Anthem for the doomed youth

- 'dead'/'doomed' (sounds, word meaning)

The change from 'dead' to 'doomed' links 'doomed' and 'youth' through assonance, thus tying the two concepts more closely together. The presupposition of 'doomed' is also more poignant. Dead youths must already be dead, but doomed youths are not yet dead but doomed to die. A textual world is thus set up where the persona is walking through the battlefield, talking about not just those who have died, but also those who are in the process of dying and those who are soon to die.

- 'you'/'these' (grammar, discourse relations)

In the first version of the poem, the use of 'you' suggests that the persona is addressing the young soldiers directly. But in the last version the discourse situation is different. The soldiers are referred to in the third person and so the persona appears to be talking to someone else who is with him. Because that person is unspecified, we tend to assume that he is talking directly to us, his readers. This has the effect of involving the reader more directly in the poem.

In addition, the third-person plural pronoun is a proximal deictic. This suggests that the dying soldiers are physically close to the persona and the reader, thus increasing the amount of reader involvement even more.

- 'in herds'/'as cattle' (lexis, phonetics)

'In herds' can refer to any animal, wild or domesticated, which live in herds. So the soldiers dying in herds indicates a large quantity dying and a general comparison with animals who live in herds is indicated. 'Cattle' is more specific, being a particular domesticated animal which live in herds, the males of which are bred to be slaughtered for meat. Hence the idea of the soldiers being purposefully slaughtered in large numbers for someone else's benefit, like bullocks are slaughtered for meat, is made stronger. Because the poem is a sonnet (which is usually associated with love and beauty, not death, and so introduces another dissonant note), the change in phonetic form will force/be forced by a phonetic change in its rhyming line (line 3).

- '!'/'.' (graphology, discourse)

The exclamation mark in the first stanza indicates a heavily emotional attitude, perhaps, given the context, anger, on the part of the persona. The full stop of the final version suggests that Owen decided that a less hectoring tone would be more effective.

- 'rattled words'/'rapid rattle' (lexis, phonetics)

This change relates to the change in the rhyming word of line 1. But it also has the effect of extending the onomatopoeic effect of line 3, which because it has lots of short vowels and short consonants can be likened to the rapid fire of guns. Moreover, the word 'rapid' intensifies the idea of lots of shooting (and perhaps machine guns) and the word 'rattle' is also associated with death (cf. the phrase 'death rattle').

- 'your'/'their' (grammar, discourse)

See the first set of comments for 'you'/'these' in line 1.

- 'No chants for you, nor balms, nor wreaths nor bells'/'No mockeries now for them; no prayers nor bells' (grammar, semantics, lexis, discourse)

Grammatically, line 5 in the first version is a just list of items normally found in funeral services which the young soldiers will not receive. In the second version the list is replaced by a relation of apposition between 'prayers nor bells' and 'mockeries'. The dissonance introduced by the word 'mockeries' is clearly ironic. The inferred suggestion of the word is that if burial services were performed it would be a mockery, given the implications concerning the attitudes of those who have sent the young men to die, as seen in the use of the word 'cattle' in line 2. The reduction of the four funeral-related words in the first version to two in the final one ('prayers', 'bells') restricts the focus to the burial of the dead rather than the wider concept of a funeral (church service etc.). The change from second-person to third-person pronoun matches the grammatical and discoursal changes already referred to in lines 1 and 4.

No change.

- 'And long-drawn sighs'/'The shrill, demented choirs' (grammar, lexis, semantics)

The first version has both versions written as possibilities, and Owen chooses 'The shrill demented choirs' in the final version. This choice is much stronger than the other. 'And long-drawn sighs' indicates that the sighs must be different from the 'choirs' of line 6 as grammatically it is another item in a co-ordinated construction. But the removal of the 'and' forces an appositional relationship with the 'choirs' of the previous line, and hence a direct ironic comparison between the wailing shells and the singing of the choir at a funeral service. Connotatively 'shrill' is much more unpleasant than 'sigh', and also reintroduces the noise the shells make. And of course 'demented' introduces the idea of insanity not seen in the other version.

- 'you'/'them' (grammar, discourse)

See lines 1, 4 and 5.

- 'we hold . . . you'/'be held . . . them' (grammar, discourse)

The pronoun changes match those for lines 1, 4, 5 and 8. The 'we' of the first version suggests a personal relation between the persona, the reader and the soldiers, as the persona and the reader would have to be assumed to be thinking of holding the candles for the dead. The final version is more generalised. Given the fact that most of the other changes we have noted have been towards the particular, with increased emotive effect, it is arguable that the 'we' of the first version is better than the 'be' of the final version.

No change

No change

- 'must . . . your'/'shall . . . their' (grammar, semantics)

The pronoun change matches that for lines 1, 4, 5, 8 and 9. The change of modal verb from 'must' to 'shall' increases the degree of certainty and brings religious connotations with it, as God, being omnipotent, often uses it in The Bible when ordering people to do things or saying what is ordained to happen.

- 'Your . . ., . . . comrades''/'Their . . . patient' (graphology, grammar, lexis, semantics)

The appositional relationship between the two noun phrases in the line is clear without the comma, and so it is removed in the final version. The pronoun change matches that for lines 1, 4, 5, 8, 9 and 12. The change from 'comrades'' to 'patients' introduces an interesting ambiguity. In the first version it is the attitude of the other soldiers which is the appositional equivalent of the flowers at a funeral. In the final version, the appositional attitude could be that of seriously injured soldiers (patients in a military hospital) or of anyone who has a mind which is patient (which in turn connotes a caring quality)

(graphology)

No change apart from the removal of the unnecessary comma.

A systematic examination of two different versions of the same text, in this case a poem, helps indicate the way in which linguistic choice affects meaning and effect. Moreover, we can also see how changing just one word can produce changes, and so effects, on more than one linguistic level, which in turn might lead to consequent changes elsewhere in the text. In this particular poem we can see that almost all the changes Owen makes lead to increased reader involvement, either discoursally or connotatively. As a consequence, it is relatively easy to see the changes he makes as being improvements (though note the remarks we make concerning line 9). What do you think?

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