Dulce et Decorum Est

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Dulce et Decorum Est (written in 1917 and published posthumously in 1921) is a poem written by the English poet and World War I soldier Wilfred Owen. The work's horrifying imagery has made it one of the most popular condemnations of war ever written.

The 28-line poem, which is written loosely in iambic pentameter and may be found in its entirety on Wikisource, is told from the person of Wilfred Owen. It begins with a description of war-weary soldiers marching "through sludge," "blood-shod" and "drunk with fatigue". As gas shells begin to fall, the soldiers scramble to put their gas masks on. In the rush, one man clumsily drops his mask, and the narrator sees the man "yelling out and stumbling / and flound'ring like a man in fire or lime". The image of the man "guttering, choking, drowning" permeates Owen‘s thoughts and dreams, forcing him to relive the nightmare again and again.

In the final stanza, Owen writes that if readers could see the body—the "eyes writhing", the "face hanging", the "vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues"—they would cease to send young men to war while instilling visions of glory in their heads. No longer would they tell their children the "Old lie," so long ago told by the Roman poet Horace: "Dulce et decorum est / Pro patria mori" (literally, "Sweet and honorable it is, to die for the fatherland").His use of effective language through out the poem causes the reader to empathise with him.

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.

Throughout the poem, and particularly strong in this last stanza, there is a running commentary, a letter to Jessie Pope, a civilian propagandist of World War I, who encouraged—"with such high zest"—young men to join the battle, through her poetry.

The poem was originally intended to be a personal letter to Pope, but Siegfried Sassoon (another war poet at the time) ironically dissuaded him from doing so. As such, Owen decided to address his poem to a larger audience, that of all war supporters. In the last stanza, however, the original intention can still be seen in Owen's bitter, horrific address.

The poem is often contrasted with the more patriotic tones of poem The Soldier by Rupert Brooke.

The line "Dulce..." is taken from a poem by Horace (Odes iii 2.13):

"Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori:

mors et fugacem persequitur virum

nec parcit inbellis iuventae

poplitibus timidove tergo."

"How sweet and lovely it is to die for your country:

Death pursues even the man who flees

Nor spares the hamstrings or cowardly backs

Of battle-shy youths."

Owen died almost to the hour one week before the signing of the armistice. His mother received the news on Armistice Day, to the noise of church bells tolling in celebration.