Mental Cases Analysis

English war poet Wilfred Owen first drafted Mental Cases in Ripon in May 1918 based on the horrors he witnessed in Craiglockheart. It is a sardonic message disillusioning the grim realities of war taking inspiration from poet Sassoon. It is primarily the expression of the horrors of the war. The first stanza portrays a tone of weariness as it describes the exhaustion felt by the soldiers as it questions the situation which led to the baring teeth and the chasms . The tone and scene then develops the answers in stanza two to the questions in the previous stanza and the poem ends as the narrator criticises the romanticized perception of war. Owen uses techniques such as explicit visceral imagery, varying structural techniques and auditory distorted diction to create a truthful picture of war. In particular, the title was used to create an immediate impact upon the reader. The negative implications of the term mental pervades our minds as the first word read within the poem. This continues as the patients suffering neurasthenia are depicted as Cases suggesting the medical subjects are empty shells that are on trial, dehumanizing the soldiers as a unit. The plurality is continued into the first stanza wherein the rhetorical question Who are these? The use of the interrogative creates a tone of shell-shock as the narrator questions the reason of the devastation surrounding him, this tone continues as he omits calling them people as the war torn soldiers do not represent humanity to him henceforth.

The trochaic pentameter then continues to question the change settling around the narrator referring to change through the setting of twilight which suggests that darkness is ascending and the biblical term purgatorial implying that the men s viewpoints are changing from hope to despair as the war continues outside leaving them neither alive nor dead. The aural distortion of the line stroke on stroke of pain, - but what slow panic uses sibilance and plosives jarringly and punctuation to slow down the rhythm amplifying the pain felt by the damaged, writhing patients, the oxymoron slow panic building a rising sense of alarm within the reader. Stilted structure is present in the final line of the first stanza who these hellish? as the grammar is left untended implying his basic functioning skills have been broken by the ravages of war, yet again using religious imagery to indicate the severity of their situation and the hurt they are emanating.

The nature of the poem then shifts in the second stanza as the narrator develops the answers highlighting the horrors of the war twisting humanity into pieces of themselves. This is shown through the alliteration of the letter m as it mirrors and mimics the noises and cries of the wounded soldiers. It dehumanizes them as it suggests that they are mentally stunted as the capitalized and personified Dead haunt them. The repetition of the action verb murder signifies the men were killed with intent, emphasising the crime that it is and the evil that has been committed. This sinful act refers to Macbeth as like the soldiers he had wad[ed] Treading blood through a sea of blood leading to his ultimate demise. This contrasts the lighter alliteration of the letter L in the line lungs , loved laughter highlighting the end of the joyful sound.

The final stanza concludes and reflects upon the implications of war. This is shown through the eyeballs shrink[ing] showing the readers the soldier s souls diminishing from within themselves as they lock themselves off from the realities of war to the heinous memories within themselves due to both their actions and that of their opponents. The plosives using the letter B within the second line of the last stanza mirrors the splattering of blood tangible to the men in the recesses of their mind. The time placements of day , dawn and night are used to show the inevitability of the nightmares repeating on a cyclical loop, leaving the men unable to cope or recover. The graphic visceral alliteration of the letter H in hilarious, hideous head furthers the image of evil and madness leaving the sound of unrestrained and deranged laughter within the reader s mind. This continues on to the verbs used in the last four lines plucking , Picking , Snatching and Pawing showing the reader that they are senselessly following the actions bid by others by giving them animalistic tendencies. However, the technique which stood out most to me within this stanza was the use of the pronouns us as it suggests the reader too is to blame for the bleak outcome of the war. It is our romanticism and beliefs that a man s place is on the forefront of a battlefield that caused the disease of war, subjecting the men to neurasthenia.