The War Poems

By: Wilfred Owen

Narrated by: Charlton Griffin

That it required a horrible war to motivate Wilfred Owen to write some of the 20th century's best poetry is symbolic of that great calamity. In a vivid, languorous, mesmerizing style, Owen has left humanity the language of loss.

When the Great War broke out in 1914, Owen, along with millions of his compatriots, were drawn into the maw of the world's first mechanized war. The savagery and appalling loss of life would change humanity forever. And it was in the poetry of Wilfred Owen that these changes first became manifest.

Owen was born in 1893 in Shropshire. He was engaged in teaching up until the outbreak of World War I and joined the army as a private in 1915. He was killed in action on November the 4th, 1919 while leading his men across the Sambre Canal...seven days before the armistice ending the war. His promotion to Lieutenant had just been approved. Back in Owen's home town a week later, the church bells began pealing to announce the armistice at the precise moment his mother received the news of his death.

Included in this recording are his other poems and fragments, constituting his entire poetic output.

Public Domain (P)2010 Audio Connoisseur