Description

Poetry, more than any other art form, can capture a moment and preserve it forever. Centuries on, poems allow us to understand what people in the past were feeling, and lets us feel it for ourselves?, writes the producer and director Sebastian Barfield. This is no truer than the poetry written about the Great War. In fact the term ?war poet? immediately makes one think of the poems written about that conflict, more than any other conflict in history.

The War Poets Bent double, like old beggars under sacks, Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through sludge, Till on the haunting flares we turned our backs And towards our distant rest began to trudge. Men marched asleep. Many had lost their boots But limped on, blood-shod. All went lame; all blind; Drunk with fatigue; deaf even to the hoots Of tired, outstripped Five-Nines that dropped behind.
Extract from ?Dulce et Decorum Est? by Wilfred Owen