Dulce et Decorum Est by Wilfred Owen

Question 1

Dulce et Decorum Est
Person?
Structure?
Rhyming?

Answer 1

1st- Personal, autobiographical feel
Majority is a flashback- speaker can’t forget the horror
Clear pattern, then disjointed with caesura and enjambment- sound of men marching, physical and mental damage of war

Question 2

Dulce et Decorum Est
Context?

Answer 2

Joined battle of Somme in 1917, led to shell shock
Awarded Military Cross
Killed 7 days before peace declared

Question 3

Dulce et Decorum Est
5 quotations

Answer 3

‘Bent double, like old beggars under sacks’
‘Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!’
‘He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning’
‘vile incurable sores on innocent tongues’
‘The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est/ Pro patria mori’

Question 4

Dulce et Decorum Est
‘Bent double, like old beggars under sacks’

Answer 4

Simile, struggle and burden of equipment
Plosive bilabial alliteration, spitting out words, fury
Aged before their time

Question 5

Dulce et Decorum Est
‘Gas! Gas! Quick, boys!’

Answer 5

Monosyllabic exclamatory phrases, reflect panic
Unknown speaker, lack of individuality
Reminder of youth and innocence

Question 6

Dulce et Decorum Est
‘He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning’

Answer 6

Asyndetic triadic list of non-finite verbs, suffering and struggle while gas invades lungs
Desperation in verb
Personal pronoun, emotional, realistic

Question 7

Dulce et Decorum Est
‘vile incurable sores on innocent tongues’

Answer 7

Gruesome adjective, harsh reality
Damage of war can’t be reversed, changes lives
Tragic reminder of youth, pathos
Inability to speak on memories as painful

Question 8

Dulce et Decorum Est
‘The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est/Pro patria mori.’

Answer 8

Final rhyming couplet references Horace’s Ode 3.2, disputes it
Bitterly ironic, war is cruel, degrading, horrific
End stop, finality, last most important words