ENGLISH LITERATURE (CBSE/UGC NET)

Detailed explanation-1: -Rupert Brooke was Britain’s first war poet, a patriotic favorite of the nation. His poetry set the precedent for those who came after him. Siegfried Sassoon, Brooke’s radical opposite, offered a brutally realistic portrayal of war, and influenced future war writers such as Wilfred Owen to write raw verse.

Detailed explanation-2: -During the First World War Sassoon developed a harshly satirical style that he used to attack the incompetence and inhumanity of senior military officers. These poems caused great controversy when they were published in The Old Huntsman (1917) and Counter-Attack (1918).

Detailed explanation-3: -There is patriotic poetry, which honors the sacrifice and bravery of the soldiers who fight for their country. Anti-war poetry sees no glory in war but only destruction and suffering. Witness poetry is written by those who experience the effects of war first hand but are not participants in the fighting.

Detailed explanation-4: -War poetry is not necessarily ‘anti-war’. It is, however, about the very large questions of life: identity, innocence, guilt, loyalty, courage, compassion, humanity, duty, desire, death.

Detailed explanation-5: -He showed these lyrical poems to his battle-weary friend, Robert Graves, who told him that the war would make him change his style. Graves was right. From mid-July 1916, after having served several months in the trenches, the now bitter and mocking tone which we associate with Sassoon’s poetry today became his forte.