Dulce Et Decorum Est

The writer Owen Craiglockhart used very effective and wide range of language techniques,emotive language and imagery to reflect his feelings,thoughts and experiences about the war more clearly and convey the tragic realities of the war.

Craiglockhart began the poem by showing how terrible and tragic situation the soldiers are in. The soldiers are compared to old beggars under sacks and they are also compared to hags. "Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,knock-kneed, caughing like sludge''.The phrase "Bent double" is definetely not a nice word and it creates and image of soldiers who are exhausted and can't even walk properly.The phrase ''caughing like hags'' suggests that the soldiers got ill in the dirty, unhygenic place or they were tired and injured.

In the sixth line of the first stanza, the poet uses a visual image of the soldiers who were exhausted and badly injured.'' But limped on, blood-shod.All went lame;all blind;''.The word ''blood-shod'' shows that the soldiers were injured after the gas attack and they got sored on their body. It may also suggest that the soldiers were shot by ordinary guns, but the next phrase:'' All went lame;all blind'' increases the probability that they were blinded by the gas and this makes the reader understand that war is not a good thing and the reality is that dying for your country under a gas attack was was very terrible and tragic.

In the next stanza, the writer uses the repetition of the word ''Gas'', with capital letters. ''Gas!Quick, boys!--An ecstasy of flumbing fitting the clumsy helmets just in time''. These phrases emphasize that the soldiers were so desperate that they had to hurry up for putting their helmets and run away quickly not to die by a gas attack. This is very tragic as it reminds the reader one more time in how bad situation the soldiers were in.

In the last stanza the writer uses the comparison of soldiers face with a devil who is sick of sin.'' His hanging face,like a devil's sick of sin''. The phrase ''like a devil's sick of sin''. shows that there cannot be any worse ways to die than this.

The poet Craickloghart, succesfully managed to convey the realities of the war with the language techniques which were used the describe the the tragic situation of the soldiers and how they died which effectively showed the reader

that war was a terrible thing, unlike how it was told to poeple at the time to trick them and force them to join the army.