The Poetry of Wilfred Owen

The poems of Wilfred Owen have shaped our remembrance of World War I. The power of his writing arises not only from his role as witness but due to his poetical prowess and the strength of his descriptions. His work conveys the sheer range of suffering experienced during the war, from the graphic depiction of a gas attack in 'Dulce et Decorum Est' and the blinding of a soldier in 'The Sentry' to the reflections on madness in 'Mental Cases' and 'The Chances' to the nightmarish visions of a haunted psyche in 'Strange Meeting'. Owen's poems capture the physical, mental and emotional toll of the war with devasting clarity. A leading voice for a lost generation, he was killed in November 1918, one week before the war's end.