"Insensibility" is a poem written by

Wilfred Owen Wilfred Edward Salter Owen MC (18 March 1893 – 4 November 1918) was an English poet and soldier. He was one of the leading poets of the First World War. His war poetry on the horrors of trenches and gas warfare was much influenced by ...

during the

First World War World War I (28 July 1914 11 November 1918), often abbreviated as WWI, was one of the deadliest global conflicts in history. Belligerents included much of Europe, the Russian Empire, the United States, and the Ottoman Empire, with fightin ...

which explores the effect of warfare on soldiers, and the long- and short-term psychological effects that it has on them. The poem's title refers to the fact that the soldiers have lost the ability to feel due to the horrors which they faced on the Western Front during the First World War.

Owen and the First World War

During and after the First World War many combatants and former combatants found their lives and minds permanently altered by the violent, loud and traumatic life of trench warfare. This disorder was called "

shell shock Shell shock is a term coined in World War I by the British psychologist Charles Samuel Myers to describe the type of post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) many soldiers were afflicted with during the war (before PTSD was termed). It is a react ...

" or "

neurasthenia Neurasthenia (from the Ancient Greek νεῦρον ''neuron'' "nerve" and ἀσθενής ''asthenés'' "weak") is a term that was first used at least as early as 1829 for a mechanical weakness of the nerves and became a major diagnosis in North A ...

". Wilfred Owen was diagnosed with neurasthenia in 1916, within four months of arriving in France, and was briefly invalided home. The "We wise" to whom the poem refers might, as

Jon Stallworthy Jon Howie Stallworthy, (18 January 1935 – 19 November 2014) was a British literary critic and poet. He was Professor of English at the University of Oxford from 1992 to 2000, and Professor Emeritus in retirement. He was also a Fellow of Wolfs ...

has suggested, be construed as "we poets", to which the Owen scholar

Douglas Kerr Douglas Kerr is a British writer and academic who is best known for his work on Arthur Conan Doyle and George Orwell. Life and works Kerr was born in 1951 in Broughty Ferry, Dundee. Kerr went to school in Scotland, where he started reading Cona ...

adds the possibilities "we officers", "we shellshocked neurasthenics" and "we cowards". Kerr describes the relationship of the poem to Owen's neurasthenia as "obvious though complex".

References

2. Poetry Foundation. (n.d.) "Insensibility." Retrieved from https://www.poetryfoundation.org/poems/57258/insensibility 3. Theatre cloud. (2014). Sassoon and Owen: A meeting that changed the course of literature. Retrieved from http://www.theatrecloud.com/news/sassoon-and-owen-a-meeting-that-changed-the-course-of-literature
World War I poems Poetry by Wilfred Owen Poems published posthumously {{1910s-poem-stub

Owen and the First World War

See also

References