Anticlimactic ending of each stanza
They start with these powerful and blunt statements followed by emotive vocabulary. After heightening the tensions each stanza ends with an anticlimax. Highly emotive opening sentence building up to nothing. Owen wants his readers to empathise how the soldiers felt.
Repetitive rhyme scheme
ABBAC shows the repetitive nature of nothing changing in the war. Regular rhyme demonstrates the monotony of war.
Irregular line lengths
This showed how the soldier’s hope is fading due to the unpredictability of war. Owen uses the first person plural “our” or “we” to show how the suffering is felt by everyone.
Pararhyme (knive us / nervous)
The rhyme is incomplete which shows the unease of the situation. The soldiers are denied the satisfaction of a full rhyme and are forced to be incomplete and imperfect just like the rhyme itself.
“Merciless iced east winds that knive us”
Sibilance is used to convey the severity of the wind, linking back to the reality of war.
The adjective “merciless” also describes the continuous nature of war and how relentless it is to soldiers.
Personification which is also ironic as the weather is a bigger weapon than the soldiers themselves - another way of Owen exposing war.
“For the love of God seems dying”
Metaphor as God’s love is eternal and WW1 was a very religious time. Quite shocking that Owen questions God and his intentions. War must be horrible if even the love of God is dying.
The dynamic verb “dying” could represent the physical loss of soldiers and the loss of hope which both convey the harshness of war.
The noun “God” uses religious imagery - Owen yet again reinforces the harshness of war because even the benevolent can’t stop it.
“Sudden successive flights of bullets streak the silence”
The noun “streak” creates sensory imagery suggesting that the war is particularly overwhelming for these soldiers.
The noun “silence” has connotations of calmness and tranquility
The juxtaposition between the two suggests how unpredictable the war is. The soldiers are stuck in this unpredictable mess.
“But nothing happens”
The repetition of this phrase reflects the stalemate stage of the war the soldiers are entrapped in.
The only fighting that happens is the exposure to the power of nature.
The indefinite pronoun “nothing” is a constant reminder from Owen of the harsh reality of war and the constant battle with nature.
“We turn back to our dying”
This metaphor shows how war is inescapable and has an ongoing nature of suffering.
The imagery refers to the painfully slow process of dying.
The pronoun “we” emphasises the shared suffering which suggests all the soldiers experience the same slow death.
The present tense verb “return” makes the suffering feel ongoing and immediate.
Who is the poet?
Wilfred Owen
What themes does Exposure cover and how
Power of nature-Nature is shown as the dominant force, more powerful than humans or war itself.
Conflict (war)-The poem presents war as passive and pointless, rather than action-packed.
Reality of war-Owen exposes the true conditions of WWI soldiers.
Patriotism-The poem questions traditional patriotic ideas.
Suffering-Suffering is constant and unavoidable.
Inevitability of conflict-The poem suggests a cycle with no escape.
