Talk:Wilfred Owen

message: I was in Westminster Abbey recently and I'm pretty sure there's a commemorative headstone for Wilfred Owen in Poet's Corner. Can someone confirm this and add a little blurb to this page? 70.55.228.57 (talk) 13:45, 11 September 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yes, one of the most famous. 83.112.227.231 (talk) 05:07, 4 January 2015 (UTC)
thread_title:  Westminster Abbey 

message: Going to change the link to the Battle of the Sambre, rather than the canal. Seems more appropriate that way. IxK85 (talk) 15:19, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
thread_title: Change link to Battle of the Sambre

message: I think it is good to hear that Wilfred Owen and Sassoons poetry is being taught and analysed around the UK in schools. A good start for kids. - Erebus555 ↕ TALK
I agree, but I just wish schools would teach it as English literature and not as history.IxK85 (talk) 15:15, 15 February 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I'm doing English Lit and we're analysing Wilfred Owen in detail. --79.66.69.234 (talk) 19:29, 10 November 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I first came across WO's work - 1974 in prep. for O-Level English Lit. The world has changed since that time!!! 172.220.81.119 (talk) 17:51, 4 June 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  School 

message: This page could do with a photo of him. There are several to be found on the web, but I have been unable to establish the copyright status of any of them. --BillC 22:03, 19 July 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  Image 

message: Why was the sentence on his meeting with Sassoon removed? Most biographies of Owen remark on the  importance to his work to their meeting while both were recovering in Craiglockhart War Hospital. See here for example BillC 09:42, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I don't think it was removed, only moved – in fact, the entire section was moved, but is still there. --MarkSweep 14:29, 6 August 2005 (UTC)
replies: text:  I was thinking of the edit that was made at this diff. As the article now stands, there is no reference to Sassoon prior to suddenly introducing him in the poetry section. --BillC 15:01, 6 August 2005 (UTC)

text: Having played with it a bit, I think we can remove the NPOV tag now.  Would you agree? Mgriffin 14:27, 8 April 2006 (UTC)
replies: text:  Good stuff, I removed another weird line about "an inferior poet known as Siegfried Sassoon", seemed to jar with the following paragraph describing Sassoons's influence on Owen. e03bf085 10:15, 9 April 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Sassoon 

message: I don't like reverting edits, and I agree with the message that was inserted by the last contributor, but this sentence already exists in a near-identical form in the second sentence of the article. --BillC 21:53, 8 September 2005 (UTC)
thread_title:  "Owen was believed by many to be one of the finest poets of WWI." 

message: I would get rid of the sentence of his death being a possible suicide, if it isn't being cited. The (citation needed) has been there for weeks.
Moved to here:
There is some speculation that his death was in fact a suicide. Specifically, he stood and exposed himself to machine gun fire unnecessarily.
--BillC 21:45, 28 September 2005 (UTC)
replies: text: I have taken 3 tours of the WW I battlefields & cemeteries with highly knowledgeable European guides.  There were NO indications of any sort from the guides that Owen committed suicide.  He was shot in the head as he was trying to lead his men in military action. Owen is buried in Ors Communal Cemetery in France.  I have seen his grave and have left tributes for him at his grave site. MacLennan123Maclennan123 (talk) 03:57, 25 April 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Is there any suggestion you find in the article that he committed suicide? Span (talk) 11:30, 25 April 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: I see no suggestion in the article that Owen committed suicide.  My post [copied above] referred to speculation on the Talk page about his possible suicide. MacLennan123Maclennan123 (talk) 05:24, 16 May 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Not suicide - sounds like (as happened to so many officers) he was taken advantage of (by a sniper) in the act of his gesture.Cloptonson (talk) 05:57, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Suicide speculation 

message: This section is extrememly short and somewhat confusing. Where does it say that Owen is God? And who exactly regards his works as holier than the Bible?
What is with the section on "sublimity"? It's incoherent, reads like an out-take from someone's bad A-level coursework.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by AdventurousMe (talk • contribs) 15:28, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
replies: text: I took that bit out, including the quoted reference, on the grounds that anyone who can't get Owen's name right can't have written an authoritative work about him. Deb (talk) 18:00, 1 February 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Poetry Section 

message: The paragraphs in the 'Relationship with Sassoon' concerning Owen's homoeroticism - is there any citation or evidence for this ? Or is this just random speculation ? If the former, is this just more than one author's attempt to stir up controversy, or do others accept this ? If the latter, it needs pruning. The Yeti 01:55, 17 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Homoeroticism 

message: I am learning about Wilfred Owen in literature so putting some of his poems on here has been really helpful
Thanks From Emily
now i have to do an analysis of three poems *groans*
←86.128.154.178 20:27, 23 November 2006 (UTC)
thread_title:  Thanks 

message: Some of his poetry was published in a magazine called 'The Nation', and this was during his lifetime whilst serving on the Western Front. I'll find a source to back this up.
that shouldn't be too hard - the Dominic Hibberd Biography should be enough to back this up. Mhmaudling 11:30, 14 August 2007 (UTC)
thread_title:  Publication during Owen's life-time 

message: HI FIRST TIME HERE jUST WANTED TO SHAIR THE FACT THAT WE LIKE TO REED MR OWEN'S POEMS ALSO. TAKING ENGLISH COMP 102. HE JUST HIT ME WITH THE BLUNT AND TRUTHFUL ASPECTS OF BATTLE SEEN BY HIS EYS. "Dulce Et Decorum Est". SHOULD WE JUST BLINDLY GO INTO BATTLE JUST FOR THE HONOR FOR THE COUNTRY. THE HORROR HE SAW WITH WASTEFUL CHARGES ACROSS NO MANS LAND INTO THE TEATH OF OVERWHELMING FIRE POWER. LIKE" ANTHEM for a DOOMED YOUTH." A WHOLE GENERATION OF HONORABLE MEN WERE CUT DOWN FOR MUD AND MIREER, WHILE COMMANDERS JUST SENT THEM TO THERE DEETHS. DONT GET ME WRONG I HAD RELATIVES THAT WERE IN THE SAME TRENCHES AND BATTLE FIELDS. IN BOTH WARS. I AM PROUD OF THE HONOR SHOWN BY ALL . JUST PUZZLED WITH THE THINKING THAT FLESH AND BONE CAN SURVIVE THAT KIND FIREPOWER, WHAT WERE THEY THINKING. THANK YOUDrickerjr (talk) 17:57, 4 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  We Across the pond enjoy him too. 

message: While setting up a transcription project for , I came across an image that might be useful here if someone wants to extract it from the page and upload it to commons.  The image it is definitely PD in the US, but as the book was published in the UK, it is UK law that applies and there is a small chance that the photographer still holds copyright.  The name of the artist isnt mentioned in the front matter of the book, but there is an Introduction by Sassoon and a Preface; perhaps it will be uncovered in there. John Vandenberg (talk) 08:05, 5 April 2008 (UTC)
thread_title:  image to be extracted 

message: I think the line "His brother Harold Owen saw him a week later in a ghostly encounter on HMS Astraea." should be revised based on the fact that ghosts are widely regarded as none-existent, and yet it is stated here quite matter-of-factly. Perhaps it could be written as "His brother Harold Owen believed to have seen him a week later in a ghostly encounter on HMS Astraea."?
Wikiqueenwiki (talk) 07:31, 5 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I hadn't noticed it said that; that is quite wrong. Yes, your change seems like a good idea. Perhaps "His brother Harold Owen believed he saw him a week, etc" for grammar. — BillC  talk 07:37, 5 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text:  On further thought, I don't think the article should say this at all. The source for this story appears to be Khatri, Vikas. True Ghosts & Spooky Incidents, Pustak Mahal. , whose title doesn't inspire confidence that it is a reliable source. It doesn't seem like the sort of thing a serious biography of Owen would carry anyway. — BillC  talk 14:20, 5 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: I agree. Well done for getting rid of it. --John (talk) 14:29, 5 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: While I was at it, I rewrote the 'Appearances in popular culture' section. — BillC  talk 17:08, 5 December 2008 (UTC)
replies: text: Yep, good idea removing the whole thing. Well done with the rewrite too.Wikiqueenwiki (talk) 06:56, 7 December 2008 (UTC)

text: I am trying to clarify the discussion of "ghosts" etc. on the Talk Page.  Here is Wikipedia on Harold Owen's vision of his brother: "During the First World War, Harold Owen was an officer on board the British cruiser, HMS Astraea. In the weeks following the armistice whilst the ship was at anchor of the coast of Cameroons, Owen fell ill with malaria. it was during this time that Owen claims he had "an extraordinary and inexplicable experience": I had gone down to my cabin thinking to write some letters. I drew aside the door curtain and stepped inside and to my amazement I saw Wilfred sitting in my chair. I felt shock run through me with appalling force and with it I could feel the blood draining away from my face. I did not rush towards him but walked jerkily into the cabin--all my limbs stiff and slow to respond. I did not sit down but looking at him I spoke quietly: "Wilfred, how did you get here?" He did not rise and I saw that he was involuntarily immobile, but his eyes which had never left mine were alive with the familiar look of trying to make me understand; when I spoke his whole face broke into his sweetest and most endearing dark smile. I felt not fear--I had none when I first drew my door curtain and saw him there--only exquisite mental pleasure at thus beholding him. He was in uniform and I remember thinking how out of place the khaki looked amongst the cabin furnishings. With this thought I must have turned my eyes away from him; when I looked back my cabin chair was empty . . . I wondered if I had been dreaming but looking down I saw that I was still standing. Suddenly I felt terribly tired and moving to my bunk I lay down; instantly I went into a deep oblivious sleep. When I woke up I knew with absolute certainty that Wilfred was dead".   MacLennan123Maclennan123 (talk) 02:17, 18 May 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Ghostly appearance 

message: I think it's worth noting the use of his poem "The Next War" in the alternate reality game marketing campaign for Halo 3.
(Seen here: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2c958sNu03o)
(Poem here: http://en.wikisource.org/wiki/The_Next_War)
74.166.240.133 (talk) 10:49, 30 August 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Popular culture

message: Suggested change of the In music line with Anathema and The Crestfallen, and with the line from Mental Cases. Sources from the Metal Archives: https://www.metal-archives.com/albums/At_the_Gates/The_Red_in_the_Sky_Is_Ours/450773 (hit the Show lyrics for the track), https://www.metal-archives.com/albums/Anathema/Serenades/412848 (ditto) and https://www.metal-archives.com/albums/Gnaw_Their_Tongues/Dawn_Breaks_Open_like_a_Wound_That_Bleeds_Afresh/174931 
In 1991-1992, Anathema released "They Die" (in three version, most prominently on The Crestfallen EP), quoting a stanza from Owen's poem "The End", which also formed the epitaph on his grave in Ors. 
In 1992, the line "Dawn breaks open like a wound that bleeds afresh" from "Mental Cases" was used by At The Gates in the song "Night Comes, Blood Black" on The Red in the Sky is Ours, and the next year by Anathema in the song "Lovelorn Rhapsody" on the Serenades album.  The line was used as title of an EP and its title track in 2007 by Gnaw Their Tongues.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 2001:700:100:400D:0:0:F:8B58 (talk) 13:56, 3 January 2024 (UTC)
thread_title: Additions requested (since article semi-protected)

message: He is said to have been born in Peterlee. The only Peterlee known in wikipedia is in County Durham. Welsh wikipedia says Oswestry. 82.65.112.47 (talk) 04:51, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
replies: text: Thank you for pointing that out. It was changed without comment by an anonymous user on 5th of October and nobody seems to have noticed. William Avery (talk) 10:51, 22 December 2009 (UTC)
thread_title: Peterlee

message: This article implies that his father may have been Thomas Owen (1861 – 1931) who was a railwayman who made one appearance for the Wales national football team against England in 1879. One of my football reference books says that Owen senior was later employed at Reading, which ties up with Wilfred's education. Does anyone know if there is any other evidence to support this?     Daemonic Kangaroo (talk) 20:43, 26 February 2010 (UTC)
replies: text: The ODNb article certinly concurs that Thomas Owen was a railwayman (and Welsh, it gives dates of 1862-1931 for him), it mentions employment in Birkenhead and Shrewsbury, and later places Wilfred in Reading, but doesn't specifically mention his fatehr being employed there.  David Underdown (talk) 18:16, 27 February 2010 (UTC)
thread_title:  Father 

message: Just a samll thing; in the War service section at the start of th second paragraph it refers to Wilfred Owen period of convalescence in Northern Ireland, perhaps this should be changed to Ulster or Ireland as Northern Ireland did not come into being until May 1921 under the Government of Ireland Act.  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 82.24.106.220 (talk) 12:29, 10 November 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: To reflect the political historical points, I have uncapitalised the 'Northern', reducing it to a 'geographical', not a political, expression.Cloptonson (talk) 21:15, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: Further, I have for locational clarity changed the word preceding Tynecastle High School from 'nearby' to 'Edinburgh's', to avoid impression the school was in Ireland.Cloptonson (talk) 21:21, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Date/place name inaccuray 

message: Although I do not have references or pictures available, there are 3 memorials to owen in Shrewsbury. One is in his parish church, St Julians, in the list of war dead in the entrance. The second is in the list of war dead inside Shrewsbury Abbey. the third is a stone/concrete model of the bridge where he was killed, the memorial lies in the grounds of the Abbey. (79.190.69.142 (talk) 23:04, 1 December 2011 (UTC)
replies: text: Is one sure he is the man listed on the memorial in St Julian's Church? While Wilfred did recall being at services there (likely when he was pupil-teaching in Wyle Cop, within St Julian's parish - but have found no evidence he lived in the parish, although he certainly resided in Abbey Church's parish when at his Monkmoor Road home), I am hesitant, without further evidence, to believe he is the 'Wilfred Owen' listed on St Julian's memorial, when the Abbey's memorial carried his full initials.  In Shrewsbury there was then, and still are, a number of Owen families (unsurprising in the Welsh borderlands).Cloptonson (talk) 20:27, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  Memorials 

message: "...he was blown high into the air by a trench mortar, landing among the remains of a fellow officer."  Did Owen or the trench mortar land among the remains of the fellow officer?  It's a morbid question that may seem a bit inane; however, it contributes to sequence of events and impact. Most people would be devastated to land atop human remains, especially those of someone they knew; yet, considering the violence of the war, the corpses of many soldiers likely became accidental death-traps to their comrades, so Owen as having to accept this new understanding of the dead would be a different interpretation.
Suggestions for clarification:  "...he was blown high into the air by a trench mortar that landed among the remains of a fellow officer," OR "blown high into the air by a trench mortar, he landed among the remains of a fellow officer."  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 98.220.72.92 (talk) 12:34, 8 June 2012 (UTC)
replies: text: It seems to me fairly clear that the present participle in this case goes with the subject of the sentence. Deb (talk) 21:30, 13 November 2012 (UTC)
thread_title:  A question of accuracy 

message: I note Owen is described as working as pupil teacher at Wyle Cop School, after his work in the parish near Reading.  Is it Wyle Cop, the street in Shrewsbury, which then contained Shrewsbury's Boys' High School, or another place with a coincidental same name?Cloptonson (talk) 05:48, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Wyle Cop School - Clarification of Location Needed

message: There is more than one way to express what the the STS of Owen's day is now.  Institutionally, it is the forerunner of Shrewsbury College of Arts and Technology (SCAT).  The Wakeman School is a secondary school which conveniently set up in the STS building when the then Shrewsbury Technical College (as it had then become) moved to new premises in London Road late 1950s.  Would it not be better to say it is now Shrewsbury College of Arts and Technology (or whatever the precise title of the institution is now)?Cloptonson (talk) 20:36, 25 June 2012 (UTC)
thread_title: Early Life - Shrewsbury Technical School

message: If pararhyme is rhyme with variation of vowel sounds and assonance is matching ("rhyming") of vowel sounds, then how can pararhyme have a heavy reliance on assonance?~~  — Preceding unsigned comment added by 202.179.19.10 (talk) 07:40, 9 January 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  parassonance 

message: Although cited to online information, the statement he and his parents were forced to move to lodgings in the back streets of Birkenhead after leaving Oswestry is questionable on more than one count.  Information on Owen from Peter Francis' recently published book, Shropshire War Memorials, Sites of Remembrance (on page 181, chapter "Oswestry and the North West [of Shropshire]") states that the family moved first to Shrewsbury where they lived with his father's family (in Canon Street, near Monkmoor, where Wilfred and his parents lived from 1907), then three years later (ie 1900/1901) they moved to The Wirrall when his father was appointed Stationmaster at Woodside, Birkenhead.  This preceded their return to Shrewsbury in 1907. I also question the implication the family were living in lodgings when in Birkenhead - railway staff of his father's status usually had tied homes provided by the railway company that were proverbially 'over the shop'.Cloptonson (talk) 20:51, 18 October 2013 (UTC)
replies: text: Answer to my own question.  After consulting Stallworthy's Wilfred Owen, A Biography (1974), I discovered the chronology was tighter than that suggested by Francis' book.  In March 1897 Tom Owen got a transfer to Birkenhead from Oswestry in the railway company but only lodged there before getting transferred to Shrewsbury in April.  He moved back to Birkenhead in 1898 and the family lived in three successive houses in the Tranmere district that do not appear to have been tied to his work.Cloptonson (talk) 11:00, 19 October 2013 (UTC)
thread_title:  Early life after Oswestry

message: : The account of Owen's sexual development has been somewhat obscured because his brother, Harold Owen, removed what he considered discreditable passages in Owen's letters and diaries after the death of their mother, Owen also requested that his mother burn a sack of his personal papers in the event of his death, which she did.
It should be unequivocally said who requested burning a sack of Wilfred’s papers? And it seems that the mother was supposed to burn the paper after her death. Could somebody clear up this paragraph, please?
Ceplm (talk) 16:00, 7 March 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Who asked for burning Wilfred Owen’s papers? 

message: :It seems that there is a small mistake in this line "Wilfred's parents lived in a comfortable house owned by Wildred's grandfather", shouldn't it be Wilfred's grandfather, not Wildred's?105.237.131.132 (talk) 15:28, 9 August 2014 (UTC)
thread_title: Small inaccuracy in early Life

message: Wilfred Owen suffered concussion through falling into a concealed cellar of a ruined building NOT a shell crater. Why does the writer suggest that Owen imagined the dismembered fellow officer in the next shell-hole, an experience that led him to be invalided out with shell-shock? On the western front bodies literally littered the field and lay unburied for long periods. A number of sources tell of this incident and I have not heard of the suggestion this was a hallucination or a falsehood. 
Cfitzs05 (talk) 08:47, 11 October 2014 (UTC)
thread_title:  Corrections 

message: Hi, I'm adding a link to our one box collection of archival materials on Wilfred Owen. Please feel free to review at your leisure. Starfruitseason (talk) 15:47, 9 June 2020 (UTC)
thread_title:  External links modified 

message: In the 'War Service' section, para 1, the article states: '.... he was commissioned as a second lieutenant in the Manchester Regiment.' It goes on: 'He fell into a shell hole....' Where? In Essex? In France? I think the latter is intended and would like to add it - i.e. the Manchester Regiment in France. (My emphasis)
What do other editors think?
--RASAM (talk) 12:20, 13 May 2022 (UTC)
thread_title: Where?

message: In the "Death" section, the word "quote" (a verb) should be changed to "quotation" (a noun), as follows: 
The inscription on his gravestone, chosen by his mother Susan, is based on a quotation from his poetry: 67.83.127.49 (talk) 02:50, 1 November 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  Semi-protected edit request on 1 November 2022 

message: The following Wikimedia Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion:
* 
Participate in the deletion discussion at the . —Community Tech bot (talk) 13:37, 12 December 2022 (UTC)
thread_title:  A Commons file used on this page or its Wikidata item has been nominated for deletion 

message: "In 1911 he passed the matriculation exam for the University of London, but not with the first-class honours needed for a scholarship, which in his family's circumstances was the only way he could have afforded to attend". 
A matriculation exam is a university entrance exam, so how would it be possible to insist on achieving "first-class honours" in it when the latter only applies to first degrees achieved after three or four years of studies at a university? Helmardine (talk) 12:47, 25 February 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Education 

message: The caption under Owens' portrait in the 'Shrewsbury' article has a significant error in stating that he was a 'World War 2 poet'. Will some wikipedian please
correct this caption please. Wilfred Owen was a 'World War ONE poet' Spyglasses (talk) 05:38, 31 March 2023 (UTC)
thread_title:  Caption inaccuracy in article 'Shrewsbury'