War Poets Wilfred Owen and Charles Sorley

War Poets Wilfred Owen and Charles Sorley Free Online Research Papers The first World War affected the lives of many young men. Many poets and authors who were part of the war shared their stories in their writings. Poets gave people a look at the reality of war with their vivid and sometimes grotesque depictions of life as a soldier or a citizen. Two of the greatest war poets from this era are Charles Sorley (1895-1915) and Wilfred Owen (1893-1918). Charles Sorley was born in Aberdeen, Scotland in 1895. He attended Marlborough College from 1908 until 1913. He then moved to Germany until the start of the war, when he moved back to England to enlist in the military. Sorley was killed in the Battle of Loos on October 13, 1915. (â€Å"Charles Sorley†) After his death, his poetry was published in a book entitled Marlborough and Other Poems. (â€Å"Prose and Poetry- Charles Hamilton Sorley†) Wilfred Owen was born in Oswestry, Shropshire in 1893. He attended what is now the Wakeman School until 1911. He enlisted in October 1915 with the Artists’ Rifles and was killed a week before the end of the war in November 1918 (Wilfred Owen). Both poets’ works primarily consisted of descriptions of their first hand experiences during the war. Perhaps one of Sorley’s most influential poems was the one written just before his death; When You See Millions of the Mouthless Dead. In this poem he talks about how it won’t help to praise the dead soldiers or to cry for them because they can’t hear or see you. He says in line 8 of the poem that â€Å"it is easy to be dead†. This shows how the war hardened the emotions of some soldiers. It also suggests that death was so common that it has little to no affect on him (Prose and Poetry- Charles Hamilton Sorley). Also in his Poem Barbury Camp, he speaks of how war can be a soldier’s heaven or hell. He writes about fighting in the wind and I the rain. He also writes about the soldiers talking to God after they die and basically having to answer to him about their actions (Barbury Camp). Some of this same raw emotion and descriptiveness is seen in Owen’s poetry. Owen’s poem Dulce et Decorum Est was written during a time in the war when gas attacks were common. Owen speaks of how the gas has them fumbling, coughing and choking. He writes about how they have to throw soldiers on wagons and listen to them â€Å"gargling from froth corrupted lungs† (Kennedy and Gioia, 689) in line 22. This poem shows how the specific tools and tactics of the war affected the soldiers. In another poem entitled Disabled, Owen writes about a wounded soldier who sits in a wheelchair reflecting on how the war has changed his town. â€Å"About this time town used to swing so gay† he writes in line 7. He reflects on how happy people there used to be watching the children play in the streets. He also writes about how the war has affected the soldier personally. In lines 10-12 he speaks of the time â€Å"before he threw away his knees† (Poetry of Wilfred Owen-Disabled). This poem gave clear insight into how the world changed during the war. Both poets were similar in the way that they used their own traumatic experiences during the war to bring forth the emotions portrayed in their poetry. They both were on the frontlines of war which heavily influenced the subject matter in their poems. The poets were also different in that Sorley wrote all of his war poems while actually fighting in the war while, Owen on the other hand, wrote a great deal of his poetry while being treated for shell shock at Craiglockhart War Hospital in Edinburgh (Wilfred Owen). This perhaps explains why some of Owen’s poetry was so much more descriptive. While Sorley was writing about his experiences in the moment, Owen had time to reflect, and possibly have flashbacks of all that he had seen in the war up to that point. The writings of both poets mainly consisted of their experiences in the war. They basically gave us a glimpse into their own minds as they were fighting in the trenches themselves. Their works equally made us aware and conscious of the terrors and the trials that were the war. Owen’s writings gave us his view on how drastically the war had changed the worlds of men from before the war until days before his demise. Sorley made us aware of the many men in the war were hardened to the point where they would never be the same. The insights these men gave are the same during today’s war just as they were then. Barbury Camp. Poemhunter.com. 22 Oct. 2008 . Charles Sorley. Wikipedia. 19 Sept. 2008. 22 Oct. 2008 . Gioia, Dana, and Joe X. Kennedy. Literature : An Introduction to Fiction, Poetry, Drama, and Writing. 10th ed. New York: Longman, 2006. 689-99. Poetry of Wilfred Owen-Disabled. Everypoet.com. 22 Oct. 2008 . Prose and Poetry- Charles Hamilton Sorley. Prose and Poetry. 11 Aug. 2001. 22 Oct. 2008 . Wilfred Owen. Wikipedia. 21 Oct. 2008. 22 Oct. 2008 . Research Papers on War Poets Wilfred Owen and Charles SorleyMind TravelHonest Iagos Truth through DeceptionHip-Hop is ArtThe Effects of Illegal ImmigrationEffects of Television Violence on ChildrenThe Masque of the Red Death Room meaningsThe Relationship Between Delinquency and Drug UseCapital PunishmentNever Been Kicked Out of a Place This NiceQuebec and Canada

Where people look online - Emphasis

Where people look online Where people look online Recent eyetracker research reveals that users of news websites look at the headlines first, rather than the images. The study, called Eyetrack III, from The Poynter Institute in the US, looks at how peoples eyes move, focus and skip while reading news websites. It found that people zoomed in on headlines first, although they tended to read only the first few words of the headline. Similarly, they scanned down the left-hand menu of headlines until something prompted them to read on. This and other findings from the research have important implications for those involved in creating online content. That people are attracted by headlines first online (as opposed to in print, where photos are generally viewed first, according to a 1990 study from the same institute) highlights the importance of gripping online readers in the first few words. The research also found that people devote less than an average of one second to scanning a headline, so your words need to captivate visitors almost instantly. Short and snappy headlines are clearly the order of the day when it comes to attracting and more importantly keeping website visitors. There are implications for email writing too. Subject lines should be fairly short and as self-explanatory as possible, with the key words first. Text: bigger is not always better Surprisingly the study found that smaller fonts encouraged people to focus and read content, rather than just scan it. This finding seems a little counter-intuitive, but suggests that if you want people to read closely, making the text size smaller may be a good idea. Obviously, this could be taken too far: try not to induce squinting, but choosing a small(ish) font may encourage your visitors to read more closely. People tended to just scan those news websites using large fonts. Paragraphs, too, should err on the side of short. The research found that people focused on shorter paragraphs twice as often as they did on long ones. Images: faces and click-throughs Although they werent the first thing the study participants looked at, pictures did tend eventually to draw the eye. And the bigger the image, the more attention it got. Seventy per cent viewed an average size photo, compared with a postage stamp sized picture, which caught the eye of only ten per cent. Pictures of clean, clear faces were the biggest draw (though not on stamps, presumably). Many of the test subjects tried to click on photos even though it got them nowhere. Picture links that lead somewhere useful could be a good way to cash in on this apparent reflex. And its an area that is often underutilised or overlooked when creating online content. Be careful with visual breaks Those participating in the study often didnt read blurbs beneath an underlined headline, and researchers found a similar phenomenon with adverts. Adverts were read less frequently if they were separated from editorial content and preceded by white space or a rule. So use lines, rules and other visual breaks with care. Eyetracking and the future The process of eyetracking, which youve guessed it tracks and records a persons eye movements while they are reading, has advanced greatly in the last 20 years. Where subjects once had to wear cumbersome (and, frankly, unflattering) camera headgear while under observation, now the technology consists of a small video camera, which is placed under the computer monitor being viewed. From there it locks onto and records the subjects gaze, making for a more natural experience and therefore providing more realistic results. The researchers themselves point out that research in this area is far from exhaustive (test subject groups tend to be quite small and variables are not always tightly controlled), but theyd like to see it continue. We hope that Eyetrack III is not seen as an end in itself, but rather as a beginning of a wave of eyetracking research that will benefit the news industry, say Steve Outing and Laura Ruel, the studys project managers. And with over 1.73 billion people currently logging on worldwide and the paperless office potentially just around the corner, it looks like this area of research is definitely something we should all keep an eye on. Emphasis runs a one-day course, called Writing web content with clout, which explores the specific skills required to write compelling web copy. Call us on +44 (0)1273 732 888 or email us to find out more.