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Ball Turret Gunner And Dulce Et Decorum Est Comparison

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“When I died they washed me out of the turret with a hose" (“Ball Turret Gunner” 5). This is a line from the poem, “Death of a Ball Turret Gunner.” It shows how hopeless, terrifying, and tragic war really is. Both of the poems, “Death of a Ball Turret Gunner” and “Dulce et Decorum Est” give a rational explanation of how war can be life changing and how the speakers perceive war as a challenging experience. “Death of a Ball Turret Gunner” is about a drafted soldier that is stationed inside the ball turret of a plane. He awakens to the sound of nightmare fighters attacking and before he knows it, he has been brutally murdered. “Dulce et Decorum Est” is about a group of soldiers heading back to camp to rest when suddenly they are attacked by bombs and gas. In his dreams, the speaker has repetitive flashbacks pertaining to what he has witnessed and wonders what people find good in war, pain, and death. In both instances, the speakers recount their war experiences to show that they feel war is extremely unfair and …show more content…

Literally, he is miles above Earth, but figuratively, he is speaking of being far from everything he knows and has always known. War has changed him and all of his previous life seems so far away. Each line in the poem begins happy and shifts toward despondency. Jarrell uses the belly of the ball turret as a metaphor for the womb; the womb being the under attack of the nightmare fighters. The womb births the gunner into death. Jarrell also uses ‘the State’ as a representation of the speaker’s state of mind. The speaker is in an emotional state of war, death, and innocence. When Jarrell says, “…till my wet fur froze” (“Ball Turret Gunner” 2), he is actually cold and freezing, but figuratively, he is referring to how lonely he is and having no one to care for him. In “Death of a Ball Turret Gunner,” Jarrell uses metaphors to emphasize the hopeless attitude of the

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