'Dulce et Decorum est' - a poem, and a harrowing account of World War I

During World War One, poetry was popularly used to promote participation in the war effort. Many poems would emotively indicate that it was an honour to fight for one's country - an example is the work of Rupert Brooke. But war poet Wilfred Owen presented a different, and less happy, vision of the conflict.

One of Wilfred Owen's most famous poems 'Dulce Et Decorum Est', offers a graphic, gruesome account of life in the trenches.

The title of the poem means 'it is sweet and fitting', a shortened version of 'dulce et decorum est pro patria mori' - a line taken from the Odes by Classical Roman poet Horace. Its full translation is 'it is sweet and fitting to die for the homeland'. Owen's satirical title suggests that the realities of war were less romantic than the vision that pro-war poetry presented. Owen's own macabre vision is consolidated by a haunting tone throughout: 'Gas! GAS! Quick, boys!' and 'the blood... gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs'.

Owen is believed to have written the poem in 1917, before revising it in 1918 - during his own time in combat. The earliest surviving manuscript is addressed to Owen's mother, and includes the message 'Here is a gas poem done yesterday (which is not private, but not final).' Owen himself was killed in action on 4th November 1918 - a week before the war ended.

Owen breaks the traditional conventions of rhyming which accentuates the chaotic events being recounted. The poem's final lines again reference Horace, and in the original Latin, and they also directly address war-positive propaganda:

My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est Pro patria mori

The final line translates as 'How sweet and honourable it is to die for one's country'.