The War Poets

During the First World War thousands of young men volunteered for military servi
ce.
For the soldiers, fighting for their own countries was the highest and noblest e
xperience that they could ever had. But, after this first phase of pride and pat
riotic enthusiasm, some of these men started to realize how bad, dangerous and r
ough was the war.
The english soldiers passed some years fighting and surviving the trenches. Life
in trenches, and, in general, during the First World War was horrible: fighting
in the rain and in the mud, among the decaying bodies of the dead soldiers, und
er a bombing sky, and always ready to die for some irrational patriotic values.
The War Poets were a group of common soldiers, ordinary people or well-educated
men, that fought during the war (and many died too in those years) and wrote abo
ut their experiences, in a realistic and unconventional way: they started a new
line of modern poetry.
Rupert Brooke (1887-1915) and Wilfred Owen (1893-1918) were one of them, but the
y had different ideas.
Pagine di riferimento: F42-43-45-46)
Rupert Brooke
He was born in a rich family and he grew up in a rich context. He is remembered
for his handsome appearance and because he died very young. He wrote a collectio
n of poems called 1914 .
Brooke thought that war was clean, and death was a reward, an ideal to pursue. T
he publication of these war sonnets made him popular because of his image of the
young romantic hero . In the petrarchan sonnet The Soldier (divided into an octave an
d a sestet) we can see his lyric style and his love for his country ,England. Wh
en you go to war, you normally think about your eventual death, and that s what th
e poet says in the beginning of the poem: If I should die.. . Then he asks the rea
der to think that his death is right and it will always represents England, even
in a foreign field , far away.
He s thankful to England, described as a mother ( a dust whom England bore.. ). He s ver
y proud of being English and he s proud of his choice to be a soldier. Sacrifice i
t s good for him, because sacrifice means dying for your country ,and he s happy to
do this. He even speaks about a sort of resurrection, because, in the first vers
es of the sestet, he says that after death, all his thoughts will come back to a
n eternal mind: they will be given back to England, so he s not afraid of death.
In the poem there is no extreme sorrow, or sadness, or desperation ,it s just a se
ntimental declaration of love and faith, a declaration to his country. He wants
to be remembered as an english men, a proud, happy, english man, and not as a so
ldier. That s why he doesn t mention anything about war or violence. This was the ty
pical attitude of the first phase of the war, when patriotism was the most impor
tant value and death in war was still considered just as a noble way to end your
ordinary life.
Traduzione:
Se dovessi morire,pensa solo questo di me:
che c un qualche angolo di una terra straniera
che sar per sempre Inghilterra. In quella ricca terra,
ci sar nascosta una polvere ancora pi ricca;
Una polvere che l Inghilterra partor, form, inform,
diede, una volta ,i suoi fiori da amare, i suoi sentieri da percorrere,
un corpo che appartiene all Inghilterra, che respira aria inglese,
lavato dai fiumi, benedetto dai soli della sua terra.
E pensa ,questo cuore, liberatosi da tutto il male,
un battito nella mente eterna, nondimeno
riconduce da qualche parte i pensieri che l Inghilterra gli diede;
le sue immagini e i suoi suoni, e sogna felice come il suo giorno;
e la risata,imparata dagli amici; e gentilezza,

nei cuori in pace, sotto un cielo inglese.

Wilfred Owen
Wilfred Owen was an English teacher, he fought in the war from 1915 until his de
ath, in 1918. He represents the dark side of the war poems, because, differently
from Brooke, he shows the pain, the violence and the pity of war.
He doesn t want to speak about heroes, death and glory. He just wants to tell the
truth. In the poem called Dulce et decorum est he speaks about his own experience
in the trenches, describing a particular episode when he faced death in a gas a
ttack.
Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori ( it is sweet and honourable dying for your cou
ntry ) it s a quotation taken from the Latin poet Horace. It s the old lie ,told by ord
inary people to justify the horrors of war. Only the men that were there can und
erstand how awful and painful this experience is. War is scaring, and brutal, it s
obscene as cancer . The vision of his friend chocked by the gas that asks help is
still a nightmare in his dreams.
Owen is very realistic in describing the horrors of war and the desperation that
is left behind, inside the people that have experienced it.
Traduzione:
Piegati in due, come i mendicanti anziani sotto i sacchi,
con le ginocchia che si toccano, tossendo come le streghe, maledicemmo attravers
o il fango,
finch non ci lasciammo alle spalle quei bagliori spaventosi
e verso il nostro distante accampamento iniziammo a trascinarci.
Gli uomini marciavano addormentati. Molti avevano perso i loro stivali
Avanzavano zoppicando, calzati di sangue. Tutti camminavano zoppi; tutti ciechi;
Ubriachi di fatica; sordi persino ai sibili
Delle stanche, lontane granate cinque-nove che cadevano indietro.
Gas! GAS! Rapidi, ragazzi!
Un brancolare frenetico,
Indossando i goffi elmetti appena in tempo;
Ma qualcuno ancora gridava e inciampava
E si dimenava come un uomo nel fuoco o nella calce viva
Offuscati, attraverso i vetri appannati delle maschere anti-gas e la luce verde
spessa,
Come sotto un mare verde, l ho visto annegare.
In tutti i miei sogni, davanti al mio sguardo impotente,
Si precipita verso di me, barcollando, soffocando, annegando.
Se in qualche orribile sogno anche tu potessi metterti al passo
dietro il furgone in cui lo scaraventammo,
e guardare i bianchi occhi contorcersi sul suo volto,
il suo volto a penzoloni, come un demonio sazio di peccato;
se solo potessi sentire il sangue, ad ogni sobbalzo,
fuoriuscire gorgogliante dai polmoni guasti di bava,
osceni come il cancro, amari come il rigurgito
di disgustose, incurabili piaghe su lingue innocenti amico mio, non ripeteresti con tanto compiaciuto fervore
a fanciulli ansiosi di farsi raccontare gesta disperate,
la vecchia Menzogna: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.