Dulce et decorum est (by Wilfred Owen)
план-конспект урока по английскому языку (11 класс)

1. Follow the link, do the task and read the biography of Wilfred Owen

https://learningapps.org/display?v=pz1kycsec20

2. Before we get acquainted with the poem, I want you to show you one painting and watch the video about the story behind the painting. Follow the link and answer the questions: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=MNaI5iDzYyY&feature=emb_logo 

1. What put J.S. Sargent off painting portraits?

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2. What was the aim of British propaganda to get him to make some art for them?

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3. What was the trigger for him to create works of art on and about the front?

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4. What struck him most as an artist in the scene he witnessed?

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5. What does the painting remind in terms of its shape?

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6. What message lies behind the image?

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3. The title is part of the Latin quotation at the end of the poem: Dulce et decorum est pro patria mori. Here is Owen's own translation of the quotation: It is sweet and meet to die for one's country.

4. Read and listen to the poem DULCE ЕТ DECORUM EST

https://yandex.ru/video/preview/?filmId=4263364446863860678&from=tabbar&parent-reqid=1588204311721173-1808487683969324588900121-production-app-host-vla-web-yp-59&text=dulce+et+decorum+est+pro+patria+mori+owen+audio

Wilfred Owen
DULCE ЕТ DECORUM EST

Bent double, like old beggars under sacks,
Knock-kneed, coughing like hags, we cursed through mud
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.

Gas! Gas! Quick, boys! – An ecstasy of fumbling,
Fitting the clumsy helmets just in time;
But someone still was yelling out and stumbling
And flound'ring like a man in fire or lime...

Dim, through the misty panes and thick green light.
As under a green sea, I saw him drowning.
In all my dreams, before my helpless sight,
He plunges at me, guttering, choking, drowning.
If in some smothering dreams you too could pace
Behind the wagon that we flung him in,
And watch the white eyes writhing in his face,
His hanging face, like a devil's sick of sin;
If you could hear, at every jolt, the blood
Come gargling from the froth-corrupted lungs,
Obscene as cancer, bitter as the cud
Of vile, incurable sores on innocent tongues, –
My friend, you would not tell with such high zest
To children ardent for some desperate glory,
The old Lie: Dulce et decorum est
Pro patria mori.
1916 (1917)

1....hags: Witches; shriveled old women 
2....flares: Bursts of bright light produced high in the air by exploding rockets. Armies used flares at night to survey a battlefield.  
3....distant rest: Place of safety where soldiers could rest. 
4....hoots: Sounds of artillery shells. 
5....outstripped: Outpaced by the marching men. 
6....Five-Nines: Artillery shells with a diameter 5.9 inches. Fired by a Howitzer, each shell contained gas that dispersed when the shell exploded. 
7....ecstasy . . . fumbling: Frantic scrambling to put on gas masks for protection against toxic fumes dispersed by exploded grenades, artillery shells. or other devices. 
8....panes: Framed eyepieces of a gas mask. 
9....green light: Light of the flares as filtered through the green mist of chlorine gas. 
10..you: In general, any person who romanticizes or glorifies war; in particular, Jessie Pope (1868-1941), a poetess who preached the glory of going to war for one's country. 
11..cud of vile: Vomit

Now I want you to analyse the poem

1. What logical parts can you divide the poem into? How do they differ?
2. What epithets are used by the poet to describe soldiers? Does his description reflect the painting by J.S. Sargent?
3. What words and expressions describe sufferings of the wounded soldier? And what do his luckier comrades fell at the moment?
4. Why does the poet use 1st conditional in the poem?
5. Who are “children ardent in some desperate glory”?
6. Why does the author preferred to use the Latin quotation instead if his native tongue at the end of the poem?
7. Is "Dulce et Decorum» as meaningful today as it was when Owen wrote it in 1917. 

Finally

The following video gives insights into the composition of the poem. It shows how the poem was written. If some expressions are still vague it is supposed to reveal their true meaning.

https://www.bl.uk/world-war-one/videos/wilfred-owen-dulce-et-decorum-est