Dulce et Decorum est

Content Warning: The section features references to and descriptions of war and its effects on the human body, physical descriptions of the effects of chemical warfare, and discussions of post-traumatic stress disorder.

In 1917, much of the British populace on the home front was still unaware of the physical horror that occurred on the battlefield. Some didn’t want to hear about what modern warfare meant for the young men who served, but much of the news they received was abstract. Many pro-war writers focused on the nobleness of the British cause, ignoring the millions of men who were being maimed or worse. “Dulce et Decorum Est” was one of the first poems to use stark physical imagery as a wake-up call.

Even before the gas attack, the soldiers are physically brutalized, “[b]ent double” (Line 1) and “[k]nock-kneed” (Line 2). They tromp through “sludge” (Line 2), many bootless because of the rough terrain, exposing their skin to infection and damage. The trench boot, a much sturdier boot, wouldn’t be invented until after the poem takes place. As the poem begins, the reader has no idea how long the men have seen battle—hours, days, weeks, months, or years—but they are so exhausted they are “deaf even to the […] / […] gas-shells dropping” (Lines 7-8) and looking for “distant rest” (Line 4).