1. The war poets believed that many soldiers had been lied to and
ended up fighting in a war that neither enhanced their identity nor
valued them as human beings. Owen writes about how war
emasculated the soldiers and describes them as ‘knock kneed,
coughing like hags’. This simile is used to show war has destroyed
their lives and made them physically weak, ‘like hags’, and now they
are struggling to stay alive. ‘Hags’ are not only female and old but
often live outside of society as outcasts so perhaps Owen suggests
that war, instead of making these men powerful and respected, has
damaged them to the point that they can never return to who they
were and as someone who is well: war has broken them.
The war poets believed that war stripped soldiers of their identity as
many joined wishing to be heroes but left without anyone caring for
them or respecting them as human beings.