Strange Meeting Summary starts with here Wilfred is widely known as a war poet because most of his literary works deal with themes of war. The poetry of war poets deals with the horrors and gloomy side of war and the destruction caused by world wars. The speaker in the poem ‘’Strange Meeting’’ is a soldier who immediately descends into hell. The poem describes the atrocities committed during World War I and the horrible effects of these atrocities on the remaining world after this war. We can assume that the hell mentioned in the poem is the representation of the world after and during World War I. The poem seems to be a sort of reconciliation. The poet of the poem was himself killed in the First World War and the poem was not published till his death. He wrote the poem in 1918 but it was published in 1919. Wilfred Owen was serving as a front-line soldier in the war and lost his life in the bloody battle.
Strange Meeting Summary Analysis
Strange Meeting Summary starts here, the speaker of the poem descends into an imaginary hell in the poem. The poem is set up as a meeting between two soldiers belonging to different armies. The two different armies are enemies of each other. The poem hints the strange meeting does not employ the themes of heroism and heroic deeds. The poem does not aim to celebrate the grand victories of the participants of the war. The poem is aimed at discussing the pathetic details of the horror of the war. The poet considers war as the most disgusting phenomenon of the present world. The poet laments over the miserable condition of the participants of the tone of the speaker in the poem is pessimistic and satirical. The poet expresses his grief over the destruction caused by the war.
The enemy soldier in the poem comments on the land that is deserted by the atrocities committed by the forces. The land represents the area as a pity of war distilled. He says that war is the only thing that causes enmity between the different races of the world. The two friends from different countries can become enemies of each other for the national cause. The poem hints at the idea that human beings cannot stop themselves from developing prejudices against each other. The speaker of the poem wants to show his humanistic approach towards the victims of World War I. The poet of the poem condemns the violence and hatred spread by the different races and nations against each other.
The poem Strange Meeting Summary also describes the dehumanizing effect of different countries that lead to creating disintegration among different nations. The poem intends to draw a graphic picture of the atrocities done to the different people in the war. The poet feels sad and gloomy at the tormented sight of humanity during World War I.
The poet adds the details that the targeted landscape and the area turn into a heap of ash during the war. The speaker conveys the message that where war is ongoing the area becomes deserted. The natural solidarity vanishes from the people of the country where war is ongoing. This thing is quite painful for the speaker of the poem.
The scenery of the poem suggests the destructive and painful sight. The speaker imagines his presence in a dark imagined tunnel in hell. The speaker claims that the Titanic wars have destroyed the tunnel in which the speaker of the poem has been enslaved. The poet wants to suggest that the world has been turned into a hell and man is the architect of that hell himself. He points out that the successive wars have turned the world into hell. The speaker of the poem claims that war is so much horrifying that it has left its tormented effects under the tunnel. He has tried a lot to save the tunnel from the dehumanizing attacks from the participants of the war. But the speaker of the poem suggests that he fails to save the tunnel from the horrors of the war. The speaker explains the fear and anxiety that they felt while residing in the tunnel during the war.
The violent forces in war have snatched the humanistic approach from the people of the world. It has made men feel deprived of certain emotions. The enemy soldier appeared like a ghost to the speaker of the poem who is also a soldier. The speaker of the poem suggests at the end of the first stanza that war is harmful to both the landscape and the people of the world. The speaker of the poem laments over the disgrace and the gloominess spread by the war. The speaker of the poem suggests that war does not produce any kind of hope and happiness for the people. People during the war became pessimistic because there was not any ray of hope for the people. The only way to save the people from the horrors of the war is to give them awareness about the disaster spread during the war. The enemy soldier anticipates that if he would survive the destruction caused by the world war, he would surely roam into the world and inform the people about the destruction caused by the war. He is anticipating the saviour of mankind from the destruction spread by the war.
He also ponders over the idea that if he would not lucky enough to save himself from the horrors of the war, he would certainly regret this. He thinks that in this case humanity will be in constant danger if he fails to escape from the horrors of war.
The enemy soldier suggests that no one will support the brutal killing of the people in the war. He is generating a hope that people of the world will be convinced to take a stand against the atrocities committed by the horrors of World War I. He says that people of the world will certainly raise their voices against the atrocities done to them.
The poet of the poem talks in an imaginative way that he has strayed from his path as a soldier. He was going to his battlefield being a soldier but now his path has been changed. He has descended into deep dark hell where he pretends that he is sleeping in that dark deep dig of hell. The poet is interested in creating a new kind of poetry in order to exhibit the effects of World War I on the civilians of the war-torn countries. The poet himself is the victim of the disaster of the war. He is against the war and says that war has nothing to do with the life of the common people. He looks upon the idea of war and wants to eradicate the effects of the war on the common people of the countries.
The poem was published after the death of the poet and there is little speculation about the original manuscript of the poem. The poem is deliberately aimed at creating a moving effect on the reader’s mind. The poem has a universal appeal because war is the subject matter of all nations and all times. The poet has been regarded as a war poet in the national history of England because all his poems deal with war themes.
The poem is intended to explain the brutality and injustice done to the people of different countries by the war. The people of war-affected areas are always in bad condition. They feel horror due to the miseries spread by the war. The poet does not deal with the heroic and glorious tale of the war and heroism in the poem. The characters appeared in the poem are soldiers belonging to two different countries. Throughout the whole poem, their identity remains hidden and they continued their meeting. But in the end, the two soldiers revealed their identities. The poem has rendered a great service in highlighting the brutal effects of the war. Strange Meeting Summary Analysis plays the idea about the untold miseries of the war and the victims of the war. The two young men in the poem showcase the brutality and horror faced by the young soldiers in their life. The soldiers remain detached from the joys of life when they encounter such kind of brutal events in their life. The war put an end to the civilization of any society and the inhabitant of that society. The poet laments over the grief of the young soldiers who have participated in the war. The poem presents the deepest contempt of Owen against the horrible deeds of the warrior. He is against bloodshed and revenge in the name of the war. He feels pity and sympathy for the war-torn people and countries. We can conclude that poet has rightly struggled for the peace and pacification of mankind. He has tried us to save from the evils of war.