World War One Poetry

World War One Poetry

For this assignment I am going to give a detailed consideration of

poems from World War 1. I will be looking at poems by Wilfred Owen,

Jessie Pope, Rupert Brooke and Siegfried Sassoon. I intend to study

the language, imagery and poetic techniques of the poems. I am going

to begin with some of the earlier war poetry. These poems were written

to encourage young men to join the army. They are patriotic,

jingoistic and unrealistic. These were written by poets who had not

yet experienced or seen the awfulness of war. I will begin with "Who's

for game?" by Jessie Pope. This poem is full of questions which make

it interact well with the reader. The poem starts off with "Who's for

game, the biggest that's played,". This, just like the title, is an

ego teaser. This means that the reader connects well with the poem and

would be more encouraged to join the army because of it. It also

compares war to a game. Throughout the poem the poet uses a comparison

of a man joining the army and a man choosing not to. She always gives

a positive view to the man that joins the army, putting him one rank

higher than the civilian. This is displayed in four verses, but, most

strongly in verse two.

"Who wants a turn to himself in the show?

And who wants a seat in the stand?"

The poem is comparing the man in the show to a soldier and the man in

the stand watching to the civilian. Again she is using imagery

associated with sport.

Pope also uses slang such as "sit tight" and "up to her neck" to make

the poem connect more with young men. The rhyme scheme of the poem is

"a, b, a, b". The "a" lines are longer than the "b" lines and ...

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...s" In the first line of

each verse the injury gets worse. In verse 2:

"Does it matter? - loosing your sight? . . .

In verse 3:

"Do they matter? - those dreams from the pit? . . .

Sassoon believes this to be the worst injury from war, going insane.

In this poem Sassoon shows how he detests people who are patriotic and

jingoistic towards the war. He understands from first hand experience

how war can affect an individual and he is trying to help other people

understand that.

I think Sassoon wrote this poem because of the uncaring society that

did not consider the personal effects of war on an individual soldier.

The older war poetry was about thinking of our country, which

encourage patriotism and people signing up for the army. Sassoon's

poems consider individuals and shows what life is like for them.