1

2
3
62e

4
3

5
6
7
8
  Anthem for Doomed Youth Introduction

In A Nutshell
Wilfred Owen, the poet behind "Anthem for Doomed Youth," was a young British officer in
World War I. He entered the Great War full of enthusiasm and patriotic fervor, ready to fight and
die for his country. But over time, after grueling months in the trenches, and through his
encounter with Siegfried Sassoon (an older soldier and poet who was pretty cynical about the
war) Owen came to realize that the realities of battle were far different from what he'd been led to
believe. As in, they were much worse.
With some help from Sassoon, Owen was soon writing brilliant, biting poems, including "Anthem
for Doomed Youth," which was published posthumously in 1920. In Britain (and in much of the
world), talk of the war was steeped in a jingoism that hid the realities of what was going on. (By
the way, jingoism refers to the following attitude: "Our country is the greatest ever! Our enemies

9
are vile and worthless! Dying for your country is holy and glorious! Hurrah!") But "Anthem for
Doomed Youth," along with Owen's other poems, brings the reader right into the normally hidden
senselessness of this fighting, and the brutality, too. And the poems hold that horror-filled image
up next to the more patriotic versions of war we get at home, so the reader could see how
different, and how terrible, war truly is.
Owen died just days before the end of WWI, but in the fourteen months leading up to his death
he produced a body of work that has come to be recognized as some of the best war poetry ever
written.

Summary
Our speaker asks us what sort of notice or holy ritual marks the deaths of soldiers who are
slaughtered in battle. He then answers his own question, pointing out that there are no special
occasions or pleasant ceremonies on the front—only the sounds of weapons and battle, which
he compares to a demented sort of song and ceremony.
Then he asks what ritual can be done to make those deaths a little easier to swallow. He
concludes that only tears and the pale, drained faces of their loved ones will send these
deceased boys off; the tenderness of patient minds will be like flowers on their graves. In the last
image, our speaker shows us an image of civilians pulling down their blinds at dusk

 Stanza 1 Summary

Line 1
What passing-bells for these who die as cattle?

 People are dying and our speaker asks us, what sound is there to mark their deaths?
 Those "passing-bells"? They're church bells, which are rung to mark someone's death
(when they have passed away).
 Already this phrase has introduced religious imagery to the poem, but it's contrasted with
the horrific experience on the front lines of war, where men die like cattle. And where we
can't imagine any church bells are ringing.
 Did you notice that our speaker says "these" instead of "those"? Why do you think that
might be?
 "Those" gives a sense of distance to the poem. You might use that word to talk about
people who are far away, or whom you feel separate from. If you use "these," it's as though
you're talking about someone who's right there in the room with you.
 So with this very slight matter of word choice, our speaker has deliberately brought the
soldiers that much closer to us. It's as if we're on the battlefield, seeing those soldiers
falling right and left.
 And what are these soldiers compared to? Cattle. It's not exactly the best simile we've
ever heard.
 The phrase "die as cattle" suggests slaughter. He's saying that something about these
deaths is especially terrible—it's inhuman, it's treating soldiers like animals.
 Cattle come in herds. It seems a lot of these men are dying all at once.
 . Do you notice anything about the way it sounds? A rhythm? A meter? "What passing-
bells for these who die as cattle."
 There's a little da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM da-DUM action, with an extra "da" at the
end of the line.
 When we see this rhythm in poetry (five da-DUMs in a row), we call it iambic pentameter. In
this case, it's got an extra syllable at the end.

10
Line 2
Only the monstrous anger of the guns.

 The speaker answers his own question .

 The only thing that marks their deaths is the angry sound of more guns. Gunfire is just
about the opposite of pleasant church bells.
 That word "monstrous" is a pretty big and heavy word, especially to load on top of "anger."
 We mean, anger is already a pretty violent and scary thing. So "monstrous anger" means
that something about these guns is terrible enough to put regular anger to shame.

Lines 3-4
Only the stuttering rifles' rapid rattle
Can patter out their hasty orisons.

 Our speaker says that rifle fire is the only kind of prayer for the dying soldiers. ("Orison" is
kind of a fancy word [from Latin] for prayer.)
 anaphora action with the repetition of "Only." Owen uses it to build momentum and
pacing.
 That word "hasty" makes us aware of the suddenness of death on the war front, and also
underscores the haphazard and senseless nature of the killing that's going on there.
 These are not thoughtful deaths—they're quick, loud, and messy.
 The word "stuttering" helps bridge the gap between the rifles and the people back home
who are saying prayers for these boys. By personifying the rifles, it gives the opposite of
what happened when the soldiers were first compared to cattle.
 The soldiers become like animals, while the guns become like people.
 There are some strange connections being made—between guns and prayer, between
people and animals.

Line 5
No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells;

 There are no prayers and no bells on the front to mock the dying men.
 The word "mockeries" mockeries would be—prayers and bells
 This line strips the holy, solemn mask off those rituals and casts them as an outright sham.
Those prayers? Those bells?
 We're thinking the speaker feels this way because he thinks that those rituals totally miss
the point. They ignore what's really happening.
 They glorify the deaths by pretending that the fighting is purposeful and noble, when really
it's akin to slaughtering cattle.

Lines 6-7
Nor any voice of mourning save the choirs,–
The shrill, demented choirs of wailing shells;

 In fact, there's basically no mourning going on whatsoever on the battlefield, except for the
wailing of shells, which our speaker compares to the sound of choirs.
 Once again, we've got a traditionally religious image (choirs) being used as a metaphor
for the rather harsh reality of war (in this case, the sound of shelling). Now that's a
terrifying contrast.
 The choir- It's "shrill" and "demented.

11
  The use of these uncharacteristic adjectives could be another way for our speaker to point
out the huge difference between what life and death are really like on the front, and the
holy and noble way that those back home present it.
 Plus, this word choice also has a way of pointing out that all the holy and patriotic civilians
are absent at the front. There's no voice of mourning there for the young men, no pomp
and circumstance—just the sound of shells.
 Our speaker is either lamenting this fact—wondering where all these mournful patriots are
in actual battle, or he's saying that if there isn't any fancy memorial going on the battlefield,
then we shouldn't pretend by having them at home.

Line 8
And bugles calling for them from sad shires.

 Our speaker now draws our attention to another sound of mourning for the soldier—the
sound of bugles playing in sad towns.
 A "shire" is an English term for a county.
 And of course the bugle is an instrument with military associations. In particular, it's the
instrument used to play "Taps" at soldiers' funerals.
 This presumably is meant to call to mind all the towns left with half or more of their young
men dead.
 There is a lot of sad music in this short poem, although the music of these bugles is a bit
more literal than those scary sounding choirs. There's no metaphor here. That bugle music
is all too real.

 Stanza 2 Summary

Line 9
What candles may be held to speed them all?

 Now our speaker wants to know what candles all these mourners can hold in honor of
these fallen soldiers.
 We might think of this as a more general question: what rituals can people possible
perform to help these soldiers pass on peacefully (to speed them)? Rituals like, say,
lighting candles in churches.
 These candles used as a metaphor for the larger ceremonies we hold when attempting to
honor those killed in action.
 We can also expect, since he did it in the first stanza, that our speaker might be about to
answer his own question.

Lines 10-11
Not in the hands of boys, but in their eyes
Shall shine the holy glimmers of goodbyes.

 Sure enough, the answer to the question "What candles?" is exactly that—what candles!
There are no candles here.
 Our speaker brushes off the idea of lighting candles. What's the point of that? He instead
turns our attention to tears, which, if you think about it, are also a sort of ritual that marks
the soldier's death, although less fancy (and probably more sincere).
 This reference to what's "in their eyes" could refer both to the tears of the soldiers' sons,
and to the tears of the soldiers themselves.

12
 The words "shine" and "glimmer" remind us of the candles from line 9, even as we know
we're now talking about tears. Those two words make a sort of link, so that we know that
the tears are standing in for the candles.

 Note that these lines employ words that we associate with holy things, rather than human
things. For example, instead of tears we have "holy glimmers," and instead of deaths we
have "goodbyes."
 "Holy glimmers and goodbyes" certainly sound more lofty and noble than tears and death,
but when we think about it, we're still talking about human pain and suffering.
 Owen is emphasizing the emotional aspect of grief—the private mourning that goes on.
Holding a public vigil is nowhere near as poignant as actual tears.

Line 12
The pallor of girls' brows shall be their pall;

 The pale, drained faces of girls will stand in for the cover on the dead soldiers' coffins.
 A pall is the cloth typically draped over a coffin, so in this case, the girls' pale faces will be
metaphorically draped over the soldiers' coffins, sending them off in style.
 The drained (sad, shocked) faces of girls probably refers to the significant others and/or
daughters of the soldiers—the women who are left behind by war.
 This line, like the lines before it, brings our attention to the suffering caused by the death of
the soldiers, not only to the soldiers themselves but also to their towns and families. And
it's mixing that suffering in with the language of funeral rituals.
 So what matters here is not the pall, but the pallor; the girls' grief is what really counts.
 In this way, our speaker is not letting the funeral ritual get away with seeming somber and
noble; he's forcing it to take on the weight of the real suffering that surrounds it.

Line 13
Their flowers the tenderness of patient minds,

 "The tenderness of patient minds" will be like the flowers put on the soldiers' graves.
 This, for us at least, is one of the more mysterious lines in the poem.
 It could be that our speaker is holding up tender, patient minds in contrast to those who are
all eager and excited about war.
 In that way, this line could be telling us that the only positive tribute to the dead soldiers
comes from the tender thoughts and concerns of those who have more patient, sensitive
minds. Those who are really concerned about their safety and the danger they're in, and
mourn their losses.
 On the other hand, it could be that this line's getting at something more critical of those
patient minds: perhaps they shouldn't be so patient with all the jingoism and the eagerness
to send boys off to die.
 Maybe these minds should be a little less patient, and a little more eager to bring the boys
home.

Line 14
And each slow dusk a drawing-down of blinds.

 Our speaker ends with an image of blinds being drawn shortly before dark.
 That word "slow" reflects the way the poem has been slowing down throughout this second
stanza, with this last line being the slowest and quietest of them all.
 All that pacing is enhanced by the fact that this line, unlike many of the ones that have
come before, is written in perfect iambic pentameter. That meter gives the line a somber
cadence; it really lands.

13
  But a big part of its impact comes from the image itself.
 The drawing of blinds certainly works on one hand as an image of death. The families that
have lost young men are the ones closing the blinds, as a sort of matching image to the
closing and ending of a life.
 It also works as an image of civilians at home, with the drawing down of blinds acting as a
symbol for the way they're keeping out the realities of the war. They don't want to be
troubled by it. These folks will wave their flags by day, and close their blinds at night, so
they don't have to see the darkness, the terrible realities of the war.
 The grammar of this sentence also has a brilliant way of demonstrating the way that
people are unwilling to take responsibility for what's going on.
 Tender, patient minds might be more likely to draw down blinds and block out the real
horrors the fighting men are facing.
 We might read this line as a simple, tender, private moment of grief. What else is there to
do when you've lost a man in combat but to shun the rituals and shut out the world and
mourn in your own personal way?

14
15