War in Owen's Dulce et Decorum est and Sassoon Base Details The First World War brought a revolution in the ideas of the masses. The people of warring nations would no longer apathetically support their governments and armies. A concerted and public effort by a literary circle turned soldiers attacked government propaganda. Questioning the glories of war and the necessity of nationalism, an "anti-war" literary genre developed in the European trenches during the First World War. Gruesome images juxtaposed with everyday events brought the war into the pages of literature. Despite the formation of this new “anti-war” literary genre, few popular poets chose to address the theme of war and its purpose. Of the few poets, only two, Siegfried Sassoon and Wilfred Owen, attempted in any sincere sense to convey reactions to the war in a modernist style. Sassoon and Owen both write about the glorification of life and the detestability of war; however, while Owen's "Dulce et Decorum est" describes the universal perception of war, Sassoon's "Base Details" intellectualizes war more subjectively through its melodramatic efforts. Owen's objectivity creates an immortal image of war while Sassoon's subjectivity makes his works anachronistic. Sassoon and Owen's backgrounds shed light on their respective styles as poets. Unlike Sassoon, Owen only posthumously achieved a level of stature in literature. Born in 1893, Wilfred Owen experienced an almost Dickensian childhood with a devoted mother and a "rough" father. Sent for his first year of study at a severely disciplinary academy, Owen learned to escape into the world of literature. He later joined the 5th Battalion of the British Army and within a few months was fighting on the battlefront. During…half of the paper…harsh criticism of his prose today. Owen, as a modernist poet, has stylistically far surpassed Sassoon in the eyes of critics and readers. Works Cited Cohen, Joseph. "The Roles of Siegfried Sassoon": Rpt. in Criticism of Poetry. Ed. Jane Kosek. vol. 12. Detroit: Gale Research Inc, 1995. 248-250. Magill, Frank. "Wilfred Owen": Rpt. in Critical investigation of poetry. Ed. Dedria Bryfonski. vol. 5. New Jersey: Salem Press Inc, 1982. 2157 - 2163.Murry, John M. "Mr. Sassoon's War Verses.": Rpt. in Criticism of Poetry. Ed. R. Cobden. vol. 12. Detroit: Gale Research Inc. 1997. 75-84.Murry, John M. “The War Poet”: Rpt. in Criticism of Poetry. Ed. Carol Gaffke. vol. 19. Detroit: Gale Research Inc. 1997. 705-707.Parsons, I.M. “The Poems of Wilfred Owen”: Rpt. in Criticism of Poetry. Ed. Carol Gaffke. vol. 19. Detroit: Gale Research Inc. 1997. 658.