rituals to honor the fallen soldiers and alleviate the terrible suffering in warfare.
In his poem "Anthem for Doomed Youth," Wilfred Owen creates a formal poem which eulogizes the fallen soldiers who have no funeral ceremony given them. It is his sonnet that acts as an anthem, or sacred hymn composed to honor the soldiers who have fallen in the lonely fields. All that can be heard are the "wailing shells" and the "demented choirs of wailing shires."
In this sonnet, Owen expresses his poignant emotion for the soldiers who have lain down their lives in what seems a senselessly cruel war:
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells,
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,--
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells....
In this octave, Owen represents as "mockeries" the burial rites of the Church that do not include these fallen soldiers. For, there are no church bells nor any prayers--only the "demented choirs of wailing shells" and the sounds of the call to battle: the "stuttering" of rifles in rapid fire.
Having once planned to be a clergyman, Owen represents in the sestet the burial rites of the established Church as “mockeries” and imagines instead a private, nonconformist ritual of the "heart and patient minds."
No comments:
Post a Comment