Theme of Owen's Work

The overall theme in Wilfred Owen's work is that war is a terrible thing to go through. When Owen writes about war he is describing his own personal experiences. In Owen's first few months is where he gets his inspiration for most of his work. And in those few months he goes through a lot. In his poem "Dulce et Decorum Est" he describes the things he sees during a gas attack. He references a man "plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning" (16) He describes the unlucky ones who could not put on their masks. He continues to describe the man "you could hear, at every jolt, the blood/Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs, /Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud" (21-23) Seeing this man suffer truly did affect Owen. Again in Owen's poem "The Sentry" talks about a awful experience. He witnesses one of his own men go blind holding a German trench. A German shell exploded in the trench and the shrapnel caused the man to go blind. "We dredged him up, for killed, until he whined/"O sir, my eyes -- I'm blind -- I'm blind, I'm blind!""(18-19) Owen thought the man was dead until he picked him up. Owen tries to see if the man can still see but ""I can't," he sobbed. Eyeballs, huge-bulged like squids"(23) It truly is awful what happened to the man. Finally, in the poem "Anthem for Doomed Youth" Owen describes the situation a soldier might be in when they're about to die. In the first line Owen compares the soldiers to cattle. He continues "Only the monstrous anger of the guns./Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle/Can patter out their hasty orisons"(2-4) When a soldier is trying to say a quick prayer before they die they can barely hear themselves as there is gun fire going on. A soldier's death is not a very peaceful one. In short Wilfred Owen's work shows the reader how awful war can truly be.