Exposure

• wilfred Owen

  • pursued career in church, felt that it was hypocritical as it failed duty to care for its dependents
  • 1917-written whilst owen was fighting in trenches, first person narrative
  • war romanticised to the point where it obtains a mythical status - owen dispelled this lie by exposing horrific reality of war.
• They believe that war is the only way of keeping their loved ones at home safe
• They return to thinking about their deaths in the icy, bleak trenches
• Form


  • The poem's written in the present tense using the first person plural "Our", "We", "us"
  • Each stanza has a singular rhyme scheme (ABBAC), reflecting the monotonous nature of the man's experience, but the rhymes are often half-rhymes
  • Each stanza ends with a half line, leaving a gap which mirrors the lack of activity or hope for the men
• Structure


  • The poem has circular stanzas, but there's no real progression-the last stanza ends with the same words as the first one, reflecting the monotony of life in the trenches and the absence of change
• Language


  • The poem uses rhetorical questions to ask why the men are exposed to such dreadful conditions, and whether there's any point to their suffering
  • The poem includes lots of bleak imagery to remind the reader of the men's pain, the awful weather and the lack of hope for the soldiers
  • Assonance, onomatopoeia and carefully chosen verbs add to the bleak mood and make the descriptions vivid and distressing
• Personification


  • Nature is repeatedly personified, making it seem the real enemy in the war