Throughout Wilfred Owen's Dulce et Decorum Est, the Horatian image of a glorified and idealized war is stripped away to reveal the bitter and ferocious nature of war a new era in the history of conflicts. Language and imagery are used to great effect in conveying this notion, in the rejection of the "strong and patriotic soldier" stereotype, in the description of the chlorine gas attack, in the depiction of the agonizing and dying soldier, and in the final ferocious invective against those that glorify war, for example the intended target of the poem, Jessie Pope. One of the poem's stanzas uses depressing and pathetic language to convey the image of a ragged band of soldiers advancing across a devastated battlefield. Owen describes the soldiers as "bent double, like old beggars". This dispels the romanticized notion of soldiers as proud, upright, and masculine beings, presenting them instead as broken and exhausted, stumbling forward, thinking only of survival and rest, not patriotism and support of the nation. Their dilapidated external state reflects their internal psychological exhaustion and highlights the devastating mental impacts of such a brutal conflict. The word "cursed" is used as a verb in the phrase "cursed through the mud" - the effect of this is that the men are presented as resentful of everything about the war and have become bitter and disillusioned. The nightmarish quality of war is highlighted by the description of men 'marching asleep', this reinforces the idea that war is so far removed from the normality of life that it seems almost unreal: a strange and terrifying dream from which there is no real escape route. . An alternative reading of this quote might suggest that men have become less than human, they are reduced... to the middle of the paper... the nature of Horatian's concept as dead and useless. With carefully selected words and phrases, Owen is able to expose the horror of war and condemn those who pretend it is something other than it really is. If ever there was a war poem that had more influence and power in the minds of the people, a war poem that always did more to expose and dethrone the illusion of glorious war, it must have been written by a master. Although it has critical points, such as awkward similarities, it is for all its flaws a masterpiece of horror and harsh description that reveals the dark heart of the First World War. Owen's impressive and total mastery of the English language and the images it forms in our minds completely overshadow every false piece of nationalistic fiction that lured thousands of men seeking adventure and delivered them into the hands of Death..