Futility is a poem by Wilfred Owen, possibly the most renowned poet of the First World War, written in May 1918 and published as no. 153 in The Complete Poems and Fragments. The poem is well-known for its departure from Owen's famous style of including disturbing and graphic images in his work; the poem instead having a more soothing, somewhat light-hearted feel to it in comparison. It details an event where a group of soldiers attempt to revive an unconscious soldier by moving him into the warm sunlight on a snowy meadow. However, the "kind old sun" has absolutely no effect on the soldier - he has died.
In 1982, singer Virginia Astley set Futility to music she had composed; the track was included on an NME compilation cassette in October 1982 (credited as The Ravishing Beauties) and on Virginia Astley's 1983 album Promise Nothing.[1][2]
The poem is among those set in the War Requiem of Benjamin Britten.
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