WILFRED OWEN:

Selected Poems

A-LEVEL ENGLISH LITERATURE

INTRODUCTORY INTERNET TASK
English Favourites >
Wilfred Owen Multimedia Archive>
Broswe the Archive >
Anthem for Dead Youth >
War Poems and Manuscripts of Wilfred Owen>
1. Save: The Send-Off and The Parable of the Old
Man and the Young into a word-document of your
own - a manuscript version(landscape - in a table (?))
2.

Well read the poems aloud! (at some point)

3.

Task - for OHT presentations on Friday 6th Oct:

In PAIRS, prepare landscape slides of EITHER

poem, with EITHER handwritten OR computerised
annotations around the poem (see Gds examples),
with which you:
Show how Owen uses language/style/techniques
to bring across his themes and feelings
Gd will supply slides and pens - come and find me
before Friday with your landscape sheet ready. I can
turn them into transparencies. You can either put
your annotations on in advance of the lesson or put
them on live

The Sentry

We'd found an old Boche dug-out, and he knew,

And gave us hell; for shell on frantic shell
Lit full on top, but never quite burst through.
Rain, guttering down in waterfalls of slime,
Kept slush waist-high and rising hour by hour,
And choked the steps too thick with clay to climb.
What murk of air remained stank old, and sour
With fumes from whizz-bangs, and the smell of men
Who'd lived there years, and left their curse in the den,
If not their corpses....There we herded from the blast
Of whizz-bangs, but one found our door at last,Buffeting eyes and breath, snuffing the candles,
And thud! flump! thud! down the steep steps came thumping
And sploshing in the flood, deluging muck,
The sentry's body; then, his rifle, handles
Of old Boche bombs, and mud in ruck on ruck.
We dredged him up, for dead, until he whined,
'O sir- my eyes,-I'm blind,-I'm blind, -I'm blind.'
Coaxing, I held a flame against his lids
And said if he could see the least blurred light
He was not blind; in time they'd get all right.
'I can't,' he sobbed. Eyeballs, huge-bulged like squids',
Watch my dreams still, - yet I forgot him there
In posting Next for duty, and sending a scout
To beg a stretcher somewhere, and flound'ring about
To other posts under the shrieking air.
Those other wretches, how they bled and spewed,
And one who would have drowned himself for good,I try not to remember these things now.
Let Dread hark back for one word only: how,
Half-listening to that sentry's moans and jumps,
And the wild chattering of his broken teeth,
Renewed most horribly whenever crumps
Pummelled the roof and slogged the air beneath,-

A-LEVEL ENGLISH LITERATURE

Wilfred Owen - Selected Poems
EXAMINATION-PRACTICE: TIMED ESSAY CHOICES - 1
Hour
U6B Tuesday 3rd April, 2001
EITHER

1.

Explore the relationship between Owens uses of

previous
poetic forms and literary allusions and his desire to
produce
shocking realism. Make close reference to two or three
poems.
OR
2.

Re-read Futility. Using this poem as a starting-

point,
explore the ways in which Owen presents both
frustration
and inevitability in his poetry.

The Parable of the Old Man and the Young

So Abram rose, and clave the wood, and went,

And took the fire with him, and a knife.

And as they sojourned both of them together,
Isaac the first-born spake and said, My Father,
Behold the preparations, fire and iron,
But where the lamb, for this burnt-offering?
Then Abram bound the youth with belts and straps,
And builded parapets and trenches there,
And stretchd forth the knife to slay his son.
When lo! an Angel called him out of heaven,
Saying, Lay not they hand upon the lad,
Neither do anything to him, thy son.
Behold! Caught in a thicket by its horns,
A Ram. Offer the Ram of Pride instead.
But the old man would not so, but slew his son,

And half the seed of Europe, one by one.

YEAR 10 G.C.S.E. ENGLISH and

ENGLISH LITERATURE
Post 1914 Poetry: The WW1 Poems of Wilfred Owen
ICT APPROACHES and THE ARTISTIC CONTEXT
ACTIVITIES

ICT PROJECTOR PRESENTATIONS

FOR SOME EN1 ASSESSMENTS
Preparation Time =

TASK: Powerpoint / Word-document Presentation PAIRS/THREES

English Favourites: Wilfred Owen Multimedia Browse the Archive

Anthem for Dead Youth War Poems & Manuscripts of Wilfred Owen

You will be assigned ONE OWEN POEM other than Dulce et Decorum
Est from our booklet: = The Send-Off, Exposure, Futility,
Anthem for Doomed Youth, Mental Cases.

Use the Art of World War 1 web-pages fromEnglish Favourites to

import at least three different pictures

PREPARE a 3 minute talk, in which you highlight key THEMES,

LANGUAGE and CONTEXT points about your assigned poem, referring
also to the pictures and their techniques

Copy and paste your assigned poem from the webpages: use autoshapes/
callouts/colour-highlighting/inserted frames/ powerpoint-slides, etc., to
annotate your poem with BRIEF THEMES, LANGUAGE and CONTEXT
comments.
Save your completed presentation to be ready to present it, full-screen,
via the projector and your own spoken comments,

SECOND TASK: Powerpoint / Word-document Presentation

In the SAME PAIRS /THREES

English Favourites Art of World War 1 .. List of painters
Browse through some of the paintings
CHOOSE ANY ONE PAINTING
Prepare a 1-2 minute presentation, in which you cover:

How the painter has used colour / shapes / light vs. dark /
dimensions, etc., to bring across his impressions of and
messages about the War
How this painting helps you to understand any your assigned Wilfred Owen
poem, in terms of its THEMES, LANGUAGE and CONTEXTS
As with the poem-annotation presentation, USE ANY COMBINATION
of ICT programmes / TECHNIQUES

EN1 ASSESSMENTS
SELF-ASSESSMENT / ASSESSING OTHERS
KEY SKILLS FOR BOTH PRESENTATIONS

Appropriate VOLUME, PACE and EYE-CONTACT

Clear, precise ANALYTICAL points on BOTH POEM and PAINTING
Clear, precise EVALUATIONS of

BOTH POEM and PAINTING

Ability to respond to questions / points from the audience

COMMENTS: SELF-ASSESSMENT / ASSESSING OTHERS

With specific focus on 4 or 5 of Wilfred Owens poems, compare,

contrast and evaluate the ways in which Owen brings across his
convictions, feelings and ideas to you, the reader (you should also refer to
several of the German poems by Trakl, Lichtenstein and Heym, in passing, as also to
a selection of relevant WW1 art images, as contexts).