'Anthem For Doomed Youth' Summary

'Anthem For Doomed Youth' is an anti-war poem Owen wrote whilst recovering from shellshock
in a Scottish hospital. The year was 1917. Less than a year later, Owen was killed in battle. The
poem laments the loss of young life in war and describes the sensory horrors of combat. It takes
particular issue with the official pomp and ceremony that surrounds war (gestured to by the
word "Anthem" in the title), arguing that church bells, prayers, and choirs are inadequate
tributes to the realities of war. It is perhaps Owen's second most famous poem, after "Dulce et
Decorum Est."

• Wilfred Owen, a well-known British poet wrote this poem. It is one of the tragic
sonnets also known as a funeral dedication for soldiers in the First World War. It
was first published in 1917. The poem speaks about the death of soldiers either in
the Battle of Somme or Passchendaele. It explains how the soldiers die helplessly
on the battlefield. They do not have anyone to give them proper burial after their
sacrifice. One of the notable aspects of the poem is the poet’s rejection of God and
religion after seeing suffering around him.

Form and Style

'Anthem For Doomed Youth' is a sonnet made up of eight plus six lines, fourteen, an octet and
sestet. The sonnet form is usually associated with romance and love, so the poet is being ironic
by choosing it. The poem throughout compares the deaths of the soldiers with traditional
funeral rites and ceremonies.

“Anthem for Doomed Youth” Setting

1.The poem has two distinct atmospheres or settings. The first of these is the battlefield of
WWI (warfront described in lines 1 through 7), which is powerfully conveyed by the terrifying
and deafening sounds of weaponry. In this setting, guns and rifles seem to be firing from all
directions, and "wailing shells" are falling overhead. It's a horrific scene that contrasts sharply
with the mild images of church bells, prayers, and choirs.

2. The other setting is back home [Homefront]. This setting is described in lines 8 through 14,
and specifically, it's the nation of England (as demonstrated by the phrase "sad shires," which
refers to different areas of England). In the 2nd stanza, the focus shifts from the war front to the
"home front" (the home country in which civilian life goes on). The post-war future predicted in
the second stanza is a mournful, tentative one.
Analysis of the Poem
‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’ serves as a dual rejection: both of the brutality of war, and of
religion.
1st Stanza explanation:
Anthem for Doomed Youth’ opens, as do many of Owen’s poems, with a note of righteous
anger: what passing-bells for those who die as cattle? The use of the word ‘cattle’ in the
opening line sets the tone and the mood for the rest of it – it dehumanizes the soldiers much in
the same way that Owen sees the war dehumanizing the soldiers, bringing up imagery of
violence and unnecessary slaughter. Owen made no secret that he was a great critic of the war;
his criticism of pro-war poets has been immortalized in poems such as Dulce et Decorum Est,
and in letters where Wilfred Owen wrote home. In ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth,’ Owen makes
no secret of the fact that he believes the war is a horrific waste of human life.

The first stanza of ‘Anthem for Doomed Youth’ continues in the pattern of a pitched battle, as
though it were being written during the Pushover the trenches. Owen notes the ‘monstrous
anger’ of the guns, the ‘stuttering rifles’, and the ‘shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells’. It’s a
horrible world that Owen creates in those few lines, bringing forward the idea of complete
chaos and madness, of an almost animalistic loss of control – but in the same paragraph, he
also points out the near-reluctance of the soldiers fighting. At this point, a great deal of the
British Army had lost faith in the war as a noble cause and was only fighting out of fear of court-
martial, therefore the rifles stutter their ‘hasty orisons’. Orisons are a type of prayer, which
further points out Owen’s lack of faith – he believes that war has overshadowed faith, that it
has taken the place of belief. As he says in another poem, ‘we only know war lasts, rain soaks,
and clouds sag stormy’.

Ironically, the use of onomatopoeia for the guns and the shells humanizes war far more than its
counterparts. War seems a living being more than the soldiers, or the mourners, and the words
used – ‘monstrous anger’, ‘stuttering’, ‘shrill demented choirs’ – bring forward the image of war
as not only human, but alive, a great monster chewing up everything in its path, including the
soldiers that poured out their blood into shell holes. The quiet nature of the second stanza, and
the use of softened imagery, brings out, in sharp relief, the differences between war and
normal life.

2nd stanza explanation ;

In the second stanza, Owen moves away from the war to speak about the people who have
been affected by it: the civilians who mourn their lost brothers, fathers, grandfathers, and
uncles, the ones who wait for them to come home and wind up disappointed and miserable
when they don’t. The acute loss of life that Owen witnessed in the war is made more poignant
and heartbreaking in the second stanza, which, compared to the first, seems almost unnaturally
still. He speaks about the futility of mourning the dead who have been lost so carelessly, and by
making the mourners youthful, he draws further attention to the youthfulness of the soldiers
themselves. Note the clever use of words like pallor most often associated with death or dying.

Owen also frames this second stanza in the dusk. This is to signify the end, which of course for
many of the soldiers it was their end. The final line – ‘And each slow dusk a drawing-down of
blinds‘– highlights the inevitability and the quiet of the second stanza, the almost pattern-like
manner of mourning that has now become a way of life. It normalizes the funeral and hints at
the idea that this is not the first, second, nor last time that such mourning will be carried out.

• Major Themes in “Anthem for Doomed Youth”: Horrors of war, death, and
suffering are the major themes of this poem. The poet paints a realistic picture of the
battleground. The readers must realize how soldiers sacrifice their lives to defend
their country, but the civilians honor their deaths. They are killed like animals during
the wars. Usually, at funerals for the dead, the bells ring, and prayers are offered.
However, the soldiers do not have that privilege. Instead of bells and prayers,
sounds of guns, fires, and shells are heard after their death. Their families can only
cry on the news of their death.

Analysis of Literary Devices Used in “Anthem for Doomed

Youth”
Wilfred Owen has also employed some literary devices in this poem to express his ideas.

1. Assonance: Assonance is the repetition of vowel sounds in the same line. For
example, the sound of /o/ in “No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells” and
“Only the monstrous anger of the guns.”
2. Consonance: Consonance is the repetition of consonant sounds in the same line.
For example, the sound of /l/ in “The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells.”
3. Alliteration: Alliteration is the repetition of consonant sounds in the same line in
quick succession. For example, the sound of /r/ in “Only the stuttering rifles’ rapid
rattle”; the sound of /d/ “And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds” and the
sound of /g/ in “Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes”.
4. Enjambment: It is defined as a thought in verse that does not come to an end at a
line break; instead, it continues to the next line. For example,

“Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes

Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.”
 5. Imagery: Imagery is used to make readers perceive things involving their five
senses. For example, “What passing-bells for these who die as cattle”; “Not in the
hands of boys, but in their eyes” and “Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.”
6. Rhetorical Question: Rhetorical question is a statement said or asked to make the
point clear without expecting any answers. For example, “What passing-bells for
these who die as cattle?” and “What candles may be held to speed them all?”
7. Simile: It is a figure of speech used to compare an object or a person with
something else to make the meanings clear. There is one simile used in the opening
lines of this poem. For example, “What passing-bells for these who die as cattle.”
Here, the poet compares dead soldiers to cattle.
8. Personification: Personification is to give human qualities to non-living objects. For
example, guns are personified in the second line of the poem, “only the monstrous
anger of the guns,” as if the guns are humans that can express anger.
9. Rhyme Scheme: The rhyme scheme followed by the poem is ABAB CDCD EFFE
GG.
10. End Rhyme: End rhyme is used to make the stanza melodious. For example,
“cattle/rattle”, “all/pall” and “minds/blinds.”
Anthem for Doomed Youth” As a Representative of Death: The poem presents the
speaker’s sadness and agony on the loss of lives during the war. The poem begins with
the awful deaths of the soldiers. The poet sadly states nobody rings the bells for those
who die like cattle on the battlefield. They never receive any formal ceremonies to honor
their death. Instead, both sides of soldiers receive anger of the guns and rifles. Although
they fight tirelessly, they get no mourning sounds and cremation. They are brutally shot
and killed. The poet expresses his agony as he recalls that nobody lights up the candles
for their memorial. Only girls with their pale faces who could be their mother, girlfriend, or
close kin put flowers.