Anthem For Doomed Youth - Wilfred Owen

• Doomed - Inevitability of death. Youth - The poem is dedicated to all of the younger generation who are victim to this.
• "What passing bells for those who die as cattle?" Starts with an aggressive interrogative tone. Perhaps Owen is critiquing the conduct of war here. Cattle - the men are victims of a slaughter house/meat grinder. Cattle - no individual names are honoured - they are a group of victims, the youth.
• Anger at the beginning is reinforced by "The monstrous anger of guns"
• "Only the monstrous anger of guns. only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle" Anadiplosis emphasis the "Only" as if this monstrosity is now ordinary. "Stuttering" rifle. Homophone has two meanings. The shudder of the gun, which is implied as reluctant, as if the opponent sympathises with this monstrosity. But also, the vocal deformity. The sound of the rifle can be what shapes the PTSD, after all you are a product of your environment.
• "Rifles rapid rattle" the alliteration has connotations of remarking this violently. the poem so far is an outrage at this scenario.
• "Can patter out their hasty orisons" (Prayers) - The guns are so powerful and overriding that the restlessness of prayers and pleads are just "patter(ered)" out as if they mean nothing.
• "Passing bells" "Orisons" "Prayers" "Bells" Semantic field of religion. There is no sanctity on the front.
• "No mockeries for them from prayers or bells" - There is no respect in this conflict - Death means nothing.
• "Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs" - No decorum in their send off
• "The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells" Horrific description of airborne shells whining as their send off.
• "And bugles calling for them from sad shires" Bugles = trumpets. People at home waiting for their return, they are not coming.
• "in their eyes Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes" Their only form of goodbye is within the shuttering of pupils losing consciousness and fluttering a goodbye.
• "The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall" - The shock of the women at home will kill them and bury them all together.
• ABAB rhyme scheme - This horror is so engrained in conflict there is no return from this.
• "Mourning" "choirs" vs "demented choirs" The craze of the demented war effects consumes the youth.
• Sonnet - ABAB Rhyme Scheme. Sonnets are love poems. This a love poem in the sense that Owen is dedicating this poem to the youth who were caught in this immense craze of war.
• "Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds" The soft, feminine appearance is tainted by this monstrosity.
• "And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds" -Owen concludes with an image of finality. The men are taken by nature now (The "slow dusk") and a new range of youths will be taken tomorrow.
• Octave: Focus is on explaining how the soldiers will have no sanctity in their sen doff, their lives are passed in animalistic and traumatic fashion.
• Volta: 'What candles may be held to speed them all?" No honour in their deaths
• Final Rhyming Couplet "patient minds" "Drawing down of blinds" Raises the question. How long can we as the human race remain patient?


  Every "dusk" a whole new population of youth's are taken. Owen questions why we aren't getting angry at this.
• Themes are: Religion, value of human life, futility at the front and grief.